History Repeating

When I started writing this blog, I wanted to sell everything and travel the world… yesterday, I was checking the prices of vans. I was so sure I wanted to become a writer, I posted on my Facebook that I would love for more people to read my blog, but this morning when I woke up and remembered the post, I felt the urge to delete it. The faces of certain Facebook connections appeared in my mind, I saw them sneer at the post with thoughts of “she’s not nearly as interesting as she thinks she is”. I don’t know why my mind always conjures up so much jugement… is it just me, or is this a common experience?

Having spent some time writing down my thought processes in the last year, I can see the patterns repeating. When I’m in a good mood; I feel unstoppable. My head is full of ideas that feel like destiny, but before I can move forward with a plan, I enter a low mood that makes me doubt not only my ideas, but my very right to exist. Like I shouldn’t write, shouldn’t be public, I should hide, work at McDonald’s shut up and die.

I know everyone experiences mood swings, moments of alignement and moments of disconnection, but do most people experience it as heavily as this? It feels like I look in front of me and all I see are green lights, arrows pointing forward and inviting backdrops. I take two steps forward and all the lights turn red, cops jump out of the bushes telling me to turn around and the scenery catches on fire.

I believe a large part of this is due to traumatic invalidation. Decades of being told by my narcissist mother that I am not who I think I am, that I don’t know what’s good for me, that I’m wrong about my own internal experience, that she knows better. Decades of being trained to hate myself, doubt myself and live in shame. It’s like she created this mental block inside my head preventing me from trusting my instincts and trusting my inner experience. To put salt on the wound, I went to her blog yesterday, I saw she had a new post and I couldn’t resist reading it… The gist of the post is that it’s one’s responsibility to shed their need for validation and to seek happiness within, not from external factors. She did not attend my wedding because she felt judged and not accepted in her transphobic beliefs… but she tells others that it’s their responsibility not to need external validation. The hypocrisy is unreal and I am fueled with rage at the idea that she gets to live blissfully ignorant while I suffer with reality.

Knowing that we go through life seeking biases, I will need to re-establish my trust in my inner experience, or I will unintentionally seek to prove to myself that I can’t be trusted… I’ve avoided “healing” for quite a while now, because I don’t want to perceive myself as perpetually broken, but I think it’s time to go seek help. I’m not sure where to put my money/energy for that one. This feels too big for psychotherapy… I need a fucking exorcism.