Recovering Me

About 2 years ago I cut all ties with my family for the sake of my trauma recovery. The process set off worsened flashbacks, dissociation, panic attacks, etc. I figured once I settled into life without them it would all go away. Instead, 2 years later I’m still more fragile than I was before. I’m ok when locked away at home blocking the world out, but going out at all is really hard for me. 

The thing is, trauma is much more than a reaction to something traumatic. It is a rewiring of your brain. It makes you more susceptible to stress and anxiety. It tends to make you assume the worst possible outcome and fear the worst of people as a warped form of protection. It changes the way your brain responds to stress. It causes so many physical changes that just because you’re no longer in contact with the people who abused you that doesn’t mean the signs of the trauma go away. As long as you have sources of stress in your life, like we all do, you have opportunities for your brain to mistake benign situations for dangerous ones and cause too much fight or flight response than a situation calls for. You don’t always respond to a situation, like being safe, in a way that recognizes the fact that you are safe. Your brain is wired to look for danger in every situation so you’ll never be caught off guard. 

Patience, self-awareness, acceptance, and exposing yourself to situations that cause you anxiety until you gradually decrease your reactions to them will help you over time. Exposure therapy is fantastic if you can afford a therapist. Dialectical behavioral therapy skills are great. There’s a workbook that’s used in most DBT therapy groups and sessions you can buy on Amazon.

Your English is great! :)

I used to have a constant fear of something causing me to relapse into my eating disorder, something setting off depression again, making my panic attacks come back, etc. When you’ve been in a really bad place it makes sense to fear ever going there again. You know how much it sucks. The best thing you can do is make your fears productive and learn new coping skills so that you can take on whatever comes away. 

First of all, it is not ungrateful to be honest about the flaws in your childhood and acknowledge things your parents did wrong. We so often are guilted with the lines about having had a roof over our heads and food on the table, therefore we should be thankful and get over anything bad. But that’s literally just what’s legally required of parents. Family tends to get away with things no one else could simply because they’re family. I don’t know how you were treated, so I can’t tell you the answer to all your questions, but as for the was it for your own good question, think about it this way; if you had a child would you treat them the way your parents treated you? If you did would you consider yourself a good parent? I can’t tell you if you were wanted or unwanted, but I can say that being unwanted by your parents has no impact on your worth, your talent, your intelligence, your lovableness, or anything else. It only reflects on your parents, not on you. 

The times I wanted to die the most were when I felt most convinced that people were evil and almost all like the people who hurt me. So what helped me was finding ways to connect with good, kind, caring people. Exposure therapy made a big difference when it came to reducing my reactions to my triggers, and even getting rid of some entirely. I got hobbies that helped keep me calm. I learned mindfulness. Dialectical behavioral therapy workbooks could be helpful for you. Sometimes I write down the dark thoughts I’m having, then write down what I would say in response to each one if a loved one was saying those things. Sometimes it helps to simple acknowledge what I’m feeling, validate myself, take my feelings seriously, and sit with them until they go. I remind myself that just because I feel something doesn’t mean I have to act on that feeling. 

If someone mocks something difficult you’re going through or have gone through they are not worth having in your life.

If someone uses emotional manipulation to get what they want from you, you are not obligated to keep them in your life. 

If someone makes threats towards themself when you try to set up boundaries and distance yourself (”if you leave I’ll kill myself”) what they do is not your responsibility and you’re allowed to think of your own needs and remove them from your life. 

If someone disappears every time things get rough and you need someone that’s not a good friend and there are better people out there. 

If someone constantly repeats things you told them in confidence because they like to gossip you do not have to stay close to them. 

No one is a bother. It helps me to help others. 

I an not my mental illness.                                                                         

I am not defined by my mental illness.                                                       

There is so much more to me than my diagnosis.                             

Someone else seeing me as a walking set of symptoms does not mean that view is accurate or that I should view myself that way.              

My mental illness is not my personality.

My mental illness is not a character flaw. 

You are flooded with adrenaline and fear hormones. Your brain is producing chemicals and functioning differently. Trauma alters your brain. That does not mean you genuinely wish you were still being abused. It does not mean you are beyond repair. It’s like your immune system having to heal after fighting an intense illness. 

Why do more women not find being judged and valued based on their sex lives incredibly degrading? Judging us based on what we do with our bodies reduces us to nothing more than physical beings. It says that our bodies have more importance than our minds, relationships with others, things we have overcome, what we do for each other, academic achievements, beliefs, self improvement, etc. Considering so many people profess to believe we are souls with bodies, not the other way around, you would think people would place most other defining characteristics above sexual expression. Men are rarely judged for the same thing and when they are people rarely define them by their promiscuity. They are still seen as well-rounded people with more to them than that. 

The sad part is that men created chastity rules for women because women were seen as possessions. Sexual activity was not necessarily viewed as immoral- rather the rules were based on the idea that women had no right to decide when they engaged in sexual activity because their bodies did not belong to them. Men believed women's bodies belonged to their husbands, and before marriage their fathers. Read the laws regarding sexuality in the Old Testament. Rape was not a crime against the woman, but rather a crime against her father if she was unmarried, or her husband if she was married because the rapist was damaging their belonging. Instead of rejecting such damaging and reductive ideas, many women embrace them. I have witnessed far more slut-shaming from women than from men. 

In middle school girls whispered behind backs that other girls were "whores" for making out with a boy or "sluts" because they kissed two boys in one month. There was never acceptance that not everyone’s sexual desires were the same and no attempts were ever made to understand them. The judgmental girls usually made comments along the lines of, "she must have no self worth/respect" or "she must have low self esteem to need boys' approval so bad". Once a girl was known to have engaged in any activity that was not universally socially acceptable she was nothing more than that experience. She often received cruel nicknames based on her activities and people would snicker and gossip behind her back for years, even if in every other area of her life she was a fantastic person. 

I know of people in their 40s and 50s who still behave like those middle school girls. Shaming other women seems to be a way for some to feel morally superior and lets them feel good about themselves when they might not have anything else to be proud of. How do women at no point stop and ask themselves why it is that our physical bodies matter more than our characters? Why do women not question the logic behind these values and who they are benefiting? Why are more women not bothered by the fact that every time they judge another woman for her actions, the man in the situation does not get a second thought?

Look up teen girl suicides and read how many are related to boyfriends secretly filming sex, releasing it, and the girl being torn to pieces by every person in her life for it. Look how many are because a girl gets sexually assaulted and called a slut for it. When we tell girls that their worth is primarily in what they do with their bodies, the moment they do something "wrong" with them they will be made to feel as though all their worth is gone. 

In schools that use abstinence only education girls are often taught the metaphor of their bodies being like gum- once it is used it is disgusting and dirty and no one will ever want to use it again. The same metaphor is also used with socks and underwear, and yes, it is put that harshly.

When will women finally have enough of this? Why do we not value ourselves more than this? Why do we not insist on valuing ourselves for our intelligence, kindness, passion, curiosity, friendship, diligence, determination, and just about anything else more than what we do or have done with our bodies? When will we stop shaming each other when we have enough of that from men? Why do we value things just because that is what society around us values instead of thinking for ourselves?

Your doctor is telling you you’re losing too much weight, your parents seem scared about your health, and your therapist says you’re killing yourself. But then a friend, coworker, relative, etc gushes that you look amazing, expresses jealousy over your waist, and asks what your trick is. 

When you are insecure about your body compliments on it are thrilling. You interpret them as proof that your eating disorder is a solution to your problems. You know many people see it as a bad thing, but when others who never noticed you are complimenting your body and relatives typically judgmental about weight are telling you that you look great, you can become conflicted, confused, and unsure whether to see your disorder as a bad or good thing. 

People who gush over weight loss often treat it as a moral accomplishment, even when the person losing weight was not overweight in the first place. They act as though you are a better human for removing some fat from your body. Suddenly you are seen as a determined, committed, and persevering person for being able to eat less. Do you really want to adopt those values as your own? Do you want to view weight loss as a personal accomplishment when it is not for health purposes? Do you want to value yourself based on how low the number on the scale is? You have two things to weigh. On one side you have people telling you the safety of your body is at risk. On the other side you have people telling you your body is visually pleasing. What do you want your priority to be: health or attractiveness? What do you value in other people?

Re-frame the situation. What do you care about more in your friends? If the choice was yours would you make them skinny or healthy? Why do you value the option you chose more? Why do you have separate standards that only apply to you? Are you so unique and different that you need rules that you do not think anyone else on earth should have? Are you so terrible and depraved a person that you need harsher rules than anyone else? 

The basis for the standards you hold yourself to is low self worth. You do not value yourself enough to care about your physical well-being. You find it difficult to care about what you might be doing to harm your body. You just want to feel good about yourself and the compliments seem like proof you have found a source of self esteem. It does not last. It stops being enough. The self loathing consumes you to the point where compliments sound like mockery. Fighting to recover is the BEST source of self-empowerment and self esteem there is. 

When people compliment you for weight loss caused by your eating disorder remember:

They have no idea you have an eating disorder and likely would not be encouraging you if they did. Their comments are uninformed. 

Being small is not the most worthy thing to aspire to be. It is better to be kind, compassionate, accepting, generous, creative, intelligent, thoughtful, weird, unique, curious, passionate, enthusiastic, and many other things that are far more fulfilling to pursue than weight loss. 

You do not have to value what the person complimenting you values. We are taught that attractive people are more likely to be good people and that losing weight makes you impressive and that being overweight is akin to being immoral. None of that is true. Many people believing something is not proof that it is true. 

Remember what you value more in others and remind yourself that you are allowed to value the same things in yourself. 

Feel sorry for the people who see weight as a moral issue and are so shallow and empty that sizes and measurements are important to them without even having a disorder causing those thoughts. Feel sorry for them not having more meaningful, interesting, and fulfilling values instead of feeling pressured by them. 

One of the most helpful and startling things a therapist has said to me was, “In a way, in spite of having low self esteem you’re a narcissist. Narcissism says that you’re so special that you live by a different set of rules than anyone else. You judge yourself by standards you would never judge others by. Do you really think you’re so special and unique that you and only you should have individual standards no one else shares?”

I remember being offended and annoyed by the assertion that applying unique standards to myself was a narcissistic behavior. (the therapist was by no means diagnosing me, only pointing out that specific behavior’s unhealthy nature). As bothered as I was, I went home and thought about their words. At dinner when I judged myself for how much I ate I knew I would not judge anyone else by the same standards and wondered why I thought I was different. I had flashbacks and judged myself for not being over my past yet. I judged myself for how many triggers I still had reminding me of the abuse. I realized I was applying my own standards to many areas of my life and wondered when I had decided I was such a unique human I should have standards I did not think anyone else on earth should have applied to them. 

1. Identify the topics where you have standards you only judge yourself by. Write each one down and add, as close as you can remember, when that standard started and what was happening in your life and mind at the time. Figure out what the areas have in common. Ask yourself what their original purposes were. Some might have been meant to motivate you to work harder on recovery or toughen up. What were you hoping to gain from them?

2. Think of other abuse survivors and identify what you admire about them. Do you aspire to be able to openly discuss your past like they do? Do you admire that they do not judge themselves, that they have found self love again? 

3. Create emotional goals for yourself. Do you dream of being able to honestly say you did not deserve to be abused? Do you want to truly feel you deserve happiness? Do you want to allow yourself better self care? Imagine you won the emotional lottery and write everything that would entail in relation to deal with having been abused. Then ask yourself if your current self blame is getting you closer to that goal. 

4. Break down the rationality of your self-blame. I think every person blaming themselves for being abused truly believes that it is a rational conclusion to come to, and can even feel frustrated when other people refuse to acknowledge that they deserved it. Imagine you are in the jury and your abuse case is being presented. Picture it being presented by someone the age you were when it happened to you. Imagine the events are exactly the same- the only difference is it happened to another person. What conclusion would you come to?

5. Imagine any of your abuse happening to a child you love. Imagine your own child, a niece, nephew, cousin, little sibling, someone else you care for experiencing even a small part of what you did. Does it make your blood boil or are you harsh towards that child like you are towards yourself? Can you imagine ever being alright with an adult doing that to someone who is not you?

6. When you speak against victim blaming remember that includes you. You are not the exception to every act of kindness and compassion. 

7. Remember that when you are blaming yourself you are defending your abuser and defending their actions. Saying that someone can do something to deserve or bring on abuse is saying that abusers sometimes have a legitimate reason for hurting others. You being the victim does not make defending an abuser any more acceptable. 

8. Know that if you would not apply your harsh standards to anyone else you do not have a single rational reason to apply them to yourself. You did not do something in the course of being abused that only you have done and made only you deserving of mistreatment. You were not born any different or worth any less than other humans. 

9. You cannot progress when after your abuser gone you made sure the abuse continued by adopting the abuse into your own mind. You get to control when this abuse ends. It can stop once you decide to try gentleness and kindness instead of harshness and judgment to heal yourself. 

I wanted to check in with you guys in a few areas to get an idea of what would be most helpful for me to write about. 

1. How has the election of Donald Trump negatively affected your mental and emotional health?

2. I haven’t been on tumblr in almost 2 years. Are there any changes in tone, types of trigger warnings, new ways to demand we be impossibly PC (I don’t know 40 words for gender, sorry), site rules, formatting, etc that I need to know about?

3. What are ideas you have for how we can help each other for the next 4 years? I’ve had so many friends who were raped and sexually abused tell me how knowing their families voted for a man who bragged about sexually assaulting women and forever destroyed their trust in them. I know a couple of people who relapse into their addictions because they felt the election results were proof people had no empathy so it didn’t matter. I want to be involved and make sure people don’t feel no one cares. How can we do that for each other?

It’s been almost two years since I last posted on here. My life was a wreck at the time and it was affecting my mental health too much for me to focus on how anyone else was doing. Once I pulled myself back together and my life improved, I still felt unable to talk about mental health and recovery anymore. I have been so isolated and shut down it’s been hard to find my inspiration again. 

I got married since I was last on here. It’s the guy I was dating two years ago. He is the best human I have ever known and good for me in so many ways. I am officially a step mom now. It’s a role that has completely changed how I see my life and myself. I had to resort to methods of making money that I never would have considered in normal situations. I was unable to afford vital medical care and had to do things that were not always comfortable for me. 

I have tried to come back to blogging many times, but always stared at the screen unable to think of anything to say. That changed after the election results. I saw so much of the country and so much of the south around me support a man who bragged about sexually assaulting women. I’ve always known that most people do not care if people are abused and most people have no empathy. But seeing it demonstrated like that has set me on fire. I am not setting out to fix Trump supporters. I am not trying to give people compassion or empathy because I do not know how. What I know is that now is when we need each other. This is when we need to know we are not alone in our experiences and feelings. 

I will warn past fans of my words: I am not the same person I was then. I have a different perspective. I have a blunter way of putting things that the trigger warning obsessed tumblr might not always like. i am not saying I will not use trigger warnings. I strongly support letting people know if content has graphic descriptions of abuse, self harm, calorie counts, etc. But sometimes they go to far when people feel we should warn each other about topics that are merely uncomfortable. I do not believe in hiding like that. If you disagree you do not have to follow me. 

Parenting has completely rid me of blaming myself for my abuse and feeling that I deserved it in any way. All I had to do is imagine one instance of it happening to my son and I wanted to kill that hypothetical person. There is no logical reason to apply different rules to myself than I apply to anyone else. To say I should be judged by and live by my own set of standards and rules would be narcissistic. I wallow less than I used to. I spend less time in my feelings because I do not have time for that anymore. I have to think about feeding myself, making enough money to not be homeless, making big health decisions, being emotionally healthy for my child, setting a good example of how to be a kind person, etc. Processing my feelings and reacting to them became a luxury. Normally, everything I went through would have made me relapse into my eating disorder, but I did not have time for that. It would have been completely selfish, too because I have to set a healthy example of eating and emotional regulation for my son.