Acting Tough to the Public

Acting Tough to the Public
I

InjunE

Registrant
I don't know if I'm the only one, but I'm sure I am not. I was just wondering if anyone else ever does this.

Basically what I do is act tough for the general public. I make sure I look as mean as can be, and I groom myself to be exactly that. I talk loudly and roughly, making everyone always think I am looking for a fight. I have the people at work a little afraid, as well as all my "friends". Some people think I might be a little crazy. Maybe the guy to go "postal" with my hands on the guys at work. I'm the guy most people move to the other side of the street for when I am walking down the sidewalk. But here's the truth.

The truth is that I have been in very few fights in my life. I am scared to death of everyone and everything. The idea of a fight petrifies me. If it ever came down to fighting, I have no idea what I would do. I don't think I would run, but I may stay and take a beating, relive my childhood. Maybe I'd go nuts on the guy, take out all my anger. I have no idea, except that is scares me, so much, more than anything else ever could.

Is anyone else like me in this way? Or even similar?

btw, this is info I would never dream of sharing with anyone else, ever, under any circumstances. But the people on the site have shared so much with me, I feel I owe them.

Thanks
 
Ya Sir,


Its the I like to call {I am a REAL MAN attitide and aint shit you can do about it} cept in my case I used to find one big sum bitch and beat the shit out of him to ensure everyone around knew not to screw with me. Its all in the psychi of trying to protect ourselves from being hurt again.

I did this every couple of years just to prove to my self that no one wouild be able to hurt me against my will again.

It was mostly my rage coming out and a beserker kind of attitude when it came to fighting.

I really lost those out bursts since I have came to terms that I dont have to act like a big bad dude in the TERMS that society sets, but more in terms that I have set for my self as a family man that needs to be the father and husband that my family deserves and be able to set good examples for my kid.


Fight the Good Fight


Pete
 
InjunE,

I haven't done that, but I think we all have a "public face" that we show to the world, hoping that the "real me" won't show through. The real question is why we do that.

I think we do that as a protective tactic. We still see the world as a place where danger can strike us from anywhere at any time. We need to put up a facade of strength to confront that threat.

But why don't we simply use the strength and other resources we already have? I that's because we still suffer from a lot of the false bad feelings about ourselves that we learned during abuse episodes and from abusers. We don't think we HAVE those resources, or we think they will fail to protect us, just as they failed to protect us from abuse years ago.

Good thread: something to think about!

Much love,
Larry
 
Yes, this is not an easy thing, you are using survival instincts to keep yourself safe.
I am the other way around, but it is swings and roundabouts.

Nice guy to meet, ppl take advantage, and wow, they get hit hard, not a fight, but rather, dont mess with something you dont know.

I hate fights, but, I have never lost one, and the pitiful thing is that it is not me who starts the fight. Have you ever thought about how ppl perceive you?

They perceive me as the strong guy who is full of fun, but take advantage and just mock me sometimes.
Wow! That hurts me, and I can fly off in a rage if challenged, and nobody ever made the challenge.

Have you ever thought that, all you want to do is be loved for who you are? I do, thats all I want, and heck its hard sometimes, as you or I, think that what the hell is going to happen next.

Its a boundary issue, and I have lots of that in my fibrefogged mind, but dont forget, its part of survival from the past which is redundant.

If I look on this thing as one thing in my life, its like I am the man protecting the little boy from hurt, the little boy is me, and the man will protect him no matter what.

Trouble is, he protects him from good and bad :rolleyes:

ste
 
If there is one word or phrase that almost always comes up when people describe me, it is he has a good spirit or he is so nice. However, it certainly wasn't always the case. Around the high school years, I was quite the meanie. I did not want anybody saying shit to me and I hung around with the scariest looking folks in the place. I just got so tired of feeling like a target, I just went over to the other side instead. It really wasn't me though and claiming a big bully persona as a defense mechanism against CSA proved no better than claiming a perpetual victim's persona. So, I dropped them all and just decided to be me instead, warts and all and generally nice.
 
Oh Yes

So much so that I graduated to soccer violence just to show my peers what a man I was, the ironic thing however is that 50% of the guys I used to be in the gang with had also been abused by one if not all of my abusers.

Kirk
"Lets grab this bull by the horns and swing it about a bit"
 
Kirk - now that answers so much! Not about you, but about others when I have been to football matches.

There's a friend of witnesss 2 (from when I went to court).. he's covered in tattoos, and comes across as a total 'hard man'. Every time he see's me, he asks if I've made any more progress against the 'shite' sentence!

I think he's got a personal interest! Sorry I can't give him the answer he wants!

Best wishes ...Rik
 
Rick

It has often crossed my mind that there are a lot more "thugs" that have been through what I have been through, it certainly does not make it ok to do what I did ie fighting but what can you do when you are shit scared and have no way of telling, you just dont admit to being scared when a teenager. Perps certainly have a lot to answer for, for some of the ills of society.


BTW I know of a few "hard men" who have been abused, my past fellow football hooligans being some of them. I just wish they could find the release I have by disclosing and putting those perps who still demand that they are innocent where thy truely belong ..... behind bars

Kirk
"Lets grab this bull by the horns and swing it about a bit"
 
Perps, must be the single worst thing about our dysfunctional society, kids on drugs, murders, assaults generally come from abuse.

Hard men in general give me loads of respect, maybe we have a hidden trait that others can latch onto, I dont know.

I am generally thought of as very calm and easy going, but rattle the cage and beware of the dragons, its the man fighting for the little boy, 'again'.

Nobody will get past the mean look that I reserve for those who mess about with me too much.

Anybody else get that feeling, leave me alone, and I will leave you alone'.,

ste
 
InjunE,

You just helped me put another piece of the puzzle in place. The abuse was first done to me when I was 8. Two years later, we moved to another city and I put up this huge tough guy front in school for at least a few years. I even got violent and beat up on a few kids. Not that I was tough, however. I was scared as hell.

I didn't understand why at the time, but now it makes sense. I was not going to have my space violated again, and this was an over-reaction and message to people to not even think about messing with me. It was also the beginning of my isolation which went on for far too many years.

Couple this with what many of us experience: that we think the whole world is aware of what we are aware of from the inside - and that they will think less of us for it, or that we even perceive ourselves as worth something less.

It wasn't until I began to share the experience of what happened to me with others that I began to see and understand it differently. Sharing the abuse with others is an experience of moving towards a healthier kind of relationship, and it has began to open me up. To my surprise, people have responded with nothing but compassion when I share what happened to me with them. It also gives them license to share their stories more freely.

Sharing my story with transparency has enabled me to see that we are all broken, each in our own way, even those who were not sexually abused. By opening more to others with my whole self rather than with selected parts is helping me to lower the wall to enable others - and myself - to see what is really there inside of me. I'm finding that I kind of like it so far.

Thanks for the post,
Ed
 
Guys,

This has been an interesting thread for me to read. I was a quiet kid who wanted nothing more than to be left alone. I loved beautiful things such as mountain scenery, a fern frond, puffy clouds in the sky, etc. I loved animals, and was a book worm. I loved playing outside by myself and could do so by the hour, making up fantastic stories where I was a participant in the events taking place.

Somewhere along in the 4th grade (I have no idea what the comparative school level is in the UK or Europe) I got fed up with being picked on and shoved around out of glance of the teachers. I resorted to violence to keep it at bay, but only when provoked. This behavior was also encountered by one of the perps who tried to get into my pants, leading him to use an extremely cruel mind game to guarantee my silence about his attack on me.

Kids soon learned I was not an entity to be trifled with and left me alone. That aggressive behaviour was so effective I continued to use it throughout my school years and on into adulthood. Woe to any coworker or boss, for example that messed with me or whom I perceived to be messing with me, even verbally. I'd take them down to size in an instant with my angry tongue.

It's a miracle I never got fired. It affected my relationships including my marriage. I tremble to think what I put my wife through all these years.

I never realized I'd resorted to this kind of behavior until I found the MS website and began interacting here. It's been quite difficult to unlearn that aggression, especially with my wife and daughter. Thankfully they know me and although they don't give me a pass on it, they forgive me when I need forgiveness.

I've wondered a lot while reading this thread what it was that the "bullies" in school had gone through themselves. What was it that caused them to act the way they did toward myself and other unfortunates? Were they too victims of some sort of abuse? Were they acting out in some way in order to be the tough guy thus protecting themselves from some imagined threat from me?

Excellent thread.

Lots of love,

John
 
sometimes you got to fight to gain respect ,when your confined with bad people fight or flight is not possible ,its fight or be perped ,sometimes you get perped anyway but not more than once,nobody screws with a kid that fights there were to many that didnt.
 
This one of the master quotes of life!

nobody screws with a kid that fights there were to many that didnt.
Click to expand...
Sorry to say, but none of us should have needed to fight, sometimes it was too much, but we did fight, but what about the ones who 'just gave up'!

Thats the sad but true side, :(

ste
 
I fought, and so he victimized me in another, and perhaps even more cruel way. I don't believe there was any way for me to win when he had all the power and knew how to use it to cause maximum harm.

Fight or no fight, I was screwed, either physically or emotionally. I simply found myself trying to pick put the pieces and put them back together 35 years later...

Lots of love,

John
 
Duplicate post :p
 
John,

I really appreciated and learned from your perspetive here. It drew my attention to possible explanations for some of the ways I was behaving towards my wife - forget about fired, I'm amazed I wasn't divorced.

And yes, what about all those bullies in school? We all hear that bullies were often victims of bullying themselves, but perhaps what you are saying offers a more nuanced view of specifically how aggressive behavior can get triggered by abuse.

Much love,
Larry
 
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