Loud Mouth Brown Girl

But I won’t be able to say the same thing tomorrow.

One of the things that I’ve never talked about, is the brain damage I have from both being beaten in the head, and the rest of the physical trauma that comes from being abused.

Right now my doctor is focused on my iron issues, but after that we’re moving to the brain to focus on what’s going on up there. I am also going to get tested for Autism and ADHD. I know I have both, but I don’t have an official diagnosis. The last time I tried to get tested for ADHD, I was told “I can’t tell what’s ADHD, and what’s brain damage due to trauma.”

So that’s frustrating.

I am tired, but now I know the kind of tired I am can be fixed, it’s already getting better. I’ve had two iron treatments already, and now I’m up at five am every day. I feel better, but I have to tell you I also feel super guilty.

I haven’t always put myself first and that’s because I was taught that I was unimportant period. Today I have people in my life who are showing me the kind of person I want to be.

I have friendships today that are healing parts of me that I didn’t even realize were broken. When I give a gift, I don’t just get grattitude in return, I get people who genuinely appreciate the effort it took for me to find and aquire the gift.

Having friends with wildly different interests is so funny because I’ll see mushrooms and immidiately think of H, or sparkles and it’s for S, if it’s black and shiny it’s definitely for E.

I love how much my friends know me. They didn’t mind when I trauma dumped on them when we first met. One of my neighbors and I – I will never forget this – were talking one day when she said “I love those doc podcasts, like you know about NXIVM?” I laughed.

“What would you like to know, I’m sort of an expert” I replied. She didn’t believe me at first, until I told her I was a survivor of that same cult leader, and gave details the podcasts didn’t have.

To this day my friends know who I am, and they accept me. We don’t spend every single day hanging on to each other as if the world will fall apart if we’re separated, and that’s healing too.

I know if I Need to I can call up any of the girls and say “I need you,” and they’d show up as soon as they were able. Whether it’s an hour or a few days I know they’ll be there.

I don’t have women in my life trying to separate me from the group, or isolate me from people I care about. I no longer have to worry that if I start dating my “BFF” is going to fuck my guy or girl.

I no longer question my relationships, I take them for what they are and I meet people where they are at. Not everyone can handle all of me, but my friends take me in the doses that I am able to give and they don’t judge me when I have a “What about me” moment.

I no longer feel the need to pretend to be something I am not, I fuck up and make mistakes and sometimes I’m bitchy and unfair, and you know the worst part about being friends with these women? They call me on my shit and let me know when I am going overboard, and I work really hard, because I love them, at not going overboard.

I am trying, but I am also setting boundaries. I have learned my love language – or part of it – is communication. I need conversation, I need to be able to hear what you are thinking and to share where I am coming from. If you can’t converse with me, and let me be vulnerable, then we can’t be friends.

That’s okay. I don’t hate people I don’t connect with, I just don’t communicate with them if I can avoid it. I’m not being mean or cruel or even bitchy, I’m just drawling a line in the sand about the kind of treatment I am willing to accept.

I know what I want in my life today and it’s not white supremacists who want to stop me from dying, shaving, or otherwise decorating my hair. I don’t want to hear disgusting comments about my tattoos, or their placement, or how I shouldn’t have them at all cause “Not a proper lady.”

You bet your fucking ass I am not a God damned Lady. I spent my life pretending to be the perfect lady and all it did was get me raped and damned near mudered and missing. And I assure you, not one person in my past life, would have questioned my disappearence except my mother and siblings.

I don’t think surviving that shit made me strong. I think that I survived because I had ancient ancestors watching over me. I think getting through the survival part, to this place where I am actually healing, that’s the part that makes me strong.

I don’t know what it’s called, but I know that this moment in time where I’m spending more time healing my brain, and my thought processes, is more important to me than chasing dick. Or vagina for that matter.

I don’t need an intimate sexual relationship. What I need is as H puts it, “Soft friends,” friends who understand that I don’t always have the mental capacity to hang out, and that sometimes I just need to be left alone so I can sit in my head and figure out what the fuck is going on up there.

Having that in my life today tells me that I want everyone in the world to have what I have. I want the calm, the sweetness, the sillyness of getting your friends key charms or a balloon just because you know it’s going to make them smile.

The friendships that I am cultivating today, are setting the limits of what I am willing to accept tomorrow, and honestly I love that for me.

Sending all my love,