#anyway. i don't know. sometimes i wish that i went to a therapist earlier

[elytrafemme]

not putting under cut bc i feel like thats weird idk but jsyk im doing more mental health musings here 

u know something i find really interesting is like. okay i’m on my 4th therapist right now, right? which sounds like i burned through a lot and i guess i kind of did but really she’s my 3rd, the first one stared at me blankly for one session diagnosed me with GAD and “a mood disorder” with 0 other specificity and then recommended i go somewhere else. but the other two that followed were at that same place and i guess i just find it interesting how ill prepared they were with dealing with like... complex mental health issues?

because i mean, i don’t think either of the people i saw were bad people. but like. i told the first one about this one time where i was in one of the lowest mental states of my life (and at the time it was the worst i had ever felt) and my friends had been laughing at me during it, right. and so i gave them the finger. and my therapist laughed and was like well if someone gave me the finger i wouldn’t want to talk to them either. and then my second therapist said i hadn’t dealt with any “major trauma” and would watch me have dissociative episodes and do absolutely nothing but go like “i know sweetheart i know” and then the session would just. End. 

and it’s like, they were helpful when it came to things like my school stress, or ... well i guess just that. it was very basic things they could help with, it was like a school counselor. and that kept me from making these realizations about my mental health because they did not know anything more complex and couldn’t talk to me about it. 

my fourth therapist has been different, obviously, treats me like a person. it just so happens she’s the only private therapist i saw, and also the most expensive one. so like. fuck. 

#nightmare.personal #it's strange because i recognize that i know more about my mental health than a lot of people do at 17 #like i've already gotten a lot of work done really early and stuff #and yet i mean. i spent like. so much time not? learning about myself #and i just have to wonder how much time i could have saved if i was told that me having dissociative episodes wasn't normal #when i was just thinking about a memory #how much time i could have saved if i wasn't told that giving someone the middle finger for laughing at my trauma was #unjustified God i'm still so angry about that #and it's been like what. 4 years? #anyway. i don't know. sometimes i wish that i went to a therapist earlier #but i also know that either way i would have only seen the one i'm seeing now #when i started because she also saw another relative so like #otherwise we wouldn't have known her so. no matter how early i started nothing would have changed #i consider being 15 the worst year of my life but by far all the years before when i was with those other therapists. were the darkest.

[jettman1970]

I want to tell you how I found out what she is.

So her and I have been together off and on for almost 3 years. She has a ton of traumatic experience throughout her life, starting in childhood. This type of trauma is something I wouldn't wish on my enemies. I really don't know how she made it through it all, but she did. She's currently working through it all with a therapist and I am very proud of her and the progress she's making. She's also been in abusive relationships before me.

That being said, I always from almost the very start sensed that something wasn't quite right. I didn't know what it was but my gut just knew. I chalked it up to the trauma and abuse and dismissed it. I just wanted to make sure she knew how much she was loved and that all that was behind her. At least I tried to when she would let me.

But there was still this constant thought in the back of my mind that kept telling me that something was wrong. Even the way she held my hand told me something wasn't right. She just didn't hold it in a way that I would say is the correct way. It's hard to explain and it sounds dumb, but I felt that. But because it sounded dumb I dismissed that as well. Maybe that's just the way she does it?? I don't know.

So, I guess sometime into the second year and after yet another breakup, I started googling things after I found some Red Pill content on YouTube. Some of the people were talking about various mental issues women have that affects relationships.

I looked at things like Borderline Personality Disorder, Bi-polar disorder, Schizophrenia, and I even looked at Narcissism among a few others. She did have a few traits from each of these but none of them described or applied to her in such a way that I could feel confident that was what I was dealing with. I eventually gave up on it because I couldn't find anything particularly applicable to her. So again, I just chalked it up to her past affecting her current relationships.

Fast forward a few months, we're in couples therapy. I'm not really feeling like I'm getting much out of it but I persist and go because I really wanted us to work. In hindsight, that was a dumb move but I digress. The night before our last couples session we had which was at the end of June she found a picture on my phone of a young woman. She went ballistic and accused me of cheating and so on. She made me take her home at about midnight. It was an hour drive one way. So I did.

The next morning she texted me and asked if I would be at counseling. I stupidly said that I would be there even though I knew exactly what was going to happen there. And it did. But this time was different. It happened in person and in front of the counselor. I knew it was going to happen but it still felt off because all the other breakups ALWAYS happened over text or phone calls. She would get mad, hang up and immediately block me.

Also, this time she said we could still be friends. That came across to me as being weird at the time. I still don't know what it means or how to process it.

Anyway she was having some minor health issues around that time. I would text her every day and check up on her. We would have a few exchanges and I would drop off because I didn't want to impose. I didn't know what our new boundaries were etc.

Now, I don't remember exactly when but it was just a few days after that, I'm on YouTube and over on the side where the suggestions are my eyes locked onto a video with a term in the title I had never heard before.

I mentioned earlier that I had looked at Narcissism and dismissed it. Well apparently there are several types of it from what most everyone thinks about when talking about Narcissism. I had no idea.

So, I see the term "Vulnerable Narcissist" in the title of this particular video and I'm thinking WTF is that?

So I clicked on it and started watching it. It was a life changing video. The flood of emotions I felt. I had goosebumps watching it. I would've bet money on it that they produced the video based on my relationship with my narcissist. It was so spot on with everything and I mean everything I was experiencing with her. Apparently it's quite common and predictable. The situations change from person to person but the methods of abuse all follow the same pattern. I had finally found my answers.

I went down the YouTube rabbit hole for Vulnerable/covert Narcissism. I've watched well over a hundred videos on this topic at this point.

I now knew what was going on. All the pieces of the puzzle fell into place. I could now see our conversations for what they were. Looking back, I can identify where the abuse was, where the love bombing was and I certainly knew that I wasn't the bad apple in the relationship like I had been told repeatedly and somehow believed.

I'm not saying I'm perfect. I make mistakes and I'm most certainly an asshole at times. But the truth is, she was the problem all along. All the issues we had were mostly fabrications and the legitimate issues that she harped on the most were basically my reaction, or rather lack of reaction to her needing supply.

So after I found that video, I mostly go grey rock and predictably the "Friendship" deteriorated. She ends up getting mad at me, blames me for something and ends it.

So that's where we are now.