Finally made a start on resurrecting my old webpage.. Been reading through and organising my old writing.
Its been quite interesting to read those things that I wrote as a teenager, some of it over 10 years ago, and see how much I have changed, grown up, learned and evolved.. I was so confused.
Its a shame I was unable to write in most of the time in between, it would have been interesting to see the changes in progress.
I came to a realisation, about a feeling I had a long time ago. Perhaps its just a coincidence that the timing was so… Uncanny.
Allow me to explain.
This realisation was spurred buy reading my old writings. I remember thinking that I would probably not live past 21 years old or so… That sometime before that I would die, one way or another. I suspected it would be something to do with my brain, like a tumor or something.
It was actually a driving force in a lot of my reckless behavior I think. I couldn't settle into anything, I craved a variety of experience as if I would have a limited time for it.
But a single paragraph among many many pages made me realise that in a way, I did die. Or at least, a part of me did. I wonder of it is possible to resurrect a part of oneself?
Obviously, I'm still here, or this wouldn't be getting written, but still, in a way.. I was right.
How to explain? Is it possible to sum such a complex thing up in a couple of paragraphs? Or will it require pages of explanation and autobiography?
I'd hate to bore you, whoever is reading this. Aaah there is a battle in my mind now, between my ego who believes I'm most fascinating and my more modest and self conscious side who believes no one is really interested in my dull mind and its workings.
But when it comes down to it, I don't write for anyone but myself, and it really doesn't matter if anyone else reads it.
In the hopes that someone will appreciate/relate to/benefit from the stuff I write somehow, I put it online. So it doesn't just sit on a shelf someplace. At least someone might appreciate it besides myself…
But I digress.. Because I'm not sure where to start! And I'm afraid it might hurt.
Here's the shortish version.
In March 2003 I was 20 years old. My birthday is in October.
March 2003 I met my ex.
By the time my 21st birthday came around, we were living together as partners in a dingy old unit, with several of the most badly behaved cats I've ever known, and a small group of lovely pet rats.
That birthday was terrible. It was all about her as she had her first (in my experience) really bad "attack" of… anxiety? It was more like irrational anger and cruel impulses (to throw a pet rat onto the road) than irrational fear but in later years it fell under the broad category of anxiety.
She ruined dinner out with my parents with a disgusting attitude and somehow made it all my fault afterwards, as she always did.
By this point she'd already bullied, manipulated and criticised me into submission. To the point where all I was concerned about was making her feel better to reduce my own suffering. I was a shell of my former self, existing only to please her, because if I didn't please her, she hurt me. Not physically- I'd never even imply that she was physically abusive (unless you count the occasional slap) but emotionally and mentally.
Some sort of "attack" happened on or damn near every single one of my birthdays during our relationship, sometimes only calming down a short time before the next birthday then the cycle would start again.
That part of my life was like a limbo. I felt like I wasn't living, just existing. I couldn't grow in myself, I had to put all my energy and time and feelings into her.
I came out of it all a different person.
(a quick note… At the end of the relationship she claimed to several mutual friends that I was physically abusive, in an attempt to make herself look like the victim. She exaggerated one or two incidents and implied that it was a common occurrence. Anyone who knows me knows how much bull shit that is, but I just thought I'd point out that I have not lowered myself to the same level. I'd rather be honest and admit that I was too weak and pitiful and scared of getting emotionally hurt or hurting others to up and leave when I should have. Yes I made mistakes I wasn't perfect, but I do not deserve that kind of accusation.)
So, in a manner of speaking, I was dead by the time I reached my 21st birthday.
A huge part of the person I had been suffocated and passed into oblivion and when I read what I wrote before that time, I hardly recognise it as something that came from my head.
I find myself mourning now, the person who I was. Even though that person had a great many faults and seemed to be constantly suffering, bitter and torturing herself… she was intense and passionate and caring and lived for experience, didn't care how people judged her and thrived on being individual despite constant fears. Depression was fuel for creativity and happiness was manic and thrilling.
Perhaps my life now has no place for that person, but damn, I miss her.
I think the saddest thing about her loss is that she'd only just learned to love herself, after so many years of hate.
And after 6 years I am free, but I have to waste time learning who I am all over again.
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