Old Pain

[i-m-Bri]

The most painful affect of my abuse was how it cemented my understanding of myself as a boy. More accurately it convinced me that I wasn’t a boy. I wasn’t anything but a failure.

Yesterday my trainer reminded me of how far I have come. There was a time when I couldn’t have spoken to a guy like him, a bro, masculine and muscular. Oddly, remembering the isolation now is more painful now then when I lived in it.

I can’t articulate what I was, but what I wanted was to be a real boy. I was always the other. I was incapable of feeling like I belonged with the boys. And the more I was apart from them, the more distant I became. It was a vicious circle that just chocked any chance of fitting in.

I couldn’t even imagine allowing myself to do the things that would have helped me to become the boy I wanted. In my festering isolation, the strangest rules made sense: Me attempting to better myself physically was somehow insulting to the idea of real boy. It wasn’t a club you could earn your way into.

When I was young, if I could have talked to the "guys like him" I would have asked “what’s it like to lift weights?”, “what’s it like to get stronger?” and the riskiest “could I do it?”.

For the boy who wanted to so bad I have to say my answers: There is something scary and exiting about the challenge of lifting I really enjoy. Slowly but surely I have gotten stronger. What is that like? Satisfying, rewarding and encouraging to keep going.

I guess part of me thought my training was a tonic that would kill the pain. In a way it's highlighted it. That memory of the longing is hurting here and now.

I just needed to say it, be with it.

 

[Ceremony]

Thank you BDD for articulating a part of me. You've brought memories up for me, and your words resonate very deeply. I looked from afar, and had no clue. This connection with you is in it's way deeply moving, a bond. We're unlikely to meet, yet I've read a lot of your posts and blog. I'm pretty sure a video too. Some of my memories are not reliable.

Being a bit overwhelmed, this topic includes things of my number one source of bullying trauma, and trying to listen with support and avoid any me, is a real drag. I need to share you mean a lot to me and I'm glad you're here. To bits of me in others is so relatable, and shares a lot of very heavy pain. It's that which makes some things a big deal. Being where we are in healing. The connecting brings a yearning to know men who care so much, who are so compassionate, can discuss these topics. My sense of being is not developed, it's very hard to b appropriate expressing the need of bonding. My experience is very much, that interest I showed to boys/men, got sexualized by them, owing to the old adage of what men think about every 15 seconds. I was effeminate, maybe cute, my voice, my mannerisms where far removed from societies athletic male requirement. It haunts me, it drives me to distraction and my first EMDR is about this. I think? My intentions don't always jive with reality, my perceptions often being wrong.

If any of that makes sense, it's not all unhappiness, tears of bonding have been missed by me. I don't know exactly what I'm babbling, but this seems so important.

 

[newground]

hey BDD
I have to expect that many here can empathize I know I certainly can. congratulations on working on yourself FOR yourself. that is a real prize. There is so much that I could highlight from back then but I think you said a mouthful it is exciting to move forward and show myself that all former appraisals were not complete and were clouded by abuse of all kinds. oddly enough for me I felt I could do those things that the others did even though I was so different but I never dared take a chance and prove it. Not even to myself but things are changing. Congratulations on accepting that challenge from yourself
Jeff

 

[i-m-Bri]

Ceremony,

The word "community" that has a real yearning in it for me. I think that's what I hear you saying. Maybe it's my own junk painting your words. I am so thankful I have MS to say my pain to men who understand it, know it. That is a really powerful connection. I am glad to share it with you.

There is a weird dichotomy with what's going on my me, and it's at play here. The reasons we've even glanced at MS are serious and unfortunate, but there is a beauty to the community that it has built. Thank you for making it all the more richer.

 

[Ceremony]

Ceremony,

The word "community" that has a real yearning in it for me. I think that's what I hear you saying. Maybe it's my own junk painting your words. I am so thankful I have MS to say my pain to men who understand it, know it. That is a really powerful connection. I am glad to share it with you.

There is a weird dichotomy with what's going on my me, and it's at play here. The reasons we've even glanced at MS are serious and unfortunate, but there is a beauty to the community that it has built. Thank you for making it all the more richer.

In person has built the biggest in me; I've a very long history of online community building with 2 other sites. Not for this context, farthest from the truth. Old, old Slate's the Fray, 1997-??1999 and the Mote 1999-2004-6?? I still visit the Mote!! the Poetry thread there and the Fray eased me into learning how to form sentences with diluted coherency. That's to mean, I could see the meaning, but others, HA!!

I need this site, and my interactions thus far are the norm for me, I do not hold back now that I'm older and have been around for two decades. But, I'm still not coherent in the scale I hold up to judge it... Maybe 50/50. My brain is holding me back so fiercely, and my desire to join the few, the proud, the healing, is tearful, deeply impactful, running to physical pain.

 

[Ceremony]

Is it totally odd, weird in context of self preservation, toward privacy and anonymity to exclaim empathically, I don't care?! I'm going to write, say and be the words I'm writing here, and anywhere? Though, my irl interactions are only with 5 others, and a cat? 2 therapists, my wife, my mother and sister. The best results have been the 2 therapists, thus far. However, the reveal with my sister had an impact. My mother is trying so hard, but our history is connected to some very deep pain, unprocessed, and as bad with my Dad (he revealed to me this morning that he's got COPD). I don't respond much to him.

Ok, this is too much hijacking, but relationship type topic has been my intent. This community brings thoughts, and lots of words to write out of me.

 

[KMCINVA]

BDD

I just read this. I have been working on what I will say to the Bishop tomorrow of my life and my abuse. I wrote something that brought your words to life--not exactly the same words but the thought is quite similar

"I beat myself up for a lifetime over how I thought about myself and how I felt from the abuse. I saw myself as a dirty boy, a damaged soul, someone not worth knowing or loving, a boy who kept to the outside and never realized how many true friends I had until I began to unravel. In life I had a shield to protect me and it never allowed me to be who I truly wanted to be."

I was my own obstacle to being the boy I wanted to be because the abuser and abuse controlled my life, my perception of self. I created isolation and only now do I realize I only isolated myself from the people who truly cared and gave to those who are to self absorbed to have given support to me. How ironic the world is to a survivor.

I hope as you grow and see yourself in a new light, life will allow you to be the person you truly should be

Kevin

 

[Bluedogone]

Thanks BDD,

A great post.

I don't have a trainer, but my journal entries will very often remind me of how far I've come. But at the same time it can hit a raw nerve, that's really an old pain that doesn't go away no matter how far along I think I've progressed.

When one of my abusers coaxed me to come join the team he coached, it didn't take a lot of coaxing for me to go along. I knew I wasn't very good, I'd proven that over and over. But I so wanted to believe I was good enough to play with the other boys, not always be the outsider.

I just about had to know some of the things the coach was doing with me had nothing to do with baseball, but denial convinced me I would be a team member. Why didn't I ask "At what cost?"

I agree with you. That memory of the longing does hurt now and then.

 

[i-m-Bri]

Jeff,
“former appraisals were not complete” That says it so well! We grew up believing crap that was so fractured and incomplete. Unfortunately we acted it on it as if it were true.

Now that I do talk with all types of men, I am discovering a common humanity that bridges those differences that seemed so vast. Thank you. I am glad things are changing for you too. It feels really powerful, doesn’t it?

Ceremony,
Write away! I like how topics morph and grow. I don’t like the phrase “hijacking”, I prefer the free expression

Kevin,
I’ll be thinking of you tomorrow. Your passage beautifully expresses what I feel.

I did the same thing. Looking back there were so many opportunities to hang out with guys. But I keep on my side of the fence they couldn’t see. What really gets me is I was coming out of it in Junior High. But when I was molested everything whipped back and split the old wounds open.

I am seeing different versions of myself lately that run parallel. I am enjoying who I am becoming, it feels more real and true to who I am.

Bluedogone,
Even your hunger to be with the other boys can’t be held responsible. The person who abused your natural needs is at fault. Not you. These bastards look for it and prey on it. There is a thousand ways it all made sense, the coach said you could play, he was the authority.
Kids can’t do risk assessments. There are studies that prove young brains aren’t wired to weigh risks. That is why human childhood is so long. We need adults to protect us. That is there job, your coach failed and used you.

 

[i-m-Bri]

Bluedogone,
I'm sorry if that sounded harsh. I am passionate about assigning blame squarely on the abuser. And I was feeling/seeing my yearning.

 

[Bluedogone]

Thanks Brian,

But it didn't sound harsh at all. There are many memories of the abusers and their abuse, most of which are just that - memories. Memories that are part of life filtered through time and space, with no emotional baggage. Then there are those like the coach, that can easily rev up the emotions.

I definitely don't take any of the blame for his actions. If anything, I would spread that blame to include the church group that hired him without knowledge of his past. But my history of being picked last so many times, (long before he was on the scene) and seeing this new situation as a different outcome is not to take on any blame - just a reality of my life.

Blue