Processing My Past

@TealTempest27

Thank you for being so friendly and open.

I always perceived my childhood as pretty idyllic, stay at home mother, homeschooled, suburban neighborhood with a big yard to play in, father I respected, friends I loved like family.

I always, and still do, had a deep admiration for my mother. She was creative, compassionate, loyal, and fun. Growing up she had her own circle of close friends, some were my friends mothers but many were others she met through her own interests. She was in the area sewing guild, she painted, she took classes in subjects she was interested in. Looking back I respected how she kept her own life and had a healthy support network despite homeschooling me. She was in therapy working out issues from her past, I never knew too much about it but seeing her in therapy helped my outlook on getting help. I would spend hours playing in our yard, or down at the creek behind our street. I helped in our vegetable garden and picked berries from our bushes, and my mother would use life situations to teach me as well as textbooks for my homeschooling.

My father worked an IT job, and I learned a lot about computers from him. I never remember him having his own time with his friends, or really having friendships that existed outside his work. When he moved workplaces his friendships didn't seem to continue after. He was interested in plants, computer games, and science fiction. We would watch Star Wars and Star Trek together, and he taught me edible plants.

I had a small group of very close friends, I considered them my best friends and chosen sisters. I can remember meeting them all between the age of 7 and 8.

J lived in my suburban neighborhood. She was about the same age as me and also homeschooled. She was on the autism spectrum and had lots of medical issues. She and her four siblings were all adopted.

C also lived in the neighborhood. She was a few years younger than me and in private school. She had a younger sister whom I also got along with.

K I met through our homeschooling group, she lived about an hour away. She was three years older and had two brothers, one older and one younger who was a few months older than myself. Her younger brother D played with us much of the time. She was my "best best friend" and we were extremely close.

K always criticized me, my meekness, my sense of humor, my messiness. Anything I said or did, or even my reactions, that she didn't agree with I would be berated with righteous indignation. Being an already sensitive child I was deeply effected. She gained a great degree of control over me. With her little brother along side us we would obey her directions. I even copied her obsessive behaviors, and she normalized/trivialized depression in a way that was extremely unhealthy.

She regarded my other friends as competition for my attention and I was always on edge at my birthday parties or other gatherings where I tried to keep her happy without neglecting everyone else.

The gaslighting she subjected me to broke my spirit and reality, and led to a lot of anxiety and self doubt. I still struggle with these issues.

When I was 16(on my half birthday) my mother was killed in a car accident. She, my father, and myself were all driving home from a weekend outing together.

I remember ending up at C's house when we left the hospital, we stayed there for about two weeks. All I remember about that time is crying. I never really spoke to any of my friends about it, they never asked. My father didn't speak about it either.

I still have images from it seared into my mind. Flashbacks have diminished but driving remains stressful for me, and I have panic attacks when I encounter triggers. I didn't get my driver's license until I was 18.

Our car has been broken down for over two weeks now, we replaced the easiest part and that wasn't it so now we're looking at towing it to a shop to get to the bottom of the issue. I've been going stir crazy not being able to get out, I love living in a rural area but we're so far from everything. I've been texting my new friend intermittently, and a couple of my husband's friends came over to cook out once, but it's been kind of lonely.

I ran out of my meds after the first week and am transitioning back on after finally getting them delivered, so I've been really emotional and kind of irritable. I've been having headaches again like I hadn't in a while, not quite full blown migraines because I've taken meds at the first sign but worse than a regular headache.

Procastination is catching up with me on a few fronts and being stuck at home isn't helping me get it back under control. It sucks when I'm panicking about what I have to get done when I can't even get there to do it.

I have been really busy lately, I haven't thought to journal.

For the most part things have been good, my husband started a new job that pays well and seems to be gratifying for him. I'm happy for him, but there was definitely a period of adjustment after having him around so much for so long. The daily chores all came back on me, which I don't mind too much it's just getting into a routine.

I signed up to sell at a holiday market and have been crocheting almost constantly to have plenty to fill my table. It's coming up soon and I'm getting excited, and a little anxious, about it. I hope I actually sell a decent amount, I think I'll be really disappointed if I don't sell enough to cover my supplies to attend. I'm trying to keep in mind this is dipping a toe in the water and it can take perfecting to do really well.

I haven't been getting out of the house much still, thankfully our car is fixed now so I can but I haven't heard from any friends in ages and I got sick of initiating contact every time I did chat with them. My friend from therapy was just given a terminal diagnosis and my heart hurts for her so much, she hasn't been in contact as much recently because she had just started a new job and now this. I wish I could help her process it more but I don't know what the most helpful thing to say is, so I'm trying to just be there and let her know I care.

After triggering emails from my father and stepmother on my birthday I finally blocked them on everything they still had, emails and FB. It was a relief, but the old guilt programming is still set deep.

My aunt, late mother's sister, messaged me asking if my address was still the same. I didn't think much of it even though we've never been close. I've reached out over the years but she's never done more than send family recipes once in a while.

This weekend I got a Christmas card from her, I opened it and immediately had to put it down because I knew in the first sentence it was some bullshit. When I gathered myself and read it she talked about her brother in law dying and urged me to reconnect with my father. He turned her to his cause evidently, she never even seemed to like him before. There's so much I could tell her, but she never bothered to care before so it's really not my job to suffer through that.
One of my first thoughts was, my mother would be spinning in her grave. I'm so angry that a whole generation of my family who I want so badly in my life is actually just a bunch of abusive pieces of shit. Or at the least, happy to be agents for my abusers.

I'm glad I've added one on one therapy on top of my trauma group, I need to move on from the hold these people still have on my heart. I'm done being broken so thoughtlessly.

Ugh.

My Christmas has kind of sucked. I'm putting on the happy face and going through the motions for my kid's sake.
I made a comment about how I'd like my husband to stop smoking before we have another child yesterday and he got upset. I apologized and told him it was a request of something I would appreciate not a demand or ultimatum. I apologized again later. He went and took a nap for a few hours and I started cooking since he was clearly just shut down and determined to be pissed at me for the day. He woke up after food had been the oven for an hour and got mad that I was using the whole oven, I took out the half cooked food and went to get drinks and he had put it back in when I got back.
He didn't get up to help me with anything for the rest of the day and didn't eat any of the food when it was done.
Didn't speak to me all night, or in the morning. When I asked him if he wanted hot chocolate he just said, leave me out of it. He left for a bike ride shortly after our daughter opened her presents with just me while he sat in the bedroom.
I'm so frustrated that any comment I make can set off this silent treatment and I never feel like I can ask him for help or anything he doesn't want to do, but I never really do what I want because all I do is care for our child and him.
I'm worried I married another narcissist just like my father.