A while ago I wrote a post about a man who assaulted me on a date. I had a hard time finishing Part Two, but here it is;
Part Two:
Obviously I have some things I need to work on personally
and looking back it’s easy to see the red flags and the many opportunities I
had to cut this guy loose before it got to any kind of threatening situation.
Maybe it’s a symptom of the depression, but I think that deep down I just don’t
see myself as a person who has value. It’s not like I’m thinking in the moment,
“I deserved that,” it’s just a general feeling and a habitual way of responding
to the world. And day to day, there are times when I think, “Hey, I’m awesome!
I’m kick-ass! I’m a strong, independent woman who will never be taken advantage
of by a man!” But those are surface thoughts.
It
tells me that other people can do whatever they want but I am always to remain
polite, calm, courteous and agreeable.
And
yes, apparently it means whatever they
want.
I could
say if it ever happens again I’ll punch that loser right in the nose! But I
know I wouldn’t. I’ll make up a polite excuse and leave. I’ll freeze up and do
nothing and wait for it to be over.
But
maybe I shouldn’t be too hard on myself. This is a legitimate survival
instinct, isn’t it? If I can’t fight him and he’s got me trapped, then it’s
best to pretend nothing weird is happening so that it’s more likely I’ll get an
opportunity to get away. If I fought, he might have just held me down harder or
even hurt me.
It just
made me feel a little bit like I was contributing to the problem, making him
think I condoned his actions. But in the moment, I shouldn’t feel bad about being
only concerned about my safety and getting out of there without further
incident. I did whatever it took and that happened to be being compliant and
courteous.
But it’s
true that in general, I have a problem using this defense mechanism ALL the time.
I think it’s because when growing up, my dad was angry a lot. It’s not like he
beat us, but he would rant and rave and I would have to walk on eggshells. He
would get very mad at me if I got the A not the A+, and would force me to ask
the teacher what I could do to ‘make up for it.’ I learned that if I was quiet
and just sat there until the raging was over and I could run up to my room then
that was the best and quickest way out of the situation.
In
summary; knowing all this about myself makes me want to pay more attention to
those red flags in the beginning. Because they were there, and I ignored them
because sometimes I don’t feel like I deserve to be treated like a person. And,
I think I started this post feeling a bit sorry for myself because I freeze-up
and I am polite and courteous to people who are trying to hurt me but I am going
to tell myself to refuse to feel that way (hopefully this will work) because I
am just trying to protect myself the best way that I know how.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 United States License.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 United States License.
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