I Grew Up With Violence And Never Expected To Live Past 21

[atl22]

I don't know how to start, of course. I have lived a very violent life in very dangerous neighborhoods. I never expected to live past 21. I have buried 12 friends, been shot at many times, stabbed twice, hospitalized a few times from beatings. I have been beaten so bad that I begged god to kill me from the pain and when I didn't die I lost faith in god and became very violent and extremely cruel to others. My father was also an alcoholic that beat me but that was nothing compared to the fear that I felt walking to and from school. I thought that I was very strong but I think that I have finally realized that I am not. I am having nightmares again and I wake up screaming and punching and trying to remember what is the present and what is the past.

For many years, I have thought of going to therapy but I kept putting it off. A few months ago, an old friend that was never involved with gangs was killed. I can't believe it. It has been very difficult to get over because I always thought that he would be fine. His death has made everything much more intense. I wish that I could say that I had gotten over my past, but to be honest, I think about violence every few minutes no matter where I am. I have flashbacks at the oddest moments, like reaching for a gallon of milk I remember a murder that I witnessed and I get lost sometimes when walking in the middle of the street. Sometimes I feel detached from myself and have to stop for a minute and convince myself that I am really alive, that this moment is real, and that I did not die.

I feel guilty that I survived while others did not so sometimes I put myself in dangerous situations so that I can take the chance that life will even things out and take me. So many of my good friends died while the evil ones lived that I became convinced by age 16 that only good people were killed, which made me act crazy and taunt death in order to prove to myself that I am a good person but each day that I lived made me believe that I was not good at all.

I take really hot showers so that when I get out the mirrors are too fogged up for me to see myself, my scars and tattoos that remind me of my past. I hate cold weather because it makes my scars itch. When I walk into any room, I look for weapons or what could be made into a weapon. I look for exits. If people get within 3 feet of me, I empty my hands and get ready to attack them. Any human is a threat to me. I grew up in tough neighborhoods where we were taught how to kill. Older gangmembers that had been in the military taught us what they had learned. We studied boxing, martial arts, knife-fighting, and I carried a gun for self-defense. We had no choice. Fight or get beaten was the rule. The day that I put down my gun was the scariest day of my life. I remember how light I felt and how empty and terrified.

I want to change and learn how to control my anger and not be violent. I want to have faith in humans again because I learned so young that every human is capable of murder. I live in a different city now but quite often I miss my old neighborhood and, in a sick way, I miss the violence because it helped me cope with my anger. Now I leave in a peaceful city but I am still the same. I am addicted to adrenaline, fear, and can block pain. I have just started to learn about PTSD and to search for a therapist to talk to because I am getting married to a normal person and I need to change. My screams at night freak her out and I almost punched her when she woke me up the other day. I know that I need help.

 

[goingonhope]

:hello: & Welcome to the Forum atl22, .........This: "I Grew Up With Violence And Never Expected To Live Past 21", sounds very very familiar. I'm glad you found the forum.

Haven't read past the title yet, but am soon to do so.


Hope

 

[goingonhope]

Well atl22, it seems like I should've read your post before commenting, but no matter, because I would've Welcomed you anyhow. Yes, you have most definately lived violence. I wish it could've been different for you. It's just the way it was, and it doesn't need to define you. Like you said yourself, it is your past.

Some time ago, upon this forum I was told that we learn from our mistakes, as well as, the mistakes of others and we can choose our direction from thereon, now and in our present. You can heal and recreate yourself. But, it certainly takes an awful lot of sweat and tears if possible and a whole new lifestyle change with much therapy. I really hope you find that therapy that you want and need.

I can identify with some of what you write.

I never expected to live past 21.

I too never expected to live past 21, so therefore never was much into attempting to plan anything for a future, because I didn't think there was a future with breath ahead for me.

Many of the experiences you've seen and had, I didn't, however the violence and threat of it daily was there. My father threatened to kill us girls on more then one occassion and then as he had a fetish with his knives and would sharpen them regularly before us while ranting on about mad stuff, we knew what he was capable of. He made sure he told us. And, there was lots of threats in home from being slaughtered like the animals he cut up to being chased and beaten and threatened with his bullwhip, belt and fists. My father too was an alcoholic.

I have been beaten so bad that I begged god to kill me from the pain and when I didn't die I lost faith in god

Me too. Only the pain was not much physical, as I was quite numb to my bodily feelings, rather it was tormenting in that my entire family circled around as it took place with one cheering it on and so forth, and my mother squatting down her face in mine and screaming that I f'n deserved it, even after I pleaded that I give up and you win. I wasn't giving up a physical fight, because I wasn't fighting I was being beaten, I was then willing to give them my soul, just to have them feel good that they had won it.

The nightmares they're terrorfying, there are no other words for it. I'm sure yours are just awful.

I wish that I could say that I had gotten over my past, but to be honest, I think about violence every few minutes no matter where I am.

atl22, you may have not yet got over your past, but you can and you can learn to live with and manage Ptsd, but it's gonna take a lot of hard work.

There is a handful more that I hear you loud and clear with but, I'm gonna wrap this up.

I feel guilty that I survived while others did not so sometimes I put myself in dangerous situations so that I can take the chance that life will even things out and take me.

This is the #1 thing that sought to destroy me. It was and still is this guilt that I've been left with having survived while leaving others behind (even though the others were abusive and some violently abusive,) they were my family and I had once loved them. I couldn't stomach watching them disappear into a vacant insane world of total spiritual bankruptcy, poverty and helplessness and crazy desperation, but not the kind of desperation that counted themselves in for ever seeking help. Rather it was the kind that just left them having disappeared from there existences and beings. They too experienced just way too much cruelty and brutality and indifference. My guilt of having escaped and survived then is the very worse thing I've ever had to deal with.

atl22, Again Welcome to this great forum! Read much and participate when you're ready.

goingonhope

 

[atl22]

Thank you for the reply. I was very happy to find this forum because I think that I will be able to find some ways of coping. I have already read a few articles and I plan on reading everything.

 

[goingonhope]

atl22, Sounds like a great plan, .....the reading and all. As you likely know already, there is a great deal of good helpful articles and stuff to read, hope you search for and find the reading materials that's gonna help you the most.

 

[atl22]

I'm going take a break from reading. Maybe I need to take it slow because I have been very emotional today after years of not feeling anything. I made a vow to god to stop crying when I was 12 after I had been to 5 funerals and I began to notice that the dirt they dug up from the graves was different at each funeral. At 12, I felt that I was a man already and I had to put aside the tears and only seek revenge. I didn't cry for many, many years. Today, I feel like I'm about to throw up.

After reading some other posts in Introductions, this seems "normal". I think it's because I have put this off for years and now I want to fix myself and I'm in too much of a hurry. After months of contemplating, I finally told my fiancee that I was going to go to therapy for PTSD - at least to get diagnosed for sure. It was at the weirdest moment when we were happy and getting along and for no particular reason, I just broke down and exploded with all these confessions of things that I had done to survive. I told her something that I had never told anyone and that I really never intended to tell her and now it's out. It was awkward because I couldn't explain why I broke down at that moment.

I've read in a few places that PTSD is not curable and it freaked me out. I'm scared as hell. My heart is beating too fast. Where did these emotions come from? It's not normal for me.

The main emotion that I have felt is anger. Anger is what kept me alive because I always felt that my own parents were out to get me killed by moving me to these areas where gangs dominated. I would always tell my mother not to buy me any blue clothes because it would get me shot but she liked blue, so she would ignore me and every Christmas I would get more blue clothes that I couldn't wear without getting a bullet to the brain. Anger kept me alive because I refused to give in. I would think constantly "I'm not going to die here". That was my mantra starting at about age 7. I would say it over and over and over. I was determined to survive to spite my own parents. Anger and spite kept me alive.

I remember when I changed. It was after I was jumped, beaten, and thrown down a flight of stairs. I woke up in the ER and everything was puffed up and in pain and doctors were all around me. They were holding me down because I was frantically trying get away. They kept telling me not to look and they were trying to put this piece of cloth over my face so they could work on it. The cloth had a hole in it so they could work on my face and still prevent me from looking. Even though every movement was excruciating, I never gave up. I managed to move so that I could see through the hole and I saw the doctor just inches from my face with a 6 inch needle. I saw a nurse looking at me and I will never forget her look. It was a mixture of shock, disgust, and pity. I was trying to talk but my mouth was split open and had to be stitched closed.

They shot me up and I went unconscious and suddenly everything was black and I was falling in an endless pit. There was no light at the end of the tunnel but falling there with me was a short, razor-thin beam of light. I stretched my whole body out and reached for it but it was just beyond my grasp. I never gave up. I remember thinking how sharp the light looked and I felt that if I grabbed it, it would just cut off my fingers like a razor. I grabbed it anyway and I finally woke up. I was the new me.

I think that I need to find someone to talk to soon. Slow, right? Slow. I'm not fixing myself anytime soon.

 

[Nishkaa]

Welcome atl22.

Holy Smokes-- have you ever been through the ringer! I grew up with guns in the house, but they were more contained there, less of a problem in the neighbourhood at that time. Yeah, an unpleasant fatality.

I feel pretty angry though about the violence that errupts in my neighbourhood from time to time, and I totally get feeling angry; it also brings out rage in me, that's challenging to contain. There was a shooting in my building's lobby a couple of years back. Goofs, and I do mean "goofs" flashing their damn weapons. I've also experienced neighbourhood violence in having survived a couple of assaults, by strangers out there (that also makes me recall feeling rage); and I've also seen family members return from "out there", even a cop doing a bad number, abuse of force, violent assault to my brother who was mentally ill at the time, etc.

It's hard to settle down from rage, I feel it by my own experiences and my own brushes with others on the other side of the law-- rage. But man you've certainly experienced things in the extreme.

I have to think just how amazing it is, that in love with your girlfriend, how much you are willing to commit to healing from these horrible things that have happened in your neighbourhood and to you.

My roommate was out on the streets for several years, he often comments that he's "buried most of his friends" and it seems like he's "the last one standing", if it wasn't the drugs that took them some other unforseen bad even.

There are some healthy ways to deal with rage, help release that energy safely (not involving you being in the ring either).

By the sounds of it, you are one hell of survivor! I'm crammed into a small apartment, a one bedroom with two roommates, one including my brother (real, biological brother), and I like this better than living in the projects, because that would drive me totally batty-- I can't tolerate that anymore. I find some peace, exercise in the great outdoors, hiking, biking MTB and even better if it's far away from the city!

I'm glad you survived and you have arrived-- that's quite amazing and it sounds like it was meant to be that way. My roommate survived, he "walked before he had to run", "last man standing" he writes his songs as tribute to those he lost; last person to tell the stories.

You write very well by the way and in a way that is very present and very authentic. Sometimes when we walk away from it (and stay away from it! :) ), on a new road, some undiscovered gifts arrive, learning and discovering new talents.

I've got some not nice pictures in my mind, I've been learning ways that help them get unstuck from me. EMDR therapy might help you in the future with some of that? I've been able to do it with breathing techniques and "grounding strategies" which have gradually helped reduce their sticking, they're more distant images than landing right on top of me and consumming me, that's what I've been noticing lately anyhow.

I love it when others can survive such truly horrible and wretched stuff, to be able to come out the other side and thrive.

I know you will thrive; you've got a pretty good handle on a lot of stuff.

All the Best,
I'll see you around here,
Cheers,
~Nishkaa

 

[atl22]

I have to think just how amazing it is, that in love with your girlfriend, how much you are willing to commit to healing from these horrible things that have happened in your neighbourhood and to you.

I think that she is the only reason that I am willing to do this. I do not think that I would be willing to do this if it were not for her. I have seen the pain that I cause her when I lose my temper and I can't take causing her pain. I feel guilty for days afterward and I always vow to never do it again but I do not have the tools to stop. I have been promising for years to go to "anger management" counseling but, thinking about what I have experienced, I think it's PTSD.

For years, I have just kept myself busy - obsessively - with work. I can not sleep unless I work myself to exhaustion. I work in architecture, so I draw, make models, furniture and art. This has been my only coping tool for the past 20 years. When I stop working, I think about bad things. Even when I sleep, it is only for a few hours and the slightest noise wakes me up. If someone wakes me up, I start swinging. In a huge brawl when I was about 15, someone got behind me and almost slit my throat, so I have a serious phobia about protecting my neck at all times and I can only sleep with my neck tucked in down to my chest.

I want to find coping mechanisms and I have already read about some on this site that I am going to try. It seems that I need to be more conscious of the things that I am doing rather than being an automaton.

We were trained to ignore pain when I was young. "Pain is a message. Accept the message and move on." They would punch us and stab us with sharp objects and make us chant that phrase. We were taught ways of acknowledging that pain is just a way for our body to tell us something is wrong. Once our minds accept that, pain can be ignored. Lately, I have been trying to teach myself to move myself away from feeling pain. For example, I've found myself sitting with my leg against a sharp object that causes pain. It doesn't bother me. I don't even really notice it. But intellectually, I know that there is pain and that I would be more comfortable if I moved my leg away. Twenty minutes later, my leg is still there. Is it too much of an effort to move my leg? Yeah, I don't see the difference. It's just pain - it's nothing nothing nothing. I've been trying to feel comfort and not ignore pain. It's a tremendous effort. I fail almost every day.

I'm going to read more about EMDR, which seems to work with people that have had similar experiences. I'm still trying to get to the point of acknowledging that I have experienced trauma and that I am not just being a weak, little crybaby but I have had to admit that I am not fully in control of myself. It works with images? I had a traumatic experience that I associate with sound. My friend and I crossed a line to get sandwiches. He got his first and went outside. I asked for extra pepper and when the guy was shaking it on my sandwich, my friends was shot through the eye and died. Now, every time that I hear shaking of salt/pepper, I have flashbacks. It's just every day, multiple times per day. I want it to stop. Could EMDR help me with that?

I have a lot of trauma associated with food. Pepper, as I just wrote, and which I obsessively ate to remind myself that I was still alive. Pepper gave me life, literally. I saw my first stabbing at 7 when we were cutting up watermelon. I continued to eat my slice of watermelon as the paramedic wiped the blood off my leg. I was nearly killed over donuts when my friend dragged me across a line to get donuts and I got clubbed with a pipe. So, yeah, pepper, watermelon, donuts mean too much to me.

This forum is helping me but it is difficult to open up these old wounds. There has been a sick feeling in my stomach for the past three days.

 

[goingonhope]

I've been trying to feel comfort and not ignore pain. It's a tremendous effort. I fail almost every day.

It's pretty powerful for me to read this comment, because who generally considers this stuff anyways; It's good to. Myself, I have done as you do and seldom if ever go out of my way to make myself comfortable. This has allowed me to accomplish amazing amounts of work and other things in which I wish to, all while in a great deal of pain.

Unless my pain is quite severe from my neglect to do anything about it, I don't even seem to feel it or bother with it. Therefore I don't seem to notice the warning signs until I have some serious problem on my hands and that, in itself, will cause or escalate my anxiety, and then it's often too late for me to think straight as to what on earth I should do for relief. And, I just seem to cause myself all sorts of problems resulting from ignoring pain. So atl22 you make a really good point of both desiring to and needing to put forth the efforts to make a change, and do something that makes you feel comfortable. A really important point and good stuff.

I'm pretty sure that being conscious of this stuff is the first step, and then choosing to do something to make that change and to seek some comfortability is not only helpful and most productive, but is a contradiction that will, at one point in time or another, cause and allow often painful frozen emotions to surface and be felt. So it would stand to reason why some, like myself, might for a time blindly avoid making any change, taking care of oneself, or doing something to ease physical discomfort or pain while doing something to permit oneself to feel comfortable.

For me it's like a dilemma, I feel like I lose if ignoring my body and I feel like I lose if doing good stuff for my body. It's that good stuff that really wakes up the chatter-box in my head nagging me that I don't deserve this, and I don't deserve that, but I certainly deserve to be uncomfortable, feeling powerless and even feeling miserable. I guess I tend to punish myself once again, and most especially over this past year.

atl22, I understand what you mean when you say, "tremendous effort", and I fail at this almost every day.

Me too.

It is great that you're aware of this and that you're making decisions and trying to feel some comfort every day while not ignoring pain. If emotions and any kind of negative thoughts come up for you as you go beyond trying and get to doing this regularly, then the forum is a great place to help you process this process. Now that I'm aware of just what I've been doing to myself, as well, I'm going to borrow what you're doing, and do it for myself as well.

Hey atl22, keep up the good work, and I enjoy reading here.

Take Care.
goingonhope

 

[atl22]

goingonhope:

I got your message but I didn't know how to respond with that message system, so I decided to post here. I am doing ok right now, just a little emotional but that must be normal, I think. I am searching for a local PTSD therapist and I hope to call a few places on Monday. My fiancee seems much happier the past two days, but I know that if I don't follow through, she will be really upset and eventually leave me. I want to do this for myself, too, so it will happen.

I'm worried about "triggers". I have too many and the main problem is that I still have friends that are involved in that life. I rarely talk to them but from time to time I hear bad news and it is hard to overcome what is still happening. And my tattoos...do I have to cover them? They remind me of bad things and it would be nice to be able to go swimming again with my family and not be too afraid to take off my shirt and feel humiliated.

Thank you for sharing your story with me. It has really helped me start this process. For the most part, I have known that others must be experiencing similar things that I have but I have never talked to anyone that has. I will keep you updated after I call some places on Monday. I hope to go in as soon as possible. Nightmares are really bad right now. I told my fiancee not to wake me up, just stand back, throw a pillow at me.

Weird. I asked my fiancee if she thought that I had PTSD. She said yes. I was hoping she would say no. I don't know why but that makes me sad.

 

[Tinyflame]

Yes, I have 2 categories: 'manageable' or 'collapse'. When I think about it so did all my family members. Physically and emotionally.

Yes, Hope I think self-awareness is the first thing that has to be learned then self-permission given/ self-care/ self-soothing, whether we feel "worth it" or not. Even accepting other's care, too, if it exists. Some of us have never done that (well).

 

[goingonhope]

Hi :hello:atl22, Glad to hear you're alright. Oh' ya', ....A little emotional is good! It's progress, ....it's an improvement to being completely on auto pilot.

You said Monday was the day for health related phone calls and any such related actions required thereafter; Please remember this if you log on to the forum tommorrow. As outside of meeting basic needs, it sounds to me as if "First things first" will be, seeing to it ......that, you don't have to go through so much alone. There's help for you somewhere (In The Present), and it's just waiting for you to find it. Please stay strong, seek and find it ASAP.

I know you said that you feel weak, and this is good too. It is in these feelings of weakness that you can find the help you also deserve. If you didn't feel weak, likely there would be no motivation to go looking for support, or your diagnosis, or professional help.

There are more gifts in life, (In the Present) for us to notice, then many of us generally ever recognize and see.

atl22, it's good news that you want to do this for yourself as well as your fiancee, however I suggest you do it whether you want to or not.

......And, because it meets your most real needs; and this is very good! Sometimes we're on track only to later fool ourselves with what the chatter-box in our head thinks, and it likes to appeal to our emotions telling us that because I don't want to do it any longer, .....I'm not going to, .....It's not worth it, .....It's not helping, .....I don't have to, You can't make me.

The problem with this is too often because of (Our Past) identification with too much self-destruction and other destructiveness, in our very minds, and through many a thought and behaviors, we tend to quit on ourselves before we accept the unfamiliar; Way too much violence too often has swallowed many a parts of us through repeated traumas and neglect, and sometimes we don't, for a period of time, have access to all parts of ourselves.

So through our vigilance to our management of Ptsd, and healing efforts and recovery efforts, much progress is made and often there is an opening of doors as well. Without others, much needed support and finding professional help, even our hopes may some days start to look like some bad idea or something; After too much time with ourselves and any nagging negativity and self-talk, ....All begins once again to appear real.

atl22, It's good to hear how happy your fiancee is these last couple days. Sounds as if you're sharing parts of you, as well as, your intended direction and resulting new hopes with her.

You've begun to share so much with us, and it is a pleasure to feel a part of listening as you begin to expose, begin to release, and further understand the natures of the toxicity that has been propelling you into destructive ways all these yrs.

You're no longer alone atl22, I trust that you're and will be meeting more friends here within the forum and outside of it in the real world as you continue, continue, continue to surrender to your past. Don't bother fighting any of it. Chances are you do very likely have Ptsd and you'll find out so, and so what?

Now, another door is opening in your life, as will more, and as you continue to seek healing, and exposure, or other therapies, and forms of management of trauma, and/or Ptsd, I trust you will find yourself.

And, I'm betting that it will all be worth it.

atl22, Thinking well of you and wishing you my best. Keep up the good work!


Sincerely,
goingonhope