Tag: Relationships

In My Own Words, Lifestyle

I Disowned My Parents So I Could Survive and Write

RaeAnna

My parents aren’t a part of my life. Not for their lack of trying. I set boundaries again and again and again, but our perceptions of our own realities are not compatible. They are allowed theirs, but they do not allow me mine. They cannot listen with compassionate hearts or accept me as I am nor own responsibility in our downfall yet expect all of this and more from me. I might be a real adult, but I’m still their child. 

Life without my family is hard. I won’t lie. But it’s so much easier than giving up who I am to be who they want me to be. Fitting into a too small box and swallowing the truth, I couldn’t do it anymore.

I have chosen the unpopular route: disowning my parents. 

For so many reasons. This is not the first time. It may not be the last, but it likely will be. 

One of the biggest upsides to continuing my life without them is my ability to write. I am a writer. One who has always found real people’s stories to be far more interesting than fiction. The life I’ve been dealt and the choices I have made or were forced into making sure do make great copy. My life isn’t just interesting, it’s an example of how far we have yet to go as a society. I refuse to stay silent when I have a voice and the ability to use my voice. I know why so many people choose silence when they’re confronted with abuse or the ramifications of what telling their truth means after it’s over. As a survivor, sometimes the event itself isn’t the most traumatic part; it’s the after. Choosing what to say and to whom for fear of not being believed or worse being believed and told to hush hush. I have been towing the line for eight years, trying to be the good daughter, creating fewer waves. But the waves have always been my favorite part of the ocean, and I’d rather be in them than watching them.

For the first time since the last time I cut off my parents, I’m writing again with emotional depth, clarity, and vulnerability. I have spent eight years playing diplomat. Weighing every word I type to avoid hurting them because my story and, in many ways, my existence causes them pain. Though it may not seem like it, I am a people pleaser. In order to write what I do, I have to fight against every instinct in my body to stay silent, to save people’s feelings. The problem is trying to prevent pain. There is a moral component to telling stories and who owns a story. As a victim and survivor, this component becomes even more nuanced with power dynamics and silencing tactics coming into play all but immediately. In a great many of my stories, my parents were not direct players and fall into a category of affected bystanders. Though, I have plenty of stories to tell where they are active players and even abusers, but the majority of the stories I am ready and capable of telling have nothing at all to do with my parents. The only reason they hurt over the stories I tell is because they are adjacent to me and my stories are a reflection upon them as parents, people. 

Over the last eight years, I haven’t written these stories because I don’t want to cause pain unnecessarily. Except the pain is not unnecessary. This is necessary pain. I haven’t spoken to my mother or father in over two years, and it’s been within the last six months that words have started pouring from my soul again. I needed time to heal. I am writing my truth, my pain, the life I have lived. It has been a painful life. A beautiful life, but painful. And I’ve finally gotten to the point where I’ve gone beyond ambivalence. 

I’m not purposefully inciting pain, but I’m not going to skirt around it anymore either. I’m bringing a lot more fuck you energy to the stories I’m telling because I’m not making this shit up, and if I’m the only one who believes me, then fine. If my stories hurt my parents, then good. I was raped for years in their house. I’m not angry and I don’t hold it against them, but let it hurt. I have hurt for a decade and a half. They parented me for nineteen years and failed to do the one job they should have done above all else: protect me. Maybe I am and was as good at hiding behind a mask as I think I am, but I asked for help and was turned away time and time again. Precedents were set that I would not be believed, my safety was not a priority, my mental health was to stay hush-hush. They chose to not protect me, to not stand by me, to not pay attention to their daughter when I needed them, when I begged for help, when I was assaulted, when I told them I wanted to die. 

So what was I to do when a boy held me down and raped me for the first time? Or the second? Or the fiftieth? They had proven they didn’t care and I couldn’t trust them. So I found solace in myself and learned to depend on no one. Now that I no longer need them to parent or protect me, they want to do both and by doing so silence me, whether that is their conscious goal or not. 

I love my parents with all my heart. Truly. Though no one will believe me, family is the most important thing to me, which means it is so hard every day not caving in. But it is possible to love someone and not want them in my life. I am happier and healthier without them. I wish them well. I do not wish to cause them pain, but I will not stop writing the stories that matter. 

More than anything, I wish they would let me go. 

11..., Lifestyle

11… Phrases Partners Have Uttered in the Past

RaeAnna

You know… I’ve dated. I’m 31, never married, no kids. I have yet to make someone projectile vomit when they look upon me. I have a pretty successful career, not lucrative, but successful. I’m tall. I wouldn’t say I’m a catch, but I have enough going for me that I could catch a date if I felt so inclined. 

Sometimes people say stupid shit, and that’s why I love being in nature… without people.

I am not so inclined, but I have spent years romantically attached to humans. I wouldn’t call myself a dating expert; although I am in possession of stories. I was thinking of some of the more ridiculous things that have been said to me while coupled up. Also hurtful things. The people we date have access to our inner selves in a way most people never will, so our partner[s] has the ability to hurt us more deeply than almost anyone. And the shitty bit is: we give them all the ammunition.

Partnership is great. Truly. Almost all of the best moments in my life have been shared with and when I was in a relationship. As I get older and more set in my ways, I’m not sure how for me it is. At least, right now, I’m so good with what is.

The world is vast. I am so glad I haven’t let the words of others keep me from exploring and living.

I like other people’s opinions; I tend to search out criticism. Especially from people I love and respect. I am not perfect, but I do try to be a safe space for people to talk about anything and everything. I also really try to make it known that I want my friends to tell me when I fuck up, fall short, hurt feelings, can do better. Life is hard, and the least I can do is love my people the best I can—so much of that is accepting my own shortcomings and doing better when I can. Don’t be mean, I am sensitive underneath all my armor, but I can take well meant criticism. Most of the time, my people’s opinions help me grow and become a better person… But these comments, not so much. 

  1. I don’t think I love you anymore. This is number one. This is the worst. It’s an absolute gut punch. I’ve heard I don’t love you anymore. That doesn’t hit quite like the addition of think. Cause guess what that means??? There’s still a chance. Which means… I’m gonna spend way too much fucking time trying to remind you of all the reasons you fell in love with me to begin with. It did work… It just took nine years, a lot of money, a bunch of tears, and then I came out as a lesbian. 
  2. You’re conniving cunt. Yes I am… Said in the heat of a break up after I was tired of having my money stolen from me. 
  3. If you need to have sex with women, that’s fine as long as you love me. Oh buddy… Sweet, sweet dumb-dumb. That is not how that works. 
  4. Ex Nothing Situationships are the best. I did cry after this one. That stung. 
  5. You’re so fucking quiet during sex. I sure fucking was. I earned that. My high school rapist, I mean boyfriend, had a penchant for violence. He liked to hear the pain he was inflicting. So I didn’t make a noise. I wouldn’t give him the satisfaction. No matter how hard he hit, no matter how he raped me, no matter what he said, I never even let him see me cry.  
  6. If you break up with me, I’m going to kill myself. I did. He tried. It was not a good day.
  7. Will you marry me? This is wild. I’ve been proposed to four times. I said yes once; it did not last more than ten hours. Good times. Thank god that didn’t happen.
  8. You show signs of psychopathic tendencies. It’s called dissociation and compartmentalization due to extreme trauma and CPTSD with psychotic features, thank you very much. I was just serviving and didn’t have time for sharing feelings. I’ve done a lot of work in the ten years since that comment. But also being private with feelings does not equate to psychopathic tendencies. 
  9. I’ve never met anyone like you before./You’re different. It’s called trauma. 
  10. You’re fat. High school rapist again. After two years of severe abuse, this was the comment that made me leave. I wasn’t fat. I knew I wasn’t fat. And there’s nothing wrong about being fat. But when it’s said the way he said it… Fuck right off. 
  11. You only talk about getting raped because you like being a martyr. Yeah… That’s it. It’s super duper fun being this open and honest with the entire world about my past. The pity is 100% worth the rape/death threats. 
In My Own Words, Lifestyle, So Gay

Gay A Synonym For Happy, So Gay Pride 2022

RaeAnna

The very first Pride I ever went to was ten years ago in London, albeit accidentally. I haven’t been to one since. I have celebrated every single Pride month in some way for twelve years—a year before I came out as pansexual. 

“Can’t Even Think Straight” True Facts

I’ve never really been to Pride. As an extreme introvert with zero gay friends in Houston, I haven’t had anyone make me go or go with me. As soon as my life included people, straight but supportive people, who would happily accompany me to Pride, the pandemic hit, and Pride was canceled for two years; though, I put on my own Pride Parade, dressing up my six dogs in 2020. 

The pandemic put stress on the seams of my life that I had been so desperately mending as they tore until I couldn’t do it anymore. I let every seam pop, and my life is just a jumble of fabric and thread at this point. Eventually, I’ll figure out how to sew it all back together, but I’m in the process of figuring out how I want the pieces to fit together because what was didn’t work. 

Over the last two years, I have become more and more outspoken about being gay. I’ve never hidden this part of myself since coming out eleven years ago, but being in straight passing relationships made it a bit more complicated. And it is exhausting arguing with people over my own identity. Two years ago, I decided to stop letting exhaustion deter me from calling people on their heteronormativity. A conversation worth having for myself but also for every other queer person so maybe one day it no longer needs to be had. Six months ago, I came out as lesbian. 

Gay, queer, lesbian. They’re all identities I happily wear. 

Living my best gay life surrounded by a bunch of circles.

Sometimes I feel like my life has been nothing but doing hard things. Thirty-one years of just getting by, biding my time until the next tragedy creeps in. In my early twenties, I chose to walk away from a cushy corporate life to pursue a career in doing the hard things. I spend my time learning and writing about this life and this world of inequity, violence, and struggle. As someone who has chosen to always have the hard conversations, to stand up for what I believe is right, to never stay quiet, to not accept what is as what can be, my career and beliefs, though rooted in kindness, has alienated everyone in my life who do not believe in working to create a better world. We do not have to hold the same opinions or beliefs, but my people cannot actively cultivate ignorance, hate, violence, or worse ambivalence. So, I am well acquainted with watching people walk away. 

My life has been a series of doing hard things, but coming out was the easiest thing I’ve ever done. 

As someone whose life revolves around gender and racial equity and human sexuality, as a gay someone, I am well acquainted with the fears my community has when they come out, when we live our lives in the open. I know the privilege I have as a straight passing woman. A 5’10” woman who can hold her own in a fight against a man. A white woman. An American woman. A cis woman. A woman with an education and the words to tell my story and defend my actions and understand the consequences of my choices. I choose to come out at every opportunity. I chose to get very gay tattoos in very visible places. I choose to put rainbows on everything. I choose to call myself gay and lesbian and queer. I choose to be loud and proud because so many people never had the chance. So many live in fear because they are who they are. 

My community has fought for the rights we have. We have died to be where we are today. Yet three days ago, I listened to a fifteen year old girl talk about her parents refusing to acknowledge her sexuality because she’s not straight, maybe bi, maybe lesbian. The fact a fifteen year old feels comfortable enough to call herself gay is such an amazing win, but the fight is not over. Especially if we look at what is playing out in the highest court of this nation and the repercussions of the decision and overturning of Roe v. Wade will have for women and my community. 

Blue and yellow are my favorite colors, so yes for this wall.

Pride is a celebration. It’s a celebration of who we are. It’s a celebration I hold in my heart and life every fucking day because Pride isn’t a month, it is my life. It is the lives lost to violence and ignorance; the lives lost to hopelessness; the lives lost to a lack of health care; the lives lost fighting for equity. Pride is a remembrance of every person who has come before so that we can wear rainbows and dance in the street. Pride is honoring the pain that has led to joy and love and laughter. Pride is hope that the struggles and fights we continue to face will be alleviated for the queer people of tomorrow. 

So yeah, I’ve made gay a huge part of my personality in the last two years. Because I’m fucking proud. I’m proud of my community. I’m proud of myself. I’m proud of who I am, and it has taken me thirty-one years of doing the hard things so that I could have this one easy thing. 

I am gay. I am lesbian. I am here. I am loud. I am proud. I will be at Pride in Houston whether that is with my people or by myself. If you need people, I’ll be your people. Because I’m proud of you too. We’re not perfect, but gay is a synonym for happy, so here’s to a Gay Fucking Pride and celebrating exactly who we are because we are exceptional.  

In My Own Words, Lifestyle

My Favorite Love Story; Happy Birthday, Alex

RaeAnna

Alex is the person I have written about most. In a way, he’s at the heart of every word I write, and my heart will always write about him. He turned 33 two days ago, and for the first time in a few years, I wasn’t able to celebrate with him. I didn’t post anything the day of because I couldn’t come up with words to say, and, if I’m being honest, I will never be good enough with words to properly convey what he means to me. 

This is and always has been who we are together.

I have spent twelve birthdays loving Alex. My entire adult life. I used to believe all love was conditional, but over the last twelve years, he has proven time and time again that some love comes without strings, rare though it may be. Through college, break ups, an enlistment, deployments, vacations, cross-country moves, deaths, coming outs, falling in love, buying cars, growing up, fights, and so much more, we have persevered. 

At 31, I’m not old, but I’m no longer young. I can look back on the stunningly complicated life that I have led because Alex came into my life. Thank you choir. Every person we encounter shapes us in some small way, but there are people who are fundamentally impactful. Looking at my life, Alex is the fundamental human for me. I am who I am because of him. I am because of him. Every story I tell, I get to tell because he showed me I was worth loving, that life isn’t just pain. Life can also be joy. He saved my life in the abstract but also held my head above water many years ago. 

Falling in love isn’t a choice, but the act of loving someone is a choice. To stay, to work, to be present, to ask the hard questions, to show up, to admit fault, to forgive, to see someone at their worst and at their best, to communicate, to be compassionate, to challenge, to support, and all the in betweens, that is a choice. An active choice made every moment of every day in big and little ways. Alex has made the choice to love me even when he has had every reason to walk away. From the very beginning, if he were any less of the man he is, he would have and should have walked away. When we broke each other’s hearts, he could have walked away. When I came out, he could have walked away. He never has. I hope he never will. At this point, there’s only so many life altering things I can drop in his lap.  

Our love started in college. A grand, sweeping love. The kind I dove into with body and soul. The kind that is devastatingly beautiful. A once in a lifetime kind of love. I knew the moment we kissed I would die loving him, and I will. Though, I’ll never wear white or have children with him, I will grow old by his side—good lord, I hope his future wife likes me. We have never been a perfect couple; there is no such thing. To me, he will always be perfect. The pain. The love. The tears. The laughter. The life we built and lost. The love we found and have worked to maintain. It is all perfect. We are my favorite love story. Love cannot conquer all (it’s the gay bit), but it has conquered so very much.

One of my favorite pictures of us.

Life didn’t play out the way I saw it at 19. Although, looking back, I’m not exactly sure what I saw for us. I saw him. He saw me. There have been so many twists and turns to get lost in the way I used to get lost in his eyes in our bed ten years ago. I’m not going to go down the what if road because I am who I am and he deserves to find someone who is not gay. I don’t think I would change a single thing about our story. It’s beautiful and sad. If I could go back, I would tell myself to give more grace, be angry less, communicate more, be vulnerable, tell the hard truths, stop being strong all the time, lean into him because he loved me as I was, as I am, and there’s nothing I could have done that would change that. 

I will never love anyone the way I have and do love Alex. A love I could spend forever writing about, and I might. A love that I can’t explain but I feel so deeply. It’s transcendent. 

Experiences, In My Own Words, Lifestyle, Travel

Abandonment Issues Triggered Over Driving Myself to the Airport

RaeAnna

I drove myself to the airport this morning. It’s not the first time I’ve had to park my car while I jetset. It definitely will not be the last. But I was not supposed to drive myself. I hate spending money I don’t have to, and honestly, there’s something really lovely about having someone care enough to do the airport drop off and pick up dance with. 

I masked up. I was just alone and drinking coffee.

I booked this trip two weeks ago, and for me, that’s some pretty good advance warning. I spoke with my platonic life partner and roommate and best friend, all one person, about driving me. I had picked flights that would work with his work/life schedule. He agreed. It went on our household calendar. Last night, he got home from work. I was working at the table. He’d been invited out with friends. Great! Have fun. Remember we need to leave the house by 3:45 am, so just be home by then. He gives me a hug and says he’ll be home by nine so we can watch a show before getting some sleep and heading to the airport. 10:30 hits, and I head to bed.

When I wake up and head downstairs to leave… No truck in the driveway. No ring notification. No man on the couch or in his bed or anywhere in the house at all. It’s 3:30. You know. Still time. Four calls straight to voicemail while I’m brushing my teeth. I eventually leave a voicemail. “I’m not angry. I’m not even disappointed. I’ve just come to expect this.” The petty asshole in me responds to his midnight-thirty “Love you!” text message with “Then maybe you should be home to take me to the airport…..” “But I guess not.” I did not take the high road. Grace was not given. Not my proudest moment. I let all the doggos out and said my goodbyes before hopping in the car and driving my independent lady ass to the airport. I did cry in the car. Not a breakdown cry. The silent stoic tears of a war bride waving goodbye on a train platform in a 1950s black and white movie. Probably not that pretty, but you get the picture. Hurt.

I’m taking this trip because I miss my best friend; I’m going through an intensely tough time and need to get away; the day after I get back my life will revolve around the out-all-nighter because he’s having his hip replaced, and I’ll be taking care of him. This is me being punchy about the fact I’ll be his nurse round-the-clock for six weeks and he couldn’t make it home in time to take me to the airport. Not sorry. I am also not sorry for airing this information. I’m a writer. He knows this. Life is copy.

Two quick things before I get to what I actually want to talk about. 1) This scenario is not actually a huge deal and was easily solved. The emotional aspect… Different story. Had this happened ten years ago, I would be a proper mess, but I’m so much more healed now. So I’m a slight mess instead. 2) If this were an isolated incident, I would be mad or disappointed. The problem, it’s not. So I’m hurt because it never feels lovely to be forgotten, and it’s pretty terrible never being a priority or able to depend on someone. 

Trauma is a huge part of my story. I have issues. I am excessively familiar with all of my issues and triggers and the coping mechanisms I’ve developed over the course of thirty-one years. I’m quite good at telling my people what I need from them to keep functioning as optimally as I can. These things are quite easy and simple because at the end of the day, they’re my problems and I hate being a burden. I wear my trauma on my sleeve; it just makes life and relationships easier when I’m not hiding things that impact me so deeply. So everyone close to me knew what they were getting into and decided to stay. To the extreme point that if I’m dating someone or getting to know someone as a friend I lay it all out there on the first date/hang out. Truly, all they have to do is Google me and so much is out there for consumption. I am old enough to know I don’t want to waste my fucking time on people who will judge me, not support me, are intimidated by whatever, think what I do is dumb, can’t handle it. Trial by fire. Their reactions say it all. 

Sad and hurt for too many reasons but ready for adventure.

When you have a relationship, platonic or romantic, with a person who has survived and lives with trauma, you have to accept that your actions, even the innocuous ones, can have a huge and sweeping impact. I struggle with worth, abandonment issues, being enough, and just feeling like an entirely forgettable human. Among other things. So when I was left to fend for myself this morning, the thought was “Alone. Like always.” Maneuvering the logistics of getting to the airport: so simple. Maneuvering the emotional toll of being forgotten and abandoned: not so simple. 

Trusting people is so hard for me. I’ve let people in and been hurt over and over and over again. Trust is built over time and in the little moments. Watching TV on the couch after a rough day. Text messages to check in after falling down the stairs. Sleepovers for funsies. Showing up on time or at all when plans are made. “Safe travel” texts before planes take off. Not canceling. Including people in conversations. Remembering how to pronounce a name. Randomly reaching out for no reason. Sending a postcard. Listening without judgement. All these little things are teeny moments building trust and relationship between people. Trust takes time to build and often so little to corrode or destroy. To protect myself and cope with a life of abuse, I keep people at a distance, don’t give them chances to build trust, and make it incredibly hard to get to know me. How I have any friends is quite the mystery at this point. I’m working on it. As shitty as it is to say, when one person lets me down, it feels like another tick mark against all of humanity. Like, welp, this person can’t be trusted, and they’re human, therefore all humans are ashtrays. Refer to the first sentence of this paragraph… I am aware this is a problem.

I’m not someone who needs, wants, or even craves grand gestures. (Maybe I am, but I’ve never had anyone remotely try, so I wouldn’t actually know. I do love doing them, however.) Little things mean the most. A ride to the airport is not life altering, but it’s a little thing. Love, true love, exists in those little things, the quotidian, the quiet moments, the in betweens. It’s not always explosions or fireworks. It’s life altering in fundamentally consistent, persistent ways of sharing joys and sorrows, every big and little moment. Love is showing up and bearing witness to a lived life. Those tiny moments mean everything. To someone with trauma, it means everything and so much more. I don’t ask for much. I don’t need much. I probably need more than I realize, but I’ve been alone and self-sufficient for so long, I don’t know what it’s like to lean on someone or ask for help. Maybe someone will force my walls down and make me realize it’s okay to need things. To that woman, I say, “Best of luck. I’ll be quite the challenge.” Until then if ever. Fuck that shit; I’m a strong, independent woman. I don’t need anyone. I got myself to the airport like I’ve done numerous times before. And I’ll take myself home. 

That doesn’t mean I’m not hurting. I’m not struggling. I’m not wondering if he forgot because I’m forgettable. Or he didn’t come because I wasn’t supportive enough of his night out. Or he didn’t think I was worth taking to the airport. Or that maybe I just don’t deserve someone to care about me. Or he just doesn’t want me in his life anymore. Or he never cared at all. Logically, I know all of this is untrue and it was an accident. But that doesn’t mean I believe it. Feelings and logic rarely coexist peacefully. 

When you decide to be in someone’s life who is dealing with trauma, you better be damn sure you know what you’re getting into and that your actions have repurcussions. Your accidents and mistakes carry more weight. Little things mean the most, for the good and the bad. I know what it’s like to be on both sides. Being the traumatized and loving someone with trauma. It’s hard doing the loving, but I also know just how worth it it is. Then again, I also know how to be there for them because I know. And when you love someone, you just show up. Trauma or no trauma. Show up. That’s the bare minimum, and it shouldn’t be a lot to ask for. Then again, my bare minimum was “This one doesn’t rape me!” for the longest time. It’s been upped to, “This one doesn’t make me cry every day!” I’m fucked up. I know. 

So I’m sitting on this fucking plane, crying my big, gay tears next to a man in a MAGA hat, trying to convince myself that maybe someday I’ll find someone who will ask if I need a ride to the airport and show up. (Shout out to Amanda, who offered, but I “had a ride.”) It should be simple. But it’s not for me. The idea of my having worth enough for anyone to take me to the airport let alone love me does not exist. The accident of falling asleep at a friend’s house after a fun night out is small, but to me, it carries connotations of so much more. 

11..., In My Own Words, Lifestyle

11… Tidbits of Life I Avoid At All Costs

RaeAnna

Writing is about cracking into one’s soul and extracting truth. It’s a raw and often painful process. Especially when one’s chosen genre is memoir or creative nonfiction, like mine. Fiction has never called to me; not that I don’t or can’t. Creativity is not my talent, and I’ve lived an interesting enough life to provide a good amount of therapy, I mean, content to write on for a good long time to come. 

Sometimes I feel like I should just be a hermit in the wilderness I avoid so many essentially human things.

The genre is an interesting choice because I’m an intensely private person. What a conundrum. From a very young age, I realized if I shared enough seemingly personal things, I wouldn’t have to share anything of actual importance. As a writer who puts words into the world about my life and story for the purpose of starting conversations to change the world for the better, I have been able to find an incredibly delicate balance. My writing is far more honest than I am in person. Face-to-face, I have a tendency to undershare through rose colored glasses. 

During the four years I was a stripper, coworkers, who I had spent thousands of hours with naked, never knew I had been raped until one my rapist walked up to my stage on my second to last night. Suffice to say, I lost my shit. I’d been hit and abused in front of these men and women for years, and they’d never seen me cry or even lose a smile. I am a well curated façade allowing people to see only what I choose, except under the most remarkable circumstances. 

My ability to share an overview of my abused past or even the gory details of certain events without allowing people to know me is, honestly, exceptional. People feel like I’m letting them in, but, in reality, all they would have to do is google me to find out far more. It’s my way of testing the waters; seeing if they can and want to handle it; but I’ve done it so many times over the years, it’s just one of many stories to tell in the “This is who I am, who are you?” dance we do with new people. 

As a coping mechanism to keep people at a distance there are so many things I don’t do or won’t talk about or avoid in general. Never were these choices I made consciously. Habits developed over time from experience, callousness, pain, or goodness knows. I have always held people at arms distance, only letting them get so close, only showing so much, sidestepping vulnerability in favor of mock intimacy. As you can imagine, this is detrimental to relationships of all kinds. More often than not, it has helped me survive. But I am consciously trying to move forward differently because I’m not trying to just survive anymore. 

Sometimes I feel like I live in isolation surrounded by humans.
  1. Feelings Having them. Talking about them. Other people’s feelings are welcome, valid, heard, honored. Mine… I’m sorry. What feelings? I’m just happy, rainbow, sprinkles, sunshine lady all the time, forever. I spent a very good chunk of my life ignoring the fact that feelings outside of happiness existed. When I went to college and met someone who made me confront those feelings, it wasn’t pretty. There’s a strong history of disassociating from all feelings outside of a very compact zone of happy because the moment too much joy, an inkling of sadness, a smidgen of discontent crept into that zone, I did not know how to handle it and would absolutely crumble. I’m better. I’m not great. Feelings are still hard because they’re a gnarly, interconnected yarn ball with a potential to unravel if a random string is pulled a little too much.    
  2. Being Held Touch is integral to my relationships, platonic and romantic. I’m a very touchy human. I love cuddling. I’m realizing by cuddling, I mean holding someone because I can hold people without a problem. Turn that around, not so much. Being held is hard for me. Really, really difficult. I don’t let people hold me much. If ever. Or very long. Hugs. Being the one cocooned in a cuddle. Little spoon. There’s a time limit that my body reaches where I have to let go, become the one doing the holding. I would rather stand sobbing in my kitchen with someone watching me at arms distance than be held. For me, it feels so vulnerable and intimate. There’s a sense of depending on someone, letting them take the weight of me and my pain, a transference or sharing of emotion. If I’m crying and someone holds me, I may not stop. I have this innate need to suck it up. Do it alone. Being held feels like my independence is being taken away because I’m letting someone in. Just a calm night on the couch with no drama or anything other contentedness, if I’m the one being held, I could tear up because I get overwhelmed feeling connected to someone. Even typing this, the thought of someone holding me for too long makes me antsy. I get this is problematic and that I likely need more human touch than I’m getting. Also I should learn to be vulnerable with people, but I had a really bad habit of choosing all the wrong humans to be vulnerable around, so I compensated by never leaning into people. I guess quite literally.
  3. Attachment Getting attached to people sucks because there’s feelings, and I think I’ve been very clear on how I feel about feelings. Many people in my life have turned out to be… abusive. To put it bluntly and a bit lightly. When parents, close friends, and romantic partners are highly abusive, it makes forming attachments with new people even just as friends incredibly hard. There are some trust issues here. Staying detached makes it hurt less when I get treated like shit or they leave or they leave after treating me like shit.  
  4. Sex with Lights Off I can’t. I don’t like. In the dark, I can’t see my partner. With my past of rapeyness, I have some lingering issues. Sex with the lights on allows me to feel safe and comfortable. The likelihood I lose my shit is much lower. Fluorescent, stage lighting, super bright isn’t necessary, but I do need some light.  
  5. Crying I hate crying. This feels self-explanatory. I don’t like crying in general. But crying in front of people. Whew. No. Way too vulnerable. We’re very far outside my compact zone of happy, and I am not happy about it. If you see me cry: a) I’m really in my feelings. b) I trust you. b alternative) I might be really angry, so this is not a trust you moment. c) I am hating it while it is happening and will do everything in my emotional wheelhouse to stop immediately.
  6. Hope This is a depressing one. I am an optimistic person for other people. When it comes to myself, I take realism to an extreme. I expect the worst, prepare for the worst, and don’t dare to hope for anything except the worst. The few times I have allowed myself to even contemplate things might be turning around… the things I was optimistic about turn out to be pretty insurmountable obstacles. I have surmounted them but always at great cost. Hope has led me to dark and even dangerous places. I just don’t. I tend to take each day, each moment as it comes, as it is. I keep going not out of hope but out of obligation, necessity, the fact others need me to. 
  7. Mixing Public and Private There are clear divisions in my life. A whole lot of compartmentalization. My home and what goes on inside it is very much a private place. Very few people know what is going on in my family. Maybe one day, I will feel like opening up more about the relationships in my life, but I keep them private. For as much as I share on social media, I keep it very much in its own lane. Whether people realize it or not, there are very clear boundaries maintained at all times. Part of this is because it’s nice having things just for me. Partially out of respect for my family and friends’ privacy. Honestly, mostly, it’s for self-preservation. Until things are cemented, I don’t write or talk about them. I DO NOT LIKE CHANGE OR EXPLAINING THINGS THAT ARE NOT AS CERTAIN AS LIFE CAN BE CERTAIN. There are three relationships I will write about with a degree of freedom, and those are my three people. One of which I spent many years romantically entwined with; the other two have always been strictly my closest friends. These relationships are going nowhere, probably. I can write about them honestly and openly because I know they love me, support me, and are stuck with me because I know too damn much. 
  8. Silence I love silence, but I have to be incredibly comfortable with someone to be in silence with them. Normally, if there is silence, I will fill it by asking lots of questions. Get the conversation moving… as far away from me as possible. Or I’ll start dancing like the uninhibited human I am for a laugh. The only time I’m really comfortable with silence is when I’m letting questions or statements sink in, allowing my conversation partner time to think and open up more than they would otherwise. I like hearing people’s stories, and silence makes other people just as uncomfortable so they fill it with all sorts of interesting tidbits. I don’t like silence because it gives people time to read me or come up with prying questions. I have a great poker face, but I don’t like to bank on it. 
  9. Prolonged Eye Contact I think most people avoid this. Eyes are telling. It’s cliché but true. This is a double edged sword. Like silence, I love good eye contact because it allows me to really see people, but it also allows them to see me. Abuse and stripping taught me to veil my eyes, but some people are good at seeing through it, calling bullshit. I rarely look at someone with unguarded eyes. One of the most interesting compliments was from a gay man in the strip club. I was 21 and tired after ten hours on my feet with four more to go. We sat and chatted for a while when he said, “You have Marilyn Monroe eyes.” Obviously I said thank you, but he continued, “You’re both beautiful. Her eyes were sad in the way your eyes are sad. It’s not a fleeting sorrow. The kind that killed her. You both guard your souls because all you’ve known is pain. It’s hard to see, but it’s there.” I felt so seen. I hated it. A stranger called me out, on the job. No thank you. It hasn’t happened since. 
  10. Confrontation This isn’t even the angry kind of confrontation; I can handle that, even if I don’t love it. I avoid confrontation in the being confronted kind of way. I find people fairly predictable. They ask the same questions in different but similar fashions. My life story and what I do isn’t exactly run of the mill, so when people find some things out, they tend to ask questions. I have no problems with questions. I love them. It allows me to share my passion with people and learn from them at the same time. Due to severe anxiety, I have tons of canned responses to an array of common questions. This makes me sound smarter than I am and doesn’t require thinking on my feet. I hate being flustered and having to come up with cohesive and interesting answers representing my truest feelings, opinions, or facts on the matter is very stressful and not something I’m naturally gifted at. It’s rare that I find someone who asks new, interesting, and nuanced questions. I have unfortunately found one of those humans recently, and she’s full of smart people questions. It’s throwing me off my game, and I’m realizing just how much I rely on these go-to answers. I say unfortunately but actually it’s fascinating the questions she asks because it makes me think and forces me to articulate things I do not usually disclose or even formulate into cohesive ideas outside of the thought clouds in my brain. I end up sounding like a bumbling stream of consciousness rather than the tenacious writer I pretend to be. I am a writer not a speaker. I can edit words on a page. I cannot go back three days later and say, “Hey, remember that miniscule conversation we had twelve days ago in passing? No? Well, I can’t stop thinking about it, so here is my dissertation on it anyway.” I HATE, HATE, HATE not being clear or concise. Being misunderstood is one of my great fears in life, and being confronted ups the chances I will be misunderstood.  
  11. Women Weird since I’m very gay, but also why it’s taken me so long to just be very gay. This is kind of a culmination of this entire list. Men and women are different. (The feminist in me feels the need to state that does not imply women are undeserving of equality/equity.) Men trend towards surface level interactions for much longer than women. Even after years with men, the conversations, questions, interactions are more surface level and less intrusive than with women. I’ve covered more on a first hangout with a woman than I have after a year with a man. This is terrifying when you’re a very private person with a shit ton of baggage and trauma who also has a chronic problem glossing over all of these things. Opening up about all of these things ever let alone quickly is intimate, intimidating, and rough for me and, oftentimes, for them. Women are excellent at all of the things on this list that I avoid, whether that’s biological or environmental—I’ll let scientists fight over that. Women, on average, are exceptional at creating deep bonds quickly, which I avoid… always. Making it difficult to have and keep women in my life as friends or whatever. I’ve been doing a lot of work on this since moving to Houston. I’m getting better. I’m intimidated. It’s great. I’m fine. 

I’m done now. This list caused a lot more emotions than I thought it would. I only cried twice. A few more things I need to work on have been identified. Shocking I have friends or people in my life. I’m a dumpster fire. God help me. 

bisous un обьятий,
RaeAnna

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