I Won't Be Quiet

Usually my posts are prompted by thoughts that arise from everyday interaction with the (largely normal and sane) people in my life.  Coworkers make comments about their situations or I have a deep discussion with a friend or something changes in my thinking and I have an AHA moment that makes me need to express.

This post is a little different, having had no specific trigger but I've been recollecting several small conversations or asides that all seem to point to a particular mind set that I often come across.

I think that we, as a human race, just don't like to talk about ugliness.  Specifically, we don't like to talk about our own experiences with ugliness, whether that's darkness we've caused or darkness that's been done to us.  We like news about bad things that have happened to other people, but only those with whom we have no connection or hope of ever knowing; additionally, I think that normal and sane and good people become fascinated with news of harm happening to others partially because it helps us to understand that those bad things aren't happening to us.  I'm not saying that's the way to be, but it seems to be the way that many of us are.  Human nature or conditioned response?  Someone out there knows, I'm sure, but I don't.

I've written before about transparency and my need to be so.  I define personal transparency as this: I speak the truth.  That doesn't mean that I preach the truth, I don't go around proselytizing about my experience or belief system or moral code.  I fully realize that many of the traumas, abuses and experiences I've had are... hard to swallow.  I did, after all, live through them and know just how painful those events were and are.  Hearing about some of them is more than a person needs to know, most of the time, and I'm fine with that.  I've long since stopped needing or seeking validation from those around me when it comes to dealing with my roots or my character.  Good thing, too,with the active smear campaign the NFOO still mounts occasionally.

But, I'm a listener and a thinker, and people seem to like to talk to me.  I end up with a lot of people looking for an ear and a shoulder to bring their stories and tears to.  I'm okay with that, and glad that I can be a friend.  I try very hard not to give advice, but I will pick up on certain areas of a story that I can relate to or have been through and I do relate back my experience, should it apply.  It seems to help those in need.

I've noticed, though, that when I talk about my reality; the abuses, gaslighting, revision or history, using, scapegoating, maiming and attacking that the NFOO did and still do (as individuals and a whole,) I typically receive one of three responses.

Those who have been through similar experiences and are looking for understanding and/or help can relate.  Relief at not being alone, at being understood finally by someone else who's been through 'it' too, becomes almost palpable.  Being part of a larger  group has the benefit of helping us to understand that we are not on our own, and for ACoN's, that we are not at fault.  Some of the best - so far - relationships of my life have come from this kind of connection.  We speak the language of each others' hearts, you see.  And having an ally and friend of the heart is strong mojo.  There's power there that can be shared and borrowed all throughout the process of healing.  We can hold each other up with our connections.

Those who haven't been through similar hells are... baffled.  Their eyes get big and round and they say things like, "Um, wow, um, your mother?  Really?  Why?"  They've maybe never had anyone try so hard to intentionally hurt them, and to a normal and largely sane person, the facts about coming from a Narc family full of dysfunction - delivered in a clear, calm, explanatory style - just can't be absorbed.  So far from their realm of experience are mine as an ACoN that they end up looking like they've been hit with a cattle prod.  Baffled.

There's a third group, though, and these are the folks who've had bad things happen to them too, but for whatever reason, they're not ready to face it.  And when I speak about the horrors out loud, these folks invariably respond with some version of this:
"Wouldn't it be easier for you to not talk about it?"
It's often  phrased as a cliched helpful positive, "Stop thinking/talking about it so that it won't affect you anymore." or "You're letting them take up rent free space in your head." or (my personal favorite,) "Well, maybe if you let it alone for awhile, things will get better."  Yeah, that's the ticket.  Never thought of that before. Hee hee.

We like to pretend that bad things only happen to people we don't know.  But I live in truth, and here it is; bad things happen to people everywhere and the only way that bad things stop happening is if good people know about those bad things and take action to stop them.  Hiding the bad things and pretending that they don't exist or that they weren't as bad as maybe we thought they were doesn't make the bad things any less bad.  In fact, if any form of psychological study is to be believed, hiding bad things for too long causes... more bad things.

So, no, I won't be quiet.  People need to know, sure, what the face of abuse looks like and that it is possible to heal.  More importantly, I need to be clear about me.

I am who I am today due to many different influences and experiences in my life, a large number of which are the abuses that I suffered from birth to 30-ish year old freedom through NC from the NFOO.  And I like who I am.  Would I go through it again or wish it on anyone else just to garner the strength and prescience that having survived the darkness affords me?  Fuck no.  But it happened.  And that's the truth.  So I'm sticking to it.

Be quiet about it?  Why?  It's real, after all, and no amount of hushing up will make it any less so.  And, in my experience, once the truth has been 'outed' so to speak, it's a hell of a lot easier to pick it up and begin to move forward toward the light of freedom.

I won't be quiet.  I'll keep telling my truth as it's appropriate and wherever it's needed.  Because it's me, and because I can and because other people need to know that there's joy and hope and freedom out there just waiting to be picked up and carried.

And, ooooo, just a side note that isn't all that important to my cause but makes me chuckle; I bet the Narcs just hate that I won't shut my gosh-darned cockadoodie mouth.  Tee fucking hee.

Love,
Vanci