I Don't Know Yall, But I Genuinely Wish You The Best Of Luck In Your Endeavors! We're In This Shit Together...

Confessions from an emotional abuse victim:

#2 Tough Love

Recently, I've been finding myself thinking about the concept of 'tough love'. That is one of the terms I used to describe the abuse and manipulation before I fully accepted that I had been abused. But the thing is, what he did was not love.

Love is not being judgemental. Love is not being brutally 'honest' about someone else's flaws because they should fix them.

Love is making sure someone is cared for even if they don't ask for it or are a bit apprehensive. Love is when my friend noticed I was acting a bit different and asked me when I last drank something. After I told her I didn't know, she told me I should drink something. I refused and said I was fine, but she still went and bought me a bottle of water and made me drink it in front of her.

I feel like the term 'tough love' isn't really a term that should be used in the first place though. Even though there are situations like that, where it seemingly fits the term and is actually okay, it's still a slippery slope into justifying abuse.

If people would point out that my abuser was being really harsh to me, I could say it was just because he cared. It was because he wanted me to improve as a person so I could do better. His punches and kicks and yelling and degrading were just his way of saying he cares. It's 'tough love'. This term helped catch me, and I'm sure many others as well, into the cycle of justifying the actions of my abuser. It let me believe it was my fault for feeling hurt from what he did.

I think it might be time to retire this concept. Yes, sometimes you need to be a little pushy to make sure someone you love is cared for, but even then, you still should be kind. Honestly, that doesn't need its own term. It's just being caring. We don't need any more ways for victims caught in the throes of abuse to try to justify it.

My first Tumblr post, a little drawing I did of some of my friend group's favorite Pokémon! It was kind of an impulsive idea so not the best executed, the cheap fineliner I used bled pretty badly on the printer paper, and the proportions are all sorts of wacky, but I still think it's cute.

saying “i want him” about the character but not in a romantic or sexual way . i just Require him i need to Obtain him

...well that's a new memory that I just unrepressed.

That's definitely something that a 12 year old me was told and repeated to herself whenever something happened...

I tend to think that it wasn't so bad and that I've remembered all the big bad stuff but I guess I haven't. Leads to the memory of my twelve year old self admiring her friend because he's using tough love and he's so honest to her about how bad of a person she is and helps her fix it.

(She didn't really do anything wrong, but he yelled at her about it and hit her)

Within one day of getting a fitness watch, it has:

1. Called me out on my sleeping habits

2. Shown how I barely move all day

3. Buzzed multiple times because my heart rate got up to like, 160.

I imagine there will be more things to come from this.

*getting on an empty bus and sitting down in a seat at the front of the bus (reserved for disabled people) because my legs hurt and the other seats are harder to get in/out of*

Me: I feel so bad for using this seat, it's supposed to be for disabled people and I'm just hogging it so nobody else can use it who might need it.

...

Me: wait a second... I am disabled...

Today was the first day of tech week for my school play. I was very stressed and have also been dealing with some physical and mental health problems. I was feeling sort of lightheaded and mentioned to my friend that I hadn't eaten earlier because I've been feeling weird about eating today. I kept feeling worse and my friend handed me two oreos which I stared at for a few minutes until I was needed onstage. I felt pretty bad after performing my scene and getting backstage again, and my friend noticed I hadn't eaten the oreos and I had offered one to another person. They proceeded to hand me the oreo and make me eat it while watching me. It was kind, but also pretty embarrassing...

I told my friends some stories from my life and they told me I have "insane lore". I thought that I didn't have that much, so I made a list of random events and I'm starting to see it...