I’ve lived through being broken my whole life.
From the moment I was carried down the dark hallway in our Balch Springs house, to realizing corners and where the ceiling meets the wall were comforting. From grabbing my little brother every time the phone rang and someone came to the door and hiding us both under the bed, to being locked in our rooms every day after school with the smell of weed lingering in the air. From almost dying at Christmas because our drunk dad tried to drive us off a bridge, to learning to tiptoe around people so as not to get in trouble.
I survived being raped by A***n at sixteen. I survived my brother figure dying after getting hit by a car. Less than four months later, I survived failing Chemistry when Mikey died and came back to pass with flying colors.
I survived us being locked out of the house as teenagers during the summer. I’ve survived self-medicating in my 20s. And I survived watching my best friend being taken away in handcuffs because of drugs, all because he said I wasn’t involved.
I survived the first heterosexual relationship where I was cheated on, and I survived the first homosexual relationship where I was cheated on. I survived a group of girls claiming I was an abortion machine in my late teens / early 20s although I’d never had sex that I wanted.
I’ve survived job changes, home changes and a divorce.
I survived childbirth with a 12” umbilical cord that could have killed both my child and me.
I survived a mental hospital that I never should have been in, and I’m surviving reentry into the real world.
I have been broken to my core. Exposed nerves.
I’ve been broken, shattered even, and survived.
But what I’m struggling with now is that I’m having the mental hospital stay rubbed in my face—being told that I’m always the victim and to stop making myself the victim. I’m struggling with the insinuations that I am a bad mom because I’m trying to get medications right. I’m struggling with being told that I’m not trusted to be around my own child. I’m struggling with hearing these things from someone who says he loves me but lashes out in “fear.”
I’m angry. I ugly cry on my toilet pre-shower.
I’ve tried so desperately not to be my own parents, just to have it be insinuated that I’m being like them every day. And the cherry on top of the shit cake is that there are people whose silence is deafening when someone insinuates that I’m a bad mom. A bad mom for trying to get the help I need to break cycles. Psychiatrists, hospitals and therapists. And I’m being told to just give myself time and fix myself. But why am I the only one being told to work on myself when I’m putting in the work? Why isn’t the other half being told to put in work also? Why’s he being defended, or made excuses for? “He just says things in anger,” or “He just said that because he was tired,” or “He’s just afraid.”
At what point am I allowed to be the victim? When I’m forced into a hospital that I didn’t ask for? When I deal with the consequences of changing medications? When I’m begging the person that’s supposed to be MY person to have patience with me because it’s been less than a week? Or what about when I was locked in my room as a child? Or raped? Or having to learn to tiptoe around people so I don’t get mentally or emotionally abused?
I’ve lived this whole life with almost no help. I’ve never settled for less than I deserve, and I’ve always run towards change for the better. When, in actions or words, have I made myself a victim?
I’m so goddamn mad. I just needed to vent.
More to come later, when I’m not so tired.
anna in the clouds 