If it is not broken

[Nanuq]

Hi,
Have you ever had any counselling?
You seen to have so much stuff going on.

[Spideysenses]

Fascism: I sometimes fear...
I sometimes fear that
people think that fascism arrives in fancy dress
worn by grotesques and monsters
as played out in endless re-runs of the Nazis.

Fascism arrives as your friend.
It will restore your honour,
make you feel proud,
protect your house,
give you a job,
clean up the neighbourhood,
remind you of how great you once were,
clear out the venal and the corrupt,
remove anything you feel is unlike you...

It doesn't walk in saying,
"Our programme means militias, mass imprisonments, transportations, war and persecution."

[Spideysenses]

As you are shifting
You will begin to realise you are
Not the same person you used to be.
Sing. The things you used to tolerate
Have now become unacceptable.
When you once remained quiet, remain,
You are now speaking your truth.
Where you once battled and argued you are now
Choosing to remain silent.
You are beginning to understand the value of your voice
And there are some situations that no longer
Deserve your time, focus and energy.

[Spideysenses]

A breakdown is due to trying to be strong for too long. Talking to one person once is sometimes enough. Except life does not always grant you the right person at the right time. So maybe I am a touch lucky to be here. I am where I want to be. I am in the headspace I need to be in.

[Spideysenses]

Sometimes we have to say: f##k them.
I cannot deal with this at this very second so I have to say (in my head): they can get to f##k, I cannot deal with this right now. I have to deal with it later.
Ah f##k they did not just say that. Do not say: stuff it. No need to tell anyone to go to hell. Do say to yourself: F##k them. I do not have to listen to them. Agree to disagree.

[Spideysenses]

Odd accused me of projecting. No. Odd was using displacement.
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/basics/displacement

[Spideysenses]

Displacement in Therapy and Mental Health

Defense mechanisms crop up for everyone from time to time; displacement only interferes with mental health when it becomes habitual or interferes with daily life, such as a job or relationship.

Displacement may relieve distress or preserve self-esteem in the moment but damage well-being over time. The reaction can exacerbate personal problems or relationship conflict while failing to address the underlying problem.

It can be difficult to recognize displacement, so a therapist can be a helpful guide. The therapist may observe patterns in which a patient seems to overreact or redirect frustration onto a seemingly unrelated person. The pair can then explore the root cause so the patient can move forward.

Why does displacement occur?
Displacement takes place because it’s sometimes safer or easier to focus on a less threatening person. In the case of the employee who is reprimanded by his boss, responding in anger could cost him his job. Responding differently would require skills of confrontation and conflict resolution. Displacing his anger onto his spouse or child provides a less powerful, lower stakes, and more controllable target.

How does displacement manifest in therapy?
Displacement may arise in therapy for patients who struggle with anger problems. Anger may be often related to adverse childhood experiences (ACEs), such as physical, emotional or sexual abuse, neglect, witnessing violence, parental divorce, and parental alcohol or substance abuse.

These individuals may not have been able to acknowledge or fully process their emotions as children. It can be overwhelming to endure pain and not be able to seek comfort from a caretaker who perpetrates this suffering, so anger may be displaced onto someone else. This pattern can continue throughout adulthood: Problems with authority, law enforcement, bullying, or relationships can lead someone to seek therapy. These emotions and experiences can then be explored.

How can people counter displacement?

What’s the difference between displacement and projection?
Projection is another defense mechanism, in which people attribute their feelings or desires to someone else. For example, if a bully constantly ridicules a peer about his insecurities, the bully might be projecting his own struggle with self-esteem onto the other person. Projection and displacement are similar, but projection involves misinterpreting the target’s motivations, while displacement involves misattributing one’s own response

Psychology today

[Spideysenses]

Professional life goal - make good art

[Spideysenses]

I rebelled. Off the rails. It was nipped in the bud. My body is a temple. It was not street drugs. Alcohol is a controlled drug. My parents were only interested in their own social lives and giving me a good start in life was not considered important to them. I was bottom of their pecking order. I spent so much time with my grandparents as a youth. We went to the beach/woods/the park every Sunday when the weather permitted and had tea and cakes with our extended family.
It was jarring to then have them turned against me. Many of my teachers seem to take an attitude similar to theirs. I was so smart so I could figure it all out on my own. I also felt like they did not want to endorse someone from my "disadvantaged" (working-class) background. They did not think I lacked confidence. When it became clear, that I was not going down the "safe" academic route, instead of seeing it as a choice, I was condemned. In smaller communities mud sticks but I had made the right choice. Their attitude showed me that I was right to find an alternative route.

[Spideysenses]

At eighteen, if my parents could get away with it, they would rather have silenced me so I didn't get better, rest up and find the courage to talk. They would not have cared what happened to me. Through their scapegoating campaign of lies and manipulation, my grandparents would take my mum's side come hell or high water and they believed one hundred and one per cent, that others would consider the conspiracy theories if they enforced them enough. They did try and silence me by ignoring a positive prognosis in favour of their warped agenda. I was very reluctant to talk. I made an anonymous blog hidden in an online forum. Hidden and hidden again. Ripping off the plaster and stitches is not a decision to be taken lightly.

After 28 days I was sent home after the doctors went over the conclusion with me and me alone. It was like a slap in the face to my parents. Their control was compromised and cracks were appearing. Respect must be earned. Having power over someone by fear will have consequences. The tide will turn and people will push back. What my parents would do with that stinging pain would be what they always did. How dare I oust them. How did I manage to do it? I was just a little girl. I was just a girl. I had no power to change anything. Men had the power. It was inconceivable that I would be listened to over them.

I overheard my mum say to my grandad: "I did not like the woman doctor. A man would not have taken pity on err." They were cut from the same cloth. They lied and I told the truth! Their motives were rumbled. I was listened to. What century were my parents living in you say? Not modern UK. Not the enlightened freedom fighting Scots.

I have had male psychiatrists who were equally as easy to speak to and cared about what I was doing and planned to do with my life. I spoke to male officers when making a statement but I was asked if I would only speak to female officers. I think that it was good for me to have seen female doctors because I did not grow up around that many working professional women in my close family or the circle of friends I grew up with. Some did not respect themselves as much as they were supposed to.

I am the one who has grown up and done the heavy lifting with family. They still live a double life towards me. If people have listened to me it is not because I asked or begged. It is because I was worthy of it. I fought hard for it. I went after the truth. I was screwed over and thrown to the wolves. It wasn't right, just or fair that I was eighteen and made to feel that one month, would equate to the end of my life. So I set out to hone my art.

I was listened to and straight off the bat and it was understood that it was a genuine breakdown. I started to believe that my future could be a lot different from the past. I had to keep doing what I was doing and one day the bad relationship would also sink down to the back of my memory, and my subconscious would be able to deal with it.

[Spideysenses]

Perspective: Uneventful is good. Uneventful means things went well.

[Spideysenses]

It has taken this long to get my dragon to retreat to its lair. It is about having someone to relate to at a point in life when you feel alone. Being able to inspire someone to look at their own resources within as well as reach out.

I could have blamed the collapse. For the rest of my life, I could have solely blamed everything that happened in my life which had led to the collapse for ruining my life and stopping it in its tracks. I could have not just blamed the cuts and lacerations life and people dealt me, I could have held them accountable until I died because they were accountable for me feeling how I did. Feeling trapped. Bad luck was really bad people in my life. Friends, mentors and family. I was made to feel like I was the one who had let everyone down. The stigma of having been in rehab that followed the collapse could have dictated my whole life. The collapse and the stigma (attached to drug addicts when I never was an addict) only happened because of what happened in my life. I did not need help with my choices. I made peace with them and got back on course. I spoke to who I needed to when I needed to and I was lucky in that respect. I needed help to escape from others who made my life hell. Others cruelly knocked me back off course. I needed the time and space to pull the threads of my life together away from the people who had backed me into a corner.

It has dawned on me that Odd's abusive ways were more like my old dear than never left. Trying to make me feel like I did not deserve more from life. That I could not change anything. He himself was emotionally troubled and damaged. He enjoyed violence because it made him feel big. I had been through enough madness and abuse from my family to have carried on with what he was throwing at me and to allow him to think that he could threaten me and get away with it. Writing was never a silver lining. It was not a far-off dream to help me cope with a harsh reality. It was my goal from day one. Not this garbling recollections. To be a storyteller. To write a Good vs Evil adventure as old as time. A good old-fashioned love story. The main difference between sci-fi and fantasy is as follows: sci-fi has rivets and fantasy has trees. So let's world-build thinking Fantasy.

[Spideysenses]

Downplaying my existing computer skills on my cv was wrong. I should have changed it rather than taken advice from someone I hardly knew from Adam. I could navigate a computer before primary school. I cannot give my family credit for much, but they would encourage me to be active. I never had any interest in coding, programming or the mechanics of tech and machinery. If I pursued the science route in further education, I would have been interested in biology and organic matter. Not computer science. What is alive and breathing. The natural world. With computing, I only ever wanted to know enough. I selected biology and chemistry. I could have taken physics for the full set. But it just was not my path. I knew that something malevolent was waiting and it was close. Women's intuition spoke to me.

I could have gone into the corporate world like some of my family. Like many bright students fall into. I chose not to. Why turn my back on what I thought was a beautiful part of the world? For what? I was using my brain but for the right reasons? For me? For the men in my family who never had my interests at heart at all and who I did not want to be like in any way shape or form or the women who already hated me for having a brain and the will to achieve something in my life? I had to look after my own interests because everyone in my life was selfish. I hated feeling selfish.

I am self-motivated. I was forced to feel like I had to turn my cv inside out and put focus on the people skills sections when that was natural to me long before then. I had found my feet before. I could get there again.
I had to downplay what I was actually good at because there were not many jobs available to me in my home area. I went against the grain because I needed to survive. But I did not want to do that forever. Why can't I play to my strengths? How was I going to meet people on my brainwave if I was taking jobs that were suited to people who were vastly different to me? I had to break the cycle at some point. I did not know that I would have to break down to mend first. Eighteen did not need to happen but because it did, I had to turn to my art even more. I had to keep the creative spark. I got back on track. The minute I chose to write and come clean I was on the right track. I knew what I was at eighteen. I fought tooth and nail to get into this headspace.

I am not wallowing in the past or dwelling on what might have been. Odd did what he did to me - almost left me stranded - because he thought that compared to him I was nothing. I could not let this happen to me again. The temptation to change and harden up was growing louder, but to me that was giving up.

[Spideysenses]

Thinking is difficult.
That is why most people judge.

Carl Gustav Jung

[Spideysenses]

I have not ruled out a counsellor. I am certain that I have unravelled all the threads I need to, and have all the tools I need for the future. I feel that going any further will just be splitting hairs. I need to live. To move on is to grow.

[Spideysenses]

I have said that Odd would not change for me. Odd would not change the way he was towards me. Odd would not change his violent ways for me. Odd wanted control above all else. I had given up more than I should have had to. I simply said to myself: no more. Their upbringing made them emotionally hardened so they are not to blame for the abuse?
I went through the process of realising that my upbringing had left me unable to fully feel my feelings at times and that was why I drank to excess. It is not like that now. I have worked through the stages. The brain will numb emotions to get by. I had every right to go through a rebellious phase and to have had to deal with depressive feelings. I had to be over cautious. I had to figure out a lot on my own and made mistakes. I am in the mind space I need to be in.
My blood father was army and so was his father. My mums father, my grandfather was navy. She was (still is) a brat. Her mother, my grandmother was an alcoholic. My step-dad does not do emotions. His dad was an alcoholic. He drinks every night after work never a day off. Emotions were a problem in my family. Only certain emotions were permissible. On their terms.
But I got myself help. I did not do what the others around me did and hit out at others. I stood up for myself. That is different. Seeing the way others had failed or made themselves worse was a learning curve for a young me. I made the right decisions.

[Spideysenses]

Odd had left me without the livelihood I had worked so hard to reattain. Smashed self-worth. A shadow of my former self. A nervous wreck. Frayed nerves.

[Spideysenses]

Truthtelling treats people with dignity. To tell someone the truth is a measure of respect that is missing when someone is lied to

[Spideysenses]

When I said no more work b!t##£s, I did not mean the American usage. I literally meant: no more bitches at work to deal with. At work women can be the worst to one another. Some men are worse gossips than women. I am talking about burly tradesmen who want to know everything about everyone.

[Spideysenses]

A woman keeps her secrets
White lies protect the ones we love

[Spideysenses]

A classmate committed suicide at the end of primary. It was an accident. I wondered if he would have been in my art class. He probably would have. I knew he would have. I think I could feel the loss.

[Spideysenses]

I was working two jobs. I was taxed astronomically on the second job. I blame the conspiracy theories that hounded my life after being in rehab in the hospital even though I knew it was more than that. Everyone made me feel like if I did not stay with Odd that I would end up alone. I felt indebted to him for not breaking up the relationship when nobody would have criticised him for leaving as he was a young man. Yes even though I was on suicide watch for the first days I was in rehab. I know I needed to be there. I was only eighteen. Five years later, it was clear that going it alone was better than being with the wrong person.

[Spideysenses]

I was well respected by my peers growing up. I was top of my class without applying myself. Post-rehab my family went out of their way to try and protect themselves. They did not need to go to the lengths they did. My old dear kept the feud going between her and my now late father. Stirring up theories about there being a flaw that must come from his side. I really did not need that. My own family should have been trying to protect my privacy and above all else; my future. I am proud to be Scottish. Land of the brave. I know I was lucky to be born here. The Scots are generally open-minded. What my family did was un-Scottish.
So at the start, I blamed myself for messing up my chances when in actuality I knew all along that the odds were stacked against me and that my family had ruined many of my chances before I was in rehab for one month. How to commit murder in a small town.

[Spideysenses]

That bread is fresh why are you putting it in the toaster?

Why am I putting bread in the toaster? What do you think will pop up when I put bread in the toaster? The sugar plum fairy? Seriously mither. I want toast. The only reason someone ever puts bread in a toaster is so toast magically appears. Peanut butter does not melt into the bread. I need toast

You could have said that you were having peanut butter first instead of all the cheek. I don't eat peanut butter! I do not like peanut butter.

I will bear that in mind the next time you ask me the initial question of: why am I putting bread in a toaster

It is breakfast and you already have an argument under your belt

I don't argue with everyone. I learnt from you: ask a stupid question get a stupid answer

Thin ice girl

[Spideysenses]

I do not think that my blood father was a bad person. He was very intelligent and mild mannered. It was life that had made him so bitter. My mum left him for selfish reasons too. Faults on both sides. I was my own person. It was all about finding a balance. Not pretending that everything was ship shape all of the time.