The journey begins ... or continues ... articulating the rollercoaster that is my life

[mumstheword]

So, update; My guy is taking our neighbor to look at a car.
He even taught her to drive (years ago).
He doesn't always like how much she relies on him but he's too caring and chivalrous to let a young mum and her agoraphobia fibromyalgia suffering mother be in such need.
I don't really mind, even though both of them have been a bit horrible to me in the past, it was mostly that I got badly triggered by my "crazy ex friend"(on that note, has anyone seen crazy ex girlfriend? We absolutely loved it, it was hilarious).
I'm actually happy to have them as neighbors coz all the other neighbors up here are way worse.
I'm just struggling with the need to isolate and avoid most of the world's population, except my kids and care team and my guy.

 

[Freida]

Also, dealing with that feeling and sense of being a total fraud. Like I've lied and made up everything. Like I'm a rotten person who is just histronic and a drama queen attention seeker. What a weird, irrational but powerful sense it is! I really don't like it.

Oh yea.....this. It comes up like clockwork for me....including just today at session. T just looks at me these days and waits for me to work it out....she doesn't even bother to argue lol

Your parents were shitty and abusive and inadequate. No wonder you didn't learn anything good about yourself from them.

This^^^^^^^^ nuff said

Building my life and my self and my family back up again! Celebrating resilience, love, commitment to growth and healing, truthfulness, integrity, creativity, service to others, faith, hope and kindness.
I am firmly on my path and looking forward to what I can bring to the future with excitement and wonder.

almost
Yea!!!!! Misery loves company but hope bonds to hope even more!!;):):chicken::chicken::hug:

 

[mumstheword]

Oh yea.....this. It comes up like clockwork for me....including just today at session. T just looks at...

Yeah, that was a good moment I just grabbed on to while I could, but yeah, definitely feeling I've turned a corner on this whole life-and-every-bit-of-happiness-leaching level of symptomaticness.:)
Nearly 20 year old son and I went for a walk out into the country today. Beautiful winter day, beautiful scenery, interesting convos.
I've decided to commit to daily walks everyday that I can. Self care improving!

 

[mumstheword]

I vented my spleen so much, over old friend/ex friend, I've softened. She's really, really mentally unwell, not malicious, just frightened, lonely and a little desperate, I think.
She reminds me of mum and ex, very ego driven, fearful and really selfish and not honest. I figured out ex is an Aspie that is one of those ones that present kinda sociopathically. Of course it's theoretical, my long term T said he was a psychopath and my kid's pdoc called him "grandiose". My ex friend isn't a psychopath but she is grandiose. My mum isn't a psychopath either, she's just a histrionic narcy type. Labels, shmabels, but it does help me to realize my ex has a social/neural disability he's not capable of knowing how to behave decently, his brain doesn't work like the rest of us who have natural empathy.
I never read the signs. He was estranged from his family. He was living in a squat with ex cons who I was really frightened would rape and murder me, everyone called them "the bush pigs". I went for a drive with one once, a drive I didn't think I would survive, very very fast, along a windy, country road. He was scary. All of them reeked of violence. My ex was living in a squat with them. I was utterly alone and homeless. I had been callously preyed upon by numerous men. I had slashed my wrist. The doctor was a hostile, callous man, he didn't ask me any of the right questions, he didn't care. I was nearly mute by then, a very shut down, frightened, desperately lonely child-woman.
My ex was a dazzling musician. I was, most likely, his first groupie. I needed protection. He exploited me. He preyed on me too. I was really brain fried and I'm amazed I didn't write myself off. I just got pregnant instead.

 

[Swift]

Here with you.
This comes back to what I was trying to say before...
If someone has a disability or deficit, it does NOT mean that they aren't treating you shittily.
It doesn't make it hurt any less.
I get this with my mum a lot.
Dad will often say "that's just what she's like." I think she might be Aspie, because she's so emotionally incompetent. My friends think so, based off observing her. "Jesus, is she really a doctor?" Is a fairly frequent comment. I try to laugh off the worst of it - she manages to put things, even when she's well-meaning, in a way that's like, "how did you say that, with your mouth?!?"
It doesn't make it hurt any less.
But, it does mean she's got difficulties I can't comprehend.
Your ex... f*cking preyed on you.
He picked you as a target. He picked you because you were vulnerable.
And I know you're an awesome, amazing, strong, talented, artistic, creative, badass woman...
But that wasn't why he picked you. Those traits aren't what he saw.
I f*cking hate him. Sorry, but I do.

 

[mumstheword]

Here with you.
This comes back to what I was trying to say before...
If someone has a disability or def...

Yeah, my Dad isn't really mean, just totally, totally clueless and incompetent at support. I mean, he did send me to a adolescent psych hospital, but when told I'd been "most probably sexually abused" did and said absolutely nothing. He let me go off to live by myself in Hobart.

I was self harming a lot those days, serious path of self destruction, lots of getting obliterated with alcohol, more rapey stuff, but I never, never, would dream of telling him about any of it. He's not available for stuff like that, neither of them are.

Dad's what my guy calls "Aspie as f*ck" he's an academic Aspie, well into his PhD as we speak, no doubt.

It's really hard to comprehend how they can be so socially f*cked, to put it very bluntly, so emotionally retarded.

It feels kind of good to commiserate about lame parenting received though.

Thanks @Swift :-)
I feel your pain, well, not exactly but similarly, in a way. I feel like we get each other's extreme vulnerability and harm caused by the neglect. The terrible loneliness and no sense of self in a healthy way, no learning healthy boundaries, no learning we were worth care.

I'm sad for our littles, our teen selves.

I'm glad you got out of abuse and into therapy earlier than me but sad that you're still subject to your mum's callous, inept-mum, narcy crap.

 

[mumstheword]

So, my kid's grandfather died last week. I liked him, he tried to rebond with his son later in life. I think he felt guilty that he wasn't a better Dad and his son didn't turn out to be a good person. He had been an alcoholic most of his life, until one day he was out fishing and he nearly died. Obviously a life changing event because he gave up the grog for good, became a much better husband and started reaching out to his son. His wife was a bit of a fierce woman. She didn't like her son, she said "We love you Alan but we don't like you".

She ended up with dementia and got quite violent with her husband. She's still alive but isn't lucid at all, anymore, doesn't recognise anyone.
My mum's mum is also dying at the moment. Yeah, she's still alive. She had my mum when she was a teenager. Funny, lots of my kids are old enough to be parents but none are; she could have been a great, great grandmother.

I've only ever met her once and none of my kids have met her. My mum frightened me badly about her. I don't really know how bad she was but I think she was pretty terrible. I don't really feel anything about her dying, she's one of those people who has been dying for years and years and yet she outlived my grandfather.

She wasn't interested in being a grandmother. She was quite wealthy but I'm not expecting anything.

My mum isn't what you'd call a generous person and yet, I always have been. My mum's even commented on it.

I have a disability pension, which, while I have plenty of shame for needing it, I'm also so, so, so grateful and relieved to have. I usually do a lot of volunteer and creative work, but the last couple of years everything has crescendo'd on top of me, like a tsunami of symptomatic crap. I tried, I really tried, but triggers, triggers, triggers. I tried to study, changed my degree to Social Science, big mistake, too much triggeryness. I lost babies, a dog, friends to suicide. .... Sigh... I'm sad I won't get to go to the funerals now. My family and I are so disconnected.

Bye Grandad Mick! Bye Grandma Pat! By Pete! Bye Giselle! Bye Dawn! Bye Blossom! Bye Peanut, little guy, we miss you so! Bye Angel! Bye other baby who wasn't even an embryo yet! Bye our neighbor's 2 cats who were killed by neighbor-from-hells dogs!

Wow, lots of loss for only 2 years!

 

[AngelKeeperJ]

((( :hug: :hug: @mumstheword :hug::hug: )))
You are such a HUGE inspiration to me!!! You have been through SO MUCH, and are going through so much NOW, but you ALWAYS rise up to meet whatever comes your way! You are a TRUE "soul warrior" because your heart has grown SO much more than it ever "should have", given the wretched parenting you had!

You can't see (yet) the BEAUTIFUL and intricate "tapestry" of your life that has been woven together from all the threads of pain and sorrow that have been a huge part of your life. You ARE healiing, even when you can't feel it. I can see your beauty in my mind's eye, as it leaps out from your written words!

Your talent and creativity are a part of who you are and I look forward to "watching" as you open up more and more to the knowledge that you ARE LOVED, and are LOVEABLE! I am praying that you will be able to learn and absorb the FACT that you have a DEEP beauty that emotes from your soul. No matter how hard your ex tried to keep you down, he couldn't do it! You fought, and ARE fighting the HUGE odds against you, and your children are ALL going to have a HAPPY and HEALTHY Mum for their adult lives.

I LOVE reading about your interactions with your children! The good things in your life are EXACTLY what you deserve and I pray that it continues to get better and better.:hug:

(((THANK YOU))) for sharing your journey here with us, and for your supportive nature. The encouragement that you offer to others is a testament to how you have used your struggles to grow and learn. Your insight is invaluable to others who are struggling with PTSD. I know that I learn from you.

Keep up the GREAT work! ;)

Love, Hugs, and Prayers :inlove::hug:

 

[mumstheword]

Wo

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((( :hug: :hug: @mumstheword :hug::hug: )))
You are such...

Wow, I'm overwhelmed, but in a lovely way:shy::joyful:. I read your message out to my guy and he said "See!!! I told you!!!"
I'm working on absorbing the feedback. There's some cognitive dissonance going on but I do know that things have improved with some of my children and I'm very happy about it.:inlove:
Thank you @AngelkeeperJ :hug::hug::hug:

 

[mumstheword]

So, I'm trying to making inroads into my housecleaning and general housework avoidance issues. I know it comes from so much experience where I had threats on my life, much abuse and neglect, entrapment, very difficult living situations and much "enslaving" type treatment while I was in a domestic situation. There are so many horridnesses overlayed on top of one another.

This is one of my main focuses to address at the moment.

I don't even want to talk about it with my main T, she is primarily a sexual assault and childhood sexual assault T. I feel too much shame to even bring this up in T. Anyway she's been on leave for about 6 weeks and is away for another 4.

I got a call from her fill-in yesterday, but I declined to work with someone just filling in, about such sensitive stuff.

I still have my lovely trauma T. We are going in to housing on Tuesday to submit all my transfer application paperwork.

 

[mumstheword]

Walked with my son again :)
He is getting into hair, clothes and make up in a big way. He did his face up today. He follows some androgynous and gay fashion icons and hair and make up artists and models.
He looked good :)
He smiles a lot now and I heard him assertively saying to his little brother "well I don't care, I'll wear what I wanna wear" .
I've been encouraging him to give less f*cks about what people think and listen to what makes him happy and feel good in his skin.

He has a septum piecing, Crystal ear extenders and long long hair that he plaits elaborately or wears in a bun. He says he's a feminist and we have thoughtful discussions about the issues and respect each other's viewpoints.

I took my exogenous ketones yesterday and today.
I'm down from a whopping 87.3 kg to 84.9 in just a couple of days.
I'm definitely prioritizing my walks, weight loss and home life at the moment. I think it's a good approach for now.

Emotional symptoms are minimal.

Physically, I'm gonna have to work my way back from a really low point, but slow and steady does it. I'm accepting that. Gonna ask my trauma T about the trauma sensitive yoga teacher she knows about because "normal" yoga is too much for me at the moment.
I did get to a NIA class the other night though. It was good :)
Hopefully go next Tuesday night too.:)


I said no to sex last night for about the first time ever!
He was fine, just said "I love you" after I said I'm tired. So thanks @somerandomguy for talking about that issue. I was inspired and it felt good. I'm feeling really unattractive, self- conscious and uncomfortable about my weight and it's affecting my sexual desire. Entirely my issue and nothing to do with the way my partner treats me.

 

[Swift]

Woo hoo! Saying no! Big step.
I'm glad your son is getting more comfortable doing his thing.