Eerie Anne's Journal

[Eireanne]

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[Eireanne]

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[Eireanne]

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[Eireanne]

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[Armee]

I'm sorry you've been in such abusive and triggering situations, EA. Do the domestic violence hotlines have any helpful suggestions or resources to help you get out of the living situation and find a less abusive job that will allow you to get your feet under you?

 

I'm sorry, it's a lot to be going through.

[Eireanne]

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[Eireanne]

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[Armee]

I'm really relieved to hear you are out of that dangerous living situation, EA.

Thanks for clarifying. Sometimes I find when I am writing, my inner child also comes out too. Usually when that happens I am triggering myself and need to take a step away from writing or processsing for awhile to focus on core needs like eating, drinking water, sleeping, laughing, and getting a walk. Sometimes unfortunately we can trigger ourselves and it's important to be gentle with ourselves.

[Eireanne]

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[sanmagic7]

 

[Eireanne]

Something I told him in July 2020

There was so much gaslighting and him making me feel that normal reactions to his actions were a failing on my part.  Making me feel like I was crazy, having doctors tell me I had depression.  Believing everything everyone says about me.  Because I've heard the same messages my entire life, from everyone, so how could I help but accept that if everyone thought it, if everyone was a witness to my reactions, then it MUST be something wrong with me. 

My entire life I've just wanted someone to attend to me, validate me, make me feel seen, heard, accepted.  That I can be loved.  Just as I am.  I get so many messages that conflict with this that I don't know what's right and what's wrong and what's real and what's not.  I feel so lost in it all, all the time.

I need you to understand that I'm still not ok.  I'm not saying this so you'll feel bad or guilty, but I need for you to understand the course of events and I need you to understand the reasons why I've done things before you jump to conclusions. 

I want you to know that I'm still very fragile.  I'm still dealing with my depression, but I've done everything I can think of to help me get out of it because it's not fair to you for me to always deal with my trauma/being so triggered. But I'm so afraid you're going to hold me to this standard where you won't make an effort to really understand my trauma is real, and not something to just dismiss.  I know it's hard for you when I lash out at you or hold you accountable for so many things all at the same time, constantly.  I know I'm asking a lot, but you also need to understand it takes years for some people to heal from the stuff I get anxious about.  I'd really like it if you made an effort to hear my reasons for reacting the way I do and not just make me feel like I'm "picky" or "hallucinating" or  making a big deal out of nothing.   You can't expect me not to be triggered if you don't take the time and make the effort to understand why, you you do things a certain way causes these reactions, but respect me enough to understand that even though it may not be a big deal to you even if you can't understand/like because it's not a big deal to you it's a big deal to me and not must think my reaction is appropriate or that my reaction isn't on par with the circumstances.

Why wasn't there anyone who sat me down and said, THIS ISN"T YOUR FAULT.  This is something being done to you, this is abuse.  This is gaslighting. This is something that has NOTHING to do with you.

[Eireanne]

@Blueberry - thank you for that. I do feel bad I'm not in a place that I can read other's journals yet and it's hard for me

You wrote your M came in the room. So that means you have the added difficulty of FOO (family-of-origin) around. If they don't understand, that tends to not help. This is not a criticism of you because there are many reasons why you might still be living with FOO.

@Blueberry, sorry for the delay in responding to your kind note.  I appreciated everything you said so much.  Just one clarification - since I'm processing several layers of trauma at once, my inner child remembers a triggering/inciting incident and mentions it.  I do not live with my FOO - I cut ties with them over 13 years ago.  But that memory of her asking, when I was 16/17 - "how long are you planning on being miserable for" lingers in my head every day.  This is my own fault.  My suffering is because I am "feeding" it.  That this is my own doing. That my choices have led me to have everyone give up and abandon me. That I will never have anyone who cares....it's all there, and how could it not be when it's all I've ever experienced?  Then when I say, "this is all I've ever experienced" I'm told I'm negative, and pessimistic, and depressed.  *throws up hands* 

I appreciate you, and all of you who are reading my journal.  Sorry I still am not clear on how to "quote" and respond. Sending a direct message would be easier for me, but I am told not everyone is comfortable with that, so I'm doing  my best etiquette-wise. 

[Eireanne]

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[sanmagic7]

hey, EA, i have not read walker's book, but i know many people here have and have found it very helpful.

the idea that we're told our suffering is our own fault is abusive in itself, to my mind.  same w/ 'too sensitive'.  i once heard of someone replying to that 'i'm as sensitive as i need to be for me'.  i liked that because i'm also very sensitive and often wish i weren't but there it is.  in that way i am who i am.  you are who you are as well.  trauma is a beast whose jaws and teeth get under our skin, constantly gnawing at us. (until it gets resolved, which is often small piece by small piece).  of course we're sensitive.  who wouldn't be when they're constantly distressed by being gnawed at!  love and hugs

[Eireanne]

Things are starting to pile up again, and I'm becoming more anxious, but instead I'm just doing ME and not being hard on myself for not creating a more orderly, disciplined life. 

I've had a pile of books in my possession for several years, and absolutely no attention span to get through them...also a lot of them no longer seem relevant to me as I now frame everything through my trauma lens. 

So I have this book, Change Your Life in 30 days.  Day 2.  She makes the comment, "You are doing better than you think you are" and asks what is your immediate response, then proceeds to tell you what your immediate response says about you.  Much like being quizzed for having depression, if there is no context about the trauma and WHY I am responding the way I do, then...it's really not accurate, is it? 

So I decided to take these thoughts to my journal.  The first filter is, "the author doesn't know me".  You have problems with intimacy and the feeling that the person you aren't attempting intimacy with won't go away.  In short, you have abandonment issues, right? Well, being as I've been abandoned by everyone, and I've never known trust or what it is like to truly depend on someone....yeah, it's easy to see that anyone that just writes, "you are doing better than you think you are" doesn't know me.  Especially since I haven't fully recovered and the traumatic incident that necessitated me needing to go on leave still hasn't been processed, I'm still triggered by it, and I didn't develop any skills or have any treatment that would allow me to return to this abusive situation with any "tools" other than what I've done myself.  So yes, in one hand, I am doing well...I am still extremely vulnerable and traumatized and clearly not doing "better". 

But no one would know that, would they? 

Next.  "I haven't done enough"  You put yourself last and work harder and longer than anyone else.  I've had to.  Going back to "I have no one to trust or depend on" means I need to be a subject matter expert in EVERY area, and I can't seem to find anyone to help, support or advocate for me.  This creates an issue with processing and knowing how to navigate abusive situations, recognizing when I'm being gaslit, used, lied to....I haven't had any experience building up the muscle where I am ALLOWED to put myself first.  So...yeah.  Next.

Deserving success is a major challenge because you focus on what you don't do well rather than what you do well....actually, I've been told my whole life what I don't do well.  I could clean every inch of my house and it would be pointed out the one thing I didn't get to yet.  So all I know how to see is what I didn't get to yet.  At work, I could do 100 things, and improve, create processes, be on top of everything, yet I'm called out for things that I wasn't even involved with...which creates me needing to remain hypervigilant....

It goes on to say other things that also don't....really work.  "If you don't believe it, you haven't had the confidence to change your life"  "You are committed to "fixing" yourself no matter what"...well yeah, if I've been told my entire life that the things that are happening to me are my fault and if I'd just change, then they'd stop happening....um....when that is framed as a lifetime of abuse, and reiterated by everyone...how am I NOT supposed to assume that I somehow didn't deserve these things because I'm not enough?  To have the understanding now that I really AM NOT enough, that I can't do this alone, without support, and I have to figure out a way to do it anyway...and to have all of that disregarded as the context necessary to understand why I respond the way I do...then how am I supposed to "acknowledge myself". 

I give myself a lot of credit...but I also am extremely self-aware at all the things I still don't know how to navigate.  I still don't know how I'm going to be able to survive and keep my mental state intact by returning to my abuser.  How I'm not going to get emotional, when even re-telling what happened to a coworker I trust 3 months after the incident had me reduced to tears and terror, causing the story to come out in a non-linear fashion, all the while my conscious awareness narrating what is taking place. 

Being told I can control how I react...is putting a lot of pressure on me, when I still haven't learned any tools on how to respond correctly to being manipulated and gaslit. 

So the exercise for today is to list 25 things I acknowledge I have done for the past year, to "give me more courage to take risks in the present".  So here goes

Today, I acknowledge myself for:

1 putting myself on medical leave
2 being adamant about not being misdiagnosed 
3 educating myself about how chronic isolation has been aggravating my situation
4 having compassion for myself and my parents for creating this condition
5 I don't have the tools or support I need to get out of survival mode, and that also aggravates the situation
6 I will no longer accept being told that this is my fault
7 Me being told I am too sensitive, too emotional, too anything has more to do with the other person, and my "too" are my strengths, not weaknesses
8 I've been doing all the work to process my trauma and reparent myself in isolation
9 Just because my trauma is "little t" doesn't mean it's any less valid
10 my brain has done it's best to protect me the only way it knew how
11 my inner child deserves love and attention too
12 I didn't know what I didn't know, and I still don't know.  Society is not set up to protect people like me.  That does not mean something is wrong with me.
13 I am raw, vulnerable and have no defenses.  I have been a target for bullies my entire life. 
14 I am now going to be the parent I wish I had. 
15 I am going to remind myself that the trigger is a natural response to being bullied, gaslit and manipulated. 
16 I can take all the time I need to process what is being said, and learn how to frame my response from a place of curiosity. 
17 I have a right to an opinion, and I deserve to feel validated. 
18 being allowed to grieve all that I have never experienced
19 being allowed to be scared, being allowed to feel my feelings without being told they are wrong
20 letting go of people who make me feel bad about myself
21 not being hard on myself for not knowing what to say or how to respond to people
22 understanding that recovery (and grief) is non-linear, messy and complicated and there are no "shoulds".
23 doing the best I can with what I have
24 every micro-step I take in the right direction is still a step
25 without resources or support, I am still kicking *, and it's everyone else's loss if they can't see that. 

Not going to lie, that's hard.  These are not "accomplishments" and the book wants me to do it another 25 times.  Pass.  It says,
In what area would you like to acknowledge yourself more?

At work, I did amazing things, I gained confidence and started to make company-wide changes.  I acknowledged the work I did and expected to be supported.  I was retaliated against and told to "watch my step" - I would like the courage (not confidence) to stand up to my abusers and hold on to the understanding that I am right, and they are just bullies protecting themselves

What could happen if you gave yourself more credit?
If I gave myself more credit, people would be quicker to kick me, as they only enjoy bullying me when I am down.  If I do not crumple, they will kick me harder and harder until I fail (this is what has always happened in the past).  If I continued to stand firm in my understanding of how I want to be treated, I will most likely lose my job and my health insurance even quicker.  Saying this sounds like a "self fulfilling prophesy" yet I must accept and prepare for the inevitable, as there is no evidence in my favor, and to be forewarned is forearmed - again, cognitive rehearsal and hypervigilance, my superpowers.

Are you willing to give yourself more credit?
Yes, I am willing to reparent myself and stand up to my abusers.  I just wish I had the language to navigate the system.