#like I can't undo the experiences they've had to make them have this worldview

[creative-anchorage]

Man I. I'm not sure if people who view the world negatively through the lens of "most people are bad" realize just how many things it affects their response to

[sudenlehto]

My experience with healing and developing the kind of self-compassion that allows me see where I'm being given less than the bare minimum, - often feels like growing out of a glass box.

You grow, but the glass breaks and the shards wound you. The price of wanting better is being reminded that indeed, you settled into a small glass box before, and therefore growing into a bigger version of yourself will remind you of this.

By this I mean the people in your life who, even if they've been good and supportive with you in many situations, - don't really exhibit the qualities of someone who could be truly close with you.

I mean people who have not yet unpacked the cruelty towards themselves, who still find it silly when someone grows out of the same mentality. I was just like that, and can still be like that in some life areas. I remember being younger and telling a fellow autistic person they're asking too much by asking their friend to stop perpetuating dehumanizing caricatures/stereotypes of autistic folk, because I was used to just taking plain open transphobia and ableism to my face without complaint, to not get abandoned by others. To me, tolerating bigotry towards myself was just how life was and I wasn't allowed to complain. The price of complaining was humiliation and being told I'm asking too much, and I had internalized this.

My words to that other autistic person were still cruel. I was wrong. That person just wanted their friend to have basic, bare minimum level of respect for themselves. I found it silly, and like it's asking too much, because I had never gotten even the bare minimum in my whole life. I could not envision this kind of thing in social relationships.

Similiarly, now that I'm growing to be the person who draws a really hard line to certain things, and has actual experience of what being truly listened to, respected and understood feels like, - this including people in my life committing to unlearning bigotries towards various marginalized identities of mine (and I'll do the same work with myself for their sake because I want them to be safe with me), - I am discovering how many people just can't do the work.

Their reaction to hearing of a wrong that seems too petty for them, is to mock it, to even rub it to my face a little bit, how much I need to just "take it", even if they're somewhat compassionate about it.

Because I've began growing out of my glass box, these moments I was formerly desensitized to, now make me very emotional. I feel hurt and betrayal, I feel the slight in them, because I remember what it felt like to share this with someone who was truly supportive.

It sucks to realize some friends go from friends to acquaintances you regard similiarly as a grandparent who you love but who is also toxic and homophobic and won't change. A part of their worldview will always dehumanize with you and view it as a personal attack that you ever stand up for yourself. They feel like you're the nuisance and the burden for wanting anything different.

You can't force people to change, or force their formation of opinions or worldviews. Everyone in this life comes to hurt another. Nobody is perfect. Everyone is triggering for someone. I have compassion for that these people are just in that kind of part of their own journey, but for my own good, I need to admit some folks are just toxic to me.

For my truth and integrity, their views and attitudes feel violating. I am not a bigger person than this. This hurts me. I will no longer deny my hurt, like I did for my whole lifetime. If a friend's reaction to my pain about dehumanizing tropes that were repeatedly used to abuse me is to make fun of it, that friend is cruel, and doesn't respect me.

This work to undo my desensitization has restored me to be more in touch with my emotions than I've ever been. I literally use testosterone HRT which is stereotyped for how little you'd cry on it, but this emotional work with myself has actually made me more prone to tears than I've ever been back when I had PMS. I get moved to tears by little things, I feel emotionally vibrant, - and that includes feeling hurt and angry to the fullest scale too.

It's beautiful to finally be present and able to feel my emotions so vibrantly, outside of just mind-numbing bitterness and rage or terrified fawning, my typical default states...

It's just that this sensitive, true and beautiful person needs to be treated with a certain level of kindness and protection.

I can not change others, but I can change how I encage with them, or whether I encage at all actually.

A boundary is something you say you won't do. "You keep doing that and I won't stay here in this room with you."

A rule is telling others what to do."Do not talk about banana peels in my presence."

Making boundaries is stuff like... - Never staying in conversations where the other person starts verbally abusing you - Never encaging with people on topics they have shitty and hurtful views about because this gives them a chance to hurt you. - Not arguing with assholes. Instead, not giving them a time of your day.

In this world, especially when multiply marginalized, your dehumanization is everywhere, behind every corner. Repeated bigger and smaller traumas over the same shit happen simply because you refuse to give up on life and encage with society. Sometimes the PTSD anger makes it hard to make good decisions. Sometimes it feels like you're forced to fight, to get justice, to win yourself back from someone else. But often the damage you'll suffer from being punished and victim-blamed is even worse than the initial offense, and not worth the fight.

It's a heartbreak, because it's repeated losses of people who were truly bright stars in your sky, to them being assholes and unwilling to work on it. If you feel stupid and belittled for even kindly bringing up a problem, that's a red flag.

Your only option remains kindness and love with boundaries.

By this I mean, especially kindness for yourself. You need to create your own bubble where you thrive. You get to be exclusive with who belongs to your more personal sphere. With CPTSD it's hard to have "layers" of social relations, as we kind of fall in love with even strangers for being kind of nice to us and stuff... Or worse, we mistake our terrified fawning for 'love'.

Yes, you can be in community with the people who are well-meaning but harbor a couple of toxic views here and there. But it's very different to be friends than acquaintances with someone.

You can have your broader sphere of people where you also navigate the people who are sometimes difficult. Maybe these people, too, are in different tiers, - some are ones you avoid unless mandatory to interact some way, some are people whose company you seek occasionally and others are those fair-weather-buddies you don't really take your mask off for.

With my all-or-nothing thinking stemming from this angry part of my healing journey, it's easy to forget this, and fully obliterate your relations with some people you simply just needed clearer boundaries with.

Your more personal sphere of people are the ones you are letting into your thriving and love bubble. With CPTSD it's such a difficult concept that there can be things that are yours, which exist so that you can have your needs met. That's something healthy people naturally know to cultivate. For us CPTSD havers it's a struggle to conceptualize we too can create our exclusive, personal bubbles we get to be selective with.

These bubbles are our source of strength and joy. They are our sanctuary. Only the people who truly listen to and respect us are welcome here. Being here is a priviledge of the few, one that can be revoked too.

Without my own bubble, or remembering I should be gardering and cultivating it, - I'm just an angry, resentful mess who feels that I'm forced to fight people, because I can't make the choice to close my world away from them. I'm constanty angry, always at war with everyone, feeling in my bones how I can not escape the evil projections casted on me to justify my dehumanization and mistreatment. It makes me feel claustrophobic, like a trapped animal that wants to kill and destroy, kill and destroy....

It's a constant stabbing and exhausting pain to have mind-numbing anger bigger than this body, because I want control, because I want JUSTICE, because I want to "teach a lesson". I'm a nightmare that wants to kill, a nightmare that wants to crush your skull to the wall, and drown your annoying friend into the nearest water sink like he fucking deserves, - in my homicidal ideation, that is.

It doesn't represent my values or real opinions.

TL;DR; When you grow to care for yourself better, you'll realize some people are more toxic than you thought. Sometimes you realize you're no longer compatible.

Disappointments, loss, betrayal and grief are always on their way. Sometimes it feels like asking for even the bare minimum is almost like asking to be punished, - with the wrong people in your personal inner circle, that is.

The anger can sometimes consume you. You can't escape the source of it because you exist in a society.

The solution is letting go. Making your own personal bubble that exists as your sanctuary, to get your needs met, and that you only choose the people for that make you feel genuinely safe, listened to and accepted. You need this source of love, kindness, strength and joy.

The love will be greater than the hate. It'll make you a stronger, more resourceful person.