#she seems fine btw i got scared as fuck i thought i like accidentally deleted her c drive . idk a out the sd card

[brinelakes]

bluescteen jumpscare

[babygirlgiles]

personal life rant below the cut, I guess. tw: abuse, trauma

Wow, I just??? Have so many??? Things??? Going on???

Like I’m actually sitting in bed with Chopin nocturnes on the bluetooth speaker on the brink of tears because my life has been the perfect shitstorm of everything all at once. And it would be fine?? If it wasn’t??? For my mother???

For context, in the next ten days I have four papers and three job applications due. Normally, that would be stressful and I’d be beyond burnt out by the end but yeah, it’d be manageable, I did basically the same thing earlier in the semester so I’m not too concerned. I cut my family out of my life completely about a month ago but let’s be real I probably hadn’t talked to anyone in my family for about a month before that. It’s been hard but tbh at the same time it’s bizarrely easy to bury my guilt prob because the joy and relief at not having to interact with people who abused me throughout my whole childhood, who actually had no business raising not just me but multiple children (not just bc shitty abusive people but??? poverty??? like abject poverty that).

(Let’s not all forget my therapist said last session that she was able to get in contact with the three different trauma therapy programs that rejected me and they all said it was because I was actually too traumatized. Like that shit is embedded too deep for any kind of short term program, no matter how intensive. Literally what kinda fuckin PTSD have you gotta give someone to where a program run by some place called The Victims of Crime Association is like nah)

ANYWAY. My mom used my school email (my whole ass school email that she probably had from years ago but whatever) to email me and be like “Why are you cutting me out of your life? Can you at least give me an explanation? Don’t you at least owe me that?” And like??? No. I don’t owe you anything. And I moved on.

But that night (Sunday) I had fucking rough nightmares and I mean I woke up screaming and then cried for a while and just decided to stay up until my alarm. Just reliving the actual physical pain of being beat up constantly, plus the constant fear and instability like... even writing this right now my breath got short and I feel anxious. And my dream brother said that things had only gotten worse since I’d left and that my father had broken his jaw-- which, like, I am guilt-ridden now.

Also I thought I was going to die at work today like I thought my heart was going to give out from the sheer horribleness of it all. Okay, so I’m in a one-on-one with my boss (I hate this person with an actual fiery passion, btw, and have for a while so that’s nothing new).They don’t know details but they know that I’m involved in some kind of situation that involves me being under school and police protection. For example, any information about me is on lock down. Like, a fellow student or even a professor can’t look up my school email and if they were to, for example, call the Registrar and ask, I’m immediately alerted.

Because of the actual literal protection I am under from the actual, literal government, my case manager here suggested “hey, maybe having a Facebook isn’t the best idea?” and it makes sense bc even though I never use it, even if I like accidentally check-in somewhere yeah that’s fuel to the fire. So I did what the school administration did and deleted my Facebook. So flash forward actual, literal WEEKS and I ask my boss a question. “Check the Facebook,” they say, with Facebook clearly open on their desktop (mind you this is the same boss who was two hours late to a meeting yesterday that was ultimately rescheduled to today that they were 45 minutes late to AGAIN). I say I no longer have Facebook. This does not come up again for actual WEEKS.

Flash forward weeks AGAIN. Today in my one-on-one this boss tells me I should really make a new Facebook so I can do work with it. I explain (for the 100000th time) that I cannot bc LITERAL POLICE PROTECTION. They tell me to use a fake name and use the work logo for the profile picture and like, yeah, sure, guess I could. I tell this boss that it would actually make me so uncomfortable though because, even though I know it’s safe, it would really fuck with my paranoia.

But this self proclaimed radical queer tells me that it’s an unfair distribution of labor if I don’t spend the 3 minutes making my own Facebook events and that I should then give it a try. Because fuck my peace of mind I guess. Anyway, later in the meeting they say that we should come together as a staff to help me the event I just created and organized (not with any of the space reservations or people coordinating mind you, but with the DECORATING) because it would be a fair way to distribute the labor. But it’s too much to ask for someone to make two Facebook events for me so I can keep the small thread of my sanity? I have never understood true anger until that moment. But whatever, I guess.

So yeah, I’ve felt on edge basically since. Here are a multitude of examples:

Had more nightmares last night and this morning when I was walking down the hall to the bathroom I was so scared I actually had to remind myself that I was safe over and over.

Bad OCD habits cropping back up (oh my fucking god if only I could tell you how dirty my hands have felt for absolutely 0 reason the past few days). 

Been snippy and irritable to people around me. I got drunk for the first time in... months the other night.

When a girl said something stupid in class today (and it was actually asinine, she said that white flight was “a return to community values” like okay, sweaty) I couldn’t stop myself from actively grimacing and I don’t normally have this much of an issue not being an ass.

When someone said “have a good day to me this morning”, I wanted to snap back for no good reason (when I looked a little further into this thought I turned up “I don’t deserve happiness” as the reason which is wild like classic 2011 Elliot bullshit.

But let’s be real. Okay, sure, maybe these are some small examples of little fuck ups triggered by weird circumstances but normally this shit doesn’t affect me at all. I go days without thinking about it lately, especially not having contact with these people. It’s just been the perfect shit storm of shitty papers plus shitty job plus shitty mother.

I think on the whole though I’m really happy. Like, I’ve been able to recover from a lot and create a full and meaningful life for myself. I take care of myself in a multitude of ways. I’m just gonna list some here so I can like finish this 20 page venting essay no one will read and then feel better.

I go to the gym and then exercise in healthy ways

And then after exercising in non-maladaptive ways, I eat meals to replenish

I go to sleep at a reasonable hour every night so I can go to the gym and then have a good day

I light all the candles in my room so it smells good. I also keep my room tidy because it makes me feel good

I listen to soothing music

I am studying a subject that I love and having thoughtful conversations with my professors and fellow students on the material and honestly it’s the best

I work with two researchers and not only do I #makemoney, I get to look into super interesting stuff

Also I’m loved by my friends and adults in my life so that’s pretty lit

Top surgery is basically right around the corner

So it my name/gender marker change

T is going great!!

I shower everyday which may seem like a small thing but that’s some #NewYearNewElliot shit

I take my meds (what a concept)

I don’t drink myself into a coma four nights a week anymore like wow??? Sobriety???

I’m going to finish with a degree I want, surrounded by people who love me, very soon and that’s 10/10

Anyway, this will pass and it’ll be fine so yeah.