Andrea Gibson, The Madness Vase

A lot of pop psychology gets thrown around and since I already have a headache, here's preventing you lot from making it worse.

Love-bombing: A manipulation tactic of increasing affection and grand gestures before or after doing something abusive, specifically to weasel one's way out of consequences.

What it is not: A streak of affection and generosity towards friends/loved ones.

Trauma-bonding: Knowingly traumatizing someone to take advantage of their vulnerable state, to then act like the "hero" or the one who cheers them up.

What it is not: Bonding over similar traumas.

Gaslighting: *Knowingly* convincing someone they cannot trust their own perception of a situation in pursuit of one's own narrative.

What it is not: Misaligned perception of events.

Narcissist: Someone afflicted with Narcissistic Personality Disorder, a traumagenic cluster B disorder, that struggles with self-obsession, paranoia, craving validity from the public, delusions of grandeur, and social disconnection.

It is not: Your rubbish ex that cheated on you.

Thank you for coming to my TED Talk.

-Xanthe

alternatives to “i want to die”:

i want things to change

i want a different life

today was a shitty day/week

i don’t want to live like this

i want to be somewhere else in life

i’m not where i want to be yet

+ much more

You CANNOT lose a month's progress in an hour. If you fall back or you do something you're not proud of, that does not undo all your hard work.

You've formed habits, you've made changes, and one mistake will not erase that.

Beating yourself up for falling back into old habits won't undo anything. All you can do is continue forward toward your goal.

Remind yourself of everything you did that you were proud of. Remember the progress you made. Acknowledge your power.

Please don't punish yourself for that moment when you lost control. You weren't weak, you aren't a failure, and everything you worked for is not ruined.

when i was little i thought it was stupid that sims had a meter for how much they liked their environment, while as an adult i'll clean some part of my house and later feel the bar going up when i walk by it

It’s really easy to think that our friends and other loved ones think negative things of us when we’re not around but I have to say that it’s much more likely they’re thinking positive things.

I think about my best friend, and how beautiful she is and how I miss her and hope she’s doing okay.

I think about my partner at work and how much I love him and can’t wait for him to get home.

I think about my online friend and how amazing it was to meet her this year. I wonder how she’s doing and I feel so thankful she’s been a part of my life for so long.

I think about my cousins and how wonderful they are and how even though we don’t talk much anymore, they were a huge part of my growing up and I’ll always love them.

We often think positive things about our loved ones, and it’s likely they do the same for us as well.

the "feeling like something is wrong with you that you have to hide" background noise is often a result of childhood trauma because an abused or neglected child who doesn't rationalize their mistreatment runs the risk of alienating themselves from what little shelter and care is actually being provided. it's theorized that blaming yourself at that age is a way to survive by coming up with a justification for why you're being abused so you don't blame your caregivers for your own suffering, thereby alienating them to the point that you are fed or sheltered or protected even less than you are currently. believing you may be able to "change" so that you're worthy of love also prevents despair/giving up. it's of utmost importance to the survival of very small children to develop a worldview that keeps them alive, even if it's by totally magical thinking and at the cost of their ability to perceive reality or navigate normal human relationships. the same thing can happen to adults in abusive domestic situations.

anyway once you're out of that situation it's time to get really pissed off

Powerful stuff here. One of the biggest things for me was realizing that I had been in survival mode for years, something that kept me from developing close friendships with others during my teen years and early 20s. There is some interest now, but time also has moved on.

Fyodor Dostoyevsky, The Brothers Karamazov Chapter 4: A Hymn and a Secret (1880)