Sometimes the outside world makes you unsafe. Sometimes people harm you physically or emotionally, even people you should be able to trust.
And sometimes the inside world makes you unsafe. Sometimes you might cause yourself physical or emotional harm, even though you’re the person you should be able to trust the most.
We’ve been discussing the past couple days whether I am safe or unsafe. We’ve been discussing whether I trust myself not to attempt suicide. For right now, I trust that my thinking is just thinking, with no intention to act. If that changes, if I begin to doubt my ability to keep myself safe, I’ll go to other people who can help me with that, other people who can keep me safe. That may even mean being hospitalized, however much I would hate that.
I wasn’t able to keep myself safe from other people who hurt me, but I can keep myself safe from myself. I didn’t have the resources when I was a kid, but now I do. I *will* ask for help if I need it. I swear it. I swear it to myself and to the people who love me.
A counselor who doesn’t know my past very well said to me yesterday, “You’re human. You make mistakes. Nobody’s going to slap you upside the head if you mess up,” and the bluntness of those words made me realize that I’ve been doing that. In the absence of parents who physically hurt me when I did something “wrong,” I’ve been beating myself up emotionally, telling myself I’m a “bad person” or other such rubbish.
You’re human. You make mistakes. That’s okay. Nobody ever should have beat you up for it. Don’t you beat yourself up for it, either, or you’re just saying that what they did to you was right. It wasn’t.
Itwasn’t.
It really really wasn’t.
Work on believing that in your heart. That’s what I’m trying to do. And I’m trying to learn to be kinder to myself, just like they should have been.
I recently explained to my toxic, narcissistic mom that I would not be in contact with her any more, since she has explicitly stated (and proven) that she will do and say whatever she wants, regardless of whether it hurts me or anyone else. I told her I wished her well, that I was grateful to her for the sacrifices she’d made in raising me, but that I would not allow myself to be hurt by her any more.
My mom responded, and this is a direct quote, “You have turned out to have some very strange ideas about how a family works and how to treat your mother.”
Yeah. These past few years I fell in with a real bad crowd that taught me about treating people with kindness and respect, and—even more shocking—having a right to expect the same in return.
They’re some very strange ideas, I know, but I kind of like them.
I finally did it. I went no contact with my toxic, narcissistic mom. I sent her the email yesterday. I’ve been low contact for about 4 years, but I finally couldn’t take it anymore.
So I’ve gone from low contact to no contact. It feels weird. I’m happy and sad at the same time. It’s like someone I love has been kicking me on the floor for 47 years, and now I finally stood up and walked away. So I’m happy that I’m not getting kicked anymore, but I’m sad that I’ll never see the person I loved again.
Because yeah. I loved her. I still love her. No one is all bad, and there are good things about her. But she’s also mean, and … none of the good stuff is worth having someone mean in my life.
So … yeah … I’m free. I’m happy and sad. But I wouldn’t have done this if I wasn’t sure that the happy will win.
They should make “Congratulations on your estrangement!” Hallmark cards.
how about this: when i was 9 and my stepdad beat me until i passed out and i told my friends at school, my teacher over heard and i was interviewed by cps. they also went to my house when i was at school. when i got home, my step father was waiting on the couch, and told me who visited him that day. he told me if i ever snitched again he would beat me to within an inch of my life.
how about this: my mother locked me out of the house when i was 14 and when i cried so loud the neighbors called the cops, the cop told me i should have been respectful of my mother who was trying to sleep.
how about this. the demon you know is less scary than the demon you don’t.
children in abused households are raised to fear the idea of being taken away. children in abusive households see that help makes things worse.
dont you ever blame an abuse victim for not going to the authorities.
yes this okay to reblog!
Also, a lot of abused children don’t realize that they’re being abused or the extent of the abuse. It’s their normal. Their minds are formed by their experiences and if all they’ve known is one existence it can be difficult to recognize that it’s wrong
STORY TIME!
Under a cut for those sensitive to stories from survivors
I didn’t know that a lot of what I was subjected to was abuse until I was in my 30′s and a partner at the time gently explained to me that what I was describing to him was *not normal* family behaviour.
I knew my father’s physical violence was abuse, that was obvious. But the rest, I thought that was “normal”.
Besides, I had teachers say “I know what happens in your house.” to me and then do nothing about it. The one young teacher who tried to help was told by the school and police to “Mind his own business”.
