paradise

I spent the better part of a screen addicted hour reading this AskReddit thread about teachers' worst “apple doesn't fall far from the tree” stories.

I'm doing this at about 3am, while my 14 year old is playing a-god-knows-how long screen-addicted streak on Fortnite, casually blasting online friends with scathing obscenities and taunts.

It's a formula that makes for a fairly bad mood.

And it's like. When does one of these shitty parents notice when they're doing something wrong, if they ever do?

How do they ever get help?

I've been reaching out for help my entire life, but was constantly ignored in my formative years. I guess I've coped by having a very rich internal world and a somewhat above-average capacity to write. I mean, there are other diagnosable personality disorder problems I've been given as well, but if you were to ask me, these are symptoms, not the problem itself.

This thread is crack. Couldn't stop reading it. Don't know how to emotionally process it.

This is different than my silly VGK vs SJS passing obsession as far as not knowing how to emotionally process.

I think I pick up obsessions as a way to cope with not really knowing what to do, or how to fix things I've let go completely off the rails. Feeling powerless in situations bigger than me. They let for an escape from this unbearable stress the mind creates when something is wrong.

But what am I teaching these people in my house? To make stupid pictures and taunt my television screen instead of deal with real life problems? Like taking out the trash or having video game restraint? I've always thought that raising a person takes an entire community to help, and I feel rather isolated in that I haven't had access to a healthy community for... ever.

I guess it's just...

Troubling. I don't know.

When I'm faced with all this reality, endless, hundreds of stories of rotten parents and the results in the children's lives — many stories much worse than mine, providing contrast — and I'm just much more aware of the daily struggles I am usually dissociated from, or numb to.

Well, I believe I, as a human, can't or shouldn't feel happy or positive all the time.

One has to experience the pain of existence, or understand the shared pain of existence, to be able to fully comprehend emotional depths of others.

Um

And since we're talking “shoulds”, one should “be the change they want to see in the world”, despite it being “hard”.

Um

But really?

---

So what do we want out of this life?

Clean efficient places to life? Richness of being? Richness of experience? The ability to challenge oneself and surprise themselves at the results, whether you win or lose?

That seems like a script someone wrote that jaded, ptsd people like myself white-knuckle – like we need to believe this is reality sooo badly we repeat it like mantra.

In reality, it's probably something more like

Try to survive

Cope with overwhelming stress

Try not to murder people you supposedly love (incl murdering their soul with your desire to keep control of things)

like

I just don't know, man.

This is all ...

Escapism. Writing to avoid the pain. Writing for praise. So I can feel something.

It's all false, man. False. False feelings. A false foundation. False futures.

Threads like these, written from real adults, wake the irresponsible kidult in me and wrench my pain circuits so hard I'm now reflectively surveying my environment for evidence on my disastrous effects on the humans around me. Hawkeyed like a CPS agent, and not being able to mentally shelter myself from the negative emotional cascade.

I wish we were all just saved from ourselves and our maladaptive coping mechanisms.

But help is not on the way.

Unless you reach for it.

— .:~:..:~:..:~:..:~:..:~:..:~:..:~:..:~:..:~:..:~:. published not proofread. #NeverLookBackspace! Words, Ideas, Magic copyrighted by Zem at BeTheFuture. this is confidential communication. Protected by US and International law.