Your post about the "Stand By Me" video - that anxiety, that feeling of wishing you could join in but feeling you're not good enough, not knowing that it came from being bullied by a parent - resonates deeply with me right now. I feel like an old bell that has been rung for the first time, but the sound is so, so familiar and uncomfortable and real and awful. I remember that anxiety. I've lived it. I still do. I'd never connected those dots until now. Thank you, sincerely, for that realization.
Oh man. Iâm so sorry you have a similar experience to mine. It hurts so much, and even when you think youâve healed the worst of the pain, some memory pops up, or something you never expected will trigger you.
I want to say it gets better, because I believe it MUST get better (and having no contact with my abuser and his enabler is WAY better than participating in a toxic relationship, simply because they are my parents) but I donât know that firsthand, because Iâm still going through it.
Iâm so sorry that youâre a fellow traveler, but I hope that pain shared is pain lessened.