by Band Back Together | Apr 18, 2014 | Depression, Guilt, Loneliness, Panic Disorder |
I sound pathetic.
I never really confront my problems, to myself or anyone. I want to accept my life, but I cant.
My family is dysfunctional. I have accepted that. My mother has been isolated from 90% of her family, and my grandmother gave me a panic attack at my Nana’s funeral.
Family issues have clouded time for grief. I have only cried a handful of times over her death, but countless times over the problems in my family. There are too many to list, and yeah, every single one stings.
But there have been no family issues since Christmas time. I don’t blame that for how I feel now.
No.
I dont even blame my family for their problems.
Everything is my fault.
I feel like I’m literally the cause of everything.
I have things going well in my life. I have a nice boyfriend, lots of friends who support me, and whatever’s left of my family.
But I feel alone. Like there are people around me who are meant to listen, but I cant get the words out to them.
I guess it would be impossible for someone else to understand something I cant even get my head around.
They don’t understand. They never would, so I wear a smile and push them away when they come too close. All I will do is hurt them in the end, anyway.
In the end I’m just another girl no-one cares about. No-one will remember me when I’m gone. No one will know what eats me inside because it’s my fault. They’re my problems, and I should clean up my own mess.
I understand that I have a problem, but I dont know what it is or how to fix it. I want to talk to someone, but I’m alone in this.
It’s like I’m alone on an island, screaming for help, but no one can hear. If they could, I wouldn’t deserve their help because it’s my fault I’m on the island anyway.
And I cant swim.
by Band Back Together | Apr 15, 2014 | Depression, Emotional Abuse, Helping Someone In An Abusive Relationship, Trust |
5 years ago I finally was able to get myself and my two children out of an emotionally abusive relationship. It wasn’t easy, and definitely took a toll on all of us. However, the kids and I WERE able to move on, and although life isn’t perfect (is it ever?), it’s decidedly BETTER.
Today, I find myself in a non-abusive relationship with a really great man. He takes care of me and my children and is wonderful in so many ways. Yet he can’t seem to understand why I am often sad and moody, sometimes depressed, and why I am constantly asking for him to validate me, our relationship, and his love for me. I sometimes feel so overwhelmed that I can’t even explain to him how I am feeling or why.
Sometimes I cry for no reason, or get overly upset. I find myself not trusting that he REALLY loves me and fearing that he will leave me. He doesn’t understand my behavior, and sometimes, neither do I. It frustrates me because I feel like something is wrong with me. It frustrates him because he doesn’t understand what is making me act this way.
My behavior is ruining the only stable relationship that I’ve had since my divorce. Does emotional abuse really do this? Is this why I can’t figure out how to function normally? I feel so lost. I want to be “normal”. I want to trust that this man will love and care for me. But I CAN’T. I feel like I don’t know how to act, and I’m afraid to do or say the wrong thing. It’s awful feeling this way. I know in my head that this man is great & supportive, but I can’t control the negative thoughts and feelings that I am having.
Has this happened to anyone else? Is there any kind of support group or information for someone who is in a relationship with someone who was previously verbally abused? I want so badly to help him understand me. And I want to be able to trust someone again.
by Band Back Together | Mar 21, 2014 | Depression, Loss, Pet Loss, Sadness |
You hear about people losing homes to fires all the time on the news, but you never hear about how the people are doing afterward.
I lost my home December 3rd, 2013, and I feel as if my whole life has been stolen from me. I’m having a hard time carrying on. This can’t be my life. I sleep maybe four or five hours a night, then I wake with the worst feeling of despair, thinking about the things we lost.
The fire took my 10 cats, that I loved dearly. Two may be missing – I go back to the property and search every evening, but have had no luck. Our home was in a rural area, and I have posters hung on poles nearby, but there are just farmers and some homes in the area, miles away from any vets or pet stores.
I’m grieving my cats, but also my home. All of my things are gone. People tell you it’s just material things, and you can get new, but I don’t want new. I was happy with my old things. I can’t get back the afghan my grandma made me, or the yearbooks that were signed by my best school friend, who died last January.
I’m stuck in a rental home until we get our land cleared and a new home. I’m surrounded by unfamiliar people, things, even different clothes. We even have a different car now because our car is what started the fire. It caught fire under the hood and spread to the garage door. I ask myself questions like, “Where did my life go?” or just “Why?” or “How are all my cats gone all at once?”
Our house looks as if it were hit with a bomb. I didn’t know the metal in your windows could melt and twist like that. Firefighters put a huge hole in our bedroom window. The things I had hanging on the wall there are gone. Even the pot of chili I had on the stove is gone. Papers my son brought home from school that I had on the fridge aren’t there now. My son’s toys and the toy box just melted all together.
I’ve had my piano since I was 7 and began taking lessons. The top has been taken off. The varnish looks like it melted. Some keys are sticking up. I’ll probably need a new one.
All the ceiling has been torn off. A lot is just hanging down. The study above the garage is just a burnt black room with no roof. It rains and snows in my study. Pages from my books burnt and laying in the yard. All my music melted.
Only one of the arms and the metal bed springs are left of the wooden daybed where the cats loved to lay. My telescope that I put together myself is gone – it was mostly plastic and wood. The whole place is beyond repair. It has to be knocked down. That brings up another whole set of emotions. Ten years of life there turned to rubble and going to be discarded in a dump.
I was having panic attacks. Self-talk is helping, but I don’t know how I’m going to get through this. I’ve never been so depressed and anxious in my life. I used to love my life. Just five days before it happened, I had a wonderful Thanksgiving with family. I felt so blessed to be surrounded by all I loved, and in abundance. It was all taken from me in 3 hours. It still feels like a strange dream. I wonder if I will ever feel happy again, if I’ll ever even smile.
The days are long. I always used to be busy, so they used to speed by, but now I plod through the day at this rental home doing a little cleaning just to get the day over with.
I’m not myself. I don’t feel like interacting with anyone. I can’t afford counseling. I try to journal and read self-help books, but I still feel so dead inside.
One thing I’ve learned from this already is who is on my side and who’s not. My relations to various people have changed. I’ve had to distance myself from some family members who were hurtful or whose words just make me feel worse. Many people don’t seem to understand just how huge this loss is. It’s loss at multiple levels, pet loss, home loss, things that were special, my daily routine is gone. It’s a huge change.
To say it’s all unreal is an understatement. I don’t know what the future holds. We’ve picked out a double wide home already and have much of the paper work done to get it. We just have to wait on the destruction of our old house. We’re having a hard time finding a local company to do that. And as much as I hate it, it has to be done. I will take my sister’s cat and am thinking about a kitten to keep it company, but in my heart right now I’m just wanting the ones I lost back. I don’t think anything would give me any happiness now but to get my two missing cats back.
For now, I’m just trying to get through each day, one day at a time. I don’t know how I’m going to pick myself up from this, but I have to move on somehow. Each day is a day further away in time, and hopefully a day closer to getting my life back together again.
by Band Back Together | Mar 17, 2014 | Bullying, Cyberharassment, Cyberstalking, Depression, Emotional Abuse, Fear, Guilt, Insomnia, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, Psychological Manipulation, Sexual Harassment, Stalking, Stress, Trauma, Workplace Bullying |
I’m many things: a daughter, friend, a pet lover and a 4.0 student. I swim, volunteer, love the beach and enjoy music. I’m also a victim of a growing epidemic among teens and young adults entering the workplace: sexual harassment.
On Valentine’s Day 2007, I attended my first corporate event as a volunteer for a major media corporation. I dressed professionally in a long-sleeved pants suit and arrived early to Houston’s baseball stadium. Plastered on my face was the biggest, most secure smile I could find, in spite of the butterflies in my stomach.
This corporate event was a huge deal and I played a special role in it. Around sunrise, the radio station’s videographer arrived and began setting up his equipment. He spotted me and walked over to extend a handshake. Eager to make a good impression, I introduced myself.
“Hi, I’m Jill. I’m the poet,” I said, confidently.
“Hi, I’m Howard. I’m on-air each weekend and do video as a side-gig.”
“I know. I’ve heard you.”
“Well, I work at another station, too.”
Having varied musical tastes, I said I knew – I’d heard him there, too
When the brief, friendly banter had finished, we each continued our business, the discussion far from my mind… Until I arrived home that afternoon and discovered that within an hour of meeting me, he’d found my website and sent a highly personal email. It discussed his dating history, his taste in women, that he thought I was in my forties because “forty-something women are the hottest around;” because I was “hot.”
I wondered how he’d found my information, I told my instincts to “hush” – I was certainly overreacting. After all, the media must’ve given him my information. Pushing concern aside, I believed I needed to keep the peace for my new position and sent a simple, friendly reply.
The conversation continued as he told me he had a daughter my age and found my information through an internet search. The third day, he asked to purchase signed copies of books I’d written. I gave him my home address – easy as that.
The subtle signs of trouble were there from the beginning. The wishy-washy words to keep my feelings off-balance. On my birthday he said, “The world is a better place because you’re in it.” Not two hours later, he said, “You’d look good in black lace … and I’m not talking shirts.”
It took nearly five years for me for me to find the courage to accept that the harassment was serious and not the jokes I’d thought the man was making.
“Nice to meet you” slowly became “You’d look great in an adult film” and “The world is a better place because you’re in it” became a blend of comments like “My girlfriend is an iceberg in the bedroom,” which played to my empathetic side. Feeling “sorry” for his “plight” he claimed would “improve” if he could buy me lingerie and sex toys.
I never thought he was serious, I’d thought he was joking. I know now to trust my gut; this kind of behavior is not normal for the workplace.
By the time a box of lingerie he purchased for me was delivered to my home and I pursued action against him in 2012, I’d endured a lengthy history of requests for dates, pressure to pose for pictures and/or provocative video, cyber-stalking, emotional abuse, and calls and texts at all hours. The toll on my life was apparent – sleepless nights, stomach upset, and stress. I lived in constant fear of what the next step in his obsession might be.
My innocent response happens far too often among teens and young adults unprepared for workplace sexual harassment. Today’s teens and young adults are not alone in dealing with job-related harassment. According to Adolescents at Work: Gender Issues and Sexual Harassment, thirty-five percent (35%) of high school students reported they experienced sexual harassment in their part-time work. Of the 35% who were sexually harassed, 63% were girls and 37% were boys. In 19% of cases, perpetrators were supervisors, and 61% of the time harassment came from coworkers.
Sometimes it can be difficult to tell the difference between flirting and harassment, but it’s never okay for an adult to flirt with a child. It’s not okay for someone in a position of power to flirt with or suggest improper behavior. Such behavior in the workplace is illegal and companies must have guidelines in place outlining zero tolerance for sexual harassment.
If you are going through something like what I experienced, I want you to know that this is not your fault. Nothing you did or didn’t do caused this to happen. This did not happen because of anything you said, your choice of friends, your appearance, or your personality. Anyone who harasses another is a bully. Bullies are cowards that pick on the strong and innocent, simply the person is there. No more, no less. You are not guilty of anything, even if you initially went along with the harassment. The blame is with the harasser; you are a survivor. You can heal.
You deserve respect.
From the minute that you feel awkward about a work-situation, tell someone you trust and begin documenting every comment, action, or event that’s left you feeling uncomfortable. If you’ve received e-mails, save screenshots. If you save the e-mails, don’t alter them in any way. If someone says that they don’t think what you’re going through is that bad,” remember – it’s not their place to judge. You own your truth. You own your boundaries. Only you know what you will or will not accept.
While someone else may tolerate behavior that bothers you, it’s your life and your decision. You’re allowed to end uncomfortable situations; no job is worth trauma, torment, or the health toll enduring daily abuse can cause, such as depression or post-traumatic stress disorder. You cannot always leave your job, but you can stop the cycle of harassment. The harasser wants your silence; don’t give them the satisfaction.
Some may believe you’re weak for choosing to address sexual harassment and strive for change, this is not true. You are not weak; you are courageous and brave, trying to make the world a better place for others; that is an admirable aspiration for anyone.
As the result of my journey, I reached out to a therapist to help me understand what had happened. My therapist put the harassment this way: “The harasser is an annoying gnat you can flick away until the pest becomes smaller and smaller on your horizon. By standing up, speaking out, and refusing to accept abuse – you are a big flyswatter with the power and will to end the cycle of harassment.”
If your boss, co-worker, or friend demands your undivided attention, calls you five or ten times per day, follows your every move on and offline, or starts mimicking your style or words, there could be a deeper problem.
Stand your ground; know your boundaries; always listen to your inner voice. Respect, trust yourself and you will get through this. I told my story and put the spotlight on my harasser; you have the power within you to do the same.
Even on the darkest day in your fight against sexual harassment, always remember you’re worth so much more than workplace abuse. You will come through the experience with greater awareness and more compassion for others. You have a bright future ahead of you and you will survive this.
I believe in you!
by Band Back Together | Jan 31, 2014 | Bullying, Childhood Bullying, Coping With Bullying, Coping With Depression, Depression, Fear, Guilt, How To Heal From Being Bullied, Major Depressive Disorder, Psychological Manipulation, Rape/Sexual Assault, Sexual Harassment, Teen Bullying |
When I was in about 4th grade my friend would tell me all these sexual things. One night this person was over my house and they fingered me. I didn’t know what it was. This person manipulated me into thinking it was okay. I touched this person back. And it went on and on. This person would touch me a lot. And I would do it back.
I didn’t know any better. All I knew was it felt good. This person told me to never tell my parents or anyone else.
I’m still scarred by it. It distorted my childhood. It changed me. It made me do things I didn’t want to do. I can’t help but feel guilty. I mean 4th grade? It makes me feel so gross. I’ve never even kissed anyone.
In middle school, since I felt ugly, I jumped at any chance to show off my boobs to get some sort of positive attention from boys, and of course, I did. Sometimes it went too far. It made me cry, but it was better than being called ugly.
One time a boy touched my front-side in the hallway. He said if I told anyone he would get his sister to beat me up, so I kept quiet. Another time a boy shoved me against a locker and had his hands around my neck. He threatened me, but I don’t remember why.
Riding the bus was the worst because while they were calling me ugly, they were touching me or pushing me on the floor of the bus.
One time I was the park with my best friend and a few boys who bullied me. (Why did they bully me? I don’t know.) We were playing soccer. My old friend Melinda was there. They respected her, so they left her alone. But they would circle me and smack my butt, poke me with sticks in the front area, my boobs, and my butt. I liked the attention, but I also hated it. I told them to stop, but they wouldn’t. Two of the boys walked me home (not sure why) and one of them smacked my butt. A 30 or 40 year old man saw him do it. He yelled, “Oh yeah, smack that!” It scared me so much! I was furious! I yelled, “Fuck you!”
They told me if he came back to rape me they would leave.
I’ve had multiple experiences with grown men making me very uncomfortable. I get looked up and down. I see the lust in their eyes, and it really frightens me.
I have a friend who I love very dearly. But he can be very abusive. He’s very “hands on.” He touches my butt and my boobs every so often. But when he’s mad, he literally hurts me. He pulls wresting moves on me or chokes me for a few seconds. To him it’s a joke. To me, it’s scary, and it hurts.
One time I was locked in a room with him and he pushed me down, and he was standing over me. It sounds ridiculous but I was still scared. We are best friends, I just wish he wouldn’t take things so far sometimes.
All these events make me fear men a lot. I have a lot of anxiety and guilt from these events and I’m still not over them. I honesty think I have depression from all the bullying and harassment.
by Band Back Together | Jan 28, 2014 | Anxiety, Date/Acquaintance Rape, Depression, Fear, Healing From A Rape or Sexual Asault, How To Help With Low Self-Esteem, Loneliness, Rape/Sexual Assault, Sadness, Self-Esteem, Sexual Coercion |
I think I’m depressed. That’s the thing that worries me the most. I had this kind of shitty thing happen to me about a year ago, and I fear it has changed me. I used to be really happy, and could see beauty basically everywhere. I was outgoing, loved hanging out with my friends, and generally just doing stuff. But now I have absolutely no motivation to do anything. I sit at home watching tv, or playing games; anything to keep me from having to go outside and face life.
It’s sad, because I just moved to this new town, for school. An education I should be really excited about, but I’m not. I should try and make some friends here. I have one good friend left. The rest I have neglected to the point where we don’t speak anymore. Several have tried numerous times to call me, but I just don’t pick up. Before I moved, I would make plans to meet them, but then make up some lame excuse and not show up. They must think I don’t like them anymore. I’m so sad. I don’t want to cause other people pain just because I’m not feeling well, but I just can’t get myself to contact them.
My self-esteem is so unbearably low, it’s a pain to even go shopping for groceries. I only do when I absolutely have to. Unless I’m having a really good day, I can only buy certain items, so I’m not embarrassed. I over-eat, drink alone and don’t exercise. And as my weight goes up, my self-esteem drops even more. I’m a bit of a mess.
While I was volunteering in Africa, I was raped by a guy I worked with. I’ve had some trouble with guys in the past, so I went to Africa because I wanted a change and to clear my head for a while. He was so sweet and funny, everybody loved him. We started flirting a bit, and then it evolved into something more. He acted like he was really falling for me, and to this day I still think he was. (Unless he was just an extremely good actor, and I have no idea how to read people.)
There was a party. It was a great evening, and there was a lot to drink. I really liked him, and was going to have sex with him. My friends left for bed, but I stayed behind with him, with his friends close by, thinking I was totally safe. Like an idiot.
As soon as my friends had turned their back, he started kissing me and trying to undress me. I laughed and told him to wait, but he continued. That’s when I got scared, and told him to stop. So he raped me.
He was so much stronger than me, there was no way I could fight back, so I just shut down. I was in complete shock. Never once did it occur to me to scream for help. I’m ashamed of that now, and the fact that I was really into him. At the time, all I could think was “What? Is this really happening?”
After he was finished, I was lying on the grass, half naked, with him and his friends looking down at me. I will never forget that image. It was the most humiliating experience of my life. He started pulling me up by the arm, saying we would go to his cabin. I said no, and got away from his grip, but then he grabbed me by the hair.
That is when it finally occurred to me to scream.
There was a bit of mayhem in camp after that, and I had to report the incident. If the people I worked for hadn’t made me, I probably wouldn’t have. For that I am grateful, I suppose. It became quite clear who believed me and who didn’t. The guy who found me that night did. The rest of them, not so much. I had been working closely with these people for months, and I truly believed they were my friends. But they still thought it was my fault. He was such a sweet, likable guy, and if anything happened, it must have been my fault.
He told people that we were already in a sexual relationship, and he didn’t know he was forcing me into anything. His friends backed him up, of course, but he still went to jail for a while …about 4 months, if I’m not mistaken.
I stayed over there for a while after that, confused, broken and alone, not wanting to go home and deal with reality here. Obviously it didn’t work out in the long run, and I left a few months after the incident. About two days before going home I saw him again in the city. I completely panicked and ended up hiding behind a car.
So now I am left with the painful memories that pop up every now and then, a general distrust in all people, and absolutely no motivation to do anything. I am ashamed, sad, constantly tired, and I feel so incredibly lonely. I went to talk to a therapist a few times, but she went on vacation for a few weeks, and I never tried to schedule a new appointment.
She did tell me however, that I can get some kind of compensation for this. I just need documentation stating that the rape happened, documents from the police, or basically anything. But the people I worked for refuse to help me. I know the documents are (or were) in their office, I saw them, I touched them, but now, all of a sudden, they don’t exist.
This was extremely painful to write, but it turned out really long! Thanks to anyone who bothered to read through it, and thank you to whomever started this incredible Band. It is very nice to be able to vent like this. I normally have serious problems talking about my own emotions and problems.
Lots of love to everyone here!
