I am unlovable. I am just a sex object. My only purpose is to be raped and abused.
How hard was that to read? How much more would it hurt to hear me say it out loud?
These are the most common thoughts that spin through my head while I am activated. The cycle at which they spin depends on how busy I am and how much energy I am having to put into challenging and ignoring these thoughts.
These are false thoughts that do not belong to me. They the words and the beliefs of my PTSD. Most days my PTSD lies dormant inside of me, a volcano waiting to erupt. Thankfully eruptions are few and far between.
Due to recent events, the thought that has gained the most traction is: No one will ever want to marry me because no one would want to settle down with someone so damaged as me. No one wants to commit to PTSD.
Every person I have been romantically involved with has left because of PTSD. Even if they do not mind my PTSD at the beginning, eventually my PTSD becomes too much.
The thing is I will always be too much, too loud, too outgoing, too defiant, too hopeful, too loving, too intense. While these thoughts from my PTSD has been reinforced by many, they will never truly be mine. On my bad days, I may believe these thoughts more than I should but I will accept these thoughts as my truths. I will always find positives.
Maybe I am never meant to get married because my partner would take up too much of my love. Maybe I have too many people to love and there will never be just one person capable of loving me back because I am too much for just one person. (Maybe I am a sex object but sex fucking sells!)
If you are struggling with negative thoughts, take the time to label who or what they belong to. I read about a psychologist who had to clients separate from their mental illness and give it a name. I had done thing long before. My PTSD is Dark. When it starts to take over I say "I am going dark." It means I am not myself. (Go back and read the beginning paragraphs replacing (my) PTSD with Dark and see how it changes the narrative).
When we separate from our mental illness we can attribute the negative thoughts and emotions to something other than ourselves. It helps us see ourselves as good and separate from the negative things. It makes it easier to challenge something that is not ourselves. We see the negative from a different perspective.
Then we find the little pieces that tell us these thoughts are inconsistent. It's the inconsistencies that make these negative thoughts untrue. They are little things that are easy to miss if you are not looking in the right mindset. They easy to miss on your worst days.
This is why we need others. We need to be supported and to be the support for others. To helps our loved ones see the inconsistencies they may be missing because their 'dark' has taken over. Those of you who do not suffer from a mental illness, need to love and support your loved ones who do. Ignoring it and shying away from the heavy negative thoughts and feelings they are experiencing, only leaves them to suffer more and reinforce those negative thoughts and feelings. They may seem obviously untrue to you but in those moments your loved one needs the negative things they are experiencing validated and then challenged. What they are experiencing is real even if it false.
Validate. Challenge. Love.
"Love is the only rational act. " Morrie Schwartz.