Various Musings on Abuse

I don't know how to handle abusive situations. I've always just suffered them or escaped them when I could get out of the situation. Attending groups at shelters never helped give me any idea how to handle abuse. It was mostly repeating that men were evil and women were innocent. When asked what to do about the abuse women were told to leave. I mean before hand therapists told you you could secretly get a bag ready with money and clothes and hide it when the time was good. You had to leave out the back like a thief. Women (because men were never abused,) were expected to be powerless victims and act like they had no control over the situation.

To listen to rhetoric about abuse and people who've been abused you'd think that victims have no choices. I never agreed with the advice of the people who were there to help me through the abusive event. I've found that abuse is many times not an event. Abuse comes from human manipulation and social influence. It involves more than the victim and the perpetrator. Many abuse victims encounter multiple abusers in their lives sometimes more than once during a set period. Personally I have been in many abusive situations with different abusive people in different places. School, the baby-sitter's, home, family events, the hospital and even public places have been areas where I've been assaulted or abused or bullied. I believe that specific training could help me to be more assertive and possibly reduce the abuse that happens to me. I really think that finding ways to deal with other people will help me be less of a target and lower my stress and anxiety. 

I have been experiencing abuse since I was a toddler. Over the years my siblings, parents, classmates and baby-sitter's children have had their turns. I've grown up an untrusting paranoid adult who often experiences suicidal wishes. Depression has followed me throughout my life. I've been called lazy for sleeping often and deeply until *I* sought diagnosis and discovered I am bipolar. Then it seemed everyone let out a gradual sigh of relief as if to say: "OHhhhhh that is why you are so fucked up! We were right! It wasn't our faults! You are defective! We were not wrong in blaming you for your problems!" My parents thought I was retarded because I had delayed reading and speaking skills. I was in special education classes for my delays. I've had unusual sleeping habits where I'd walk our dog at 2 am while everyone was asleep. All the signs that there were problems all through my past had been discarded. It was okay though because there was nothing anyone could have done, right? When your brain chemistry is faulty it means EVERYTHING in your life is your fault. 

There has been many times that bullying and abuse has happened to me. In our family every person has experienced and seen abuse. It has been a part of our lives and part of the communication (or miscommunication,) in family interactions. Through mobbing techniques we were taught to be quiet and not question or whine as children. Throughout my childhood I felt I was never wanted nor loved. But always felt guilty. I should love my Mommy, I should love my Daddy. They worked hard to keep me in food and under roof. I never asked for them to work all the time. I only wanted to be safe. Truely what I wanted was not important. I was stupid and lazy anyway in everyone else's eyes. I was raised to believe that I am wrong, guilty and undeserving. That is the basis of my low self esteem. The climate of abuse and victimization over such a long time had eroded any will that I've had to live and thrive. It damaged the belief that I could have a happy life. Knowing that I am a loser and that I can't win with family or anyone that I have loved has kept me down and unmotivated to believe that I deserve help or can successfully get help in my life. 

The therapeutic help that was given to me was so flawed and unprofessional that it was detrimental to my building trust in anyone with a psychology degree. The therapist that brought me bags of food while I was in public, on the street without my permission or requesting it. The therapist who told me that since my son would not talk he didn't need therapy for the molestation by his Godfather. The many doctors who told me that I wasn't bipolar, or they didn't have time to listen to me and only prescribed drugs or that what I was describing as indicators of bipolar disorder were not symptoms. The years I was given antidepressants and roller coastered up and down without a doctor questioning if it was the medication that was wrong. Professionals in the field of therapy and psychological disorders are less reliable than any other medical profession that I have ever met.

Who am I? What am I doing? How can I live in a safe atmosphere? I was able to make a safe place for myself and my children after leaving abusive situations more than twice in the past. The only person I could ever trust was me. And the problem was that I was not stable. I could have boundless energy at one time or not be able to get out of bed another. And I knew that the abuse, neglect and molestations I had suffered were part of the problems of keeping myself balanced. Whether or not my chemicals were balanced in my head if my psychological history was still affecting me and determining my self esteem, anxiety, social interactions as well as my paranoia levels it could trip up the bipolar symptoms as well as send me into a deep depression that was not chemical related but could become chemically detrimental.

These are notes from a documentary that I partially watched last night: "Human Resources"

The driving force in society is not love but fear. John B. Watson.

Irrationality of Rationality.

Taylorism _ Fragmentation of the workers is encouraged so that classcism is beneficial to the rulig classes. Discouraged workers creates workers who are not involved with their communities. They have lowesteem and motivation.

A Section of Musing Over The Past...

I realize that when I was a kid I could section off the pain and enjoy the holidays. As time went on and I got older that proved harder and harder to do. There were times that I did what would seem to be crazed things. The year I refused to spend Easter with the family and made LW stay in Bristol with me. I remember the anger. I remember the resentment. I remember wanting my family to pay to suffer like I did. I was driven by rage to have a day separate from the people I blamed for my misery. 

A Lesson That Happens Every Now And Again...

Teaching K to give Paul respect. I know that K loves Paul but his history to annoy the living sh!t out of family members and animals is almost legend. Paul sees him and lays his ears back. His eyes become huge and disturbed. I used to laugh when K would tease him and make him angry. More and more I saw that Paul was beginning to hate and fear K. K was bullying him.
K is actually a very loving person. He can be so very sweet and he understands when something hurts. In fact he's very sensitive to pain and when he was little he'd try to comfort me when my anxiety attacks became unbearable. Sometimes when dealing with G/A I would actually feel like life was spiraling down on me and a huge vacuum was sucking at my guts. I felt like I was being literally pulled into H3ll and that my soul was being drawn into a dark and dank place. I would clutch C's hand and ask him if everything was okay, "Everything is okay. Everything is going to be okay, right?" over and over again. I think I would scream that I was going to H3ll and plead for him not to leave me or I would be damned. It is making my eyes water up so I am going to stop thinking about it.
K didn't know how to deal with it. He would crawl into bed beside me and ask if I was okay. He was seriously concerned. I freaked him out. To this day we can create a fearsome anxiety black hole between us. It isn't pretty and I've realized in order for me to help myself and him I need to stop when I am angry, turn to him and say: "I am really mad right now. I need to talk to you about this at another time. I am not going to make sense soon so let's stop talking." Before I wind into a screaming fit and say horrid angry mean things. There is something there that makes me react very strongly to him. And he just takes it. So I have made it a point to a) stop before the meanness starts and becomes harmful, b) give him the opportunity to be mad at me by telling him that he has the right to his feelings and c) asking him politely if we can talk about the problem when I have some time to think it over and can express myself in a more polite and respectful way.
Dealing with Paul has been an exercise in letting K know that he too can be a better person. He too can control when his emotions and treatment get out of hand. He too has his own power and can use it to create fear in something, someone he loves or use it and control it so he can make a better relationship. He can make a difference to Paul and he can make it so that Paul is not afraid of him. Even that Paul may seek him out.
Although Paul may only be a cat, animals have feelings too. And when we don't abuse those feelings we can exercise our benevolent will to exist peacefully with other creatures. That sounds all dirty hippy but it reduces abuse, neglect and angry feelings. These are the things that I can do to make a different life and create a different world. I love K and Paul. I want them to be happy. This house has seen so much neglect, abuse, anger and unhappiness we need to shape it into another place. I need to exorcise the demons out of this place. I need a safe haven. It's got to start somewhere.

Ugh, Again And Again Like "Groundhog Day"...

I used to want to help other people with mental illnesses to deal with their lot in life. I realize that I have to help myself because there are many self defeating habits I have and thought processes that keep me from being happy and healthy and limit me from living even a low grade normal life.
I know, it's boring and nothing new. To me though it's really opened my eyes to how little I really know myself. And that is a door I'm not sure I want unlocked anyway.
I hate myself. I hate that I'm human. I hate that I don't look the way I want to look. I hate that I have something nasty in me that I have to hide. I hate that I am not happy 95% of the time. I hate that I second guess myself all the time because when I let my guard down and don't second guess myself I almost always shoot myself in the foot than spend so much time degrading myself for making that mistake. I hate that I am not free from my past. I hate that I can't just take off and spontaneously go somewhere because the anxiety within me prevents me from not examining the situation beforehand and stopping myself from doing something new and exciting in case I find that my head might explode with fear and self loathing.
In my dreams I travel to foreign places and enjoy the land, the sights, the noises, the smells, the food. I explore places and events without impunity. In reality the worst punishment is already wrought on me internally. My brain flogs me continually. I get tired of the repetitiveness of the same words, the same messages, the same people and places. Mostly it is my point of view. I know there are people here that are wonderful and not scary if only I could present well. The anxiety I experience just walking out the door, the messages in my head, the bridle on my senses reduce my life to monotonous drudgery of existence. I rarely see the point in this harnessed experience. I can't even express the past and the pain so that I might even benefit from what I've gone through. At least the people I love could get something from this humiliating continuation.  

Stinging Swinging and Swearing...

I'm still stinging from that @sshole at the bank. I don't want to be wasting my time over someone who obviously is unhappy enough with their life to try to make me feel small. So I am trying to work this out in my head. I am symptomatic though and that gets in the way. I've decided that I am probably going to spend Christmas on my own this year. I am fixating on two people (three if you add that twat in the bank,) and it is running my mind ragged. Sometimes I wonder if it actually is a reaction to my mind becoming bored. Does my psyche create these dramas to hold my ego in thrall so I can get other things done? Is it a tool to get me motivated with anger? I do not know.
I've been reading William Gibson's books lately. Devouring them really. They hit a chord within me.
Back to the fixating: I told Car that I was planning on not going to Christmas. He said he really didn't want to go to Christmas either. It's his only day off. I'm wondering if he and I can do something simple and nice on Christmas. I feel guilty that I would seek to save myself embarrassment on the Holiday by not showing up to a family gathering. I haven't taken medication for almost a year and even though I started right after Thanksgiving I won't have enough in me to effect my behavior by Christmas.
What is it about help? I was thinking that all day. What is it about seeking help from someone that makes people think the seeker is weak? Asking for help takes much more courage than just dealing with a problem alone. To expose yourself and your weaknesses is much stronger than hiding them and hoping they'll go away. I know, these are not questions that have never been asked. But I see people react to the same old stimuli in the same old ways. So many people unmindful of who they are how intimately they show their weaknesses by how they treat other people and how they react to information.
SM, I am afraid of. I think she's angry at me and passively aggressively ignoring me to "teach me a lesson". J, I am angry with. I think she is a spoiled child that assumes she knows everything and everyone. I want to punch her right in her face. I can't stand to even think of her at this minute she drives me nuts. And K from the bank. I want to teach that slob a lesson. Go up and ask her why her life is so miserable that she derives happiness from someone else's potential misery. Maybe it has to do with DP. I want to hear the gossip from the fiends of our past. But then once I do, I don't find it so funny. They are human. They are fallible, they are children of their genes. Do I get forgiveness if I can't give them forgiveness for the same offenses I commit? Where does the misery stop? I want off this cycle of Hell. I have my own cycle to deal with. The Bipolar ride, a chemical roller coaster to hang on to and try to manage. Let the little people have their small entertainments, I don't have time for their petty stupidities. Then again how much have these people really been challenged? If seeing a pathetic wretch suffer makes them giddy with power they can have their narrow days.
Trying to get over the hurdle of anger and find release in self control. 

Got Out, Sick But Dealing When I Can...

I went to Looney Tunes today. I wasn't planning on it. I saw A's car there and I like talking with her. She's just as angry as me and intelligent. She is also "in touch" with her emotions. Well I mean by that that she isn't uncomfortable with them.
I went to far I fear. I told her exactly how I felt. All the self hatred and pain and desire to maim and kill came out in a horrifying stream of emotional talk. She just wanted me to change something and leave the situation that I'm in. And I known that that is what most people want for me. I am raw. I am an open walking wound.
Last week I went to the bank. I dress like a slob. Basically I just don't care. I was also sick and I wanted to be comfortable. My broken zipper on my fleece hoodie with the patches hung open and my Pajama shirt hung out. I had on a pair of sweatpants that still had paint from when I helped P out with the posters. My comfy slippers scuffed on the ugly laminate tile floor.
A person I knew from high school, Kelly "served" me. She implied that I was a hopeless slacker by saying that I must be just hanging around lately. I was bleary and I do not do comebacks so I replied, "If you say so." I wouldn't give that c^nt the time of day in public but the b!tch couldn't be ignored. Afterwards I played the coulda/woulda/shoulda game with my damaged psyche. The past of being constantly bullied throughout elementary, junior and senior high came down on me like a curse. My mind reeled with the years of being called names not just by the scum bags like her in school but by my own parents, family. "Lazy", I can't even list the crap that I endured for years.
The worst of it all is as I left I turned around, waved and said, "Happy Thanksgiving!" I am a mark and I felt it. Visions of slicing her fat neck open slammed me and my Mother's chattering annoyed me. I knew if I told my Mother she would say something stupid like: "That's in the past now." or "It couldn't have been all that bad." I couldn't stand thinking that I wanted to punch my Mother in the throat.
Still when we got in the car I told her, "That's one of the sh!theads who made my life hell." I figured she needed a face to go with the constant bullying. There are many. I dwelled on the years I actually lived here, under the radar carefully not showing my face in public. Shopping after 1 am in grocery stores to avoid the past and the people I feared hadn't changed an iota from childhood. Walking around town at 5 am to avoid faces and the possibility of recognition. This c^nt confirmed my fears.
Living in fear. Living it every day. The stalking that my husband committed against me for years was nothing compared to fearing that many people I used to know will catch sight of me. RD being my Mother's plumber must have sent the 411 out there that the loser was in town.
The reality is that these people are small minded sad little people. Taking pleasure in my pain, seeking to humiliate me to make themselves feel better. I know that although I am no celebutard or rich and famous whack job I am still in a better place than them. I always was and always will be. I don't set out to hurt people to gain pleasure from it. I don't enjoy seeing someone squirm under my questions. I am attempting to climb out of my hole, be honest with people and undo the damage that people like this have inflicted on a child who was an outsider. Lucky them. They can keep their company. These are not people I want to be associated with.
I wonder to myself do I have to conquer the fear or is it a survival technique. A way of shielding myself against people who have no empathy. Is it better to hide and limit myself so that I can strengthen my own identity and understand the damage that was done? Or should I go out and try to be as shitty as they?
I talked to A about it. I gave TMI. I made her cry; the tirade of self hatred and emotions was too raw and real. She understood it and it hurt. I felt ashamed that I let the monster go. I felt like an assh0le for letting my inner reality spill out onto her. I work hard not to share these things with people. People don't understand that I don't shoot a hole in my head because I have seen the effects of what happens to a human skull once a bullet has entered and exited it and the results of the human that survives this experience. My ex took a gun and blew a hole into his head. He still had a hole in the back of his head that they had to sew up but he let me feel the scar damage. He took massive drugs, was a bad junkie and died of AIDs later on. His life was a miserable hell that he tried to escape daily. People would tell him it was a miracle he survived. He had fake teeth, headaches, talked with a slur and looked kind of fucked up. It got worse the larger his bender got. He'd lose his teeth at people's houses. His glasses would get damaged. He'd have sex with anyone. His self identity was so damaged that he would talk of God then tell me I shouldn't be his girlfriend. He'd try to fuck with my head and he succeeded; I was young. I finally told him I didn't want to see him anymore. He was too much and I needed someone who wouldn't f^ck around on me and take drugs and lie to me.
I've had a boyfriend who was a transsexual. I should have known it and I suspected something when I met him. I think I am a hero and want to rescue men who are so out of control that their lives are hanging off the edge of reality. I want to help someone who needs the help I needed back then. The black lamb, the sacrificial flesh, the rejected, the down trodden all call to me. I have turned my back on that now. I am the lamb that needs to be saved. And it's hard to have hope, sympathy, love and tenderness for the person you hate the most.
This has been the hardest part for me. I don't know how to love me. I believe all the b^ll sh!t that was thrown at me over the years. That is what years and years of different people putting you down does: you believe all the sh!t that people tell you. If it was just one person it would be simple to understand that that person is a bullying scum bag. But years of multiple people joining in and throwing stones... I hold a hard core of hate and memory of all the people who did me wrong. My memory is far and wide and deep like the oceans. It looks glassy or disturbed on top but underneath cold currents of hate freeze my mind. Hot vents of passion burn my thoughts. I know who you are and I know if I put a knife to your neck I would slit your throat like a piece of meat.
To say that is sacrilege in psychology. You are a serial killer if you even breathe that you have feelings like these. The problem is that these feelings are not abnormal. The problem is that bullying is tolerated and even an expectation in society. It is a right of passage. You "become stronger" when you weather abuse like this from undisciplined and cruel children. People tell themselves that children that do these things are innocent and grow out of it. They don't. Where do bad bosses and abusive spouses come from. How are people who abuse the system made? This is something that is not dealt with when it should be. People don't know how to handle it and the people who instigate it mask it. It is part of the violent cycle of abuse, power, control and manipulation. And the sufferer comes out sick and warped, their self esteem damaged forever. There is no healing when the pain has continued on and on. And then again once the person comes back and the abusers start in again.

Standing up to Damaging Advice and Overcoming Trauma Directives By Darlene Ouimet

Here is a good blog entry that inspired me to write this. I'd also like to thank A for her patience in listening to the toxic core of my being today. I hope the pain she is suffering becomes something she can dispense with.

Not With The Program...

I'm a little creeped out. Seems that my posts are being viewed. I suppose expecting them to not be viewed is counterproductive to posting a blog. This blog was basically just so that I could keep track of my activities to see if the WRAP program was worthwhile to do on my own. I got my answer. It's alright if I plan on basically living my life around doing the WRAP program all the time. Writing a daily page and a blog page took up a lot of time. I guess it kept me out of trouble and to a schedule but realistically I don't stay with schedules.
It's the holidays now. With Thanksgiving over and me on lithium again (CR informed me it's been maybe  a year since I've not taken any lithium and close to two years that we haven't had a face to face meeting.) My does time past when my head is busy trying to survive stress.
I think the posts I've been doing are boring. Who cares, really? I know I'm not interested in going over them. I planned on looking at them and trying to collate any worthwhile data that would help me deal with my mental health. I had hoped to add anything that would help me deal with the past and the abuse and molestation that happened to me. I have always thought a time line of abuse and major events in my life would help me put together just how screwed up I am and was at the time of the happenings. I just can't concentrate. I think I need someone focused and organized who can keep me on topic and help me deal with therapy at the same time. A group (like the WRAP group,) is too loose and unfocused. I have a terrible time trusting any therapists after all the shit that happened with the kids and I and school. So where does that leave me? Rambling on...
My identity is not static. I see myself as hero, genius, outcast, black sheep, freak, misunderstood guru and many other things. Other people see me as a good mother, a lost soul maybe other things, I don't know. I tend not to believe anything positive people say about me. I feel it is a way to get me to like them or as a reward for being nice to them or as a reward for being friends. Every thing is done for a reason. Everything is suspicious. When I can believe someone it is rare basically because it doesn't last long. I question everything. Nothing is real in reality. The older I get the worse it gets. I become adept at seeing things as a means to an end. Everything has a reason.
I lied to a friend last night. Not because I had to. I could have told them the truth: I didn't contact them immediately about something they sent me because the things my mind told me were upsetting. I know better than to tell people the truth though when it comes to my mind dictating what should and shouldn't be done. And when my mind becomes confused because of the past and the present or because of this person and another person, I freeze. Better to lie than say, "I wanted to call you but I am caught in a mental whirl of believing that you think I am a pathetic victim and you need to give me things to make yourself feel better." See, I've had that done to me in the past by friends and relatives and even therapists. I don't care to be seen as a victim or a charity case. And that is normal.
But how far do I go? I forget who I've told about my past. I forget how much each person knows. I don't care if they know about the abuse. Or the molestation. Or the bullying. Or the belief that I was retarded. Or the alcoholism in the family. Or the mental illness. Everything I say is a story about someone else. Someone who evolved into me. I am not them. I am a shell. I am nothing. That doesn't bother me. I know who I am. I know that the general public doesn't like people like me. They lay the blame for everything bad about society at the door step of people who are not "successful", who are struggling to get by. Because if you are struggling that means that you are sinful or unacceptable or lazy or... It doesn't matter really what they label people like me as. They don't want to hear it. And I don't care to waste my time on people that have no time for me.
I get easily confused. I don't know why. It could be the constant stress. It could be the anxiety. It could be that my mind works to avoid itself everyday just to stay lucid. It takes a lot of energy to look normal when every moment you wake up you want to scream and you don't remember why. I am very very good at looking normal. I don't look people in the eyes unless I am having a one on one conversation with them and I feel safe enough to talk with them. I limit my outside contact to certain people at certain times. I spend time with my friends generally on a solo basis. At parties I either drink a lot so if I get blitzed people expect me to be incoherent or say unacceptable things or I hap from person to person unless I locate someone that I feel isn't getting anxious with me presence. Once I feel a certain anxiety level with someone I either go into safe mode (shut up and smile and nod,) or leave. If I locate someone like me who also is on that edge of social acceptability (meaning they may say heinous things and laugh and make sick jokes that others would be uncomfortable with,) I may actually spend the rest of the party with them or much of the time returning to them as I mingle with the crowd.
See, I wrote much without saying a great deal.
Okay. A little story, you decide if it's true...
I was sitting down at the breakfast table hunched over a bowl of corn flakes. This is unusual since I don't like breakfast and don't like to eat at the table when my Father is there. I wasn't looking at him because I know the rules: "Don't look a (crazy, desperate, homeless, screwed up) person in the eyes if you don't want them to talk to you." You never look at my Father with an open face. You always avoid his eyes or he will start in on his broken tape recorder stories. I know this makes me look like an unfeeling mean person. You don't live with him so you can shut the fuck up.
Anyway, I was scooping the flakes into my mouth, that cereal gets soggy fast so in order to eat it while it's crunchy you have to shovel it in fast. I had had a long night of it: bronchitis, sinusitis, ear ache, migraines and all made me so tired and yet I couldn't sleep. So I'm sitting across the table from him and he knows I am not going to look at him. He's demented but not stupid or totally out of it yet. Sad but that's how it is now.
He flicks at something on the place mat next to his own place mat, a picture of a map done in a very old style. I see everything, I just don't look directly at anything or that too is an invitation for him to talk to me. Occasionally I will make small talk with him or help him with something that won't lead to a series of useless actions that makes me want to scream. I may tell you about the remote control sometime. That is a screaming story. But he's flicking something. I assume he'll do something disgusting like pick up whatever is there and eat it. You never know what he'll do now. He scratches at the plastic laminated cover of the French photo of a beach. The sand is beige, the water an aqua to cerulean blue. I can see that the thing he is flicking at is a dead house fly. I become nervous. If he picks it up and eats it I'm afraid I'll feel sick. I hurry faster to eat my cereal. He pushes the fly as it has been loosened from the place mat now. I look up because I can see he is not looking at me. It is safe to look up. I'm still a little not sure that it is a fly but figure I really don't want to know.
With one last push he says to the air: "There's a crayfish on the beach."