I let them off the hook

When is it enough? When is it bad enough? Day after day we endure micro traumas, day after day we are reminded how un-safe we are as women. Day after day we see sexual predators get away (sometimes literally) with murder. Court case after court case we see the victim get vilified and blamed for the attack, and always we are told we must worry about the reputation, the future, the life of the perp...meanwhile our lives are forfeit, apparently.

So when is it enough for us to get justice, for us to get compassion, for us to not be asked what it was we did wrong to cause the attack? And when do we get a fucking break? When is it we don't have to grip our car keys like a weapon as we walk alone to our car, when do we get to chat with some man in the elevator without having to worry that he has taken it the "wrong way" and will follow us to our apartment, when will we be able to walk down the street without some man commenting on our body and knowing we better not talk back or we'll "get what we deserve"?

I've been having trouble acknowledging both the seriousness (vileness?), and the impact of various incidents of varying levels of fucked-upness. Hell, I still can't call them what they are; they have always been the "incidents" or "weirdness" or just "that thing with (so and so)". And because I couldn't allow myself to name them for what they are, even though they felt like violations I've had this internal battle of shame, self-doubt, this endless tug-of-war of the Judges in my head saying "it wasn't that bad" and my Spirit saying "Fuck me, I was violated."

And as I dig a little deeper some things are finally falling into place. I was letting these men off the hook, because I have been expertly trained in taking care of everyone else's feelings/needs/wants to the detriment of myself. I let him off the hook. "He didn't know," I've told myself. "I wasn't forceful enough," I've told myself. "I should have fought harder," "I should have known what he was up to and gotten out of the situation sooner", "I never should have trusted him in the first place then I wouldn't have been alone with him" I've told myself. Shit, I've even told myself I should have thought to kill myself since nothing else I tried got me out of the situation. The facts didn't matter because I do not have as much value as them, AND it was more important for me to have no feelings and needs, to be the care taker, to be the one to take the blame, to be the depository for their shitty emotions and deeds; and for Them to have Their needs/wants met, their feelings protected, to be respected.

Here is the reality: My clear boundaries have been disrespected.  My agency has been disrespected. My very existence has been disrespected. And if I dared confront or fight the most common response: "Whats wrong with you? I was just joking." There is no joke in violating someone's body. There is no joke in threatening to assault someone. 

Letting go of that fucked up care-taker bullshit that I didn't even realize was there starts to allow me to see a little more clearly. Recognizing that maybe I should have as much value as everyone else allows me to see a little more clearly. Sharing my stories and having my sisters reflect to me how fucked up those situations are, and that helps me to see a little more clearly. Maybe if my sisters and I keep sharing our stories and lifting each other up we can raise our voices loud enough and everyone will know that enough-is-enough, we are done tolerated the bad behavior, we are done minimizing our situations, we are done letting Them off the hook, and we are done with staying silent.

'Twas But A Flesh Wound: Affirming Trauma

So, an interesting thing happened when I posted my last blog. Although I wrote the blog because of the moment I realized that it was kind of silly to have have a loaded gun under my pillow at one time,  however; my friends (rightly) picked up on the part where I had to fend off an old perv.

If you haven't read the last one, it was inspired by sitting across from someone, talking about an admittedly traumatic event, but no necessarily one I had filed under "Holy Shit, That Was Fucked Up", more "Meh, That Was Some Bullshit". Specifically what was significant to me about this telling of the tale had little to do with the tale, and all to do with as I was talking about planning to run for my .357 (under my pillow) so I could shoot Mr. Perv before he shot me, was the fact that I started laughing uncontrollably at the epiphany I had. The epiphany was that it never occurred to me to lock my doors (not that locking my door in that particular situation would have helped anything), and instead I kept a loaded pistol under my pillow to keep me safe. Granted I was only 16/17 so my frontal lobe had some growing/maturing to do, but still, my thought for protecting myself at night long before locking my doors was to keep a loaded pistol under my pillow.

Anyway, after posting the blog a couple of folks commented about how horrible the situation with Albert was. And I kept thinking, "It's really not that big of a deal," I just thought I was a dope for keeping a gun in my bed! And I really wanted  to respond in way that minimized the situation, but I kept reminding myself that if I minimized this situation, I might be minimizing someone else's situation that resonated with mine.

As I was pondering it a little further during my time on the stationary bike this morning, I started to pick the event a part a little bit, as well as my And here's what I came up with.

1. I think I have trouble recognizing/acknowledging/affirming that i was a really traumatic event. I was terrified, and I was sure for a few moments that one of us was going to die in my house that evening.
2. It was gross. He was a gross, dirty old man, and he was intent on doing no good.
3. Because it only happened one time, AND I got away I stored it as "not a big deal" in spite of the terror I expedience at the time, AND THE FACT THAT I WAS SURE ONE OF US WOULD HAVE TO DIE. He was going to rape me if he could, and I was NOT going to let that happen, so either me or him was going to have to take a bullet.
4. Because I hold it up to other events that didn't go so well for me, I haven't thought of it as a capital "T" trauma. Sucky, terrifying, stupid, but hey, I got away from him before he could do anything to me and he walked out on his own when he knew he would have a fight on his hands.
5. I have no fucking idea how to respond when people acknowledge that I have had a legit traumatic experience.
6. That I always want to spell respond, and "responde" (I had to correct the correct on 3 times even now.
7. I have some (a lot of) judgement about letting him in the house when I already had a sense that there was hinkiness in his intentions. I invited the fucking vampire in...cuz I had to be nice, right? I mean he's a man and from early on we are taught to cater to the men folk; plus he gave me a ride, he gave me food; I have to be nice right, it's not okay to say "no" (and even if you do THEY won't listen anyway)...I can't be rude!
8. Perhaps I need to re-think my perspective on this situation...

I still have some sorting to do to figure this shit out, but I wonder if perhaps part of the not allowing myself to define this as a "big trauma" is due to the self-judgement that I let him into the house (obviously my fault, right?)...and it is my fault, then I don't get to have feelings about it...right? I know to that it's one of those things you force yourself to get used to as a woman...the cat-calls, the inappropriate comments and touch that aren't quite illegal but are definitely and invasion, the attempted assaults that they blow off as "just a joke" when we manage to escape (and suddenly we the one who is wrong, we are the 'bad guy')...then the actual assaults but somehow the perps never seem to have to take legit accountability even if by some alignment of the stars they actually get convicted.

To borrow the words of my friend CW,  "These fuckers couldn't care less that their inability to control themselves impact us for the rest of our lives". And we are left as the walking wounded carrying our physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual traumas with us like basilisk fangs pierced through every fiber of our being, and trauma after trauma gets heaped upon us, day after day. And yet we still have to be nice, we have to take care of everyone, we have to make sure everyone else's needs are taken care of-and if we think about our own needs we are being selfish. And we always have to be a lady...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=86&v=QmJAwsrMQIk&feature=emb_title

The Gun Under My Pillow

When I was 16 I went to live with my dad so I could finish my senior year of high school back at my old high school...my junior year I'd gone to two out of state schools while living with my mother and I couldn't handle another new school. Seriously, like I was going to hang myself when we lived in Texas (see: What if tomorrow is better? (TW: Suicidality)).

Anyway, there's a long story for another day, but the short version is that we had lost the ranch when I was 13, but my dad through a sub-lease had access to the house/buildings and someone else was farming the land. My dad worked "in town" (the town 70 miles away from the ranch where you could actually go to a hospital, or a mini-mall) for his disabled brother during the week.

With me being alone during the week at the ranch, and sometimes on the weekend if the weather/roads were bad I picked up a habit of sleeping with his Ruger .357 under my pillow (yes, fully loaded, and no it didn't have a safety so the safety was not on)...for safety.

I was chatting with someone the other day about the time the sub-lease partner's ranch hand Albert, a fellow in his 70's had picked me up to join him and the other ranch hands for dinner at there bunk house. When he dropped me off he came in the house and unfortunately got pervy-he wrapped his arms and legs around me like a fucking anaconda and tried to kiss me, and that old son-of-a-bitch was strong. Fortunately I was too...it took everything I had to break his hold and during the struggle I was thinking, "I have to break free so I can get to the .357 under my pillow/thank god it's fully loaded, and I have to do it before he does." Fortunately, once I was able to fight my way out of his tenticals he didn't pursue me; he had the audacity to thump the couch and tell me to come sit next to him, which I declined and he finally left on his own.

As I was telling the mini-version of this story I started to laugh at myself. Something about saying it aloud that time gave me a little perspective...I SLEPT WITH A LOADED FUCKING PISTOL UNDER MY PILLOW. What really struck me as funny is that I never locked my door to keep the bad guys out, I SLEPT WITH A FUCKING LOADED PISTOL UNDER MY PILLOW. And I shared that thought, and she pointed out to me that perhaps because of my past the protective part of myself was just, "Fuck you! Mess with me and I'll kill you!" and simply having a barrier (locked door) between me and potential weirdos felt too passive to feel safe. And hell, perfect example-I let the damn vampire right into my house!

At the end of the day, the adults in my life didn't do a very good job of creating a sense of safety, hell, they didn't provide an environment of safety either. By the time I was 16 I was well aware, and had been for many years that he world wasn't a safe place, especially for women. So, I had to create my own safety, and I did that with a loaded pistol under my pillow, and a wall of anger. Unfortunately the wall of anger didn't keep out the people it was supposed to-it seems they were the most immune to it, but the pistol represented tangible safety to me. And it still does.

I have since sold that pistol because it was the same one that I put to my head when I was 20 and when my suicidal thoughts hit hard it just felt a little too easy to have my old friend around. But I continue to "feel" like having a pistol around creates safety for me. Logically I know that statistics show that it generally does not increase a gun owners safety to have a pistol, but there's a 16 year old in me that is mighty glad that pistol was just in the other room the Albert went crazy-eyed pervert on her. Maybe someday I'll have created enough of my own safety, I'll have had enough positive other experiences with other humans, that I'll feel like I can keep/get myself out of bad situations without having a gun around...but I'm not there yet. As I ponder it, I think when I started sleeping with that damn pistol under my pillow was probably the first time since I was 7 that I felt any level of safety.

I need some coffee and a slice of gluten free toast right now, but maybe down the road I'll explore what safety means to me, and other ways I can create a deeper sense of safety in my life...without guns.

FYI, I don't sleep with a pistol under my pillow anymore.