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The ABC’s of being a POS: Intro
(Edited 08/09/2024)
Note: This upcoming series is for entertainment and educational purposes only. If you wish to learn more about mental health, abusive behaviors, and support, please talk to your primary physician’s office, or a licensed professional.
For emergencies, please call 911, or call 988 for the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline.
Life is full of a healthy balance of people that deserve hugs or suplexes.
Sometimes both.
There’s a long list of examples of these people in both the past and present, public or private figures, and all types of relationships.
No matter what, the world has its shares of people that deserve attention as much as the others need to be starved from it.
This is dedicated to the second half.
By now you’ve assumed that the POS in the title does NOT mean “point of sale.” It means the other thing.
The one that made you think of a person or people who could understand physical actions more than a sentence about their behavior.
And even though one word or phrase will sometimes be used for each letter, they are not limited to them.
Consider each one a gateway into others that, like the ones chosen here, are tied to each other, and will be mentioned and even repeated within most of them.
So, if you or someone you know is a POS, and you’re looking for how to increase your villain potential, you’ve come to the wrong place.
After all, what better way to talk about the tricks and tips in ways that match your actions towards your targets/marks?
No matter what, remember this quote as this journey begins:
“If it hurts you, it’s about you.”
-Kingston Priest
P.S. – It is understood that there are those with undiagnosed or misdiagnosed mental conditions which will have similar behaviors mentioned here. This is in no way meant to offend them, or their related parties. This project is dedicated to those who choose to behave certain ways that deserve to be spoken about.
First: Animosity
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Network
(Edited 11/27/2023)
The internet, for all it has given us, we rarely see much love given to the long distance connections that are made, and stay connected.
From those I’ve met, would love to meet, and meet again, and how I’ve grown with them has helped me decide who I want to be around in person, as well.
All of them remind me to think more about who’s here celebrating my progress. Helping each other in every way we can. It helps to think of them over dwelling on the departed, and especially the lurkers.
You might be thinking of a few people now. Ones that you’ve grown close to that fit the title of a friend, not just an “online friend.”
All the joys, pains, and trust that are built are as real to us as the people we’ve gone to school with, worked with, even built romances with. There are the deviants on both sides, and it’s why you have to remain careful who earns that title, but let me keep it positive for now.
Enjoy all your pure and honest friendships, no matter how they began. In the end, none of us can and should make it alone.
D.F.
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The Blacklist
(Originally written for March 21st, 2023)
Since starting this page, there’s been one thing I’ve had to fight countless times with each post, and that’s throwing out names of people that inspired the posts about negative behaviors. It didn’t stop me from saying titles though, some are more direct than others.
I’ve said again in a previous post how confronting these people is futile, but stating who they are with receipts can help lift the weight of their emotional hold on you.
Honestly, you don’t even have to use evidence for that. Speaking your truth, declaring the need for boundaries, and standing by what you’re against can be enough to hurt them the ways they’ve hurt you.
And for some of us, it’s not about hurting them like that, it’s about releasing the pain they gave us repeatedly.
It’s about ending the hurt of being the scapegoat, the punching bag, and starting the goal to be the breaker of damning cycles.
There’s no room for guilt in the mind of someone that feels they never did wrong. But the more you bring their behavior out into the light, the more it can eat at them and risk self-exposure.
The guilt from their pain isn’t yours to bear. They did that do themselves.
Keep on healing.
D.F
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REC.
(Updated 11/27/2023)
Ever since I learned about the “One Party Consent” law in my home state, it’s become helpful in keeping records of moments you know for a fact happened.
The law allows you to be the one consenting party to record conversations which you are specifically involved in, so long as it’s not made with “criminal or tortious intent.” It’s also a problem if you’re recording someone else’s conversation without their knowledge.
In some cases, it became legal, but it’s been a way to guarantee that, if needed, serves as proof that any domestic issues I claim will have evidence to back it up.
I kick myself for the times I didn’t have any recording device on. The things I remember, most of what I’ve said throughout this blog is based on moments like that. Moments that often replay in my mind that I wish I could replay for anyone else.
I don’t have a reason to lie about any of it, but in speaking out about abuse and deception of all kinds, you want to have leverage against those who will lie.
Those that will further convince their sidekicks that they’re still the good guys, the heroes, the victims.
Monsters that can’t be seen without adjusting one’s vision, with or without sunglasses.
Check to see if your state abides by this law. Most have the “Two Party” or more, some outright say “no” to it. But having that “one” can go a long way in proving that nothing is as bright as it seems with your personal relationships.
And if the guilty get wind of it, maybe they’ll act better around you. Then again, if they acted right in the first place, they wouldn’t be the kind of person that this needs to happen to.
D.F.
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The Gambler
(Originally written Feb/2023)
As essential as money is for basic living expenses and more, there will always be people ready to abuse its presence as a weapon in their narcissistic armory. Fitting description for something that falls in the “love bombing” subcategory of narcs.
When you’re in a position where close people can “gift” it to you at the risk of guilt tripping you about it later, it makes you appreciate any sources you earn much more. Especially if you’re doing it privately.
Even if you have a livable amount of wealth, they’ll weasel their way into becoming an additional resource. All going back to the points I mentioned above.
The dramatic hold some people have about money is sad, sadder when you treat loved ones more like piggybanks. It’s one thing to ask for help or receive payment for acts of service, but the world would be a better place if we gave greater attention to our mental health than anyone else’s wallets.
D.F.
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Fear Factor
(Originally written Dec, 2022, edited 11/27/2023)
While healing the inner child, I bent to the demands of people that were threatened by my counterpoints. Older, younger, same age, it didn’t matter.
They spoke to that part of me I wasn’t ready to defend. I let them win so many times, that it’s all they know of me. Even down to the moments where they play on things that are allegedly or legitimately of common interest.To partially quote Hector Berlioz, “time the greatest teacher.” In this case it’s made me aware how much time I’ve given away out of a false sense of fear. The type of fear that was put towards me, and what I put into myself based on their previous judgments.
It eventually inspired two unique thought patterns.
The first being that, in another quotation, how what I want is on the opposite side of fear. The other, I should be more afraid of myself than anything or anyone else.
With them, believing that I’m not worthy, or not allowed to have it yet, are ideas of those afraid of losing their access to me. True for the ones that praised me for an achievement, only to talk down on it later , in hopes to put doubt (back) in my mind.
They won’t say they love it when it works, but by the time I learned of their ways, it was too late. Years of experience leading to how they were ready to do it again, smiling because each time I wouldn’t see it coming.
It’s a sad, annoying way to live, the mental jukes on people they claim to love.
And it’s very easy to consider that line of fear in yourself. More than them being a path to any chaotic actions.
For me, they are there. As much as I’ve built for myself, I refuse to see them carried out.
While some people are beyond words to convince them that their actions are/were wrong, it’s safer for many parties to keep and maintain distance. Not everyone who disagrees will be afraid of that happening to them, but sometimes it gets easier to know who’s who.
D.F.
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A Change of Heart
It takes a long time to recognize your own bad habits.
One of mine was that I’ve spent most of it projecting negativity on people I claimed to care about. Some I still care for despite who caused the distance.
I do my best to forgive myself for doing that, and for other habits that were once hard wired.
I often succeed. Still do.
The other times I risk getting stuck in that once comfortable self-pitying. That feeling that you’re not so different from your old self. Like you’ve only learned how to hide it better from everyone, including yourself.
What are your ways to remind yourself that you’re not speaking the uncomfortable ways you used to? The ways which you feel may have driven people away?
What makes you think that will change when you speak about goodness in its place? Have you noticed that the more you speak up about negative traits, the more you attract the like-minded and repel those that benefited from your old self?
And not all people will develop the same way, for reasons I will leave to medical, psychological, and even spiritual experts. But when it’s done, when you even so much as share memes dedicated to whistleblowing the dark behaviors, even most of the suspects and the convicted will want to keep watch.
By the time you take even that much in, will the awareness of that stop you? It hasn’t for me.
My focus is what it’s always been, to leave behind my word and inspire others to do the same when they’re ready. When you are ready.
And if you’re already doing it, keep going. It’s a great reminder that you really have changed.
D.F.
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Live to Be a Hundred
This is my 100th post.
What!?
I’m smiling, laughing, and holding some tears back as I write this.
I didn’t have a set number to shoot for when I started. I had the original nine set to go, and figured that would be it.
Then it clicked that there’s more to say. “Maybe I can keep up with three posts a week.” I clearly had the time for it.
But I never imagined getting this far. At times, I didn’t think I’d live long enough to get to it.
And yet, here I am.
Wiser, arguably funnier with many I personally know. Grateful I’m catching myself better with most triggers, and not be discouraged in the ones yet to be managed. Even with most based on location.
I’m still doing my best to leave the unhealed people to their own lanes, yet celebrating the ones I left to their own.
Overall, it’s been a long and powerful set of changes that began in an early season. Always in growth, reminders of grace, and strengthening in faith.
I’ll be posting for as long as I’m allowed to. As I’ve said before, there will always be something new to say, something new to add on to past work, and encouragement to keep the faith in yourself above others. All while making sure that I need a break, which may come soon.
Thanks again for sticking it out with me.
D.F.
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Down Low
There is a certain depth that I reach when I’m done with someone’s nonsense. It’s one that others have subjected me too many times because of who I was.
A tiny few have reconnected because of then-proposed and later confirmed growth, but it’s the others that maintained a distance that I draw deeper knowledge from.
Even before my mental health journey began, I had moments of being done with people. Either telling them in private messages, blocking, or the one time to someone’s face.
That depth seems to strengthen with each time, which is a good thing.
Sometimes it was scary. At first because it was new, and given other emotions that I had to wall up to spare others, I was unsure how to control it. Now, I see it like a program running in the background, updating itself with each new account of threats to the entire system.
How they feel about me cutting them off or limiting exposure is their fight, just as much as it is for those you’ve cut ties with. To do that with people that are “danger close” to you does warrant cautiousness, so long as you don’t lose the desire to do so when that distance is established.
D.F.
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The Long Kiss Goodnight
There’s nothing like that first genuine kiss after a dark time of uncomfortable partners. It feels like you’ve never kissed a person before. Or that even the good ones in the past were prerequisites for the one that holds you as close as you hold them.
It hits more when you’ve grown to accept and change from any time you may have been uncomfortable yourself. That level of self-discovery can heighten your senses on who you desire as a romantic partner, because you learned what you should be to have a lasting one.
You’ll see many people talk down or praise the “hook-up culture” that’s running wild these days. Others, regardless of age, have learned from uncomfortable experiences how that life isn’t for them.
They want someone to reflect their emotional goals.
A partner that refuses to deviate from their overall goals.
Someone to not reflect trauma bonds.
Someone whose body, mind, and soul was waiting for you to level up and arrive at the right time, and vice versa.
If you so desire that person* for you, and you’re already on the path of self-healing, trust me when I say the wait it worth it.
Whether or not it’s unplanned, you two will know that your 100th kiss will feel as wonderful and safe as the first one was.
You’ve always deserved it.
D.F.
*or people, within specific consensual arrangements.
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The Hunt
(Update: 4/13/2023 – The search is over. Start date pending. Leaving this entry up, though.)
There’s something that I need to confess about these entries, and the time I’ve had to write them. Hopefully, by the time this is posted, circumstances have changed, and I won’t continue scraping by as I have.
As of this writing, I have been unemployed for an uncomfortable amount of time.While I haven’t been without, the pressure has become more intense. More reasons that I’ve applied to work that I’ve constantly reframed to be temporary, even jobs that my health may be on the line again.
Meanwhile, even temp agencies have been unreliable. One intake appointment after another, leading nowhere outside a statement that they’ll reach out once something in my fields of interest come up.
There have been multiple rewrites of resumes, cover letters. Full interviews with either future rejections or shifty requests for sensitive information. Memory slipping of appointments with my state to improve my conditions, and nearly being chewed out by a county rep for the time lapse in replies.
Even my therapist spoke to me the very things I had said to myself but didn’t completely take to action. That I need whatever can help me get by until that better job comes. I hated myself for some time after our session, but finally accepting that truth coming from the outside was met with pushing forward in a stronger pattern.
I can only go for so long believing that the faults, falsehoods, and F.U’s from employers and more are stepping stones to something greater. That all the missed opportunities are clearing the way for a powerful blessing.
It’s been hard. Too hard to hold on to that feeling most days.
The ones that can handle news like this, ones that aren’t entirely affected by it yet still care for me, are the only ones that know. They’ve helped in every way they can, and I’m forever grateful for it. Others, two primarily, will make my time more uncomfortable than they ever did in older periods of being a dislocated worker.
But this “down time” hasn’t been all bad.
Any time I’ve been on the clock somewhere, the things I’ve written about in here since August 2022 were in the back of my head for years, waiting for expression in any form I chose.
Granted, there is a fictional project that weaves pieces of my trauma into the main character’s life, but even this time has given me reason to write more realistically. Heal the parts that couldn’t wait to be thrown into another story.
Just a way to talk about them plainly, yet artistically, without sounding high-brow, which is far from who I am.
Even with programs like ProWritingAid occasionally badgering me for edits here and there, this time has made me a better writer.
Outside of that, it’s made me a better human.
Wherever my next line of employment is, I hope that it’s a place that reflects the things that I’ve spoken about since this journey began.
If not, I pray that it’s a stepping stone towards that.
While it would be rude of me to think that these entries have been for nothing, each one has been given the time and place to manifest for more than just a chance for self-healing, discovering and refortifying boundaries, and to inspire the same for others.
I look back and see that it’s the beginning of something beyond my imagination. The start of something beyond my times of tears and frustration, all felt in between the blogging and writing the same info for different apps.
Something good will come of finally revealing this tumultuous yet progressive part of my life.
I’m claiming it.
D.F.
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