harmonygorkia-blog

[harmonygorkia-blog]

I grew up not celebrating this day (or any holidays). As I age and raise a family, I have become a lot pickier about what holidays I will celebrate. Today isn't one of them. Today I morn. I morn for the land that was stolen, the families that were destroyed in the colonization of this land, the "freedom" that references the lives of the white man and built on the backs of humans stripped from their homes. I morn for the generations of suffering that have and still take place. I morn for those that cross the border to see their children thrown in cages, malnourished, and "lost". I morn for those that are trafficked and live in modern slavery, and the system that completely ignores this reality. I morn for every person that faces systemic racism and lives the reality that there are armed forces that can and will shoot them and their children for no reason and be able to get away with it. I morn that our leaders are white racists who rape children and are still in power. I morn that our system is built for those who take the most advantage of the most people, and celebrates it. Today is not a day to celebrate. Today is a day to look at ourselves, and our government, I do not celebrate this day.

[harmonygorkia-blog]

I been trying to understand how to use my skills better, to leverage my position better, and to just do better to do my part to contribute and advocate for a community in which all people are treated with dignity and respect. I feel overwhelmed and... uninspired. I'm fighting a pretty epic burn out. I've been without a mentor and paddling upriver in a boat laden with baggage, doing what I can within a system that I bought into to address change, only to find out that it just continues to perpetuate it. Everyone I know and work with whats to address it, and yet I can't help but wonder if it is actually possible? Do we need to burn it all down!? I really don't know anymore. All I know is that I can do what I can with where I am. I can teach my children and household how to respect others. Now I can do this better than ever before.

[harmonygorkia-blog]

Dont act like you give a shit when you really dont.

You cared about you getting your apology and your feelings - making it my responsibility to ask five thousand questions to even understand what the problem is because YOU can't articulate anything, and meanwhile barely even aknowledge my own hurt feelings and decide that you know everything about them. You treat me like i'm an idiot and like i have no value except to praise you. My emotions and my feelings are meaningless. Additionally excluding me from family events like birthday parties because you care more about running off and delaing with yourself then to communicate with me. Thanks for excluding me. I'm not really even a part of your family or anything am i. I'm just a fucking pay check and you just pissed you dont get to put your dick in me anymore.

[harmonygorkia-blog]

White Girl Raised in a racist home

I was raised in a white racist household. I don't believe all of it was out of intention... and - it was. I was raised in a household that met the first Black Partner I brought home with a glare, refusal for a handshake, and remarks of asking if they even washed their hair. Further blaming this individual for my choices, blaming the Black Person for the corruption of the little innocent white child. I remain disgusted with myself and my family that this truly wonderful person was "greeted" this way. I remain disgusted that the reaction to being called out was the justification that they have "black friends". I was beyond fortunate to have my handheld as I walked into the world out of my racist cacoon, stretching my wings to know that the world isn't as it seemed as I was raised. That there was so much more to open my eyes to. And as I did I began to see, when taking public transportation they would move - and insist that I move - away from the young Black Boys sitting down next to us. I saw the look of disgust and annoyance as I refused, my first act of defiance, and understood in context all of the other times my family had created these barriers and treated Black People like they were a blight to them. I left home to leave my youngest siblings in this household - never wanting to create the barriers that would prevent my input on their lives as they grew old enough to understand. I have one that gets it, and in all her white privildege acts ridiculous and young, and wants something different. And the other who degraded me for bringing home an "inner city black man" when it came up. Racism is disgusting. I failed my family by leaving these babies in this home. And I continue to fail by leaving the adopted siblings in this home to be subjected to this racism, and whom are of Hispanic and Black deccent. And yet - where would these children go? How does this get addressed? I just don't even know...

[harmonygorkia-blog]

Fake, fake, fake people

My whole life I've been so in need of a place to belong... a place to fit. Constantly shuffled around I just wanted it. And its taken me until now to figure it out, that so many of these people and groups tried to make me wear their masks to fit in. They never really cared who I was, as long as I fell into line. And I look at the list of people I've gather throughout my life, the ones that I've held invisible heart strings for, and I just can't help but wonder why? Why did I let them into my life, and filled with regret and shame I realize that it was simply for the use of each other. They didn't want to be alone and neither did I. I'm nothing but a guise for their isolated disguise.

[harmonygorkia-blog]

If I wasn't a mother I would have already killed myself by now

Most life-insurance will cover suicide if the coverage has been for at least three years. Maybe if I get life-insurance now I can kill myself when he is 7 and then this bullshit can all just be over. The house will be paid off, and my fucking husband can do whatever the fuck he wants with the million dollar inheritance. Then he can just be the fucking rich boy he wants to be. 

[harmonygorkia-blog]

Protests

"My feelings are hurt when you do XYZ and it makes me feel unsafe." "HOW DARE YOU say that I'm hurting your feelings with my actions! You hurt MY feelings by saying that I hurt your feelings. You are so abusive and are belittling me." If you are an activist and still perpetuate these behaviors within your work... it should be something you aim to work on. I don't trust any leadership that can't take accountability for the way they are making someone feel and deflect accountability and make it all about your feelings in response. Is this gaslighting?

Watch out for the glory hounds. They want to ride their way to the top of your planning and protesting - but they haven't done the work in the long hours of the night. It's a hot topic and they just want to be the cool kids. These are the folks that treat their partners like slime and won't take accountability for their actions and if anything is pointed out to them act like the same gaslighting pathetic excuses that everything you are fighting against

[harmonygorkia-blog]

Thank you to that agora asshole that basically stole all hope I had at sexual trauma healing

to the one that ruined hotlines and trauma therapies, because now I never know who is really safe. 

All I can say is you better be really secure with your boundaries and know that you aren’t going to take something out on someone else. Are you? 

There’s a reason that I wanted to talk to my Dom I had at the time, and its because he could turn in to that. I want to help him know not to do that - but isn’t that because I know that he was doing that to me himself? We both know it. We both talked about it. I was given the space to call it out in way that felt safe and I didn’t. Why not? Is there lingering loyalty? Lack of trust for sure, so I should be quetsioning it now post everything? Apparently.  Rape and violation to your autonomy are so confusing... When you learn to let things happen to you... but was it me that was making it happen so that I would be raped? And why? Why did I do that? What was the compulsion? Epigenetics? 

[harmonygorkia-blog]

Unpacking Triggers of PTSD.

Do you remember when you first understood that you were reacting from a trigger?? How did you come to understand your first known trigger?

I’ve been trying to do better about getting my brains out on paper, and I don’t know why I have this barrier to getting them out there. It is definitely emotionally based, and is based on some sort of trigger.

Life is so chaotic and silly,

We must learn to trust each other’s autonomy,

But its just so damn hard to understand,

As we ourselves barely comprehend,

what’s in our own heads.

Becoming a parent is when I started to learn what it takes to care for another – and we live in a society that has children hacked up by their own mother. This sort of abuse exists and as a society we hardly know how to talk to each other. We must learn to have the uncomfortable conversations, the ones that might make it feel like you’ll be destroyed – but you surely can survive. We have to be able to trust in the other, the person outside of ourselves. But who is it that you can trust? Who is it that you tell what to? What is socially acceptable in what locations?

[harmonygorkia-blog]

My Story

I've overcome a lot. I hold a ton of survivors' guilt.

Most days I don't believe I should have made it this far. Most days I remember the many times I'd nearly lost my life on the journey getting here. I don't often talk about it - it hurts too many people close to me that I know will think that they must have failed me. And in a lot of cases - they did. And yet - I know that somewhere down the line someone failed them too. It's a long repetitive - and often confusing - history. I don't hold it against anyone, and so I keep my mouth shut.

And then I remember how many didn't make it. I remember the faces of those I woke up next to that would never wake again. I remember how many more might not make it.

It isn't simply "homelessness". It's every victimization that comes along with it. The isolation, the manipulation, and subjugation. All the things that you do to survive, and the things that on the other side - if you are lucky enough to survive it - are all the things you don't want to remember.

It doesn't end when given a home, and often the hurt intensifies in a way that no one ever talks about. Sitting in an empty room, it becomes much more noticeable that you've got nothing of your own. The stillness can be deafening, isolating, and not at all feel like home.

--

They say not to make it personal, that this is work.

And for me I’ve never been able to adequately separate it.

I don’t believe that we should corporatize it.

And now I have a home, a family, and a really good job. I have gone on a long journey to healing myself so that I can better help others. I've worked to understand my limits and to push out of my comfort zone. This whole isolation experience has been invigorating in so many ways. I've had to lean into my own self-worth, to know that I am worth it. To push myself to talk to people in my home is much harder than doing it in an office where I can pretend a whole lot easier. This has taken a personal issue and intensified it, empowering me to stop hiding behind what I think I should be, and to be what I really am. This is my story, and I don't have to hide it. I shouldn't be ashamed of how I got here, especially when advocating for others to do the very same. How can I be ashamed of myself, and expect anyone else to be able to make it. I can't keep spreading the shame of homelessness.

[harmonygorkia-blog]

Fuck your Censorship

Somewhere along the line, I lost the freedom of my voice. Or maybe I gave it up willingly, in exchange for comfort that I thought that I would receive in simply appeasing. As it turns out, not having a voice sucks just as much as I remembered. To anyone that thinks they can control my voice: fuck you. And to anyone that considers me family that has shamed me for speaking - fuck you even more.

[harmonygorkia-blog]

Undue Burden

I been feeling undue burden of responsibility - in everything. And you know what - it's my own bed, I made it & I'ma lay in it. 

But I also ain't gonna keep layin' - so get your act together because I will start steppin' if it don't start changin'.

[harmonygorkia-blog]

I get through 5 emails (all very involved tasks that coordinate with them), and go back to my inbox to have 17 - 25 more that are equally as involved. It's never-ending. I'm drowning... And it's not like I can just stop, because I'm just trying to address systemic injustices and move things along and stopping means that people eventually end up being hurt more. On top of this - I'm a mom to a toddler and a teenager, a wife, and a daughter. I'm a dog owner and a chicken owner. I'm concious with my life, as much as possible. I'm the head-of-household, and the only breadwinner. I'm very tired folks.

[harmonygorkia-blog]

Educating A White Son

We've started talking about war, racism is right around the corner, definitely needing assistance in talking about gender identity, and just in general discrimination. What it is, how to identify it, and what to do when he sees it. We've got a pretty good foundation, and I've been sitting in wait for a while before starting to introduce these topics. We've started conversations about police and mouthing off to the cops, you can't rush the cops, and that firefighters are different than cops. It's a lot more overwhelming having to be aware of my white son's privilege and figuring out how to navigate that with my own lack of knowledge from being a white man, but also a white female privilege. It's not unintuitive, but it's a whole other concept to parent in response to something I can only observe. Especially coming from a family that well... I left when I was very young because they wouldn't shake the hand of the black partner I brought home. They would move if black people sat next to them on the subway. Right now I focus on teaching humility and consent. I focus on confronting harmful behaviors and don't show him that they are funny. I don't buy in to the "boys will be boys" bullshit. Have I had to check myself on it when in a group of people that are bigger and bullier than me? ABSOLUTELY. Haven't we all?

[harmonygorkia-blog]

Emotional Manipulation, for sex

I told myself that he wasn’t using me for sex.... I really wanted to believe it. 

But tonight I held my composure, I really did it. I was calm, cool, and collected. I was open and vulnerable. I communicated and asked questions. And all he could do was project onto me a negative self talk about how I didn’t like him. He told me over and over again about how he didn’t feel loved and that I wouldn’t touch him. 

I literally have been loving on him physically so much. Enough to know that I made it a priority to make an effort physically to show affection and that I was proud of myself for achieving my goals. And as I laid there listening to him tell me how I didn’t so exactly what I knew I had done, I knew it was a lie. 

He was lying to me to manipulate me to give him what he wanted. To guilt me into giving him what he wanted. 

And as I laid there refusing to reach out unless he were to navigate our conversation with vulnerability and respect for me, I would not extend myself physically. 

Because that’s the way it works. You barely even touch and suddenly all your rights to autonomy are gone. 

So as I did, and I heard him saying that I did nothing, I felt my heart begin to race. This is the sign that I’m feeling triggered - but right now its the type of triggered that I know is being caused by something I need to not react to and push through and have a different reaction than what I’m being led into.  I don’t like being emotionally manipulated. It doesn’t feel good. It has happened to me my whole life in some really extreme ways, and I am probably overly perceptive to when it is happening. Also maybe sometimes projecting - but mostly just trying to observe these days and not react. 

As I pulled myself back in to observing myself, and calming my heart and breathing before rushing to response - I decided to not defend myselff, and to ask questions. I asked why he thought that I didn’t like him - what was it that I was doing. He told me that it was how I acted and how I never touched him or anything.

Now this I know is just a farce. I’ve been observing this for too long now. I’ve talked about it in therapy. I’ve journaled about it. I know that I am making physical efforts to be available for him. Just this morning I cuddled with him and kissed him when he woke up. He went on to tell me how I just don’t like him. I really really just don’t like him since I never touch him. 

I waited for myself to calmly come to another question, and I asked when he started feeling this way. He said a few weeks, for a long time. 

I told him that i felt it was unfair that he was projecting this lack of worth onto me and deciding that I don’t like him enough based on this, while dismissing everything that I do for him, including the physical affection that I had given him just today. 

I was soft in my tone, purposefully reassuring as best as I could in tone. He became defensive. Inturupted and berated me. I’m not sure what he said because I shut down, but I know he cussed and got loud enough for me to classify it as yelling. Though when I mentioned this he told me he never even raised his voice. 

Typical - if he keeps projecting falsehoods, maybe they will become truth? 

I held my ground.

The realization I’m having tonight is just how much he is projecting. Not only is he projecting that I don’t like him (when in fact he is either not liking me, or not liking himself, or both), but also that 

[harmonygorkia-blog]

A Confession and Commitment

He's being all emotionally manipulative tonight, and I started to feel my heart race and I was going to react, but I didn't. I held my composure and I didn't allow myself to be manipulated into just having sex. I'm really working to be sure that I have myself respected - and I literally was just being sweet and bubbly and he was being all terse because I didn't just get on top of him when he said he was horny (like... serious?) and said that I wasn't super horny and he literally just berated me and projected on me how much I don't like him because I wont touch him and how I act towards him and all this stuff, and I KNOW that I've been on point. I KNOW this because I see the reflection of it with my son. I KNOW that I've been good because I've been keeping record. He keeps saying that I do things that I don't do, or that I don't do things that I do do. He literally just creates any reality so that he can try to manipulate me into doing what he wants. I feel a bit dumb that I didn't see it before, and also... I still want to make this work, but I'm just getting so confused. I've been in over my head for a long time. I had so much of my own trauma that I brought to the table, and maybe even some of which brought me into this relationship - and that doesn't even begin to account for the trauma that he brought to the relationship that I acquired and also carry on my shoulders. And I don't feel the same exchange. I feel like he carries some, but I really do feel like I carry more of his. And he's got ten more years than me. And I was already pretty maxed out when I came to him. I am just so tired. And here he is saying that I don't like him and I don't touch him and I don't do things that I literally do. Because I'm being emotionally manipulated. And I don't want to tell anyone. That's how I know its real - because you know me... I tend to just... be flippant. I'm enough like Julie in that way. But this is different. Even as I'm typing I want to delete it all, but I also want to hold myself accountable and get it out there so that I don't let myself ignore this. I've only barely started enacting different behaviors, so its bound to take some time for adjustments to work out and for him to feel a bit of a different experience as well - and I just need to hold my ground. Don't be manipulated into doing things that I don't want to do, or I didn't want to do and then because I'm being guilt tripped I figure out how to make myself want to. That's NOT healthy. Tonight I won enough because he left to go to the other room. And came back. So I know that I have the upper hand. So I need to act like it. Keep being calm cool and collected. And when I do - I'm going to write to myself or to someone at least. I'm not going to do this.

[harmonygorkia-blog]

I feel old... thin. Like butter spread over too much bread.

Living a life of chaos and trying to "settle down" doesn't ever actually mean settling down. I'm really just trying to gain a foothold strong enough that I can not feel like I'm fighting to survive every day. But I wouldn't want to be too comfortable either - just enough. Right now I feel safe most days. I've had to really come to trust myself that any fight/flight I'm experiencing is probably a reaction due to past trauma. We've been through a lot of collective trauma as a community in the past few years. Is it always like this? My whole life has been that way, but I lived everywhere. Is this just what life is? I'm getting older - and this is the year I'm really starting to feel it. I feel it in my joints and I feel it in my reactions. I'm finally starting to lose some of that youthful angst - not enough to be "lazy" but enough to not be such a "freak" either.