Tag: change

Lessons from my Addicts

I’ve had two relationships with addicts—alcoholics to be specific. Addiction is a characteristic ingrained in a personality that can cross its attention from where it derives its fix. Addicts can be addicted to anything from substance abuse to behavioural stimuli.

Addicts live by excuses. They rely on those to drain as much life as they can from a connection until it’s beyond done. Addicts lie. They lie to themselves, so it’s no surprise that they lie to you too—with so much conviction that you question yourself. You question the facts you know. You question your gut. You question the words they used. You question if the bottle was already empty. What you know and what they tell you never lines up. You question your sanity. You question your worth. And in that, you inadvertently facilitate the addiction and behaviours that come along with it.

Liars (like Narcissistic character types—I’m intimate with those too) will make you believe you are the problem. They will twist up a story so you’re the villain. And when you come out of being buried by a relationship like that (romantic or otherwise) and begin working through the debris alone, and recognise all the ways you were used, manipulated, and abused, there’s a clarity that comes with reconfiguring and regaining trust in yourself. That kind of healing (when embraced and worked) roots deep. When you start to trust yourself again without the games of wonky mirrors—the half-truths that were all lies. Boundaries form—both healthy and guarded.

These relationships had a significant impact on me. And why I put more stock (as we all should) into what people do over what they say (but I listen too—always). And when the confidence is shaken, even just a little, it makes my insides shudder. Lessons have been learned from those connections, and still I’ll sometimes let things slide, offering the benefit of doubt (maybe once), considering a background, trauma, other links but when I feel I’m betraying myself (again), when that realisation kicks in and the alarm starts roaring, I need to be done. I’ll betray myself so someone else feels safe—a trait I’m still working hard on breaking—and I cannot be doing that anymore, not for anyone.

Until the Last Breath

Another Annoyingly Introspective Personal Post

I was never soothed or comforted – born into a ‘let her cry it out’ parenting style, with the technique of — if a child is that upset, threaten to give them ‘something to really cry about!’. I know that it is not entirely untypical of the 80s and 90s. I can’t deny the impact, though; a significant part of my nature of dealing with everything myself to the point of extremely unhealthy hyper-independence was very much a result of the lack of nurture. I isolate. I squirrel my emotions away so no one else is inconvenienced by them. I process and work through little and big hells in solitude. And that hyper-independence has been taken advantage of in poor relationships.

I’ve never felt loved, only tolerated. And that has carried through all my relationships, including the romantic. I’ve never been loved – tolerated, settled for, or convenient, but never that. Even when those empty words were uttered, I knew that they loved what I did for them, how I made them feel. I was never the subject to be adorned with that robe. That word was never mine. Folks have given me the minimal and I’ve been grateful because I shouldn’t exist. Being born was a mistake, I should be grateful for the crumbs.

I know I’m worth more than how I was conditioned to believe. I know I’m not just an instrument for others. I know I’m more than tolerable.

Still, accepting the minimal is a hard piece of conditioning to break when it was so deeply embedded from the moment I let out my first cry. The world told me to be quiet. Be seen, never heard. And if one could avoid being seen, all the better. I’m trying to fix it. And I’m awful at creating massive swathes of room for the broken parts of others because I want them to feel all the acceptance and love that I’ve never had. And I’ve offered it in abundance to my own detriment. I never want anyone to feel as awful as I have – it’s dark in here, always cold. There’s work to be in done in this messy hollow. I’ll weave the spindly roots into knots, so you don’t fall into the dark when you walk over me. I’ll turn back clocks and drop all time to make someone I care about feel loved, heard, accepted. I struggle to give that time and space to myself.

Every day I’m trying. Changing. Attempting to remake so many broken pieces or accept them with that word. The one that wasn’t mine when it fell from liars’ lips.

I think prioritising being loyal to myself is becoming one of the hardest lessons to learn in this lifetime. The perpetual work in progress until the last gargled breath. Still, the geese. At least none of this is forever….

Change in the House of…

Life is constantly changing, as it should. I’m of the mind that if things stay them same, we may as well cease to exist. Right now, the changes outweigh anything settled. It’s profoundly unsettling physically and emotionally.

The connections we make, the connections we miss, and those that break are in constant motion. Sometimes we need to go back to move forward.

We learn, grow, change, evolve.

I’m thankful for every person I’m crossed and blended paths with so far in this mad life. Even the horrors I would not change. There are pathways forming through the fog.