Feed The Good Wolf

Tag: estrangement

  • Biological vs Ideal Mom

    Family are the people you care about, not who contributed to your DNA. If someone is blessed enough to have family be who contributed to that person’s DNA, that is a privilege – one that I did not experience.

    My biological mother threatened to throw the love of my sister’s life off of a rooftop. She wanted to have kids with this man, who dared to speak his mind to my mother. By standing up for my sister’s feelings, telling my biological mom that my sister gets to feel however she wants on her graduation day from her dream school. Given they weren’t going to be seeing each other every day, my sister was sad. He had become such a part of my sister’s life that she was understandably upset. He stood up for my sister, and my mom threatened him with physical violence in return. In reality, my sister’s feelings are valid. She gets to feel how she wants to feel. My biological parents saw the worst in everyone. My mom informed me that she believed he was stealing her away from the. Years later, my mom started pedaling the same story – that my partner is stealing me away from my biological family. My sister spot the same lies that had been used on her and didn’t believe what she was hearing. My ideal mom would have respected my sister’s feelings and comforted her – not threatened her. My ideal mom would have comforted her and worked through her feelings in a healthy manner – not destroy a relationship. In private, she still harbors feelings for him and still speaks of the pain caused by my biological mother nearly two decades later.

    I knew I was different, starting at age 3 – my second memory in life. I was held back from participating in a bouquet throwing at a wedding. I wanted to go with the other women and little girls – a group I instinctually felt I belonged to. I was denied. At the time, I knew better – I just couldn’t vocalize my feelings, being three years old at the time. Years later, I found myself alone on the internet for the first time. I added the words “transexual” and “transgender” to my lexicon after some research into my feelings. In school, I would go on to be teased that I was “gay.” I was in denial about being transgender, although my true feelings would assert themselves when I was alone. A secretly borrowed high heel shoes, a dress, a one piece swimsuit, and makeup. I expressed an interest in growing my hair out long to my biological mother. I was informed that should I try , my mom would shave my head in my sleep. She threatened me to exert her will and mold me into her exceptions. She refused to meet the person who I really was. I didn’t dare stand up to her in fear of her retaliation. My ideal mom would have communicated with her child, asked why they wanted to grow their hair out, and heard them out, respecting their desires. My ideal mom would have been there for me, heard me out, respected me, and met me on my own terms. Instead, I was threatened.

    By fifth grade, I had thoughts of killing myself. I remember sitting on a curb at recess, crying, and was eventually taken to the school counselor’s office. I was terrified that my mom would find out and felt like I couldn’t open up to him as a result. Having swallowed those feelings of suicide and pressing on, I had later asked my biological mom to see a therapist. I was straight up told no – that mental health was a scam meant to push pills and to line the pockets of doctors from pharmaceutical reps. My ideal mom wouldn’t have thought the concept of mental health was a scam. If that was the case, I would have felt comfortable opening up to the school counselor – maybe I would have gotten some help as a kid. I would have seen a therapist and worked through my feelings a kid instead of letting them fester for decades. My ideal mom would have asked why I wanted to see a therapist in the first place and worked with me with the help of a therapist to confront my feelings. She would have been there for me instead of shutting my feelings down.

    In high school, I stumbled across a club called the “Gay Straight Alliance”, the GSA – a LGBT community at my high school. I joined this LGBT club and ended up in a club photo in the high school yearbook photo for the GSA. When my mom looked at the yearbook glossary, looking at all of the instances where I appeared. When she saw the GSA photo, she exploded, yelling at me, and told me it would hurt my chances of getting into college. My ideal mom would have emotionally connected with me, inquired further, and embraced me. My ideal mom would have emotionally connected with me, showing compassion instead of anger. She would have embraced who I really was – a member of the LGBT community.

    My love of food has gone back very far. I remember a coloring assignment I had in grade school. The assignment was to draw what you wanted to be when you grew up. I drew myself in a kitchen, holding up a knife. I would do my best to look for cooking shows on the limited number of channels we could pull in from public broadcasting. Whenever I was sick at home watching TV, I would binge watch them. Despite my lifelong culinary passions, the idea of earring a degree in the culinary world wasn’t acceptable to them – they told me I had to choose a major containing with the word “Engineering.” My ideal mom would have embraced her passions, and told her that it’s her life to go live – follow what you’re passionate about. I have continued studying this passion of mine for decades and plan on going to culinary school regardless. I feel like my ideal mom would have embraced my heartfelt passions in life instead of setting me back decades of progress by pushing me into a passionless career that I am regularly unenthralled by.

    The first time I had seen a therapist I was in college, terrified of my biological parents finding out. My emotional walls were still reinforced, but the limited amount of information I had disclosed managed to concern her. Our very first sesion, she was deeply concerned for my wellbeing and even walked me over to a university-ran campus physician who prescribed me antidepressants. I continued therapy with her, and discussed started the process of opening up about my feelings. By the time graduation day came around, my biological parents had picked up on the body language of my therapist. My biological parents introduced themselves to her and learned that I was seeing her. Already highly alarmed, they threatened her when she disclosed that she had almost hospitalized me for what I had told her. My biological parents then threatened her and spouted fear surrounding what would have happened to me should I actually be hospitalized. My ideal mom wouldn’t have threatened her when she learned I was seeing a therapist. She would have helped me work through my feelings and actually been there for me instead of issuing a threat. She would have been emotionally supportive instead of making my graduation day worse than it already was – just like she did with my sister.

    After a suicidal gesture, I self-admitted to a hospital for treatment. I had hit rock bottom in my life and I knew I needed help. At the time, my parents were regularly calling me and I wasn’t able to have my phone while in treatment (along with having clothing containing zippers and other items). I had called them through a hospital phone and let them know that I was alright, completing hiding the fact that I had made a suicidal gesture or even letting them know where I was. Looking back, it seems ridiculous that I had to hide all of this from them, but that’s the kind of relationship I had with my biological parents. Only a single person knew where I was — the friend who had driven me there. My ideal mother would have open to hearing about what had happened, been supportive of me, emotionally supportive, cared for me and shown some compassion. Instead of I feared about her finding out that I was in crisis.

    When I finally came out to my parents on “National Coming Out Day,” it was not well received. I later found out they prayed for me to no longer be transgender. Coming out to your parents is a huge event in the LGBT+ community. Mine was filled with fear. My ideal mom would have welcomed me with open arms, embraced her daughter, and made sure she felt welcome to express herself. Instead I was made to feel like a pariah.

    In therapy, we keep discussing what my ideal parents would do in various scenarios. How they would have been supportive, how they would have been there for me, how they would have spent time with me, learned about who I was as a person, and inspired me. Instead, they’re a large part of why my childhood was traumatic.

    Children don’t get traumatized because they get hurt; they get traumatized because they’re alone with the hurt.

    – Dr. Gabor Gabor Maté

    #FeedTheGoodWolf

  • Emotional Needs

    My therapy homework was to make a list of my emotional needs. Looking back at my childhood, I can identify my emotional needs weren’t met; however, identifying a list of my emotional needs isn’t quite so simple

    In my childhood, I was raised in an environment where asking for my emotional needs to be met was uncomfortable and regularly discouraged. It was highly uncomfortable. I would either be dismissed or even chastised for asking for my emotional needs to be met. As a child I was feeling more and more depleted and without hope for a better future. By the time I hit fifth grade, I encountered suicidal ideation. Having no outlets for my emotions, I learned to burry my feelings. Dismissing my emotional feelings didn’t diminish them though, it just buried them deeper.

    Over time, I learned to be the emotional caretaker in my family, addressing the emotional needs of my sister and my mom every time there was a fight. Any time I caught my mom crying, or when there was a blowout between my biological mother and sister, I was there to pick up the pieces. I would go up to my sister’s room, knock on her door that she had slammed shut, and try to get her to talk to me – sometimes through the door she refused to open. My sister and biological mother would go on to describe me as the “rock” of the family. I was taking care of everyone else’s emotional needs while no one was taking care of mine. My emotional needs were always put last

    As an adult, I was praised for being “easy going.” In reality, I was just used to putting my needs last. I continued to feel more and more depleted, more and more hopeless. This started to show up in other ways. Disconnection, disassociation, burnout, and anxiety to name a few. I tried to manage this myself, knowing I needed to take a step back when I encountered apathy; however, this only managed my problems – it didn’t solve anything. By the time I had passed beyond the suicidal ideation phase to actually make a suicidal gesture, I had hit rock bottom. I had become so disconnected from myself and my needs. I was lost.

    After being hospitalized for two weeks, I was released with a determination to heal. It was time to make some changes in my life. I had learned to silence my needs in order to feel safe. With tremendous fear, I timidly began to make changes in my life. It was incredibly difficult for me to identify what I was even feeling, let alone express these feelings to anyone else. I’ve gotten better at expressing my feelings, but still struggle with this and identifying my emotional needs.

    Feeling as though I’m emotionally being heard is an emotional need of mine. As a child, my emotional needs were summarily dismissed. When I told my parents I was depressed and wanted to see a therapist, I wasn’t even asked why. Instead I was given a lecture about mental health being a scam. Instead of being heard, my needs were discarded. After several attempts of attempting to get my needs met in this manner, I withdrew inward. In my journey of healing from CPTSD, I recognize that the internalizing and suppression of feelings isn’t healthy. Feelings are meant to be expressed through healthy means. They’re not meant to be buried and left to fester in a mental compost heap.

    Another emotional need of mine is having emotional connections to people. Deep conversations are very meaningful to me, as emotional bonds develop. As my emotions run deep, having no emotional bonds as a child left me feeling suffocated and abandoned. When this aspect of conversing is neglected, I resort to feelings of emotional abandonment and feel like my emotional needs aren’t being met.

    To be anything less than who and what I am erodes my sense of self. My ideal self wouldn’t stand for it. This is why another emotional need of mine is to know that love and validation are not conditional. As a kid, I was emotionally abandoned. My partner’s family has expressed sadness when I told them that I had become accustomed to being alone. I wore a mask for so long and I have no intention of ever putting one back on. I’d rather be completely alone than to ever deal with the emotional firestorm wrought by keeping people in my live who believe love and acceptance are conditional. My parents were only one example of this. I gave my parents numerous chances before cutting them out of my life. I even gave them yet another when my partner (unaware of what they were really like) said, “You only get one set of parents.” After I briefly started talking with my biological parents again, I was informed they prayed for me to no longer identify as transgender. For the sake of my partner, I swallowed it. I wanted my partner to understand what they were really like behind closed doors. My biological parents eventually blew this chance at reconnecting, calling my partner a “gold digger”. After I showed my partner the text messages, they stopped pushing for me to have a relationship with my biological parents. I cut them off again. They won’t get another chance. They’ve had too many chances already. Enough was enough. They never accepted who I really was. Their love and validation was conditional upon conforming to their expectations, bending to their will, and the expectation that I’d remain imprisoned in their own twisted sense of how the world works.

    Standing up for who I am and what I believe in is something relatively new to me in life. It took a long time for me to gather up the pieces of my broken psyche from childhood and start rebuilding myself piece by piece. It’s why in the new life I’m building for myself, I refuse to accept anything that degrades my sense of self.

    An emotional need I’ve had since childhood was non-sexual physical intimacy. As a child, I did not receive many hugs as my biological parents were emotionally distant. As it turns out, I love hugs and cuddles. I even had a non-sexual cuddle buddy back in college. We both liked cuddling – it never went any further. My partner’s mind just about exploded in disbelief. In the past, I have even had Human Resources at my workplace speak to me about the length of my hugs – apparently the duration of my hugs at work were making people uncomfortable. Nowadays, I have my “hug-meter” filled daily with about dozen hugs. This is an emotional need of mine. Non-sexual physical intimacy is vitally important to my emotional wellbeing.

    Looking back, I feel like all of my emotional needs weren’t met as a child. It’s probably what led me to experience suicidal ideation by the time I was fifth grade. It’s probably what led me to build an emotional wall to protect myself to feel numb – it was simply too painful to endure otherwise. Since then, I’ve come a long way. I’ve become a lot better at identifying and expressing my needs. I am actively working on this

    #FeedTheGoodWolf

  • Cookie Monster

    An unsent farewell letter to a former friend

    From the moment you saw me head-banging to a French lullaby, you knew I was different. You even cited this as the reason why you approached me in French class, knowing we would become friends. You knew there was something different about me that resonated with you. There was. I was different. For better or worse, everyone saw I was different; but they saw neither the pain, nor the self-destructive behaviors that were holding me back. Now that I’ve broken free of the emotional prison I built for myself have journeyed down the path to healing my trauma, it’s time you know the full story. I write this to letter continue the healing journey from my childhood, not to reconnect with you.

    Dating all the way back to even pre-school, I remember being bullied. In the very beginning, I stood up for myself. I was even written up a few times. My teacher even wrote a note about me standing up for myself during a parent-teacher conference in preschool. In grade school, I also got in trouble for putting a goldfish into a bully’s chocolate milk. Eventually, I’m ashamed to admit that I broke. I stopped standing up for myself.

    Sitting alone on the curb one day at recess in fifth grade, I was thinking about suicide. I was in fifth grade and in a very dark place. I was being bullied relentlessly and was being emotionally neglected at home. When I had attempted to talk to my mom about what I was going through, I was yelled at and told I needed to “toughen up.” Between being bullied, an emotionally toxic environment at home, and zero outlets for any of the big feelings I was having, an emotional stockpile started to assemble and brick by brick an emotional wall was constructed. Some days it felt a mile thick. Others, as thin as paper. I continually felt like I was walking on eggshells in my own life, living in fear, ridicule, and shame on a daily basis.

    In middle school, the bullying escalated to almost being killed in gym class via a can of spray deodorant while two bullies laughed in torment. Afterwards, I might have appeared okay on the surface, this event has been brought up in therapy many times. Almost dying changed me for the worse and I emotionally withdrew, fortifying my emotional wall even further just to survive.

    The bullying continued through high school. I’m not sure how many students were aware of this, but our school had a policy where if there’s an altercation between students, all parties got in trouble. Even if one student is mercilessly beating another student without reciprocity, both students would get into trouble. This policy was weaponized by my mom who told me to be agreeable and to not escalate – that it wasn’t worth hurting my chances of getting into a good college.

    Sophomore year of high school, during a moment of learning in French class, I was within my “Window of Tolerance” (CPTSD term) and feeling momentarily comfortable just being myself and having fun listening to a French lullaby. You saw the real me for a moment there and we connected. 

    We connected and grew to be best friends. I printed out lyrics to songs and left them on your homeroom desk. I gave you that empty bottle of grape soda filled with knickknacks and their meanings. You said it was the best gift you’ve ever received. My actions were trying to tell you what my words never did, they never could back then. I had been so conditioned by years of trauma that I was never direct with you about the feelings I had developed for you. Others noticed –several of your partners even asked if I had feelings for you. You never looked at me that way, and to be fair … I don’t blame you. I was a freaking mess, held together by chewing gum and bailing wire.

    Despite our separation in college, my feelings didn’t change. I continued to be there for you and even agreed to pet-sit in Connecticut when you were unavailable. I stayed up on the phone with you long into the early morning hours, listening to you complain about your most recent relationship woes. Years later, you told me that you were proposed to. You were my first love and committing your life to someone else. I don’t blame you, or hold any feelings against you whatsoever for this. You didn’t even know how I felt towards you, trapped by trauma and emotional pain. I felt immeasurable and unbounded sadness in the situation and in myself for not speaking my truth. I bounced between hyperarousal and hypoarousal for a while, having my emotions vary between feeling numb and then way too much. Eventually an old self-protection mechanism kicked in. You were my best friend. I was your best friend … and I cut off all contact with you in an emotional response. You deserved better – I was just unable to do any better. All the feelings I was having were all so overwhelming. This trauma response was the best I could manage. I felt shame about doing this for a long time. After I cut off contact with you, the experience of watching SpongeBob changed from an enjoyable, silly cartoon to a painful reminder of the highly traumatized person I used to be that led me to where I was. 

    Some have the luxury of building their lives from a place of emotional stability, with emotionally responsive, loving, caring, attentive parents. I was not provided such a luxury in life. The foundations I was provided were broken, and so I had to build from scratch. After a suicide attempt landed me in a hospital, I spent a lot of time asking myself who I was, what mattered to me, and who I even was as a person. I went through a gender transition and I was trying to start my life over, unburdened by my past. I had met someone and felt like I had a chance at something real, something tangible – a real, healthy relationship I could call my own. This is when I broke my silence with you and reached out for a video call. So much had changed, and yet so much hadn’t.

    After that call, the person I was seeing at the time connected the dots. Between SpongeBob being a sore subject, her historical knowledge surrounding my childhood, and my demeanor summarizing reconnecting with you, they had felt threatened. As a result, you were blocked for a second time in my life to save my relationship. While I felt shitty about doing this, a part of me thought maybe it was best to simply move on and shut out everything from my past. You had never seen me as anything other than a friend after all.

    Run away as someone may, no one can escape their past – but they can become unburdened by it. To this day, I am still working on unburdening myself. I have an EMDR certified LCSW who’s helping me cut the emotional strings to my past. I have heard that writing can help with this process, so I’m working on writing a book. While I don’t know when or even if it’ll ever be published, I truly believe a book will help me process the trauma I went through as a kid. I just feel remorseful that you got dragged into all this.

    Honestly, I wouldn’t blame you if your response to all this is “F**k you, I don’t care. You treated me horribly and I don’t care about your feelings.” I would deserve it and worse. Truthfully, the reasoning behind writing this is not to attempt to get back in contact with you, but to say goodbye. You’ve taken up too much of my headspace for far too long. I loved you and was too traumatized to be direct about it. Then I cut you off, not once, but twice. I feel shame about my interactions with you, but you were a great friend. I hoped this letter connected some more of the details behind my behavior and provide you some explanations. All I’ve ever wanted is peace, but trauma is a bitch.

    I’m tired of being in survival mode, tired of being on-edge all the time, tired of being scared, tired of my own bullshit standing in my own way. I’m tired of so many explanations coming down events in my childhood. I’m just so, so tired of not feeling whole. Trauma is fucking exhausting. This is no excuse for my behavior, but it is an explanation.

    People in the know about my parents have called them “monsters” for the things they’ve said and done to me. You could probably call me the same for cutting you out of my life twice, and I’d deserve it. I know I destroyed the relationship we had. 

    I sincerely hope you have a great life, and I apologize for my behavior.

    Farewell, Cookie Monster

  • Wearing a Mask

    Dating all the way back to pre-school, I remember being bullied. It was always about something. They called me fat, they called me stupid, they said “no one will ever love you,” they made fun how how I dressed, who I sat with at lunch, how fast I could run, that I had asthma, what music I said I liked … I mean, you name it, I was made fun of for it.

    From what I was able to piece together from distant memories and old stories from my biological mom (back when I was actually speaking with her), the bullying had started back in pre-school. I only recall fragmented memories of the events, but I recall choosing a parent teacher conference night at pre-school to get back at a bully. I recall feeling as though my biological mother would witness me prevailing over a bully and she would be proud of me. I don’t recall what I did exactly – nor does she – but I was written up and scolded for it. References later appeared in a pre-school report card

    After that, I was habitually taught not to stand up to bullies. I was told that one day these people would be pumping gasoline while I made something of myself. The bullying continued through being made fun of, having my clothes be drawn on with a pen, being kicked, stolen from, and physically abused. I almost died once. I had been taught to never fight back and never stand up for myself. I had been indoctrinated to this mindset further by being told that standing up for myself could lead to further violence. My school district had a policy – even if a fight is completely one-sided, both kids get in trouble. As unfathomable as this policy was at my school, those were the rules. At a certain point, I had become scared of standing up for myself.

    Over time, this suppression of natural instincts, never standing up for myself, and feeling emotionally abandoned at home made me feel like I was constantly wearing a mask. Only I knew it existed, but it numbed my torment as an emotional wall was fortified around me brick by brick. By a certain point, I felt completely numb.

    I begged to see a therapist, and was told no – that mental health was a scam. I was struggling with some very dark feelings being bullied at school and emotionally neglected at home. When I tried to confront my feelings, I was dismissed with “What do you have to be sad about? Don’t you know how many people have it worse than you?” There were no outlets for my big feelings, and I began to self-destruct.

    You wear a mask for so long, you forget who you were beneath it

    – Alan Moore, V for Vendetta

    By the time I had gotten to fifth grade, I remember sitting alone at recess on a curb one day, kicking stones around on the pavement. I was thinking about killing myself for the first time and was utterly inconsolable. After crying for some time, a school aid charged with supervising recess inquired why I was upset. Unable to get an answer out of me and not knowing what to do with a crying child, she took me to the school counselor’s office. It took a full ten minutes of him talking to me before I could manage to mutter out a few words through tears.

    Terrified of the situation I had gotten myself into, I had mentioned that I was scared for my parents to discover that I had been sent to the counselor’s office. I couldn’t fathom their reaction to knowing that I was receiving counseling when they were so against the concept of mental health. Between the emotional wall that had built up and the thought of my parents overreacting to learning of this incident, I was unable to let the counselor into my emotional fortress. He may have merely caught a breeze of the emotional hurricane that was in my mind. He did manage to learn that I was fond of chess and proceed to coordinate a regular chess game in his office during recess.

    My therapist and I processed these memories today. We discussed how my ideal parents wouldn’t be revolted by the concept of mental health. They would have been receptive to their child asking to see a therapist, and inquired further as to why their child wanted to see a therapist in the first place. They would have seen their child withdrawing instead of emotionally neglecting me. They would have gotten in touch with their emotionally wounded child and worked through my despair with the help of a therapist. My parents did none of these things.

    Even though several decades have passed since I was sitting on the curb at recess, I’ve come to realize that some of the same mindsets have endured. The thought of confrontation makes me uneasy. I’ve done plenty of things against my own interests … all in the name of keeping the peace and being nonconfrontational. In a lot of ways, the story I told myself was that I wasn’t “good enough.” I lost my spirit behind a mask. I hid behind an emotional wall and suppressed who I was down, deep into an emotional abyss where no one could hurt me again. Sufficed to say, that strategy didn’t turn out so well.

    After my suicide attempt a little over a decade ago landing me in a hospital for two weeks, I spent a lot of time figuring out how to heal the festering emotional wounds I had neglected. One of the things that helped me heal was cutting my parents out of my life. I had mixed feelings about doing so. Cutting your parents out of your life comes with a log of heavy feeling all on its own. I had lived with these feelings for a while now, but as a byproduct of therapy today, I think I’ve finally found a sense of peace with that decision. After discussing these events and hearing the following lyrics on the drive home, I felt an emotional release.

    I loved you once, won’t do it twice 
    All of my teardrops, they all crystallized 
    Out of my way, out of my way 
    I loved you once, fire to ice 
    All of my teardrops, they all crystallized 
    Out of my way, out of my way

    John Summit – crystallized (feat. Inéz)

    #FeedTheGoodWolf

  • Can of Worms

    My therapist claimed they opened a can of worms today. Last week my therapist had asked me to generate a list of characteristics of my ideal partner, and we started our session by talking about them. Where that conversation ended up going left me speechless by the time I left. I drove home in silence, contemplating what was said, even dissociating on the way home. I had to stop my vehicle and recollect myself before I could safely make it home. Before I get into all that, I’ll share some additional backstory.

    I never understood the relationship between my parents. Not once. I’m not sure how my father even got a second date, no less got married and had kids.

    On my parent’s first date, my dad “forgot” about my mom and abandoned her at a mall. Personally, that single action would have disqualified someone from a potential dating pool, and I’d seriously consider ghosting them moving forward. But no, despite this major red flag, they continued dating and eventually got married, rented an apartment together, and eventually bought a house.

    After they moved into their new house, my dad started trying to make as much money as he could, volunteering to travel for work to boost his salary and bring home additional income. Thing was, he was traveling and out of the house for well over 90% of the year. My mom once painfully described this to me as feeling like her heart was being ripped from her chest when he would come home, only to leave once again. Eventually, she broke. She moved back into their old apartment and changed the locks. She couldn’t see this marriage going anywhere. She was done.

    When my dad came home from traveling and found out his wife wasn’t there, he flipped. He pulled every dime out of their bank accounts and went to confront her. She did not want to speak to him, but he was banging on the door so violently, a family member had to come restrain him and hold him back. Eventually, the police were even called. I never really heard the end of this story. My therapist pointed out today that she likely went back to him because of the financial pressures of having all her money taken. Personally, I would have rather had him arrested and imprisoned.

    Things never really improved between them. Further fights included the time my dad canceled our health insurance. The multiple times where my dad spent his vacation days while still at work to unnecessarily draw a double salary instead of spending some time off with his kid’s during summer break. Then there was the time my mom and dad were yelling so loudly I could hear them from a different floor, through a closed door, through headphones at max volume. There have been quite a few times where my therapist has looked at me in stunned disbelief while describing events from my childhood

    My mother was no angel either. She prevented me from seeing a therapist as a kid – even after begging to see one – because of her own views about mental health. She would yell at me to toughen up when I was bullied at school, telling me how good my life was, how so many people have it worse off than I do, and told how I’d never survive in the real world. I’ve written about my mom a fair bit in earlier posts, and now I’ve written some tidbits about my dad.

    Through a lot of therapy spanning over a decade, I’ve come to be able to admit that what I went through wasn’t “normal” and that I wasn’t blessed with good parents. My childhood left me traumatized, and I feel a certain level of revulsion for both of my parents. I have given them many chances to attempt to redeem themselves and they have continually let me down. From my mom threatening to throw my sister’s boyfriend off a roof, to hearing they they prayed for me to not be trans, to my dad using racial slurs, to my mom insinuating my partner was a gold digger, I am just done with both of them. They are toxic people.They wouldn’t know what a healthy relationship looked like if it slapped them in the face.

    Circling back to today’s therapy appointment, my therapist suggested that we discuss an early memory of unhealthy relationships. I told my therapist about the incident where the cops were calls on my dad. This led to some further discussions about relationships in my life and if I even know what a healthy relationship with another even means.

    I know my therapist is religious, but I wasn’t prepared for the hard left turn that came next. They implied that the reason why I identified as trans might be because of the dislike of my father. This left me speechless. I couldn’t believe what I had just heard. We ended the session shortly after and it was suggested that I go home and do a lot of journaling after they said they “opened a can of worms.” The truth of the matter is, sure I dislike my father. But I also dislike my mom. I mean what kind of mother threatens to throw their sister’s boyfriend off a roof? They -both- have issues

    Deep down, I’ve always known I was different – before I was aware of a word for it. From not understanding I didn’t belong with the other little girls at a wedding when I was three years old, to sneaking into my mom and sister’s closet to try on clothes, to the fantasy writings of magically stepping from a stereotypically male body into a stereotypically female body. The very first time I was on the internet alone, I added a new word to my lexicon: transexual. Even the first time I had an orgasm was telling – I was trying to tuck to appear more feminine. Something unbeknownst to me at the time happened, and I stopped. It wasn’t until later I had learned what had actually happened.

    In this regard, I know exactly who I am.

    The only “can of worms” my therapist opened is me now questioning if I need to find a new therapist.

    #FeedTheGoodWolf

  • Brush with Death

    My sister and I were not close growing up. While we were both physically living in the same house, mentally speaking, we were living on different planets. It really wasn’t until after she graduated high school and went to college that I started seeing her blossom into her own person. I don’t hold any of this against her – we were both just trying to survive our childhood.

    After cutting my parents out of my life, I worked on connecting with my sister. While my sister is still on speaking terms with them, it has been a strained relationship that’s not built on a healthy foundation. My sister even went no contact with them for a few years after my mom threatened to throw my sister’s college boyfriend off a roof – all because he told my mom my sister’s feelings were valid. To this day she still morns the death of the relationship. He’s married to someone else now, and that remains an emotionally charged topic my sister struggles to discuss.

    I had previously gone no contact with my parents for a few years before coming back to them at the behest of my partner, claiming “You only get one set of parents,” pushing me to attempt to reconnect with them. Knowing this would not end well, I appeased by insisting parter in an attempt to quell any skepticisms surrounding my childhood. It wasn’t long until my parent’s character was revealed after lashing out at my partner that I went back to no contact. My partner no longer pushes for me to have a relationship with my parents, having observed their true nature.

    Cutting my parents out of my life wasn’t the result of a singular incident – it was the climax. I have given them more chances than they deserve, explained how they’ve damaged the relationship and they’ve still expressed they have no interest in changing. The only way I could foster peace in my life was to hold them accountable for the patterns of behavior they’ve habitually refused to recognize, and cut them out of my life.

    I got tired of being yelled at every time my parents saw me crying, being told I needed to “toughen up” and that “I’d never survive in the real world.” I got tired of playing peacemaker trying to end fights between my parents and my sister. I got tired of emotionally picking up my sister and my mom after every fight. Mostly I was tired of being bullied while being emotionally abandoned at home, preventing me from having healthy emotional outlets.

    Between being bullied at school and my life at home, I became sensitized to picking up perceived threats as they seemed all around me during most of my childhood. I was left to continually be the overcomer of obstacles and the peacemaker of arguments. Without a doubt, I was considered to be the peacemaker of the family. I wanted the fights to stop. Sometimes they were so loud, they couldn’t be drowned out with headphones at maximum volume, despite being on the opposite side of the house. Any time I brought up my parent’s behavior, I was mercilessly refuted and challenged as they could not see the forrest through the trees. I was told to reflect on how much better my life was than those starving and living on the street, reminding me that I was living under my parent’s roof and that I should be grateful. While I never feared physical violence at home, this was not the case at school.

    In additional to the emotional violence incurred at school, I was kicked, tripped, pushed, and even encountered a brush with death. One day in the gym locker room, two bullies approached me with a can of aerosolized deodorant and began emptying the can into my face. They raucously laughed while I recoiled, collapsing to the floor while I struggled to breathe. The assault persisted, adjusting the stream to meet my face in my new position on the floor. After some time the aerosol thankfully expired, otherwise my life would have.

    #FeedTheGoodWolf