#paralyzing

I talked about having an alter that prevents all anger I feel towards an abuser, in order to protect me, because they believe this abuser would kill me if I ever showed any anger towards them. I've been working on this and realized there was an event where this alter player a major role.

I don't remember how old I was, but I had to be a bit over 18, when this happened. There was a hostile atmosphere in the house, and I could feel it in the air, that father came home angry and was looking for a target. So, I made myself scarce, went outside and out of sight. However just a few minutes later, I heard my youngest sibling screaming.

Without thinking, I raced to them, found him attacking my sibling, and punched him in the face as hard as I could. He switched targets and attacked me instead, which was the point of it. Me punching him in the face did absolutely nothing to him, as he was both bigger and stronger, but I didn't care, I was enraged he would dare to attack my sibling, I would fight him to death. But, I couldn't.

He punched me back harder, and I fell to the floor, but I got up, raised my fist, and then froze. He was watching me in both rage and expectation, he was waiting for me to attack so he could return it double, but I couldn't do much more at that point, than hit him on the shoulder, at which he hit me in the head, and I fell down and couldn't get up.

I was paralyzed on the floor. I twitched and struggled to move, but I couldn't, something was keeping me completely immobile. The self hatred I felt was overwhelming. I wanted to fight him, I wanted to do as much damage as possible to him, I wanted him to pay for laying a hand on my sibling, I wanted him to know it would not be without consequences, I wanted to fight him to death. But instead, I was weakly lying on the floor, too weak to even move, terror sinking down into my bones, when I didn't want to be scared, I wanted to attack!

He left me lying on the floor without a second glance. Teenager lying motionless on the floor is not a good target. I lied there for a few minutes, unable to move, then somehow, I managed to crawl a few meters, my room was just around a corner, I was shaking badly with effort it took to just close the door, and then I fell back to the floor, and lied there paralyzed, for 6 hours.

Lying on the floor for 6 hours, hurts. I tried to at least switch positions a few times, but every small movement would end up in hyperventilation and loss of ability to breathe. I was filled both with self hatred for being this weak, this scared and this helpless, and terror that someone in the house was going to barge into my room, and realize that I cannot move, cannot do anything to defend myself, and then they'd kill me. I was praying that nobody finds me, nobody realizes just how vulnerable and open to attack I am at the moment, because if they did, I wouldn't be able to stop them. I was enraged with myself, and would have done anything just to be able to move, and fight, but it was all in vain, I couldn't move at all. At that point I already had ptsd and I knew what was going on was going to create a whole new trauma and I already tried to suppress it, pretend it wasn't happening, as if I could somehow will myself not to get affected by this. I was right too, from that moment on, I would become frozen in those moments, lying on the floor, without being able to do anything, waiting to see if I would be killed.

During the long 6 hours, I had time to think quite a bit, and I realized at one point, that this wasn't normal. It wasn't normal for me to be lying on the floor waiting to be killed, when I was in the house with my family, place where I should have been the safest. It would have been more normal for someone to be concerned that I can't move. I was scared that I would never be able to move again, and was contemplating how I would probably spend the rest of my life there on the floor, and how that would go for me.

My protective alter started joking around with me in order to ease my thoughts, which took me out of my trepidation. Nobody found me, nobody checked on me. After any event of violence towards me, my entire family would immediately shun me, to show that I was wrong, to show that they were all standing with the father, and absolutely detested me because it was my fault this violence occurred, and I had to be avoided, shamed, and ignored, until I somehow made it up to all of them. And in this case, it was extremely hard to argue against it; I did punch him in the face. There was no defense for me whatsoever and I knew it, this was very much provoked violence, he could have killed me and it would have been my fault for attacking him first. I know now, that it was fairly predictable what I would do, because I often put my body between him and my siblings, in order to protect them. If he attacked them, I would come running. He was almost summoning me. You know why he attacked my sibling? They didn't close a door. It wasn't a door that particularly needed to be closed. It was an excuse.

After 6 hours of lying on the floor motionless, I managed to shakily climb into my bed, where I fell unconscious almost immediately. I have no memories of anything that happened for the next month.

So why did I paralyze? I thought it was out of terror. Because this man did torture me, hit me, and almost kill me on multiple occasions. He was eager to kill me, and I could feel his murder intentions while fighting him. But I was also done, I didn't care if he killed me anymore. I was going in to fight him to death, I wanted to hurt him as much as possible even if it ended in my death. I think, that's why I paralyzed. If I had gotten up and punched him as hard as I could again, he would probably feel it was enough of an excuse to be able to kill me and get away with it. After all, I was coming at him, right? You can kill someone smaller and weaker if they keep attacking you, or so it felt inside of my head, since I was living in a world where that was normal, where attacking meant you are going to be killed and it was going to be your fault.

My small protective alter wasn't going to have me dead for anything. Even if I had wanted it. Paralyzed on the floor for 6 hours, hating myself to the extreme, feeling ashamed, weak, terrified, incapable of even any self defense, was still preferable than death to them. They were on a mission to protect my life and anything I experienced as a consequence was not that important to them. So they kept me paralyzed for as long as I was in any way capable of retaliating and attacking back. As long as I was angry and reckless, I needed to be stopped. Life needed to be preserved.

But for me, being reduced to that paralyzed self hating state was so traumatic, I ended up frozen in those moments, for a very long time, I think it took me over 10 years to get free of that. Whenever I would close my eyes, I would still be on that floor, unable to move and waiting to be killed. I think it triggered another past situation where I was also paralyzed, unable to run, and waiting to be killed, that was something that happened to me multiple times. So whatever else I was doing, a part of me was just waiting to be murdered and I couldn't relax or feel any relief, for a very long time. Thus my frustration with the alter, everyone knows torture is worse than death, and waiting to be killed is worse than death, except, for this very small alter who is determined to keep me alive consequences be damned.

Anyway, I don't regret what I did, in that situation I know I wouldn't be able to live with myself if I didn't protect my sibling, even if I suffered for it extensively. My heart broke over and over when I realized my siblings thought that I was actually the rightful target for the violence and deserved it all. Even if they had to keep that belief up in order to be sure it 'couldn't happen to them' and 'it was only happening to me because I deserved it, and they were different so they were safe'. I don't care for their point of view anymore because in that point of view, I exist to absorb violence and don't have a point of view at all. I don't need to look at myself from such a perspective, nobody deserves that.

Here's one for you DM's that just wants a trickster enemy!

Once there was a trickster, a trickster so tricky that when they died, they used a form of mirror magic to creat a vast swarm of his own soul. That soul has become what is now know as a devious soul. All of them tend be the same, with just a bit of verity in what tricks they play. Most tricks in themselves sarn't deadly, but come at times when people really don't need it. A trickster soul tends to follow people they wish to trick, till they get board of tricking them & or until there soul is threatened. Due to the oddities of mirror magic, this enemy can't deal any damdge to their targets (atleast not directly)

Stats

Cr: 1/6

Hp: 20

Ac: 16

Str: 6

Dex: 18

Con: 16

Int: 14

Wis: 8

Cha: 6

Movement:  30 feet

Ability:  -Incorporeal: can pass though object as if they were rough terrain. melee attacks hit at a disadvantage against them  -Active: Has two actions per turn. 

Attacks: 

- Shining Boom: |+2 to hit| If it hits, the person affected becomes blinded & deafened for a turn. 

-Frightening figure: |+ 2 to hit| if it hits, the person affected becomes frightened for a turn.

 -String Trip-up: | +2 to hit| If it hit, the person affected becomes grappled for a turn. 

-Stunning Smile: |+2 to hit| If it hits, the person affected becomes stunned for a turn.