I believe one of the most damaging results of the verbal and emotional abuse in my life has been never fully knowing who I am. When this type of abuse starts in childhood, it is very difficult, if not impossible, to know yourself. Over the last week, I have come to realize that rather than developing an identity, I actually created the opposite. What I wanted more than anything was to not be like the abusive people that surrounded me.
Life on a Boundary
Instead of becoming more of who I was meant to be throughout my life, I chose to become less like the people who were hurtful. It turns out, though, that building a life based on a list of things not to do is a blueprint that is destined to fail. It’s like building my life on a boundary instead of a foundation. Boundaries can be moved, crossed, ignored or climbed over, firm foundations cannot. It is a strategy that will fail many times over. And it has.
Relationships are messy, people get hurt feelings and misunderstandings happen. It is unavoidable no matter how hard I try. When it does, I’m crushed and confused. The very essence of how I have tried to live my life has failed and I am left not knowing what to do next. Unfortunately, I have a tendency to freeze up and go into myself when things get rough. It’s a learned response that is very helpful when life is filled with abusive people who bring more harm than good. It is not helpful in most other situations. It makes it hard to work through issues and be present in a conversation.
Unfortunately, I not only freeze up during rough situations, but I get quiet and go within myself when I am in situations or settings where there are a lot of people who I don’t know well or at all. It happens automatically. I learned that being quiet and unnoticed offers great protection from someone coming at you, but it does not build rapport or elicit warm feelings from others. It actually makes me appear as if I am unfriendly, grumpy, unkind and so on. In essence. it is not a great way to build friendships.
A Complex Shell
Both of these attributes make it appear as if I don’t care about other people. Also, because I am not able to fully explain myself or think rationally, it’s easy for the other person to believe that whatever negative thoughts they have about me are true. This, then, hurts me that the person doesn’t really know me because they believe things about me that are not true. How could they not know who I am? What a stupid question! If I’m unaware of who I am, how could they possibly know me?
Being completely honest, I have to admit that my interactions with those close to me are usually guarded to some degree as well. I try to remember everything that upsets or hurts the people around me so that I won’t say or do those things when I am with them. I am not sure that I am fully at ease and open with anyone because of the way I have structured my life.
That is really sad. I realize now that I have tried so hard to not be hurtful that I never became a complete person. Instead, I am a complex shell. I didn’t try to build my life following a passion I had or doing something that I felt led to do, instead I became a list of what not to do. It is really hard to build something from just this as an identity. I still don’t want to hurt people, but there has to be more to a person to actually have an identity. I guess I need to figure out the first step. It’s funny, but I feel a bit like the Winter Warlock in Santa Claus is Comin’ to Town – “Put one foot in front of the other…”
~ Joanna Lynn
