Messages

Decimal Rocket, thanks for reading! Good luck on your journey, I hope the resources I've listed here help you too. 

***

Update: I've started crying a lot. It's surprising to me how much I have to cry about. There's years of pent up crying to do and I am tired. I feel very bad about myself lately as well. I read about how to apologize (Why Won't You Apologize by Harriet Lerner, I highly recommend it) and I learned a lot. So then I apologized to someone from my past and they don't forgive me which is upsetting. I'm proud of myself for admitting I was wrong and apologizing without excuses. I know that took a lot of character that I didn't have before. But tbh I haven't forgiven myself. It has finally sunk in that it is too late for some things. Like it's too late for me to have a loving childhood. I also read about how to forgive (The Book of Forgiving by Desmond Tutu and Mpho Tutu, also highly recommended) and I cried a lot when I read it. They say that forgiveness is the only path worth walking, and I know they are right. I know I won't heal if I don't forgive.

I am really stewing in grief and rage. I'm just listening to Chris Stapleton songs and stewing. I want to throw a royal fit and I think its the only way I'm ever going to make more progress on this. I want to finally behave like I matter to myself. I want to change and I need my life to change. I'm in so much pain. Every day is another tortuous experience. Does anyone have advice for how to cope with these emotions of intense loss, shame, betrayal, rage, and humiliation and still go about daily life? I'm having trouble even sleeping and eating on a regular schedule.

I know that this is significant progress for me (it is such a relief when I cry), but I really wish I could heal faster than this. I know healing requires community, and I am lonely a lot, so maybe I will post more on this site. Please pray for me, or think of me. I really need the help. 

San,

Thank you for encouraging me in my journal.

I'm so sorry about the difficulties you've been facing recently, and for what's happened to you in the past.

I'll be thinking of you and sending support your way.

Sceal,

I agree with Sanmagic7, you are so deserving of compassion and care, including your own. You are tough and kind. I know you will see it for yourself. You don't need anyone to give you permission.

Also, happy birthday!!

[Two Articles I Read Recently:]

Hope66, I post here because I hope that it might help someone else, so that means a lot to me! If you get the chance to pick up either of her audiobooks, I recommend them for sure.

sanmagic7, thank you very much for the suggestions. I have been doing the pillow punching and cursing, and I like the idea of drawing and writing about it in a notebook. Also, I have spent a lot of time being angry at god too, imho it is only fair.

Two Articles I Read Recently: I read an article this morning that moved me, and it reminded me of another one I read a week ago. I want to share them here. Both are from Lenny Letter, which I really enjoy reading for the stories that I wouldn't otherwise see, including relateable stories like these.

trigger warning: sexual abuse

• Her, Too: My Mother, and the Legacy of Abuse, Joy Bryant on the sexual assault that has affected her family:
  http://www.lennyletter.com/relationships/a1053/joy-bryant-mother-sexual-assault/
  
  I won't explain the entire article, but the gist of it is that her mother was sexually abused by an older man when she was 15, got pregnant, and the author was the result.
  
  

  A family member once told me, "Your mother ain't been right since she had you."

  This quote makes me want to purse my lips, put a hand on my hip, and shake my finger like Giiiirrrrl, ain't that the Truth! If anyone in my family was untouched by childhood trauma, this is a version of how I think our conversation about my childhood would go. My mother and father certainly ain't been right.
  
  

  Her story is one of stolen innocence and lost potential, a record of pain spun on a never-ending loop. Her story is sadly the story of so many.

  Ugh, the more I read about negative parent-child relationships and negative events in childhood (on this forum included) , the more the tragedy of it all becomes clear. When I was younger, my idea about how widespread these issues are was narrow. I was very focused on myself. In retrospect, I see that many of my friends at the time were facing similar challenges. I can tell stories of sexual assault at 15 (and earlier) for at least two other girls I knew, including my own.
  
  I have since learned that this is in the time frame that girls are most vulnerable to attack. It is incredibly sad that anyone would hurt children (or other adults) like that. It is shocking to me how common it is. Statistics estimate that 1 in 5 girls and 1 in 10 boys are sexually abused as children. This stat rises a bit over a lifetime, becoming 1 in 4 women are raped in their lifetime. Something is seriously wrong. Our society is protecting abusers, because all of these assaults are being perpetrated by someone! And I strongly believe the solution is to teach everyone to stop abusing others. The solution is definitely not to hold victims responsible, because obviously when the victim is a young person, they weren't asking for it. No one deserves it. It's the abusers who are sick.
  
  

  What matters is she was trapped in a trauma she could never escape, a trauma that prevented her from being the mother I needed her to be. What matters is that she didn't matter. And because she didn't matter, I didn't matter to her.

  
  Who matters is such a sore subject for me. I think everyone matters. We all have something valuable to offer the world, and it upsets me that the society we live in is comfortable with throwing away people like trash, or with allowing children to be abused. If neither of my parents (and their parents, and so on) had been abused, if they had mattered, maybe I would have mattered to them and we all could have had a better life. My hope is to help create the world I wanted to live in growing up - a world without this kind of pain - and that's partly what keeps me going. That said, even though I strongly suspect my parents are abusers bc they were abused as children themselves, I do not forgive them for what they did to me and my brother. They were the adults. They should have known better.
  
  

  For years, the silence between us was so loud, I had to cover my ears. I never knew who my mother was as a woman.

  
  This describes my relationship with my mother currently. I have nothing to say to her. All of our interactions are superficial. And I prefer it this way to the terrible relationship we used to have. It is a big improvement for me. Even though I still wish she could find it in her heart to change, I know that she won't. I know my mother as the terrifying and tortured mother she was and is. Unfortunately I think that is who she is as a woman, too. That's what becomes of a person who lets bitterness ruin their life. I don't want to be like that.
  
  end trigger warning
  
  
• The Time I Went Into a Full-Body Spasm for Six Days, Glow star Betty Gilpin on how she got her mind and body into alignment: http://www.lennyletter.com/health/a1050/betty-gilpin-career-stress-body-spasm/
  
  

  I spent the weekend going to twelve doctors. No one knew what was happening; no one had seen it before. One ventured that my nervous system was having a panic attack, but had no idea what to do. "You just have to calm down and take a break." I was supposed to start my dream job in two days.

  
  That is exactly what it was - her nervous system was having a panic attack! It's what happens when we are triggered into fight or flight, but are trapped, and so our energy gets tied up in the nervous system and later has to be released some other way (such as by shaking or acting out what you would have done to fight or escape the dangerous situation). Having too much of this nervous energy tied up inside the body is potentially the cause of cptsd, and the symptoms occur bc this energy is constantly needing to be let out or be suppressed. (I got this info from Peter Levine, In an Unspoken Voice, mentioned in earlier posts.)
  
  Reading this woman's account of her experience was very encouraging for me, because now I know I'm not the only one having "nervous system panic attacks". I can often control when mine happen, so I deal with it at night, but occasionally small twitching and fidgeting has happened in public during the day (especially when I'm doing something really triggering for me like starting a dream job). Thankfully nothing like what she describes - big motions non-stop for six days - has happened to me. However at a job interview I did have to go to the bathroom at one point and let it out before I could continue. I'm proud of myself for handling that.
  
  

  I called my new bosses and told them we had to change the schedule, because I, um, had a weeklong full-body muscle spasm that, like, stemmed from childhood stuff, and untended self-worth issues? I spent the days leading up to filming having conversations that would have sent pre-body-apocalypse Betty to the fear hospital. But my once-crowded brain now had a morning-after-Pompeii placidity, where apologizing for being alive felt sort of ... dumb.

  
  Apologizing for being alive is dumb! I don't see any reason to keep doing it either. I've also been facing situations that would have sent me to the "fear hospital" before all the shaking and crying started. Healing is possible - even though it is a painful journey. I looked for any other way besides experiencing the hugeness of my pain. But there is no shortcut which works that I have found. I think looking for a shortcut was probably wishful thinking.
  
  Anyway, apologizing for being alive is silly bc I didn't ask to be here. And I think that now that I am here, I am here for a reason, and I belong in the world as much as anyone else. I didn't used to think this. Changing my mind about this has helped me to claim my life for myself. I do not regret it. It's the best thing I've ever done. 
  
  

One more quote: "A sheltered life can be a daring life as well. For all serious daring starts from within." - Eudora Welty Amen.

There is clearly something wrong with me, because people withdrew from my life whenever they knew more about me. So I think whatever truth I revealed about myself, no matter how trivial it might be, must be scarily ugly and revolting that pushes the others away instantaneously.

Camille, I have also had this experience of people who got close to me being scared off. In hindsight, this was mostly due to my social skills not being great, and bc at that time I was looking for unhealthy relationships. What really helped me was reading a book about managing my emotions so that I didn't take them out on others (Constructive Wallowing by Tina Gilbertson), and also reading a book about relationships and healthy attachment (Hold me Tight as an audiobook by Sue Johnson - it really helped to hear the compassion in her voice that at first made me uncomfortable bc I thought it wasn't ok for me, but of course it was).

Whatever it is that is causing you problmes, I hope that you know that it is fixable, and you will find people who are capable of accepting you and your past and present as is. There's no need to be so hard on yourself because its completely understandable to struggle with this.

I stump on my self-esteem for it, I curse myself with it, I silently wait (even wish) for the external world to crush me as it enjoys the show and laughs, as long as it stays. It enjoys my pain; I rely on its accompany to breathe.

This sentence makes me so sad! You deserve so much compassion. Not having/losing a sense of self is something that (from my reading) I've gathered can happen with cptsd. It has happened to me, and it was terrifying and incredibly difficult to bear, but I believe that you will get through this. You have been so tough to make it this far. Don't give up! 

[Update:]

Aphotic, thank you for the encouragement. 

Update: So, I ended up not meeting with a therapist. I messaged 4 different ppl/places and all of them had rates too high for me rn. That was a bummer. But I've been doing what the book by Levine talked about, just letting my emotions happen and shaking as needed. It has helped with reducing and managing my triggered responses significantly. What is discouraging for me is that I don't think that these feelings and emotions are ever going to completely go away.  My goal now is to cope and reduce the pain. In the past I wanted the pain just to go away and stop hurting so much. Now I see that I can't escape these emotions, and I wouldn't be myself without them anyway. It is a bit of a let down, bc I wanted the pain to entirely stop asap. But it won't, it will only fade in intensity and force. I have hope that it will become little twinges of pain instead of overwhelming. I also hope that I will be able to accept my past and have a more clear mind in the future.

A note on emotional coping and the nuclear family: My rage is toxic and destructive, and it's hiding the hugeness of my pain and sadness. Having mercy for myself is important for me to remember rn. Another thing for me to remember is that I definitely don't want to take out my anger on others, even if I think they deserve it. I don't want to do this bc I am not at my best when angry and say things I regret, and I believe in nonviolence including emotional and spiritual nonviolence. It is one of my most important values. But I am very angry at my parents and brother and grandparents and society in general for letting this happen to me, my family, and anyone else. This is a kind of hurt that no one should have to face. The statistics on abuse in this society are frankly appalling. When "family values" includes protecting abusers, there is something deeply wrong.

From my reading, I've decided that the "nuclear" family system we have now is unnaturally lonely and separate from our communities. The result is a seriously toxic environment for parents and children alike - full of jealousy, hatred, betrayal, anger, etc. These negative elements of human relationships could be better handled in larger groups where there is less constant pressure on individuals, and ideally no one is trapped. I think making parents the only ones responsible for their children is incredibly unfair to both parents and children. Everyone deserves more attention and care than that.  I also don't think that children should be owned by their parents. Children don't belong to their family or their country. They belong to themselves. Just like adults.

Warming the Stone Child: I listened to an audiobook by a Jung trained author called "Warming the Stone Child". The author is Clarissa Pinkola Estes. It is short, only a few hours, and is about abandonment and unmothered children. It was quite healing, I sobbed through the entire first time I listened to it (I have listened to it a second time since then). It was very moving because of how much it helped me to see my own pain.

Here is something I found interesting from it: she says that the thing unmothered children needed was not unconditional love, but guidance. And this struck a chord for me, because I have found secure attachment love in another relationship with my partner atm, and it has not filled the hole in my heart. I think that this is partially because what I so craved (and continue to crave) is guidance. Someone wise to talk to. Someone to confide in. Someone to help me find the way. My partner is a good listener, but can't be my guide - we are at similar confused and insecure places in terms of wisdom. Similarly, my parents are not wise or secure and couldn't possibly guide me at all. The result is that I still feel very lonely and neglected in this way. I am now listening to the first in a series by this same author called "The Dangerous Woman", and this is guiding me a bit thankfully.

One more observation: Posting here is hard for me. I am often tense (in my daily life) because I am expecting to be emotionally abused at any moment. I am metaphorically crouching with all senses at the ready, waiting for the next blow. This is tough for me rn. My responsibilities are increasing, and I have done things far outside of my comfort zone recently that were very triggering for me (including flying on my own and doing multiple job interviews). Stress levels are also just high for me bc of school, and I have been struggling to sleep, eat, and function normally due to my triggered emotions (an unfortunately normal and expected and understandable situation). I keep thinking of a Vietnam vet (I was watching a documentary about it) who said that after an attack where many of his friends died, he couldn't eat or sleep or get out of his bed for two entire days. I completely understand that kind of overwhelming and crushing and narrowing pain. I do not compare my childhood situation with a concentration camp lightly, but it is the most accurate analogy. I was terrorized, controlled, brainwashed, used, and abused for years - years I was supposed to be developing personal and interpersonal skills.

The good news is, it's never too late! We can all start where we are and do what we can. An important goal I have for myself rn is to just take it all one day at a time. Wish me luck!

It has been awhile since my last post. I do intend to write another update, but it may not be for awhile again.

Good luck with your journeys out of the storm.

Aphotic,

Reading about your relationship with this terrible person brought back so many memories for me. I'm really sorry that this happened to you. You deserve so much better.

Trigger Warning - Rape
My experience with being raped is stunningly similar to yours. I initially said yes over text, then changed my mind in person, but he (my boyfriend at the time) then guilted/forced me into it, and I just laid there dissociating while he did it. It has caused me a lot more pain than I initially thought it had. For the longest time I thought it wasn't rape because like you, I 'consented'. In hindsight, I didn't say no, but I also don't remember saying yes, and even if he took my silence when he went for it as meaning he could do it, he was wrong to do so. And even if it was just a miscommunication, he should have known by the way I just laid there. How was that enjoyable for him, to force sex with a limp unresponsive person, I really can't imagine it. And now that I know about how consent is nonverbal too, I know that it was rape.
Anyway. After that I had sex with him a bunch more times because I felt like at that point, who cares, before finally getting in touch with myself enough to realize how disgusted I was with him.
I'm really sorry that happened to you too.
Having the strength to walk away from his marriage proposal and defying your family is very inspiring. It was very brave. And I also like the idea that your cells are completely different now and every trace of him is gone.

I hope you get to have the safe and supportive relationship you deserve!     

Berceuse,

Reading your journal is very moving for me. I have experienced so much of the same pain and longing for love. Thank you for sharing.

She never tried to reach me indeed and blamed me for being closed and unreachable.

My mother was cold and unreachable too, and it's not your fault.

I really don't know what to do with my life. I have a bunch of passions but any time I try to do something that I really wanna do, I quit because of some ridiculous reason and I can't get in touch with those feelings that drive me in the first place.  I lose my interest so fast. It is actually more than interest. Whenever I try to put an effort to realize what I have dreamt of all the time or whenever it gets real, my whole desire dies so quickly that I start to feel like I have never wanted to do that thing in the first place. Then I try something else that I like and I think I can do it for a living. The same thing happens. I detach from those views and interests.

I used to do this all the time too. I would have (what I thought to be) another fantastic idea, and then it would turn to dust in my hands. In my case, I found out that it was because I was chasing the fantasy that if I just do this one unknown thing, my parents will miraculously love me, and it's been really hard for me to let that go. I'm so sorry this is happening to you.

I need space in my life and in my head. I need space for loving and caring for my self and for other people. I need space for giving my time and attention to what I want to do. Life is precious and I don't want to live a life full of regrets.

This is such a great attitude. Life is precious. Whenever I self-sabotage, I feel awful, but it helps me to remember that I can just pick up where I left off on my healing journey again. You can too. 

I also really connected with your first post about being a perfectionist. It's such a shame that people made us feel unloveable as we are. We are completely loveable, as is, today, right now. And whatever painful emotion is happening right now, it will pass. Keep your chin up!

[It is hard enough for observers to bear witness to pain]

Be warned, there may be triggers below. This post talks about trauma in general terms.



I started reading a book called The Body Keeps the Score by Bessel van der Kolk. This book is really hyped up on Goodreads, and I was excited to start it. So far, it has lived up to the hype. I want to share three of my favorite quotes from today's reading that really spoke to me. I've shared them all below and my reaction to them. Definitely, my own thoughts are not on par with the wisdom in these quotes, and may be incorrect in many ways, and I share them only to show how I've tried to connect the quotes to my own life and make sense of them for myself. 

"It is hard enough for observers to bear witness to pain. Is it any wonder, then, that the traumatized individuals themselves cannot tolerate remembering it and that they often resort to using drugs, alcohol, or self-mutilation to block out their unbearable knowledge?"

• How many times have I kept quiet because I thought that nobody wanted to hear about my pain? It felt to me like nobody cared. And now I see that maybe it's really because hearing about it was unbearable for them - they would rather say that it wasn't so bad or that I made it up, to keep themselves from having to feel my pain.
• I like how he calls it knowledge, because that's what it is. It's the knowledge of terror and power and human frailty and the disturbing face to face understanding that 'normal looking' people hurt other people. That 'normal looking' mothers and fathers hurt their children in their own homes. (I emphasize looking here because normal people and normal mothers and fathers do not hurt people or their children.) When I felt like I was the only one carrying around this terrible knowledge, I searched out equally hurt people to validate my experience, but it was never enough, because I wanted validation from all the people who should have noticed but didn't. In a real physical way it is unbearable to know about.

"...for every (American) soldier who serves in a war zone abroad, there are ten (American) children who are endangered in their own homes. This is particularly tragic, since it is very difficult for growing children to recover when the source of terror and pain is not enemy combatants but their own caretakers."

• Wow, comparing the plight of abused children with that of war veterans is effective for me to more fully understand the seriousness of the situation for the children (like me). I want to say here though that often the comparison of pain that I've experienced is ridiculous and cruel, and is only used to invalidate my pain. Basically, it's the idea that 'children are starving in Africa', so my pain can't be that bad. In my opinion, pain is pain and no matter what is causing it, it deserves attention and care and compassion.
• It really sunk in for me reading this that my parents were the source of my terror and pain...and that's appallingly awful.

"Being traumatized means continuing to organize your life as if the trauma were still going on - unchanged and immutable - as every new encounter or event is contaminated by the past. After trauma the world is experienced with a different nervous system. The survivor's energy now becomes focused on suppressing inner chaos, at the expense of spontaneous involvement in their life."

• My entire adolescent life is summed up in this quote. I was living a compulsive life, still behaving like I was living in the past, and I was trying so incredibly hard to control and hide the absolute terrifying chaos going on inside of me.
• The further I have gotten on my healing journey, doing meditation and yoga and becoming aware of my emotions and feelings by using the TRUTH technique from the first book I read on the topic "Constructive Wallowing" that I mentioned above, the more spontaneous and alive moments I've been able to have. It's beautiful and so rewarding when it happens.

(emphasis in quotes mine)



I had empathy for myself when I read these quotes, which can be challenging for me. I've read a lot on this subject, trying to figure out what the heck is wrong and how to feel better, and it's just now finally sinking in that I have a brain injury. And its an incredibly cool kind of brain injury that can 'undo' itself and go back to normal once the emotional flashback is over.

When I'm having an emotional flashback, my brain looks like the brain of (some) stroke victims. It's not working correctly. And since I've been experiencing trauma in my home and having continuous emotional flashbacks and dissociations for my entire life, I don't even know what it's like to be un-traumatized. How sad is that? I'm curious now, what would it even feel like to live without cPTSD?

Something exciting I decided to do is to meet with a therapist for the first time. I want to try Somatic Experiencing, because I agree with the premise of the therapy, which is (as I understand it) healing from the 'bottom-up' by allowing my frozen traumatizing physical sensations to complete themselves so I can re-orient to the present. Has anyone tried this before?

Since no one does this treatment nearby, I'm going to do a Skype first session.

I'm really nervous about talking to a person I don't know on Skype about my history. I'm nervous just to say it out loud...because I don't want anyone to hear me in the other apartments next to mine. I'm so used to fending for myself and figuring things out for myself that I'm really nervous about asking for help, being seen at my most vulnerable, and sharing my deepest pain with another person.

I'm still excited though. I was an extreme skeptic, because it seems a little bit magical, but I was convinced by the book by Levine that I mentioned earlier. I hope that it helps. I'll make updates here about how it goes.   

Feeling hopeful. 

Aphotic,

Your parents denying you food is so, so wrong. I'm so sorry that happened to you. And I'm really inspired that you got a job to be able to buy food for yourself. It took a lot of guts and initiative to do that to feed yourself when your parents were treating you so horribly about being hungry. Don't give up!

It's such a relief to see that there are people who understand and who care. I've spent a lot of time thinking I was making it all up, or being dramatic about it. Thank you both so much.



Today was really hard. After I did everything that I needed to do today, I came home and just collapsed in bed. I have so much pain that I'm carrying around with me all the time. It's exhausting and frustrating, because I want to live in the present and move forward, but my heart and mind are stuck in the past. I'm thinking tonight of everyone else in the world suffering from this awful wound. I hope we can all heal.   

[I will not go into minute detail]

Hello,

This is my first post here. I want to tell my story, and keep track of my journey, so hopefully this is the right place for me to do that. There may be triggers in any of my posts, including this one. Topics I will definitely talk about are:

• childhood physical abuse, emotional abuse and neglect
• overeating & overspending addictions
• unhealthy intimate relationships including date rape

I will have a red "trigger warning" before any potentially disturbing content, and use a red "end trigger warning" when I am switching topics. I hope writing about this for myself will help me to recover, and I want to share it in case it's helpful for anyone else too. I will not go into minute detail.

The rest of this post is about my background.

The long and short of it: I was abused by my undiagnosed narcissitic parents, and now as an adult I'm dealing with limiting physical and mental symptoms from childhood trauma.

Symptoms: I don't have a diagnosis, but my best guess is I suffer from cPTSD, as discussed by Pete Walker in his book "Complex PTSD: From Surviving to Thriving". I currently suffer from anxiety, depression, triggered emotional flashbacks, low energy levels, difficulty concentrating, compulsive avoidance behavior, food and spending addictions, low self-esteem, difficulty forming friendships, deeply rooted insecurity, imposter syndrome, intimacy issues, and insomnia.

Childhood:  trigger warning   I had a childhood which looked great from the outside, but which I experienced as a long and lonely emotional desert with moments of intense pain and isolation. My parents often treated me with contempt and scorn. Physical abuse was rare, and included being locked inside of my bedroom and being roughly pushed and pulled by the arms. Emotional abuse happened in unpredictable bursts, and included screaming in my face, terrorizing with threats and fits of rage, as well as much more subtle enmeshment, undermining, tyranny, and jealousy. Emotional neglect was the most common feature of my childhood. Whenever I had a problem, there was no one reliable for me to turn to, and I was not given any positive support from my parents. 

Early Adolescence: I had a very tumultuous time as an adolescent. Life was most difficult for me between the ages of 13 and 16. I withdrew from social and academic life, and was tormented by the belief that I was somehow inadequate as a human being and was doomed to failure and rejection. My largest fear was that no one would ever love me, and I had a series of three unhealthy relationships in high school (2 long, and 1 short) that in hindsight were a compulsive way for me to act out my rejection and abandonment trauma at the hands of my parents. During one of these relationships, I was raped, which has taken a long time for me to admit to myself.

Late Adolescence: Between ages 17-19 I  re-engaged socially and academically. The most important realization I had was that I wanted a good life. Before this I had a revenge fantasy of ruining my own life to shame my parents, who I subconsciously understood only cared about their image. I also had two relatively more healthy relationships (1 short and 1 long) that gave me minimally more support and confidence. In hindsight, I started having cPTSD symptoms during this time.  end trigger warning

Young Adulthood: Aged 20-22 I spent a lot of time trying to improve my life.  For 3 years I was single, to focus on loving myself. I also read several very helpful books, the best of which were: "Constructive Wallowing: How to Beat Bad Feelings by Letting Yourself Have Them" by Tina Gilbertson, "Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents: How to Heal from Distant, Rejecting or Self-Involved Parents" by Lindsay C. Gibson, and "S.E.X.: The All You Need to Know Progressive Sexuality Guide to Get You Through High School and College" by Heather Corinna. I was devastated after the failure of my most important intimate relationship, and then I realized that I wasn't living my own life - I was living the life my parents wanted me to lead. I decided to change my job path and create a more distant relationship with my parents. I was ultimately in denial about the extent of my pain and its cause.

The Present: I changed job paths 3 times (I am in college) and am more distant with my parents. I felt much better for about 6 months. I even felt recovered enough to start a relationship with healthy boundaries. My current partner is very supportive and caring. However, I'm not currently capable of leading the life that I want to lead. I will go into more detail later. I'm currently reading "In an Unspoken Voice: How the Body Releases Trauma and Restores Goodness" by Peter A. Levine, and I'm really connecting my experience to the material of this book. My main goal right now is to treat myself with self-respect and compassion.

Thanks for reading this long post. From now on I will only post updates, and provide any more background information as necessary. I would really appreciate any support along the way!