sex

I Am Free

~ crumbiniville ~ 1 Comment

I believe that trauma is something that can be passed down through generations. It can present itself in subtle ways, or it can come full force.. but I don’t believe there’s a single person born on this planet that just has the innate desire to hurt others. I know there are situations and mental health concerns that make it near impossible for some people to feel empathy and other feelings that most of us consider ‘normal’… but that’s not what I’m aiming at right now.

Recently, in the past two years or so, I’ve been sharing more of my trauma with others.. mainly in the form of therapy, one on one sessions with a mental health professional.. but also to close friends and romantic relationships. There’s this saying, I’m not exactly sure the wording but it says, be careful who you open your heart to, not everyone knows what to do with something so valuable. I’m 33, almost 34.. and I wear my heart on my sleeve, I always have and I believe I always will. I share my thoughts and feelings with anyone, as long as I feel like they’re listening… but I’ve also seen that this is potentially more harmful to me than it is helpful. I share now because I’m able to articulate how I feel… I share now because it took me a long time to speak up for myself… I share now because I’m healing and haven’t really had the opportunity to share before… I share because I need to feel heard.

I’m smart enough to understand that there is a right place and time to have personal conversations, but I’ve been emotionally stunted in areas that make FEEL like any place and time is the right time. The two can be confusing. The truth is, many people are struggling, and even more so, many people do not really know what to do when someone expresses themselves to them. Instead, they block off the emotions and portray you as someone who is immature, emotionally unstable or “crazy”. I’m smart enough to understand this.

I’m reaching a point in my life where I finally feel free from the weights that have tied me down. I feel like I can actually “choose happiness” rather than be swallowed up by overwhelming grief and sadness. It’s a breath of fresh air… it seems like a whole new life.

Sometimes I can physically FEEL my parents trauma.. I know what my Dad experienced as a child.. not fully but based on what he expressed over the years, I know he had to survive at a young age. Looking back at my own childhood, I can rationalize where his anger came from… I can see him repeating some of the same cycles with my brother that his dad did to him.. I’ve felt similar stress to trying to manage money and do the right thing and progress in a profession and take care of my belongings and live with people who couldn’t or didn’t help out financially or take care of their belongings, etc. The point is.. I can feel it, I don’t want to perpetuate it. I’m sorry he experienced his traumas, I’m sorry my brother, mom and myself also experienced residual affects of that trauma.. and I’m sorry that at some point I probably lashed out on others with similar trauma based actions. I’ve seen my Mom struggle with her mental health for years, her depression and the volatile dynamic between her and my Dad. I have worried for a long time that I see very similar traits in myself in that regard, mostly the depression, that I don’t want to carry through life and pass along to anyone.

My heart breaks for my family… but I firmly believe in free-will and I know that I have the ability to stop certain life experiences from being passed down to the next generation. 33 years is a long time, I’ve immersed myself in trauma, unknowingly through childhood, but then as I had the free-will to decide who I spent my time with and what I allowed myself to experience. It all seemed so “automatic” to an extent… like I was blindly gravitating towards similar situations and people who would mimic the chaos I was used to. I knew I didn’t belong in friend circles that included people who had pretty decent upbringings or hadn’t experienced a whole lot of drama. I’m sure, to them, they had… but I tended to feel like I had to act like a different person to be around them.

I’ve spent years of my life, dedicating my time to people who (now looking back) needed me in some way.. and vice versa. People who had drug addiction in their family, a one parent household, extreme money problems, a parent who died by suicide, a life in foster care never knowing their parents, abuse, sexual abuse from family members, homelessness, lawlessness, begging, poverty… I have experienced, second hand, trauma from these people who I loved. The only thing I ever wanted for them was happiness and for them to know that they were somebody and that they were worthy and could amount to anything they wanted. But trauma is not easy to overcome… generational trauma is not easy to break.. and it’s never been my sole responsibility to take the brunt and abuse from people who are dealing with their circumstances.

Everything finally came to a head this past year or so. I worked through and processed (through therapy sessions) a lot of childhood stuck points, vivid memories of anger and abuse and violence, hate and manipulation, worked through sexual assaults and low self worth, through the grief of “losing” my twin brother even though he is still alive, through the physical and mental abuse from my marriage that ended pretty abruptly before I moved out of the country, worked through a miscarriage and narcissistic verbal and emotional abuse leading to major depression and suicidal ideation, then through ridicule and life altering career decisions. I’m typing it all out here, mostly because it validates that I KNOW I have survived some things and I know I don’t need to share them with everyone… but it’s a form of healing for me and at some points I just wanted to feel heard.

The tides are turning, and they’ve been shifting for some time.. but I no longer feel tied down by my past or the trauma… I don’t really feel like I need to keep trying to tell my story to deaf ears. I’ve been heard by those who love me who have allowed me to take the weight off my chest and release it. I feel a little bit like a butterfly, and the cocoon that kept me so safe.. the guards I had up.. were also helping me grow and transform. I finally feel free.

I’m FEELING

~ crumbiniville ~ Leave a comment

I haven’t published on here in over a year, but I have thought about it more often than not. I hold myself back a lot because I’m afraid that people will find this blog post, people that I know, and that I would become vulnerable to their judgement. As it stands right now, people only know what I tell them, which isn’t a whole lot unless it’s my best friend Jade. But even right now, something prompted me to get on here and write.

I’m struggling really hard right now. I can see depression setting in. I come home from work and I instantly head to my room, take a shower and lay in bed. When there is so much that I want to be doing. Normally, I’m an advocate for getting people out of funks and encouraging their happiness and positive vibes, but I live a life right now that is hypocritical.

I don’t want to burden people with my feelings. I don’t want to be vulnerable either. I feel incredibly lonely. And I ALWAYS feel incredibly lonely, but I drift in and out of it.. and recently, meaning months at a time, I’ve been out of it. I’ve been fine. I’ve watched some triggering shit lately.. maybe on purpose? Curiosity? Boredom? I haven’t been feeling. I haven’t been able to feel anything in a long time. I have been numb to empathy, caring, love, peace, and all the negative feelings as well. At first, I thought “I’m fucking healed”.. no more crying, obsessing over shit that means nothing anymore, anger… nothing. It was relieving at first when I realized that I was just rolling through days on auto pilot..  then I got a little worried, because isn’t that how sociopaths or psychopaths are?? They’re unable to feel empathy?? Or anything at all!?!

One of my greatest fears is developing a mental illness. The brain is so fragile, and I’ve got a twin brother who is diagnosed with schizophrenia, mania, bipolar, ptsd…. and a Dad with SADD, mania, ptsd, night terrors… and a mom who is slowly developing dementia. I am PETRIFIED of losing my shit. I see my parents in myself, my actions or ways of speaking or thought provoked memories that I compare myself to.. I understand what my brother is talking about sometimes, like I REALLY get it… my short term memory is fading quickly… I’m out of touch with my emotions… I am fucking SAD.

I guess today or this week is national tell you rape story or some shit, so every post I’ve been reading on facebook is about my friends and acquaintances who have gone through a traumatic experience, and they’re speaking out. And I guess I applaud them for coming out on such an open forum?? But… I’m also annoyed at the whole thing because it’s such a PERSONAL experience… I can’t imagine myself posting about it on my facebook for everyone who is friends with me on there to see… what kind of things would people say about me? Would they treat me differently? Would they see me as weak or blame me or judge me? Why the fuck do I even care?? I guess, I don’t care enough to post about it because I feel like the post wouldn’t do anything to change what has happened… and I guess I feel like people would judge ME, because I judge THEM for posting it.

Other things that have triggered me have been a video I watched of a cop interrogating a murder suspect… for two hours… and I watched 40 minutes of it. 40 fucking minutes of interrogation. I haven’t watched something like that before.. on purpose.. other than just watching crime shows where they show little clips of the interrogation part.. but memories came FLOODING back, shit that I have not thought about or lived in over 10 years. Growing up in a house where I was interrogated regularly by my Dad who worked in corrections. Another reason I would never want my family to see shit like this that I’m writing. I have made amends with shit from the past, forgiven both of my parents and tried so hard to move on and create a life I want to live. And it took so many years for me to heal the wounds that I had, some that I didn’t realize I had.. but I would never want my parents to find this and read it. I would never want them to feel guilty, or angry, or upset with me for talking about how I feel or what I feel like I’ve been through. My Dad would probably get upset and take it personal that I was attacking his actions as he raised us… my Mom already knows all of this. My Dad was a correctional officer for 26 years in one of the worst prisons outside of Washington DC, no doubt it was hard on him, mixed with his own past traumas of growing up with an extremely abusive, alcoholic father.. he brought his work home with him, he brought his childhood traumas into all our lives, my brother, mom and me. Interrogations are triggering to me, because when my Dad would come home, we would turn the TV off, prior to him coming home my mom would have mini panic attacks having us obsessively clean the house to “perfection” so that NOTHING was out of place for him to complain about when he got home.. but there was ALWAYS something to complain about. And I stop myself here for self reflection… I am meticulous.. I find shit to complain about.. am I going to raise children in the same environment he did??? IDK. I don’t have children. Thank God? Anyway.. he’d come home, and my mom would be “boosting his ego” as she would encourage us to do.. which makes me cringe just thinking about it.. and we would sit down for family dinner, which we were supposed to be grateful for because other kids didn’t have dinner, or family, or a table, or a roof over their heads, or shoes, or a shirt on their back… and we had all of that and then some. Reality check. He would ask questions and if the answer wasn’t EXACT or to the point or with the right tone of voice.. we were accused of talking around something, we were hiding something, and the interrogation would begin. We couldn’t possibly be having an off day or be stressed out for anything, we would be questioned on why we had an attitude, why we couldn’t look him in the eyes, why we were twitching out feet or hands, sit up straight, put both your hands where I can see them, why is your hair like that, why are you wearing that outfit, go get your bookbag let me check it, whats in your pockets, ask questions about our friends, where we were, what we did, what their parents did for a living, where they lived, I mean the questions were endless, and I can understand having basic conversation, caring about someones day, listening to eachother, but it always felt like we were guilty for something. And interrogators have a unique talent of making people confess to shit they didn’t do, just because they FUCK with your brain and start making you believe what THEY are trying to put in your head. My Dad would call it “planting seeds“. There were times where this interrogation would go on for hours and then I’d be sent to my room… and I remember just sitting there looking in the mirror confused as fuck, not understanding what just happened, I felt drained… I felt crazy… I would have panic attacks (I didn’t know that’s what they were then, I thought I was just crying hysterically).. and I felt like my brain had shattered into a million pieces. Especially because my brother and I would talk about it to try and undo the programming we had just sat through and we would laugh and FEEL insane.. it seems to weird typing it.. but hopefully I’m really the only one reading this for a long time. I know what I mean. My brother and I learned the technique or sitting perfectly still, only answering questions with monotone yes or no or I don’t know responses, so that my Dad couldn’t provoke emotion or “guilt” from us… I watched many nights at that dinner table as my Dad broke my Mom, it was heartbreaking to watch her question herself or see her brain getting twisted and turned and guilt trips and questioning… and if she fought back my Dad was emotionless and would make her feel even more guilty for it. They argued every single day of my life growing up, he scrambled her brain and the ironic part is now he has to live with her while she develops dementia. When he longs to have a conversation with her, it’s just the two of them, she can barely keep her focus or remember things or  she will repeat herself, and when I come home its like a breath of fresh air to have somebody to talk to.

I never want to live like that again, but I can’t help but wonder if those are the environments that I create when I’m in relationships. I’m at the point in my life where I am starting to think that maybe m purpose on this Earth is not to get into relationships, so I can break the cycle, so I can just take demons to the grave with me and not raise a child in another broken home, or put a partner through one hell of a ride. I am exhausted. Any maybe that’s where my numbness is coming from. Have I finally given up? No, not completely, I’m still living. I don’t have the balls to kill myself. But right before I frantically searched for this laptop to get shit off my chest, I frantically searched for a micro blade, and got pissed when I couldn’t find it. I fee like I’m losing it. The only thing that makes me happy is the routine of work.. even though when I’m there I want to go home.. and when I’m here I want to start walking somewhere and never look back.

I’m judging myself. This post is so morbid and I feel like I should just write positive things and change my thought patterns. But shit can’t always be positive, and believe me, I actually try really fucking hard not to slip into a state like this.  When I open up the flood gates I just want to keep pouring everything out. Would that clear me up? Would that allow me to become a blank canvas and never have to slip into these episodes? No. But maybe someone will come upon this 30947 page book I’m writing right now and be able to relate, atleast just a little? Maybe that’s why the people on social media are posting their experiences, to show that we are not alone.. If I were going to write about my experience with rape I would start with the one instance I know for a fact was rape. The other times, maybe I was just having sex and it felt like rape? I didn’t feel good doing it, or I didn’t want to do it but the person I was with made me feel guilty if I didn’t.. those accounts are too many to recall.

I was in Indiana for the training phase of my new job at Verizon. They flew me out there to get trained and it was a 4 or 5 day event. I stayed in a hotel, had my own room and everyday we would go downstairs and do our training for the day. I was super excited about it, I had never been flown out for training for a job before. The first night everyone decided we were going to have a hotel party and I went out with my new friends I had just met and we went to a liquor store and I got a 5th of Crown Royal. I’m not a responsible drinker, so I made the biggest cup or crown and barely sprite that I could and started chugging it before heading to a room on a different floor. I got there and there were about 20 people in there, all drink, playing beer pong, being social, meeting eachother, it was nice. I was shy because I didn’t know anyone, so I just sipped my drink every 5 seconds just waiting til I was drunk enough not to care anymore. I sat next to a girl I met in the beginning of the day and talked to a bunch of people in the circle, and I remember our trainer coming over and introducing himself and seeing how we were all doing, and then I don’t remember much. I guess I started leaving the room and another guy followed me out, he was a Marine veteran and told me he was walking me back to my room because he didn’t want anything to happen to me.. and that’s exactly what he did, and I was grateful for that because I hadn’t met many guys who would do that. I take a shower and I’m about to pass out on my bed and I get a knock at my door, and I answer it and this man that was in my class pushes the door open and comes in and I’m telling him I’m about to go to sleep, I’m really drunk and he’s being a pushy dude and trying to persuade me to do things with him, compliments etc… he pushed me on the bed and started getting on top of me and (everytime I remember something it’s from an outside perspective, like I’m watching the event happen from an aerial view) and I start PUNCHING him in the face and telling him to get the fuck off.. to me, I’m punching him hard as I can, right in his face… and I think he liked it because he kept going until he was done, then he left. JUST like that. And I took another shower and sat there wondering what the fuck just happened and went to bed. I never told the trainer or anybody there or my manager back in MD.. I didn’t want to cause shit, especially being new.. and I was afraid of what people would think.. so I never told anyone. When I got back to MD, I told my boyfriend at the time what happened… and he didn’t say a word, he took my clothes off and had sex with me then told me I was his. And it fucked me up mentally because I didn’t know if that was supposed to be romantic or possessive. Fast forward to about 4 years ago, I get a random call from a number and it’s the guy from the hotel.. and my heart STOPS.. and he tells me that was the best sex he had ever had.. and I told him to never call me again then blocked him.

That’s my story. Part of me feels like it was my fault for being so drunk or opening the door or for not fighting him off hard enough or for not telling anyone. But, I’ve been through enough training now to know that that was rape, anyway you look at it. I’ve never had a healthy relationship with sex, ever. The first time I ever had sex I was drunk, and that’s my trend. I don’t have healthy relationships with sex. I was with a guy one time where I was actually sober.. and I told him I was nervous because I wasn’t drunk enough yet and we had sex.. sober sex… and while we were doing it he said “isn’t this nice? I think being sober is better” and… I think I died a little bit inside… I had NEVER been treated with such care or softness… and that shit stuck with me to this day♥