I sometimes discover things about myself when feeding my chickens. It provides a good time to think about things, especially when I sit and feed my disabled trans-rooster, Antonio (he started crowing, so I guess that even though he used to look just like a hen, and had no spurs when he was younger, that was "Antonia" coming out as a male).
I was thinking about why it was so important, and so terrifying, to me to come out as bisexual to my family--and especially to my uncle, who shits all over LGBT people in one way or the other, it seems, almost every time I see him. And I realized something.
Long before I knew I was bisexual, I hated myself for being "weak."
I don't use the words "hate" or "self-hatred" lightly. It was more than anger that I have felt towards myself. I have wanted to hurt and punish myself. I have hated myself.
And it was very early on. I remember being as young as seven, or maybe younger; seven is the age I remember. And I didn't find out that a girl could get my heart racing just like a guy, until I was twenty-three, about two years ago.
But all of my life, I have felt a lot of pressure to be "tough" or "strong." I hated myself for being hurt in my heart by his bullying, especially to such a painful degree. I always knew my mother loved me, but she basically told me to let it go. I couldn't, though, so I had absolute hatred for myself, because I couldn't let it go.
Worse was the way she phrased it. "He's just giving you a bad time." An adult would take this as, "He's just teasing/playing with you," but a child will take it literally. I heard, "He is making you have a bad life, and I don't care. He's JUST giving you a bad time."
Then there was my grandmother, saying so sweetly and sincerely, "He just does that, because he loves you."
So I was crazy and too sensitive--too "weak"--when I was hurt by him. And I hated myself for it, all my life.
My mom finally believed me that I wasn't choosing to hold onto what he did, that I couldn't just "let it go," when I talked about him "tickling" me: "I couldn't breathe--I felt like I was drowning!" She said, "I think you have PTSD."
So now that she knew I feared for my life, and felt like I was dying, there was a label for it, and now that there was a label for it, she knew I wasn't choosing to dwell on it. (Though frankly, she should have believed me even if there wasn't a label to attach to how I felt, but the fact that people need labels to legitimize things, to themselves or others, is a whole other topic.)
And potentially having trauma and PTSD makes it a little easier not to blame myself, even deep down, for being too "weak" not to come out, or to just put him in his place in general.
Every time I'm around him, especially when he shits on the people he doesn't agree with (anyone he doesn't like), I feel scared, just like I would have if he had waterboarded me.
(And he never can disagree, without expressing what I can only describe as hatred--and I am very cautious with that term, because I don't like it being thrown around lightly. So I literally can't hear this very contrary contentious individual disagree with anything, LGBT or otherwise, without being triggered by it, because I'm traumatized and afraid of him.)
My mom also speculated that it might have actually been "easier" for me, in a way, if his abuse had been sexual (or he touched me in a "sexual" place; I think he got turned on, in a way, by having complete power over people, like women and those very small).
I suspected what she had, too, though I have no idea if it is true or not, and I'm just lucky that I don't know. But everyone knows that sexual abuse is very traumatic; and with other forms of abuse, not so much. So I ended up blaming myself for being "weak." And my mom didn't believe me that in telling me to let it go, she was reinforcing this, shaming me for being too "weak" to let it go.
If you can't let something go, it may be because of PTSD or something else that is wrong--some kind of trauma. If you can't let something go, it may not be your fault, and there may be things you can do to make things easier on yourself. You may not be "too weak" or have a "weak" character.
I also hated myself for being too "weak" to get my driver's license, for a long time. But I've had a traumatic experience when I first learned to drive, with an angry drunken man following and threatening my mother and me, while I was driving, and still learning the very basic fundamentals of driving, while fearing for my life. And my first driving tester was so condescending and cruel that he reminded me of my uncle. So this was not me being "too weak" either.
And I hated myself for having too "weak" a character to continue to read my bible and pray, and struggle to get close to God, like I had always done. It was just too painful, and still is, and I don't even know or care if there's anyone there anymore. But people who lose their faith are absolutely despised and vilified in evangelical culture, and guess what I did to myself when it became too painful to try to reach out to God? I have had this struggle not to hate myself for these "weaknesses" and "character flaws" all of my life.
To my knowledge, I don't hate myself for being gay--or at least, not nearly as much as I have always hated myself for being "weak." My uncle's hateful voice is in my head all the time, any time I watch, read, or write anything even remotely gay. This is because I dread, every day, the next time I see him, even though I see him only every few weeks.
I used to dread seeing my grandparents, on my father's side (not my uncle's parents) in much the same way, until my grandmother and my family had a huge falling out and I didn't speak to or see them for at least six months. Now, I only see them a few times a year (and they were not nearly as bad as he was). But this made me feel better, whether it was because my grandparents know we can do that again, or because I spent a few months totally free of the worry of seeing them again.
So I'm thinking of being "sick" for family gatherings for a while, even as the holidays are coming up. (Even though I shouldn't be excluded from the family; he should.) And I'm going to try searching for exercises for PTSD and trauma, maybe even see a therapist for it to give me more techniques. Even if I don't "officially" have PTSD, these things can only help. But if they don't work completely, I may have to be "sick" at convenient times, at least for a while.
And if this doesn't work...well...maybe I'll have to have a falling out with him, so he knows to respect boundaries, or he's not in my life at all. I'll have to do it by phone, because of the trauma he has caused me.
I wonder if coming out will start an argument with him...
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