Brave and... Broken-Hearted?
Sep. 9th, 2019 03:15 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sophiarantsIf I had read ‘Rising Strong’ without listening to Lani and Kelly’s podcast first, there’s no way I would have thought it was for me.
Rising Strong is about getting up after a fall. It’s about serious people who’ve faced serious things and were incredibly brave and got back up again. And that’s not me.
I’m not Humpty Dumpty. I haven’t had a big fall. I’ve barely had a little one. I look around at the falls people around me have had - Lani and Kelly just two examples of many amazing people who have to deal with major falls and get right back up again - and I feel like that’s just not me. I don’t have a reason. And yet, here I am, on the ground. Time after time after time.
This refrain, ‘I don’t have a reason,’ has been how I’ve invalidated my pain - time after time after time.
I’ve been disabled since the age of about 28. I have a genetic condition, but it only fully manifested when I got older. These days, I use a wheelchair or other walking aids. Meanwhile, aged 33, I got a diagnosis of autistic spectrum disorder. I was half way through a PhD at the time. (I finally finished the PhD seven years later, aged 40.) I’m also queer (bi, demi and nonbinary), which were also things that all occurred to me very late and very slowly,
I survived my whole childhood, and a lot of my adulthood, not understanding how I was different. But, somewhere inside me, I always knew. I knew something was ‘wrong’ with me. It always felt like society - the people around me - were keen to tell me and show me just how ‘wrong’ I was.
In Brene Brown’s words: those people were doing their best, but their best wasn’t good enough.
My parents didn’t mean to hurt me when they punished me for stimming and echolalia and a lot of other autistic coping methods. They thought those behaviours would make life harder for me in society. They were trying to make things better for me.
They were doing their best.
But their best wasn’t good enough.
I could repeat that paragraph, with slightly different details, for a lot of people and groups of people. The doctors who hurt me when I was in psychiatric ‘care’; their colleagues who continue to belittle and dismiss and occasionally mistreat me in appointment after appointment, right up to today. Who’ve taught me that asking for medical help only ever leads to neglect and abuse of power and ‘treatment’ that damages me... and the constant message that I am broken and useless and will never deserve the resources that I take and take and take from society. Who, by extension, have taught me that asking for any kind of help is a bad idea. That I don’t deserve it.
They were doing their best.
But their best wasn’t good enough.
The ‘friends’ who left me feeling like I wasn’t worth their friendship. Or anyone’s. People who, even today, give up talking to me because disabled people are boring - because I have no energy and can’t always keep up social appointments or see my friends regularly ‘enough’ for them.
They were doing their best.
But their best wasn’t good enough.
I could list many more examples of times when I’ve been broken-hearted, and learned (taught myself?) that I deserved it.
But none of that is serious, you know? Even as I write these things down, even as it hurts to write them down and see them in black print on a white page, done-and-can’t-be-undone, there’s a very loud voice at the back of my head screaming attention seeker - freak - broken - bitch - scrounger - drain on the resources of society - all you do is take take take and you’re not even worth what they deign to give you...
The phrase ‘They were doing their best - but their best wasn’t good enough’ is an absolute kicker for me. I’m happy to believe Part 1. Part 2? That I don’t deserve people’s crap? No. I can’t believe that.
It’s all I deserve.
When it comes down to it, I don’t honestly know why I feel this way. Being autistic and disabled in our society is tough, and can lead to difficult experiences. But that doesn’t feel like enough. I feel like I will always hear that voice in my head that says, you don’t even deserve for your experiences to be taken seriously. Look at the people around you - at what they’ve suffered. Stop fucking complaining.
Until recently, I didn’t even believe that I deserved the term ‘trauma’. Trauma is PTSD. It’s a term that people get to use if really terrible things have happened to them. If they’ve had a really bad fall.
I have not had a bad fall. I just won’t get up.
‘Just get the fuck up, Sophia, you broken freak,’ screams the voice in my head.
But I can’t. I just can’t. I’ve been on the ground for a long time. And I don’t know why.
I started to claim the term ‘trauma’ very recently, based on a small number of difficult things that have happened to me, and a large number of very small things that happen on an almost-daily basis. I have a friend who works with disabled and autistic people with trauma - she calls her work trauma-sensitive yoga. She says that, for many disabled and neurodivergent people, the experience of living in society can be traumatic. Maybe I’ll try to explore that more in another entry, another time. All I know is that, as much as it feels like I shouldn’t claim that term, that I don’t deserve it... it’s also been really helpful and empowering to let myself claim it. To say, yes - what’s happening to me, what has happened to me in the past, what continues to happen to me, is traumatic.
I still fear, very strongly, that someone will come along who’s experienced real trauma and say, How dare you claim this term? Nothing has happened to you that deserves that term. You don’t deserve it.
But here’s the thing. The concept of trauma is a framework. In my ‘offline life’, I’m a qualitative researcher. I love frameworks. Names have power, just like in the old fairy tales. (In the Pagan world that I sometimes inhabit, knowing the name of a god or goddess can be empowering - as much as it can also be dangerous. They might want something from you, if you learn who they are.) This name, this framework - trauma - it’s just a way of understanding something. Just like autism and disability, which are concepts that I’ve studied as a social scientist. These frameworks help me to organise the world, and my (autistic) brain really likes the world to be organised. It’s a key to fit a keyhole. There may be many keys that fit it. But if I can use the concept to help me turn the key and walk through the door, then it’s a powerful resource. And gods know I need those. I’ve been stumbling in the dark looking for a way to open the door for a long, long time.
I want to thank Lani and Kelly for ‘Big Strong Yes’. This podcast is an amazing resource - it’s helped me to think that if they can do it, maybe I can. I’m a little bit stuck at the beginning. I don’t even feel like I deserve to talk about having had a fall. But maybe I can still learn to get up, anyway. I’m terrified that I can’t - that I’m just broken, and that after 41 years of being broken, I always will be.
But, broken-hearted or not, I’m going to be brave anyway.
Next entry, I’ll write about my Year of Bravery - and I hope I’ll be able to be a bit more positive!
Rising Strong is about getting up after a fall. It’s about serious people who’ve faced serious things and were incredibly brave and got back up again. And that’s not me.
I’m not Humpty Dumpty. I haven’t had a big fall. I’ve barely had a little one. I look around at the falls people around me have had - Lani and Kelly just two examples of many amazing people who have to deal with major falls and get right back up again - and I feel like that’s just not me. I don’t have a reason. And yet, here I am, on the ground. Time after time after time.
This refrain, ‘I don’t have a reason,’ has been how I’ve invalidated my pain - time after time after time.
I’ve been disabled since the age of about 28. I have a genetic condition, but it only fully manifested when I got older. These days, I use a wheelchair or other walking aids. Meanwhile, aged 33, I got a diagnosis of autistic spectrum disorder. I was half way through a PhD at the time. (I finally finished the PhD seven years later, aged 40.) I’m also queer (bi, demi and nonbinary), which were also things that all occurred to me very late and very slowly,
I survived my whole childhood, and a lot of my adulthood, not understanding how I was different. But, somewhere inside me, I always knew. I knew something was ‘wrong’ with me. It always felt like society - the people around me - were keen to tell me and show me just how ‘wrong’ I was.
In Brene Brown’s words: those people were doing their best, but their best wasn’t good enough.
My parents didn’t mean to hurt me when they punished me for stimming and echolalia and a lot of other autistic coping methods. They thought those behaviours would make life harder for me in society. They were trying to make things better for me.
They were doing their best.
But their best wasn’t good enough.
I could repeat that paragraph, with slightly different details, for a lot of people and groups of people. The doctors who hurt me when I was in psychiatric ‘care’; their colleagues who continue to belittle and dismiss and occasionally mistreat me in appointment after appointment, right up to today. Who’ve taught me that asking for medical help only ever leads to neglect and abuse of power and ‘treatment’ that damages me... and the constant message that I am broken and useless and will never deserve the resources that I take and take and take from society. Who, by extension, have taught me that asking for any kind of help is a bad idea. That I don’t deserve it.
They were doing their best.
But their best wasn’t good enough.
The ‘friends’ who left me feeling like I wasn’t worth their friendship. Or anyone’s. People who, even today, give up talking to me because disabled people are boring - because I have no energy and can’t always keep up social appointments or see my friends regularly ‘enough’ for them.
They were doing their best.
But their best wasn’t good enough.
I could list many more examples of times when I’ve been broken-hearted, and learned (taught myself?) that I deserved it.
But none of that is serious, you know? Even as I write these things down, even as it hurts to write them down and see them in black print on a white page, done-and-can’t-be-undone, there’s a very loud voice at the back of my head screaming attention seeker - freak - broken - bitch - scrounger - drain on the resources of society - all you do is take take take and you’re not even worth what they deign to give you...
The phrase ‘They were doing their best - but their best wasn’t good enough’ is an absolute kicker for me. I’m happy to believe Part 1. Part 2? That I don’t deserve people’s crap? No. I can’t believe that.
It’s all I deserve.
When it comes down to it, I don’t honestly know why I feel this way. Being autistic and disabled in our society is tough, and can lead to difficult experiences. But that doesn’t feel like enough. I feel like I will always hear that voice in my head that says, you don’t even deserve for your experiences to be taken seriously. Look at the people around you - at what they’ve suffered. Stop fucking complaining.
Until recently, I didn’t even believe that I deserved the term ‘trauma’. Trauma is PTSD. It’s a term that people get to use if really terrible things have happened to them. If they’ve had a really bad fall.
I have not had a bad fall. I just won’t get up.
‘Just get the fuck up, Sophia, you broken freak,’ screams the voice in my head.
But I can’t. I just can’t. I’ve been on the ground for a long time. And I don’t know why.
I started to claim the term ‘trauma’ very recently, based on a small number of difficult things that have happened to me, and a large number of very small things that happen on an almost-daily basis. I have a friend who works with disabled and autistic people with trauma - she calls her work trauma-sensitive yoga. She says that, for many disabled and neurodivergent people, the experience of living in society can be traumatic. Maybe I’ll try to explore that more in another entry, another time. All I know is that, as much as it feels like I shouldn’t claim that term, that I don’t deserve it... it’s also been really helpful and empowering to let myself claim it. To say, yes - what’s happening to me, what has happened to me in the past, what continues to happen to me, is traumatic.
I still fear, very strongly, that someone will come along who’s experienced real trauma and say, How dare you claim this term? Nothing has happened to you that deserves that term. You don’t deserve it.
But here’s the thing. The concept of trauma is a framework. In my ‘offline life’, I’m a qualitative researcher. I love frameworks. Names have power, just like in the old fairy tales. (In the Pagan world that I sometimes inhabit, knowing the name of a god or goddess can be empowering - as much as it can also be dangerous. They might want something from you, if you learn who they are.) This name, this framework - trauma - it’s just a way of understanding something. Just like autism and disability, which are concepts that I’ve studied as a social scientist. These frameworks help me to organise the world, and my (autistic) brain really likes the world to be organised. It’s a key to fit a keyhole. There may be many keys that fit it. But if I can use the concept to help me turn the key and walk through the door, then it’s a powerful resource. And gods know I need those. I’ve been stumbling in the dark looking for a way to open the door for a long, long time.
I want to thank Lani and Kelly for ‘Big Strong Yes’. This podcast is an amazing resource - it’s helped me to think that if they can do it, maybe I can. I’m a little bit stuck at the beginning. I don’t even feel like I deserve to talk about having had a fall. But maybe I can still learn to get up, anyway. I’m terrified that I can’t - that I’m just broken, and that after 41 years of being broken, I always will be.
But, broken-hearted or not, I’m going to be brave anyway.
Next entry, I’ll write about my Year of Bravery - and I hope I’ll be able to be a bit more positive!
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