Silence

The reason that I am so open about things is because the most evil people in my life made me quiet about them. They didn't want to be inconvenienced with  my feelings, while I was supposed to sacrifice for theirs. My ex even gave me a book called "The Power of Silence" when we were dating. This is the same man who duct taped my mouth for talking when he was raping me. I made sure he knew what he was doing, that it was wrong, and that he would not be able to spin it or say he misunderstood. For this he tried to silence me, and I continued to make myself heard and fight him every step of the way with my mind, even though my body was hogtied hand and foot. Eventually though, by the fourth time he raped me, violating my privacy in between each rape, reading my diary, my emails, etc (anger turned him on), I had no more words. I was broken and just stared blankly. My fire had gone out, and whatever energy, willpower, I'd been using up to that point to keep going had gone out.

These are the facts of what happened. He even confessed when the cops arrested him, trying to plead insanity. So by his own words, this happened. This just is. I talk about it, because whenever you visit a memory in a safe environment, part of that environment transfers to that memory. This is why it is important to talk about these things with people you trust. It's why psychologists exist. Talking about it is healthy, the ones steeped in silence are not. I refuse to be ashamed of the actions of someone else. There's plenty of regret and guilt surrounding getting entangled with a psychopath and believing his lies, but he would have liked nothing more than for me to be quiet so he could keep manipulating people. So yeah, I talk about it and other things. For this, I catch A LOT of hell, usually from my next abuser or people who have abusive tendencies.

If you don't want to read these things, then don't, just move on. It does you no harm for me to express myself about the events of my life on my page. And despite the proclamations of other abusers, if there's anything I know better than anyone else, it's me. Despite what you may choose to project on me, I aim to be as genuine as possible. Though some of it may seem absurd, well, I've seen some crazy things and sides of people you would not believe. You chose to be here and if you can't handle it, leave. I don't want anyone here who doesn't want to be.

I try to be as grounded and honest as possible with myself and others, because I do have the habit of going quiet, when I need to speak up. What can I say? Some of the training stuck, and I still get blindsided and glamoured by certain people where I'll be upset and then somehow it's like going in a trance and I think it's okay while listening to them manipulate things, even though it's not okay. But eventually I shake it off, which tends to tick them off. My verbal prowess was burned up that night and left me with a speech impediment when nervous, so fighting back verbally, though something I could once do well, isn't really an option for me anymore. Maybe because I've had verbal turn physical too often and my brain is freezing waiting for it to turn ... I therefore do not fair well in verbal altercations. Being able to say anything at all is impressive for me, and extroverts don't see to get that. I literally cannot verbally fight it out face to face, while I can write a message that will lay bare one's soul for all the world to see.

However I've been known to handle a physical brawl pretty decently. But when I feel like I'm facing someone manipulating facts and giving off all the abuser vibes, my mind is just trying to extricate me from the situation before it turns violent... because I have been known to snap when continuously pushed. If people get to the third no and I feel genuinely threatened, well, ever seen those wind up cars that you pull back and it just winds them up and then when let go they zoom forward? It's like that. After having been literally drowned, out of body experience and all, one fellow who I repeatedly told not to push me under the water had a nasty surprise, when I stopped him and threw him by his hair into the ocean with my left hand, saying "I said NO"... He ran home, was not hurt, but was scared shitless. Meanwhile even when my ex attacked me, though I could lock and trap and do holds on him, I could not actually HURT him. It just wasn't in me, even with him choking me, I just wanted to get away. However, recently, I think I burned up my fight again and now life just feels like a Wack-a-Mole game, where every time I stick my head out, there's someone there to beat me back down. I'm getting rather tired of this game, and because I know they're not going to stop and I just attract them, despite trying to do things to fix that... I just find myself feeling like I just don't want to be here anymore. Thus how I want to be a hermit. My only consolation is that I know by being open about my fight, others fighting have benefited. And that's why I do it. But I hope they know what a deeply flawed and screwed up person I am. That's a good thing, because if someone as messed up as me can keep fighting, then it makes it easier for others. Every fiber of my being wants to quit right now and has for a while. But I can't live by wants, so little of my life has been comprised of what I want. It's a need to keep going, and knowing that even my body, my long time nemesis, is trying to silence me. And as Tyrion said in A Song of Ice and Fire...

Memories of the Ranch

My heart aches for the ranch. I want to be riding a horse through open range where I can't hear a single sound that can be attributed to man or anything manmade. I loved watching the city lights in the distance from the plateau, smelling rain in the air and seeing clouds roll in from miles away. I miss stumbling upon all sorts of weird flora and fauna and even artifacts could be found if you knew where to look. The last time I was there, it was October and the full moon never looked so beautiful as it did from that cabin, a cabin I'd known all my life and would never see again. I knew every inch of that ugly orange shag carpet, and the trick how to open the broken handle on a fridge left over from the 60s. The whole back wall was covered in pages from 1800s Sears and Roebuck catalogues. In the winter we had to keep warm by feeding the fire in an old wood stove. I remember the smell of horse, leather, and wood. And few things were as brilliant as the trap door to the basement that fascinated us kids. There was a peg board there where artwork was thumbtacked. One was my grandfather's and the other mine, from one of our adventures where we would take the watercolors and search for something to paint, often on the side of the road, painting someone's cattle, or the horses at the ranch. It's hard to remember my grandfather, that last night at the ranch. He had always been so strong, so brave, a real cowboy. He was everything I wanted to be, but time always has its say. No matter how weak he was, he never lost his sense of humor. As a youth, I remember his cowboy boots, thick with dust from the trails, and trying to walk in them, shoes I'd never be able to fill. Those were the best moments of my life. Some part of me will always long to relive sitting on the porch, eating watermelon with my grandfather, our legs dangling over the bottom story. We watched my dad and brother throw horseshoes below, while my mother and grandmother could be heard inside. The horses meandered curiously not far away, grazing and moving slowly in search of better grass. It's a place I can never go again and the people who made it home are gone as well. I wish Morgan could have gone there, met my grands, seen the cabin my grandfather designed and the family built. It was a little slice of our own personal history permeated with memories. When I imagine things before I fall asleep, of something happy, it always starts with that ugly orange shag carpet and the place my heart still calls home. There my horse still waits for me to ride the trails that I still remember to the old 1800s caboose, or the shed, or the cliff, or the Olsen's, or the deer trails to the top of the Rimrocks. I'm grateful that I was so fortunate to have those wonderful memories, and so sad that they won't come again.

Polite is not Nice

Fall is coming, and the memories of the ex are fast on its heels. Fall has always been a big memory stimulator for me, and having the worst days of my life associated with it, makes my once favorite season, a rather hard one. It gets the wheels turning in my head. Memories come unbidden. The nightmares kick up, and a general melancholy comes over me with the North wind. It gets me thinking on certain things, observations I wish I had known when I was young and stupid. This is one... there's a big difference between nice and polite. There are plenty of polite people in the South, but they really aren't very nice when you get to know them. I met a lot of nice people in New York, but they weren't very polite. They were direct, and they just didn't want people wasting their time, and I can appreciate that. To me it's more honest. This polite posturing makes me not believe people actually like me, which meant it took a year before I would consent my best friend ever, actually liked me and wasn't just being polite. I liked him a lot, but I'm not easily convinced of reciprocation.

My psychopathic ex-husband used to tell me the way to get out of trouble (in this case a speeding ticket) was to "act nice"... and I just stared at him. What about just BEING nice? Why can't you just BE nice? But that was the thing. It was an act, an act to get people to respond to him favorably, to get what he wanted. It was means to an end, a manipulation that never penetrated the surface, a way for him to mojo himself out of being held accountable for his actions. That's why when he didn't get his way, he often shifted to threats and violence in a heartbeat, because that was what was behind the act, control. The thing is, that works for psychopaths and narcissists because most people don't make it past the facade to see beyond the act. They see the charming, funny, charismatic facade, but psychopaths know how to set the stage and perform captivatingly. Psychopaths often have this glamour effect when they talk that is spellbinding to the listener. That's why you get serial killers where afterward people always say that they seemed like such a nice guy.

The thing is, the real nice people are a little more rough up front, but they're genuine.  It's a little harder to accept, not wrapped fancy and neat. They just are and put it out there. While a psychopath or narcissist is a gift box wrapped beautifully and perfectly with nothing inside, most genuinely nice people come unwrapped with the price sticker still on. Genuine people are functional and serve a purpose, while you've already seen the extent of what the pretty box has to offer. Genuine people don't have that euphoric charisma that beguiles people with a silver tongue and a smile that doesn't quite touch their eyes. Psychopaths and narcissists tend to bypass reason, even if your subconscious starts to throw up walls, they have a way of quieting your very founded fears. My ex laughed at me for being worried when we were dating, "What, do you think we're going to get married, and this mask is going to come off and I'll be a monster underneath?" He made it sound ridiculous to be concerned, but that was EXACTLY what happened and he knew it. Listen to your gut, because it knows. Every time I've ignored it, I've been sorry and regretted not heeding that little voice that said something wasn't right, and instead listening to the words of someone who could twist anything to their favor. I've lost a lot because of not listening to my gut.

Personally I try to be polite. I'm getting less nice as I get older and collect more wounds from psychopaths and narcissists. This makes me sad. I like being nice. It's my first impulse to want to help people. But I've had to hold back. Yeah I harp on the subject, because I have had an abnormal number of psychopaths and narcissists in my life, and no, not everyone who hurt me fits in that category. But it's a high percentage of the people I cut out of my life, which is really a rather low number. I haven't even gotten to counting on my toes. But one person can do a hell of a lot of damage that accumulates over time. I've already mightily screwed up my own life by repeatedly getting involved with such people. I only hope others will learn from my mistakes. Cause, goodness knows, I'll probably do it again, about the time I relax and think I've got this.

Polite is easy to see. Nice... well that comes with time and if you ask a psychopath if they are a good person, they will tell you how awesome they are, while hiding dark despicable deeds. A narcissist will never have the wherewithal to question whether they might be the problem. And both will justify whatever they do to be the "right" thing. All you can do is watch what they do, and pay attention. That knot in your gut knows why that person can't hold down a regular job, or keep a boyfriend for long, or why their close friends don't stay close for long before there's a new one, or why the people who seem the closest live miles and miles away and don't see them much. People tend to like psychopaths, sociopaths, and narcissists at first... but eventually emotionally healthy people get tired of the crap through constant exposure, and patient friends are just rewarded with more abuse for their toleration. All that does is enable the person to keep steamrolling over people. The only person who can cure a narcissist, is the narcissist themselves, and most don't want to because they enjoy it. It takes them really committing to caring about others and wanting to change. But most are incapable. To narcissists, their "caring" is what other people can do for them, not what they can do for others. Even when they do something for someone else, they tend to do it as a social obligation for appearances more than genuine concern, much like the psychopath, for which there is no cure.  Their "good" deeds are done for show and manipulation. They are born that way and they will never change. Sociopaths... well... they have their own set of rules that don't quite work within society. That's why they are called Anti-social as in against society. You're not going to get anywhere with them either. Save yourself the heartache and don't waste your life like I have. Get out, and don't mistake polite for nice. Polite has no commitment. It's a pretty sign that doesn't do anything. Nice listens. Nice gives. Nice empathizes. Nice is grateful. Nice helps you move. Nice isn't overly critical or self centered. Nice is an expression of the good within someone. Polite is a rehearsed response to adhere to social graces. I'll take nice over polite any day.

Mile Marker 183

So I can't visit my folks without passing the road my ex tried to kill me on. It's a reminder I don't have to deal with now that I live a couple hours away, but it still hits me when I drive past and I can't help remembering. So like with other things that try to destroy me, I combat it by creating something. In this case, I wrote a song... it was very Sarah McLachlan in tune.

Mile Marker 183
Lindsay Archer

Standing at the Crossroads of Music Row and Memory Lane
Remembering the chill of a burnt out old flame
staring at the wreckage that to this day remains
A head to head collision won’t leave you the same
When you encounter a pile up of the criminally insane
Standing at the Crossroads of Music Row and Memory Lane

He gritted his teeth and gripped the wheel
His foot hit the gas and the rubber peeled
down this old country blacktop street
toward a wicked curve of near 90 degrees
On the other side all I could see
was the interstate’s mile marker 183
That’s when I realized it was death staring at me
as the speedometer buried somewhere near 90
It was my life at stake and him at the wheel
If he couldn’t have me, then my life he would steal
I’d be free of him, even with my last breath, I swore
At least I wouldn’t have to live in fear anymore

Standing at the Crossroads of Music Row and Memory Lane
Remembering the chill of a burnt out old flame
staring at the wreckage that to this day remains
A head to head collision won’t leave you the same
When you encounter a pile up of the criminally insane
Standing at the Crossroads of Music Row and Memory Lane

He curved to the left and couldn’t believe
that I was more angry and ready to leave
This torturous game of predator and prey
I could never gain, only lose more each day
That’s when crocodile tears formed in his eye
His frequent trick to avoid caught in a lie
That’s when I realized it was death staring at me
On the other side of mile marker 183
There was no way he’d ever let me leave
The passing of freedom, which I still grieve
Left cleaning up the mess that he made
and his deep debt that can never be paid.

Standing at the Crossroads of Music Row and Memory Lane
Remembering the chill of a burnt out old flame
staring at the wreckage that to this day remains
A head to head collision won’t leave you the same
When you encounter a pile up of the criminally insane
Standing at the Crossroads of Music Row and Memory Lane

Now I’m exhausted and all I want is to sleep
But slumber since has not been deep
Would that I could, finally find rest,
so rare in this world, even at my best.
If only it were just him, but that’s a far cry
There many like him, both girl and guy
That’s when I realized it was death staring at me
Well, beyond mile marker 183
In the dirty looks and the judging eyes
of those whose life has never capsized.
Reopening old wounds that can never quite heal
At the hands of people who can’t know how it feels

Standing at the Crossroads of Music Row and Memory Lane
Remembering the chill of a burnt out old flame
staring at the wreckage that to this day remains
A head to head collision won’t leave you the same
When you encounter a pile up of the criminally insane
Standing at the Crossroads of Music Row and Memory Lane



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Honesty is the Best ... way to get hurt ... but wouldn't trade it.

"In this world of lies, Truth is forced to fly like a sacred white doe in the woodlands; and only by cunning glimpses will she reveal herself, as in Shakespeare and other masters of the great Art of Telling the Truth, — even though it be covertly, and by snatches." ~ Herman Melville

Ever see that episode of Star Trek where Jean Luc Picard was tortured by being shown a number of lights and punished because he said what was there instead of what he was told to see. Welcome to the life of the abused.

This particular method of torture is called gaslighting, made famous thanks to an old black and white movie, where changing the gas lighting was a vehicle for convincing the victim that they were going crazy. Although I've experienced this directly from my ex-husband when he would laugh and lie about things, it's been something ingrained more post trauma than previous. It's a symptom of society that does not want to believe that bad things happen to good people, so someone must ultimately deserve it or is just trying to get attention.

From the time I was a kid, I've been hard wired honest and it's been a point of contention through out my life. Can you imagine the torture it is to tell the truth and constantly be told that you are lying, because I can all too well, to the point that even when I do tell the truth, I just expect people to not believe me.

When I was around 3 years old, they changed the time that Tom and Jerry came on, so when I told my brother what time it was on, and it was different, I burst into tears. My mom had a hard time figuring out that I thought that I had told a lie and that God was going to strike me down right then and there.  My brother had no such problems however, and when he made untrue claims and I brought him books with proof, he would just say, "that doesn't prove anything." When I would be sick, since my immune system has always been on the puny side and eventually attacked my thyroid, he would accuse me of faking, because that's what he did (The acting of projecting one's own intentions onto another is called projection). And I think that's a lot of where this stems from, because the people who have most often accused me of making things up for attention or lying, are often the same people who happen to do such things on a regular basis. Therefore it's less to do with me and more to do with them.

When I was 12 and molested on a church trip by a boy in my class, he called me a liar saying, "You wish" and getting his male counterparts in on the taunting. The same boy, later chased me out into the water and held me under till I stopped breathing and I had an out of body experience, because well, I drowned. I shouldn't be here. I woke up alone on top of the water, staring at the sun, and coughed the water out of my lungs.  When I started at a new high school where he already knew everyone, he became the popular football player, and I had a reputation for being a liar. After repressing the memory, I became very depressed, especially in association with school, and I did indeed cut my wrists, which of course made more people pile on that I was an attention whore, instead of someone who was post traumatic. Suicidal thoughts were more of a constant companion than so-called friends. Things at home had heated up with my brother in the full swing of hormone hell. My parents had their hands full with him, and the incident that caused my woe was forgotten to all including me who repressed it just to move on, till my mother mentioned it one day and I relived the entire event in one horrifying wash. Looking back now it's easy to see that I needed therapy, but the closest we had was family therapy with everyone and while we were all in a lot of pain, my father did most of the talking and thereby got most of the attention. I sat quietly and when they finally asked me, I went down the line with keen analysis of what was actually going on, much to the surprise of the counselors. Because there's one thing that people forget about the depressed. They are depressed not because they are clueless, but because they are perceptive. The problem is, convincing other people.

It was once said by a friend of mine's psychologist that depression and intelligence go hand in hand. Stupid people don't get depressed, because they don't perceive the connections or information that disconcert those intelligent enough to grasp what it is and where it's going. This inability to affect the things that they understand but cannot stop often frustrates intelligent people into a state of hopelessness. There's a reason that ignorance is bliss.

But that's only the start of the pain. For those that don't care about others and aren't sensitive or empathetic, it's easy to shrug off the onslaught that follows. But being sensitive and empathetic, my hardship had just begun. There's a deluge of people who don't want to think about things or become depressed themselves, so it's easier to attack the source or deny its validity.  I had many worries when I was pregnant and the majority of them were truly founded and came true, while the lies of others were no comfort or salve to my grasp of reality. During that time I was labeled crazy for having a very real concern for the impact on my life of having a child, devoid of the delusions of this being anything but a huge sacrifice. She was worthy of that sacrifice, but it didn't make my concerns any less valid or ultimately true, when I ended up in the hospital with preeclampsia and congestive heart failure after giving birth.

Most of this gas lighting was a byproduct of poor choices as a teen while I was still self destructing over another sexual attack. Not to mention some dates that went down right violent. I've had health issues and pains, most byproducts of anorexia, bulimia, and exercising myself into the ground. Although the pains were real, I was literally dying to be pretty so someone would love me, and while in pain, being told "you are faking" is a horrible assault to the psyche. When doctors were no help, I started taking better care of myself and things began to even out. Others used this as proof that I was only faking, instead of actually taking charge of my life and health, and letting some things go. It's a lot easier for some people to attribute nefarious past intentions than to accept that someone might have actually made a move in a positive direction. It disrupts their ability to see things in black and white or allow others to change, which is why 20 years later I still find this crap crop up.

As a result of this, and an incident being molested by a doctor in Macon... sorry you don't have to cup my breast and compare me to your Catholic ex while listening to my heartbeat... I've had several issues surrounding any form of medical treatment. In 1997 when I asked the doctor about my thyroid, she pretty much yelled at me for even asking. 2007 I had to have my thyroid removed because it had been damaged and my immune system attacked it. While pregnant I had symptoms consistent with preeclampsia such as crazy high blood pressure that were over looked until I ended up in the hospital for a month with congestive heart failure and double lung pneumonia. And just recently when my heart was wonky, they handed me my EKG which clearly said "abnormal ECG" and was just wrong to look at. Then they told me I was fine... Most of this is in some ways saying "you're faking" "You're lying" and "you just want attention". And what these undertones do, is basically the same as gaslighting. When I go to the doctor now, it's very rare for my blood pressure to be anywhere near normal, because it's like going into battle and expecting an attack, an attack I'm not prepared for or in any way armed to defend. When you're sick, you are vulnerable, and don't have alternative options to going to a doctor, which may or may not result in being treated like you're doing it for attention from people that you would rather avoid at all costs. 

The other drawback is that I have good hearing, and when doctors talk about you on the other side of the door, you hear it "Gotta go pretend to be someone's friend" was said when I told the first doctor about being raped after reading an article about how rape victims are at higher risk for certain health problems so you should tell them. So that went well... Another treated me like a statistic when he found out, and I had to answer all sorts of questions about my family. I suppose being treated like data is better than the more commonly treated like an attention whore, when I'm white-faced waiting, hearing people I don't know character assassinate me, or in clear violation of Hippa, always brushed off as me being the crazy one. And honestly, I'm not 100%, but who would be in my shoes? That's part of what gaslighting does, it breaks your reality to the point that you start to think, well am I telling the truth? You begin to feel like you're lying even when you know you're not. But you also feel like you have to defend yourself all the time. Ultimately it feels like a life under siege, and there's no one at your back. 

The thing is that people who know me, know I'm honest... to a fault at times. I can be down right blunt, and if I find out I was wrong, I usually come back to correct it. My poor swiss cheese brain that has a hard time remembering chunks of trauma, does not have the energy for such games.  But I find that those around me do, and turn it into those very games, while putting the blame on me.  

People who are close to me have learned that I tell it like it is, and I don't do well with others who don't. I've had friends who used to lie occasionally. Then after being around me long enough, they learned to love the open honesty, so much that they were unable to go back to lying afterwards. There was one overwhelming response to this change - suddenly people didn't like them very much anymore. Those who have been afraid to tell me the truth, found that telling me was so much better than the alternative. After a lifetime of crazy crap, I've heard it all, and am relatively hard to surprise. The problem is that I often combat with logic, and that's where people take issue. Even emotions are fairly logical and rational byproducts of certain things, even if the core of the emotions isn't always what the person thinks it is.

So here's the deal. Don't judge what you don't understand. It's easy to write people off into a certain category. It's harder to cope with the reality of a person, a full human being of flesh and fault, life and laughter, flaws and merits. But just because you don't get them, doesn't mean that what they are saying isn't true. You can't know what it feels like to be that person, having been through everything they've endured. All you can do is know yourself, and that gets extremely hard when people are constantly attacking your perceptions.

Part of the problem with domestic violence and emotional abuse is the silence. The victim is often bullied into silence and afraid to speak up. Society likes to enforce this subconsciously by insisting that you aren't being positive, or that you're being a gossip, or whatever else to the person who is already in a hard position taking an even harder stance to stand up and stand against something. After being terrified into silence by multiple abusers, I've decided "No More" and I simply tell it like it is. Sometimes this is disconcerting to the listener, but it makes it no less true. The byproduct is that it opens up others to talk about things that they have never talked to anyone else about before, because the way I can nonchalantly handle the information and empathize with the person speaking. It's one of the reasons that psychologists exist. This is healing, if anything else, to know that you are not alone.

The other message that it carries is that there's nothing wrong with having experienced it, or talking about it. I've been accused of feeding off of it for attention. I've had any number of accusations thrown my way, and they are all the symptoms of what is wrong. The moment someone stands up and openly discusses real events that are unpleasant, there are always people to tear them down for doing so and project intent onto them.  Many people have worked hard to shut me up, but the thing is, for every person I help, for every person I get through to, for every person who supports me, there are 10 fold who attack me for it. This does not earn me any extra privileges, only more scars. It's painful and goodness knows it would be a hell of a lot easier to be quiet and go back to biting my tongue. It wouldn't stop the people who already want to take me down though, it would only encourage them. The only way to fight is to end the silence, even if Honesty is the best way to get hurt... I still believe it's the best policy. 

What You Allow is What Will Continue.

Newborn Morgan Snuzzles

I was born in North Carolina and spent the first 3 years of my life in a small town. It was a nice little neighborhood, and my older brother by 3 years and I had friends in the neighborhood.  My father was a traveling salesman as he had been most of his life, and my mother was a home maker at that time. At some point she decided that she could make some extra money by watching the neighborhood children during the day.

My mother has always been good with children. I won the lottery on moms. She majored in sociology and had been a social worker. She was patient and good with children. However this taking on several neighborhood children at once presented new and unusual circumstances.

There were twin blonde girls who would instantly attempt to eat crumbs from underneath our table and there were rowdy boys who broke my toys that I was forced to share with them, knowing how it would end. They did the same to my brother's as well. This lesson carried with it 2 consequences to my brother and myself. My brother ended up with no respect for personal property, even when I was in college and he would mess up my stuff while I was away. I learned that I was supposed to let people destroy my stuff and that strangers mattered more than family. Neither of these were lessons that my mother would have taught us, it was the lesson of experience learned from the other children and parental reaction.

My mom eventually found that watching other people's kids cost more than it was worth. She tried to do what good she could before sending the kids home, feeding the poor twins who seemed to be always starving. Mom has the best heart of anyone I've ever known, but ultimately it was too much and she had to stop doing it and focus on her own kids.

Still there was damage done in that short time, damage my mother would not have wanted, damage that affected her children for years afterward. I learned quickly that I was last and had to tolerate even the destruction of my own property. Nothing really felt like mine and could be taken away at any moment for the whim of someone else, often  my brother who did things like "magic tricks" of sawing my barbie in half.

It's amazing what little things, allowed to continue, can escalate into over time.  Or how little inappropriate behaviors can grow into bigger ones. I'm no stranger to "boiling a frog" and when someone discovers that they can get away with something small without consequences, it emboldens them to try a little further, do a little more.

Now I find myself on the flip side, in my mother's shoes. It's so hard to know what is the seed of something worse to come if allowed to grow.  And it's so hard to make calls to protect your child in potential situations that may or may not develop. However I have experience that my mother did not, she herself who had an experience at a young age that effected her.  Sometimes things that seem small can leave an impact with unintended lessons that could affect someone's personality for a lifetime. And sometimes mom's have to make hard calls that are painful for the benefit of their children.

It was not so long ago that I was carrying Morgan down the stairs. She wriggled and I lost my balance. In a split second I had to decide which way to fall. If I fell forward, I could spare myself, but if I fell backward and broke my leg, I could spare Morgan. In an instant the choice was clear, and I chose to break my leg. Morgan was spared personal pain, other than watching her mother in pain as I slid down the stairs on my broken leg, breaking it worse with each step, and holding her to me to protect her.

If I thought that was the most painful decision that I would have to make, with the most lasting effects, I was probably wrong. Being a mother has come with significant sacrifice in many areas. It's always ongoing and there seems to be no end in sight.  It seems that protecting your child is easier when they are small, but preparing them to cope with other people on their own is so much harder. The pain of child bearing was short and intense (and almost killed me), but the growing pains are constant, and there's no painkiller to soothe a wounded heart when you have to make a painful and unpopular decision to protect your child. If what you allow is what will continue, and you know that it is harmful, it's still hard to put that foot down and no longer allow it. Sometimes you just have to suck it up and be the bad guy so nothing worse happens.

Alive and Kicking... and Punching

Yellow Belt Testing in 1994.

It's a little fitting to be back in Martial Arts so close to the anniversary of when my ex swung at me directly. He charged, and muscle memory kicked in before any other thought. Although emotional abuse was harder to contend with, I was prepared for what to do in this situation, after earning a red belt in Tae Kwon Do and some experience with Wing Chun. Though I never tested at Francis Fong's school in Gwinnet, the lower belts and higher belts all learned the same moves, moves that became ingrained and were highly useful.

The incident went down, because Liam had been doing petty things to keep me trapped at home. He had a habit of letting the air out of my tires, disabling the car battery, and this time, he had hidden my keys. After contending with one of his insane emotional attacks, I decided to leave, and my keys were not where I had left them.  When I confronted him about the possibility of hiding my keys, he laughed at me as he often did to make me feel like the crazy one. But whenever he lied, he had a facial tick that I'd come to notice (he hated that I was so perceptive) and I knew instantly that he had hidden my keys.

"You're lying," I said and I looked around where I had seen him last. There was a pile of laundry waiting to be cleaned next to the laundry room, and a few clothes under the surface, there were my keys, in a place I would have never left them.  He followed me making fun of me and still denying what he had done. I was headed toward the door when I turned to see him charging me, right arm raised in a punch.

Reflexively, I ducked under his arm, grabbing his now punch extended wrist, pulling it forward, and pulling him off balance, as I got him in a headlock that he could not get out of. It was meant to subdue him, restrict breathing till he passed out so I could get away, because I could not bring myself to break his neck. Even in physical danger, I just couldn't bring myself to hurt another, even in self defense... even with all the abuse I'd endured. So instead, I held on, hoping. He then ran backwards, slamming me into the walls again and again, until the hold took affect and then he threw himself onto me on the floor and started crying.  The keys were now long gone and out of sight in the struggle. If I stopped to get them in my escape, I would have been prone. So I just ran.

I ran out the door, and as Liam had insisted, we lived on a small street of houses in the middle of nowhere (he threw a fit that we had neighbors on one side - now I know why). Tears streaked my face as rain started to fall. We were 10 miles from my parents' house, but I was ready to walk there in my nightgown in the middle of the night in the rain. I didn't get there, when Liam drove up next to me, again smiling and laughing at me for walking away. I wasn't going to walk 10 miles with him driving next to me, so I got in the car. (I was kind of scared that he might try to hit me with the car if I didn't comply). We drove back to the house, where I promptly did not forgive him (which he depended on my Christian background to manipulate previously) nor did I let him get away with no consequences, much to his chagrin. I told him to leave. After all, it wasn't long ago, he'd threatened to kill me and drove toward the dead end of a road, because I mentioned the word divorce.

That night, he left and committed himself at the Coliseum where he immediately began manipulating well meaning psychologists into thinking I was the bad guy and that I needed to be there to support him. They were flummoxed when they called me at work on speaker with Liam, and I asked if he had mentioned trying to kill me, which of course Liam tried to blow off as me exaggerating. Then I said that it was hard to think it's exaggerating when he was shouting that he was going to kill me while driving 90 miles an hour toward a road that ended in the interstate. It's a mile marker on I-75 that I still can't pass without remember.  But for the first time, someone started to listen and see that maybe, just maybe he was the liar that I'd come to know.

While it was traumatic, I learned sadly that no one else would protect me, if I wasn't willing to do it for myself. I'd been isolated and abused, while simultaneously having all that abuse projected onto me, where I was completely debased from any support by the character assassination, blamed for all the evil he did to me. This is something that still haunts some older connections and estranged many relationships. People I thought I could trust believed the charming liar, a pattern I've witnessed my whole life with people around me. Heck I fell for it for a while too, but eventually I see through it, which tends to upset people who like to think I'm stupid because I give people a chance.

After the trauma, I have an inclination to hide, to not be seen, and have had other abusers, reinforcing my C-PTSD. So getting back into Martial Arts, I see as a victory. It's something I enjoyed and was good at. When I was a child, I was not allowed to take it, because "you're a girl". I was expected to act like a lady and apparently "take it like a man". After getting tired of being used for practice by my brother and not allowed to learn to defend myself, I took my graduation money and enrolled in Tae Kwon Do.  I had stopped at Red Belt, because at the time it was suggested that black belts would have to register their hands as deadly weapons and if you defended yourself, you would have a harder self defense stance. Eventually I switched to Wing Chun when I moved to Atlanta, which was harder work and more effective. But I found myself combining the two with grappling in actual situations.

I'm very thankful that I made that choice, and I believe that it is effective at warding off attacks. Now my daughter will be able to do what I could not, and it's already good for her. At the beginning of the class, the loudness of the instructor's voice upset her, as mine does when I ask her to do something, but by the end of the class she was having a blast, and many of the things I'd been trying to teach her were sinking in as a good thing.

I know that I cannot protect my daughter from the world, but I can prepare her for it, something I did not have with an archaic expectation of being protected by the men in my life, when ironically, they were the ones I needed the most protection from ... and had the least.  With the whole family doing it, I see many benefits for us in health, and Morgan watching her parents demonstrate respect will be beneficial as well. She's so smart, but being an only child, I worry. Already she's adorable, and I worry what she will have to contend with when she grows into the beautiful, smart woman that I know she will be. I just want to make sure that when that day comes, she will have the confidence, emotional strength, and physical capability to handle whatever comes her way.

The Smoker Incident

In a conversation with a friend, today, I told one of the family stories that still brings a smile. It was one of those that needs to be written down. Allow me to regale you with a most interesting birthday dinner.

It was my 20th birthday and my father had recently acquired a new smoker for flavoring meat. Eager to try it out, he offered to do something special for my birthday and smoke steaks. My father is and was an avid beef lover. At the time, however, it was very low on my list.  This did not register with my father. Neither did him offering me coffee every morning, since becoming a teenager. Every morning I declined and said I did not like coffee.  Now that I'm 37, he has actually learned this and offers me a coke instead, so kudos for that. 

Cooking a steak for my birthday dinner was not a huge enough event to indelibly write the anecdote to memory so much as the smoking of it. When one thinks of smoky flavor, it conjures thoughts of hickory or other flavorful options ... not ... pine. So that was the first interesting aspect of the smoking incident.

The side dishes are where the story gets interesting, because my father decided that they were getting cold waiting for the steaks to smoke. He figured that putting them in the smoker would warm the rolls and the aluminum wrapped baked potatoes. Perhaps that would have been all that happened if he had put the baked potatoes on the top, but they were on the bottom, close to the flame.  The aluminum on the potatoes caught fire and soon the steaks were not only smoking in pine, but aluminum.

This was not common knowledge to those at the table, when dinner was served. My brother's friend, Shawn, was the first to take a bite when he was asked how it tasted. After a strange expression, he said, "I don't know, my tongue is numb." This is apparently what happens when you smoke a steak in aluminum we soon discovered.

I thought surely that the rolls would be fine, not knowing that they too had spent time in the smoker, where they became hard as rocks. I bit into one, and could bite no further, as my teeth got stuck. 

Luckily the potatoes were fine on the inside.  And we were all thankful that I had an ice cream cake, so it didn't end up in the smoker. Poor Daddy, it wasn't his finest hour, but it is a funny memory. It's the thought that counts :)

Broken Nose

Riding at the Ranch in Montana.

One of the things that I am very self conscious of is my nose. It's been broken so many times that the bone that should keep it straight isn't even connected anymore.  I'm sure I have a deviated septum, and wish that I could get it fixed, but I have to say it holds a lot of stories.

How does one break their nose that often? You may ask. Well, although my present sedentary figure does not convey it, I was once very active and pursued life with a passion. I wanted to live it to its fullest. Although I was arguably sheltered in many ways, I also had experiences that others did not, and in my youth I was enamored with the West and being a cowgirl. This was largely in part because my grandfather had been an actual cowboy (also architect and WWII bomber pilot) and I spent my Summers in Montana adventuring on his 300 acre ranch.

However growing up, I had a knack for surviving extreme circumstances without a scratch, while getting wounded in the most embarrassing of circumstances. To this day, stairs are my number one enemy. In one such case after winning a fencing match with a friend, I was changing in the bathroom and taking off my shirt broke off the metal hook to han it on, which gouged my arm.  This is not the exciting story of a fencing wound, but my general clutzy bad luck.  I also have a katana scar in my leg... from my own sharp katana... I was doing forms with a live blade next to someone who wasn't watching, so when I tried to add a step to the side to avoid his blade... well... you get the gist.

One of the main reasons for the broken nose is that I decided to teach my horse how to kiss.  I did this by holding a carrot in my mouth, and normally she would put her soft muzzle to my lips for a "kiss". I asked for kisses before feeding her, and on some days well, she was more demanding than others. At times she would open her lips and I would get a real kiss from chin to forehead in horse slobber.  But a couple times I just got whopped in the face real hard. This was by far an anomaly and not a frequent

A Summer day, my friends and I were headed to the river.

occurrence.

The incident that probably did the most damage was a quite embarrassing car accident in my Jeep CJ7.  I was driving down a washboard dirt road, when the Jeep began to bounce.  One of the things about Jeeps is that they have truck shocks, but they aren't actually heavy enough for them.  So the vibrations of the road made the Jeep bounce up and down. Two things happened. The seatbelt clinched tight prepared for an accident, which although just about knocked the air out of me, would have been one thing, but the metal latch holding the seat in place was rusted. So when the seat belt clinched tight, it pulled the seat back as far as it would go, which pulled me away from all the vehicle's controls. Pedals, stick, and steering wheel were all out of reach.  As I attempted to unfasten the seatbelt and regain control of the vehicle, the bouncing broke the ties holding down the soft top, which in the bounce flipped over the roll bar, landing the metal framing firmly on the bridge of my nose and covering me in the soft top.

So there I was helplessly bouncing off the road next to my old church into the Kudzu.  I was so mad when the vehicle stopped that I got out cussing and just wrenched my nose back in place. I noticed as I stumbled over something that there were lots of car parts in the Kudzu, which left me to speculate that I probably wasn't the only person to have such an experience on that road. That was a bad day. While I was at the hospital some people looted my car, before the tow truck got there, stealing my radio and even my car battery.  However that is not the most badass of the broken nose tales.

By college, I was pretty used to breaking my nose.  It was just part and parcel of the lifestyle I'd had, and I accounted it as collateral for experience. Although the next story is by far the most unbelievable, it also has the most witnesses since it happened at a fencing tournament. Although I got no medals or awards at the tournament, what I did is well remembered.

Honestly my heart was not in the tournament that day, and I was not fencing my best. I just wanted to quit, so when I was fencing this one fellow, higher rated than I, my heart just wasn't in it. Funny how you remember little details. When the incident occurred, I had 1 point when he scored his 7th.  We were fencing Epee. His point caught a dent in my mask and the force of the blade caught my mask, spinning it and breaking my nose. The director called a halt as I pulled off the mask, holding my nose. He asked if I was okay when the battle computer switched on in my head. Now it was personal and there was no way in hell that I was going to lose this bout. Taking my nose and jerking it back into place, I told the director flatly, "happens all the time," as I put my mask back on and took my guard position.

The director looked a little unsure, but carried on.  I went from losing with 1 point to his 7, to winning 14 to 7. He didn't score another point, and later was heard telling his coach that he never saw anything in between. The director said fence, and then I hit him and it was over.  Bouts last to 15 points though and I had one more point to win. That's when the epic happened. Woe be to those who oppose me when I apply my will.

As my opponent attacked and I retreated, I began to trip backwards and my brain went into over time as time seemed to slow down.  There was no way I was going to fall on my butt, no way that I was going to let this person win. So, although I had never done one before OR since, I used the momentum of the fall and the pull of the reel and pushed upwards instead, doing a back flip. It was not just a backflip, but a backflip into a split.  I saw opponent, sky, floor, opponent, and stuck out my blade.  When I landed, I was in a full split with my opponent bent over me, balanced on the end of my blade. I had my left hand down to make sure that my left knee was not touching the ground, which would have been illegal. Then as my opponent withdrew, I popped up like it was nothing.

The director asked me what happened, and I told him that I did not know. He asked if I could do that again and I told him that I had no idea what I just did.  Although I could have gotten a red card for fencing off balance or turning my back on my opponent, they decided to throw the point out, which meant that I had not won. My opponent got one more point on me before I got the winning touch, but I won 15 to 8, and although there were no accolades for that one match, they ended up changing some rules because of me. I have a story that's lasted longer than most in those circles and have had other people tell me my own story only to be informed that it was me afterward. Perhaps it's no great accomplishment, and perhaps if I had meant to do it, it might be something to be proud of, but at least my broken nose has one interesting story behind it.

Although I still wish I could fix my broken nose, or wish that it weren't so pointy, or maybe that it was a little smaller, I like to think it gives me character, and characters have history.

Grief

Dragon Con 2004

With the blustery month of March come many memories in tandem with the changing season. It was the month in which I gave birth to my daughter, both happy and tumultuous as I spent almost a month in the hospital afterward. Although it was traumatic, eventually I got better, and got out of the hospital to enjoy my daughter, which softened the blow. But there was another event in March that stings much worse. To this day, the loss can be felt.

On March 18, 2007, I lost my best friend and one of the best people that I had ever known. If you know me, I don't let a lot of people get very close to me, but Richard was literally the closest friend I have ever had. We bonded as I have with few people in my life.

Our friendship seemed to stretch back in time, when my mother discovered in our genealogy that the Wilhites came over on the same ship as my relatives. They were betrayed by the captain who they had paid for passage, and then detoured South and sold the passengers into servitude. Hundreds of years later, Richard and I forged a friendship, having shared many strange correlations that seemed to be serendipity. We lived in Indiana at the same time. We had both been to the Philippines. Our senses of humor were so on par that we spent a lot of time feeding the flames and laughing to where the most simple task became fun when we were together. Like anyone you are close to, we had our spats, but we valued the friendship more than anything and worked to improve our relationship, becoming better friends and closer afterward.

The night he died, he had called me not more than an hour before. Previously he had moved to NC for a new job, and his life seemed to be on an upswing. Because of his heart condition and the expectation of a shortened life span, he told me that he rarely made an effort to connect to people, much less keep in contact with them, because he felt that everything was temporary. Previously there seemed no point to staying in contact and that it would ultimately protect and insulate them. However he told me that he loved me and wanted to stay connected. At the culmination of everything two people with difficulty making attachments had defied the odds and attached to each other in a unique and strong platonic friendship that became very important to both of us. Little did I know that was the last time that I would ever hear his voice.

Drawing of Richard to commemorate him.

We were playing World of Warcraft and Richard had been playing his dwarven hunter killing ooze monsters. He had told me ironically that he was tired of dying. I made some stupid joke about green ooze and mutant turtles. It was a pretty bad joke, but then he never responded. Little did I know that at that moment he had turned to say something to his room mate and died mid sentence of a stroke.

It was sudden and unexpected when the call came from Tom (his room mate). We rushed to NC, but Richard was gone by the time we got there. I was devastated by his loss. I had lost family members that I was not as upset about losing as him, because they were not close. He was one of the most important people in my life, and a part of me died with him, as did the laughter.

To pour salt in wounds, people liked to speculate that maybe more was going on, but it was simply the truest of friendships. The best of friends. He was that person who we were so in sync that we almost didn't need words. We could make silly hand motions and the other person would know what we meant. Sure it was love, but it wasn't romantic. Just like you could love a family member and it not be romantic and the loss be tragic and heart breaking.

Grief is a process, and it never really goes away, because some people in your life can never be replaced. A little part of you dies with them. You can look for someone else to fill the void, but it's not the same, especially when someone is so close as we were.

Recently some friends of mine lost family members and friends. Certain people have been callous while others are compassionate. Truly you discover who are your true friends are in times like these, and it is hard to know how to respond.  Even having lost someone so close to me, I am lost in what to do for my friends. It's not like a car that needs to go to the shop and be fixed. As Kaylee said in Firefly "Sometimes a thing is broke and can't be fixed," even when you really wish that you could.

Grief comes in stages, and people go through these stages at their own pace, sometimes revisiting one stage more than once. However people on the outside often want you to just be okay so they don't have to worry about you, and don't understand if they have not experienced such a loss. Even if they have, everyone deals with things differently and it's hard to compare one relationship to another. Some have unresolved issues that now that the person is gone, can never truly be resolved. While others may not have been as attached and seem to be unaffected.

Although Richard and I were open with our feelings and had nothing really unresolved, the sudden shock of his loss and the huge hole it left behind were tremendously difficult to cope with, and really you never get over it.  There are things in this life that get better with time, but the damage always leaves a mark, like breaking a leg. It may heal, but it will hurt when the weather is cold. Others may not heal correctly and be left with a limp. Some may break so badly that it can never heal correctly without help. If they don't seek that help, they could be lame for the rest of their life, effecting everything that they do. Although emotional pain is not as visible or easy to explain as physical pain, it works larger the same way.

The world may not stop for broken hearts, but hearts can break further if not handled correctly in such situations. Though grief is not a free pass to abuse people, if you are dealing with someone who is grieving it helps to understand and expect emotional outbursts. Anger and depression are part of the package.  This is all normal and part of the process. To expect differently may stunt the process and the ability to heal.

I still think of Richard and miss him. That never goes away, especially near his birthday and the day he died, it's hard to ignore. There is still a hole in my heart that will never be filled. I doubt that I will ever meet another that can fill his shoes. But at the end of the day, I am glad that he was in my life. I cannot imagine how dull and different my life would be had I never known him. I guess it's true that the good die young. In that case, guess it will be a long time till I see him again ;)

Spiders

View from the house we stayed in outside the city.

I was talking to a friend yesterday about why I think I've never been afraid of spiders.  When I was a child, my dad would take a hand and move his fingers like a spider as a game.  The objective was for me to hit the spider.  I believe that's one of the reasons I've always had really fast reflexes by playing this game from the time I was a small child, until later in fencing when a friend said I was "fast like a freak." But in general, it taught me what to do if I saw a spider, and I was not afraid of them. Ironically I didn't feel the need to kill them either, because I was armed with a sense of preparation.  So they never really bothered me ... except once.

When I was in the Philippines in the Summer of 1996, my cousin and I stayed with my Uncle in Tagbilaran on the island of Bohol. While in the city, we had no hot water heater so showers were either cold or you ladled water to clean yourself and basically had a sponge bath.  Some rather extreme circumstances later, and a threat to kidnap my cousin and myself, and we were moved to a new location where we stayed, 2 girls alone in the jungle in this house.

The house like many in the Philippines was open to allow the tradewinds to blow through the structure and cool it. In the temperate climate, those winds did an excellent job keeping us cozy.  However, this also meant that it was open to the encroaching jungle as well.  In fact before we could stay there, they had to remove the dead pythons hanging from the rafters.  They would climb up to try to eat the eggs out of birds' nests and the birds would peck holes in the snakes' skulls, leaving their limp bodies as a ghastly decoration. We had not had any game growing up to deal with snakes, so they did scare me.

The one thing about this new location though is it had a hot water heater, and neither of us girls could wait to get a real shower.  It was glorious and steamy as I bathed in what felt like luxury and is commonplace here in the US. I remember washing when I saw a huge spider, bigger than my father's hand climb down the wall in front of me. It was brown and hairy, and nothing like I had ever seen.  As if it wasn't bad enough to be alone and naked in a shower with the most monstrous spider I'd ever scene, but it was just then that the island had a "brown out".  A brown out is when the electricity for the entire island goes out.  I was plunged into darkness, wet, naked, and alone with the spider.  This I was not prepared for in the least as I yelped and groped in the darkness for my towel and raced to get as much clothing and distance between myself and the spider.

Although that one summer had many stories that came from it, and some unsettling, it was an experience I won't forget. I wish that more young people had a chance to visit a third world country and realize the things they take for granted on a daily basis. Perhaps the next time you take a shower, you'll think of this story and be thankful for something as simple as hot water.

Grappling with Depression

When I was in highschool, I was very depressed. For years, I did not know why I was so adverse to school.  There were reasons of course. I didn't fit in. My brother had gone before me, and my only identity was "Alan's sister" and he had rarely mentioned me in a positive light. Our relationship had been one of rivlary, delaying his jealousy (I was not allowed to wear my class ring because it might make him jealous since he was a drop-out), and walking on eggshells to not wake the dragon.

But there was one lurking secret in the back of my mind, a repressed memory that one day unlocked and bathed me in reliving the experience. The next day I turned and realized that the fellow I was sitting next to in French class had drowned me on a church trip.  When I say drowned, I mean out of body experience, waking up staring open eyed into the sun, floating on top of the water, and seeing my attacker who had held me under until I had breathed in the lake, fleeing to the shore. I should not have been alive. Consciousness returned and I coughed up the lake. No one saved me.  There was no one giving me mouth to mouth... I just came back.

My mother had unlocked the memory by mentioning it one day, years later. I had buried it in order to function, but it came flooding back when she mentioned it and I staggered where I stood. His parents were lawyers, and threatened us, but we had not the financial means to defend me.  I learned that day that money determines guilt or innocence, more than truth. The result was entering a new school where my attacker was to become the popular star quarterback, and I had a reputation as a liar for telling on him.  What was worse, we not only went to the same school, but the same church, and I was supposed to carry on as if nothing had happened.  But it had, and as Ayn Rand said, "you can ignore reality, but you cannot ignore the consequences of reality."

Without memory of the incident, I found a lot of the memories of that time also suppressed, as was my joy, my desire to live, and my tolerance for being called a liar, especially when I had been working pretty hard to be the best person I could be, before and after that point. I was post traumatic and villainized especially for the ensuing depression. I remember taking the SATs and thinking... what does it matter, I'm going to kill myself tomorrow. Rarely did I study, and rarely did I care.  Life felt brief and cruel, separate from those around me, and I became even more introverted than I had been before. I went from a straight A student to not caring much about my studies, doing homework either before school or during home room.  After all, when you don't feel like you have much of a bright future, who wants to work toward one. I was just going through the motions of what was expected of me.  To make it worse, I ended up getting braces before school pictures in 7th grade, which only added to my growing unpopularity.

Truly the only healing came when at 15, a life long dream was realized. At 3, my parents told me that I could have a horse when I could afford to pay for it myself. I took this to heart, and by 15 I had the money and we had a place to keep it. She was my shelter in the storm of youth, and of course not all things were bad. This was when I was happy, on a horse.

Still I was gripped in depression. Added to this were the expectations of others, and the other stresses of high school. Repeatedly I was told, "You would be so pretty if your legs weren't so big". Mostly it was my brother who said this, and took delight in criticizing my body, but I became anorexic, hoping that maybe if I was pretty or thin enough, someone would love me. My grandfather, whom I adored, told me I needed to lose weight when I was already anorexic, comparing me to cousins with higher metabolisms. However it was never good enough. I had big legs, because they were strong legs from horseback riding.  Whatever I did, it wasn't good enough, and by the time I entered college I was fully anorexic, bulimic, and binging and purging.  Meanwhile I was working out to insane levels. I would do aerobics, bike 10 miles to the gym, lift weights, and bike back, often adding horseback riding, martial arts, and fencing to the list.  But I was doing too much on too little fuel, and in essence killing myself to be loved.  One day it took it's toll and I found myself utterly depleted. It was then that the next attack occurred.

In a weakened state, multiple "NOs" were ignored by my best friend's boyfriend, and I once again found myself in the grips of dealing with trauma that only magnified the previous depression.  My brain told me to "give him what he wants and he'll leave you alone" ... so I did, and it was not worth it. I didn't have the energy to fight at the time, but the guilt that followed was overwhelming and destructive.  The tenuous thread that made me want to keep breathing, was cut and panic attacks increased. All the while instead of help, or the sympathy people thought that I was doing it for, I mostly got disdain.  When I cut myself, it was not for the reactions, it was me trying to get the nerve to end it, and with that end, to stop the pain that I found myself in constantly. It was a form of penance for the horrible person that I felt I was, and that I did not deserve to live. I felt I could never be perfect, the person that I was expected to be, so I wanted to end the pain and die, in hopes that I could go to heaven forgiven before I screwed up again. I did not see any hope for me or my soul, which felt under constant scrutiny.

This of course was not the time to end up in a relationship, when I was self-destructive, depressed, and unstable, but of course who could resist someone holding the carrot of love, when you had been literally dying for it until then.  Honestly I am not proud of who I was during that time, but it was a mutually unhealthy relationship in many ways. I didn't know what a healthy relationship was, because I'd never had one. So instead I did what I always did, tried to be the person that I thought he wanted me to be, instead of being myself and finding someone who appreciated that person.  I thought it was love at the time, but it took me a long time to figure out what that was.

Afterward, I picked myself up, and losing that relationship was a huge turning point. I only wish it had happened much sooner, when I had tried to break it off the first time. We both would have been much happier and honestly should have never been more than friends.  There were other relationships, flashes in the pan, but the next traumatic relationship was the exhusband.  I was 23 when we met and he was 32.  At first I was trying to just be friends with him, but he had only one thing on his mind, and every No I threw his way, was a new challenge to overcome. It seemed that he had not been told No very often and it was something that he just couldn't have.

He was a psychopath, not the flippant term psycho given to difficult exes, but a true pathology. As a child, he had pulled the legs off frogs for fun. He lied without compunction, and I found out later that the majority of what he had told me was in fact lies.  The manipulations ran deep, and his glamour of charisma enfolded many in its snare.  Women were jealous that he chose me.  Many had their eye on him, but I was that unattainable one and the chase was on... He contacted my friends to learn more about me, and they happily aided him in his stalking, because it was true love after all...

Although there were red flags, he knew that I considered intercourse to be for marriage. I had been guilt tripped into dating people with a kiss, and being guilt-ridden already, he manipulated that, and me into losing my virginity... another No that he ignored.  At the time he was the most romantic person that I had ever dated, and all warning signs were shrouded in excuses and glossed over with lies.

He proposed and when I was not happy about it, he bullied me into telling everyone, and to pretending to be happy about it. I did not want to say yes, but I was already afraid of him.  The fear continued, but he still made an attempt to wear the mask until the day we were married, and everything changed.  He was being himself for the first time, and that person was cruel and cold.  When I asked him what happened to the things he used to say, as everything he said after marriage was contrary, his only comment was "I was just trying to get into your pants." The next 11 months, lasting longer than the previous 2 wives (partially by manipulation of my family) were torture, pure and simple, culminating in his attack a month after the divorce papers were signed, where he kidnapped me, raped me repeatedly, and then got derailed on his way to dump my body in a swamp.

This is how I arrived at C-PTSD (Complex Post Traumatic Disorder) which I still have though lesser today. With it there has been depression. People would tell me how lucky I am to be alive, and then push me to live the life they wanted me to live, but that's how I ended up there in the first place.  In response, I aimed different. All my life I'd been following the guidance of others when my gut response was screaming not to.  I had been taught to obey others, not myself, and that time was ending. It was not until I started to listen to my gut more and others less that depression began to melt away some.  Also I began to see later in life that as a middle-aged woman there are far more people to relate to me now than there were when I was in high-school.  More time had exposed more women to similar experiences.

I won't say that I don't experience depression, but I have worked to understand the human psyche, to understand how people can go so wrong, and that has helped.  Understanding helps, but being understood helps too.  Also being true to myself. I know that I am most depressed under the weight of what others want of me more than I ever am when I go my own way. It is not popular, but I would rather stay true to myself than a slave to another's will.

Also I had to examine my spirituality and the people who wielded it as a weapon against me.  Those who were the most intent on telling me how to be a good person and holding me to some high standard, often had a double standard and could not get as close to meeting it as I already was.  In so many hands religion is a tool for domination, defining expectations, but not keeping to them.  It took studying and determining my own faith to conquer that as well.

Much of my depression over the years came from seeing abuse, double standards, unfairness, manipulation, emotional abuse, and knowing deep down that it was inherently wrong. But at the time I had no words to express what I perceived as wrong in the world, and when I tried, I was often silenced and my concerns minimized.  The patterns that I saw around me were there and bright as day. I would say things and people would scoff, then a month later return and say I was right about this or that. But in my earlier social circles I was often pushed down the pecking order and my concerns were a source of disdain rather than regard.

Through research and personal education, I have found those things to reinforce what I already knew to be true, and those things within myself that were wrong.  It's a constant battle, not a war to be won. Life is like the 100 years war but more like 72 years.  Within it are little advances and retreats, wins and losses. We can tire of the fighting and think of surrender, but learning of ourselves and our enemies provides us with the insight to win more battles until the fight is over. The real enemy is the behaviors more than the individuals, unless it's a psychopath, and then there is no cure for them.

People often rarely take me seriously. Some in the worst situations refuse to believe emotional abuse is a real thing, preferring to color me as someone who thinks everyone is abusive.  This is usually because they are only carrying out what they learned in their own families, so it seems normal, even if it's destructive. I've had conversations with people when I talk about emotional abuse and then use the word unhealthy instead, and suddenly the same topic becomes acceptable, and the person more willing to admit to those same behaviors as long as the tag of abuse is not attached. Which means that they know it is wrong on some level, but are willing to accept it as a bad habit more than as something they are doing that is harmful to others.

The struggle to open my own eyes, as well as those around me is a fight against the darkness. It's never ending, rarely rewarded, rarely appreciated, and rarely validated.  However when it does happen, when we turn away from those things that destroy ourselves and those around us from within, you can't help but be happy.  For it has always been the lies, the denial, the coverups, the manipulations that make me depressed, moreso when pointing out those destructive behaviors and being the villain for not ignoring the elephant in the room, and having the gall to ask people to stop feeding the elephant peanuts.

It's truth ... and finding people living in truth that is the best remedy for depression.  Watching people make poor decisions that you can not help but see the future outcome of, is terribly depressing, but watching someone make a good decision and set their life in a more positive direction, is cause for joy.  I only hope that I can help people evade those pitfalls that I fell into, climbing fool's hill. We all stumble, but it's important that we get back up and avoid making the same mistakes again.

Nightmares

Just when I think I have a really good grasp on everything and feeling confident, my subconscious decides to ninja attack me with horrific nightmares about the ex.  Lots of people seem to think that all the bad was condensed into the last extreme event, but I was married to the bloke for almost a year, lasting longer than the previous 2 wives who left after 8 months. Most of that time I was not allowed out of his grasp, restricted in every way imaginable, and was somewhat forced to have sex every day whether I wanted to or not.  The ways in which this occurred were coercion, mocking me, defining a wife, religious manipulation, and every possible emotionally abusive technique under the sun.  He scoffed at my internet use and then used my email to get into porn sites to watch rape porn and incest porn.  I know this because I started getting notifications for new material after I left him.  After being turned on by abominable acts, he would come in where I was sleeping, roll me over and do his thing.  All of this I took in stride, trying to be a good little Christian wife, but it was toxic and wrong.

He would force me to do things that he know I hated, often waiting to spring them on me mid act.  If I began to bleed or hurt, he got so turned on that it was scary.  It became clear that the real things that got him off were subjugating me to increasingly humiliating and painful acts.  So in essence, he didn't rape me the one time, because the mentality was applied to my daily sex life with him... something I was still relatively new to, being that he was my first intercourse partner... Oh yeah and I said no the first time too, but he begged and pleaded until I lost my virginity to pity sex, after he told me that his mother raped him as a child.

My wedding day to the monster in 2001

The few times I tried to initiate sex during my marriage to the monster or attempt to enjoy it, a tantrum would ensue, and eventually lead to me curled into a ball crying at his rage.  The emotional attacks left me emotionally devastated, as he raged at how selfish I was, meanwhile being the reigning brat prince to throw tantrums when things were not just so, from how I dressed, to Christmas decorations (what would the neighbor's think?), to what I said and thought, to what I ate, to how groceries were supposed to be put on the conveyer belt at the grocery store. The message was clear... all I was to him was his toy/maid, his whipping boy, for his pleasure.

Most people would think that when I have nightmares that it's about the physical assault at the end, the kidnapping, the multiple rapes, and the intent to murder me.  Although that was the culmination of the abuse, in some ways it was less stressful.  That was clearly wrong to all by-standers.  Even emotional abusive people would probably agree on that one.  It was the event that finally got people to take notice and listen about the complaints I had, because he was so apt at glamouring people into thinking him the victim and projecting all his evils onto me.  At last people were willing to help me, when before he'd been manipulating people to get me back.

So when I have nightmares, it's not about the physical attack, it's about the emotional siege that I was under for a year of accumulating emotional damage.  It is about the charismatic lies that I'm still untangling, years later, that have continued to damage my reputation long after he was incarcerated.  It is about the stalking, the character assassination, the lies, the rage, and other people believing him.  There is nothing more frustrating or painful than reaching out for help and knowing that nobody has your back, that they would deny you aid because of religious notions.  It was this that forever changed me and my world view.  All the people who were "supposed" to protect and love me, were pushing me back with a monster because he was my "husband", a nomenclature that somehow excused any and all abuse.  I was screaming inside and no one listened, or if they did, they would justify his behavior or try to play devil's advocate, or just in general deny me the aid that I really needed.  It became abundantly clear that my husband was not the only misogynist in my life, and that my worth to others was far less because I was female.  Any and all reactions to my husband were labeled to me being crazy, regardless to behavior on his part.

Sidenote: Great article on calling women crazy. Read it here!

He was  SO good at manipulating people and so charismatic that he almost got released from prison for a picnic with his mom.  His excuse was that I was just crazy and trying to punish him.  When the victim role works on hardened prison guards, you know he's pretty effective. Of course when they contacted the detective, who put a stop to that, because the evidence of his crimes was pretty clear.

I hate lies and always have.  However being married to a psychopath made me hate them even more.  It's that which gives me nightmares, the way he seemed to manipulate and shape the world around him.  He would have people thinking day was night, and turn against me for speaking the truth.  So often that had been the way of it.  Whatever world warping abilities he had, stopped working on me, because there was this core of truth inside me that would scream NO! But often it was silenced.

I remember the exact day that everything changed.  Praying one night, I asked God to help me to see things as they really are.  At the time, I don't think I even meant in the context of my husband, but something else.  However I remember riding in the car with him the next day, and I ... saw ... him.  He turned his head, and to me it looked like there was a skull underneath that looked at me with dead eyes, moving just slightly out of sync.  There's really no way for me to sufficiently explain what I saw, and it may have been a byproduct of the immense emotional turmoil that I was subjected to on a daily basis.  But that moment is indelibly marked in my memory, never fading, nor what happened after.  Suddenly whatever hold he had over me was just ... gone.  His tricks stopped working, and it was almost as if I had been under a spell that had broken.  For the love of him... or at least the person he pretended to be when we were dating, I had done things that I normally would not have done.  I got something back after that, and he seemed dismayed that his power over me was gone. In response, he got increasingly scary. When he attacked me physically, I kung fued him. I was and am a fighter, body and soul. Now more than ever, I know that I can not depend on others to protect me or even support me.  If anything, I learned to trust myself more and others less. I threw off the shackles that others had bound me to all my life, and started really truly thinking for myself. This meant a re-evaluation of many of the beliefs that no longer fit with what I knew to be true.  It's a better place to be.

In my dreams, he's still playing the old games he always played and lying pathologically like he always did. That old frustration of speaking the truth and being called a liar, comes back to play havoc with me again.  It's been an ongoing theme in my life.  I remember from childhood my older brother who was so sure that I was wrong that he laughed when I brought him evidence to prove my point... and still denied it.  I remember telling on the boy who drowned me, and being called a liar for that as well. In fact most of the abusers in my life had that same theme. This was so foreign to me. When I was 3 I had told my mother that Tom and Jerry was starting at 3pm, but the network had changed the times. When they announced that on the television, I started bawling hysterically because I thought that God was going to strike me down right then and there.  Mom had to tell me that being mistaken and lying were different things, before I calmed down.  I can watch violence on TV and never bat an eye, but have a show where people are lying, and it ties me up in knots. Having been a stupid teenager, I have told a very scant few lies in my lifetime, but usually turned around and told the truth quickly thereafter. Certainly I've told far less than I've been accused of, but I didn't always have an iPhone to capture the crazy as it was happening. Sometimes I did...

Won the Mythbusters Sweepstakes...
obviously made that shit up!

There have been some extraordinary experiences in my life that are true, but people just don't want to believe it, because it hasn't happened to them, regardless of things like witnesses.  This mentality is especially frustrating and indicative of an absence of abstract thought.  However since two-thirds of people never reach the final stages of mental development, so it's more common than not.  Some days I feel like Diogenes, holding up a lantern, in search of an honest man.

The deception at the heart of emotional abuse, is what makes up my nightmares. Because every one that is believed causes subtle sometimes irreversible damage.  Someone comes at me with a physical blow or attacks me straight on emotionally, they are in for a battle.  But most abusers are too cowardly for actual confrontation. I might do something like use logic on them, and then what would they do? However, how do you fight a shadow?  You would think shining the light of truth on it would make it vanish, but shadows spread and hide from light.  All I can do is keep shining my own light, and forgive others that aren't that bright. Sure, my subconscious will occasionally decide to replay old frustrations, but it's just a dream.  In so many ways, I'm stronger than I was then. Despite others wanting to attribute preconceived notions to me, I survived, and I dare say that I took what happened and turned it into something positive. My trial by fire only ignited a fire in my hearth that has fueled a search for knowledge and a desire to go after my passions instead of extinguishing them for the pleasure of others. I only hope that I can help pass on that knowledge, so others can see things as they really are.

Here's a really good article on what it's like to deal with sociopaths.  As an empath, I've attracted my fair share, but they give a really good description of what it's like http://www.sott.net/article/268449-Empathic-people-are-natural-targets-for-sociopaths-protect-yourself