Crying Girl Update

Back in 2003, I posted about being The Crying Girl at the bus station.

After spending the night at my boyfriend's house in Derry, he unceremoniously sent me back on to a bus to Belfast (about two and half hours away). I was so confused. Why?

Nothing significant happened between the night before and the morning of. We took care of his infant daughter, who was sickly, and that was all. It always bothered me that I couldn't put the pieces of the puzzle together.

The "official" story was that it was his mate's birthday and they were going to have a "lad's night out." I said that was fine, I would go do touristy stuff around Derry. But they wouldn't be home until late. That's fine, I'll stay at the hostel downtown. Nope, that was a stupid idea. The dumbest idea he's every heard of, in fact. Shocked and aghast, I rode in the passenger seat to the bus station and walked away. "Don't let him see you cry!" I was saying to myself as my eyes betrayed me and welled up with tears. Fine, I just won't face him. He said goodbye. I said nothing.

Fast forward fifteen years, give or take. Believe you me, whenever we had our period contact, I asked him MANY times what the deal was with that kick to the curb, with no sufficient answer. I moved countries, fell in and out of love, suffered loss, became a teacher, started law school and then one simple electronic conversation brought it into focus.

In a recent conversation, it finally made sense. The night before the baby, something happened. We stayed at a bed and breakfast for a nice little romantic time together. (I will have to check my old blogs for the timing of this exactly, but I think that's the sequence of events.) Everything was hunky dory until I had a PTSD flashback while he was on top of me.

I had been raped by a former boyfriend about ten years prior. I thought I had worked through things, but this hyper emotional setting and the physical similarities between he and the rapist must have set me off (not that there ever has to be a reason). So I pushed him off of me. Apparently, I looked at him with such fear that he said he now knows what a rapist sees looking back at him.

Once it was over and we had moved on from it, I thought it was over. It wasn't. It still isn't. At least not for him. It really affected him.

Every time I think I have a grasp of how rape has affected me, I find something new. Rape and violent crime affects so many people close to the survivors in ways I never even imagined. When people think that because something happened years ago, it's over; here is another example of why it's not. Ten years after the fact, someone who I didn't even know when it happened, was directly affected by the trauma of rape.

It does not go away.

One relationship in my life that I thought wasn't affected by the attack; really was after all. Now I realize, they all are and forever will be.

View from the other side

“I will not give you what you really need, I can’t. I am too busy trying to get what I need and deserve from you. I can give you a bit of this and that if you like, but nothing that requires honest emotional investment because I am not emotionally available. I am really just empty. I am really about smoke and mirrors. I love you so much though, I’d never hurt you. But then again, how would I know if I hurt you because I am substance addicted* and oblivious to conscience or the feelings you have anyway, you know? You, on the other hand, you are emotionally available and luckily for you, I am here to demand and take endlessly from your compassion and empathic stores of emotion. You can chase me if you like, but you won’t catch me. What will happen is that the more you chase, the more I will get you and as I get you, you will get more caught up in trying to fix me than caring about yourself. I have you right where I want you.”

*Does not have to be substance addicted – just toxic, codependent, narcissistic, etc.

From A.J. Mahari September 24, 2007

I read this and I got a pain in my chest it hit home so hard. This is about trauma bonds. We get in relationships to work out issues from past trauma in our lives. It was hard core stuff that was right on the money for me. So here's a questionnaire to answer with yes or no. 

1.) Do you obsess about people who have hurt you even though they are long gone?

2.) Do you continue to seek contact with people whom you know will cause you further pain?

3.) Do you go "overboard" to help people who have been destructive to you?

4.) Do you continue to be a "team" member when obviously things are becoming destructive?

5.) Do you continue attempts to get people to like you who are clearly using you?

6.) Do you trust people again and again who are proven to be unreliable?

7.) Are you unable to retreat from unhealthy relationships?

8.) Do you try to be understood by those who clearly do not care?

9.) Do you choose to stay in conflict with others when it would cost you nothing to walk away?

10.) Do you persist in trying to convince people that there is a problem and they are not willing to listen?

11.) Are you loyal to people who have betrayed you?

12.) Do you attract untrustworthy people?

13.) Have you kept damaging secrets about exploitation or abuse?

14.) Do you continue contact with an abuser who acknowledges no responsibility?

15.) Do you find yourself covering up, defending, or explaining a relationship?

16.) When there is a constant pattern on non-performance in a relationship, do you continue to expect them to follow through anyway?

17.) Do you have repetitive, destructive fights that are no win for anybody?

18.) Do you find that others are horrified by something that has happened to you and you are not?

19.) Do you obsess about showing someone that they are wrong about you, your relationship, or their treatment of you? 

20.) Do you feel stuck because you know what the other is doing is destructive but you believe you cannot do anything about it? 

21.) Do you feel loyal to someone even though you harbor secrets that are damaging to others?

22.) Do you move closer to someone you know is destructive to you even though you do not trust, like or care for the person?

23.) Does someone's talents, charisma, or contributions cause your to overlook destructive, exploitative, or degrading acts?

24.) Do you find you cannot detach from someone even though you do n trust, like or care the person?

25.) Do you find yourself missing a relationship even to the point of nostalgia and longing, that was so awful it almost destroyed you? 

26.) Are extraordinary demands placed on your to measure up as a way to cover up exploitation? 

27.) Do you keep secret someone's destructive behavior because of all of the good they have done or the importance of their position or career?

28.) Does your relationship have contacts or promises that have been broken which you are asked to overlook?

29.) Are you attracted to "dangerous" people?

30.) Do you stay in a relationship longer than you should? 

Let's tally up your score!  You should have 0 yes answers! 

You enter into these trauma bond relationships in order to work out the issues from a past traumatic relationship in your life. You will keep on having the same relationship over and over and over again until you resolve whatever it is you need to resolve. So work on that. Get in therapy, STAT! 

Angel versus Bad boy

I was just tidying up the kitchen, thinking the random thoughts that run through my head and I had a total revelation. Okay, maybe not SO random thoughts. Since everyone now has a Facebook  someone that you haven't spoken with in say, twenty years, pops up and you may be intrigued. In this case, I was terrified. I quickly blocked the person, all of their family, changed my screen name and went into full on ninja mode. This is the person who raped me all those years ago. I haven't had any contact with him since the actual attack. Now, this wasn't just a random stranger whose history I didn't know. This was a friend. An ex-boyfriend to be precise. He was a bad boy and I was his angel.

Instead of starting at where we met, I'll fast forward to the day of the attack. I had been volunteering for the Humane Society (angel) and then started cataloging the songs on my radio recorded cassette tapes (nerd), when my friend from across the alley called me to see if I wanted to hang out. I asked who all would be there and she said her stepbrother, Cliff and his friend, bad boy. I declined, because I didn't want to be in close proximity with bad boy. Since our relationship had ended, he had taken the bad boy-ness up a notch or two. All the way to the big house. If I recall correctly, we hung up, I went back to cataloging my cassettes and she called again later. She was going bowling. I believe there may have been a guilt trip involved somehow. Maybe she didn't want to be with bad boy alone? Maybe she said I was overreacting about avoiding bad boy (more likely). I don't know. Either way, I give in and go to the bowling alley. Bad boy is there on a pay phone (archaic). I decide to get this shit out of the way ASAP and walk right up to him. I stop short and he is surprised to see me. I've got walls up as high and as strong as Fort Knox and he senses it.

Fast forward again, because frankly, I don't remember a lot, or actually anything else about the bowling alley. Somehow we are alone on a walk and I am asking him point blank about jail and his court case and what he did and if he did drugs and I think I am just so hard core because I'm showing him I know what he's about and I'm not falling for his shit. He seems beguiled, maybe. He tells me about it and then things start to turn. I should note here, that since this time, I've checked the court records and it was only two days prior (as in what would have been, "the day before yesterday") that he was in court. Here's where the angel part comes in again.

He says he has changed his ways. This experience (jail) has shown him the error of his ways. He no longer does drugs. He doesn't live a life of crime anymore. He is good now. He is worthy of me now, his angel.

My saviour mode goes into overdrive and now I want to help make him an angel, too. And not in the way I had tried before by ripping up his cigarettes. In a much, much bigger way. This wasn't about stopping smoking, this was about a changed soul.

I had fallen in the trap.

To be continued...