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Sufferer New Here, Not Sure What Category I Fit In But I Have A Life Story.

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Hello. Please, call me Ash.

I'm new to this, and I'm not quite sure where on the scale I fall or which thread to focus on because I have several issues that I can't quite place or understand.

In my personal experience, seeing my therapist does not help much because my memories are so fragmented, there isn't enough time in a session to address the whole story, and meds have only ever made me worse. Often I find the only way I find peace is by speaking with others who have experienced similar things and can relate instead of saying that I worry or obsess too much over things I cannot control.

I am only 23 but my problems stem from a full lifetime of problems which have been bottled and suppressed to the point where I no longer know what to work through or focus on. Despite the loss of memories, I've pieced together quite an extensive timeline of events so I apologize in advance that this post is quite long.

So I suppose I should start from the beginning. I don't remember a lot of things, and my grandmother often tries to reassure me that my childhood had happy moments too, she shows me pictures and tells me stories but I only ever get flashbacks of the negative. My grandparents took me in when I was 10 years old, under circumstances I will explain, and they were essentially my parents. My Mother and Grandfather both passed away when I was 18 and I often struggle because I don't have anyone to ask questions to truly understand where my problems started.

One of my earliest memories is of my step-father. My mother married him when I was two, she was only 20 as she was a young single mother, and they had a daughter shortly after (my sister, who I once hated but now am very close with). Their marriage lasted only three years, they were never divorced but were separated until the day my mother died.
My step-father was an emotionally abusive man. The first thing he ever taught me was not to ask questions, asking questions he didn't want to answer or he considered stupid always ended in me getting yelled at. And I don't just mean raised-voices, I mean thoroughly angry glutteral yelling, the sort that makes a young child cry. He would feed me things like fish eyeballs or beer because he thought my look of disgust was hilarious. I would spend the weekend with my grandparents, and when it was time to go home I would sob hysterically because I was afraid of him. I resented my sister for years because "Daddy didn't love me, but he treated her like an angel" and I had no idea at the time that he wasn't really my father. He treated my mother poorly and looking at pictures it was obvious she starved herself and worked very hard to make sure my sister and I could eat. Unfortunately this meant she survived on cigarettes and drank alcohol to dull the pain.

Eventually my mother had enough, she saw what he was doing to me and that was the last straw. She never thought much of herself, a man could do whatever they wanted with her but not with her children. With my grandparent's support she managed to leave him, they never divorced but she left. He demanded visiting rights with "his girls" and even took it to court to get those rights, until I was 6 years old and finally gathered the nerve to tell Mum that I didn't want to see him any more. He had a right to my sister, but not me, and in a sense I abandoned her because that's when he started mistreating her. He would punish her by dumping cold water on her to shut her up when she cried, and he would ignore her when she tried to talk to him.

Around this same time I met my real father. I was over the moon, I had a real dad who loved me! I had two more sisters and a brother! Life was great!

Little did I know that my father was an aggressive drunken jailbird and I would rarely see my other siblings. My father was and still is an incredibly charming person if you sit and talk with him, IF you can sit and talk with him. When he was around he was a good dad, but therein lies the problem... when he was around. He would disappear, he wouldn't call, and on his weekends to visit with me he often just wouldn't show up. It was only as I got older that I learned that most times when he didn't pick me up it was because he was serving time in jail. For driving drunk or without a license, for getting in to bar fights, destruction of property, possession of drugs and for domestic abuse, the list goes on.

From age 6 to 7 my mother lived with another boyfriend of hers, and I have only one memory of this time. My mother and this boyfriend had gotten in to a massive fight, so bad that my mother had hidden the knives in the laundry and I can't to this day say what really happened. I only remember a police officer coming in to the bedroom of my sister and I and telling us that we needed to go. They carried us out of the apartment in our nightgowns and blankets, the floor was covered with shattered glass and blood, and we were taken to a foster home for a week. I later found out that my mother had been admitted to a psychiatric unit for analysis and my Grandparents were the ones who tracked us down when she called them saying her kids had been taken away. We were not in foster care long, but the couple who took us in were very nice people. They clothed us and tried to make sure we were okay. The older gentleman taught me how to play chess because it helped me to focus, but mostly I spent my time reassuring my sister that everything would be okay. She had a stuffed dog, Wishbone from the tv show, and it had lost its nose so they helped her sew a button on as a new nose and it made her trust them.

After this we stayed with my grandparents for a short time, we went to school and we had friends and a normal life for about a year. During this time my mother was trying to get back on her feet. She had quit drinking, she had a full time job and was renting a house in the hopes that she could get her children back and have a normal life. All went well and she did regain custody of us, the first couple of months were great, it was girls night every night and she even tried taking us to church to do the 'right thing'. But then my own father came back in to the picture... he was out of jail and he was making promises to be a better man, my mother still loved him and dreamed of having a complete family so she took him in to help him get back on his feet.

This was one of her worst decisions ever. Shortly after he moved in with us the drinking started again with both of them. He would use my mother to pay for his alcohol, he even took out cash withdrawls at the grocery store so she wouldn't know he was stealing from her, and my mother being an addict just drank and didn't realize it was happening. Eventually they started fighting, almost every day, and I can distinctly recall one evening in particular. My sister, her friends and myself were sitting in the basement when we heard a loud thud from upstairs. I, being the oldest, went upstairs to investigate only to find my parents screaming and beating on eachother, my mother was thrown to the ground, she then got up and smashed a bottle over dad's head, they were both bruised and bloody. I don't remember what they were fighting about but dad noticed me and screamed at me to get back downstairs. I then had to go back down and explain to my sister's friends that it wasn't safe for them to leave yet. On another night shortly after they were fighting again, and all I can remember is sitting at the bannister upstairs holding my little sister and telling her everything would be okay while she cried and I held back tears for fear of scaring her. That Christmas was the same, and most weeks after as things got worse.

Ultimately we didn't even live with with Mum for a year before Children's Aid removed us from her custody again. This time though, we were separated. My grandparents had sold their house and were running a restaurant/resort in a small town 7 hours away in partnership with my aunt and uncle, they couldn't handle us both. My sister's grandparents from her dad's side were working full-time and didn't have the space for both of us either. I went with my grandparents and she went with hers. We saw each other maybe once or twice per year for the next 8 years, we didn't really get along so it was ultimately for the best, but when we were separated she screamed and cried for me because I was more of a mother to her than our Mum had been.

During my time with my grandparents things were okay, they did everything that they could to make up for everyone else's mistakes and they tried to make as much time for me as they could but it eventually became hard. Not one year after they took me in, my aunt and uncle abandoned us. They went in to this business with my grandparents but one morning we heard some commotion and went downstairs to find that there was a moving truck there. We didn't know why, Gran tried to ask my aunt (her daughter) what was going on but she simply turned her back and walked out the door, she abandoned her family without a word. We only heard from them when it was time to renew the business liquor license and they didn't want us to have it, they made it as hard as possible and we even had to shut down temporarily.

Another year passed, I attended a small school where I was in a class of 12 kids, most of which were cousins or had been friends since birth. It was a small town and as a result I was often the black sheep, I was pressured to steal alcohol from my grandparent's bar just to be accepted in to their group. I fell in with the "wrong crowd" because there was no other crowd to fall in with. They made me so depressed that I once considered suicide, I even mentioned it once and they egged me on, but ultimately I couldn't do that to my grandparents because they had already been through so much.

While I was living with them, my mother had gotten herself in to another bad relationship. This man was as old as my grandfather, scrawny as a beanpole, but he had money. He was the sort of man who couldn't function in the morning without a glass of wine, he would bring it to work in a sealed travel mug, and because of this my Mum stayed with him. He enabled her to indulge in her addictions, she could do whatever she wanted, but he had a history of domestic abuse and of course he eventually started hitting Mum. He would threaten to paint the walls with her cat who he despised and the alcohol made him unnaturally strong because there was no pain. One night they had gotten in to a fight, and from what I was told he had her in a headlock so she grabbed whatever was within reach on the coffee table and tried to beat him off with it. It was a broken paint scraper, it had a very sharp edge and because he was so thin it punctured right in to him. Mum said she thought he had just passed out from being drunk because there was no blood, but it turned out that he was dead. One of the punctures had done enough damage to stop his heart. My mother was originally charged with first degree murder, his blood alcohol level was so hogh that a man his size should have been unconscious, but he did have a history of alcoholism and abuse so the charges were eventually dropped to manslaughter. I was 13 years old when I was told that my mother had killed a man, I was the daughter of an alcoholic killer and an absent jailbird is what I thought at the time.

Fast forward three years, Mum had finished her sentence, she had completed AA and been to a therapist regularly and completed psych reviews. She even did schooling and got a degree in horticulture while she was in jail, we thought that she was finally going to have a future when she got out.

At first all went well, she was in a halfway house and they helped her to find a stable job gardening at a golf course nearby. She had friends who were there for her and she had met a decent man who seemed to care about her well-being. Until everything came crashing down... I was 17 at this point and we were on good terms. She had taken me to get my driver's license and we worked a small landscaping business together during the summer, all seemed great. I knew that her boyfriend smoked weed but it was never a problem, however I discovered that while he was doing this he had gotten her in to it... which led her straight back to the alcohol, weed waan't numbing enough.
I was visiting for a week when one night I found she had drank a whole bottle of wine. She didn't think she'd had enough, she said she wasn't drunk so she was going to go to the store for more. I knew rhis wasn't good so while she wasn't looking I took her keys. When she realized I took them she became furious, she grabbed me by the hand I held them in and twisted saying "I will break your fingers if you don't give me the keys little girl. I'm the mother here, you listen to me." and when I didn't give them up she twisted harder. My fingers didn't break but this is when she decided twisting wasn't enough, she grabbed me by the throat and she squeezed, she threatened me again and her boyfriend threw her off me but she had the keys... she was gone.

After this I immediately went back home, she called two days later sobbing and begging for forgiveness, she told me how much she loved me and that she was sorry for what she'd done but I couldn't trust her again. I couldn't talk to her after what she'd done to me, it wasn't until several months later at Christmas that I saw her again because my sister and grandparents asked me to as a gift to them, they wanted a family Christmas. I hugged her empty-hearted, I tried to smile, yet couldn't help but notice the glass of wine on the table. She still hadn't given it up even after all of that.

Some more time passes, now I'm 18 years old and it's Mother's day. Neither my sister or I had called her. She was still speaking to Gran so they had a video chat but Mum never heard from her children... the next day she had a few drinks and it wasn't enough so she drove to a bar where they turned her away for being drunk. She left in a hurry before the cops could come arrest her, she didn't even buckle her seatbelt, and just a few kilometers down the road she crashed in to a ditch, there were no others involved. She was propelled through the windshield and was dead on site, she never stood a chance. We recieved a call from her boyfriend at 1 in the morning sobbing, Mum was dead.

That following December Grandad also died. The only man in my life who had ever been there for me, my father figure and one of very few people I could rely on. He had multiple myeloma, a rare form of cancer that infects every part of the body, and I spent two weeks sitting by his bedside with my Gran watching him die. I skipped my college classes to be there and took an extra week following his death to help Gran sign cremation papers. I returned to classes just in time for exams and somehow still managed to pass, but I hadn't cried yet.

Now it's just me and Gran, she was very depressed and even had her own stint at drinking, but when she did she really only sat and watched her Cliff Richard vhs and cried herself to sleep. This strong woman who always did everything she could to help had crumbled... her husband was dead, her two youngest children were dead (son died in '96 from cancer) and her oldest daughter had abandoned us. I was all she had left, my sister lived far away and we had been disconnected for so long.

Fast forward another year and now I'M the one in an emotionally abusive relationship. The man I was with had a horrible temper, and I always said "It's fine, he never directs it at me." I made all the usual excuses that women do. It wasn't until I had graduated college and ended up on disability for anxiety and depression that I started to realize what was happening. Then one Christmas Eve my sister is visiting, she's 7l6 mo ths pregnant so I want to keep her away from too much stress. BF starts to become a problem at home so we go for a drive, the roads are wet and it's foggy and we ultimately end up in a car accident. The first one I had ever been in, my car was sideways in a ditch, I immediately got my sister out and we called 911. She checked out fine, baby was fine, neither of us had whiplash, I had a cut on my finger from broken glass. I had to call him to come and pick us up from the station though, and he was high as a kite. He never asked if we were okay, there was a fight in the car on our way home and when we made it back he ripped right in to me for crashing MY car. He then turned on my sister, started screaming at her, called her a disgusting wh*** and at this point I took her away to call and get her a ride home. Through this relationship I smoked weed to keep myself calm and essentially shove my head in the sand.

When my sister had her daughter I did my detox, I stayed with her for three weeks. When she went in to labour I coached her through it because it went so fast her planned coach didn't make it. I cut the umbilical cord and it was the most amazing (and in a way disgusting) thing I had ever experienced. I realized then that I couldn't smoke any more because it was a crutch and I needed to get the heck away from my bad relationship if I ever hoped to have a future.

My next relationship I thought was good, he was a decent guy and he seemed to care, but at the end of 1 year he had no commitment and it turned out that all I was to him was a sex toy. Someone to play with on the weekends and have on his arm like a trophy when we went to car shows. The moment I needed his help he was gone, I ended up in crippling debt trying to keep myself afloat. I felt stupid for never realizing that I was being used, it was right in front of me.


NOW I am in a healthy relationship with a wonderfully patient and understanding man who simply hugs me when I'm having a panic attack and does what he can to help. I have an awesome roomate who pulls his weight and also puts up with my mood swings. These two are my best friends and my support.
I have an incredibly strong bond with my little sister now, her daughter is almost 2 and I'm incredibly proud of her for doing it all on her own to keep her daughter from harm. That little girl and her mom are the brightest lights in my life.

Despite all of this and my current stability, I still can't "get over" the things that have happened. I've tried for a long time to forgive people for their actions and I can't, I still keep dwelling on them. I have a deep-rooted fear of yelling and conflict, I end up in tears even if it's someone across the room yelling at someone else and it doesn't involve me. I am psycially incapable of yelling or screaming, my voice just cuts out. I'm terrified because I'm starting to understand how my mother ended up where she is and how easy it could have been, or could be, me now that I'm older. I can't drink or smoke weed casually, I have an addictive personality and I cling to anything that makes me feel 'something' so I've learned the hard way not to even try, but I see how easy it is to fall. I'm terrified of ever having my own children because the last thing in the world I want is to cause a child to experience anything like I did, and I don't feel like I'm strong enough to do that. I'm constantly afraid that I'm standing on the line between success and failure and one simple step could send me tumbling down the same path. A simple argument has, at times, landed me in the hospital for an anxiety attack.

I don't really know what to make of my own experiences, there's a lot of hurt and resentment and I don't know how to let it all go. I know there are good memories in there somewhere, but I can't find them. I apologize for the novel, but I 100% appreciate anyone who can sit and read it all.
 
Hello. Please, call me Ash.

I'm new to this, and I'm not quite sure where on the scale I fall o...
Hi Ash Thanks for the post. Welcome to this forum
It is a long story and i'm sure it took a lot of courage to come and post it here to a bunch of people you have never had anything to do with. I'm glad you had the strength to write it. The life we have to live as children of addicted parents. They are hurting also that is why this all happens. Don't get me wrong I am not excusing there actions, They were and are guilty of a lot of crimes against children. I have shelter 3 teenaged boys that went though the same up bring you did add in sexual abuse and violence. I had many long nights spent holding on to them through all of the bad nights. They were scared of almost everything lots of waking up screaming and crying. they were all scared of the dark and night lights weren't enough. I'm sorry for all your pain and trauma. You have come to a place were you will find good caring supportive people. You will meet lots of others I'm sure over time that share those terrible experiences. There is a way to many of you out there you will not feel alone in your healing any more. I proud to have read your story and I do fell your pain.
Peace be safe
 
Hello. Please, call me Ash.

I'm new to this, and I'm not quite sure where on the scale I fall o...

Hi. I'm new here too. A lot (not all) of what you went through, I did too. This is my first time replying to anyone. I decided when I was a kid I wouldn't have kids. I'd say, "cause my parents are assholes", I don't want to spread that gene. A couple years ago I found out it was ptsd so there is no "bad genes" to spread. I still don't want kids. I'm not sure if that is good or not. Life is easier. All my friends with kids tell me they love their kids, but if they could do it all over again, they would at least wait until they are older. It's definitely a struggle at times for them. No free time or spare money. I'm not trying talk anyone into anything, just relaying facts. Kids aren't for everyone.
Not sure if it's a ptsd thing, but it's been 30 years for me and I still can't let things go. If I let myself dwell on it I get all hot and angry. My secret, I guess, is distraction. Good music, a fresh breeze, best (dog) friend, and weed will change my mood. I've smoked weed for 24 years now. Never knew I was self medicating until I found out I have ptsd. When you get used to it, you can be fully functional. No one ever even knows I'm high (unless I want them to). I have a buddy that's always down on himself to quit smoking it, but never does. So he's just always beating himself up. I try to tell him to except himself for who he is. There are much worse things to be addicted to. Anyway in my experience, time will fade the memories. Memories may never leave completely, but it gets easier every day. And for bad days, distraction is key. Here I am at 3am distracting myself, I feel better already. I should thank you. I am always up this late, usually it's tough to find something to do. I hope everything works out for you. You fought a long, hard, battle. Good Job! Now just keep it up. I hope this helps.
 
Hi. I'm new here too. A lot (not all) of what you went through, I did too. This is my first time replying...
Thanks for the post IPaul. Welcome you did a good job for your first post. I'm new here too. I'm proud for you. I'm sorry for the pain and trauma you had to go through to get here.This is a good safe place to express yourself and find answers. It is 1;37 am here and I'm most likely up for night. Sleep has been elusive for me for a long time now. There are lots of others here with similar experience but most of us suffer the same symptoms and problems with everyday life. So it is a good place to answer those questions you have.
It is amazing to me how long it took me to realize I was self medicating with alcohol and cannabis My dr. total me that was what I had been doing since I was very young. I started to drink at about 11 and was known as the drunken paper boy at 12 into hard drugs at 14 or 15. I managed to get away from the hard drugs and drank and smoked weed only then my dr. got me to stop alcohol and use opioids for pain I hated them and a ready had to much trouble in my past. So about 5 years or so I went only on cannabis and I feel better for it. I started to have the odd drink but I never drink to excess anymore 1 is usually it. all of the trauma i experienced or can remember at this time happened between the age of 4 and 22 and I'm 62 now so I have self medicated for a long time most of my life.
Thanks again for the post. I hope you were able to get some sleep.
I'm around a lot right now so if you want to talk the coffee is on.
Remember it is not only you that needs to talk, so does every other person here.
Welcome
Peace be safe
 
Thank you for your kind responses, all of you. I'm glad that sharing myself encouraged someone else to speak out as well and I'm proud of you for doing it. It definitely took some courage to tell my story, in all honesty it took me a few hours and quite a lot of tears to get it all typed out, but afterwards I had a few moments of peace and I felt better getting it out somewhere that I wouldn't be judged.

I certainly didn't realize that I was self medicating at first. I have spoken with others who smoke and for some it's the best thing that they could do for themselves, I personally found that I became dependent on it to numb myself instead of facing my problems. It caused me to spend more time moping around at home, hating the idea of going out, and although I didn't necessarily feel worse I couldn't motivate myself to do anything with my life. In a sense I was functional, I'd smoke and then go visit my grandmother and she never suspected a thing, I even used to smoke before work and nobody knew any different. It became expensive though, and my usage just kept increasing because it was never quite enough to dull the pain, I noticed my reflexes degrading and I developed tremors in my hands (which at the time was very bad, I was in college for the sciences and regularly had to handle volatile substances.) Having a clear head is extremely hard some days, but I know I'm not able to do things in moderation so it's for the best.

With my sister's encouragement I hunted down some family who could connect me with the aunt and uncle who left us. I sent them a simple email asking if they would be willing to meet with my sister and I to discuss what had happened so we could ask some questions and hear their side. I posed a few small questions within the email so they'd have an idea where it was going, asking why they left and why they never tried to contact us until my Grandfather was on his deathbed (My aunt sent an email asking say her goodbyes 2 days before he passed, he had been in palliative care for weeks already and at that point was in a medically induced coma. Gran said "She said her goodbyes when she turned her back on us" so I left it at that and never responded out of respect for my grandparents.)
They responded to me this morning and unfortunately I was met with suspicion and resentment. As it turns out they are the sort of people who hold a grudge against children for things they were not responsible for and they immediately spoke ill of my grandparents and sister (who was 8 last they saw her). My uncle called me delusional, said that nothing was their fault and that I was brainwashed by my grandparents. My aunt said that Gran told her to leave and that she wasn't family. They tried to contest things that I had even seen with my own eyes, including the bankruptcy my grandparents had to claim to escape that business.

I called my Gran to speak with her regarding this, and her reaction was genuine shock. She choked up and couldn't believe that they had said that, she sounded genuinely hurt. She has always considered family the most important thing in her life, and I don't believe she ever would have told my aunt that, especially not without reason. Gran of course went down memory lane, and I learned more details about their relationship which helped me to feel more secure in my decision not to speak with them again. Gran doesn't like doctors and is a hermit for the most part these days, I've sat with her while she drank and reminisced about the good and the bad for hours on end. I've been the only person she could talk to about her past, and I feel like after 12 years if she was lying to me something in her stories wouldn't have lined up by now. Her memories are exactly the same sober, drunk, and years apart in being shared.

However, as poorly as it all went, I do feel like I can close that door behind me. Whether it's the whole truth or not, it made it easier to simply accept that they were rotten people and I'm better off that they left so long ago. At the end of the day, Gran was always there for me and they weren't. I'm sure the resentment for them will still creep up from time to time, they hurt Gran very badly in the past and she is one of the few people who ever truly mattered to me, but I don't have questions any more. One tiny piece of closure in a gigantic puzzle I suppose, but it's something.

I am often awake with nothing to do late at night because the world goes quiet after dark, my BF works a late shift so isn't home between 2pm and 2am. I'm not good at holding conversations, but I'm going to make an effort to talk here, and to check in on others as well. I would like to be a support as much as a sufferer here.
 
Thanks for the post IPaul. Welcome you did a good job for your first post. I'm new here too. I'm prou...

I didn't realize you replied to me. They need a "you've been mentioned" alert on here for when someone types your name. Anyway thanks for reading and for the kind words. I'm proud of you too, brother. Thanks for sharing your story. I haven't met many people who can say they have had ptsd longer than me. I also haven't met many people WITH ptsd. Luckily I got my mind clear enough replying to Ash the other night, I slept shortly after visiting here. I'm sure we'll talk again, I look forward to it.
 
Thank you for your kind responses, all of you. I'm glad that sharing myself encouraged someone e...

Hi Ash. Sometimes it feels better just to get closure and move on. It does for me, for sure. I found that the people I CHOOSE to call family are way better than actual family. I'm down to one best friend of 30 years (this year). Another BF lives across the country. The distant friend is questionable after our election (I refuse to talk politics on here). Also a couple close cousins a few hours away. That's it, that's my fam. I have my girlfriend of 15 years and 2 dogs I live with that make life better. It's all good.
I still am not going to try to talk anyone into anything. Weed does have different types. Some is more awake type, and some sleepy type. Personally I can function on both. Some people can't. If I puff way too much, I'll get lazy. You just gotta find what works for you. I never liked sitting around doing nothing on it. I puff and go out, explore, wander, discover. I love the woods and fishing, myself. Maybe it isn't for you, it's not for everyone. Just throwing out some options that MAYBE you didn't know about. But if you can make it work for you, it's better than alcohol and pills. There's nothing else like it, that's why it getting more legal everywhere.
 
I didn't realize you replied to me. They need a "you've been mentioned" alert on here for when someone ty...
I'm still struggling to figure things out here. I don't learn new things easy and so when i get comfy I just seem to be satisfied and coast along
they think that that is when I started to self medicate and lots of shit happen before then so stands to reason PTSD started young. Lots of PTSD around hear I never realized how big a problem it was.
 
I still am not going to try to talk anyone into anything. Weed does have different types. Some is more awake type, and some sleepy type. Personally I can function on both. Some people can't. If I puff way too much, I'll get lazy. You just gotta find what works for you.

they think that that is when I started to self medicate and lots of shit happen before then so stands to reason PTSD started young. Lots of PTSD around hear I never realized how big a problem it was.

Think I figured out this quoting thing :p

My dealer used to keep things pretty mixed up because many of his clients worried about building a tolerance, most times when I picked up it was something different. Some strains worked better than others, but they all had the same underlying effect, lethargy and demotivation. It's not a gateway drug, but for my addictive personality and depression it was never enough to stop the thinking even when I'd smoked enough to make me sick. If I'd had access to something harder I would've been tempted because what I realize I was doing now was trying to "shut my brain off". For people who can handle it, it's definitely something I support for anxiety, pain management, etc.

I do live in a city where we're on the water. Water has always been very calming to me so I go for walks and get my feet wet (just not right now, Canadian winters are bloody cold) it's also only a 10 minute drive to find farmer's fields and gravel roads so I drive aimlessly a lot, being surrounded by buildings is suffocating. I graduated an environmental science course in college and the idea of never giving it a practical application makes me sad so I recently grounded myself long enough to sort of plan my future. It primarily involves building a homestead farm where I can be self-sufficient, growing my own food and raising animals. It's a long way off, but maybe someday...

Most of my blood family fell apart years ago, and I've also discovered that the best family is the one you choose. I've tried contacting some people because I know their problems were with the parent generation and not me, but clearly not everyone is so open minded. I try to stay in contact with my siblings but I'm 2 out of 4 on that, my younger sisters are very loyal to the idea of building a 'proper' family and they go the extra mile to make sure I get to be an aunt to their daughters just as I try to be there for them. If I find time and money to drive out for a visit, they are willing to put everything on hold to make it happen, though I wouldn't ask them to.


My biggest struggle with PTSD is having a haunting past that still affects me in ways I can't control, and not being in a position yet to really build a better future. Every day I'm just trying to fit in and pretend to be normal until I have something I can realistically look forward to, my hopes have been crushed so many times that it's hard to dream without feeling simultaneously disappointed.
 
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Think I figured out this quoting thing :p

My dealer used to keep things pretty mixed up because...

Thanks for the post UnforgivingAsh. I struggling big time right now. I have some comments on you reply. At this time I not able to comment. I will try in the next day or two.
Peace Be Safe
 
Thanks for the post UnforgivingAsh. I struggling big time right now. I have some comments on you reply. At this time I not able to comment. I will try in the next day or two.
Peace Be Safe


I'll be around when you're feeling up to it.
Feel free to send me a message as well if you'd prefer.
Take care!! :)
 
Ugh, I hate thinking back on relationships...

So as mentioned in my first post I had a couple of bad relationships, the one in college was emotionally abusive (Let's call him C), the one following (called D) and my current man (called J).

J is fantastic, and nobody is perfect but I honestly have no complaints. But because I'm now in the sort of relationship that I want, I find myself comparing it to past ones and feeling stupid for not realizing things sooner.

Obviously we've been over C's actions and why I left him, but I mentioned that I thought D was alright even though I later realized it was all about sex. J goes to church on Sundays and I don't so I was sitting here at home alone this morning thinking about how that year with D went comparative to what I have now and I realized that he is, in reality, a predator... and I feel stupid for not noticing.

Lets first explain that D is 6'1 and 260+lbs (fat, not muscle) and not what most would call typically attractive, 27 years old living at home so he could "save for a house". When he was putting on a face he seemed really sweet and caring, but to outsiders he was judgemental and pompous (wish someone has told me sooner).
Now lets explain me. I'm only 5ft, 110lbs, athletic pear-shaped build, and often get ID'd for looking 16 even though I'm 24. I never wear makeup and have always been in the "pretty" or "cute" category rather than "hot" or "sexy" and I've embraced that as part of who I am now.

Anyway... already we see that from a visual standpoint I was way out of his league, the only thing he had was a nice car and moderate income (of course, because he lived at home and had no expenses), his family basically had a "don't break things or we can't go to Disneyland this summer" rule when he was young, his parents spend their winters in Florida now so he's never struggled. Whereas I was scraping to make ends meet and have been my whole life, vacation was never even a thought for my family. I had just left C and was already insecure about myself, and D played on that to his advantage, he basically bought me from the start and slowly gave less and less as he got more of what he wanted.

In hindsight he crossed a LOT of lines. The first being that right from the beginning of our relationship 1 week without sex was grounds for him to leave me, and he made that quite clear. I was on a 9 week on, 1 week off birth control regimen at the time so the demand was constant because I had no excuse and I did end up with UTI's as a result. Period week is not "blow job week", it's a spike in hormones and a good time to leave me alone, but he thought it meant he could ask any favour not involving the offending anatomy and it would be approved, he'd guilt me in to it even like his inability to control himself was my fault.

He was adamant shortly after we started dating that we were going to have a threesome, and it was going to be with another woman. I already had a cheating complex from a BF in highschool sleeping with my best friend, so there was always a fear of being inferior. I'll be honest women are attractive and I've experimented in the past, but that was over. I'm "straight" and I'm sure of it, but because I'd done things before, he thought that meant I was still in to it despite telling him I wasn't. He took me to a strip club and paid a girl to dance for me, she took me somewhere private and noticing I was uncomfortable she spent half the time talking and only danced so I wouldn't have to lie. He of course paid her to dance for him immediately after and when we got home he made me try to replicate it.

He would comment on the size of other women's boobs and other assets in a rather demeaning manner like everyone was on display only for him, and when it came to lingerie he would pressure me to buy the biggest push-up bras and the smallest underwear in the store even though they were uncomfortable. He constantly told me that I needed to dress up more, wear makeup, wear heels to be taller, shave everything smooth always, and basically be someone that I'm not, an object rather than a person. He wanted me to be the women that he ogled and got turned down by. He signed us up for a swingers website and basically banked on me doing all the work fishing up other "hot girls" that he could screw around with or watch me with. Thankfully it never happened because people weren't interested in him.

In the bedroom he would ask again and again for things that I had already said no to. Feeling pressured I'd sometimes give in, I never enjoyed it and did what I could to avoid it but it still happened. When he was finished he had no qualms about just flopping on top of me where I then struggled to breathe, I often suffered a bruised cervix, breakthrough bleeding (which didn't stop him) and occasionally had problems with sitting when he'd coerce me in to other things or used toys. He was a fetishist and was in to S&M, he preferred being submissive but I was never in to it at all so he took what he could get, I ended up tied instead. He might take no as an answer once but he'd never let the subject drop until he got a yes, or a "fine, I'll try". He knew that physically there was nothing I could do to stop him and he would passively mention it, but he would play mind games instead, the threat of him leaving was always enough because I couldn't pay the bills alone. When he found the house he'd been saving for it was directly next door to his parents, he said he "wanted to live there alone to learn who he was first" but simultaneously told his parents they could walk in whenever they wanted and his mother was still going to do his laundry and cook dinner. We'd been together for a year and moving in to this house together was supposed to save me from crippling debt paying for an apartment I couldn't afford alone, it had already been agreed on... but the moment the possibility of any real commitment being on his shoulders came in, he dumped me on the spot.

This wasn't what I'd considered to be sexual abuse at the time because he never raped me per-say but when I put it in to words... it was and I never even realized it.

I'm not even feeling upset about it now because I'm in a better place, there's just an underlying sense of regret that I didn't let someone punch him in the face when he left me. My blind uncle seriously offered, he even had someone drive him to my place that night, and he's gotten in to his share of barfights since losing his vision so he likely could have done it. Part of me feels like it would have been funny to see D knocked out by a blind man, but the other part of me is too nice for my own good.


I guess I just needed to get out the situation with D because I've never talked about it with anyone, and after reading some people's stories here I realized that it actually was something important to work through.


Comparatively, I met J through work, we sat beside each other in a call center and were friends the whole time until he quit. for a better job. We still talked after because we had a lot of shared interests, but he never indicated he was interested in me because he felt that it would be inappropriate since I was with D. It was a couple of months after I left D that I asked J to hang out as friends. Things just kind of took off from there, I had a few anxiety attacks in the beginning just at the idea of being intimate and he would just hold me and say it was okay, he never pushed.
J doesn't even care if I shave my armpits, he'll still run his hands along my hairy legs, he's never asked me to put on makeup and he loves my morning bedhead. Sex is by no means the foundation of our relationship, I've even said no after unintentionally getting him worked up and he was perfectly okay with it. He genuinely tries to follow the commandments, and not in the ways most do, he questions everything and simply uses his religion as a guide to being a decent human being to everyone. My 1.5 year and 9 month old nieces didn't hesitate to approach him on the first meeting and I find that kids that young tend to sense what adults overlook. I have reservations because that's what scars do, but I'm feeling pretty confident overall on this one aspect of my life despite my setbacks :)
 
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