Is it a trauma or not? To me, it kinda feels

@givemecoffee

That car scenario is such a familiar one to me. Youre right when you say theres nowhere to hide in a car. Conversations have to be faced. It sounds like a very frightening memory. Of course, you survived, even though at the time you felt you didnt wish to. But youre safe now my friend, the car incident is just a memory of the past. I wonder how you can make it less powerful in your mind, less triggering for you. Are you able to use any grounding techniques to pull yourself back from those flashbacks?

@DeborahUK Not really, I do notice that typing it out sometimes helps - so that's why I wrote it and then went to sleep.. yeah it's good it's over.

@givemecoffee

Hugs

@singercrystalspirit *hugs back*

WELL WELL WHAT A LONG POST

(just a big angry, been holding in feelings all day and they just hit, I am also avoiding any negative things during the day for last week so there's a lot of .. stuff)

I found a jornal that I wrote describing the first days in psychiatric hospital after my suicide attempt years ago. I had forgotten most of those years, memory issues, so it shocked me to read it and especially the part where I described the note I left in my room:

"Mother, don't blame yourself it's not your fault. Father, you should've done something. Best friend, don't do the same thing, don't give up"

And the sad truth is how, the way I feel about it, the way I felt that time, explains my life and my childhood. It wasn't neither of my parents fault, but those months my mental health got so terrible and my paranoia was the worst it ever was - and people didn't help. Having my family everytime I went to meet them yell in my ears how my dad is to blame for everything, being pushed into a corner and told I am a devil if I like my dad. It drove me to hate him, and whenver I asked myself why would I hate him, I would panic because didn't know WHY. I didn't ever hate him for hitting me - be scared of him? Yes. Hate? No. I don't hate people that easily. But go tell someone who easily gets paranoid that you should hate someone, and see what happens. I tell you what happens: they doubt everyone around them.

My mother contributed to panic too, to a lot of it. Claiming she could see my future, tell me she saw me and my friends together until our marriages, saying she knew I'd date my crush, claim had psychic powers. Do you know how HURTFUL it is to tell someone with paranoia that everything will be perfect and dandy? It's adding fuel to the fire. And when I asked her not to tell me those things, because I would rather focus on "now", she would yell and say she knows all about me. That she "can read my mind".

And this SUCKS. Because I will always carry this guilt, and this ANGER that my family relatives have indirectly caused that episode and don't even care. No one sees harm in telling someone since they are a child that satan's blood runs in them, no one sees harm in telling a teenager that they can "read into their future" and see they will kill or hurt someone (thank you mother, really big thanks), no one sees harm in telling a child that they are planning their parents divorce, no one sees harm in pushing a child into a corner and yelling "HATE YOUR DAD or we hate YOU" , no one sees harm in laughing when that said child claims is hurt, no one sees harm when that said teenager is crying how everyone hates her - and the worst? The only person in that family to defend me was my father, and I knew it. But then they would go and literally - yes literally push me into a wall and hold my arm - while saying I should hate my own father or I am the worst person alive. THIS IS NOT OKAY, DOES ANYONE SEE WHY THIS IS NOT OKAY. Does anyone see why this would make a 13 year old leave and slam the door behind or yell "I hope I am able to erase your surname of my name for good".

Does no one care that it took me years to break away from that shit. When I say I am easily paranoid, it's because I am and took a lot of self-awareness and therapy to reach to a point where I KNOW I am getting paranoid before I do. And to erase the damage my family did, hurt a lot. Especially when my second therapist was one that believed families could do no harm. Was only when my current therapist looked deeper that I cracked away from my paranoia: my relationship with my dad got ten times better, we talk about deep stuff, he has apologized and acknowledged his harm and it HURTS that it's my fault because I made him guilty. Could he have some blame? Yes, like everyone else and myself. But to actually BLAME him?! That's what paranoia DOES. That's what a naturally nervous child when faced with multiple small traumas and a possibly mentally ill mother in a dysfunctional family ends up in. A MESS

And I am honest when I say if people weren't so bad when it comes to inducing negative thought processes, maybe it wouldn't have happened. Maybe I would've stayed stable until my psychiatrist appointment and avoid a psychiatric hospital stay which by the way didn't help, since they kept preaching "love your family, they're perfect" and trying to point my problems to something else instead of looking deeper. Do people not realize their words can harm? Saying such and such is perfect/horrible just for saying. Saying random sentences because they feel are harmless.

I am really really upset and I am trying not to be. More and more I see how these people affected me. And I know deep down it's good, it means I am breaking away from their lies - but it's not an easy realization. More and more I wish I was just like them, that my mind wasn't "this" but was "that". I would be healthy if I could be dysfunctional like them and not give two damn. My family members don't give two cents if their drinking affects someone, they even brag about how high their alcohol level was when got stopped by police and how almost lost their license or how many times crashed their car with a big laugh. While I'm here, fighting urges to hurt myself via injury or pills so I can be a functioning adult and instead falling asleep in panic and breakdowns and waking up numb because that's the REALITY. And yeah so far succesful for some time, but let me tell you doing this on my own isn't the easiest of things.. and I can't wait to see my therapist next week, only problem is: I've become detached from her. I detach from people after sometime to avoid hurt.

I find it really hard to throw old journals out. I started keeping diaries/journals when was 8-9 years old and in total have about 7. Or had, since threw away a few of them, but only the ones that weren't exactly full. I was cleaning out the trash and old things from my room, reorganizing, and since had already thrown away a lot of past things I held onto for no reason, I felt "how about tackling my journals". The moment I opened one, I felt like crying - on the first page I had drawn my grandma with a cross on top and a "miss you", and on last page had a "my grandma who I miss very much" with an arrow pointing to a drawing of us holding hands. That was shortly a year after she passed away, max year and half.

Also some journals I mentioned the worst of my mental health, how my paranoia hit. How I got ridiculed in middle school but excused them as just being "funny" until it got physical bullying. It's funny how people often claim those who get bullied just can't take a joke: I was the joke since I was 7 years old, and most times I would just laugh. People could make a circle and shame me top to bottom, and I would still laugh nervously and say "it's what friends do, right?"

I wanted to throw all of them away, every single one. But I couldn't. I was afraid that one day I would feel hurt but not know if it was real or not, since that was the reason I kept making journals - so I could know, was it real or not? Did I really felt hurt, or was it all a lie? Throwing all of them away would be like saying "yeah, you made it all up". And even reading some of them, I can see how I tried to make my days better than they were, I tried to cheer myself up by brushing over the pain and focusing on the good. And it's sad. I was 11 and instead of saying "I hate my birthday because I got hit, and everyone ignored me" I wrote "today was not good *describes situation in detail* but it's okay. Tomorrow will be better" and then flip page and describe my friend kicking me out of her house and giving me silent treatment for nothing. And the weirdest is how most entries I wrote "oh I feel so good! I hated it!" I say how I felt - when was those situations, I didn't say how I felt. I just described the facts. Maybe I'm reading too much into it

Like the day my mother travelled for a few days to visit her sister and left us home. I didn't write about how I worried her plane would crash and had nightmares, or how odly familiar being in home with only my dad was - as if was normal. I remember telling myself that, I remember watching the plane go and thinking "what if it crashes and she actually dies" and feeling nothing. And for a 12 year old, at the time, it was weird how okay I was, how accepting I was. That I didn't take it as anything. And instead I just went to school like nothing was.

It's funny how one of my earliest memories of writing journals is the fact I was using a random agenda, and one day my dad came home with this beautiful notebook - it had a japanese art feel to it, with the sillhoute of a geisha, and it was always one of my favorite art styles. He never bought me gifts, so for him to get home with a hardcover notebook wrapped into tissue paper.. was a surprise to me. It wasn't for any reason, that was the thing. He just noticed I liked journaling and planning, and decided to get me an actual journal. I don't think I threw that one out, because of the cover.. I just put the remaining 3 into the same box with my old writing notebooks, to clear up space.

but yeah, throwing away journals/diaries or anything? even if they're just negative, they are still difficult to part ways with. And it sucks

I'm considering dropping therapy all together. For past months I have associated my therapist with my mother, which is something I tried to fight at first - but now, the fact she is trying to put silver linings in anything.. Being pushed to just "accept" isn't a good process. There's also the fact everytime I tried previous to bring up things that hurt me - like boys sexually harassing me, bullying, rumors - she would ask "why are you talking about it now, it has happened so long ago". As if my mind can get over things so quickly, especially things that when were HAPPENING, I had no one to talk to for years and how after it was long gone every professional responsible to listen told me "wasn't important". It's the "it wasn't bad enough/it was too long ago" theory..

Emotionally you could say I am okay, one of the most "triggering" period is way past me, so yeah. I was putting my hopes up for Christmas, and thinking the year could go smoothly but chances are it won't *slow clap* Moving on.. What can you do but keep moving on..

I had some cute memories today from childhood. Those are still bittersweet, because I wish I could go back to those moments when I didn't second guess things.. until I did. It is so confusing to look back

I keep falling asleep daydreaming that I have a "friend" and my ex best friend knew her, and both are discussing me.. and my "imaginary friend" is explaining why I reacted in some ways.. I never told anyone everything, not even to that best friend which was the one person I could say I have shared most with about my family. And it's such a toxic way to fall asleep, let me tell you. It's so toxic to keep subconsciously attracting people to your mind, hoping to find them. It makes me more and more think of a thought I kept having in my early teens:

Nobody stays enough, they eventually hate me and go away and forget me. But I never forget them. I still remember their birthdays, favorite color/hobbies, how their voice sounds even if it's over a decade over, details like that.. And it sucks, because this has been on my mind since I am like 10. But I can never know if its "trauma/childhood" related, "mental health" related or "imaginary" related. I mean, how can I know? Is it normal for 5 year olds to fear parents leaving? Perhaps. Is it normal for 10 year old to fear people hating them and leaving, so becoming a people pleaser instead? Perhaps?

In the end, who cares. I feel like I talk and talk and talk about childish things, meaningless, and repeat myself and no one cares. I feel like I have no reason to claim "I suffer" or "I suffered" because someone has it worse. And I hate that statement. It's just too much, but I don't know what I need. I mean, I know: I need relationships, I need people, I need friends and a restart even if just slightly.. but that's not easy to do, its made to believe its easy.. but it's not. You need luck more than you need hope