And When He Looks At Me, Fuck, I Just Lose It Every Time.

“Now I know I’ve got a heart because it is breaking.”

—

L. Frank Baum

Dating when you’re borderline is like going through 8 breakups in one day and the other person doesn’t even know

Something people don’t understand about child abuse

One of the things that I really hate is that people don’t understand that survivors act differently and respond to their traumas in different ways.

I’m a survivor of csa and so is my friend. Her trauma made her extremely hypersexual while I could literally cry if someone even touched me.

My bf is a survivor of csa, I can talk for hours about my trauma if I felt safe enough while he NEVER brings it up.

A friend of mine is a survivor of emotional abuse and so am I. Her trauma made her angry while mine made me soft and defenseless.

My bf remembers every little detail about his trauma, while I repressed most of my childhood and traumas.

There’s no special “criteria” that you should fill in order to be a “valid” survivor, and there’s no specific way you should act if you were abused.

People respond to their traumas differently and it’s okay, your abuse is STILL valid no matter how you respond to it.

PTSD things

taking lots of baths and showers

constant flashbacks. sometimes you don’t even know what they’re about

you’re told you’re jumpy all the time

you always look behind you

craving abuse

alternating between missing your abuser and hating them with all your guts

was it my fault?

constantly distracting yourself from memories

you freeze at the mention of their name

overwhelming anxiety and unexplained fear

you convince yourself you deserved the abuse

you can’t relate to peers

you think you’ll be sick forever

unable to remember key parts of the abuse

remembering too much all at once

developing unhealthy coping mechanisms

you flinch every time someone raises their arm, or makes an abrupt movement

you age regress

you’re told you act “mature” for your age

always feeling like something’s going to go wrong

take a breath, spit out the blood in your mouth, and get back up on your feet. you still got a couple of motherfuckers to prove wrong.

signs that your family is abusive:

you feel the urge to hide from them whenever you’re vulnerable

you cannot bear the idea of them seeing you cry

when you’re hurt or in pain, you don’t go to them because you feel they’ll tell you that you deserved it or that it was your fault

you don’t feel like you can confide in them, either because they don’t seem to care, or try to control how you act, or yell at you and punish you, or use the information against you

you feel very self-conscious around them and keep expecting criticism and insults

you can’t tell them about your struggles because you already know they’ll side against you

you keep things in your life secret from them because you have a feeling they would ridicule, humiliate, and judge you if they knew, or take everything away from you

you feel scared of letting them know when they hurt you

you feel scared and guilty when you so much as think about them in a bad way

you feel the urge to remind yourself of all the things they did for you, whenever something bad comes up, to be sure that you’re seeing them the way they want to be seen by you

you’re scared of being accused of being a burden to them

you’re scared to hold them responsible for things they did to you, because you know they would argue otherwise, and insist they had full right to do what they did, or that you made it up

you have the inner sense of dread that nothing you ever do or say will be taken seriously by them, and your life will always look like a joke to them

you dream of living far away from them and feel guilty for wanting to cut them from your life

you don’t feel like you’re really important in comparison to them, it feels like it’s better to just step aside and let them be important, your life doesn’t matter as much anyway

you’re worried about how your every action might affect their life, their reputation and social standing

you feel that they’re ashamed of you and you’re trying your best not to bring further shame on the family

you feel like you’ll owe them for the rest of your life and nothing you ever do will be enough to erase the debt, and this fills you with dread and feeling of being trapped

you don’t count on their help when you’re in trouble, you’re scared of them finding out and punishing you for being in trouble in the first place

you don’t count on them sharing their resources with you, you know you have to be grateful for how much they’ve given you already and feel like you have no right to ask for anything more, even if you need it

you can’t feel warmth or safety when surrounded by family, instead you wish you didn’t have to be there, and seek a place to hide and protect yourself

holidays spent with family are just painful and something you try to endure instead of enjoy

you can’t imagine a world where you’re free and not defined by these people

they don’t tell you what anxious impulsivity looks like. 

when people imagine anxiety, they always imagine risk averse behavior. you overthink, you’re deliberate, your thinking is catastrophic, and you’re always thinking through seventeen possible scenarios in which things can go wrong. 

but sometimes you’re so anxious and things feel so horrible that you do things without thinking because you want the bad feelings to stop. you say something stupid in a group chat, so you immediately leave all of your servers and block your friends so that you don’t have to see the aftermath. you’re unsure about your relationship, so you break up with your partner out of nowhere or you wake up one morning and just decide to ghost them so you don’t have to deal with it anymore. you’re uncomfortable at a party with people you don’t know, so you run outside and take the train home at 3am without realizing how dangerous that is because you just need to leave. 

your anxiety can get so bad that, in an attempt to feel safe and secure, you can’t predict what you’ll do next. 

“To love and be loved is to feel the sun from both sides.” - David Viscott

via @love-diaries