Are you okay?
That's a strange question isn't it?
How do you answer a question like that? Do you tell the truth. Even if it is awkward or uncomfortable? Do you fake it? And what exactly is okay? Okay compared to what?
All of my life if I wasn't bleeding or dying I thought that the answer had to be yes.
I don't think that way any more.
And really, I don't know if I can really say that the answer to that question has ever been yes since the passing of my mother.
Right now, I am not okay.
I am broken and wounded. I came unraveled and haven't gotten myself sorted yet.
My son is a passionate and intense young man. He is thoughtful and sensitive. He also has a temper. When he was a toddler he would have outbursts of anger and would say things he believed would be hurtful.
I explained to him that when we use word to hurt people, it's like punching them in the face, only with words instead of our hand. I don't believe it is oversimplifying at all to say that we can punch people in the face with words. Sometimes it is with the words we say. Sometimes it is with words we don't say.
I am really tired of being punched in the face. I am really tired of taking shit from people. My mother took shit from people. She also had an explosive temper. Just like my son. Just like me.
I had a violent childhood. That scared, bullied kid is still here. Violence was so much a part of my life that I eventually became violent. I used violence to stop violence. Sometimes I was just violent.
Answering Why
Abused and orphaned as a young child, I spend a lot of energy pondering the question of identity. But equally important is the question "Why am I the way that I am?".
For much of my teenage years I was driven by spite. Everything was experienced through a filter of hurt, anger and jealousy. Over time the hurt slides into numbness. Anger alienates and becomes irrelevant. Jealousy doesn't go away so easily. Jealousy easily masks itself as any number of seemingly justifiable biases.
For decades I had no idea that I was jealous. Jealousy like any negative emotion, will grow like cancer. In my case I have found that an inability to recognize and address that jealousy has prevented me from healing and overcoming nearly every wound I have ever suffered. Part of my survival has been to mask wounds and to redirect anger. In a sense, I had to lie to myself about what I was feeling or why so that I could cope and get through each day. As an adult, trying to untangle this mess has been a monumental feat.
Working through my emotions, finding healing and moving forward has meant that I have had to confront, and in many cases relive the trauma I have been put through. Sexual assaults; the death of my mother; being ostrecised from my church community; being abandoned repeatedly by my father; physical abuse and witnessing my siblings be abused and assaulted. There is so much guilt and shame in all of it.
Everything that happened, all that remains is what is in my head. No one else cares. It doesn't matter to anyone else. What haunts my head, the only evidence of it that remains is words. All my emotions and mental filters, those are just more words. What use are words that no one is willing to read or hear?
At one point I thought religion had saved me. I thought god had taken it all away. But the emotions and mental filters were still there. The 'scars' are still there. Religion is just more words. Scripture, god, just words. All of it is empty and meaningless. I am sincerely happy for all who find healing and comfort in god or religion but I am equally perplexed.
The wounds wont ever be undone. They are part of me. This is an essential understanding to moving forward.
Being heard was the foundation on which healing has really, truly begun. Having someone to listen to everything I felt like I needed to say, who would not judge, minimize or excuse anything was absolutely critical. Being heard is humanizing. After being dehumanized, it is such a wonderful gift to be humanized. Simply listening to what another person wants to tell you can be one of the most compassionate things we will ever do.
Few people can really stomach hearing me tell my story. I am fortunate that I am finally at a place in my life that I have people around me who will listen to me, and even if they can not understand will not lose patience with me. They are encouraging and supportive. They will endure the discomfort of listening to me.
I am beginning to be able to let go of guilt and shame for things I had no control over. It makes it easier for me to accept responsibility for the things I am responsible for and change.
I was the way I was because of what happened to me. I am the way I am now because I have begun to find healing and I am able to have some control of myself and my life.
For much of my teenage years I was driven by spite. Everything was experienced through a filter of hurt, anger and jealousy. Over time the hurt slides into numbness. Anger alienates and becomes irrelevant. Jealousy doesn't go away so easily. Jealousy easily masks itself as any number of seemingly justifiable biases.
For decades I had no idea that I was jealous. Jealousy like any negative emotion, will grow like cancer. In my case I have found that an inability to recognize and address that jealousy has prevented me from healing and overcoming nearly every wound I have ever suffered. Part of my survival has been to mask wounds and to redirect anger. In a sense, I had to lie to myself about what I was feeling or why so that I could cope and get through each day. As an adult, trying to untangle this mess has been a monumental feat.
Working through my emotions, finding healing and moving forward has meant that I have had to confront, and in many cases relive the trauma I have been put through. Sexual assaults; the death of my mother; being ostrecised from my church community; being abandoned repeatedly by my father; physical abuse and witnessing my siblings be abused and assaulted. There is so much guilt and shame in all of it.
Everything that happened, all that remains is what is in my head. No one else cares. It doesn't matter to anyone else. What haunts my head, the only evidence of it that remains is words. All my emotions and mental filters, those are just more words. What use are words that no one is willing to read or hear?
At one point I thought religion had saved me. I thought god had taken it all away. But the emotions and mental filters were still there. The 'scars' are still there. Religion is just more words. Scripture, god, just words. All of it is empty and meaningless. I am sincerely happy for all who find healing and comfort in god or religion but I am equally perplexed.
The wounds wont ever be undone. They are part of me. This is an essential understanding to moving forward.
Being heard was the foundation on which healing has really, truly begun. Having someone to listen to everything I felt like I needed to say, who would not judge, minimize or excuse anything was absolutely critical. Being heard is humanizing. After being dehumanized, it is such a wonderful gift to be humanized. Simply listening to what another person wants to tell you can be one of the most compassionate things we will ever do.
Few people can really stomach hearing me tell my story. I am fortunate that I am finally at a place in my life that I have people around me who will listen to me, and even if they can not understand will not lose patience with me. They are encouraging and supportive. They will endure the discomfort of listening to me.
I am beginning to be able to let go of guilt and shame for things I had no control over. It makes it easier for me to accept responsibility for the things I am responsible for and change.
I was the way I was because of what happened to me. I am the way I am now because I have begun to find healing and I am able to have some control of myself and my life.
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