Buckle up, Bitches, it's gonna be a sweary one. If you have a problem with that, the back arrow is your pal. For future reference, it's my party and I'll cuss if I want to, so if you have a problem with that, feel free to file my blog(s) in your no-go zone.
FEAR stands for Fuck Everything and Run.
I've done that many times in my life.
I've left jobs, ended both platonic and romantic relationships, become estranged from most of my family, severed myself from groups I was participating in, and stopped going to therapy many times. I don't trust other people, and it shows.
Let's have some fun, shall we? I'll answer the questions posed on the Wheel of Trauma pictured at the top of the post. Don't expect me to sugar-coat this shit sandwich. This is not the Logic Mind speaking. This is not the Socially Acceptable Self either. This is the deeply wounded soul at the core of it all behind the mask.
Do I matter?
No, I do not.
All I am is dust in the wind, a flake of star dandruff, a cosmic accident.
I can usually pass for normal (except for the fact that I'm really ugly) until people get to know me. Once they realize I'm seriously damaged, they don't want anything to do with me.
The few family members who continue to have anything to do with me do so out of a sense of duty rather than because they actually like me.
I could count the people who genuinely like me on one hand if I cut a few of the fingers off.
I've never done anything worthwhile in my long and storied life.
I don't matter much at all.
Do I belong?
No. I've always been the odd one out. I'm odd-looking. I'm both physically and socially awkward. I have balance and coordination problems. I was one of those kids who was always last to be picked for a team. I really hate movies that make it seem like that shit is funny. It isn't.
I wish adults weren't so fucking stupid. You don't let kids pick their team members. You pick the teams and teach the kids how to work with people who aren't their besties. You monitor the little shits, and if you see them bullying one of their team members, you nip that shit in the bud.
Humans are cruel, evil, stupid fuckers, and if they aren't taught early on to behave in a civil fashion, they will carry that shit into their adult lives. There are plenty of overripe playground bullies walking through the world, continuing their shitty ways. There are enough people who approve of this crap behavior that the U.S. may have Round Two of a situation where the prime example of this attitude takes over the highest office in the land once again. I just can't with this shit.
Am I safe?
Technically, pretty much. There's a degree to which no one is safe. I could come up with all sorts of disasters. I like to exercise my tendency to hyperbole and appreciation of dark humor when doing this.
This planet, the solar system, our galaxy, and the entire cosmos might throw a curveball. An airplane could drop from the sky and crash into my house. The Yellowstone Supervolcano could erupt. A sinkhole could open up and swallow the town. Certain heebie-jeebies that haunted my fearful childhood imaginings could turn out to be real. At this point in my long and snarky existence, I'd probably mock them before they offed me.
I haven't always been safe. I was the target of both physical and verbal abuse by my schoolmates from first grade through my senior year in high school. However, by the time I was in my senior year of high school, I had a bit of a reputation for retaliating in nasty ways, i.e. kicking one of my tormentors in the knee while wearing hiking boots, so the abuse wasn't quite as overt.
I've been in more than one abusive relationship because abusers seek out people with low self-esteem. Many times discussions of this issue take a victim-blaming approach. Just improve your self-esteem, you dumb fuck, and you won't attract abusers anymore, duh!
This certainly isn't my intent. I'm saying if you're in an abusive situation, it's not your fault. Chances are, you have low self-esteem, and your predatory partner used it to trap you. You do deserve better.
Those of us who end up in abusive relationships were abused or felt devalued by our families. I wasn't physically or sexually abused by my parents. I was molested at a young age by another relative. I don't remember the details of the assault, but that sort of thing leaves scars.
My parents constantly yelled at each other and at me and my brother. My brother ended up becoming a workaholic adrenaline junkie. I ended up being a self-loathing, self-medicating, traumatized victim of circumstances. My (at the time misdiagnosed) ADHD combined with untreated complex PTSD pushed me to ill-advised, impulsive, and often dangerous actions.
Some of you may know the scene in Saturday Night Fever where Tony and his friends get out of the car and mess around on the bridge girders. I never literally danced on bridge girders. My brother may have. He was the daredevil. However, my life was a figurative balancing act.
I was always plunging from giddy, limerent heights, often fueled by alcohol and sometimes other substances, into the depths of near-nonfunctional despair. I can understand why I was misdiagnosed as having type 2 bipolar disorder. My behaviors and the emotional roller coaster pattern are similar. Also, bipolar disorder is hereditary, and one of my father's cousins has it.
Attempting to treat bipolar disorder didn't address my trauma issues, which are the true roots of my maladaptive coping mechanisms and shattered self-image. These roots run deep and will never be fully eradicated.
This is why admonitions that I should "love myself" ring false. The concept is foreign to me. On a good day, I accept myself. Sometimes I even think I'm kind of cool and/or interesting. I would like myself if I wasn't me.
My psyche is a bit like the nine circles of hell. I'm always emotionally tortured, but sometimes I manage to rise up and sit on the rim of the top circle for a while. At those times, I occasionally indulge the erroneous belief that I'm finally going to rise triumphantly from the pit.
I won't. Something will always happen to plunge me back into the depths of despair. Sometimes it's a thing that seems trite to most people. Sometimes it's difficult or impossible to explain what it is.
I once read a blog post by a survivor of the 9-11 terrorist attack on the World Trade Center who has lived with PTSD since that day. He posed this question.
"What if your current situation is as good as it gets?"
He said his doctor doesn't like it when he says his situation is as good as it gets. She gives him a sad puppy face. He then goes on to talk about the ways in which acceptance makes living with PTSD and anxiety easier.
I wish I could remember this fellow's name. I'm sure I have the link to his blog written down somewhere.
Ah, the joys of ADHD!
~Ornery Owl Has Spoken~
Image by Willgard Krause from Pixabay
This is the story of how Ornery Owl got her name.
"Why are you such a maladjusted, ornery owl?"
"I dunno, Principal Hoots. I guess I was just hatched that way."
