Learning To Let My Pain Take Up Space

A journal entry from April 1st, 2023. 

Some days I wish something bad would happen just so I stop feeling crazy for feeling this way. 

On days like these, days where the thoughts are consuming and both the physical and mental memories are running rampant, I wish something would happen- something bad enough to justify this breakdown but not enough to cause me to spiral for days. This also makes me feel like a victim complex. I hate it. I hate this. I hate admitting this. It feels gross and wrong. It feels like I am manipulating someone into pitying me. Except I don't want pity, and no one is witnessing these bad moments or thoughts. It's only this page, and a page can't judge me- but it can reflect me, and I don't like the reflection I am seeing right now. ​

To not like me, to not like my feelings and expressions and thoughts, my pain and my healing, is only an iteration of the silence the abuse causes. That it perpetuates. I don't talk about this often. Not with newer, though close, friends, and I have stopped mentioning it to older, closer, friends as well. I fear that I am hitting a dead-end repeat button that will get me nowhere other than an echo chamber of shitty emotional checkmate. Mentioning this to my therapist would be her having to listen to my repetitive recollection of the events. It would be an endless moment where someone accidentally tells you the same story twice- except it's a thousand times and it is depressing. An emotional annoyance and maybe a burden as well.

She would never say this, my therapist- but I never stop feeling this way. Never is a strong word, that is probably not true- but it has a nice ring to it with that statement. Although I will admit, that is a bit overly pessimistic even for my current tastes. I talked a little bit about it, about the experience, the memories- the deep-rooted fear that she is going to come out of the woodwork to haunt me- with a friend I have become close with since moving here. I feel uncomfortable now. I sent her a text to thank her again for listening to me. I made sure to thank her this morning as well, at the gym where we were training. It doesn't feel like enough. I have an overwhelming urge to repay her now, that I am in a sort of communications debt- the repayment being some intense listening sessions on my end.

​This is natural, however, right? That is how sharing works. Adjusting to also taking up some of the speaking space, and cashing in on the bit of listening repayment feels foreign, and gross to be quite honest. I feel icky causing people potential discomfort or bother because of my sad stories. I would rather not mention them- but at the same time, when asked how I am doing and how I feel, lying becomes a too-believable facade. This morning was me beginning to crack. It feels wrong, and that's okay. I know this is good, this is healthy and this is reciprocation that I am deserving of. I have to throw in my therapized analysis of everything to not let myself dwell on the shitty feelings. It sounds sort of dumb to always end sentences that way, but I do think it helps me redirect bad thoughts from becoming completely bad days, weeks, or months. 

Talking about it, however, out loud, only reminds me how sad it truly was. How much of my heart was devoted and how much of my existence was exploited. I ache for her. For my younger self. For a young woman who wanted to love and be loved and couldn't differentiate honest love and kindness from codependence and abuse if it slapped her in the face. It was all violence. The words, the hands, the cycle- yet it made sense. It made perfect sense and I kept diving deeper into this deluded idea that love was defined by its hardness. The idea that was my apparent birthright according to family. I think I’ll be returning that gift, thank you. It hurts a little too much nowadays. 

On the bright side, when bad things happen I always remind myself if I can handle what happened during that time I can handle this. Fear tends to subside when I think about this, and nothing feels too painful anymore. That is a nice side effect, I suppose. 



© 2024 Niki Christine. All Rights Reserved.
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