What's wrong (and right) with my insides

A very strange title to a post, I know.

What's wrong with my insides...omg...where do I begin? Seriously...I could be more screwed up than I am. But I guess to discuss this I should start at the beginning.

Divorced parents - they divorced when I was three. I lived with my mom until Christmas of 1985. I left and moved in with my dad then. I like to think I had a pretty okay childhood, but the truth is, it wasn't great and it wasn't horrid. It was somewhere in the middle. I took care of myself after school from age 6 and up. My mom took me out of nursery school before 1st grade and basically I walked to school and home from school every day. I was labeled as "stupid" when I was very young - first grade, actually - so I had to deal all through elementary school with the stigma of that. They actually tested me at the insistence of my first grade teacher Mrs. Baker. The test results were never shared with me. Fast forward to the summer after my senior year of high school and I received my PERMANENT RECORD in the mail and I was going through the plethora of paperwork and documents and smiling at pictures of me throughout the years and there was this little slip of paper from the state of North Dakota saying that they recommended me for the gifted program. THE GIFTED PROGRAM. Instead of getting extra enrichment and tender loving care and respect from teachers, I had been sent through years of low-level math classes and allowed to just skate through classes while living in my own little dream world because someone forgot to communicate the results to the school, the teachers and to me - that I was so much more capable than what everyone thought. From that point on, I didn't really resent what happened to me, but I tried to make the best of it. College was a good chance for me to learn to be a smart girl in my academic career and my emotional/psychological studies too.

In college I was almost raped by a guy I dated. I thought he was gorgeous - he looked like Garth Brooks. One night things went way too far - I wasn't ready for what he wanted to do. I had to push and fight my way out from under him and run to the door. He caught me part-way and my favorite purple shorts tore in two pieces. I grabbed the handle and turned it and ran from the room. He ran in the other direction (off the dorm floor) and I never saw him privately again. He lived on the other side of the dorm and we didn't really run in the same circles. I had a big group of friends that were like family to me - some of which I am still connected to. They were careful to protect me. It was an extremely painful lesson emotionally. I felt so hurt and very, very wronged. I eventually got over the incident...really and truly. To this day if I saw him of course I would forgive him. It's been a lot of years - and nothing too detrimental happened to me mentally. It was a tough time immediately afterwards, but I am such a glass-half-full person that I never let it bother me for too long.

In college I learned I love gay men. I do. I LOVE THEM. Not even in a small way. They make the best friends, the best confidants, the best shopping partners, the best advice-givers and the BEST gossip-hounds. When my soul needs brightening and lightening, I contact one of my dearest friends and he makes everything okay.

I generally don't get along with a lot of women because I hate the drama. I do. I absolutely hate the drama. I don't like "oh, she doesn't like me because she looked at me funny" or some stuff like that. I pick my female friends carefully and one thing they all have in common is that I feel like they are stronger women than me.

As far as women go, I can be pretty weak sometimes. I am also prone to crying easily. I am a weenie in that regard. I am too sensitive and I get hurt emotionally soooo easily. Physically if I accidentally bang my arm on the wall, I get a bruise - so I am weak that way too. I do play a martyr pretty well but when I actually HAVE a reason to be hurt or upset - seriously - watch out. I do have a breaking point. I will call you out on what you have done to me. I will cuss you up one side and down the other. And when I do, it won't be pretty. My breaking point is about five times longer than most people's breaking points. I am reminded of Bert and Ernie...



You can poke me and prod me and annoy me, you can flop my arms around and just generally tick me off and MOST OF THE TIME I will fall back and just go "argh" like Bert does at the end of the sketch above. I roll my eyes and sigh and then turn over and go back to sleep - IF I CAN GET BACK TO SLEEP. But in the regular day-to-day of life, I am much more like Ernie. I am happy-go-lucky, friendly, concerned, playful, fun-loving and just a pleasant person to be around.

A lot of the reason I think I am so nice is that I am afraid that if I was opinionated or mean, people wouldn't want to be around me. Who wants to be around someone mean all the time? Not me. A lot of the reasons I stand for people beating up on me (figuratively speaking) is because I am afraid if I stick up for myself they won't love me anymore. I think that has to do with abandonment issues stemming from my childhood. Friends would keep me company after school so I wouldn't have to be alone. Well, they would as long as I would let them decide what games we played and how we played them. If I spoke up, I would generally get this "well I'll just go home" response and then have to back pedal to keep them there. You see, being alone - for me - is a special kind of punishment. Like some people hate being around a lot of people, I hate being alone. Too much being alone as a little girl I think. An only child of a busy single parent coming home to no one. Imagine having no one ask you how your day was. AT AGE SIX. AT AGE SEVEN. And so on, and so on. Being alone is a personal hell for me. And yet I found myself alone often in SL. A group of people were only a quick TP away - any large store would at least have avatars in it...but I was so afraid of even talking to someone - another avatar that is. Somewhere along the line it was ingrained in me by someone else that everyone else was the enemy. I should be wary, keep my head down and run the other direction if someone said something to me unless it was someone I already knew.

The thing is, I don't think that's true.

People AREN'T inherently evil. People/Avatars in SL aren't ALL just out for themselves.

One thing I have learned is that I have control issues - as in, DO NOT TRY AND CONTROL ME, I WILL FIGHT BACK LIKE AN OCTOPUS RUNNING FROM A SOUS CHEF. And then I will talk to you using words that would make a sailor blush. Control and I don't get along well because I see it as a weak person's way of trying to force their needs/wants/desires on someone else. Is there anything less attractive REALLY than someone else trying to force someone else down? It's caged bird syndrome. You immediately feel frozen in place and as if someone has tried to muzzle you. You feel as if you can't freely move your arms and your legs. You get aggravated and frustrated and come to your defense. Unless you're me. First you put up with the control because you love the person and you don't want them to leave. Then, eventually, the situation gets too much and you explode. It would be MUCH healthier for the controlling person not to be that way in the first place - but, in the interest of reality here, let's just say that's not possible. I should find a healthier way to work with the controlling person to let them know that what they are trying to do, while perfectly acceptable for an animal or a young child, is 100% not okay for a grown woman. I should find a way to speak my mind in a nice rational way and come to an understanding with the person to make sure that they don't feel as if they are not being heard and I don't feel as if I am being controlled.

How do I plan to do that? Another lesson for another day I think.

So in summary, I am emotionally weak - to a point. I am an approval seeker, which is why I tend to follow the crowd and why I look like a puppy dog most of the time - tail wagging or hung between my legs - depending on the situation. I am NOT a good poker player - and I doubt I ever will be. But I surround myself with people who care a LOT about me and who are very strong in spirit. I hate to be alone, but I can be alone and be very content with being alone if it's on my terms. I am not stupid, rather I have the ability to be even better than I am now, given the proper circumstances - and the desire to achieve. I hate being controlled by people, but I am not very good at keeping people from controlling me. I have a lot to learn, but you know, I just got tears in my eyes thinking about how proud I am of who I am. My life could have been so much different if I had held anything against the people who made me who I am today. I long ago made peace with the fact that there is nothing I can change about what happened to me in the past. What I can change is how I react to it in the future - and what life lessons I take from it now.



What does not kill me, makes me stronger.
- Friedrich Nietzsche