i wrote this in july 2014

I mostly only know pain, as a mode. so being loving, kind and caring is a sort of weird unfamiliar character I awkwardly embody when I want nothing more than to feel like I belong alongside people I like who do it apparently naturally. I am generous, open and kind, I know, abstractly, but I don't expect it from others. I expect the opposite. humans are functional, no? functions of their emotions and drives.  

I don't want to be manipulative any more, I don't want to be manipulated. language is hard. 

phrasing, pacing, and spacing this is hard. 

mostly I am exhausted. I'm sorry you received my pain the other day, I feel ashamed about it, sure, but exhausted of the shame too. then resentment, then self pity, then shame, and so on, it's so boring. it's no wonder we can't chat. but I know it would probably make things better. but what things? 

talking leads to understanding - and that's what i've been trying to do this past year, understand why everything. talk about it - not easy. rage - yeah.

I couldn't talk to you, I didn't know what you needed or wanted from me, and I couldn't contend with everything I was feeling. I was weaker then (aug/sept 2013) than i'd ever been before - I am still weak now. I have little life force in me. I am shell/shadow of my former self. But every one of us anarchists (lol) know that you have to destroy to rebuild.* 

I was destroyed by what happened. is still happening. the environment still toxic, from my toxicity (and yours? and others?). 

I'm rebuilding from the beginning, from when I 'became my own person' (fascinating concept, overused, misunderstood), and made those initial decisions that helped shaped the person that I am now. understand some things about me, here - maybe it'll be like white noise though.

I was raped when I was 14, by two men, one I lost my virginity to, the other groomed me online. I was looking for love, I realise now, outside myself, my home was too dangerous, and barren, no security and stability. Lots of violence, emotional manipulation, and depression. I was numb, tense and unstable. I abused myself and others for years, all through my teens. I was lost, and felt secure only in my ability to gain sex, my sexuality became my worth, and my only worth, my only tool. I was stupid, university was hard and I was depressed. I finished my last exam and my mom attempted suicide but survived. I don't remember anything from university, I have a very painful relationship with my mom. something about chaotic attachment ((pop)).

When I started squatting, in queer social groups, I thought I was there because I was into the idea of a fluxing identity, but I was also there because I knew I was marginal in my expression of my sexuality. aka compulsive and numb/free/sad. I had finally 'found myself'; safe next to others who were also frightened, not-belonging, uncertain but importantly, non judgemental. 

I was finally newly beginning to feel empowered after years of blind, vague bump and drift through friendship groups, lovers, haters, when I met you and everyone else at the gym. 

I knew I would ruin it somehow, most likely with 'my sexuality', blindly, numbly, my sole worth. As I always have done, and I did. 

it's been hard to get over that and feel empowered again. 

When the trauma happened last summer, I didn't deserve to feel happy, it was true, I could 'only have been being used'. they said. 'he lies', you said. I didn't trust anyone. 

I looked at my traumas, i've been going to rape and sexual assault councilling now since january. it's boring to be a victim, it's lame to be a survivor, but it's my only individual activism. 

Around that time, back then, early days when you would still talk to me, when you, and others, told me you loved me, I couldn't and still can't really digest it, because hurt and pain and disgust are too habitually linked to allow any warmth to come from being presented with that concept (love). It is a new process, to learn to be loved and to love. To act lovingly, and to transmit love. When you don't love yourself. reading like classic pop-psych but we both know it's true. 

I want so much to feel warmth and love for you, instead of this rotten, bitter, resentful pit of bile (that I am, usually), and that I am working to purge. Moving to wilds rents stopped me from almost complete mental breakdown again, but i've been having a slow one ever since last year. My chest is often a tight suffocating bundle, and I can't breathe at my desk at work every day, or sat around the table with people laughing, and I have nothing, at all to say. 

except sad noises, and stories. I don't want to be this victim, my mom has been one her whole life and I can't be her too. I have to break the cycle. 

I am desperate to. desperate.

I know you have pain. You told me, but all I heard was white noise. Your pain became mine, mingled, ignited, surfaced and exposed. Your friends relayed your pain for you, I felt so alone. The sniffing lone wolf was mercifully given one chance to impress, and upon disrespecting an established member, was kicked out. I felt like I had noone. you had an army of female warriors, and from my perspective, all the security that a friend family can provide. Including warding off treacherous creatures. 

i'll find the foster families where I can, scream into the shelter until they can't bear it and then move on to the next. eventually i won't need to scream any more.

I'm trying to rebuild by feeling feelings I didn't feel before because it wasn't safe to. wilds rents feels safe - ish. anger, sadness, hurt, shame. 

I/we are changed. I/we have so much to do, but we began when we met, and we are still at it now. 

*confused thanks for being a player in this rebuild.