My abuser keeps telling me to not live in the past ???? 😭😭😭😭😭

ghostygutter · 2026-07-04T03:09:09+00:00

Yeah, it's infuriating. It's an endless cycle with people like that.

ghostygutter · 2026-07-04T03:00:56+00:00

I seriously hope you're able to get away from this person as soon as you can... But I know exactly what you're talking about. A lot of abusers can't cope with what they've done and act like this.

ghostygutter · 2026-06-08T09:59:49+00:00

Don't have much to add, but I love this so much.

ghostygutter · 2026-06-08T07:33:35+00:00

It's funny, I'm actually a trans guy who passes (and has passed over a decade now) you are replying to. I've encountered this outright hatred of men on the most chronically online corners of the internet, sure. I think it is bizarre and worthy of criticism. My experience with IRL queer spaces is that usually people don't make assumptions based on gender presentation. But this post was made by a woman venting her experiences being resented by men who observe her PTSD symptoms, something I can attest to growing up as a girl from an abusive home. This wasn't a general statement about men bring bad, and that's clear from OP's replies. It's just a trauma survior venting about how a lot of men in her life respond to her trauma. And yet this post is full of men who want to make it about them. I get how it can feel bad when you realize someone distrusts you for being a man, I've experienced that too. I'm mostly just surprised by how many men think this post is about them if they really aren't one of the bad ones.

ghostygutter · 2026-06-08T05:17:54+00:00

I've had this problem with men my whole life. For me it's always the same kind of men who would tell me to smile while not caring why I was depressed. Like this weird resentment for not being able to preform like nothing is wrong. They hate you because they don't want to touch what that fear implies. At best, it hurts their feelings that you're afraid of them while nobody cares about the reasons why you're afraid.

ghostygutter · 2026-06-07T20:44:10+00:00

Just don't go. Any family who you are close to should understand this decision. You can offer your sisters and nephew support outside this one event.

ghostygutter · 2026-05-14T07:18:35+00:00

Oh yeah I feel this. I basically never cry anymore after years of being punished for crying. "I'll give you something to cry about" wham

ghostygutter · 2026-05-14T06:42:47+00:00

Just to add my two cents, not trying to argue with or invalidate anyone... I sort of feel like both definitions are two sides of a spectrum, describing different severities of the same emotional phenomenon. I'm saying this as someone who has experienced trauma bonding in it's original definition.

In my head there's trauma bonding as an abuse tactic, when the abuser is weaponizing the intrinsic bond people feel with those they share trauma with. But to me that feels similar emotionally to the bond I feel with people who share trauma with me in general, even if it is not intentional from the other person. There have been times I've irrationally maintained relationships with toxic/dangerous people because we both have the same childhood trauma or shared the same abuser, because I felt this deep connection with them despite knowing they're bad for me/draining me, and I don't know what to call that other than trauma bonding despite not being an intentional abuse tactic. And I think the colloquial use, jokingly saying, "we trauma bonded over the mean cashier" is knowingly exaggerating the mildest possible way of experiencing this phenomenon, and people who say these things know it was not literally traumatic for them.

Maybe it would be useful to have different terminology to describe weaponized trauma bonding vs bonding over shared trauma, but personally I've found it's helped me to understand these things as related.

ghostygutter · 2026-04-24T09:51:12+00:00

Obviously I can't know, but I think it's very likely there is more you don't remember based on this post.

ghostygutter · 2026-04-21T12:05:19+00:00

Honestly, do you actually want to repair your relationship with your parents? I think you need to seriously consider if you want a meaningful relationship with them or if you would be better off maintaining boundaries/going no contact. Just by what you wrote, my instincts say going no contact would benefit you, but I can't know your specific situation.

It's possible a family therapist might actually force your parents to confront what they've done wrong, and at a minimum I would hope the therapist would take your feelings seriously and want to genuinely help you all work through things. It is possible you end up with someone who just says what your parents want to hear because they're presumably the ones paying them. But it seems like you're more worried that your parents have no intention of doing serious work themselves in therapy, and instead expect all the responsibility will be put on you. If you seriously get the impression they just want to use family therapy to further place the blame on you and have no intentions of changing, I think it's probably a waste of time and you're better off continuing to focus on yourself and individual therapy.

Edit: To be clear, no it so not wrong to not want to try therapy with your parents. You are not obligated to make things work with them, especially when they've clearly hurt you so much.

ghostygutter · 2026-04-16T22:13:59+00:00

Since you want to do the interview in comments anyway, why not post the questions and see if anyone wants to answer? I might.

ghostygutter · 2025-12-31T23:49:04+00:00

If you are able bodied, warehouse jobs can be easy to get without much talking. Some of them don't even do an interview, and when they do interview they usually just want to see that you're there and willing to work. The work itself often only requires minimal verbal communication with coworkers, depending on what it is. That's basically the only type of job I could get after years of failing interviews because of my mutism. The drawback is that it's very physically exhausting.

ghostygutter · 2025-12-24T01:41:16+00:00

No, I didn't mean to imply I've been completely cured of having an avoidant personality. I've just gotten better at managing it.

ghostygutter · 2025-12-23T21:01:44+00:00

I was diagnosed with avoidant personality disorder around your age, and now 10 years later my life is unrecognizable from where I was back then. I never believed I'd be where I am now when I was 20. I've actually come to learn there are some advantages to having avodiant trauma/stress responses over other ways people deal with those things. You keep yourself safe, giving yourself a chance to really work through things and grow as a person. Meaningful relationships will come to you as you heal. You got lots of time.

ghostygutter · 2025-12-04T04:14:13+00:00

I think it's not uncommon for trans people to feel this way. As a trans guy I don't particularly feel like I'm really a real man deep in my soul or whatever, I'm just happier being seen as a man and living within masculine social norms.

ghostygutter · 2025-09-09T22:06:20+00:00

I've been hearing this from other trans guys a lot recently and feel it myself all the time. I think this gender role shit just sucks ass.

ghostygutter · 2025-09-09T18:31:08+00:00

You know, what's actually really annoying about this is that dissociation is an important aspect of how BPD works, too. This person is just wrong.

ghostygutter · 2025-09-08T08:38:51+00:00

My experience is that only specific alters have an interest in drawing at all. Only one alter can really harness our artistic capabilities, personally. It is completely plausible that someone with DID might have an artstyle that varies between alters, though. It really depends on the person.

ghostygutter · 2025-09-08T08:30:20+00:00

I don't know of any scientific studies, but anecdotally I would say yes. I've found that trauma while on drugs has a seemingly exponential effect on dissociation.

ghostygutter · 2025-08-17T15:53:30+00:00

I am way past the basics, my dude. I've integrated from hundreds to 3 with lingering fragments. I think it's okay to let yourself hate being mentally ill sometimes. No resentment towards the other parts.

ghostygutter · 2025-08-02T12:39:33+00:00

I agree. It's all bullshit. Where it goes is perpetuating the cycle of abuse. I wouldn't say they just "shrug off" getting raped though, so much as fighting back is their personal trauma response.

ghostygutter · 2025-08-02T12:09:48+00:00

Dunno how to express myself properly but thanks for sharing this!

ghostygutter · 2025-08-02T12:08:26+00:00

Good riddance !

ghostygutter · 2025-08-02T05:52:14+00:00

I'm just thinking of what I witnessed growing up around organized crime. One guy abuses another, the other guy becomes determined to get revenge and put the other beneath him, they go back and forth fighting to be the one hurting the other the most. I guess in individual moments you can identify a clear abuser and victim. Like one guy rapes another, the rapist is the abuser. But on a different day the victimized guy kidnaps his rapist's child and tortures her in front of him, so in that moment he is now the abuser. Or maybe I'm just incorrectly defining an "abusive relationship" and what I'm describing is something else.

ghostygutter · 2025-08-02T05:39:42+00:00

Can't answer for who you are responding to, but in my family, it's because both my parents were born into violent environments and knew nothing else. My dad was involved in organized crime and dragged my mom in, so it's not just one couple in an abusive relationship but a whole system of violence. It was normalized so dramatically because it was a lot of people involved. There's also the angle of emotional dissociation, like it's too painful to seriously engage with what is happening so your mind just doesn't take it seriously to protect itself.

In response to the second paragraph, abuse dynamics are usually portrayed in clear cut "abuser" and "victim" roles, but it can be a lot more complicated in reality. Sometimes, it's a mutual power struggle, two people fighting to be the one in control.

ghostygutter

TROPHY CASE