“Hey, can I ask you something edgy?” I asked my spouse.
“Yeah,” he said.
“You know how kids are not supposed to have a sexuality?”
“Yeah?” he said.
“But they do, right. But we’re supposed to kind of pretend that they don’t?”
“Yeah?”
“But it’s not a problem. It’s a problem if adults hurt them, with sexuality, or if the kids hurt each other.”
“Right,” my spouse said.
“But if I’m an adult, which I am, looking back on my childhood, am I allowed to talk about that? I think creeps are going to get off on it. But what if I need to talk about it?”
“You can talk about it,” he said.
Yep, that’s edgy me. Still trying to dodge creeps who were / are after my child-self. Some habits are hard to kick.
child
A child is a beautiful, fresh person. They are usually so creative and less muddled! Everyone should be super nice to them, don’t do violence to them, and certainly don’t do violation to them. Yuck.
People were not good to me, when I was little. It’s so much work, to undo the damage they never should have done to me in the first place. I can get angry, thinking what good I could do with my energy, if I didn’t need most of it to manage c-PTSD and sad coping strategies that became part of me. I daydream about all the fun I could have and work I could do, if I was starting without a fuckton of old trauma.
creepy
I masturbated a lot, during early childhood, which I recall–going to bed, touching my private areas. I was very little; one of my earliest memories is going to the doctor for an infection in my vulva–must have been bacterial. A very painful memory of a doctor asking me if I touched myself there and shaming me, when I honestly answered with yes.
Poor little Nest, shamed for touching my own body and being honest. I love that brave kid who looked for pleasure and tried to speak the truth. My little fingers were innocent; I wasn’t hurting anyone. If only everyone was so innocent.
My mom was extreme about trying to protect me, in some ways, and wildly irresponsible in others. But maybe part of the guilt she carried about me had to do with early harm I endured that she missed.
Some things are so creepy I don’t even want to tell you. There is no content warning big enough to warn anyone, the thing I told my therapist, and she got a look of horror on her face, for two seconds. I had never seen her make that facial expression. Her horror gave me the edgy insight that it was a big deal.
healing
Thank you for hearing I have childhood trauma pain and there’s shady shit in my past. It’s part of my disabilities. I want to focus on the present and being strong now as I am. But the past feels like treacherous There Be Monsters Here, and they are really there and rear their heads, biting me at bad times.
How could I heal that? It’s impossible to get that amount of support. I would need to go on a magical vacation, where kind people cared for me 24-7 while I just howled. I would need someone to cook for me, massage, dance, qigong, nature time, and incredible therapies that don’t exist yet. Guess I’ll try to invent them.
