oooOooo

We've been writing down ideas for this blog for some time. This idea was written down last October

"I'd like to make a comic about how frustrating naming can be for us. Same with seeing what we look like, and knowing who we are..A lot of us feel so.. gradient with others? (Like so similar but also different enough?) But then sometimes its so clear that we are different in the moment and they are mostly, if not fully confident in their name. It's just.. weird. A lot of us feel weird about having a name at all but understand the usefulness of it. But it also causes certain headmates to try and figure out who is around to get to know that part or be able to recognize them in the future. Which is stressful for a multitude of reasons. I envy systems that can clearly see their headmates and know who they are."

In the last few months they have realized how counter productive it is too push for information. We will definitely be talking about this struggle more in the future and hopefully with more clarity. We didn't fully include all of what that idea did but this where it went at the time. Anyways they would like to say a word so:

I'm considered an archivist in my system and I don't disagree.

I didn't know I was doing harm. I just thought we were all over the place and we needed someone to reign it all in. I thought if we didn't collect information then there was no way to be individuals, that we'd be stuck as mixed play dough forever.

Which in theory makes sense. We started as mixed play dough, so knowing which pile to put each colour sounded like the correct next step.

But I wasn't really looking at the bits I was pulling apart. I didn't realize some had other stuff mixed in that was apart of them so I'd note the "stuff" and the "dough" as different people. I wasn't concerned with getting to know them, because I couldn't really hear them. Not clearly at least.

So I did the next best thing: put them into boxes that I could pretend to understand.

It was especially bad when I'd look at information added by others and not know if I added it or someone else; so I'd second guess everything. I didn't know who I was either, and that surely didn't help.

I know it may sound contradicting, but I'm also the one who ends up in denial spirals. So on one hand I'm trying to build a encyclopedia and on the other I don't fully believe I'm a system.

I was trying to provide myself with solid proof so I'd be at ease, I think.

By doing this I made other headmates feel unsafe and uncomfortable. They didn't want to be interrogated, and I couldn't help myself. Even after some would tell me they hated being questioned, in my mind, it was a necessary discomfort for the end goal.

So I pushed and pushed and pushed until very few people in my system would willingly interact with me. I still didn't recognize it was my own doing. I thought "Well it's hard for a lot systems to get to know each other, maybe we are just having an extra hard time." And kept going.

For around 4-5 years I thought I was going about it the only way I could.

I was wrong.

And now I have to mend my relationship with them. I still fuck up. I still get ahead of myself and want to connect dots and make others disgruntled. I get a lot of side eye from others when I ask clarifying questions, I have to be mindful not to cross the line.

CW : mention of parental abuse towards other parent and other types of neglect and abuse seen on the ACEs test

I was born under the ladder.

Everyone kept telling me I wasn't trying hard enough to climb the ladder, telling me it just took a little effort. I tried and tried but I couldn't even reach the ladder, let alone start climbing it. No matter if I went on my tippy toes, jumped, even with a headstart; it was too high up.

I used to blame myself for this. I hadn't seen anyone else ever be below the ladder so, in my mind, it must have been a quick process for everyone else to get hold of the rope. How embarrassing.

I had no idea that many people started with a stable home, a support system (family, safe adults, friends, etc), a calm and comfortable environment to grow up in.

My parents divorced when I was 3 after I walked in on my Dad tenderizing my Mom for complaining about the kitchen light being on. I don't remember details. I've gotten different sides of it from both of them. The difference between the two is that only one of them admitted that they would have killed the other if I hadn't walked in.

I grew up with my Mom. Didn't even know what a Dad was. Not even when my Dad got partical custody a few years later and I was dropped off at his house, my Mom obviously annoyed. I thought he was my new babysitter.

Honestly, I still don't really know what a Dad is.

My Mom is disabled. If you ask her if she was, she'd disagree, but she's always been as long as I can remember, even if I didn't have the words. I know that now because of my own diagnosises.

As such she had a hard time doing laundry, dishes, cleaning. She still did, mostly, but she was always so angry about it. She didn't teach me to take care of myself or how to do chores, she just expected me to know how and when to. Unfortunately, children don't respond well to kind of this attitude - at least I didn't - so I often hoarded my dirty clothes and dishes in my room.

Even in elementary I'd go to school in dirty clothes. She didn't seem to notice. I didn't understand how clothes were cleaned, or that they needed to be cleaned in the first place. All I knew were my socks felt bad and if I pulled on them they would produce small poofs of dust.

My Mom stopped making me lunches in 3rd grade after the end of year clean out when the teachers found my locker full of apples and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, most of which were in some stage of decomposing.

I had told my Mom apples hurt to bite, so she cut them up but they'd turn brown that way and I couldn't handle that ( #undiagnosedautistic ). She didn't care. As for the sandwiches, there is only so many times you can eat the same soggy sandwich while surrounded by other kids that had proper lunches with actual snacks and drinks.

By junior high (maybe even mid elementary) my Mom didn't even wake up before I'd leave for school. Our lives were so disconnected from each other..

Of course, when we did interact there was always a screaming match that came with it. It was rare that a day passed where she didn't swear at me, or I didn't hear her voice crack.

This is already really long, so I won't continue, but if you've heard of the ACEs test, I got 9/10. Possibly 10/10 but I can't remember if my Dad went to jail or not.

All this to say, if you're like me?

You need help to get up to that ladder. Most people already have that help the moment they are born, hell they never find themselves under the ladder in the first place, but you need others.

Find people that are good for you. Not just fun, and definitely not people that love bomb you or are immediately ready to jump off a cliff for you, but stable people. Calm people.

You aren't supposed to live your life in a pit.

I know it's easier said than done. I know.

But keep your heart open (and educated! Read up on abusive relationships, how to communicate, how to feel your own emotions) and be there for yourself in the meantime.

That starts with paying attention to how you treat yourself now. Are you kind? Are you patient? If not, why? Find out.

Okay I've been rambling for far too long. I love you.