u/Ok_Chest5992

i know i shouldn’t have. i know ai is killing the planet and i know im terrible for using it. but i used it for reassurance. and then, after like 2 hours, it finally told me what i wanted to hear. that i was a woman and that it is all anxiety and intrusive thoughts. but reading it, i felt my stomach drop. it was the same way its dropped in the past where i know i truly fucked myself over and i’ve made everything worse. i know i shouldn’t have but now i feel such anxiety and dread and fear over having been told exactly what i wanted to hear. it doesn’t feel right.

now, my brain is afraid of being a woman. of being boxed in. my brain can’t even say the word woman. it’s bleeped out. if i’m imagining the sentence, it’s literally a white box. i wanted to feel like a woman so badly. but now i feel like i made everything worse. i don’t know what to do. i’m so overwhelmed by my feelings and im terrified this means something more about me. i’m terrified it means i never wanted to be a woman in the first place and that im in denial. i want to be a woman again. i want to feel comfortable in my body again. but i don’t know why i cant. nothing works. and im terrified im doomed to live like this for the rest of my life.

i forgot about this until yesterday and at first, i scolded myself for thinking it could be assault because i didn’t really mind at the time. but i can’t stop thinking about it.

in my first year of college, i wanted to experiment and be free. i grew up in a house that gave me curfew even after i turned 18. my parents were emotionally and mentally abusive to me ever since i can remember. we had many screaming matches and my parents would do anything in their power to isolate me from my friends. thus, i wanted to go out and finally live my life at college.

there was this one night where i was upset because my ex friend got too wasted again to the point we had to leave a party early. i matched with a guy on tinder who also went to the same college as me and was only two ish years older than me. we were gonna smoke weed and watch a show while we hook up that same night, which i was perfectly fine with.

we smoked in his car and everything was fine. once we got inside his dorm building, however, i started to notice i was way too high. like, to the point that i was internally panicking and could feel my heart racing. at one point, he started making out with me and grabbing my breast before taking them out of my bra and sucking them. i felt out of it and eventually i told him that i was really high and i wasn’t sure if i wanted to do anything. i just really needed a break. he nodded but eventually, he asked if i was feeling better. i felt bad that i made the hookup go to shit so i just kinda nodded and he continued. again, i was incredibly spaced out and i just went along with it as to not make him upset or ruin anything.

eventually, i couldn’t take it anymore and i wanted to go home. i remember ubering home and i just kinda ignored it. at the time, it didn’t feel like assault. the only thing i could think about was how embarrassing it was that i got too high and ruined the night. but now that im a little older, im wondering if it was actually assault. it feels weird to think about and i can’t register it myself as assault. part of me still believes that i was at fault because i ruined a hookup i consented to.

was it really assault? i need someone to tell me if it is because i can’t get myself to believe it.

not sure if i have ptsd. was never formally diagnosed but ive had one therapist mention that i have ptsd symptoms back when i was in high school and another therapist wanted to evaluate me for ptsd but never ended up doing so. part of me figures i dont have ptsd and am making it up for attention but another part of me wonders if i really do.

my first year of college was terrible. i had friends say i had the worst first year imaginable. i was sexually assaulted in the fall semester and raped in the spring by two of my closest friends. after i was raped, a third close friend supported me through the painful nights of crying or just needing a friend before he confessed he had feelings for me a month later. i never really processed any of it much besides the first sexual assault because i had filed a title ix. even then, it felt like i was faking all my emotions and lying. the rape never really registered to me until very recently (happened over a year ago) after bringing it up again in therapy with a new therapist. in my second year, i was assaulted by another friend and never really processed it. i figured it was my fault that i didn’t communicate well enough.

last year in october, i started dating a guy who was really nice to me. or so i thought. long story very short, he called me so many awful things and self centered my assault around himself and his emotions. (he told me that me not enjoying it didn’t make him feel better because it invalidated his own feelings) he laughed about the racist things his mom said towards my culture and my family. he criticized my bisexuality and overall just hated everything about me. i lost so much trust in literally anyone who got too close to me after that.

now, im a much different person. i want to change and act like myself again, but the second i try to even self reflect and process my traumas, my brain shuts everything down without giving me a chance to breathe. if i talk about wanting to act like myself again, my brain immediately switches tunes and thoughts like “you’re not different. you’re a new person. own it and move on.” or “you’re preventing growth. you can’t be the old you.”

i still haven’t been able to truly process my past relationship, which ended almost 8 months ago, because when i try to, it’s promptly swept away and i can’t feel anything. some days, i can think about my relationship or my assaults, but i feel nothing towards them. my brain just tells me to stop dawdling on old issues and focus on the present. which makes me feel crazier because then i wonder if im just making all of my trauma up.

i used to be very introspective before, so i know my trauma and lack of processing everything that happened to me in the span of 2 years is definitely catching up to me. but i didn’t think it would lock me out of my own brain. is this common? how do i start to unpack everything when my brain won’t even let me?

i’ve made a post on here before a few weeks ago and i got some nice feedback and whatnot. but it truly feels like denial. i get so lost in these spirals that they last for weeks. just a week or so ago i started to feel normal again. started to feel like a woman again and i was happy. but then, i saw a guy i thought was cute and the thoughts flooded back. saying “are you sure you want to be with him? what exactly is attractive about him? are you sure you don’t just want to be him?” they don’t stop. sometimes i wonder if it’s a defense mechanism so i don’t get abused or traumatized again. but even that feels like a lie even though i know it’s a valid concern.

i’m genuinely so depressed every single time i fall into these spirals. i don’t WANT it. i don’t want to be a man. but it feels like im in denial. my brain keeps telling me it’s crystal clear and it’s all been there. that the signs have been present for years. i understand that women can have any physical expression and it not mean anything. i know that clothes, hair, makeup, etc. don’t mean you’re a woman/man/any gender identity. i know that clothes don’t mean anything but my brain keeps going “you can’t be a woman. you don’t dress like one. you’re not feminine enough.” which, in turn, makes me hate femininity.

i feel so detached from my vagina and boobs. i started feeling that way after so many sexual assaults, a rape, and being slut shamed by my ex. but my brain keeps telling me that it’s a lie i’ve made up. that my sexual assaults didn’t traumatize me that badly and i’m grasping at straws to pin this blame onto.

in the worst of these spirals, i don’t feel like it’s my body. i feel awkward and wrong in my body. like fitting a circle into the square hole. but once the spiral is tame, it feels more calm. the feeling isn’t gone, but it just feels a little lighter. and i get so scared every day that im not me and im not a woman.

my brain makes a bunch of stipulations. like, if i want to date a guy, i have to be a man. i’m not allowed to be a woman. but if i want to be a woman again, i have to either be a lesbian or use different pronouns other than she/her. if i want to be bisexual (which i am), i have to use she/they pronouns. nothing works and my brain won’t settle.

i fucking hate ocd. some days i really just want to off myself. i can’t handle this. i miss who i was before. i don’t want to be trans. i don’t want to be a man. i hate that i was assaulted and i hate that i was raped. and i feel like sometimes, this spiraling is because my brain associates women with weakness/vulnerability and men with strength/protection. and then i get so angry at myself for not being a better feminist and it makes my TOCD so much worse. (thoughts like “you’re such a man because you side with them all the time” and “you don’t even like your own kind. how can you claim to be one?”)

i’ve never had an easy life. my mother is definitely a narcissist and my father was physically abusive to my siblings and i when we were younger. now, both of them are emotionally and verbally abusive to us. my mother and i gave each other the silent treatment after a nasty verbal fight one day. we didn’t really speak to each other for 2-2.5 years except when we really had to. i’ve been called so many names and my therapist had to teach me how to mourn someone who was alive. it was so rough. i genuinely don’t know how i managed everything.

i got with someone right before i started college. it was brief. didn’t last more than 3 weeks. i broke up with him because he was in love with my now ex best friend. and he made fun of my body and my personality. all the time. he would act like i was the stupidest girl in the world and would just bully me.

college wasn’t easy either. i was known as the girl among my friend groups as “the first year from hell”. i was assaulted by someone i considered a best friend for 3 months straight in my fall semester. went through an awful title ix case and lost so many friends in the process. then was raped by another close friend of mine in my spring semester. was insulted and blamed by my mother for it. couldn’t manage and my grades were tanking. one of my other close friends helped me through it. sat with me when i cried and held me. hung out with me a lot. until he confessed to me a month later that he was into me and wanted to go on a date. and told me that we had a “moment” when i was blackout drunk and he was sober. which terrified me. i dreaded going back to college but i didn’t want to lose my friends.

then, in the start of my second year of college, i was (maybe? still unsure) sexually assaulted by a friend of mine. stayed away from him. got my reputation ruined with yet another group of friends. but i still hoped for love. still craved connection. then i met my now ex boyfriend. he was nice to me when we started talking. he shared the same political opinions as me and also had the same passion for things i did. we got together when i came back home for fall break. for once, i finally felt seen and happy. to know i was cared about as much as i cared about him.

only, a week later, i opened up to him about my struggles with sex and abuse. i told him about the guy in my second year who assaulted me. and my ex got very defensive. he didn’t seem to wrap his brain around the fact that i was assaulted but instead was upset that i got with someone right before i started being his friend. he later called me a slut for it and said i was disgusting for doing so, among other names. he would repeatedly bring up my assault and i began to associate him and my assaults in the same thought bubble. he also made fun of my pseudonyms for my assaulters, calling them “stupid nicknames” when he knew exactly why i’d call them that, which broke me.

eventually, i lost all attraction to him after he told me the racist things his mom said about spanish people, which translated to me. he laughed about it like it didn’t matter. but it mattered so heavily to me. i had to water myself down as well, since his parents hate piercings and tattoos. the entire time i was with him, it felt like he didn’t want ME. but he wanted sex with me. there would be times where he’d keep asking me to show my body parts on facetime, which was a big no for me. he’d beg and beg until i eventually gave in. sex didn’t feel safe at all anymore.

then, i suddenly lost attraction to men completely. i’d immediately get disgusted at men in movies or on social media. i was so bitter all of a sudden. i subconsciously shut my ex out. didn’t feel safe around him. dreaded being around him. didn’t want to hang out with him. i would accidentally call him “dude” without thinking. he ended up breaking up with me on new year’s eve. an hour before midnight. which broke me.

i’ve always had depression. i can’t remember a life without it. i think ive had it since i was 10. 10 fucking years of living in a life of monochrome. and i was recently diagnosed with ocd, which has fully consumed my life. i wake up with intrusive thoughts. i go to bed with intrusive thoughts. i dream of my intrusive thoughts. they’re so bad that i was never able to process my breakup. and my breakup happened 7 months ago. and i don’t know if i ever will be able to.

i live in a constant state of apathy or depression. it’s never anything else. i’ve learned to live with the noise. not well, but i do. i try to think of the future, but there’s nothing. it’s like i don’t exist. i can’t see myself past my 21st.

i feel nothing for my hobbies and interests. i hate everything that i used to love. i hate the city when i used to dream of living in. i’ve begun to hate my style of clothing, which i used to love before. i hate my hair color, which i always dyed blue or purple. i hate painting my nails, which i used to love before. i hate dressed. i hate skirts. i hate heels. i hate everything that made up myself. and i get so angry that i hate it.

i’m so pissed that ive been mistreated. and that i allowed myself to be mistreated for years. and part of me thinks i also deserve it. i don’t know why i can’t see a future. but i don’t know what ill do when i get out of college. i was so depressed i relied on cheating to get by. i learned nothing. i’m entering my third year and i can barely tell you the basics. i hate myself so much and i don’t think i deserve to get better.

i want to get better. i want to stop feeling this way. but i don’t know how. i have a therapist right now and antidepressants. but i haven’t been taking them. some part of me is afraid to try medication again. i’ve taken so many different ones and i never felt good. and im afraid of getting my hopes up.

(cw: some mentions of sexual assault and rape)

im 20f and bisexual. loved being a woman all my life. i went through my fair share of tomboy phases only to immediately turn around and dress super girly. i was like THE stereotypical girl. all the memes about how girls write in a pink, sparkly diary and play with barbie’s and were infatuated with the color pink? that was me. and i always felt like myself when i wore skirts. i was boy crazy and i loved wearing makeup. i loved heels and dresses and loved playing “fashion show” with all my mom’s clothing. i always knew that i was a woman.

for context, i’m known within my friend groups as having the worst first year of college ever. i was sexually assaulted for three months in the fall by my best friend. raped by another close friend in the spring. used by a different close friend who was “helped” me process my rape. i was assaulted in my second year and unsure if my last boyfriend assaulted me. i’ve been through a lot. and i never gave myself a break.

like i said before, i was always boy crazy. i knew i wanted a boyfriend. sometimes id act different just for guys to like me. but my ex called me so many names for being bisexual and for having a higher body count than him. he’s called me disgusting, weird, a slut, he’s called me a bitch so many times while joking that it felt like he wasn’t. one day, during intimacy, i wasn’t into it. never knew why. and i suddenly had the thought of “what if you’re not into him and you’re a lesbian?” and i freaked out. went down an insane spiral and lost all attraction to him and all men. i’d see a man in a show or movie and id immediately get disgusted by him. brought it up to my old therapist, who kept insisting i was a lesbian and to just own it. when i cut her off saying how much i wanted to be with my ex, how much i wanted to have sex with him, and how happy i used to be with him, she’d scoff and continue telling me that i was a lesbian. which made everything so much worse.

after this, i was obsessively mulling over my thoughts. i couldn’t even look at my body in the mirror or while showering because i would get reminded of my rape. i’d spend, i kid you not, 16+ hours thinking about being a lesbian and hating it. the compulsions were insane. and one day, while trying to figure out why i hated men so much and couldn’t look in the mirror, another loud and booming thought came in.

“what if you’re actually trans, and you’re just lying to yourself? and that’s why you can’t look in the mirror?”

ever since then, i haven’t been the same. id get such strong thoughts of “you want to be a man. just admit it. you acted so boyish as a child. you’re just in denial”

i don’t even know what it means to be a woman anymore. women don’t feel real. i don’t even know what a woman is. i’ll see a woman and i can’t wrap my brain around it. like they just… don’t exist. or they’re men dressed up as women. but men? they’re men. they’re fine.

nothing feels right. and i’m slowly losing everything i liked about myself. my hair parts the wrong way? looks too boyish and it’s a sign. don’t feel like doing my makeup today? you hated makeup the entire time and you’re just a man. wanting to wear pants today? you like being a guy and you want to dress like one. it’s exhausting. it’s getting to the point where the thoughts feel so real that sometimes i almost feel like i WANT to, but i know i font. whenever i’m drunk or high, i miss being a woman. but i feel like i physically CANNOT be a woman. like im not allowed to be one. my brain even tells me that im acting childish or like im “regressing” almost and that i wont grow if i dont just accept it. that women are “boring” and “it’s basic” and i wont become a better person if i dont.

i never wanted to live like a man. but it’s been 7 months of this now. and i feel like i can’t return to before. my brain is telling me that it doesn’t even WANT to return to before. i miss the old me. i want her back. nothing feels right anymore.

for context, i’m a 20 year bisexual woman. growing up, i was very very girly until around 4th grade where i started dressing like a tomboy until around 8th grade where i started dressing very very girly again. ever since then, i was super feminine. always loved the color pink, loved glittery dresses and outfits, loved makeup, getting ready and wearing heels and stuff. the whole shebang. once i was a senior in high school, i started dressing more alternative and was very comfortable in my identity but i didn’t wear as many skirts (have had an ED for ~7 years so i found shorts started to make me look skinnier)

i’ve had a couple relationships here and there (only men) and they never worked out. i’ve unfortunately been assaulted and raped by several people in my life at different times, but i still trusted men to an extent. my latest relationship didn’t last long. i had a lot of sexual trauma i didn’t know i was holding onto and it blend into our relationship since he kept abusing me emotionally (would call me a slut, told me he didn’t care that my assault “didn’t feel good” because it made him feel invalidated, got angry that i had a higher body count than him, etc) and ever he dumped me on new year’s eve, i’ve been an emotional wreck

ever since we broke up, i haven’t felt like a woman. i hate my boobs and i feel disgusted by vaginas. i see women i would’ve normally been attracted to and i feel disgusted. i am diagnosed with OCD so i know it probably plays a role to an extent but every time i think of a woman, i feel like those annoying “im not like other girls” and i feel so disgusted and angry with myself. i hate that the thought ever pops into my mind at all and i wish it would go away. i used to be a girls girl. i feel like im not even a bisexual anymore. i was high last night and scrolling tiktok when i saw this tiktok of alternative women and i felt this blockage. like there’s feelings there but they’re hidden deep down where i can’t access them. and i can’t even decipher what feelings they may be.

now, when i think of a woman, i just think of blonde hair, blue eyed bimbos that only chase after men. and god, i cannot reiterate enough how ashamed i am for ever conceiving a thought like that. i know women are powerful and capable of being whoever they want to be. hell, i’m a scientist and studying to work in a medical field. but everything feels so gray now.

i don’t know where to begin the healing process. i never want to feel this way about women. but i feel disgusted with myself and like i shouldn’t even claim to call myself a woman. i would appreciate advice as to what to do

edit: thank you all for responding so quickly. to everyone telling me to go to therapy, i’m currently in therapy right now. i’ve jumped around a few therapists lately but never found one that really stuck. my last therapist (i stopped seeing her after our last appointment in january but i was seeing her for around 4 years) sent me into a huge spiral with unhelpful advice. i started seeing one that specialized in sexual assault since he was a therapist through RAINN and i’ve brought these issues up, but i never really felt like it was going anywhere. i’m seeing a new therapist but she cancelled our first appointment so i have to wait to see her for our next one. but i appreciate yall pushing me to get therapy regardless