Feeling useless...

[Sick Puppy]

Some days I just feel like... no matter how small my body is, it is too big for me... I feel lost inside it, I feel useless and awkward, I don't know what to do with my arms or how to stand... I feel as if I am controlling a puppet and trying to make it move realistically so the audience will believe it's real.

On the outside... there's Josh. Sure, he's kind of small, and thin, and maybe not as strong as he could be, but he's whole, he's grown, mentally and physically, he's an adult. Maybe not the smartest guy around, but he's at a perfectly acceptable level of intelligence for a 23 year old.

On the inside there's this scared little kid. I know you guys know this feeling very well. His body's an adults and his mind's an adults but his feelings are a child's. He still wants a bedtime story, a nightlight, a stuffed animal to sleep with. He still gets scared of the dark, sucks his thumb, wets the bed.

I can't give in to everything Little Josh wants, can I? I can't be a child. I'm grown. I have a stuffed animal, but no nightlight. I suck my thumb, but I don't ask anyone for a bedtime story. I just feel dumb. I feel like I don't match up with myself. You give me a physical test, I could pass it, maybe in the low range for my age group, but I could do it. Same with an intelligence test; I might be dumb, but I'm not mentally handicapped; my mind is 23 just like my body.

But... put me in a situation where my emotions are tested? I'm screwed. Do I act 23? Hell no. I've never acted 23 in my life. I don't know how. I don't think the required part of me has matured to that level. I act five, I act ten, on good days I act twelve or fifteen. I throw temper tantrums, I cry, I yell, I sulk, I lash out, I do the things a frustrated child might do. People can't put up with it. The ones who can put up with it-- few as they are-- still don't quite understand; they treat me as an emotional adult, as if I could react how they expect me to, as if logic could calm me. You don't rationalize with a five year old when he gets angry and upset and sad, you hug him, you comfort him...

But then... I feel foolish for expecting them to give me special treatment. I don't want to be singled out or patronized, but I do want to be treated appropriately, and in situations like mine, the line between the two is pretty thin. But then I feel as if it's my own problem that I'm this way; I should deal with it; I shouldn't force others to adjust themselves to it...

I don't know. I guess I'm just rambling now. It's hard for me. On one hand I feel as if this is a sort of handicap and should be treated as such, like a person with limited physical movement might be given a degree of special treatment to make up for his condition. But, on the other hand, I feel as if I'm just self-absorbed, whining, wanting pity or attention, and I don't deserve any sort of adjustment... I should just suck it up and deal with it.

I don't know. I don't know how to fix it, either.

 

[Wuamei]

Josh, thanks for posting this. This is powerful, a real sharing not only of yourself, but of what I suspect most survivors go thru in some way. I know I do. You are not alone...

Some days I just feel like... no matter how small my body is, it is too big for me... I feel lost inside it, I feel useless and awkward, I don't know what to do with my arms or how to stand... I feel as if I am controlling a puppet and trying to make it move realistically so the audience will believe it's real.

Awkward? Oh yes. Reminds me of my recent post about this in Books ("Things that go bump in the day"), to which I remember you responded.

Sometimes I feel like my mind is a puppet master trying to control this puppet of an awkward body.
Or is it my mind trying to control this emotionally awkward kid in an awkward adult body?


Sometimes, I feel like all of me is the puppet, tied to & trapped by the strings of puppet masters
called the past, my perps (like my mother & the string of her damned umbilical cord), CSA & its trauma, OCD (Obsessive Compulsive Disorder), multiple addictions, people who don't want to hear about my CSA, or acknowledge than men can be sexually abused, or do anything for survivors who disrupt their comfortable little worlds.

Oh this list from hell goes on & on. Sometimes it seems like the universe itself is a puppet master,
and a cosmic stage on which I am strung & flung around helplessly in some kind of sick puppet show
that goes nowhere, no one watches, no one cares.

But then I see that there are other "puppets." Some with a few strings cut, some with many. I see puppeteer perps being found out & punished. I find people who care, who help. I notice some of my strings are cut thru, others loosening. I find I can care & help, too.

I look closer, with fresh perspective. I see not puppets but wolves. I see the vast territory we share & enjoy & protect each other in. I see that the universe is not such an entirely unfriendly place or existence after all.

I see hope & life. I see it here. I see it in the universe & in my life.

Some days...

On the outside... there's Josh. Sure, he's kind of small, and thin, and maybe not as strong as he could be, but he's whole, he's grown, mentally and physically, he's an adult. Maybe not the smartest guy around, but he's at a perfectly acceptable level of intelligence for a 23 year old.

On the inside there's this scared little kid. I know you guys know this feeling very well. His body's an adults and his mind's an adults but his feelings are a child's. He still wants a bedtime story, a nightlight, a stuffed animal to sleep with. He still gets scared of the dark, sucks his thumb, wets the bed.[/QB][/QUOTE]

Yes Josh, I know this feeling all too well & I empathize with you.

Reminds me of the Alice Cooper song "Eighteen":
"I got a baby's brain and an old man's heart."
Only I've got a old man's brain (fibrofog) & a baby's heart; throw in an old man's body (fibropain). "I get confused every day." "I'm a boy and I'm a man."

But I'm 46...

I can't give in to everything Little Josh wants, can I? I can't be a child. I'm grown.

Josh, all I know is I can't give in to everything
Lil' Vic wants. In a way it's not fair to him; he had to grow up so fast, but yet really couldn't. He never had a chance to be a child, he almost always had to be the "man" of the house.

But I am now the man of a house, of my own.
I am an adult, at least partly grown up, with lots
of adult responsibilities to fulfill & privileges I want to enjoy. I can't be a child anymore either
at least not completely.

But I can try to let Lil Vic have his childhood, & share it with him. In fact, if I'm going to be an adult, I have to. Can't be an adult w/o growing
up. To grow up I gotta have a childhood first.

I have a stuffed animal, but no nightlight. I suck my thumb, but I don't ask anyone for a bedtime story.

Lil Vic:

His stuffed animals were living incestuous adults
who made a stuffed animal of him, a sex toy. His stuffed animals became the other children, and later "adults," who played sex games with him. His stuffed animals now are the only ones he ever knew, only now they are only images, in his mind,
on paper or on screen. Not very cuddly or warm or friendly or intimate... So now I give him the stuffed animals, mostly Taz's, he should have had all along. Now he doesn't need to wake up anymore in a wet bed...

His nightlights were the moon & the streetlights shining into the dingy apartment, the light of the TV that when it went off meant his lights were going out... His nighlights became the moon & the streetlights under which he roamed late at night to get away. His "nightlights" now are the brightness of the evil images in his mind, the TV,
the computer screen. Bleak lights of darkness. So I try to give him the light of my self-love, the love of my wife & daughters & family, the love of friends & fellow survivors. Becuz he is still afraid of the dark...

His bedtime stories were acted out horror stories
of sexual & emotional incest, of physical & verbal
abuse; they went on all day. No wonder he sucked his thumb so long. His "bedtime" stories became the continued acting out of the same old horror stories with other children & "adults." His "bedtime stories" are now the sexual fantasies & stories in pictures on computer
screens to which he acts out. So now I try to share with him the real childhood stories he really needed: good books, cartoons, but most of all a rewriting of the story of his/our life.

I just feel dumb. I feel like I don't match up with myself. You give me a physical test, I could pass it, maybe in the low range for my age group, but I could do it. Same with an intelligence test; I might be dumb, but I'm not mentally handicapped; my mind is 23 just like my body.

Yeah. I feel like a nearby town I recently described to a visiting friend: like they took pieces of places, or people, from all over, and just kinda threw them together. I feel out of place becuz I feel like I'm from every place yet from no place.

But... put me in a situation where my emotions are tested? I'm screwed. Do I act 23? Hell no. I've never acted 23 in my life. I don't know how. I don't think the required part of me has matured to that level.

Ditto, Josh. Emotionally, I doubt if I've ever acted 46 years old. Usually not even close, but sometimes getting closer I think. Like you said, I don't know how; I had no models to follow.

How in the world can I act 46? I had to act 46 when I was 6 and my mother was 24. I wasn't able to act 6 when I was 6, or 16 when I was 16, or...
I've always been behind in acting my age, becuz in my so-called childhood I always had to be ahead
in acting my age.

Josh, of course "the required parts of [us] [haven't] matured to that level." How could they?
Those who were supposed to do so hadn't even matured to that level. Mine still haven't...

I act five, I act ten, on good days I act twelve or fifteen. I throw temper tantrums, I cry, I yell, I sulk, I lash out, I do the things a frustrated child might do.

Sounds like my house--and I don't mean my kids, who aren't even in the house anymore!

People can't put up with it. The ones who can put up with it-- few as they are-- still don't quite understand; they treat me as an emotional adult, as if I could react how they expect me to, as if logic could calm me. You don't rationalize with a five year old when he gets angry and upset and sad, you hug him, you comfort him...

The intolerance, lack of even trying to understand, expectations & rationales of others stink. They sometimes seem to think it's so easy, and make it sound so easy.

Yet they whine & make a big dramatic issue out of the stupidest little things.

In some of my worse moments I used to wish they could go thru even some of what I went thru, so I could see them get on their knees & thank God for their so-called problems.

Now, mostly they just irritate me. Sometimes I even pity them.

Above all, I'm working on finding those who show a genuine inkling of caring, understanding, and just wanting to be there in support. Mutual support, and mutual respect.

They are out there. I'm finding them. Mostly here in the pack, but even in "the world out there."

But then... I feel foolish for expecting them to give me special treatment. I don't want to be singled out or patronized, but I do want to be treated appropriately, and in situations like mine, the line between the two is pretty thin. But then I feel as if it's my own problem that I'm this way; I should deal with it; I shouldn't force others to adjust themselves to it...

Right. Not special treatment. Just the same treatment as a special individual which everybody is & deserves. In fact I detest being patronized. I'd rather be attacked head-on than stabbed in the back I guess...

No, Josh, it's not you're just problem that you're "this way." Sure we are responsible for actions, behaviors, responses, more & more as we grow older. But we are not the problem. The problem is our abuse & those who perpetrated it.

Others can't be forced to adjust to the way
I am. But I'm determined in finding those who care
enuf to do so, as I care enuf for them to do so. Isn't that what living & loving together is about?

I don't know. I guess I'm just rambling now. It's hard for me. On one hand I feel as if this is a sort of handicap and should be treated as such, like a person with limited physical movement might be given a degree of special treatment to make up for his condition. But, on the other hand, I feel as if I'm just self-absorbed, whining, wanting pity or attention, and I don't deserve any sort of adjustment... I should just suck it up and deal with it.

Josh if you're rambling then ramble on. If no one else here needs it, I sure do! (Somehow I doubt I'm the only one, tho).

Don't just suck it up & deal with it. I feel sorry for those who do--whether they are SA survivors or not.

In fact I'm convinced that if I try to do that I cannot survive. I don't need to suck it up, I need to let it out. I don't need to deal with it, I need live with it yet live beyond it. And I can't do that alone. I need the wolfpack!

Josh, I feel handicapped & limited in some ways.
In other ways, I think I have perspective, experiences & possibilities others sadly never even dream of. That's why I say sometimes I pity them.

We survivors, like the mentally or physically "retarded" or handicapped or disabled or whatever is PC now (with my brother, in those days, it was "retarded"), are either "retarded" or "gifted". It's all in how I look at it--not by dammit how others look at it, at me!

I don't know. I don't know how to fix it, either.

I don't either Josh. But I know some of the tools & some of the places & people where I can find help, like here. So do you. We can all help each other to use them.

Josh, pardon this long response. It's just that your post was so powerful, probing & thot-provoking. Sometimes, this is what happens when my thots get provoked.

Thanks again. Take care.

Victor

 

[Sick Puppy]

Thanks guys.

I feel kind of silly. Last night I read a children's book to myself before I went to bed. (We have a bunch from when my cousins were kids.) I have to admit it made me feel a lot calmer and better although I did still have nightmares and woke up at night with a terrible stomachache. That's all pretty much normal for me, though. I guess it's good to be in touch with that child part of yourself but I wish that I would grow up quicker because it's embarassing to me even when there's no one around to see it...

 

[Wuamei]

Josh,

You have nothing to be embarrased about! I feel sorry for those who are so insecure in their adulthood that they can't let their child out to play once in a while at least. You do that; be secure in it & enjoy it.

I shamelessly watch Looney Tunes and Three Stooges and if anybody doesn't like it that's their problem not mine. Two of my favorite childhood stories are "Alexander and the Terrible,
Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day" and "Green Eggs and Ham."



Victor

 

[Marc]

I love Green Eggs and Ham!!!

 

[outis]

Josh,

I think you're onto something here. It's not exactly like that for me, 'cause I never catch myself feeling like a kid so much. But I always look at other adults as if "they're the grownups." I remember telling someone, "I don't feel like a child. I have never felt like a child," and then realizing that includes my (chronological) youth.

Maybe I don't know what I am.

I feel out of place becuz I feel like I'm from every place yet from no place.

Victor,

This one definitely rings the bell. For the longest time, I have felt that Dorothy's line applies to me, "there's no place like home," because there literally is no place that feels like home to me. I have left communities and social circles (usually small groups) never to cross paths again so many times. I have very few connections to my past, even recent past. I live in a place that I know I will leave when it's no longer "useful" in raising my family. Home? No, it's a place that's useful because my kids are in school here, I can find work here, etc.

I'm going to post "Ghost Rider" in the music forum. Like Linkin Park's "Easier to Run" I think it expresses part of my "homelessness."

Thanks,

Joe

 

[The Dean]

Hi Josh,

Those feelings you have are natural for people who has been used and abused as we have. But they are false!
Josh, young friend, you have been through a particularysavage life. If just one of the things that have happened to you had occurred, it would have been horrendous.

To me, you Josh, are a powerful giant. You have come through so much and with very little love and caring and understanding of you by anyone. Yet, here you are, working at recovery and helping the rest of us.

When I first read your story I thought: "Can this be true, can so much harm be done to one boy?" Unfortunately, it is true and you have been brutalised.

Josh, I hated my body/physique for years, until about three or four years ago, as a result of excellent therapy I woke up in the middle of the night and told myself that I love everything about me just as I am. I have some suggeswtions to the Creator for some improvements I have to insist on. But I do love myself today.

Josh, in a sense you are still a kid. You are still trying to figure things out and you are finding some answers. You are basicly positive about yourself.

Just insist now, friend, that anyone who touches you does so in love and mutual respect. No more being used by anyone. And no more failing to recognise that you are in fact, a giant of a man.

Peace brother.

Bob

 

[Wuamei]

I love Green Eggs and Ham!!!

Marc, do you mean the book or the food?

Actually, when I was a kid (chronologically that is) I used to want to try green eggs and ham like Sam-I-Am so much I would put green food coloring all over my eggs & ham or bacon or whatever.

No wonder green is my favorite color!

Joe:

I hear you friend. When I was 35 years old I had lived in 35 different residences in my life. Now I'm 46 and it's gotten a bit better--38 residences. Still the longest I've been in one place in my life was just shy of four years--and that was within the last ten years.

For me home has to be not a place but people--my family. I've lived in lots of houses (or apartments, trailers, cottages...) but only lived with one real family--my wife & kids.

Victor

 

[RickL]

Josh,

You've got me thinking about when I was 23.

In some ways, I guess you could say I was a real adult. I bought my first house. I learned how to fix it up. I could also be very "deep" and adult-like in my thoughts.

But I too was stranded in childhood. And I remember being very lonely, with a feeling of powerlessness over that. The lonliness was so palpable sometimes, that it felt like a huge mountain.

Only in the last year or 2 do I understand that the intense lonliness was caused principly because of the dynamics of my family upbringing, which included incest.

I remember having emotional reactions which were immature. I was (thank God) drug free, but I sure had extreme highs and lows. I was a rock dj. Some evenings I was "on top of the world" and had a great show. Other nights were not. I would ride my bicycle hard to get my endorphins up. Then the endorphins would go away and I'd crash. Then more heavy bike riding to get them back up again. Same with masturbation. Sigh.

I've leveled out a lot now. I'm making progress. But still working on my issues. They are some deeper issues, and more subtle in some ways, but just as crucial to understand and heal. BTW, my life did get better after 23. In some ways it's best now, in other ways, I "peaked" at 27, when I met my wife. But now divorced for 5 years, gotta figure that one all over again.

Hey Victor--you watch all the 3 stooges you want!

And Green Eggs and Ham--yes, the book was a favorite with me too! And it was a real joy to read it to my son when he was the right age for it!