justemotionalabusesurvivorthings - Tumblr blog

[justemotionalabusesurvivorthings]

I don't have the money to buy my meds this month. I'm on lithium (bipolar), seroquil antipsychotic), atarax (anxiety), and prazosin (ptsd). I literally need these meds to remain mentally stable and avoid going back to a mental hospital again. It'll cost me 46 bucks total if anyone can donate

https://www.paypal.me/ShandiCrabill

[justemotionalabusesurvivorthings]

[justemotionalabusesurvivorthings]

I don't have the money to buy my meds this month. I'm on lithium (bipolar), seroquil antipsychotic), atarax (anxiety), and prazosin (ptsd). I literally need these meds to remain mentally stable and avoid going back to a mental hospital again. It'll cost me 46 bucks total if anyone can donate

https://www.paypal.me/ShandiCrabill

[justemotionalabusesurvivorthings]

Warsan Shire, “Conversations About Home” from Teaching My Mother How To Give Birth

[justemotionalabusesurvivorthings]

[justemotionalabusesurvivorthings]

yo does anyone else feel CONSTANTLY guilty? like you’ve always done something wrong but you don’t know what it is?

[justemotionalabusesurvivorthings]

[justemotionalabusesurvivorthings]

If you’ve been stuck trying to please a mom who became abusive/toxic because of generational trauma, realize you won’t save her. You might be the subject of your mom’s rage, paranoia, obsession etc - but you are not the cause of it. And if you didn’t change her after all those years of begging her, bargaining with her, self-harming, isolating, defending yourself, etc, you are not going to change her now. When they say “you can only save someone who wants to be saved”, that applies here. When they say “the only person who you can control is yourself” that applies here. Please let go of this guilt that you carry for something that’s entirely out of your hands. These ideas are pertinent to creating your path to freedom.

[justemotionalabusesurvivorthings]

That post about triggers reminded me also of this seminar I went to a few years ago at a dysautonomia conference which was about chronic pain. The doctor giving the talk explained that a big problem in treating chronic pain is doctors not understanding or accepting that the brain is really good at making shortcuts. We accept this for things like "practicing the tuba" or "playing a sport" or other things where repetition forms a pathway in your brain which then becomes automatic -- we all have stuff we do so much that our bodies seem to simply do them without our conscious input, right? Because it is generally beneficial for the brain to go "oh, it looks like we do this thing a lot. I am just gonna go ahead and put this shortcut in, so next time doing it is easier"

The problem is, THIS APPLIES for things like pain. This is why lingering pain after a major injury or surgery etc, even after the physical injury has healed and there is no PHYSICAL reason at the pain site for there to be pain anymore, is common. Unfortunately your brain is not immune from applying the microsoft clippy technique of "hey there, it looks like we are doing this thing an awful lot! I am going to install a shortcut for you!" with stuff like pain. And once those shortcuts are established, you can't really get rid of them easily if at all (think of something you used to do all the time but stopped doing for several years and your body just automatically remembered exactly how to do it right away when you picked it up again!)

This is depressing. Because it does mean that "there is no physical cause of pain" is meaningless when dealing with chronic neurologic pain (and therefore the approach of "let's find the cause and treat that" is not always super helpful), and because a lot of medical professionals don't fully understand or accept it and will approach pain management like "weaning you off" management is a reasonable goal.

But I also find it weirdly comforting because it makes me kind of... Sympathetic to my stupid idiot animal brain in a way. Like, my brain is just trying to help me be able to create a helpful subroutine so I don't have to consciously think about.. Like... throwing this spear at an antelope! Or whatever!!! It Doesnt know!!! My man Cornflake got the spirit!!!!!!!!

Anyway. I think I have posted about this before but I wanted to articulate it better. This applies to stuff like coping mechanisms that become maladaptive too. Ur brain makes pathways. Those you can consciously alter with hard work but your first INSTINCT may always be a certain thing that is no longer useful, bc of these shortcuts. That is just brains. That is why you can't get stuck getting angry with yourself about your first instinct in difficult situations, you have to suspend judgment and move past them.

So yeah

[justemotionalabusesurvivorthings]

This is a good good list that unfortunately a lot of people need right now.

[justemotionalabusesurvivorthings]

[justemotionalabusesurvivorthings]

good parents dont hit their children. good parents dont touch their children inappropriately. good parents dont scream at their children. good parents dont manipulate their children. good parents dont imprison their children at home. good parents dont threaten their children. good parents dont starve their children. good parents dont harass their children.

good parents do not abuse their children.

[justemotionalabusesurvivorthings]

The presence of love does not indicate an absence of abuse.

A lot of advice people like to share is that an abuser doesn't actually love you or care about your well-being.

While this is true in many cases, there are also people who look at their relationship and they see that they are loved, and they think they can't be suffering abuse.

Yes; it is absolutely possible that the abuser does genuinely love you. But you know what? It doesn't matter. They still hurt you. All the love in the world does not negate the fact that they repeatedly abused you. It doesn't erase the trauma. It doesn't fix the damage they caused.

Just because they might love you, that doesn't grant them permission to hurt you. The presence of love does not negate the abuse suffered. Just because they love you, that doesn't mean you are obligated to forgive them, and you are absolutely still entitled to your anger for what they've done. It doesn't matter that they loved you. They hurt you, and you owe them nothing.

[justemotionalabusesurvivorthings]

[justemotionalabusesurvivorthings]

fyi to yall in quarantine whos grasp on reality is getting a little slippery: isolation, intense boredom, stress and lack of positive routine are absolutely contributing factors to exacerbating psychosis and psychosis-adjacent disorders, even latent ones. im not saying this to fearmonger im saying it so u can recognise it and take steps to handle it especially if it induces your first ever episode.

some warning signs can include

starting to believe unusual things that you previously did not believe (e.g. living in a simulation / you or others around you not being real / secretly being in hell or dead / otherworldly beings communicating with you somehow / government conspiracies / everyone around you is out to get you and harboring ill intent)

seeing things youre pretty sure arent there (e.g. shadow people, floating lights, stationary objects moving on their own, animals in a house that doesnt have pets)

hearing things (e.g. murmured voices, occasional clear and loud voices, faint music, scratching sounds, any without a source)

feeling a sense of dread or generalised paranoia, a sense that you are being watched or that something terrible is looming on the horizon but you dont know what

having extra trouble putting your thoughts in order and speaking coherently, cannot concentrate, space out to the point of feeling slightly catatonic

those most at risk are anyone with a family history of this vein of mental illness as well as those using certain drugs to get through the tedium of quarantine - if this is you, its best to research whether the substances youre using have documented links to triggering episodes of psychosis in users. weed is included in this, not just psychoactive drugs.

here are some steps you can take to get a handle on the situation if your grasp on reality is slipping like this and you cant access irl mental health resources.

have a routine. this is vitally important - you need structure. set an alarm for a specific time every day, even though you have nowhere to be. give yourself a bedtime. eat 2 meals a day, at least, at regular times.

leave the house. no, i dont mean Go Out, just be outside for a while every day or two. go for a walk if you can. stand outside your house for 15 minutes paying attention to the cars and the birds and the breeze and the clouds if you cant. really observe your surroundings. get sunlight.

on that note - let as much natural light into your house as possible during waking hours. your circadian rhythm needs it.

take up some form of hobby that requires physical engagement - whether thats journaling, drawing, making origami, gardening, cooking. the point of this is to ground yourself in your body and the world around you, have an affect on your surroundings, and stimulate your brain.

dont dwell on your delusions, hallucinations or distressing trains of thought if you can help it. that isnt to say "snap out of it and just dont have symptoms", but rather accept them without either judging them or overindulging in them. observe them as they happen, accept that they happen, and let it go, if you can. you may not be able to control the experiences, but you can control how you react to them, and the best case scenario is not allowing them to overwhelm your thoughts and your days. this is much easier said than done, especially if the experiences are distressing in nature, but the aim is to sever the feedback loop that causes further stress and thus further bad extrasensory experiences.

this is honestly just a basic surface scratch of advice though bc im by no means an expert, just someone w latent psychosis who used to work in the field for a while. there are tons of resources online by others who have experienced psychosis that can be a huge help if u think you might be at risk due to the stress, boredom and uncertainty of quarantine

[justemotionalabusesurvivorthings]

this was a great read. “Laziness Does Not Exist” by Devon Price

[justemotionalabusesurvivorthings]

abusive parents be like “You’ll understand when you get older and abuse your own kids!!!” like wow I am sorry that you would even think I would grow up to be such a huge piece of garbage like you