Long Arm's Reach - Tumblr Posts

By Association

My city puts up a light display for the holidays.  It’s common for families and couples to go and take pics in various spots.

Over the holidays my woman and I went as part of a date. It was cute, and it was a good night.  But recovery, as always, made an appearance.  She’s a goof ball - she kept trying to photo bomb selfies, and couples pictures.  I kept pulling her away and refusing; all I could think of was “He’ll see me in the background and then FIND ME”  

I only really had it in me to explain it to her yesterday, but she completely understood.  She said she had only wished I had told her at the time so she would have stopped being playful about it (thinking I was just being shy).

I can’t shake thinking I ruined a bit of fun for her.  Which makes me really, really sad that he’s tainted a memory for her too.

Damper

It was bound to happen eventually. Truthfully I was expecting it to happen sooner, so I guess my surprise comes from having dodged it this long.

I flipped shit while in the process of having sex last night.

I couldn't even look at her. Even when I did to assure her that I was alright (I wasn't) I looked through her. I couldn't explain what happened; I still can't.

In the positive category, she did everything she was supposed to. She ceased immediately when she realized something was wrong. She held me, left me alone when i needed it, and then held me again when I needed that. She's supportive though a bit ( understandably) bewildered.

She keeps asking what she did that triggered me. I think I'm most upset that I don't know what happened, and despite my "You didn't do anything wrong" she knows that I can't say definitively that it wasn't something she did.

Wrong

I thought that being with someone else would help me think of him less.

It hasn't really.

Despite understanding theoretically that 13 years of deep rooted programming doesn't just rectify itself in a few short months, in actuality it's... a little upsetting.

Borrowed Time

"I’m going to leave you at some point.”

He left it open ended so he could use me, keep me anxious, and hating myself all at the same time.

I wish he’d just done it. Maybe I would have fewer nightmares by now.

The difference between me and fully functional adults is that when they make a mistake, they just move on. When I make a mistake, the world crashes around me, the air escapes my lungs and i simultaneously want to hide under my blankets and scream like a banshee out into the void.

I feel unlovable, incapable and inhuman. I want to claw my skin off and jam a stick through the part of my brain that remembers.

My woman has to spend an hour telling me I am still worthy of love and talks me down from running away.

My brain can't yet process that mistakes no longer equal humiliation and pain. And since I'm not getting the punishment on the outside my brain does it to me on the inside.

I think the abuse robbed me of my capacity for joy; that whole "in the moment" feeling everyone talks about.

It's conditioning from years in the cycle, where a happy few hours came to a screeching halt ( literally) due to some inconsequential blip, and days of misery would follow.

Beware the happy times - the worst ones come next. How do you relax and be present when that's been your programmed mantra?

FuuuuUUUUUCCCKKK

One of my clients is someone he used to work with. They've kept in touch. Dan doesn't keep friends very well, but they're friendsish.

This very vague and loose connection was irksome at first, as my ex could have used him to attempt to fish for information about me. I've relaxed a lot since then he's always remained focused on the business and never asked any probing or suspicious questions. All of the information he had access to was stuff my ex already knew, so no additional risk.

Well.

I stopped by his house to pick up some documents today and there's a person i know from my theatre group sitting on his couch. They met on Bumble and have been dating for 6 months.

We're not best friends or anything, but she's on my Facebook and has seen pics of me and my woman together. She knows I've moved just outside of my city. She knows I'm involved in a theatre production right now. She knows things that could trickle down to my ex through my client that would give him more information.

She may even say something off hand that would be damning. Like how I'm queer. I have no idea how he would react to news like that, but I'd bet money it wouldn't be good.

No longer a low risk connection. And I'm fucking LOSING IT. AGAIN.

As I am looking for a new job, I am subconsciously evaluating the level of public visibility I would have in that role. He had naked pictures and videos of me performing sex acts. And lots of videos with horrible, damaging, abusive and humiliating things he made or manipulated me to say.

I'm sure after all this time he's kept them. He's paranoid, you see, and he'd want to keep these as leverage in case I ever decided to go to the police.

He's also just a jealous, vindictive and angry man. He would be hellbent on destroying me if he perceived that I was more successful/important than him.

I wish I could say this wasn't true anymore. While I can say it hurts less, I can't even confirm that it happens less frequently.

It's incredibly upsetting that despite moving on and finding the most gentle and kind person to be with, he still pervades my thoughts.

I still think about him basically every time I get a quiet moment: in a fitting room, at a red light, in my office, in the shower.

Recovery is a bitch.

I wrote this post in the early weeks of freedom. Nearly three years later I'm still discovering new impacts of the damage.

Rinse, repeat.  Rinse, repeat.

I have started writing a number of my posts with “The worst thing about an abusive relationship is….” and then having to erase it because it isn’t true.  I can’t call this particular aspect or experience the worst thing.  It’s all the worst thing.

Hope to Despair in Minutes

You know that scene in the animated Cinderella were Stepmother tells her she can go to the ball if she finishes all her chores and finds a dress to wear?  Then she and the stepsisters load on the chores so that it’s impossible for her to finish sewing her dress? 

That was him.  He'd tell me at 8pm that we should watch a movie that night, but he’d have to be in bed by 11pm.  I’d also have to finish cleaning the kitchen, making his lunches for the week, prepping dinner for the week, all the laundry, vacuum and scrub the floors, clean the bathroom, change the sheets, and bake something for a snack before we could sit down.

When I inevitably failed, it was my fault, once again, that we couldn’t do anything nice together.  I was never to forget that it was always my fault as I was such a lazy cunt.  It was an excuse for him to be angry and hurt me, and an excuse for me to feel bad about myself 

I still have a hard time looking forward to things.

The flashbacks have eased some over the last 3.5 years. So last night startled me.

She and I are lying in bed winding down watching tiktok on my phone. She reached over me to take my phone out of my hand for some reason and her harm put a bit of pressure on my radius bone ( top of my forearm).

I shouted "Stop!" very intensely and very suddenly. My body went in full rigid alert mode, and she shrunk back like a wounded animal.

I thought about it for a second. He used to grab my arms there and squeeze. It was so painful and I felt so helpless. He'd also grab me there to shake me. There were always little finger shaped bruises on my forearms back then.

I apologised for the sharp response and I explained why it happened. She says she understands, but she blames herself for my reaction

How could she have known something so benign would have triggered a trauma response?

I feel terrible.

A prevailing symptom of my abuse is not believing myself when I don't feel well.

Today I am going to bed early.  My body is feeling symptoms of stress, and it’s high time I started listening to it.

Being sick is an Excuse: Episode Seven

I hurt my shoulder at the gym today. The pain is bad enough that I'm feeling nauseous.

My partner went to get me muscle relaxers, and I'm in the shower filled with doubt. Is the pain really that bad or am i making it up.

Imagine questioning the existence of your own pain while feeling pain.

If that doesn't sum up your brain after abuse I don't know what would.

I always assume that everyone struggles with confidence at one time or another.  So I ask myself,  do I actually have residue from the abuse or do I just lack resilience? 

I’m sure you know how my brain answers.

I wrote this the day after my first-ever post. I was a mess. I'm still a mess, but it's a different kind of mess.

I still wonder at times if I need someone to 'keep me in line.' I have a partner who is kind and gentle, and has no interest in taming or training me.

I still don't trust that I am good enough to be hers. Or anyone's.

Uphill all the way

Sometimes I feel like he’s right. That I’m crazy. That he is a good man who tried so hard to help me become a functioning adult. That I was just too fucked up to make him happy.

It’s a funny thing to be trained not to trust yourself.

Begone!

I don't know how it's possible but I'm still finding paperwork with both of our names on it. I'm cleaning out some stuff I've been putting off since moving in with my partner, and i just found one of our void cheques.

There's a story about those cheques that i don't think I've ever told, but for now just know I'm nauseous just looking at our names together.