Living the Non-Binary Life

6.) Self-Erasure

If you don't immediately know what this term is just by looking at it, good for you.

You're a lucky one.

Self erasure happens when a child is taught by a parent that the people around them matter more than anything else.

~~~~

You want something? Too bad. You don't get to have it because I want it. I expect you to conform to my rules, and I know you'll do it because you think I love you and that this is normal.

You don't know it yet but I'm gonna make you feel as if you don't matter. You'll give into the needs of others before even thinking about what you want.

Oh yeah. Expect me to ridicule you if you ever do voice your wants and needs. So just don't do it. Emotions? You're funny. You don't get to show that you have those. I'll make sure you feel them just to make you hate yourself for it.

~~~~

Okay now multiply that by every sibling I grew up with. That's at least four different people doing that to me.

Now let me make it worse by telling you I'm the youngest.

With horrible coordination.

And this feeling that I wasn't the same as anyone else.

But heaven forbid I try to understand it. That's a no-no. I can never indulge in my emotions.

The worst part?

You start doing it to yourself. You start to realize that it's no use begging for things because no one will give in as easily as you were told to. You start to figure out that your wants and needs and emotions and opinions are all best left unsaid, because someone will always make you feel stupid, someone will always make you feel worthless and needy and a waste of space.

My mother did this to me. Bob did this to me. Bob stands for Big old bitch.

Excuse my language.

Now, bob left my life over a year ago. Literally as soon as bob left, I moved in with my grandmother.

Oh, the stress she's had to hear from me.

I had no idea who I was.

It was like some part of me was trying to claw itself out of me now that it was safe, but everything I had to be just couldn't let it.

I started going to therapy for PTSD. I can't leave the house because I can't deal with people, but I can't be alone because my head is too loud, my energy is too high, I can't focus on one thing and I pace, pace, pace, pace...

Eventually, that thing that made me feel weird, that thing that was trying to claw itself out from the depths of the intricately woven, carefully placed cage I made...it smashed it to smithereens and laughed in my face and said Hi I'm here please address me. You can't ignore me.

But I tried. I knew it was there now. I understood that the discomfort I felt was my gender. But I couldn't acknowledge it, I refused to explore it any further.

Thank God my boyfriends' kindness and stubbornness are way stronger than my will to conform.

Thank God he was the one that smashed that blasted cage and started to show me that I was safe. I'm okay.

The real me, the one crying in that small dark corner, suffering and despairing and dying...he found me just in time. I grabbed his hand. Calmly and quietly, he coaxed me out. He found me, and he saved me.

I researched a lot. The word Agender was like a beacon to me.

I finally know who I am.

I finally understand why I was so different.

I just wish I would've had the freedom to understand when I was younger.

Oh yeah. Remember when I said that you teach that self-erasure thing to yourself?

Yeah, I just did it with my boyfriend.

I feel so shitty because of it, but he needed to sleep.

Tonight was probably the fourth time I asked him to do something with me before bed, and he simply wouldn't. A phone call, a video chat, a movie together, I've asked him for all of these things and he simply wouldn't give in.

It made me feel so bad to literally beg and only get told no. But to be fair, he doesn't always say no, and it wasn't right for me to expect things of him without ever actually asking.

I even tried to guilt trip him, causing him to wonder if I was okay, and to tell me that he's sick and can't sleep if I feel bad. He didn't realize he was setting me up for what I was about to do.

I gave in. Of course I gave in. His sleep is far more important than the movie I'd been wanting to watch with him all week. So I lied and said I was fine, that I'd just watch the movie on my own before I went to bed. But I was so desperate. I still am. I would still like to watch that movie with him. And I know he feels bad, and he'll feel bad if he wakes up in the morning and reads this, but I regret not pushing harder, even though I know beyond the shadow of a doubt he never would've given in.

It's not fair of me to ask other people to give in to demands as easily as I do. I just wish I didn't feel so bad about putting his needs before mine. I wish he hadn't let me. Just because I'm free doesn't mean I'll stay free.

I can only hope it doesn't turn into a regular thing. I hope he shocks me sometimes by giving in when I think he'll say no.

Sorry it's so depressing, but at least it's long.

~~~~

Be true, stay you ❤❤

~Day Dreamer~