I Have a Place In My Heart For Broken People
I have always had a deep amount of empathy and sympathy for people, along with lofty ideals of charity and giving in community. In many of my close relationships, I have been the one whose soul bleeds for the other person's pain. It is very healing for me to read some of the posts in this group though, because I was raised very isolated (in a cult and with abusive parents to varying degrees), and I think I have always thought that nobody could care about me the way I can care about others. In my healing process from my past, those myths had already begun to melt, but in reading just a few posts here, it's really helping destroy that lie that has held me isolated and unable to be vulnerable or get help.. Left me unable to say exactly what I've been through (instead, minimizing it to a degree that is confusing to people, so that they don't realize how serious it is). When my mother went nuts on me and became dangerously abusive, I had to leave home, at 23. I had just severed from the cult, so I had no friends/community. It was the worst timing possible. I went from a moderately safe (well, in retrospect, I lived in fear of her threats/harassment) middle-class home to staying with a loose friend in a tent, then to staying with a loose relative in a pretty isolated situation (no access to car, etc.). The few friends I had left, who had been outside of the cult, were close to/respectful of their parents, who were acquaintances of/friends with my mom. So at that point, I cut ties with them. I knew they would not believe me or understand how dangerous my mom had gotten toward me. Also, I had to keep my location secret, because my mom would have stalked me since she knew this loose relative (who also wanted to avoid her). This relative I stayed with, it soon became evident, was also harassing and had at times threatening, intrusive behavior. I soon did everything I could to be away from her and essentially put myself into bootcamp to train to be in a homeless shelter (being out and about all the time). Even though I had some painful issues with agoraphobia. (I had spent all my time hiding from the world in my comfortable room with my tv.) I felt like an outcast from society. Like the lonely runaway on the bus or the street curb, that I had only seen in movies, that I had never imagined (in a million years) would be me. I still struggle with feeling unloved, isolated, and somehow unworthy of friendship, with some strange perception of myself as an outcast by a world that will never care. I don't know how to communicate with people about what I've been through. I still need help, but don't know how to get it without seeming desperate/burdening or, alternatively, understating the seriousness of the situation. (All this even though I am a friendly, often outgoing, fun-loving person.) It's as if I find it almost impossible to believe that anyone could or would really care, or I am somehow frightened that they would have ulterior intentions or something. Thanks for reading :) (Any advice/input would be greatly appreciated!)
By:
beautyandlife
Age:
22-25
,
Female
