My brother is two years older than me and although I would not call him abusive, verbally or otherwise, interacting with him is really bad for my self-confidence. He’s quite blunt, confrontational, thinks anything and everything should be up for rational debate and delights in playing devil’s advocate (someone once called him “verbally aggressive”; I know what they meant), this does not work very well with someone who has issues with depression, resulting shaky self-esteem, can’t think well in a real-time situation and has other difficulties with verbal communication. Especially when you add in faded hero-worship/my-big-brother-is-always-right on my part. When I was younger he’d take advantage of that, he stopped years ago but still… I love him lots, but I can’t be around him too long because he is bad for my mental health.

“Toughen up?” Yeah, right. As if it’s that easy. As if nobody has a mental illness that makes “toughening up” pretty much impossible. As if you can shake off a whole life’s worth of patterns of interaction that easily. And that’s in a nonabusive situation!

Sorry if this is only tangential to the original post. I’ve had a very triggering day and needed to get something out. This seems like a safe space to do so. But again, I apologize for the potential thread-jacking.

But when I get upset when broadsided by a trigger? Then I better toughen up. It’s not good for my depression to get triggered, after all!

Ugh.

But words do hurt, even from people you don’t know, especially when you’re an adolescent. In middle school (maybe 6th grade), I had a shirt that said “I will not talk to boys” in Bart Simpson chalkboard-style punishment. The last lines dropped the “not.” As I got on the bus, I heard two boys say “lesbian” when I got on. Never wore that shirt again.

Words hurt. A lot. The internet has shown that again and again to me.

that is no help — my abusers said that too.

anyway the point here being the patient is told — often explicitly — that the people abusing ou will not change so ou must change to become a person who is not harmed by emotional abuse. while it’s true the patient is rarely in a position to change anyone else’s behaviour (i have damned little influence over any of the people who harm me) it’s a dangerous message. it makes the very people to whom the patient has turned to for help party to the harm ou suffered. we’ve already been told it’s our fault we hurt and we just need to buck up. many of us have come from backgrounds where real injustices were perpetrated against us and placing the burden of change on us rather than the people doing harm only tells us this is another person we can’t trust.

it’s the myth of personal responsibility again; we cannot help being harmed by structures that harm us. being told “it’s only true if you think it is” is wildly unhelpful when, say, it’s perfectly acceptable for people to go on television and claim your family is the same thing as raping children or torturing animals. this really harms real people. it’s far more than just words.

but damned if i can get most het mental and medical health professionals i interact with to understand that. for some reason they seem to think the words don’t mean what they say. i need to not be harmed by that or somehow stop interacting with a world hostile to my existence.

so far i haven’t figured out how to do either.
kaninchenzero´s last [type] ..why share when you can overshare