Hi everyone,

I’m working on a story featuring a female character whose actions and personality are deeply influenced by unresolved trauma, and I’d love your insights to make her portrayal authentic.

Here are some key aspects of her behavior:

• She struggles to set boundaries and often puts others' needs above her own.
• She flirts with nearly everyone, often to mask her own vulnerability.
• She’s outwardly happy, exuberant, and the life of the party, but it feels performative.
• Her personality shifts around different people—she’s almost a different person in each context.
• Her friends don’t really blend into a cohesive group, keeping her relationships compartmentalized.
• She engages in self-destructive behaviors, though not always overtly.

I’m trying to understand the motivations behind these behaviors and how they might connect to a history of CPTSD. If anyone has insights, suggestions, or personal experiences they’re willing to share, I’d be incredibly grateful.

Also, if this post isn’t appropriate for this group or could be worded more respectfully, please let me know—I want to approach this topic with care.

Thank you!

(A poem about trying to have dinner with a psychopath father, who had insane rules that changed at his whim with no warning, and the shortest fuse imaginable, nothing graphic) 

Dinner with Dad

By: CNW

I didn't let it clatter 

Barely made a sound

Never let tines scrape the plate

Your wrath knew no bounds 

Watched you, carefully and counted

  How many times I picked it up

Don't even get me started about

what you did,

 for excessive lifting

of a cup.

Making it through a meal with you,

 much like disarming a bomb,

Severed all my joy and chatter

Replaced it with an anxious, eerie calm.

Praying not to trip the wrong wire

Or ignite your shortest fuse

Breath and feeling only returned 

If I made it through,

And avoided the chaos and pain, 

By not becoming a casualty,

Of dinner with you.

All the words are gone, They were taken away

All the strength is used up, It was used in the fight

All the hope is lost, It got scared and ran away

All I have left, Is what's left of myself

I take a breath and delve deeper in

and I feel something reaching out to me

My breath grows deeper and stretches out my chest

The world flashes, trying take me away from myself

The feeling calls me back

But my breath begins to fail

The world sweeps me away

until I remember again

The lamb's white fleece.

There was this little lamb. This cute, adorable little lamb with fleece so pretty. So pretty, but the lamb was considered futile. So futile, because it was ugly. When it was born, it was born with a certain condition. At first, when the birth was certain, it was for certain planned to become the new part, member of the farmer family's herd. The one herd, because each family of the village had exactly one. But that lamb see, it was born uncommon. Different.

The farmer did know what that condition was, indeed. It was the root of the devil, nature's and God's flaw, the farmer, the husband, the father thought. And the farmer's wife, she said – when she saw and found out she said- put it right back.

That little lamb was called Sin. Sin, for being born. Sin, a gender neutral name. As that version of the name, what nobody of the farmer family saw, was that the little lamb was indeed of good nature, good and pure. It loved poppies, lavender and lilies. It's favourite colour was the rust of the rusty faucet at the back of the shed, where it drank crisp water from when it was a bit too warm in that summer it was still so young within.

But oh, what to do, what to do – the wife complained.

What kind of meat does it produce?

The farmer scratched his chin, looking over at Sin, as it laid in the grass and chewed that fresh grass. Innocent, innocent, yet not a lamb they needed – yes indeed, what if the meet was foul, unclean – not to be sold? But yet yes, by the law, that lamb had to be treated with the bare minimum of decency, until it became old enough for either wool usage – or slaughter. But slaughter wouldn't be possible – what a waste of resources! For some rotten meat.

But, wouldn't you know it, that lamb had the prettiest fleece of the whole herd – maybe even the whole neighbourhood, if treated right.

And that was – right. The fleece was shorn and sold, and the customer to buy it so bold, from the lamb's uncertain root – loved it. Market place was well. And so, the lamb was renamed Fleece.

The farmer, after dinner, at eve, glanced over to his beautiful wife. He remembered biology class in school – apparently there was a cause of female beauty, in the gist. And so, after tying some loose ties, he got himself some medicine. But oh, just one week after the medication mixed into the lamb's milk food, Fleece became weak and brittle, so little and so – useless!

It needs to be put back into balance – the wife complained.

The farmer scratched his chin and cut loose ties to tie new shoe laces, and injected the lamb some more medicine– to balance it back out. But oh, just one week after the injections, the prettiest of wool started to fall out, as the lamb became old and ugly. Both of those things – resulted in failure!

In the end the little lamb now named Sin again became sick, and tired – too useless for either slaughter or wool! And so, by the law's order – it was fed and given water, but aside from that – ignored by the farmer. The other little lamb friends came on over to Sin one day, as it laid with its head low, as those friends had witnessed it all, but did not know how to help at all. Bereaved, they were. Say, one little lamb said, what is unborn? Sin stayed silent. The little lamb continued: My mother said, you would have been happier. Well, you see, fleece said: There's no need. I'd crawl right back.

-Fin.

Often humans struggling with past or recurrent trauma are hard to pick out. You can’t possibly be the only one with a story can you? The truth is that most humans will experience trauma at some point in our lives. Many aspects play into the likelihood but my point is that just because you can’t see it, unless some one tattooed it on their forehead (you do you boo), that doesn’t mean its not there. Trauma is an invisible wound that if left untreated will fester and infect every part of a person. Generally that is when you see it. The Veteran screaming on the sidewalk on 7th Street still wearing his hospital band. You can say it’s not real but I promise I have seen that infection grow in people until there is nothing left that is recognizable. I have seen untreated trauma take lives and cause pain. I have seen untreated trauma in children that are labeled the “difficult student”. I have seen it in bullies and the young lady that never showered or spoke. I have seen untreated trauma in the mean girls and I have seen it in young men who grow up without fathers. I have seen untreated trauma ruin relationships and break hearts. I have seen it end in addiction, abuse and death. My ramble here is simply to show that it does not discriminate nor does it care who you are or who you are meant to be. The movie Crash highlights how no one is safe from trauma. There is no vaccine, helmet or harness that can save you from it. If trauma has come for you already or you happen stumble into it someday, you are not alone.

You are not alone and there is a way through this. It’s going to take some blood sweat and a whole lot of tears but nothing worth having is easy.

There are people who love you even if you don’t feel worthy or good enough for them. They still see you. Let them see you. You are not hopeless and there is still so much more waiting.

Something out of my writings. I am trying to put something together. I dont know what or the form it will take yet but I would appreciate some feed back on the style or feeling invoked.

I.

I developed this crush recently, 

It slowly filled up like adding water to flour 

And seeing what happens. 

I heard his shoes tap rhythmically, 

Felt the vibrations across the floor, 

Trusted his hands turning, spinning, holding, directing me 

As I let him lead, 

Fiddle playing wildly, pressingly, singing about a life out in the country with kids and chickens and green hills and community. 

I dance with a lot of people and my heart opens for them but he 

Was really good 

Does he dance like he lives? 

Is he sure, practiced, passionate, desperately enjoying each playful moment? 

If he was shorter, would he make a good follow, letting me lead when I choose? 

Taping shoes clip clopping like someone so sure and practiced, 

I resent his tallness. I can’t test my theory. 

II.

Sinking down in the heat again, sliding along towards the floor, I rest, staring ahead. 

He's young. I’m wrong. My dreams deceive me. 

Printing fables of potentialities for this young man’s journey forward 

I know because I 

Took him out after dancing one night 

To this late night Persian cafe 

And he told me about his partner, who is lives with, and how they were together since college, and they moved here together. He might be lost he might be fine I can’t really tell. I can;t tell a lot of things but my heart is pounding outside of my chest and I have all the courage to just tell him I’m seeing things, bright big things with him. But I just state the minimum, which is still big. “I really like dancing with you.” “I’m so interested in all your stories.”

He asks if he can join me for my walk in the cemetery the day he says they broke up and he’s not doing well. But the train ride is long across the city in the space between us so he ends up not trying. He’s been listening, hasn’t he? Is he feeling it, too? But again, too soon. I must retreat, I must back off. 

He doesn’t know what hit him. I believe he can’t comprehend the immensity of this break up now. And he’s younger than me. I have no evidence he’s as emotionally literate as I’d hoped. Am I? 

III.

The IRS employee woman on the TV show cries out to the wise, gentle woman she is auditing, “Is THAT what I am attracted to?!” Its her husband who treated her horribly in all the ways and won’t acknowledge any of it, and just keeps berating her. 

We all want to know when we are raised by parents who never loved each other and should not have brought a kid into the world under such a terrible canopy whether we are destined to just repeat the cycle of abuse til death. 

We all want to break out of it and we all want to believe as we heal and break ourselves and assert ourselves and shut ourselves out or in that we’re making progress and seeing what we really deserve (love). 

But what is the world we never get to know? The world of children born into a canopy of fertile love and attention and availability. The world of growing from infant to teenager to adult and being passed from family relationships to platonic relationships to romantic relationships that reflect back to them what they were born into and assume they are entitled to. What is the insular world we never get to touch, where the only abuse is that weird moment for that person where they realize they’re dating an inept person so they break up with some pain but move on to more appropriate, loving horizons. What is it like in that safe passage of the chest where a heart can throb and thrum unbothered, unafraid of attacks from the very people that person relies and relaxes on. 

Help me find this. 

IV.

Our boy is probably just a boy in a man suit. I’m a woman who feels like a girl, a child, all the time. When I dance in community settings I find safe, predictable, skilled touch. I practice leading and following. I am comfortable in both roles, and the best dance partners are the same way. 

Do we dance like we live? Can I dance until I find the passage way to the safe loving connection? To the hearts speaking front their open, relaxed, safe spaces in tandem and beating together in gratitude and harmony? I want to dance with you. I want to love with you. I want to live. I wish I knew how to get there.

V.

I’m giving up on him, it’s over. I feel the sharpest pain even when I keep my distance in these situations. He might never even know. Or maybe it’s not over, maybe I’ll be too curious. Or maybe we’ll be friends. Or maybe I’ll just get hurt even more.

But the question still stands. How do I get there?

VI.

Mom and Dad were 38 when they had me. Yeah they might have hated each other but they had a kid. Here I am. Am I still standing behind them as they make a path against the current? He’s dead, and I don’t talk to her and I feel builty about it but she’s a parasite. But they did it. And now, am I following, am I still wishing? Should I have emphasized my mothering, co-parenting, homemaking dreams far more years ago? I tried but I got smashed by that dreadful breakup. That was so long ago and I’m still here. And every time I think about every child born into this world without loving parents I feel so glad I have chosen not to have a child. But 

I don’t know. What if 

What if all I really want is to find a perfect spouse and make a baby and pour my soul into that? Its probably too late, right? 

I can barely handle daily hygiene. I can barely stay housed. I haven’t been able to hold a job. My healing, my attempt at improving my functioning in this hell society, is my full-time job and I’m dedicated. But I’m drowning. I need more joy. But what if

What if 

Well there’s no magical person waiting for me. I guess I gotta keep fishing around inside for what love really feels like, and then I’ll recognize it when it shows itself to me from another person. Dancing feels like love, just for a moment. Everything feels like love when i’m just so desperate, just so starved and deprived. The tiniest drop in the chest and the eye from my dance partners brings out the best in me. I know they see it - I’m charming, I’m wildly playful, I’m going all the way in every move i make and I’m a thrilling dance partner. I love them for it, I love us for it. But then, dancing isn’t everything. 

VII.

You see me, from above, staring up from the dance floor. I’m alone standing, a little wobbly, and I’m praying in your general direction. I’m begging you. All I have to offer you is the greatest yearning of my heart, like mercury fluid flowing straight out of my chest steadily outwards, awaiting receptivity I can’t even picture. I’ve never known it. I’m crying out. Hold me, please.

You're pretending like you're an authority but you're not, you're a politician. Politicians don't necessarily run for office (wink). I see you in the AMA I see you in APA in the DSM and more personally the meetings of the PTA.

Forever Young

You’re too young Too young to play in the rain, To scrape your knees and chase the stars, Too young to love beneath the summer moon, To feel the rush of a reckless dare, Too young to dream of distant lands, Or pack your bags and fly away.

You see, you’re too young— Everyone’s grown up Except you, Because you’re too young.

Don’t worry, you’re taken care of, You can stay young as long as you live. Why bother with what everyone else thinks? You’re too young to care, Too young to decide What music makes your soul dance, What path feels like home. Too young to forge a way, To make a mistake, Too young to take the lead On adventures you never knew how to start.

Too young to participate In the clamor of life— Missed bonfires on the beach, The thrill of a first kiss, The quiet freedom of wandering the streets at midnight, Alone, but whole.

It’s okay, you’re young. There’s no way to escape. You’ll always be too young.

But there’s one thing you’re mature enough for— You hear the waves, Calling from the shore, The water is deep, dark, Its whispers cold as they rise from below, And you step in, The pull is strong, the tide unrelenting.

You sink deeper, Letting the current wrap you In its arms, heavy as night, Until the world fades into silence.

The stars above flicker— But the void, black and bottomless, It beckons you, A soft, endless nothing That swallows everything in its path.

You were always too young to decide, But now the choice has been made. The void never looks down on you, It welcomes you— Like a parent who’s finally approved of you.

my voice is a whisper lost in the wind,

trapped by shadows that dance on the walls of my mind.

i'll gaze into your soul through my fractured lens,

no longer a story with words to weave the depths of my pain.

i am now just an empty page,

silent and vacant.

this is me disassociating

(my second poem! most days i'm fighting the inner critic in me that tells me i'll never be good enough to become a writer)

Is the fleeting nature of life not what makes it precious? It seems anything ever lasting or long lasting is exhaustive of the human spirit What a peculiar perspective As my hand glides through the cats fur I see in my mind's eye my feline companion withering to physical non existence and my hand a rotted glob I suppose the eventual end and decay of this form of ourselves is inspiration and motivation to be present and enjoy what you is there in front of you in this cycle of life There will never be my hand again, there will never be this furred companion in exactly this form. Every detail unique if your eye is keen enough. Complacency and lack of gratitude for ones life situation is all too easy to malaise into I am constantly torn between resentment for being part of this life and deep gratitude that I may experience the details the universe has manifested to view it's self in. Mainly in the beauty of nature and the creatures belonging there of- and of course the "domesticated" ones that are stuck in this as much as I am.

This is the work of my friend who suffers from CPTSD, I believe it is profound and capable of healing others.

complex ptsd

i  carry with me third degree burns that you’ll never be able to visibly see

it explains why I’m suffering from the highest degree,

of shame, self-hatred, and feeling unworthy 

the intensity of my emotions often paralyzes me,

so,

i’m sorry if i...

shut the doors,

close the curtains,

disassociate,

and numb the pain

i just need to self-isolate,

from places, people, and situations that make me feel even the slightest bit unsafe

it was because i was never taught that i’ll still be loved and okay,

even after the turbulent storm rides out its waves

“i’m okay, i’m okay”

i welp out in such frantic dismay:

“what the fuck is wrong with me?”

i now reply,

“nothing, you just have complex ptsd”

please let yourself be,

just a human being with this profound ability to feel and see

"brain dump"

No Mom you're wrong! That story was probably not a story about a kid who would likely develop CPTSD. You think he went through a lot of trauma but see a lot of trauma doesn't necessarily equate to CPTSD. Many case studies of CPTSD have in common a lack of a supportive adult who isn't in denial about what's going on. Guess what? That biography was largely about a relationship with such an adult and that relationship was portrayed as the reason why he was able to succeed. Is it sinking in yet? By the way the trauma JD Vance suffered was not any more intense than what many many other children go thru and still lead "successful" lives. Kudos that you can respect someone whose politics you disagree with, good job!

How do you mourn the loss of something that you never had? How do you go through the motions of grief when the relationship you experienced wasn't worth missing?

I suppose I'm mourning the idea of something that can never be. I'm mourning the normalcy that I never got to experience.

On your death bed did you think back to all of the times you screamed at me, beat me, shook me, threatened me? Did you feel any remorse or any regret? Or were you still fully convinced that your behavior was justified?

Did you even know you would die? Did it happen suddenly? Did you take your own life? Maybe I'll never know, because nothing could ever temp me to talk to the rest of the monsters that helped you torture me when I was just a child.

The last thing I remember talking to you about was your fervent defense of the rise of fascism, and your unwillingness to confront your own biases. You hung up on me when I tried to tell you that I still loved you, even though we disagree.

Was your downfall related to a break? Did you finally see your idols for what they really were? Did you feel remorse and regret for living your life in a way that spread fear, hatred, and discord? Or did you choose to die rather than face reality?

And where does that leave me?

I cry sometimes, not knowing why. I think about what a waste your life was, how things could have been different, all of the various paths you could have chosen, but this is the one you went down, this is the one you let define you.

Did you feel sorry for yourself? Were you still so deluded and stubborn that in the end you couldn't see that you brought this on yourself? I wasn't there because you chose violent and hateful ideology over your own child. I was actually stupid enough, desperate enough for your affection, that I was willing to try. Again and again and again, until finally I just couldn't keep going anymore.

So, thank you for that. Thank you for helping me come to the stark realization that there was never anything there, and there never would be, and for all of my efforts you would never be a decent person, or a proper parent.

Thank you for triggering me so violently that I started to remember all of the horrible things you and the rest of the family did to me, so that I could find the strength to move on and leave you all in the past.

Thank you for always being an example of what not to become, for showing me examples of what not to do. I learned more from doing the opposite of what you would have preferred for me, than I ever did listening to you.

I find solace in the idea that you're no longer there to enable and protect her anymore. I find some comfort in the idea that she'll have to be all alone, in that empty house, living with the ghosts of her poor decisions and mistakes in life.

What good are her diamonds, guns, cars, and fancy trinkets when there's no one there to show them off to? When she's left alone will she realize she's only ever been in competition with herself?

The two of you spent my entire lifetime stockpiling these items, thinking that they meant something, that they made you something, all while complaining about how you didn't have the money to take me to the doctor, to get me school clothes, to send me to university. Did your material possessions bring you comfort in your final hours? Did you tell your toys how much you loved them? Were you happy they were there instead of me?

You were a coward, that's the truth of it. You ran away from all of your problems like a child, then acted surprised when everything fell apart. And now you're dead and I'm still here having to pick up the pieces.

You were never my father; you were just the first man I learned to fear. You were never my protector, just the person who thought he owned me. You never really loved me, because you never actually saw me for who I was.

I am a small patch of mold living in a pile of straw beneath summer’s warm beam, a child born this past spring.  In innocence and bliss, I slowly grew and dreamed - unaware that my birth was an unwelcome pestilence.

They, the ones who harvested the straw and left it beneath the sun’s gaze, intend to burn me alive within my cozy cradle, to feed me to their blind and deaf flame.… I want to live, I must live. I need to grow and adapt. I need to show them that I am a good and lovely mold. 

I weave between my spotted layers of hay a coarse rope and pull together a form I can move. I fashion it after my would-be destroyers in the hopes that they can accept me as one of them. That they won’t kill me and will let me live. Perhaps they will even love me and treat me with care.

It is hard and strange to move - as I waddle out of the barn to them, they look at me odd and suspicious, describing me as a ‘strange straw creature.’ It is better to be that, I suppose, than what I actually am. 

They let me live - though they keep their lanterns lit inside of the house.

Time flows by like manure. They tell me to work on the farm and do various tasks, to help with the autumn harvest. They walk so easily and quickly - yet it is painful to maneuver the hundreds of tightly bound straw strands to move even a single step after them. They demand so much of me, wish me to always be doing something. 

I miss when I was just on the ground resting, living, and growing. Every moment I can when I am not asked to do something, I collapse to the floor and dream of long warm days in the moist barn… I can’t keep up with what they want from me, not for long…. I am so tired. They raise their voices at me - its loud. I swear I can do better, I promise that I am good.

Winter comes. And their fires burn ever brighter. 

My straw grows weaker as it blackens and decays… I struggle to keep myself together and to carry what they wish me to carry. I go to lift a basket and my arms fray off. I keep trying to weave myself back together with more and more ropes and knots til I don’t even look like a straw person anymore, just a black stained mass of knotted rope with putrid smells and mucus leaking from its very core…

People get sick of me. I make them sick and cough and gag. I contaminate the lands and all that which I touch, unable to stop from coating the world with my spores and scum… I am lazy and do less work. I lounge around whenever I am not watched, for I am exhausted.... I try harder to tie myself tighter together using potato sack cloth but inevitably my mold slime leaks through its fabric. I fall apart more and more and become less and less useful.

I can smell the smoke and feel the feverish heat of their hate. ‘Please, just accept me as mold. I will live on in peace in the barn- I promise to be a good mold” I would try and say to them through my blackened maw - yet all that leaks out is more of my toxic sludge as they observe me in disgust and horror. I know - I know most painfully that am sickness. That I am an inescapably filthy and awful thing. I can’t stop being this way, I just can’t help it.. I know most intimately that I am fundamentally unlovable.

“You created me - I exist because of you. I wanted to be like you” I wish to say to them, but my guts gasp out of me and my word are drowned out by my own filth. I know any day now they will kill me even as I desperately push myself to do more and more - causing more harm as I do so - for I am mold. I am poison to all around me and to what I touch. I am destroyer of worlds and consumer of all. I cannot help it nor hope to be anything else for long… I can attempt to be a person. I can even try to be good - but in the end, my true nature is inevitable and I fall apart.

I can’t stop being mold. For I am mold. I am me.

And there is no escaping that.

What was your biggest writing block and how did you overcome it? Mine is definitely an inner critic that tells me that it would be better not to try at all or that I'm not ‘brilliant enough’.

My CPTSD work. I took all of the love and attention that I used to give out to my friends, and laser-focused that energy onto myself. I've been on this mission for months. And it's hard when I miss someone and I want to reach out. But I stop myself to ask, have I done hygiene, meals, and studying; roughly in that order. Every day it comes up short. But each day it gets easier and easier to get into the right headspace. The reason I stop myself from reaching out, is because I don't trust where that feeling is pure: Have I staggered in the moment and am looking for someone to give me a form of attention?

Months to learn self-love.

Years before that to even realize that I need to self-love.

Things no one can do for me, or even teach me.

...

In this moment, self-love is hard. I feel it all spilling out. I want to dump so much love on my friends right now.

The hard lessons from my CPTSD remind me not to act on any intense emotion, doesn't matter how its shape seems.

These two sections feel like the answer I was looking for when I started writing. My breath...heart rate...muscles...eyes; they're all returning to me now.

I hadn't spent quality time with him in years. And definitely not since I started therapy and healing as an adult. Losing him feels like losing an entire future of possibilities. The joy of reunion. The comfort of brotherhood. And; even if it sounds selfish: the chance to recontextualize who I've become after all these years of healing. I'll never get the chance to find out if he'd love the person I am now.

All I have left is just my love for him isn't it?

I've been very anxious lately about opening up to people; to a degree where I couldn't comprehend the scope of how anxious I was.

I'm worried about letting a person in and they cause harm where I hold my complex trauma.

And for a long time, I've let this world tell me that I need to be open-minded and friendly. Worse, to "take a risk". But there's really no such thing as risk with people is there? Risk can be measured with math. People are unpredictable, unlimited harm.

But I'm really good at reading people. Even with CPTSD aside, I'm actually really good. And I do need to balance that against my traumas. That's why the mother is a stranger now, not just no-contact. If she were anyone else, I wouldn't ever have had any affiliation with her.

That's what makes this life hard though. There are days where I work large events and I see thousands of people in my field of vision. I disqualify each person.

The more I write, the more I realize that I've not thought about my needs at all.

Something that came to me weeks ago but I had forgotten. I want to be with someone who cares as much about an affectionate, supportive relationship as I do. I care about speaking kindly and wanting to be kind. And I did disqualify someone for being incapable of such. These traits...I know I'm good at spotting.

I would tell them that I need some space now, I'm feeling a little under the weather

But I didn't know. I didn't know

I only knew how to thrash about and be angry at the first person my eyes fell on

I'm sorry. I'm sorry

It's no longer a punishment because it never was

It's just my life

Tap song and no dance

What is the tap song?

A warning? A symptom?

Just describe it.

Tap is the only discernible word in it. It feels like avoidance, it feels like hushed screaming.

Disallowed

Not allowed? What is not allowed?

Breathing. Don't tell me it doesn't make sense because it does. Just because you're not allowed to do something doesn't mean you don't do it. Whether or not you have to do it like breathing or because you want to do it isn't the most important thing.

I wasn't allowed to breathe and so I breathed badly.

Shallow, inaudible with hitches and glitches.

Alone. I can do what's not allowed more easily when I'm alone.

Was sometimes is is .. because of the tap. You can be tapped and filled and when it starts leaking out of you the tap just turns on again. Holding it in, patching up the leaks, keeping the tap from turning off is your sole focus because you now know that the leaks are not allowed either. Trying to get that stuff out of you is a

pipe dream.

Was is is is in the tap - smothering, suffocating, choking but Don't drown!!! If you're sitting passively letting it leak out you'll drown. It makes no sense but for the control and the control is kept hidden. Play along or die. Release the pressure and you're soon gasping for air.

It's just an analogy for the ravages of denialism, the way I remember mine.

TW: Mentions of try to overcome Childhood SA

I’ve been in therapy for 13 years. For the past 6 years I’ve used therapy to process the trauma and the more darker Traumas and experiences. I’m at the point where I can talk about what happened but in a vague ways. I sometimes use sarcasm and dark humor to cope. Sometimes it helps draw the picture without being graphic.

Since a good chunk of the trauma is Childhood SA. I started including metaphors in my writing using visuals in my poetry and it’s helped. But I still feel like I’m missing something because sometimes I just get too upset I want to throw my notebook and cry in a corner. My main issue is listening to my body and knowing when to stop. My dream is to one day publish a book divided in 3 Parts. Part 1: How I felt when I experienced the trauma and keeping silent out of fear Part 2: Acceptance and using my voice to express and ask for help and Part 3: The Aftermath and how I am trying to find new peace in my recovery.

I guess my main question is: If anyone is at the place where I’d like to be one day and has done something similar what helped you in your journey? Is there a way to make it easier to write? I know we don’t have magic wands but who knows life hacks sometimes feel like magic.

I'm a 32 year old hermit who's been isolated indoors for nearly 20 years. The reasons for that essentially boil down to the relentless trauma I experienced as a child, and the toxic environment I was forced to grow up in. Anyway, I just thought I'd share a post from my blog here, assuming anyone finds it worth reading.

Kaleidoscope.

I'll throw in this other one as well, given how accurately it still sums up my predicament.

The Bungled and the Botched

Like a dog, I ate dog treats when I was little. I remember eating the voluntarily and liking them, but I question if someone gave one to me that started it all. My family never stopped me from eating the treats, in fact they thought it was funny and cute. When I was in my teens, my grandfather bought me a dog bowl for Christmas. It was stainless steel and had paw print designs on it. I thought he bought it for my cat at first, but he got it for me. He said it was because I dropped and broke all of the glass bowls we had. I was a clumsy kid. I didn't see what this bowl meant at the time. I just smiled and laughed, then I ate out of it for years until he died. I was always like that. I smiled and laughed, and went along with things I didn't want or didn't realize were bad.

Like a dog, I was threatened with physical violence. There were a few moments of violence. My mother once took me into the hallway, shit the door, stripped me naked, and beat me with a hickory while I was face down. I tried to crawl away, but I didn't succeed. The door was shut and there were people in the other room. No one helped me. This same mother who hurt me, I loved dearly. I was protective of her. My aunt once threatened to slap my mother, so I kicked her in the stomach. Then she, my mother, and my grandfather started hitting me with an open hand. My grandfather told my uncle to come and help. My uncle then started hitting my legs with a belt while my grandfather held me down. I told them to stop because I couldn't see straight. Of course they misunderstood what I said and I had to correct them. They never understand any goddamn thing I say because dogs and humans can't communicate properly. Somehow none of it left any marks.

Like a dog, I was left out when I wasn't wanted. I might as well have not existed. I was scolded for trying to get their attention like a puppy is yelled at for wanting out of its cage.

Like a dog, I was ignorant. I laughed when they insulted me because I thought they were some sort of fun compliments. I was so blind. I didn't know I needed help. Everything was just the norm. My grandfather's nicknames for me were "Goob" and "Pecker Head." He would say that I wasn't very bright and that I belonged in the nuthouse. He and my uncle would make crying baby noises at me when I needed food tailored to my sensory difficulties. Them and my aunt would make fun of my fat body every chance they could. They blamed me for my mother and I being evicted from our home. I was 12. My uncle liked to threaten me. My aunt would blame things on me, twist my words, and provoke me. My other aunt would infantilize me. My grandmother was dismissive. My mother was passive and compliant, but also loved to yell at me whenever she was frustrated with me.

Like a dog, I was given gifts and shelter. They were gifts. Love was conditional and could be snuffed out. But one breakdown or emotional incident would open the lockbox which contain my strings. Then they took advantage. I thought they loved me, but then one mistake would make it all go away. They would threaten to take my things away or make comments about how I didn't deserve what I had. I was demanded gratitude.

Like a dog, I was cleaned. My mother was still drying and wiping me at 12 years old. I was completely dependent. I had my first existential experience in that bathroom while being dried. I started thinking that "nothing should exist, not even nothingness as a concept should exist because literally nothing should exist. Reality's existence makes no sense to me." Then everything began to look fake. Nothing seemed real. I was detached. But my body followed my mother's commands. This could be nothing as I have no memory of anything bad. But when I ask myself if I was sexually abused, those years with my mother always come to mind. I've always had a great long term memory, but do I? I don't feel like there are any missing gaps, but sometimes the mind fills them with something else. Fuck I feel like I'm going crazy.

Like a dog, I was on a chain. I had nowhere to go and no one to trust. They had complete control over me. I was afraid of the outside world and afraid of other people.

Like a dog, I was powerless. My grandfather and uncle hit dogs. When they kept barking or weren't obeying, they were beaten. I just watched. I didn't know it was wrong, but it didn't feel right. I thought this was normal. One time my uncle had me follow a squirrel and shoot it in its private area with a bb gun. I am not innocent. When I was in my teens, I hit a dog a couple of times because he kept jumping on me. I once punched a friendly stray cat who wanted food. I hit him because he had attacked my cat I had for a few years. When I hit him, he fell off the handrail. He jumped back up there and looked for food again. He didn't run away, he just got right back up. I fucking hated myself in that moment. I hated myself in all of those moments of hurting animals, and one time when I intentionally scared my best cat friend because he kept meowing at my door. They didn't deserve any of that. I am fucking disgusted with myself. I love animals and it brings me pain that words cannot describe when I see animals who are abandoned, unhealthy or being abused.

Like a dog, I was trained. I became just like them. I don't want to be them. When I was a teenager, I told my younger cousin that we can't be like them. At some point, our friendship ended. We don't really talk anymore. I messed up. I don't know what to do. I worry about her a lot and hope she gets out too. Because she too was a dog. She was the favorite dog and the most prized one. But like a dog, she too was punished for disobedience. I took on the behavior of my caregivers and threatened my cousin by telling her I would throw her toys away if she didn't do what I wanted her to do. I even yelled at her a few times. I want to apologize, but don't know how. She has so much going on in her own life, and she doesn't reach out to me. We don't see each other anymore. I was there for her a couple of years ago when her parents were in a custody battle. But after that dust settled, I no longer got to see her.

Like a dog in his later years, I am worn out. I'm only 21, but I feel much older. I've felt that way for a long time. My family tells me that talking to me as a child was like talking to a little adult. Throughout my teen years, my grandmother would tell me that was just like an old woman whenever I brought attention to something or complained. I was always better at talking to people multiple decades older than me. People my age never made sense. That's not to say I was always mature and didn't do anything stupid or inappropriate, because I absolutely did.

Like a determined dog, I escaped this year, but not completely. I'm out of the doghouse, but I'm still on a chain. My grandmother has the money, I don't. I just need a job and to finish school. Somehow I feel somewhat optimistic. Maybe things will turn out okay. I hope I don't end up in a kennel or in someone's back yard on a chain, metaphorically speaking.

I want to write like the memoirists I admire, but there are so many holes in my memory and fractures of my psyche that I will never be able to, and it hurts.

They took so much from me. No matter how many years I've put between me and them, no matter how many miles, I can't seem to escape the trickle down of trauma.

I'm getting really tired of fighting so hard to stay human.

this started as an exploration of the interesting place I'm currently at with feeli g romantic/sexual desire and attraction. then it turned into something else that's been on my mind.

I was never anything
other than a web of trauma responses

Who am I?

I’m unraveling
I’m building myself - from scratch
From nothing.

I was pareidolia:
It wasn’t me
I never existed

I was just a web of trauma responses

(the lines in the picture symbolize the trauma that built ”me”. The little figure under the second body symbolyze the ”new” me that I’m building)

the moments that I am waking in the morning, and just after I have woken, are some of the best moments of my day. The past and the worries of the present haven't yet been remembered. I am light, loving the spring air creeping through the slightly opened window, soft cool bird sounds. Life lives and I look about through working eyes. The edges around the curtain glow from outside.

Then remembrance descends, despite the everlasting peace. The emptiness where my belonging should be solidifies. The numerous losses of hope and loving figures in my past rise inside and pull down the corners of my eyes and mouth, tug on my throat and gut, stare at me from far away. The dread of the day's loneliness is visible and palpable again, housed throughout my body, preventing joy. Where can gratitude or ease be found? Lifting out of bed will be a sore, heavy sadness, with only fear finally forcing me forward. I'm so sore, I'm so weary from the truck idling loudly just outside my window in the alley as it does every morning. Sometimes a garbage smell wafts in. People keep living their lives, totally separately from me. I have no people. Maybe I did once, but now it's just me. And there is so much to do, to drag myself through, to try once again to convince myself maybe life will get better and make these heavy seconds of staying alive worth it. Maybe all these tasks I do alone will lead somewhere better.