self_realization epitome of incomprehensibility Fill in the blanks: I'm afraid to talk about _______ because it reminds me of ________. Maybe. 211004 ... unhinged i am afraid to talk about sex with my partners because i had my virginity raped away from me 211005 ... e_o_i I'm so sorry, unhinged. And that makes sense. My recent one, not so much. But it's neither here nor there, and I need to leave soon for work. 211007 ... unhinged thanks? it is a heavy trauma burden i've been carrying for too long. embodiment of my root chakra in small doses seems to help 211007 ... e_o_i Maybe "making sense" was a bad way to put it. I didn't mean to suggest that a traceable or "sensible" reaction to trauma makes dealing with it any easier. 211007 ... e_o_i But you're brave enough to say what you're thinking, and it DOES make more surface-level sense than "I'm afraid to talk about the Holocaust because it reminds me of that time I hit someone with a wineglass." I'm not even sure if that's true, but it was a few days ago. I was trying to figure out why I had a mental block about telling kerry the reason I felt awkward asking my cousin about her granddad's birthplace. I mean, it wasn't that relevant to mention. I was just trying to figure out why I was afraid to. And then I did, and was ashamed at the absurd lack of perspective (however unconscious). Anyway, I blame everything on Greg, my former classmate, who wouldn't "connect" with me on LinkedIn. It makes sense in context. 211007 ... tender square unhinged, i'm so sorry that this happened to you. i went through my "wheels of life" book by anodea judith and she has yoga recommendations to help clear blockages in the root chakra, if you're interested: apanasana, setu bhandasana, shalabhasana, and janus sirsasana. 211008 ... kerry hey, unhinged. i read this when you posted it and wanted to respond but didn't know exactly how. i realized sometimes there's nothing anyone can say, that sorry isn't enough (i can only speak for myself), but perhaps being witnessed itself is what's healing (or comforting? i'm not quite satisfied with that word). anyway, i hope writing that lessened the burden for you, even if only a little. 211008 ... kerry also, e_o_i, i somehow overlooked the blathe you're referring to (surprise, surprise). which is it? without reading what it is you think was irrelevant or lacking perspective, i can already say, whatever. with this little circle of writers, i'm not sure what relevant even means, or if it matters. when i look at the "recent" blather page i feel like i'm browsing a bookshelf. i'm always curious about what i'll find. i'm interested in your perspective, not interested in censoring you. felt compelled to use an emoji but... eh. just know i am smiling. 211008 ... unhinged thanks ladies that first trauma set up many more and I have struggled ever since to have a healthy physical and mental outlook on sex. i've sprinkled crumbs about it on both blathers, mostly blue. in recent years it has become more acceptable,less taboo, to talk about too which helps. i'm still waiting for men to actually be punished for these sorts of crimes; in most cases i really don't believe in prison but rapists need to be separated from the rest of us because the lingering impacts are real and long lasting. maybe it is my middle age talking, but i don't have a problem letting people know now. if that's too_much then we don't need to be friends of any sort 211008 ... nr i'm really sorry about this too, unhinged. this shit makes me so angry. and i agree with you about it being good that it's more acceptable to talk about these things honestly now (finally; we should always have been able to, but i digress). 211008 ... e_o_i When I was small, I wondered why bad things, like cancer, were somehow embarrassing to talk about. And why Mom told me not to say that my uncle (Aunt S.'s husband) killed himself. To be fair, I might've blurted it out at inappropriate times - I was that sort of kid. But at least they told me. I was 9 or 10 then. ... Added to the "bad things being embarrassing" weirdness, there's the lingering idea that sexual assault is shameful for the person who suffers it, which is all sorts of unfair. I don't know where all that started. I can guess some of it: for women, idealization of sexual "purity" probably played a big part. Thinking of them more like accessories than people. And for men, the idea that such an attack would emasculate them. So basically misogyny both times. I was never raped, but touched "inappropriately"? (Inappropriately. Such euphemism.) Yes, by a boy my age and later a drunk teenager on a bus. And then it's like, who wasn't ever?? Hard to find. ... Emotional nakedness was a bigger block than physical nakedness for me. When David first asked me out, I looked down at my gloves, took one of them on and off. Excited but nervous, thinking myself undeserving, but I saw he was nervous too. One thing that I was ashamed of that I needn't have been: being "poorer" than him, less "classy." The difference in upbringing? A few thousand dollars, perhaps. Trivial on a global scale. But it led to me crying when I first saw his apartment, and blurting out my insecurity: one thing I said that his black and white carpet was "fancy" and that made me nervous. And he has. not. stopped. teasing. me. about. that. "It was just from Ikea!" and "Fancy things make you cry!" But maybe I was nervous about kissing him for the first time. Having my first "real" kiss at 31. So this was also about sexual insecurity. But less so and not only, if that makes sense. 211014 ... e_o_i tender_square: This reminds me, what you wrote in "indiscriminate" also made me think and feel things, but I didn't want to butt in since you weren't finished. When I was young, I thought I was having a worse time than others relationship-wise, just because no one I loved or liked seemed to reciprocate. I didn't consider that more relationships can mean more heartbreak. But that's not to suggest that you didn't have good memories too, or that you actually were "indiscriminate." I don't think so. Or that fate was, if there is such a thing. (Two boyfriends for me, only one "serious" relationship... wouldn't have minded a girlfriend at some point, for variety... But in real life that'd have been more stressful than not, what with Mom & some other surrounding people being depressingly homophobic at times... Moral: be careful what you wish for, because you just might get an annoying song stuck in your head.) But yes, I appreciate seeing another perspective in such detail. kerry: Speaking of perspectives, because I wasn't clear...I just meant that it feels wrong for me to say "[X historical tragedy] reminds me of [Y personal problem]." Like, imagine if I said "Whenever someone mentions slavery, that reminds me of my mean boss! Boo hoo!" But now I'm just trying to be funny. I wouldn't say the above seriously. I hope. The blathe I meant was "chairs" - I wrote that I'd feel awkward asking my other aunt where her father came from in Poland because I already asked her where her mother grew up in Montreal. But the real reason for feeling awkward is that she'd probably mention the war he and his parents barely escaped. I'm a bit curious how they did that, since my cousin L. hasn't told me much - maybe doesn't know - but also nervous about bringing up traumatic passed-down memories for no reason. There's also the closer-to-now fact that this man judged both his daughters harshly, picked fights with a bunch of people, held grudges...though he seemed to care for his grandchild L. But now that I think about it, these feelings don't actually relate to the incident retold in je_ne_regrette_rien and the_education_of_e_o_i. But still, why ARE bad things embarrassing? I mean, why EMBARRASSING, of all random emotions? And why AM I overusing capital letters? (life's deepest question) 211014 ... tender_square [1] we are all working drafts [2] you have to forgive yourself for decisions that were made based on the best available information you had at the time 211016 ... unhinged our family traumas are stored in shortened chromosomes missing telemeres because trauma, if i remember right, interferes with the sensitive protein synthesis of building genes that become later ancestors i read as much european history as i can to figure out why my family, with a medical history of schizophrenia, generalized anxiety disorder, bipolar disorder, could possibly have become this way. epigenetics (the stress of working class life activates the stresses passed to us from our ancestors) revolutions failed and successful (1905 and 1917) the dying gasps of empires i can only guess the details they were hidden from the people i could still ask but i do know my grandpa's mother sat in a local kindergarten class to learn english that when she passed her citizenship test she went to the local deli and bought all the salads that looked good to her to throw herself a party that she worked as a maid for a jewish family for a whole year to save up enough money to buy her boat ticket (maybe why i grew up eating latkes with sour cream and applesauce even though my family was catholic) that supposedly her boat crossed paths with the sinking titanic and stopped to pick up anyone still living (my grandpa is prone to tall tales so i'm skeptical about that 'fact') i know even less about my dad's family that made it here other than some of them originated in county mayo, ireland that some of them clearly spoke german because my grandma could sing 'o tannenbaum' completely in german which she did every year famine death war that's what drove my family here 'intergenerational trauma' sounds so cold, clinical 211016 ... unhinged (thanks also nr. my anger over any of it mostly burned out because it was just eating me alive, not really solving anything. i'm also sorry about your mom. i feel like we are both too young to lose parents) 211016 ... nr thank you, unhinged. i'm sorry about your dad. we are too young, and our parents were too young (not to assume parents' ages...). my mom was one of the most full-of-life people i knew, until she wasn't. 211016 ... tender_square unhinged, your writing about inherited trauma got me interested in learning more about family constellation therapy. i just bought mark wolynn's "it didn't start with you" on amazon and am waiting for it to arrive today. there were other blathes where this was being discussed, "chairs" being one, i believe, but i don't remember the others... 211017 ... tender_square e_o_i: yes, that's exactly what i wanted to explore on "indiscriminate," that more experience does not necessarily amount to the reaping of benefits, just a great deal of confusion. my former friend that i wrote about in "theresa" used to be amazed every time i'd put myself out there again, she couldn't understand why i was so open with my heart. maybe it's my optimistic and idealistic nature, but i just kept believing that who i was looking for was out there, it was just a matter of finding them. 211017 what's it to you? who go blather from