PTSD is a bitch. When you live and breathe it daily, you don’t know any better. It’s like being born with a headache; you don’t know you have one until it’s gone. As a teen, Big M told me I was moody and depressed – a typical teenager. She also told me daughters and mothers never get along in the teen years, which is also totally normal. Uh Huh.
As a young adult, I knew more than anything that I would never be a parent. Ever. I didn’t know how to relate to children, I’d never spent any time with children, I’d always been surrounded by adults; but mostly, I believe children were a burden. Deep down, I knew I’d be an abuser. I was terrified to be alone with children. I assumed I’d be a sexual deviant and if I wasn’t, I’d probably just beat them black and blue. When I told my family every time they joked to “wait until youuuuu have kids!” I was always met with shock and mild horror that I didn’t want to shoot watermelons out my vagina. I don’t think those living outside my family unit truly realized what my familial journey had really taught me.
My upbringing created a resourcefully independent woman. That’s it. You know what else it did? It made me unable to communicate my needs, wants, and desires and made me incapable of saying “NO” to anyone. I was raised to always obey, trust, and respect adults. For the better part of 45 years, I felt my only purpose was to serve others to ensure everyone else’s happiness because if everyone around me was happy, then so was I. I knew that my happiness didn’t matter, if I had a good job and friends that meant I had succeeded in life – something I bought into for many years. It never explained the huge gap I could feel inside me. I was just a shell. I subconsciously hid my true personality because I was trained to do so. I lived in a house where I was not valued for my uniqueness but for how hard I worked, how physically strong I was, and for my resourcefulness.
I adored and worshiped my father for who I thought he was - a kind, strong, intelligent, caring, honest man. All the things I now know he is not. That realization was as if a landmine went off inside my body – how could I have been so deeply fooled? So humiliated in my shame, I buried it deep and refused to feel the betrayal. That’s how I feel about my entire childhood, deep shame and betrayal; shame for believing it and betrayal for the exact same reasons. This is why I was never able to trust others, how do I know they’re being honest and truthful? How can I trust their words? I can’t, that’s why I prefer actions. Don’t tell me you love me, show me. I don’t fall for nouns or action words.
When I first moved to the Big City and found my first real ‘job’, I was lucky enough to have found a manager who saw my gifts, potential, empathy, and kindness – things I had no idea I even possessed. Claudia saw something in me and hired me without even meeting me; she read something in my resume. Claudia treated me like a daughter and taught me more about compassion, kindness, empathy, and respect in two years than I learned in the 13 years being screamed at. Claudia taught me to take meeting minutes, how to structure policies and procedures, how documentation, filing, and accounting works. She taught me how to read financials. Under her tutelage, I flourished and went from a $25K/year Gal Friday to a $55K a year Executive Assistant to the CFO. I accomplished that in less than 6 months back in 2000. It’s because of Claudia that I had confidence in this one tiny area – my work life. I knew I could accomplish anything I set out to learn. The trick was not telling anyone I didn’t know how to do something because I could figure it out in no time.
I struggled with speaking up (I still do), but not on someone else’s behalf. I discovered that I would fight to the death for anyone who is the societal underdog or anyone who had been wronged. I have friends who consider me a great source of knowledge because I enjoy researching topics that strike my fancy. As an example, I got my first tower computer at age 21 as a gift from my mother. The first thing I did was take the entire thing apart to see how it worked and then I installed various hardware by myself, with some guidance from the Radio Shack salesperson. I was incredibly proud of having done this on my own. The internet was in its infancy at the time and I just wanted to see what this “information highway” was all about; I desperately wanted to read ALL the information it possessed. They say curiosity is a sign of intelligence.
I see now that the way I was raised set me up for failure. I failed at friendships, relationships, but I had a strong work ethic so at least I could fall back on that. In my relationships, I either overshared or didn’t share enough, or was dishonest in my attempt to hide my not-so-Leave-It-To-Beaver family. I didn’t know who I was or which version of me I should be for people to like or accept me. I truly believed, deep down, that I didn’t deserve love which is the reason I told everyone I never wanted to get married. Why would I do that when I knew my husband would hate me and then just divorce me when he was done with me? Why would I want kids for them to just hate me later in life and spend all my time fighting with people I wanted to be close to? My past showed me that family hates each other, they treat each other like shit, but you’re also supposed to give them everything you have until you’re exhausted. You’re supposed to share every detail of your life with your parents so they can throw it all back in your face later. How do you learn to trust people when that’s the expectation? You don’t. You learn to divulge information you’ve already sterilized, so to speak, or you only divulge information you’re prepared to have spread around the entire town.
I struggled with that last part which is why I started oversharing all my life experiences with complete strangers. It served a few purposes, but the main purpose was that people would hear my story from my own horse’s mouth rather that the lies and bullshit and crap being spread about me in my hometown. I quickly realized it was a way to make friends… as in those who couldn’t handle my oversharing disappeared and those who could keep up with my drinking and enjoyed the humour with which I told my stories stuck around. My stories were always true, but I often added humour or made jokes at my own expense because, well, what else am I supposed to do? It happened; I had to learn to cope somehow. In life, there are funny people and there are those who had a wholesome, loving childhood… which is why I’m fucking hilarious!
My mid-twenties I label “Duty”. I had a duty to:
Have friends
Have my own apartment
Have my own money
Have a good job
Not be a waitress
Not clean toilets for a living
Call my parents every week so they know I love them
Find a mate
Be normal
Ignore all my past hurdles, so to speak
Forget my past
Be a responsible adult
Not be crazy
Those were my areas of focus, which prevented me from living in the moment. I was always focused on the next hour, day, week, and month to anticipate what would come at me. I was a girl guide in my youth and believe in always being prepared! I didn’t even know I had anxiety until my GP diagnosed me with anxiety in my early 40s. NO IDEA. Those butterflies you all get when you’re nervous? Multiply that by at least 1,000 and now image that never goes away because that’s just your state of normal, plus I was running around with undiagnosed ADHD and un-medicated for the better part of my life.
Relationships in my life were usually one-sided. I learned a lot about other people and unless I was drinking people didn’t really get to know me much beyond my likes:
The Tea Party – I’ve seen them in concert nearly 40 times
Beer
Gin
Hard Rock
Metal
Live Music
Weed
Working
Cats
Swimming
Water
Camping
Boys
My list of dislikes was shorter and pretty simple back then: Country music, short men, Big M.
It never occurred to me that relationships don’t have to be tumultuous, painted in hate, or filled with screaming matches and unfelt apologies. If my friends and I argued I always assumed that was it. Friendship over and I would walk away. My friends were the ones who needed to chase me. Same with men. I didn’t know how to be in a relationship, but I did know I did not want to be in one where everyone screamed, yelled, and called each other names daily. If I even got a whiff of that in my relationships, I was out the door in a flash. It also meant I had to sacrifice my opinions, thoughts, and desires and usually deferred to my entourage so I didn’t rock the boat. I’m glad that’s not me anymore. It was a terrifying place to be in – to feel you only have friends because you have to agree on everything and like all the same things.
My challenges in life boil down to two main categories: Being incapable of experiencing emotions (including not being able to name the emotion I’m feeling) and being incapable of interrelationship communication. When you think about it, you can see why I was a sarcastic bitch for most of my 20s. I remember Big M coming to visit when my sister and I lived in the same apartment building in Greek Town. I ran into the corner store to buy cigarettes while Big M and Roxanne waited for me in the car. While they waited, Big M asked Roxanne why I kept calling her ‘an asshole’. Roxanne giggled and said “don’t you remember? That was your nickname for her growing up.” NO was the response. NO! Because of course not. You called me names and treated me like garbage during my formative years which was a normal fucking Tuesday for you.
I’m surprised my friends see anything worthy in me at all. I was fun though so I guess that made up for my failings. My friends quickly discovered that whatever was mine was theirs if they wanted it… a result of growing up without boundaries, at all. I couldn’t even say no to my friends, my version of no was to ignore the question or change the subject. That’s pretty fucked up. I did want to rescue people though. I remember living near a teen shelter and I wanted to bring one home to show them life didn’t have to suck. Except I lived in a one bedroom and I was not a real adult… I was still a kid in a grown up body. I’m glad Mr. GQ never let me adopt a stranger. I was really close to it once, well more. Instead of humans, I started collecting cats.
I feel very fortunate that I’m not dead to be honest. I did not realize that my home life had created an adrenaline junkie either. My heart constantly beat in my ears and my anxiety ran through the veins in my body. When I left home and lived on my own, my body couldn’t deal with the lack of stimulation and constant body buzz. I see now that’s why I participated in dangerous activities. I’m not supposed to take a short cut down a dark alley? Pfffff I’d pull out my keys, keep them at the ready, and would march down a dark alley daring anyone to attack me, try to rape me, or just come at me. Doing that terrified me, which heightened all my senses and felt oh so familiar. That sensation is what I needed to feel daily just to survive otherwise I couldn’t feel anything. I did stupid shit like that all the time. But at least I could identify that feeling… I called it home. My other emotions were anger, sometime excitement. Mostly anger.
It wasn’t until I had children that the flashbacks and triggers started. I didn’t realize I’d packed so much of my life away and compartmentalized all of it. That feeling I described? The adrenaline rush one? That’s how I felt when my daughter turned 3. I couldn’t figure out what was happening, and my slow spiral began. One day it would come back to bite me in the ass.
Read from the beginning:
Prologue : Family
Chapter 1: The Early Years
Chapter 2: Protector: 1979-1981
Chapter 3: Pre-Teen Years 1981-1987
Chapter 4: Teen Years: 1987-1993
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