Large Latent Lessons

I’m still sick today. Tolerable but makes sleep hard even though I’m tired. Makes me restless. I think I can close out my SRs today though, assuming no big new ones come in. Maybe I can get to a VM for the BZ project too. I don’t have any deadline work today so if I can find sleep I should be able to take it. Not sure if I’ll make the science center movie reception tonight though. I like going but it’s too much to be out and busy until 9 if I’m feeling sick.

Not sure what today’s therapy topic is. Obviously we’re going to talk about trust, to the extent I can get engagement, but I should have something else too. I should have something less taxing for me while I’m ill. I have a heist topic about the space where people imagine they are limited externally by communication but are actually limited internally unresolved feels. The thing where people say “I don’t have the words” but mean “I’m reluctant to explore my mixed feels”. Or where they say “I’m too busy for X” but mean “it’s difficult for me to think about X”. I’m not sure if my therapist is up for heists though; I poked it before and they had a mixed response initially and no follow up in later sessions.

I think the topic is maybe writing. I’ve had a lot of trouble writing a GoFundMe for you, and I want to change that. I feel like I’ve got some handle on it now but I could use some concentrated introspection on the issue, so I can actually get it done. There are lots of parts: I’ve been having trouble writing on any preselected topic, particularly if it requires more than one session, it’s hard for me to interface with the marketing aspect of GFM both in general and with the people at the day job I expect to find it, there’s the guilt I have about my own money and the avoidance that you ask me to have about yours, there’s the way Shanda not only can’t help me but is a upset just when I mention it, there’s my guilty about running a financial heist. And probably 4 other parts, if I poke at it more. I should at least write about it if I don’t use my therapist.

I was thinking about my reluctance to imagine myself as a victim of sexual assault. There are lots of reasons for this – it was most intense when I was too young to understand the sexual aspect, I created fairly effective protections later in life, social dismissal of assault on males, etc. These days I feel pretty in control about it, but that old minimization had – maybe still has – impacts on my life, so I should do something different about it.

This next paragraph is details about child abuse, so skip it if that’s not for you.

You’ve heard the story before about Mother asking me to die quietly while she smothered me, as part of a narcissistic murder-suicide experiment. Those assaults were the end stage of escalating abuse, before she gave up on me and moved me out of the house. Earlier stages started with more typical domestic violence ¹An accurate term but not one we typically allow young people to claim when the violence comes from their caregivers. It’s almost like the minimization of my trauma was systematic and socially enforced., reactive and unplanned, usually short attacks. Over time the duration and amount of ritual in the attacks increased – I was asked to prepared for the attack later in the day, to hold a position while attacked, to perform a specific series of emotions toward my attacker, to remove my clothes, to remain in intense submission afterward. The beating itself was more random, but in general the intensity increased over time – initially strikes were unarmed and unplanned, later they included household tools as weapons and focus on particular bodily targets, eventually they included gential abuse. So that’s my oldest sexual assault.

Later when I started my own sex things were tricky. My first partner was very pushy on the issue. I can see now that’s in part a result of their own sexual assaults (which I was unaware of at the time). Our early interactions would not meet my current standards for consent, but at the time I rarely considered whether or not I wanted a thing – much of my life required that I comply regardless of my preference. And in any case they weren’t really looking for consent, particularly not at the beginning (but honestly not for most of our relationship). I’m all for sex as a tool and outlet for emotion, and there’s good sex to be had with roots in anger or fear, but only with trust. Without trust it’s dangerous and seperate and a thing I would typically refuse in my current life. A thing I might have refused then if I wasn’t living so close to the edge.

Yesterday I wrote to HT to praise them for working through their frustration and distraction to get to a solution (among other things). Today they asked me to be their advisor for some of their coursework. Which gives me the feels. It’s nice to imagine that someone thinks I can help with regular life and not just an emergency. I’m also excited to have more opportunities to interact, because I think over time I can help them find more calm. Maybe even find a direction that isn’t dictated by the fickle demands of a patriarch or the chaos that is never being satisfied. Sufficiently tense people often imagine relief is impossible, or overwhelming, or even unwise, but I am fairly confident that I know something different, and that I can teach it given some time and trust.

Finally I leave you with some of the many faces of Pree from Killjoys. He understands my fabulous bald bearded bedazzled blue style. I’m more child assassin than warlord, more mercinary than bartender, but when I see them cycle through looks for him I can see many of the things I’ve done since I started decorating my body.

ZiB

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Sent from a phone.

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