u/Myvulnerableusername

Millions of people die in old age having never left. They thought it was too late in their 30s, 40s, 50s, 60s, and even 70s. They waited until it was, Maybe thinking all along that one day the universe would make it so that this would be easy, maybe eventually giving up entirely and making their life small enough to survive as long as they did.

It’s not rare to stay. It’s incredibly common. Millions and millions of people die every year having never left. It’s your choice.

if I knew I was going to die tomorrow, if I was in my 80s and knew my time left was short, it would still be worthwhile to leave. To prove to myself that someone cares enough about me to choose something better. That someone being me. In fact, it would be one of the most worthwhile things I could do.

so when I tell myself “but i have no one now! I’m too old, I can’t start over.” I remind myself that I don’t have to. I can continue to choose to stay. I can be like the long lineage of women in my life that stayed, living quietly, desperately, contorting themselves to fit into a life filled with pain, rejection, and suffering. There is no one stopping me. It’s incredibly common, even mundane, to make that choice.

Hi all,

I realized several years ago that I was in an emotionally abusive relationship. I have tried to make it work, but unfortunately, despite his trying (therapy etc), I realize that it is not possible and it is time for me to move on. This is very hard as we have been together for 15 years.

We bought a house together. It’s in his name, but I do think I would be considered common law married (we told people we were/documents say spouse etc). We also own three dogs. A year ago, I moved out to my own apartment and have one of those dogs.

My dilemma: I want to keep the house so that I can keep the three dogs. I am the person that brought these dogs into our lives, and I feel responsible for them and for the fact that they will have to live with his anger. On the other hand, I have a weird feeling that… well that eventually he would resort to some sort of violence. Not a feeling actually, just that there is a chance. And so I’m wondering if it’s best to just walk away completely leave the house with him, but then i feel guilty about the dogs. I feel guilty even saying that, because I guess I don’t know if the “evidence” I have makes sense. I am going to bring it before you just because I am trying to assess risk and I’m so… scrambled in my brain that I don’t know what is what.

Early on in our relationship he was outright abusive but not exactly physical. It was more the pattern of his behavior that was so worrying. He would show up places and make a big stink especially if other men were there, and I eventually lost all of my friends. The first sign was that during a party in college, someone punched a hole in my door. (My specific bathroom door). Everyone blamed it on his cousin, but 5 months later he said it was him, and he had a strange grin on his face when he said it. I was really confused. He had punched it because I was talking to my childhood best friends nephew who I had known since he was a baby, and was at the time 16 (I was 21). This caused a jealous outrage on his part and he did yell at me but I didn’t know it was him who had punched the door.

This same behavior happened frequently. It wasn’t so much what he did, but the weird fog afterwards. We moved in together after college and one time we were fighting about something really stupid and he grabbed my wrist and wouldn’t let me go. I got extremely angry and demanded he let me go, and he did. I then cried in another room for several hours and came back and demanded an apology, and he got mad and stated he didn’t do what I said he did. To this day, even after therapy, he doesn’t admit it.

One of the most scared I had ever been was when we got into an argument in the car and he randomly turned off the highway into an unknown rural area and started driving deeper and deeper into that area. He was silent and I was terrified, but also thought that I was being stupid or dramatic. I just felt confused. He then abruptly got back on the highway. When I brought this up to him recently (as we are trying to “heal”) he remembered it immediately (despite us never having talked about it in probably a decade) and said that he was just trying to show me nice houses in the area because he knew I liked it. On the one hand, I know that if that was true, there’s not way he would remember it, it would have been a non event. We never discussed it. On the other hand, I feel in complete shock that he would have potentially been trying to scare me in this way.

In college, I was able to break up with him. But he drunkenly walked like 10 miles to my house and called me when he was outside and said he had no way to get home, so I let him in and that was that, we got back together (I know this is my fault as well.)

With the dogs, He would often say violent things about other people (I want to fucking kill them/slit their throat/etc). I was starting to realize things were wrong at this point, it was during covid. I told him to not say violent things about others in front of me, and he decided then to tell me how much he hated our puppy. That he wanted to bury barbed wire and glass in the yard so that she would dig it up and mutilate herself, because he couldn’t stand her crying. And when she would cry, he would scream and rage at her.

Okay… that was all pretty long in the past. Since then, he has gotten therapy. He has also stopped drinking, well, somewhat. He loves the dogs now and would never say those things to them anymore. He really has changed.

But. He also still lies to me, just blatantly. Like with the drinking for instance. And with a million other things. And he still does the DARVO thing when arguing, for instance, I will say I don’t like that he laughed when I was expressing sadness, and it turns into telling me he didn’t laugh, and also that I’m paranoid and hate everyone and shouldn’t trust my own perception and then telling me he’s sick of always being the bad guy and that I’ll never get over “him punching a door once” (I did not bring that up). That was our last argument, after many, many just like that. And I am now absolutely ready to leave.

As an aside, he is in therapy but I’m pretty sure he lies to his therapist. He told me his therapist told him that I need to “get over” some of the things that he did if we ever want to move forward. That’s because I wanted him to apologize for everything I just detailed, but the vast majority he still completely denies ever happening. I believed him, until he told me that he never told his therapist he has a drinking problem…. While telling his therapist I was upset about him lying about drinking “one drink” so the therapist thought it had everything to do with my childhood and nothing to do with him.

BUT, the other two dogs are at the house. While I absolutely know he would not kill them or hurt them physically, he still has rage issues. When one does something wrong, he still grabs it by the scruff of the neck and screams at it while pushing its head into the floor. It is my fault for bringing them into this life. I am filled with guilt. That is why I was hoping to keep the house. And despite everything I said, he tends to be very appeasing and usually gives me whatever I want when he is “in trouble” so I know that I could get the house. But part of me feels like there is a chance that things could turn. He does own a gun, which he lied to me about buying (he had already bought it but kept asking me what I thought about a gun until I agreed, then told me he had it). I don’t think that he would do anything sober, but I have that image of him running ot my house drunk in college, and I know he would probably not do well if we well and truly ended things. I feel guilty saying any of this, as I know I have been toxic as well (like, I really have, how else would I have stayed you know?) But I need to move past those feelings and just assess what to do next.

I don’t know what to do about the dogs. I think he would want to keep them, he has formed strong bonds with them despite his earlier hatred. I can’t have all three in an apartment, tbh I don’t think I can even have two as they aren’t leash trained and it would be so difficult to take them out, and then of course I’d have to determine which one to leave which is just….

If anyone can help me navigate this. I don’t have any support, I haven’t spoken about this with anyone and I have no friends left, and my family is just as messed up if not more in their relationships and treatment of women.

This is why I was hoping to ask for the house

I found this from bloodwork I ordered myself and paid out of pocket for, no doctors involved.

From what I’m reading, I am not anemic. However, I feel great hope that my symptoms could be resolved by getting my ferritin level up. The test said this was remarkably low.

My symptoms feel like anemia, and I’ve had them for about five years. Probably more. After multiple doctor visits, being told I have “fibromyalgia” which felt like a consolation prize after their bloodwork came back normal, I’ve resigned myself to this just being who I am.

Symptoms are:

/ shortness of breath, including yawning (air hunger).

Great fatigue

Muscle aches

Periods of large unexplained bruises (this doesn’t always happen.)

I get periods where my whole body hurts, my head feels like it’s swollen, and I’m exhausted, irritable, and depressed. I was diagnosed with bipolar and have always been told this is a mental health episode despite how much I insist that it feel primarily physical, the mental feels like a side effect of the physical.

The mental health diagnosis has made it very hard to get help as well. I’m told that it’s either my medication or my brain, and there’s nothing to be done.

I get nervous because reports of low ferritin seem to be self reported, and one of those women’s issues that’s simply ignored. the medical establishment has done its number on me and I doubt all of my feelings and symptoms constantly as if I’m making them up. Does anyone have studies that show that low ferritin can be the issue?

Wanted to add: when I was 14 I was diagnosed with “real” anemia or whatever. But never followed up on it. Have had blood work every couple of years or so and it’s never come back up again.

Practicing dialectal thoughts of—this diagnosis did irreparable harm to my healing. AND, (some, very low doses) of medication meant to treat it do help.

Context: I was diagnosed bipolar. This made sense to me, as one of my primary traumas is my mom being schizophrenic (Biggest fear of my life).

Looking back, I have been in active traumatic states for. Well, my entire life until recently. It went like > Living with mentally ill mother > Living with emotionally abusive, rageful father who also used me as his confidant/therapist/emotional support while actively tearing me down > Extremely abusive ex boyfriend 1 > Current abusive ex boyfriend 2.

Somehow, no one managed to put the pieces together that my behavior may have been due to abuse. There were periods where I had escaped the abuse and done very well. For instance, in college, living alone, I excelled in my studies and graduated with honors. I moved up in my career very quickly as well (these were later decided to have been hypomania).

The main symptoms were mind crushing, almost catatonic depression. I suppose another symptoms was constantly going back and forth on very important things.

My first decade on psych meds made things worse. To where I could not even function at my job. I was put on all the new meds, and cycled in and out of them frequently. My functioning was so abymsal, I truly lost years of my life due to med symptoms, but I accepted this as “part of the illness.”

Eventually, I self directed my treatment plan and asked for seroquel. I knew, somehow, that sedation is what I “needed” (also desperately wanted.) I also asked for lithium, as my mom had been on it and had given her stability for a long time.

To be honest, I abused seroquel for a long time. I was still in that abusive relationship, and I loved being completely out of the world. But over time, I began to stabilize on it. Adding lithium also helped tremendously. But I would say there is a caveat: First of all, I took lower doses than my doctor said I had to. This may have been the first time I had self-trust. The doctor continued to argue that I need more and more lithium to get to a “therapeutic level” but I knew that taking the minimum I could helped. I also tapered down on seroquel myself. Yes, I know this is against medical advice, but again, I do think this was the FIRST time I had any self trust.

The other caveat is that the way it helped me is that it made my acute distress go away. At the time, I was dealing with: My mother in another psychotic episode and homeless (biggest trigger for me), In this relationship with an abusive and alcoholic partner who was escalating his drinking and abuse.

And my mind was finally calm. For a long time, it simply made me content to live within this insanity. Eventually, I believe it gave me courage to attempt to leave. Which I did, and got my own apartment A year and half ago or so.

That is when I began to feel real healing. And I ultimately nixed lithium and moved down seroquel more, slowly. I began to understand what things impacted my mood, I was able to listen to my body, I began doing things that improved my mental health.

Well, I eventually began to slide as well. I let the abusive person back into my life. That added a stressor. My job placed me with a very nasty person and, as much healing as I felt I had, I wasn’t yet at a place where I could even think about boundaries. The last straw was going to visit my family. I went over a month ago now and have been back in severe depression that I feel I cannot wrap my head around.

At this point, I am probably going to have to go on FMLA. But I’ve also added lithium back into my life, and upped my seroquel—and it’s helped. The vivid edges of depression that I felt were becoming increasingly dangerous have softened. I feel sad, but not acutely in danger.

But the diagnosis itself makes me SO ANGRY, as I believe medical professional simply didn’t ask about my environment at all. No one thought that my depression could have been due to my environment. The “hypomania” that they had as evidence were the only stable times in my life, but given how well I did compared to the “norm” (depression), it was labeled as such.

I have a doctors appointment on Thursday, and I know the ultimate goal here is to get paperwork for FMLA and have someone monitor my bloodwork with lithium. But I am having a little tantrum, because while I know the “label” doesn’t mean anything, and they ultimately are going to have to use it to do the things I need them to do, part of me feels like I want to stand up for myself, advocate for myself, and make sure they know that I do not believe they hypothesis they have about me.

So many years behind underneath the diagnostic/medical view of my own world and emotions did me so much damage. The pain and terror that my family and my partner inflicted on me was all internalized. I feel like on some level they loved the diagnosis as well, because now it became my fault. My pain was never a reflection of my environment, it was something that was wrong with me and something that I had “fix,” which I felt like was actual, genuine punishment of years and years of psych meds that erased me.

I am speaking from my experience, and I feel the need to always explain over justify, etc—I will attempt not to in this case.

I believe I was misdiagnosed bipolar (this is where I feel the need to provide evidence that I am not, usually 3 paragraphs worth of evidence, but instead, I ask that you simply take me at my word that this may be true).

My “episodes” have always been so confusing to me. First, my thoughts spiral non-stop. Usually extreme dread and anxiety about some future problem, and also the feeling of being unsafe. The main word I would use is dread, absolute dread.

The problem with these “episodes” is that, on the outside, they appeared to come from nowhere. Oh, I went to visit my family (and at the time, had no concept of dysfunction). Oh, someone at work has overstepped my boundaries in an extreme way, but in a way which I could have easily prevented (if I had the tools to do so), and so people don’t understand the “big deal.” Me and my partner got into a fight, it was a silly fight, I ended up being the one apologizing and then spending hours fixating on how to be a better person, partner, HUMAN.

Beneath all of these is an illness sprung from trauma and dysfunction. The realization of this was slow, learning about CPTSD, Pete Walker, attending ACA meetings, inner child work. Over 5 years or more. That’s about how long it took to even know that my family was abusive, that my partner was abusive, that I attracted people who overstepped boundaries due to my need to people please, make everyone like me, desperation to “not get hurt!” And absolute fear of any sort of abandonment, even from those who treated me unkindly. (See, I feel the need to explain why and how my family and partner were abusive, as if you wouldn’t believe me and think I am dramatic or not telling the truth. I still have this sick need!)

Even when I learned about trauma etc, I never, EVER, correlated my mood state with the way others treated me. The pattern was Someone did or said something absolutely atrocious to me > I felt sick, terrible, sad, dread, fear, like my life was ending > I fixated on how bad of a person I was, what I could do to get better, whether or not it was better for me to end it all > having a diagnosis that says you are irreparably damaged down to your genes (I know this is not the actual diagnosis, I do not mean to offend mentally ill people, and I do believe in mental illness) was the PERFECT answer for me. My emotions were not mine! The fault was that I was born “bad” and the solutions all lay outside of me. What a relief!

It is only after 5 years that I am now able to track these emotions down. For instance, I visited my family almost a month ago now. Before I visited my family: I felt peace, I was organized, I was working out, showering every day, meditating, socializing, work was annoying but otherwise easy. After I have visited them > no longer showering, barely show up to work, can’t make it out of bed.

The stress from the visit cumulates. It is really like an illness, with depression and fatigue to start, but now a month in, my joints hurt, my head had a consistent pressure, and everything feels inflamed—especially my brain. this was another thing I tried to bring up to providers before (psychiatrists) and I was always told “maybe you have a cold” or otherwise thought to be in my head. One doctor did do extensive testing and then told me I had fibromyalgia, which seems like something they slap on as almost a vanity diagnosis, and gave me a vitamin shot.

Well. No one came to help me, which was a good lesson to learn, I could not rely on doctors to KNOW me the way I know me. No one even asked about my environment, and if they had, I wouldn’t have been able to tell them anything meaningful. “I visited my family this past weekend.” I would have left it at that. I was so disconnected from myself, so ashamed of my own emotions and reactions to others, so in denial about their dysfunction, their abuse, and the harm they were doing to me—I had NO way to conceptualize the impact of them on my brain and body.

I do feel somewhat sad, resentful, and angry that… in another way, at least I believe, I became a victim of providers medicalizing women’s (and I’m sure men’s too, only I think for women it comes out in a different way) emotions and reactions to abuse. I can’t totally blame them, as I didn’t even know I was being abused. (Again, this makes me feel shame, like I need to disclose all of the abuse so anyone reading this will believe me). But I will say that the psychiatrist I had was also my therapist, and he often minimized my needs. For instance, if I did want to cut off contact with my dad, he would tell me he doesn’t think I really want to do that, and even once said he may be projecting because he is a dad lol. He said my boyfriend was a “jerk” but “not abusive” (after an incident of him driving me drunk and screaming that I am fucking stupid over and over again).

I am still kind of reeling over this fact, that without my eventual ability to have found these things myself, I would have stayed in a perpetual reality where I am the problem. Not even just in my own world, but the world of my family, my partner, and even my psychiatrist. Perhaps I subconsciously needed the people around me to believe what I did, I wasn’t yet ready to face the heartbreaking facts, which were ultimately, that I have no safe support, no safe love, and no one to rely on.

This still hurts. But, I now know that I don’t have to feel ill all the time. I can simply remove access of these people to my life, and then they won’t make me ill. I will still have to deal with all of the after-effects of trauma, likely for the rest of my life. But I don’t have to consistently retraumatize myself. And even if I’m alone, I have finally learned that I have one person who does support, love, and treat me well: Myself.

I was thinking about the kind of woman I want to be. Now, I know every person has their own shadows, but there is a kind of woman who seems effervescent, is warm, kind, but more than anything she seems playful, filled with joy, and confident in exploring and doing those things that bring her joy.

I was contemplating this, and realized the last time I felt this way was when I was about 12-14. There was a little blip in my trauma world where I got to have a nice, normal life for a couple of years, and what do you know! I became a normal preteen girl, got really into fashion, makeup, cheesy romcoms, etc.

Trauma made its way back into my life in a big way, multiple ways, for about the next 2 decades.

There are parts of me that I really love, that I am conflicted in now in that I know that they developed from this space of trauma. I love these parts so much that I actively seek them, which I may actually be actively retraumatizing myself to get to.

The state is a very serious one. It can feel like extreme peace, not needing anyone else. Spiritual but not religious, but definitely feeling connected to “the divine” often through nature. It is rather ascetic, I begin to want to get into extreme minimalism, become extremely anticonsumption. I believe the thought process is > The world has been proven to be bad > I know I cannot control the world > But I do not have to be part of it and can live by my own virtues, regardless of what society thinks.

I become extremely moralistic. I often make plans to do things like donate large portions of my income, and refuse to consider moving to a lower paying job that I might like more because I need to sacrifice to make money to donate to the causes I care about.

The above state is one that, at least in religious books as well as other books is promoted. And, I do (even now, realizing it’s a trauma response) believe it’s the “right” way to be. It is incredibly mindful, conscientious, and wants to purify myself in some ways to become a higher self. I don’t even know how to get out of the tangle of this feeling, I was raised religious so a lot of my morals do come from religious texts, even if I claim not to be dogmatic. I believe it’s also a way for me to create a narrative where, even though society rejects me, I am still a “good” person.

The problem with this is that there is no play. There is often a calm, soothing peace and sometimes ecstatic “connection” to (god/the universe/etc). But everything is so serious, even the joy is filtered through “connection with god” and so has that weight to it.

I want to feel joy for joy’s sake. I want to feel light and airy. I have a lot of trauma around men and my looks, so after that initial age of 13, I stopped wearing makeup, wore baggy clothes, and often chopped off my hair. I want to explore that girly side of me again—another severe view I have is that makeup and girly things are not feminist and are made to oppress me. I adopt all kinds of views to not feel the vulnerability of exploring and playing with the world that I live in!

I’m not really sure how to even start this. I was thinking of watching rom coms and reading cheesy novels. (Another thing I did was decide that all novels made for entertainment were beneath me, I only read CLASSIC LITERATURE™️ I only watched GOOD FILM™️ etc).

I still don’t exactly understand why my response to trauma was this. It obviously wasn’t conscious, but I’m realizing in a way it was romanticizing my depression. Creating a framework around it to make it livable. A heavy curtain of guilt, obligation, romanticized suffering, rewarded with small increments of “divine bliss.” and most importantly, doing all of it absolutely ALONE. Other people bring me out of the state which makes me angry, and I remember friends telling me that I become really “weird’ when I spend too much time alone.

I want to change this, but that other “state” is so addicting and has become such a part of my identity. It’s like when I venture out of it, I feel anxiety and fear and the judgemental side comes back into play that I’m being frivilous, stupid, and worse—BAD for silly things like buying makeup or caring about my appearance or liking something for no other reason than it is pretty and makes me happy.

Person is mid 50s male that works in an industry obsessed with status and hierarchies.

Frequently gossips about others. Has made fun of coworkers for taking mental health leave “going to the crazy farm.” Has called people autistic in derogatory way.

Head honcho and highest earner in our department.

Not only that, I will be supporting his clients (people with hundreds of millions of dollars), and I really dislike that kind of clientele, their neediness, demands, and the way they treat me.

I feel absolutely, completely unsafe. I am also disappointed in myself, as I feel I could have stopped this, but was whiplashed five different times. Last I heard I was definitively NOT supporting him and then today I was told the opposite, so wasn’t expecting it. I also didn’t know how to say no without it becoming political suicide.

I feel so incredibly unsafe all at once, flooded. I do not have the skills to deal with someone like this. But My livelihood depends on it. I am paid decently. But I do not think it’s worth it. Everyone talk about how insane the job market feels, and then I have another layer of guilt for my feelings. HELP!

I went into this family visit thinking it would be different. I’ve been in ACA for a while now, and I honestly believed that because I finally had language for what was happening, I would somehow be protected from it. Like I had built this emotional force field. I thought if I understood the dynamics, I could keep my footing.

One of the reasons I’ve kept trying with my family is because of my niece and nephew. I always told myself they needed to see there was another way to live. Maybe if they saw one adult who wasn’t participating in all of this dysfunction, it would matter. But They’re adults now, and they’ve adopted the same reality everyone else has.

For years they’ve called me “tard.” During this visit my niece looked at me and said, “There’s just something really evil about you.” Later I asked why she said that. She told me that if I’d been born 400 years ago, people would’ve killed me as a baby because everyone would’ve known something was wrong with me.

I won’t go over the rest of the trip. Though no one says things so blatantly, she is picking up the reality of my family. I am the scapegoat, I’m defective, I’m the weird on, and there’s something wrong with me. I believed that for a very long time. But the reality is that I’m the only one not an addict, I have a good job, I am independent, have never been in jail, graduated college with honors. I mean, I think there are a lot of families that would be proud of me, but all of this makes me “the weird one.,” and makes them despise me for some reason. They “love me” but in a very cruel way that involves constant “joking” insults, ignoring me, and making me feel completely beneath them.

Before seeing my family, there was a man at work I’d identified as unsafe. He gossips constantly. He uses “autistic” as an insult. He mocks people who take mental health leave. I realized I had been fawning around him and trying to earn his approval.

Recognizing that was a huge step for me.

When he asked for me to support his practice, I told my manager I didn’t want the role. I was proud of myself. In the past I don’t think I even would’ve recognized that I was fawning, much less advocated for myself.

Then I came home from my family visit. He walked over to my desk. Within minutes I was right back in it. I didn’t even notice it happening.

Suddenly I wasn’t living in my own reality anymore. I was back in my family’s reality, where I’m fundamentally defective and should be grateful for anyone who wants me. I actually remember thinking, “Maybe God is finally working things out for me.”

This is someone I didn’t even want to work with. He talked about all the travel we’d do together, the executives I’d meet, how exciting it would be. I KNOW I can’t do work travel. (It exhausts me)

But suddenly my thoughts became, “Now I can finally be normal. Now people will accept me. Maybe this team will become the family I’ve never had.”At 9:00 that morning I called my manager back and told him I actually wanted the assignment.

It wasn’t until about 10:00 that night that I realized what had happened. It felt like waking up from hypnosis.The scary part is realizing how quickly my entire perception of myself can change after spending time with my family.

It’s like stepping into an alternate reality where I really do believe I’m broken, fundamentally wrong, and lucky if anyone tolerates me. When I’m away from them for long enough, that reality slowly dissolves.

I actually like myself.Sometimes I even love myself. I feel peaceful.

Ironically, this love has bloomed what many people would probably consider one of the loneliest periods of my life.I’m single after leaving an abusive relationship.I don’t have friends. I’m alone.

And somehow that solitude has been infinitely healthier than the reality I grew up in.

Right now I’m in what I call the family hangover. It lasts weeks. I feel shame. I hate myself. I question everything. Sometimes I become suicidal. I know from experience that it fades. Their voices eventually get quieter and my own comes back. But this visit taught me something important. They don’t actually have to have unlimited access to me. I don’t have to keep stepping into their reality and letting it replace my own.

hello!

I’ve been in ACA on and off for about a decade. in the past, one strong personality that was toxic would scare me away. I’ve realized, since then, that a big reason I am isolated from others is because I don’t trust myself to set boundaries.

ive been consistently going to this ACA meeting for about three months. I’ve witnessed difficult people come up and have let it go. I kept my distance, am pretty guarded, and that’s been fine. I felt the need lately to try and reach out through my isolation to develop relationships, and am regretting it.

I simply don’t trust myself to know which people are healthy or not. that is a huge goal of mine. I found myself fawning early on. if no one speaks to me after our meeting, I feel extremely depressed. if someone does speak to me, I feel trapped (often it’s someone trying to share about god or projecting their own stuff onto me). last night, I made a mistake with the lighting of our meeting place and had to call someone and he was extremely rude to me, talked down, and monologued about how things are done “the right way.”

I was also invited out by a lovely group to go to get coffee and pastries this Sunday, and said yes immediately (felt so excited!!) but to be honest, I don’t want personal relationships as I don’t think I’m ready for them, I don’t want any drama to come and keep me from the more regulated meetings and program. I guess I’m not sure if that is normal or okay? I’d be open to friendhsips with healthy people in the future, but tbh, I feel too desperate right now for friendships so that i cant trust myself to engage with them in a healthy way (like setting boundaries).

i suppose I’m looking for others experiences, Im beginning to feel emotionally flooded from all of the personalities, and of course even more so, my reaction to them. I am not sure if this is the right place to “practice” these boundaries, or if I’m going to get steamrolled instead. I’m not sure what the ettiquette is, but I sort of feel like I’d prefer to keep distance, but that makes me feel like an outsider as well.

I work supporting important executives. There is one executive who is THE MOST important. He makes the most money. Blablabla

I realized maybe 6 months ago that he is unsafe for me. I mean, I literally verbalized that though as I’m learning to have better boundaries. He is an unsafe person. I know this because I hear him gossiping about everyone, he constantly makes remarks about people around him not being at their desk or taking longer lunches (people that don’t support him). Worse, he uses words like “autistic” as a derogatory term and constantly makes fun of schizophrenics and homeless people (of which my mom is.)

I used to try and jump in on conversations and fawn. I don’t know why. That’s when I recognized what was happening and thought “he is an unsafe person.”

Well, he has recently decided he wants me to support him. My first thought was FUCK NO, and I told my manager as much (in a much nicer way.)

Today, he came over to my desk and was just saying it’s taking time, but I want you to support me, ultimately that he would groom me to be an executive, I’d travel with him (which, travel makes me legit sick unless I have time before and after), that I’d go to dinner with him and other executives blablabla

On a side note, I had a terrible weekend with my family where I was ostracized and humiliated, which is why…

all of a sudden I had a sense of urgency: this is the answer to all of my problems! It’s like god is putting this person in my life to change it! Wow, he chose me! I must be special. Maybe now I will be “normal” and be able to travel, all of my troubles in the past will go away, because obviously I am not completely healed, completely normal, and will be successful!

I immediately called my manager and said, “on second thought, I’m open to it.” I guess I did sort of realized that only minutes before I had repeated the boundary of him hot being a safe person.

If this happens, I truly think my life will be ruined. I’m not healed enough to work with a person. And, however this may sound, I think he and I have a strange magnetism (not romantic) because we’re both fucked up. That’s why when I stopped fawning and hoping for attention, he decided he want to wrap me into his world. I can just FEEL the dynamics of this being very, very bad. And I am so fucked now. I have no idea what to do. If he ever found out I did t want to work with him….. and now I’ve gone back and forth with my boss.

I just got out of an abusive relationship. my family was abusive, and I was In many bad relationships from 15 until now.

I do see my own culpability. I can see that I didn’t act like a deserved a good life, and didn’t believe I did, and made choices from fear and compete mental chaos. What I mean by that is, I do think it’s different this time.

I think I hit rock bottom. left a bad relationship of 15 years in which I lost all of my friends, family is incredibly toxic. my life up until now is nothing that I truly chose, all things that I ran to, ironically, to escape the fear of being alone.

im able to both feel incredibly empathetic for my past self and the trauma I faced as a childhood really until this point, but also see how I made choices that would keep me traumatized and retraumatized over and over again. I think this is where “things are different“ comes in, because in the past I made decisions either from a place of “I’m a perpetual victim!!” or “I am a terrible, evil person that deserves to die.”

so i think the conditions for me to really heal are there. I know it will take me a long time, I know Im not at the endpoint. but I can tell the ground is now fertile for the growth to begin.

what sometimes makes me feel fear and even, in my weakest, want to run back to my old life… is that I’m 35, childless, no friends. dating is off the table for me for a long time. I just don’t know if I ever hear success stories about people like me? people truly doing it in their own? I am looking for some proof it can be done.

I am in ACA and other support groups. I’m actively looking for community. but I don’t know. there is a part of me, louder when I’m sad or scared, that believes I am some horrific creature that exists outside of humanity. that i am the lone wolf kicked out of the pack and wandering in the blizzard trying to make it. and that is not what I want. I do want a family, chosen or otherwise. I do want community. I do want a life filled with love and joy. I understand the conditions up until this point, within myself, have not made that possible. I feel like those conditions exist now, but I fear it may be too late.

I can see that I was a victim in many ways. I have always been able to see that in some way or another.

Lately, I’ve felt safe enough to see all of the ways I’m not a victim, all of the ways I’ve had agency, and all of the things I’ve done with that agency (not great).

I’ve been working a lot with mindfulness meditation, self trust, feeling safe in my own body, attending ACA meetings and codependency meetings etc.

Recently, an intense wave of grief hit me over friendships I’ve lost. The loss was, without a doubt, my choice and my fault. It has been almost a decade of me “not caring,” hardening my heart, really feeling nothing about it.

In the middle of stretching for some reason, all of a sudden, grief hit me like a train. I realized what I lost. I realized why I lost it. I remembered the intense love of these people and their families (they were childhood friends). I realized my own age (lol?) and how long it had been since I’d been close to them (in my dissociative state, time seems to always exist in the past),

This was like a little window that brought up so many other things in my life, choices I’ve made. The nearly 2 decades of being almost purely dissociated, all of the things I did to protect that state, all of the things I missed out on, and of course, where i stand now… a life really not lived in at all, and if I want to live in it, there is going to need to be some serious cleaning up and rebuilding. It feels like too much.

I know this was important. Even though the grief felt like my heart breaking, worse than a high school breakup…. I knew I needed to let it happen.

But now, I am unsure what to do with it? My fear is that… it’s too much, and my brain will switch right back to dissociation. I want to grasp some of these realizations, as I believe they are important for me to be able to make some changes in my life. But, if I let them hit me fully, the pain is so much I would either end up in severe depression or swing right back to dissociation.

Does anyone have any ideas on how to… I guess let these realizations exist without overwhelming? Or let them trickle in?

I have had very bad experiences with therapy, it may be that I simply don’t possess the ability to trust others. Side note, I believe because I haven’t learned to trust myself, I refuse to trust others in the case that they overstep my boundaries and I abandon myself. That has happened with prior therapists in a vulnerable state. For me, I feel like I have done a good job learning to trust myself and have made significantly more progress on my own that I had with therapists. But this is one thing that I simply Do Not Know how to handle

Hello,

I moved out of my partners house 1 year ago. Initially I thought I would stay out. At the time, I felt hopeful. I accepted our relationship was over. It was absolutely hard, but I also had this feeling that I had a future and could fight towards it.

Well, he made his way back into my life. I posted yesterday about another “event.” The truth is, he has made a tremendous amount of progress. I am proud of him. I think he may one day become healthy, and he is definitely healthier now. That is true. AND, he is still not capable to being a healthy person. His past abuse will never leave me. He still has tremendous, toxic patterns that show up when I need him most, that leave me feeling suicidal and so, so wrong and sick. I know that when I really need him, he will absolutely not be capable of being there for me, and will instead make me feel worse, annoying, stupid, and alone.

I just got back from a wonderful solo trip and was so happy, I had hope for my future and had some plans I would put in place. To be honest, I was feeling increasingly ambivalent about our relationship. When I got back, the event happened that left me suicidal and in despair. That was two days ago. He reached out to me today, and I responded. Now of course we are seeing each other tomorrow.

I was determined to call it off. I have no friends left. Absolutely none. No community of any kind. My family, I love them but they are toxic and extremely bad for my mental health, I absolutely cannot share what is going on with them (every single one is engaged in the same dynamics). The old friends I had have every right to have stopped contact with me after years of me choosing unhealthy relationships over them, which also caused me to act in increasingly self destructive ways and be selfish.

I have no one. And I have no hope. I‘m supposed to go back to work. Thoughts of suicide are frequent, I do not think I would go through with it. I’m also supposed to see the toxic family I discussed this next weekend, and will not be able to share any of this with them and am afraid of how guilty I will feel for not being able to be engaging with them. I feel no purpose or reason for living, I haven’t showered in three days or brushed my teeth. I am just not sure what I’m supposed to. I have been to so many therapists—my last therapist and psych was a man who told me my partner was not abusive, just “kind of a jerk”—he also diagnosed me as bipolar, and I wonder how much of my “symptoms” were reactions to abuse. So I don’t feel comfortable reaching out for help, I know the hotlines do not help. I didn’t keep my word a year ago, and I have no hope that I will again, and so feel only despair and self hatred. I don’t want to live this life any longer. I have no one to talk to.

(Trigger warnings for anything sex related)

I went on a long camping vacation by myself, and had some intense realizations.

I realized how frequently I abandon myself during sex to try and appease my partner. It was hard to understand this. This comes from my first relationship, but has been cemented by my current relationship of 15 years. It’s something we worked at. When I used to shut down or cry, he would actually get angry and yell at me or physically leave. Later he would simply get annoyed. Now, he does comfort me, which helps. But makes a lot of comments about how our sex is vanilla and he wishes we could explore more or that we don’t have enough sex.

He used to get really angry when things didn’t result in sex. He would also get angry if I wasn’t enthusiastic about sex. I have deep shame because the blame was always on myself for not being able to be “normal.” I sometimes wished he would just rape me so that I wouldn’t have to fake being happy, which was incredibly difficult for me to do as I was completely dissociated, suicidal, and almost mute.

I know if I had expressed this to him, he would have flown into a rage that I dare blame any of this on him. To be clear, my initial sexual trauma was not his fault. Nor was it his fault that I had panic attacks and dissociated. But I do believe he is partially to blame for not having the capacity to care more about me than his entitlement to my body.

He has gotten better. He comforts me, we don’t have to finish. He accepts no and does not display anger anymore. This is after about 15 years and several years of therapy on his part (that I demanded he do last time I “left”). But I am sorry to say that the wounds are still there, and I still do not feel completely safe with him. It also hurts because… I actually do have a very strong sexual appetite. And I do think I could be more adventurous, but the truth is that I don’t think I could with him, as I don’t feel he is safe. This brings me so much shame, that I can’t be the person he wants me to be. It fills me with self hatred.

Well, last time we had sex, instead of crying or panicking, I brought up an insecurity which he took as an accusation. The insecurity was “But you say that are sex is vanilla.” That may have not been the best way around trying to discuss. I felt myself panicking and feeling dissociated, and told myself, instead of crying, I am going to try and verbalize.

His response was to roll his eyes. I believe he asked me questions, but he was annoyed, and so I became silent. This annoyed him even more, he left the room, and then came back and when I asked “are you mad at me?” (Something I repeat when in a panicked state” he told me that it was “a lot.”

So my brain and body went into old patterns. I forced myself to have sex with him even though I didn’t want to. This is not something he did, it’s something I did to myself. In these moments, I abandon myself. The adult me leaves, and maybe even hates the child I leave behind. This is the child that was sexually abused as a teenager. The adult me despsises her, is disgusted in her, and thinks she deserves everything she gets. I hate her, I want her to die, and I want her to be raped. That is a very ugly side of trauma that I know is not pleasant to hear. But it is the truth. I abandon her and force her to perform so that my sexual parter is not annoyed and angry.

On my trip, I realized this had happened. I journaled about it and cried for several hours straight. It was so clear what I was doing to myself, how it connected to my past abuse, etc. When it had happened, I had kind of just let it happen and tried not to think about it, which I had told myself was “progress” as I wasn’t suicidal for days afterwards. But in reality, it was another form of abandonment.

When I came home, I tried to discuss this with him. I was very stupid and naive, I thought the years of therapy… his kindness up until that point… I thought it would be me bringing up this thing, him expressing care and us repairing this chasm that had come up—which I understand was mostly from me abandoning myself, although I do believe some of it also stemmed from past dynamics of having to appease him unless I get silent treatment.

Anyways, I told him that event was a panic attack/episode and that I was concerned he hadn’t realized it. To be honest, I think he had, but without me crying he couldn’t follow the script of “crying means I need to be there for her” so now it was just an annoyance.

The conversation was so painful to me, more painful than that night, that I cannot remember most of it. I know that when I expressed that i needed to feel safe, he kind of scoffed and said he doesn’t feel safe with me either. I think what he meant by that is safe to try other sexual things. I know he said “So I guess sometimes I’m just supposed to ignore my own emotions if you’re feeling bad”—which really confuses me, I am not telling him to do that all the time, but during vulnerable times of sexual intimacy with my past, I don’t think that’s unreasonable? It was the kind of conversation that twists and turns and was put back on my being in the wrong. I promise you I had only wanted to express this thing that I felt was in the way of me feeling safe (as I knew he wanted to be intimate again) in hopes that I would get comfort and reassurance, and that we could move past it. But it turned into about an hour of twisting and me crying and telling him I just need the ability to be able to talk about these tings and feel reassurance.

I felt humiliated. I told him please let’s forget about it, and he said “you know that’s not going to happen” in a very angry/snide way. Like it was my fault for bringing it up and it would be my fault for feeling bad in the coming days.

I cried myself to sleep and he ignored me. I felt deeply suicidal, and I self harmed for the first time in a decade. I seriously contemplated suicide, but took more of my anxiety medication than I should instead so that I could fall asleep.

I told him I needed space. The only thing that I can think of is the fact that that he said it’s impossible for us to feel safe with each other. That there’s no way that’s going to happen. I don’t know how that is impossible. I grieve the version of me that may have had someone gentle and kind and caring during the periods of trauma that showed up, or even the one who went to therapy to deal with it. It has now compounded to the point that I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to be healthy in an intimate way. At this point, I don’t plan on being in an intimate relationship ever again, as I feel like the tolerance for a woman approaching middle age whose issues have only gotten worse, not better, is likely waning. I really do feel like I could have healed, maybe not completely, but I do think there is a reality in which I could have felt safe with someone.

I have promised myself to never abandon myself again. I cannot do that when I stay with him. During our last conversation, where I felt suicidal, I intentionally tried to not abandon myself, but I ultimately had to let go and let the thoughts of self harm and suicide come because the waves were too strong for me to hold on. They passed as soon as I got to my apartment. They might come up, but I can fight against them. He ultimately made it clear that he does not have the capacity to be a safe space for me, nor does he think it’s even within the realm of possibility. How can I let myself go back into such a situation? I refuse to hate myself like that anymore. I am choosing myself.

like many of us, I recently watched the “worst ex ever” episode on Geoffrey.

i know a lot of us are giving TLC flak for hiring people like Geoffrey, deservedly so. but what this has really made me come to terms with is my own complicity in watching and supporting this show.

there have been many times where I’ve thought this show is something I’ve done with. why am I addicted to it? it’s sort of a habit at this point, it started as a docuseries and I genuinely watched it in the beginning. friends and I had watch parties. then, as I became isolated, I found a quasi community online of people that watched it.

I do think we have to admit that the vast majority of the reasons we watch trash TV is morbid curiosity of the dysfunctional. I recently felt queasy with Lisa, who is clearly severely dysfunctional to the point that it feels disgusting to gleam entertainment off of her. but ultimately, the curiosity was somehow more important and I continued to watch.

however, the episode about Geoffrey’s physical abuse towards women is making me come to terms with the fact that, directly or indirectly, this is what we are supporting. extremely dysfunctional, fame hungry people. victims or victimizers, doesn’t matter—both are entertaining. more entertaining is reading comments from others making fun of, defending, but ultimately rewarding these people with our views.

not giving TLC any views anymore, in any way. the only story lines that aren’t fake are the ones in which they don’t need to be produced because the people are THAT dysfunctional. what does that say about a show, and what does it say me as a viewer. TLC is ultimately a channel that feeds on our worst possible impulses as a society. I am no longer engaging in it. J

Lmao, someone felt so offended by my own personal self reflection they Reddit cares’d me. Don’t worry concerned Redditor, I am fine. I am worried about the state of mind of those who took my self reflection as a personal attack. Yike!

My feelings: I feel insecure and sad when our plans keep getting pushed back. I know the feelings aren’t logical, but that’s how I feel. (Spend another 30 minutes arguing about whether or not I’m blaming him and reassuring him ad nauseam that I understand my feelings are illogical but I am seeking reassurance and comfort.)

His “feelings”: I feel like you are in a pissy mood, came over here just to take it all out on me and make my day worse!!!!

I spend about 15 minutes contemplating whether I am this selfish, manipulative person who comes over purely to lash out and make myself feel better by making him feel worse. For a little bit, I believe it, and start feeling suicidal ideation at what a terrible person I am.

Luckily, I now understand that this is not true. I came over excited to see him, wanting to spend time. So I express that it’s not right that he projects this image of a selfish, nasty creature onto me, there is no evidence for it, and it’s not true. This sparks the title of this post.

There is something incredibly painful about being vulnerable, seeking reassurance, and then being told everything you do is manipulative and selfish. I believed that for a literal decade of my life. Ultimately reaching out for understanding, support, etc, hand slapped away and called a manipulative bitch (not using those exact words.)

I do not want to cry in front of him and tell him as much, because to Him My vulnerability is seen as weak and manipulative. How dare I try and make him looo like the bad guy! His response is tha I need to get over the time he told me that my tears are produced to “win arguments”—wow! I had forgotten about that quote, I suppose he is bringing it up because for some time, I tried to explain how that comment hurt me and stuck with me, I gave up on that and hadn’t mentioned it in some time. But flashed before my mind how nothing has changed.

I am in actual purgatory and need to leave.

Once I finally get through to him, I’m met with “maybe everyone would be better off without me.” Sorry. I don’t feel sympathy at this point. Now I’m supposed to comfort you, having already descended to suicidal ideation myself, feeling frozen and unable to move, I have yet to be comforted. The best I can hope for is that you will say “sorry” not knowing what you’re sorry for or having any interest in figuring it out, and then descend to self pity so that I am now in the role of comforter.