Showing posts with label self-esteem. Show all posts
Showing posts with label self-esteem. Show all posts
Thursday, September 15, 2011
Preemptive Strike
Halley is away at college for a few days before I get there, and, as always, separation makes me a little nervous. But it's been a whole lot easier this specific time around because xe's been reassuring me by giving a blatant statement of how xe loves me regardless of where we are or what we're doing. And it's working. I feel really relaxed, and, if I can tell you a secret, I think I'm not even going to need it anymore after I just did it. My irrational fear of losing halley is evaporating. I'm not so scared clingy, which was taking a toll on our relationship. And now it's gone! All I had to do was indulge my desire to be reassured and it disappeared.
Wednesday, September 7, 2011
My Unease About Abuse
I have all of these issues that pop up when I hear about abuse, especially emotional abuse. I get worried really easily that I'm somehow being an abuser accidentally. I suppose I'm worried that I'm so needy and prone to being upset that I'm making the relationship all about myself. I get worried any time someone contrasts it with a more abusive relationship, because I'm afraid it's downplaying and rationalization. I love my halley so much that I start to feel like every little move is important, and I worry about her. Now, don't get me wrong. This irrationality is not because of my love, rather, my love combined with my general sense of low self esteem. This problem is hard to shake, but I'm getting better.
You see, I can look at all of the wonderful times we have together, and I can see that we giggle and play and be together. We talk about everything, we trust each other, and I can see how safe I make xyr feel. We know each other, on big issues and small, and we get along on so many levels. We We give affection and we always try to be so good to each other. And, of course, we have mindblowing kinky sex, with huge focus on the most important thing: consent.
And when we do have problems? well, we talk them out. Sometimes, I'm a little reluctant at first, but, again, I'm not perfect and I'm working on this. I'm doing really well, I might add. We communicate. We tell each other how we feel, as openly and honestly as we know how. We usually fill in the form of "I am feeling _______ because __________________________________" and it works. We feel better soon. And, on top of that, most, if not all, of our issues stem from the desire to be good to each other and feeling of failing, or a simple miscommunication (almost always my fault, by the way. [but that doesn't mean I'm bad, or ruining the relaitonship] Halley takes things literally, and I mess with them by adding the connotations of words and silly things.) Problem resolution happens quickly, if I don't lose my head, and then it's back to snuggles and kisses and discussions of the state of the world and how to help the underpriveleged (We have a project coming up!! I'm excited, but more on that later!) and hugs and namics and games and sex and argumentation and writing our blogs together.
So, I guess what I mean to say is that, despite all of this, sometimes, I get scared in the deepest corner of my mind that I'm an accidental abuser. Lately, though, I've been able to get into that corner and show my mind the above mention of how my relationship works. And, however prone I am to feeling uneasy, I know with the most logical parts of me that my relationship with halley is healthy.
You see, I can look at all of the wonderful times we have together, and I can see that we giggle and play and be together. We talk about everything, we trust each other, and I can see how safe I make xyr feel. We know each other, on big issues and small, and we get along on so many levels. We We give affection and we always try to be so good to each other. And, of course, we have mindblowing kinky sex, with huge focus on the most important thing: consent.
And when we do have problems? well, we talk them out. Sometimes, I'm a little reluctant at first, but, again, I'm not perfect and I'm working on this. I'm doing really well, I might add. We communicate. We tell each other how we feel, as openly and honestly as we know how. We usually fill in the form of "I am feeling _______ because __________________________________" and it works. We feel better soon. And, on top of that, most, if not all, of our issues stem from the desire to be good to each other and feeling of failing, or a simple miscommunication (almost always my fault, by the way. [but that doesn't mean I'm bad, or ruining the relaitonship] Halley takes things literally, and I mess with them by adding the connotations of words and silly things.) Problem resolution happens quickly, if I don't lose my head, and then it's back to snuggles and kisses and discussions of the state of the world and how to help the underpriveleged (We have a project coming up!! I'm excited, but more on that later!) and hugs and namics and games and sex and argumentation and writing our blogs together.
So, I guess what I mean to say is that, despite all of this, sometimes, I get scared in the deepest corner of my mind that I'm an accidental abuser. Lately, though, I've been able to get into that corner and show my mind the above mention of how my relationship works. And, however prone I am to feeling uneasy, I know with the most logical parts of me that my relationship with halley is healthy.
Wednesday, August 3, 2011
Your Sexual Self Is You
I am naturally shy. Very, very shy, in fact. And last night, I bought a vibrator at walmart. It was hard for me to get over the potential embarrassment. But thinking of what this means about my causes is helpful to me. See, I care a lot about the things I believe in. I am the sort of person who cannot just ignore a principle for practicality unless there are some very, very serious consequences. So, when I wanted to buy a sex toy, all I had to do to stop being nervous was breathe and say to myself "I am a sex-positive feminist. Sex is nothing to be ashamed of. I am a sex-positive feminist" and repeat. Then, I was able to smile at the lady behind the cash register and buy it.
There seems to be this idea in the media that sex isn't a part of a person, that if you have sex, or even enjoy masturbation, you're somehow not a person with idiosyncracies other than sexual, or else that your sexual self is entirely seperate from the rest of you. It's not. Everyone can just relax about sex because it's a part of you, maybe a smaller part, maybe a bigger one, but no matter what, you don't become not you anymore when you're feeling sexual or when you have sex or whatever. These are all on the level of your other characteristics.
Take me for example, I love some wonderful oral sex, I masturbate in the middle of the night, and sometimes in public bathrooms to calm myself down. I also love to play harvest moon and zelda and like children's songs and phantom of the opera. These are all parts of me. Maybe they're not exceedingly relevant at certain times, but they're all, always a part of me.
I'm having a little trouble trying to figure out exactly what I'm trying to say. I guess what I mean is that you shouldn't feel like sex dehumanizes you. It's not like that. It's just one more part of the beautiful picture that is you.
There seems to be this idea in the media that sex isn't a part of a person, that if you have sex, or even enjoy masturbation, you're somehow not a person with idiosyncracies other than sexual, or else that your sexual self is entirely seperate from the rest of you. It's not. Everyone can just relax about sex because it's a part of you, maybe a smaller part, maybe a bigger one, but no matter what, you don't become not you anymore when you're feeling sexual or when you have sex or whatever. These are all on the level of your other characteristics.
Take me for example, I love some wonderful oral sex, I masturbate in the middle of the night, and sometimes in public bathrooms to calm myself down. I also love to play harvest moon and zelda and like children's songs and phantom of the opera. These are all parts of me. Maybe they're not exceedingly relevant at certain times, but they're all, always a part of me.
I'm having a little trouble trying to figure out exactly what I'm trying to say. I guess what I mean is that you shouldn't feel like sex dehumanizes you. It's not like that. It's just one more part of the beautiful picture that is you.
Monday, August 1, 2011
Religion and Sexuality
This article will also be published on generation atheist so go check it out if you happen to read my blog, but not it.
I've grown up in an area with a church on every corner. This is not much of an exaggeration. There are two churches within ten minutes walking distance from where I'm sitting, and four within 20. I live in a place where church/state violations are brushed of as silly and people roll their eyes when asked to include religions other than christianity, and find it unthinkable to not believe in a god. a vast, vast majority of people around here are christian. My high school had between 400 and 500 people in it, and the number of (out) atheists was at 7, at the highest, while I was there. Most people attended a church every week, at least.
Luckily for me, somehow, my parents don't happen to be very religious. My mom is something of an agnostic, but went with the label "christian" for a long time, because she'd gone to church as a kid, and she didn't utilize her own mind very much until a few years ago, preferring to let my dad decide these things. My dad grew up in an abusive home, and tried to get religion to save him from it around age 15, and since, even though he's not gone to church or read the bible, has been a weird sort of religious that seems to mean he thinks that there's a god who wants you to worship him and believes a few randomized passages in the bible. I'm not really sure why someone with such an insanely cherry-picked religion that seems totally unique to him would feel he could criticize others, but he somehow finds a lack of religion laughable.
Enter- My homosexuality, and screw with all of my family relationships. I didn't come out until about a year after my parents decided they found out. It's all a little difficult to explain, but my dad heard rumors that I was gay, and kissed my girlfriend at school, then, I gave xem a goodbye kiss on xyr forehead one day, and he decided that he knew enough to guess that, yes, I am a lesbian, and I should never be allowed to talk to my girlfriend.
The only reason I could ever get out of him was that god said homosexuality was bad. This utterly insane man had somehow chosen the verse about stoning homosexuals to believe, out of all of them. He called me disgusting, and told me I was going to hell. He told me I wasn't his daughter anymore. And the only reason I could get out of him was religion. My mom just cried and said she loved me, but she wanted me to change so god would love me. I was so confused at the time. How was this random Leviticus verse the one that would send me to hell when none of us kept the sabbath holy, attended church, prayed before dinner, or even learned about the bible? But, religion around here seems to be all about intolerance.
So, my parents' reaction to my homosexuality was because of religion. My friends? Actually, most of them didn't care. That's why they were my friends. But my pool of potential friends pretty much evaporated at school. I lived a dangerous double life that, in hindsight, seems crazy to have attempted, but, I digress, the point is, at school, I was an out, proud, lesbian, and that people knew this made them look at me with disgust. No one wanted me as their teacher-picked partner for assignments, and it was hilarious to point at me and say "that's the lesbian" When halley (my girlfriend) was holding hands and walking with me, asking explicit questions about out (then nonexistent) sex-life was okay. Teachers looked the other way for the most part, because really, we deserved it for defying god this way. It seemed every way I turned, someone hated me for loving xem because their sky dad said so.
This caused a little shame, but luckily, most of the time, I just felt depressed that everyone seemed to hate me without actually thinking about it. But I did feel a little shame. I tended to laugh it off. And I labeled myself a "bad girl" because I wasn't listening to my parents for the first time in my life, and, even though I didn't believe in god, it was still something I was doing that was yicky, according to most people I knew. I thought maybe something was wrong with me, and I was terrified that there was some premise I was missing that made their logic make sense without god involved, and I lived in fear of debates, because what if they proved that it was bad? would I stop loving xem? could I stop loving xem?
But what ultimately saved me was my halley and my friends. They reminded me that loving hurts no one, even if imaginary sky dad says it does. I have one conversation I'd like to share with everyone reading, paraphrased to the best of my memory between me and a friend on facebook chat. We'll call him Jeremy. He's the kind of guy who is always joking about everything, so one night, as I was telling him I watched the spanish channel on cable at four in the morning and it was utterly bizarre, the conversation went little like this
Jeremy: well, there's basically porn on HBO at four a.m.
Me: lol. okay
Jeremy: yeah, so now you can watch all the naked girlies you want, and no one will know.
Me: haha. I'm too much of a sweet innocent little girl for that.
Jeremy: ... yeah, I'm sure you are. lol.
Me: well, it's not like I haven't thought about it. But sometimes, I forget I'm not a good girl anymore. haha. It's like I was for so long, I don't remember that that changed.
Jeremy: Brittany, you are good. You are sweet and kind and you loving a girl doesn't affect this. Anyone who wants to tell you otherwise is just a narrow-minded fuckhead who is jealous that you have someone who loves you.
Me: I think that's the sweetest think anyone's ever said to me. I didn't know you could get that serious.
And it continued. But that reminded me, without this nonsense god stuff, sexual orientation of any sort is okay, and it doesn't affect how good or kind you can be, so no one experiencing this should be ashamed.
I've grown up in an area with a church on every corner. This is not much of an exaggeration. There are two churches within ten minutes walking distance from where I'm sitting, and four within 20. I live in a place where church/state violations are brushed of as silly and people roll their eyes when asked to include religions other than christianity, and find it unthinkable to not believe in a god. a vast, vast majority of people around here are christian. My high school had between 400 and 500 people in it, and the number of (out) atheists was at 7, at the highest, while I was there. Most people attended a church every week, at least.
Luckily for me, somehow, my parents don't happen to be very religious. My mom is something of an agnostic, but went with the label "christian" for a long time, because she'd gone to church as a kid, and she didn't utilize her own mind very much until a few years ago, preferring to let my dad decide these things. My dad grew up in an abusive home, and tried to get religion to save him from it around age 15, and since, even though he's not gone to church or read the bible, has been a weird sort of religious that seems to mean he thinks that there's a god who wants you to worship him and believes a few randomized passages in the bible. I'm not really sure why someone with such an insanely cherry-picked religion that seems totally unique to him would feel he could criticize others, but he somehow finds a lack of religion laughable.
Enter- My homosexuality, and screw with all of my family relationships. I didn't come out until about a year after my parents decided they found out. It's all a little difficult to explain, but my dad heard rumors that I was gay, and kissed my girlfriend at school, then, I gave xem a goodbye kiss on xyr forehead one day, and he decided that he knew enough to guess that, yes, I am a lesbian, and I should never be allowed to talk to my girlfriend.
The only reason I could ever get out of him was that god said homosexuality was bad. This utterly insane man had somehow chosen the verse about stoning homosexuals to believe, out of all of them. He called me disgusting, and told me I was going to hell. He told me I wasn't his daughter anymore. And the only reason I could get out of him was religion. My mom just cried and said she loved me, but she wanted me to change so god would love me. I was so confused at the time. How was this random Leviticus verse the one that would send me to hell when none of us kept the sabbath holy, attended church, prayed before dinner, or even learned about the bible? But, religion around here seems to be all about intolerance.
So, my parents' reaction to my homosexuality was because of religion. My friends? Actually, most of them didn't care. That's why they were my friends. But my pool of potential friends pretty much evaporated at school. I lived a dangerous double life that, in hindsight, seems crazy to have attempted, but, I digress, the point is, at school, I was an out, proud, lesbian, and that people knew this made them look at me with disgust. No one wanted me as their teacher-picked partner for assignments, and it was hilarious to point at me and say "that's the lesbian" When halley (my girlfriend) was holding hands and walking with me, asking explicit questions about out (then nonexistent) sex-life was okay. Teachers looked the other way for the most part, because really, we deserved it for defying god this way. It seemed every way I turned, someone hated me for loving xem because their sky dad said so.
This caused a little shame, but luckily, most of the time, I just felt depressed that everyone seemed to hate me without actually thinking about it. But I did feel a little shame. I tended to laugh it off. And I labeled myself a "bad girl" because I wasn't listening to my parents for the first time in my life, and, even though I didn't believe in god, it was still something I was doing that was yicky, according to most people I knew. I thought maybe something was wrong with me, and I was terrified that there was some premise I was missing that made their logic make sense without god involved, and I lived in fear of debates, because what if they proved that it was bad? would I stop loving xem? could I stop loving xem?
But what ultimately saved me was my halley and my friends. They reminded me that loving hurts no one, even if imaginary sky dad says it does. I have one conversation I'd like to share with everyone reading, paraphrased to the best of my memory between me and a friend on facebook chat. We'll call him Jeremy. He's the kind of guy who is always joking about everything, so one night, as I was telling him I watched the spanish channel on cable at four in the morning and it was utterly bizarre, the conversation went little like this
Jeremy: well, there's basically porn on HBO at four a.m.
Me: lol. okay
Jeremy: yeah, so now you can watch all the naked girlies you want, and no one will know.
Me: haha. I'm too much of a sweet innocent little girl for that.
Jeremy: ... yeah, I'm sure you are. lol.
Me: well, it's not like I haven't thought about it. But sometimes, I forget I'm not a good girl anymore. haha. It's like I was for so long, I don't remember that that changed.
Jeremy: Brittany, you are good. You are sweet and kind and you loving a girl doesn't affect this. Anyone who wants to tell you otherwise is just a narrow-minded fuckhead who is jealous that you have someone who loves you.
Me: I think that's the sweetest think anyone's ever said to me. I didn't know you could get that serious.
And it continued. But that reminded me, without this nonsense god stuff, sexual orientation of any sort is okay, and it doesn't affect how good or kind you can be, so no one experiencing this should be ashamed.
Friday, July 29, 2011
The Stories Bodies Tell Us
This is a parallel of my wonderful Halley's post.
My fourth toe on my left foot is crooked, because I come from a family where this is normal, the one on my right foot is straight because, around age 8, I tripped over a toy and broke it straight.
My toenails have a little chipped yellow polish on them; I like to have fun with "girly" things, and then don't care enough to upkeep them.
My legs aren't shaved, because I don't much care to shave them.
My calves are muscular, mostly from holding so much weight off the ground, but they also tell the story of marching band, something that was fun that I used to fill up the space in my life around my halley when I couldn't talk to her before.
My vulva, generally isn't messed with, because I like the way it naturally is most times. When it has been shaved, it shows I'm ready for some oral sex, actually
My genitals, overall, are intact and not pierced, showing I come from a culture where female genital mutilation is not allowed by law, and that I don't want to modify my body on my own terms much.
My tummy is big, with stretch marks all over. They're purple and red and run deep. I don't mind them, and my halley says they're there for ayees to feel and I like that. I like how it's not all smooth and there are little valleys to feel.
My chest is uneven, and I have a little freckle type spot on the bottom of my left areola that makes me happy. I like how none of it is symmetrical.
I have long fingers just like my daddy, and a freckle that I use to tell my left from right that's right on the web of skin attached to the thumb of my left hand.
My left eye has a pupil that's shaped like pac-man. It doesn't affect my vision, except through a microscope. When looking into one, I have that pie-slice cutout in my vision. (must be something about how microscopes work)
My hair has recently been cut to a little over my shoulders. I like it this way because I feel more androgynous.
I am special. And I am the only one with a body that tells all of these stories.
My fourth toe on my left foot is crooked, because I come from a family where this is normal, the one on my right foot is straight because, around age 8, I tripped over a toy and broke it straight.
My toenails have a little chipped yellow polish on them; I like to have fun with "girly" things, and then don't care enough to upkeep them.
My legs aren't shaved, because I don't much care to shave them.
My calves are muscular, mostly from holding so much weight off the ground, but they also tell the story of marching band, something that was fun that I used to fill up the space in my life around my halley when I couldn't talk to her before.
My vulva, generally isn't messed with, because I like the way it naturally is most times. When it has been shaved, it shows I'm ready for some oral sex, actually
My genitals, overall, are intact and not pierced, showing I come from a culture where female genital mutilation is not allowed by law, and that I don't want to modify my body on my own terms much.
My tummy is big, with stretch marks all over. They're purple and red and run deep. I don't mind them, and my halley says they're there for ayees to feel and I like that. I like how it's not all smooth and there are little valleys to feel.
My chest is uneven, and I have a little freckle type spot on the bottom of my left areola that makes me happy. I like how none of it is symmetrical.
I have long fingers just like my daddy, and a freckle that I use to tell my left from right that's right on the web of skin attached to the thumb of my left hand.
My left eye has a pupil that's shaped like pac-man. It doesn't affect my vision, except through a microscope. When looking into one, I have that pie-slice cutout in my vision. (must be something about how microscopes work)
My hair has recently been cut to a little over my shoulders. I like it this way because I feel more androgynous.
I am special. And I am the only one with a body that tells all of these stories.
Saturday, July 9, 2011
Math and Self-esteem
Am I so stupid I need to take middle school all over again? I mean, I know I'm not great at math, but I never expected fours years of school below average. I'm scared. It's hard for me to remember I'm okay when my test scores aren't at least above average.
So, what is there to do? I can take refuge in my Halley girl, but she seems absent today. It's not her fault. I'm sure it's autism or something else way more important than my need for comfort, but I just feel, well, bad about me. I've tried to help her feel better, but I'm not even sure why she seems so gone. I'm sure she's sick of me whining about how I feel so bad about me. So what now? That's where I always try to take comfort. Should I just take a nappy, maybe? I don't know. It doesn't feel like anything will make me feel better.
So, I guess that's all depressing. I guess I'll just wait it out. Maybe I'll naturally feel better eventually?
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