It’s not that we don’t remember the pain.
It’s not that we’ve erased the legitimate good laughs.
It’s that you deny the pain from happening.
That you’re consistent with letting the joy outweigh the pain.
Any gift we give won’t be as strong as gifting ourselves with healing.
The kind we stopped hoping you’d discover and hold,
And claimed for our futures more than yours.
No gift you give will mean as much as a priceless one.
One where we believe your claims of love,
And not the ones masking our tears.
D.F.
Tag: ptsd
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The frequent reminder that you’re only loved when you provide for someone is why I’ve had a long time trusting anyone’s “love” for me.
Things got better when I didn’t push that feeling onto anyone else, and only associated it with people that may never learn how destructive they are when that happens.
Currently, only one person has done this. Stopped for a while after publicly addressing this in a shorter and non-labeling form, but it’s come back recently. I’m tempted to say something to them about it, but the history of addressing their behavior is uncomfortable at best.
It’s times like this that I wonder what they’d do if or when they and others learn about this page, and know that much of the heavy topics are about them and the behaviors they refuse to change.
But I won’t be surprised if they get angry for doing this inner work after years of them believing they’re successful in suppressing me.
If I waited for any people like them to change, my healing would have suffered as much as it did before I started. Even more now that I’m older, forced to take the arguably smart road by no longer engaging them directly, and share more memes dedicated to better emotional maturity.
Along with that, I work to keep growing to a point where they can’t deny how different I am from them. Even when they prove themselves to be jealous of me doing the work, which one has more than others.
Part of me is sad about that for all of them. But I’ve wasted enough sadness on people refusing to change. And they’ll know that even more when I don’t have to co-exist with them any more than I currently do.
D.F. -
(Edited 11/28/2023)
Some of you can imagine a time where you shared a space with someone that demanded your emotions to remain hidden. Some of you may still share that space with them, like I do.
They may make comments about you laughing at something, anything citing joy. But silencing your rage is high on their hit list.
It’s as if the oppressor either doesn’t want that for you, or risk having it directed to them. When in reality, they’re making it easy for that judgment to sit on their name, despite their best toxic efforts.
This attempt of control can lead to damaging thoughts if they’re not cared for properly. And if they don’t want you to feel anger about anything, what good are words to them stating that what they’re doing is wrong?
Distance really is the best option for people like this.They will say anything they can to keep you on their leash, but even they have to know that once you’ve declared how fed up you are, there’s no stopping how you feel. Now you’re just redirecting the anger made from them never willing to change, and using it to change (their role in) your life.
If they can’t handle your feelings, if they’d rather you be a doll or a punching bag for their insecurities, then they have to prepare for the day you limit or deny them any access to you.
They can be as angry as they want to be about that future. It’s the only form of it they wish to exist, compared to yours. And chances are, it’s why they’ll earn the right to be alone in their pain.It may be the only way they’ll step up to making amends and hold themselves accountable for why you’re in a constant fury, especially when/if you’re around them.
Meanwhile, whatever makes you angry about them, acknowledge it. Your experiences are real, and they are yours to learn how to be better than them from each event.
One way or another, they’ll either regret hurting you this way and change, or regret quietly and move onto the next “punching bag.”
From there, the best way to hit them back is from a safe distance, and the success made while keeping it.
D.F.
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(Updated 11/28/2023)
It takes being in a recurring amount of pain with someone to realize why it hurts as bad as it can get. Specifically when they have close access to you and whatever free time you have, and they take that knowledge to have you serve them.
Sure you have your moments of sickness that make you unavailable to even yourself. They may honor that. But any other time that doesn’t involve physical health even to the point of hospitalization, you’re the one on-call.
But if you have a request for them that’s priceless, simple words that could benefit any emotional growth that can happen in them and for those close to them, it will remain in their “to do” pile, never to be touched.
They might even wait for a time to shame you for your beliefs towards people outside of the statement. More proof that their ego means more that your stability. Their need to keep the status quo towers your demands for change.
After any amount of time that you deal with this, you have the right to be done with them.
You don’t deserve to be near anyone that refuses to change their behavior when it’s (knowingly) hurting you consistently.
You don’t need to keep your phone on DND to primarily spite them.
You don’t have to waste words on them any longer that they choose to use against you, because they’re above being stood up against.
Do all that you can to create and hold your boundaries. Make them as subtle or as loud as your situation(s) can grant you. The things you want in your own life are on the other side of the invasive thoughts that those people inspire. You deserve better, even if they do not want to see that truth.
D.F.
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(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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CW: Domestic Abuse
(Updated 11/26/2023)
There’s no sugarcoating the effects of physical and emotional abuse a child may bury away in their adult mind.
Into adulthood, they may keep it buried. They might do it by being the life of the party, forcing extroversion on themselves like a drug. Which sadly, the physical drugs can be an option to keep the burial plot intact as well.
For some of us that were abused at any age, the muscle memory for overall self-defense might never go away completely. Not when you find yourself in the presence of one or multiple parties involved in the abuse, and can tell they’d never admit to it.
They may even “forget” it ever happened and dismiss or divert your thinking from their judgment.
That’s why it can be hard for those that (re)discover this to connect with genuine people. The new people may never touch them in a harmful way, but even innocent words from them could remind the victim of the precursors to those bruises. Or worse.
I can’t say that what you went through is what strengthened you and that you should feel brave for surviving it. It’s cliche, tired, and throws more dirt on the emotional burial site.
You deserved to be safe. Protected. Loved without conditions.
And you still deserve it.
What happened, or even happening to you, should not exist. You deserve to speak up about it. No matter your age, their social or familial connection, don’t let it eat you from within.
They revel in believing you suffer in silence.
Fight back by speaking up, if and when you can.
It’s your turn to win.
D.F.
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(Updated 11/262023)
Being of service to those in need can be a taxing act, mostly when they take advantage of your free time to be there for them. Two things they request become twenty, and they feel no remorse towards your discomforts about it.
They have the luxury of not knowing what it’s like to be the person worth avoiding or ignoring, simply because they refuse to act as if they’re not afraid to lose you.
They will even dare to ask you where others are. Ones they expect to be there during their “hour of need” based on circumstantial ties.
But when you’re gone, when your time is limited only to yourself and no one else, they will do everything they can to shame you for your choices. They might even love bomb you back onto your radar.
Naturally, the other weapons hide in the love bombing. The classic guilt trips, the passive aggression, the very things that drove others to resent being kind enough to help them any time they could. Curling their toes as they fear the reaction when they tell them “no.”
It’s even sadder when their reaction doesn’t come immediately. Their toxicity shows when they come for you weeks or months later, to get that victory you denied them long ago.
It’s not our fault that they refuse to see how damaging they are to people they claim to love. If that love is conditional to their servitude, they cannot expect to have the sentiment be returned. At least not with the same energy.
In the end, we serve these people because of who they are in themselves. We may risk loving the person the abuser could have been, versus who they’ve chosen to be.
And the most important feeling of all? Our boundaries, our distance will show them how much we love ourselves more than we may love the abuser again.
D.F.
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CW: Domestic abuse
Mothers, in the biological sense, are the ones that brought many of us into this life. There’s no denying that. From there, they become an influence on how we interact with people throughout our lives.
Some of us are fortunate to have a mother that can recognize their own toxic patterns and actively do better for themselves and their family.
Some may even open up and tell you how they were treated, and hope they don’t repeat those patterns on to you.
But they are still human. With humanity comes the fallacy of being perfect and devoid of judgment. What they do with that realization can define all of their relationships. Especially if they have children of any age.
Pray for the child that will never hear an apology for any abuse the mother is guilty of. Even if they slowed down their history of being physical, their mental attacks can cut deeper. Often reminding you who they choose to be, while confirming what they are in the back of your mind and under your breath.
The mothers that have grown past their trauma, you are respected and loved to the highest form. As the most socially recognized protectors of your children, it is your duty to make sure their struggles and darkness is defended by you, and not coming from you.
All of this can apply to fathers as well. But one group at a time.
D.F. -
A close friend and I were talking recently, and I asked them if they’d like to see my newest resume. She stated in her own way that it could be sent, but wasn’t in the right mindset to look at it today. Not only did I state that I wished more people could accept answers like that, but she replied that she wished more people felt comfortable enough to say so.
“We both preaching [right now],” I replied.
It’s true though. Too many want to make requests and suggestions without any pushback. As if they’re only wired to hear “yes” in any form, and any version of “no” must be challenged or questioned.
And whey they ask why you feel a certain way, it’s done as if giving them a detailed, even passionate reason to consider your point will sit with them. Only to have them bring it back up months later to spite you, especially in front of their friends to put you on display.
This is part of a long line of reasons many of us are speaking out on toxicity and its amazing friends to anyone that can relate, or add to it. It’s tiring to expect the toxic ones to change, even when they’re presented with your case(s) against them.
But as I’ve relearned a few weeks ago as of this posting, when their issues are presented, you are resented.
A “how dare you tell the truth about me” kind of mentality.
If you’re someone that feels as if your voice only means something to the healed and healing, you’re not alone. Cliché as that statement is, it’s one of the reason those of us are still doing this, regardless if it’s for profit or not (at least for now).
It’s better than feeling alone in the presence of people that you wish you could trust with your secrets, your pain, your overall life.
People that will take advantage of your worries to favor their ego over your feelings.
People that claim to love you when they do that, instead.
No matter who they are to you, love the people that give you what the others lack in.
Make sure you love yourself at the same time.
D.F. -
(Updated 5/25/2023)
Some people, especially families, have ways to remind you that the more you change and break from them, the more they’ll stay the same.
It gets tiring to run around them in circles, run through them, or sneak around waiting to have the freedom you’ve fought for.
The depths of how venomous they can be without trying may wear you down. Hiding your issues that you know they’ll take advantage of, even lying to protect your peace.
And no matter how close or far they are, you’re targeted. No matter how much they prop you up privately or socially, you always will be. All because you’re not complying with things tied to trauma, selfishness, and ignorance.
And the more it piles on, the more you risk going out of your new or growing character. You may want to fight someone. Break something, or things. Scream somewhere.
“Opt-out” sooner.
That last one is the scariest. You risk them telling how much you were loved, and wished they knew what was wrong. When in reality, they did, and chances are they hated you for knowing it.
Either in exposure or how you walked differently in life, they hated knowing that someone, or a few people in a group structure, refused to feed into uncomfortable behavior, and not be the toxic source to others.
And if you’re like me, writing these out in every way you can, you want it to stop.
You want everything that you express to mean something to them, most of all. To want them to change, to hold themselves accountable for once, because you, and others in agreement, are tired of doing it.
But you see how deep the pain is accepted and celebrated. You see how well most others may come together to face you. How their collective knowledge about you will shape a defense of their issues, while offending you with yours.
Whether or not the idea of their unity is driven by anxiety and/or facts of the past, you feel moments of snapping coming up. As if it’s the only way to let them know that they did wrong. Because words haven’t, and with some, never will work.
But the “victim card” will be stronger to play towards anyone outside of the circle, and the last thing they deserve is another victory at the expense of your sanity.
It’s your turn to win now. How you choose to must be chosen wisely.
D.F.
