So it's come to this... Sitting here in the dark, plucking away at my keys, preparing to tell the world my deepest, darkest secrets........I've never "blogged before," but a friend of mine thought it would be therapeutic, and also an opportunity for me to anonomously share my demons with others and get their opinions on stuff I'd normally never talk about. So with a "what have I got to lose" kind of attitude, here I am plunging into blogger world.....
Me in a nutshell: I'm in my mid-thirties, have many advantages in life, kind of a tall, dark handsome kind of guy. Well liked. Well spoken. Educated. Talented. Street-smart. Some would say charismatic........But in another life, I was a drug addict, drug dealer & generally undesirable person. Most people who know me now have no idea about my past, and would probably never guess. To be honest, I've done a pretty miraculous job in turning my life around and becoming another person. However.............some mistakes you can never take back, and I'm haunted by some things that happened to me years ago. I contracted Herpes from unprotected sex with the wrong person, and then won the super-sweepstakes when I contracted Hepatitis-C from the wrong needle. Nice luck, huh? Never thought it'd happen to me..........Yeah, blow me life.
Anyway, despite the fact that I've turned my shit around, I feel like inside, that I'm a "fucked up person" and damaged goods. I'm somehow, wearing a mask with these secrets I'm carrying around and that if people ever found out the truth about me, that I'd be ostrasized and branded with a scarlet letter. I'm paranoid about anyone finding out about my medical conditions and I think it's effected a number of issues in my life. One of the biggest ones is my relationships with women. You can imagine how my "secrets" would make things very difficult when it came to me feeling comfortable with women....I've always seemed to date the wrong girls, and things never ended up working out long term, so I'm not married, don't even have a steady girlfriend. I'm pretty sure subconsciously I've been going for girls that won't want a long term relationship, because I'm scared to death that the day would have come when I had to "reveal" the truth to them, and I feel like I could never do that....partially for fear she would freak out and want nothing to do with me, and also because I'm so paranoid that if someone found out, they could reveal my secrets to anyone they wanted. So, I've lived a life of short, meaningless relationships that were doomed to fail from the beginning..........
The funny thing is, neither one of those diseases really affects my life. I take medication for the Herpes, so I don't get outbreaks, it's like I don't have it, (I still always practice safe sex). And the Hep C has been looked into by doctors who tell me it's not really hurting me, I take tests all the time and they seem to indicate that the virus isn't really damaging my liver, the doctors tell me it may never have an effect on my life at all, and if it does it won't be until much later in life, but......but that doesn't seem to matter, I still KNOW I have them, and that still screws with me mentally. I'd really like to settle down, have a nice girlfriend and family, but I have a very negative attitude that those things will never happen for me, because of the issues that plague me. Wow, I just realized how long this thing is........eecch. Sorry folks......well, that's enough for one sitting, sorry for the eye-strain, but once it started coming out, I wanted you to have all the facts.......so, if anyone out there has gone through anything similar, maybe you could share with me, your thoughts, opinions, experiences and help me understand what I have to do to come to terms with my situation and finally experience some happiness, unburdened with feelings of self-loathing, lol.
10 comments:
This is a great starting point for you. I look forward to reading more about you in the coming weeks/months. I believe this is could be your first step to releasing your demons.
Best wishes,
i'd echo bruno here... you're doing well by recognising your problems for what they are and wanting to do something about them... don't try to tackle everything at the same time though, take things step for step, issue by issue in a logical or meaningful sequence for yourself...
by opening up, with patience and acceptance of yourself you'll achieve a lot, believe me :-)
welcome... i'll see you again soon...
keep well
I agree with Bruno, this truly is a great starting point and I also look forward to hearing more. :-) You have definitely piqued my curiosity in a way that says, "I'm rootin' for ya!"
Writing a blog is really an excellent way to express yourself openly.
Welcome!
Whether it's herpes or hep-c or some other imperfection, something in the past, or something in the now, lots of us go around feeling like "damaged goods." Self-love and self-acceptance aren't inborn traits, they're learned.
Know that you are worthy of learning.
You'll find good friends here.
Bruno pointed me towards your blog. Keep writing through shame and uncertainty. Keep opening your heart and mind. Best wishes.
I've been coming back here to read this again. Bruno knew I could relate to you well when he pointed me here, but I wasn't sure how to comment the first day.
It's so hard sometimes to turn away from the burdens of our past mistakes, to stop punishing ourselves for things we cannot change. I understand this all too well.
One of your thoughts, however, has already been dispelled on a small scale. You said if anybody found out your secrets you would be branded with a scarlet letter. Well, all of us here know them now, and not one of us has branded you or cast you out. We are here, still. We accept you, flaws and all.
I have a sordid past myself, and it has been an arduous journey to accept it and learn from it, to trust people again with the truth of Sue. I have my own fair share of regrets too. A month ago, I would have been afraid to tell you, afraid that you would also shun me, but I can speak openly about them. I am not the woman who was nearly unfaithful to her husband anymore. I am not the promiscuous teenager who ended up pregnant before graduating high school. I am not the liar, the manipulator, or the pyscho ex-girlfriend. Not anymore.
People who judge me on my past are judging the wrong person, for she is not me anymore.
I'm telling you this to give you hope. There IS hope. :-)
hi
no need to apologize -- your post did not read as really, really long. lol!
welcome to the world of blogging.
i have told people some things about me that i still to this day would not tell in person. it felt good to 'speak' them. i find, in writing, that i take the little box of psychological negativity and knock it off my shoulder.
i have been an avid follower of postsecret.blogspot.com for quite a while (there is a link on my blog). there people share there deepest secrets -- those they are afraid to speak but need to tell someone in order to release the hold the secret has on them. i too have an anonymous blog and i did it to provide those same postsecret benefits through blogging.
at first i was not going to tell anyone about my blog. since then i have let a few friends know about my blog and they read it.
it is as though by telling a deep secret or shame, you can release some of its hold on your life -- does that make sense?
i am not saying that i am at peace with my demons. i just know that i am closer to being at peace with the me i know i am inside.
i wish you luck on your journey to healing yourself.
welcome the world of blogging.
storm
Still finding my way around blog-world...I left a comment in my last blog, but wanted to leave one here too, saying thanks for all your kind words and inspiration, I needed it...
(Get your pinch of salt ready.)
“Am I really as fucked up as I think I am”? That sums it up nicely for a lot of us. Some of us are just wired differently – some seem to have been born that way (to quote a big book), some of us invented coping mechanisms as kids that don’t serve us well as adults. You’ve done a courageous thing in putting your words out on the net. You got out of your self and, look!, all these supportive responses. From my experience, these are good people and are on my little list of people that help me get through. My own “fucked up” thinking got me to your page because it was a link on a blog from someone I trusted, and because my mind goes off in all directions. ADHD, maybe. Plus depression, addiction, two failed long-term relationships, loss of all my material equity, and no cash flow. All this after being poor, rich, famous, shunned, and being in recovery for 14 years. This wasn’t what it was all leading up to, I thought.
But, at the tender age of 53 and in the biggest crisis of my life, I’ve finally realized one truth and one hope. That is: “I AM as fucked up as I think I am when I don’t accept myself.” Instead of beating myself up, I just surrender to who I am, warts and all. I don’t need “fixing”, either by a spouse, or a family, or society. I’m finally too tired of being the “problem”. I’m not going around doing anything harmful, but I’m not trying to fit in anymore. Now, I see how people fit into my life, not how I fit into theirs. As you have seen on your blog, there are a lot of people who understand that and will provide you with a safe place to be honest. And they do it in their own “fucked up” way, just like you did. I don’t blog everyday, but I’m grateful for these folks who take the time to post, to comment, to keep these weird little communities going. Like Bart said earlier, take it gently and slowly.
And sometimes, it’s just hard, y’know?
Enigma,
Just one question. What do you find yourself most passionate about NOW?
For me, this is my photography.
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