Don’t worry. I’m not sticking ice picks in my brain. It’s just a new turn of phrase for what experience life has thrown my way. I’ll probably copyright or trademark it one day. My new phrase is one that sits deep in the hollow of my chest. It is like a slab of uncut marble. It’s a heavy stone. It is heavier than imaginable. It’s like the regret I feel after I realize it’s been one too many days since I’ve actually performed self-care. It carries not only my aspirations but also my fears and mistakes. This makes it feel like I’m dragging a weighted ball and chain through life. Each word grounds me. They also hold me back. This weight has long followed my footsteps in those dark shadows behind me.
Don’t worry. I’m not sticking ice picks in my brain.
Living is easy. I was born into this world without my consent. I struggled to live independently as an infant. Thankfully, I grew mildly independent afterward. I developed my own routines and ways to cope with the demands of trauma-hood. I would eventually learn to cry myself to sleep without anyone hearing me, embracing the solitude that came with it. What an achievement.
I started out as a bit of an overachiever in most aspects of my life. I was constantly pushing myself to excel in academics, like the applied arts, and extracurricular activities, most of which are sung pop-culture rap, hip-hop and R&B songs. Although, it seems that’s commonplace with undiagnosed AuDHD kids, especially little girls. They grow up as gifted and talented girls in school, praised for accomplishments, berated for failures. As we begin to navigate the complexities of adolescence, we turn into adult burnouts. We grapple with the pressures of Insta perfection and the weight of Pinterest expectations. We strive to find a balance between our need for pushing to the next stage of life and the realities of adulthood.
If only someone had noticed. Oh, if they had noticed, they’d see just how messed up I was.
Languish, the feeling gifted to a burnout gifted kid, shows up in all kinds of ways. The abused child, always carrying around their past, this invisible burden that no one ever sees. That forgotten participation ribbon, meant to celebrate effort, ending up being a reminder of constant ineptitude. Then there’s the kid who’s always picked last in games, constantly haunted by that feeling of not measuring up and feeling so alone. The little girl and young woman who dreaded group projects because she ended up doing all the work, felt resentment building with every unrequited favor while still slapping everyone’s name on the work like it was a joint effort. There’s the people-pleasing, closeted drug addict that no one bothered to look at closely, stuck in the shadows, fighting demons that seemed to disappear behind a contorted smile when everyone else was around. If only someone had noticed. Oh, if they had noticed, they’d see just how messed up I was. They would have caught those desperate cries for help hidden under a mask of weirdness that felt like it was tearing me apart.
I recently came across my old LiveJournal—let the nostalgia hit—and as I read those four posts I had, it was clear I wasn’t okay; it was a raw glimpse into my desperate need for someone to see what I was really going through. Let me give you the rundown. Post one: abuse, depression, maladaptive behaviors. Post two: suicidal ideation. Post three: drug addiction. Post four: maladaptive behaviors. And that’s putting it lightly.
It was like I had a neon sign flashing “fucking help me,” but still, people completely missed the point.
Who the hell misses that?! Like, seriously? I couldn’t have been more obvious about my vibe—my attitude, how I presented myself; my art, my writing, my friends, my looks, my health, my lack of communication, my stand-off-ish nature. It was like I had a neon sign flashing “fucking help me,” but still, people completely missed the point.
As a teen, I was ready to throw hands with a grown man who wanted to see a silly stop-action film I made. Instead of just saying no, I lied and claimed I accidentally deleted it. I was just trying to please my dad and not share any part of my art with him. Come to find out, he actually logged into my computer and downloaded it anyway. Thanks a lot, dreadfather, for reminding me how little privacy I actually have. That hit me hard. While I was trying to keep my walls up, others were just plowing right through them. Honestly, that stung way more than I expected.
A few people would ask if I was okay, and I’d just flat-out say no.
You’d think with no personal boundaries and zero privacy, I’d have been caught doing all the crazy stuff I did as a kid. But nope. Everyone was totally clueless, all wrapped up in their own lives and problems. A few people would ask if I was okay, and I’d just flat-out say no. That would usually lead to them probing me about what was wrong or if I wanted to chat, and I’d end up pleading with them to tell my parents I needed mental health help. Sadly, those cries often fell on deaf ears because my parents couldn’t see me as anything but the perfect kid they wanted me to be.
I remember telling at least 3 of my 4 sisters that I was struggling and really needed help. I reached out when I was feeling vulnerable, hoping they’d get just how serious it was. They did tell my parents that I needed help, trying to cut through the wall of indifference that was building up. I can still picture the worry on my sisters’ faces. Despite all my attempts to get attention, the silence and continuing traumatic experience after traumatic experience just kept piling up, making me feel even more isolated.
…when you are consistently tortured by both your family and your own demons, you tend to grow a lot of hate and resentment, each grossly intertwining and manipulating the other.
Loathing follows that of languishing. You see, when you are consistently tortured by both your family and your own demons, you tend to grow a lot of hate and resentment, each grossly intertwining and manipulating the other. I guess my lucky number was 34. That’s when I broke up with my parents, a decision that felt like both liberation and betrayal. Yup, it happened this year. I was finally full of so much hatred and pain, I told them to fuck off. I felt the words rise like a tide of vomit, uncontrollable and disgusting. Politely, of course, because I hadn’t quite, still hadn’t, gotten the hang of telling people I’m done with them.
Even though my voice was the tiniest it had ever been, the conviction behind it absolutely trembling, the people who surrounded me in those moments were empowering enough to get the job done. I do feel like I could tell the two of them to properly swivel on a cactus at this point, though, with what they’ve put me through this past year, each confrontation only adding more layers of loathing, as if their ignorance was a constant reminder of my own struggles and the battles that I fought alone every day of my adolescence.
…nothing quite as liberating and traumatizing as telling the two of your most deep-seeded abusers to go fuck themselves…
There is nothing quite as liberating and traumatizing as telling the two of your most deep-seeded abusers to go fuck themselves and meaning it. However, having them attempt time and time again to regain control over you while you simultaneously walk a tight-rope of re-traumatizing yourself and healing your inner child can be the most horrifying experience you’ve ever undertaken.
While I spent days tossing around in my bed, unable to eat, sleep, or have any semblance of peace, mommy dearest decided that she wasn’t going down without a fight. She continued to reach out, prying for my attention day after day, time after time. She almost wore me down. If it hadn’t been for Jamison, Emily, and Cherub sticking beside me through the torment of manipulation and barrage of text messages I would have given in.
Despite… spending most of my days cosplaying as a worm for over 6 weeks, I’d say I’ve come out the other end mostly intact.
I’ll be forever indebted to them for what they gave me strength to overcome. The liberation I’ve felt since I’ve finally let go has been nothing short of life altering. Despite losing around 40 pounds, getting less than a few hours of sleep each night, and spending most of my days cosplaying as a worm for over 6 weeks, I’d say I’ve come out the other end mostly intact. I have my bouts here and there where I sob into my pillows questioning why I was never worthy of being saved by my parents, but that’s neither here nor there.
Lobotomies are obviously the next option, short of driving yourself mad with the what-if’s, how-come’s, and why-not’s. There’s no standard of treatment for when you find out the root of your existence while also unveiling your miserable childhood side-by-side your deep trauma rooted shadow work amidst your self-loathing and loathing of those who never wanted to truly help you find a sustainable way of life. But I don’t mean a lobotomy in an ice-picky sort of way. I mean in a way of pushing through the healing process and allowing yourself to become free of the loss and grief that is losing what you wanted in a pair of humans that were supposed to be raising you.
I mean in a way of pushing through the healing process and allowing yourself to become free of the loss and grief…
Not only did I physically lose the relationship with my parents, I also had to accept that they were never truly a mother and father to me. They were abusers. They emotionally neglected and abused me. They medically neglected me. They manipulated and distorted my ability to hold my own and function as an adult. They held financial independence over my head while praising me for being financially responsible when we were paying them back tenfold after borrowing money, something only myself and Jamison did. None of my other family members ever paid back financial loans with interest, if they ever paid them back at all.
So, reluctantly I am in the stage of lobotomizing myself from them. I walk the border of numb and emotionally unstable, trying to allow myself to experience healing in a way that I’ve never done before. I’ve never before sat with my emotions in such a vulnerable way. I mean, fuck, when have I ever sat on my bed and sobbed so hard I couldn’t see just because my husband was off to work on a work day and nothing was wrong or out of the ordinary. It was weird, okay. I’m not saying it was my most aesthetic moment, but sure as hell, it was my most glorious moment. At least in my most recent memory storage bank since the last set of cache was dumped, lol. Being able to sit there and remind myself that he wasn’t going to work as a way to abandon me, it didn’t mean he loved me less, and it also didn’t mean he was anything like the people who either walked out on me or never walked in the door in the first place.
It also didn’t mean he was anything like the people who either walked out on me or never walked in the door in the first place.
My beautiful internet strangers, I hope that my motto resonates with you just as much as hakuna matata did when 90s babies still thought being adults was the thing we wanted to do. I hope that you are able to at least take away something that can help you heal on the journey that is your path from life to lobotomization. Until we meet again.
Live.
Viridimere
Languish.
Loathe.
Lobotomize.
Ridi
Traumatized Viridimere 