Rusty & Wolf 2019

December 16, 2020

I am IRATE!!

Yes, that angry! Systems. A disconnected, antiquated and privileged inequality with absolutely no equitably to be found. Anywhere!!!

I feel so frustrated. I need my own money, yet cannot get to it! This has to be called Fraudulent when any person considers what people who ACTUALLY need help and assistance need to do.

Where are the class-action lawsuits?

Are we all that afraid, collectively, to challenge this crap? What’s the crap?

1. Being allowed to be homeless and not eligible for housing until my name comes up on a waitlist. Waitlists which average years long.

2. Being told by DSS, until you go to a shelter, we consider you to have appropriate shelter because you live in a truck.

3. Being told, we disburse your money as we want. Beg and plead, in writing, while waiting and HOPE we see fit to help you before you freeze to death, starve or become so dehydrated you need to put yourself in a hospital to recover.

4. Being told, in two different counties, you need housing and then we can offer you more assistance.

5. Knowing the best way to keep yourself stable is to sleep in a truck instead of a shelter because your interpersonal skills are so impaired by the abuse and trauma you endured, you now carry the diagnosis, Borderline Personality Disorder.

6. Wondering how come you do not go to a shelter in order to fast track your services and obtain housing? While remembering your SPOA application is what you need most!!!

7. Asking oneself how much pain and trauma must a person endure? Being forced to choose between a shelter (homeless or domestic violence) and living in a truck in 19 degree temperatures seems abusive to me. Hey, that’s my thoughts.

8. Wondering how much longer Wolf and I need to live this way before we can put our plan to help others in our position into place.

9. Being sideswiped in couple’s therapy when you hear, “Your lifelong trauma…”.

Yup, I am bleeping irate!

And I don’t feel as better as I had hoped after releasing this!

Double crap!!!!

December 19, 2020

Dear Diary:

You are finally able to admit to yourself, nights are the hardest parts. Specifically about 5:00 pm to 9:00 pm when we lay down and snuggle under our covers for bed.

Bed doesn’t even mean sleep. First, by that time, it is cold. Of course, this winter has been rougher than last year. We had some reprieve during the week. A place to get out and stretch. Not this year. All options are exhausted and what there may be, between COVID and my relational safety challenges, no thank you.

I’m not sure if it it’s right or wrong. It simply is.

December 6, 2020

Note: This post is out of order. I had hand written it originally.

Dear Me,

Recently, I have questioned how come I do not go to a shelter. Really questioned it. Any doubt I had was removed when two days ago my therapist noted, the past 3 to 4 sessions, I mentioned my decision not to go to a shelter. Perhaps, even an institution. Mostly, a shelter.

Someone is actively and consciously choosing to protect us

For the first time in three years, I feel believed by a person outside of my treatment team.

That is amazing and validating. It may seem ridiculous to you. It used to me also. Yet it is real and for once, I see other people seeing and believing what even the courts and law continue to blissfully ignore – psychological abuse.

We are protected. The stalker/abuser was about a month behind us when we left. He was informed – “Leave them alone.”

Here’s to hoping he does.

Be well! -R.

A Transforming Season

Please be mindful, this site comes with Trigger Warnings throughout it.

July 2020 through November 2020 taught me more than I could have imagined. I saw and felt pain in multiple ways. Pain was unrealistic, unreasonable, unresolved, nonresponsive, denied, misplaced, lied about, ignored, explosive, solitary, isolating, confusing, humiliating and more. So many times, alcoholism was the forefront presenting behavior.

My relational safety was shared with a friend, for a few months. Until two other people, I admire and respect as well as who ground me!, were able to get through to me. Wolf took it from there. Suffice for now, please, with – I missed the warning signs and red flags. Not entirely, which is progress I am only recently aware and proud of. Enough!

Yet, for all the above, I found a peer, mentee and friendship I did not expect! Ironically, she is the daughter of the woman who comprised my relational safety.

Through an unfortunate, unexpected yet preventable death, her and I had three weeks together to get to know each other. It was AMAZING! I watched her bloom and blossom. I watched her try by pushing her boundaries.

When she did, I realized I could try too. And I did. Over and over. Successfully, stumbling, anxiously, avoiding, trying, trying again, okay! Done. Next., for a few weeks now.

My righteous anger returning. In full. More logical and restrained in response, mostly. 😳🤗

I have been and it shows every day. In spite of all the bad which went on or we endured, I came out transformed. My therapists, Wolf and I all agree on this. Our current foci was redirected to ensure I sustain this growth and progress!

There will be stumbles, of course! Today, a major snowstorm is upon us. Tomorrow, who knows what it will. We will weather it. That, I am sure of.

Be well, Reader!

Flashbacks have returned

Specifically, my emotional, maybe, mental, flashbacks.

I do not have visual flashbacks, to my knowledge, for the most part. Whether that is a blessing or a curse, I really do not know.

In terms of treatment options, visual flashbacks have more options available. They are, in some ways, easier to reframe for meaning to be less impacted by them.

Please understand – Flashbacks of any type are HORRIBLE!!!!

That said, my brand of flashbacks may not stop until I have safe, secure housing. Or until my trauma stops. Stopping my trauma from overtaking me in any way is a feat akin to climbing all of the stairs of the Empire State Building. Nope!!!

Shared trauma makes it all worse, more intense, more devastating and far harder to overcome in a relationship. Sometimes, it may not even be possible.

That is where I am at. Is it even possible to salvage our relationship with the shared trauma we endured in?

Be well!

Stay as safe as you can! -R

December 14, 2020

The weather is miserable here. Snow coming also. It is days such as this that serve as stark reminders, to me, of how little we have and how hard it really is to survive, homeless and traumatized.

As in death, the world around you goes on. The same can be said of homelessness.

While I ponder what my life has become and why, everyone else, including our abusers, get to be comfortable.

December 12, 2020

Simply checking in with myself. Randomly, of course! 🤗😳😁

Wolf and I were just talking about this year versus last year. The differences. For good and bad. This seems worthy of recall, so here it is.

Dear Diary,

Last year, Wolf was busier at this time. He had different focus. Still messing around with matters. Cooking on the grill. Setting up camp.

Last year, I was a mess of chaos. Less chaotic than the year before (2019), same time.

We were transitioning into being in the truck on the weekends, at a house during the week, money was coming in – and more than is now,

This year Wolf is bored. In addition, he is controlling his anger better, with one exception. He is learning how much neglect then abuse he endured in addition to seeing and understanding behaviors of his and the impact of them on others.

This year, I am steadily working to complete tasks and organizing in a way I can both handle and manage while being in the truck.

We are sharing and repairing our shared trauma, by Wolf’s biological father while fighting to obtain another Order of Protection to stop his attempts to locate and speak with Wolf.

Nothing has deterred him. It only temporarily stops him. The distress it causes Wolf, in addition to the time off he will need, again, is impairing his ability to work even further. I wonder, “What will stop him? Or, are we expected to live like this until he dies or is in a home for dementia? (The early signs were seen already a year ago.)

So, the relentless stalker and other barriers remain with minimal change. Additional hope for resources and supports for housing. Still, nothing with even a tentative date yet.

Onward with progress from a Season for a Reason. As well as knowing, as my therapist says, “He does NOT have you.” While hoping, they both would give the h*ll up!!!!

Stay safe, Reader!

And a polite reminder, Trigger Warnings are throughout my diary. Please read, with caution, as you need!

Be well,

Our disorders

TRIGGER WARNINGS

We both live with psychiatric diagnoses.

Wolf’s are: ADHD, Anxiety, Trauma Stressors and Acute Stress Response or Disorder. (I need to check on this.)

Mine are: Anxiety, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, Complex Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, Bipolar II and Borderline Personality Disorder.

We are both survivors of developmental trauma, relational trauma and abuse.

Abuse including, yet not limited to: economic, financial, sexual, bullying, verbal, physical, emotional, mental, manipulation, gaslighting, narcissistic behaviors and coercive control.

Quite a lot, there. It does not begin to do our experiences justice.

Be well and Stay as safe as you can! -R.

Student Loan Crisis and Me

How many of us have heard, know someone or, yourself, in Student Loan Debt?

Even I am aware of this burden many of us face. Before COVID, there were multiple reasons. The economy for one. Perhaps two and three as well. Other reasons: values changing, expectations alter, we grow up and steadfast or we demand change. (Society, in general, I mean.)

The Technology Age, which came after the Industrial Age, has transformed EVERY single aspect of people’s lives in general. So much, in fact, if you look at cultural anthropology and culture studies, as a field, you will see the world is becoming smaller and smaller.

Let me explain, briefly. It is common knowledge, I presume, the Industrial Age changed life as we know it. The Technology Age (and I think we are still in it), has reduced global to being all-inclusive. This has DRASTICALLY altered how we communicate and reduced the amount of time we have to process information. In addition, and somewhere early in the Technology Age, maybe?, came cable television and Cable News. Add the internet and people are overwhelmed by choices of where to get information, which information is correct and balancing it against your own personal values. (The advertising industry being a whole other challenge!)

Now, with all of this technology, comes an unintended, or unexpected, side effects. Anxiety, social anxiety and bullying being the three I think of.

Meanwhile, in other sectors: the cost of living has not adjusted close to the actual standards of the cost of living; college costs have skyrocketed; returns on savings accounts have dropped so low, you need a financial advisor to help you figure out, well, what the heck to do in these times to help you make your money work for you; health care industry, wealth disparities and more.