A Speeding Train
I’ve been talking a lot with my fellow basketcases about what it feels like when we’re at our lowest. The most common description is “being aboard a speeding train that’s about to crash.” Apt. There’s a strange panic which sets in when things get rough; one disaster after another, both real and imagined, seems to hit at once, a tsunami of shit that knocks our feet out from under us.
Insecurity addicts are always pulled hither and thither, hopping from one problem to another, spreading ourselves so thin we rarely fix anything well. Insecurity loves this. It squats on our shoulder and encourages us to fail, rushing us from one thing to the next, reveling in our angst as we fall behind and displease everybody. That, in turn, feeds panic, which keeps us in a perpetual state of fear and dissatisfaction, a perfect environment for insecurity to grow and thrive. Like any parasite, insecurity will manipulate its environment to fit its needs, not ours, and will continue to do so even after we’re consumed. It needs to keep us down so as to feed on us.
When I was still in my rotten marriage, I didn’t realize what my own unwanted passenger was doing. I thought it was all me. One of the first mindsets an addiction instills in its host is blindness. We are absolute dumb asses when it comes to our own mental and emotional health. For me, during that time, nothing I did was good enough. I’d subconsciously picked a mate who would aid my insecurity addiction, a cruel man with his own baggage who was impossible to please. This was a challenge and an ego boost for me. If I could make someone like him happy, that was a huge deal. If I was strong enough to stay with such a sadistic, demanding person, then I had worth. I remember a co-worker of his ranting to me about what a bastard he was. She couldn’t understand how I could possibly stay with him. This pleased me. I smiled and told her that I was good at bearing adversity, that I was like a tree standing against a storm. She snorted and said, “Then you must be a fucking oak.” I fed off such comments; such a weird and twisted nourishment for such a wretched and starving individual. The more he hurt me, the more I hated myself and loved the strength I had to endure it. I clung to it amidst the chaos.
There was also the financial fear of failure. Peter, my ex, was forever telling me how I’d never make it on my own. I was too stupid with money, too ignorant of the marketplace, too inept at organization. My insecurity convinced me to believe the lies and I did it with a fearful gladness, grateful that, even as bad as the marriage was, independence would be far worse because I was such a worthless sack of shit.
My abusive childhood fed this as well. I watched Peter pick on our kids and often nagged him about it, but I truly thought this environment wasn’t too damaging for them. I was sure they would be able to bounce back from these little digs and constant belittling. My skewed brain reasoned that, “He wasn’t raping them, he wasn’t beating them, so it really wasn’t that bad.” But it was. My own insecurity put my children in danger. They grew up in an environment of fun with Mom when Dad was away, misery when he was there. I thought fun with Mom was enough. I thought my praising them, spending time with them, would be a shield against the day-to-day emotional bruising. But I, too, had become an obedient dog. Peter told me to punish Rhianna for her grades, punish her for her slovenly nature, punish her for not being his, basically. And I did. I yelled at her and pulled my hair out with the frustration of her constant fuckups, blind to the obvious cries for help from my poor daughter. Like her mother, Rhianna became so beaten down with misery and self-loathing that she contemplated suicide. Leland, my son, turned to drugs. I was wrong that incest and violence were the only things to destroy a child’s sense of self worth, so my kids paid the same price I did as a little girl. I’d helped spread my own addiction into their innocent little heads, even as I was desperately hoping they’d be all right. And insecurity grinned at the envelopment of a whole new set of nests to grow in. It had used me as a tool to spread, just as it did my parents, grandparents and great-grandparents for a dozen generations.
We come into this world as fresh young innocents. We’re molded and shaped by a thousand and one different experiences. Most of our teachings aren’t even recognized, let alone acknowledged. So many lessons and pop quizzes are sprung on us, right under our noses, and we don’t even know what’s happening. Our brain gets this flood of information and tries its best to sort and store in the proper categories. But it only obeys what it thinks we want it to do. It reacts to emotions in much the same way our bodies do. Emotion is information too, just like book learning and what environmental factors are dangerous. Don’t touch a hot stove, don’t walk in front of a speeding car, don’t pet a grizzly bear. Emotional trauma is categorized as well, but usually in ways to damage. If we don’t counter trauma with healing, we never heal. I was a walking bag of wounds, seeping and infected, and I didn’t even know it. So my life was a speeding train about to crash, no time to catch my breath, only the constant race to destruction I was always trying to avoid by heaping coal in the furnace and making it go faster. As I said, insecurity addicts are blind dumb asses.
Thankfully, blissfully, my addiction no longer controls me. I found a way to slow the train long enough for me to jump off, waving at the conductor as it continued on its mad journey. The wounds I’d carried since birth were heavy and rotten, but I’ve worked on them since, finally recognizing that the only balm that works is love. My self hatred was salt and vinegar in the open sores, keeping them rank and fetid so my insecurity could feed. More than feed, spread to my beloved children. I fought to bring them back from the brink but the best example I could give was to step back from the precipice myself. I look to little Becky O’Donnell, the tiny rape victim who lives eternally inside of me, and I no longer beat or blame her for my own misery. Self love has cured my infection and daily self love exercises are healing my many wounds. The trick is to want to heal, to feel you deserve it. Insecurity likes to whisper otherwise, to the point where we experience guilt at the mere idea of happiness. Don’t believe it, even though it whispers in your own borrowed voice. It’s bullshit. You deserve to be happy, you deserve to be an example for others to follow. So get to it, my brothers and sisters of circumstance. Tell yourself “I love you” every day. Whether you believe it or not, and you probably won’t, keep at it. Rome wasn’t built in a day, and you weren’t fucked up in a day. Perseverance is the only thing that worked for me, and it’ll work for you. So keep at it. Best of luck.
Take care.
Love, R
