Venting

I posted this in the BPD forum and it got a lot of views, but no one has replied yet so I don't know if anyone actually read it all the way through or if anyone cares there... So I thought I'd post it here... This is a more appropriate forum anyway.

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I feel so confused right now... I want sympathy... I want answers... But how will I know if the answer is right or not? By the feeling, I guess... But I'm drawing a blank... And how will I know if the feeling is the right answer? How can I when I've felt that I've found the "right" answer, only to find out later that there's a different "right" answer? Nothing seems to work... I just want to avoid stress... But I know I can't do that permanently... At least not all of my stress... But still, if I could just get rid of some of it... I feel like I'm making progress, but not enough... Not in the ways that are most important anyway... I hate being so suspicious of other people... I hate not feeling able to trust... I hate that it's so hard for me to bond with people because of it... But I don't feel comfortable exposing my weaknesses... If I do that, then they can take advantage of me... But if I don't, then I'm left feeling hollow and lonely... What do I hate more? I don't know... I wish I did know... But it's such a tough decision... Do I take the risk, or do I avoid taking the risk?

I feel that it makes more sense to take the risk... So that's what I should do... But I still don't know how to cope with the pain of being taken advantage of and being humiliated... I get so angry and so violent in my thoughts that it makes me sick... I literally want to kill people sometimes... But I have a family... And I have a conscience... I just want to make people feel the same pain that they make me feel... But if I feel inept compared to them, then I don't know how... What can I use against them? I don't know, so I resort to fantasies of violence... I don't want to go to jail... But if I snap, I won't be able to make a rational decision... I don't want to get hurt either... I'm not confident in myself as a fighter... I want to avoid pain... I worry about someone getting the best of me in a fight... That would be a serious blow to my self-esteem... I don't need to feel weaker than I already fear... But I hate feeling scared... That makes me feel weak too... I haven't lashed out at someone physically in a while...

...I have so much pain from my past... I want to get rid of it all... But I can't do that unless I get revenge on the people who hurt me... But again, I don't want to go to jail... That would make me even more unhappy and then I would be angry at them for calling the police... Then I'd want to hurt them again... Because they'd have one upped me again... It's not worth it... I need healthy distractions from my pain... But I don't have enough of them... I have the internet to keep me occupied, but that gets boring eventually... The thoughts always come back and I always have to push them back out... It's almost a daily struggle... I don't have friends... I'm friendly with my roommates and they're friendly with me... But they're not cutting it... We don't have enough in common... I also think one of them stole something of mine recently and I'm mad about that... Even though I don't have proof... I forget things a lot so it's hard to tell for sure... But I still feel like he took it... The other one is condescending... He's also moody because he has a mood disorder... Takes himself quite seriously... That gets on my nerves... Makes me feel insecure when he talks to me like I'm an idiot...

...I've gotten under his skin a few times too... So that makes me feel better... Venting like this has improved my mood a bit... Not entirely though... I'm still bored... I have anxiety regularly... I don't know if that causes my acid reflux or the other way around... I also don't know if my acid reflux causes my "asthma" or the other way around... I take a puffer and I'm supposed to see my doctor again in a couple weeks to let him know how it's going... I haven't noticed a difference... I still get short of breath... I still have chest tightness... I still get headaches... I still have a sense of dread that washes over me because of it... I worry that I might have a more serious breathing disorder... I think about death a lot and I'm scared of it... I enjoy life... I'd just enjoy it more if I could solve all of these problems... But life is pain... Life is also pleasure... There has to be that balance... I just wish that it worked differently...

That's a selfish way of thinking... But I can't help it... I can be happy for other people... But I can't not be upset when they're doing better than me... It's just a reminder of my misery... I want what they want... So how do I get it? If I want the fancy car, I have to work for it... But is it a guarantee that I'll get the fancy car? No... Depends on what job I get... Depends on if I'm smart enough to understand how to budget and save enough money to afford it... Depends on if affording it is practical and won't interfere with other more important aspects of my life... Depends on if I'm smart enough to get a good enough job that would ensure that I could buy it without it interfering with the more practical aspects of my life... There's so many what ifs...

But do I really need that car? No... But I want it... All I can do is try my best to get what I want... If I can't, then I have no choice to accept it... I could resort to crime, but it's not worth it... I want to get drunk right now and I could steal a bottle of booze, but it's not worth it... I just have to accept the unknown... I have to accept my pain... I have to accept that sometimes, all I can do is wait it out... But I hate it... I cry sometimes... I do it privately because I don't want others seeing... I'm afraid to be judged... I'm afraid that they'll try to help me and that it will have the opposite effect... I have such much pain from my childhood... My mother never showed me enough sympathy... Maybe she thought she was... I don't know... She says she did her best... But her best wasn't good enough... I wanted what she couldn't give... So I got it from another family member instead... Now that other family member's gone... And even she didn't always sympathize with me the way I wanted her to... But at least I had someone and wasn't completely alone with my feelings... Now I am...

...It's by choice though... But that's only because I'm afraid... I hold myself back... I'm my own worst enemy... But it happens too often... Most of the people I've opened up to don't show me the support that I want... I just want someone to tell me that they care and show genuine concern... But most people want to jump right to the solution... Which I get... It's really just that I don't want to hear it right away... I want to know that my feelings make sense to them... I want their validation... I hate feeling misunderstood... I get it that some people don't relate to certain things... And I get that they don't want to be fake... I don't want them to be fake either, so that part is admirable... But it's painful knowing that people think I'm too sensitive... That they can't relate to my sensitivity... Or maybe they do and are hiding it... I don't know... I sometimes think that everyone is like me deep down and just won't admit it because they're afraid... I don't know... That's the simplest and most comforting answer... I really don't know though... Maybe everyone really is different... No, I don't think so... I think it's that they can't relate to the self-pitying... Or again, don't want to... They want to skip that part because of what they were taught... I can understand that...

...But it sucks... I'm not like that with other people... I try not to be anyway... Sometimes I am... Then I regret it... I make an effort to be the most understanding person I can be... But sometimes I fall off because I become so bitter... I become my mother in a way... It's ideal... If everything could be solved by pure logic rather than emotion, there wouldn't be any pain... But that's not realistic... Everyone goes through pain... So I want to show others the same sympathy that I would want from them... Makes me feel better about myself... Makes me feel more worthy of receiving it... It also just makes me feel good in general to see other people happy... So long as that person has been good to me... If not, I don't want to see them happy... I want them to be as unhappy as I am... I believe in getting what you give... An eye for an eye...

But then I think about what Gandhi said... "An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind"... And I can understand that... Instead of retaliating, maybe I should learn to communicate first... Make an attempt to understand where they're coming from before I react... I should try to get them to communicate with me... But many times, there will be someone who I've done nothing hostile to... Who I've never even spoke to... And they'll act hostile towards me, or insult... They'll try to deflate my self-esteem to make themselves feel better... Those are the people that I hate... Because I know then that there could be no good reason to act how they acted... I understand that they have pain too and they're just coping in their own way... But I don't respect it and I don't relate to it... I disagree with it and it hurts my feelings... I would feel like crap about myself if I did that to someone else, not better... I know from experience... And I feel that I would deserve it if someone hurt me because of that... I would understand it, looking back, if some people would have punched me in the face, for example... Which is what I'd like to do to those kinds of people...

...I think it's a lesson in respect... That there's consequences for those actions... But then I realize that punching someone would get me into trouble and I don't want those consequences... So the best thing to do would be to hurt them with my words... Or walk away and ignore them... But I feel insecure about myself, so I often don't respond or act as though I don't care... But I want to say something... So I should... But often I freeze and don't know what to say because of my insecurity... I doubt myself and I expect it to get worse if I respond due to past experiences... I also feel like I'm lowering myself to their level... That's exactly what I'm doing... I want to make them feel inferior to me, just like they did to me... I want to make them feel disrespected, just like they did to me... But really, it's all just so ridiculous... If someone calls me gay, why should I be offended? It's because they came at me with aggression or superiority... I feel like if I don't respond, I look like a coward... I don't want to look like a coward... But why? Why do I care? Is that the truth? Am I a coward? No, I just think it's silly... But why should I think that something natural is silly? That doesn't make any sense...

...I should respond according to my feelings in that situation... I should stand up for myself... I feel the need to, so pretending I'm above my own needs isn't going to make me feel better... But then others who are witnesses might see me as petty... They might look down on me for it... So that's the issue... But who's to say they're not just pretending to be above their own needs? Maybe they are... I don't know... Or maybe they do really see it that way... I should speak my mind to them too... But then they want to analyze me... They want to get to the "whys" and such... I really don't know why... It's just a need that I have... I want others to know who I am... I don't want to hide the real me... I don't want to be afraid to be myself... I don't even care why... It's just who I am and I don't see a reason to change that... I don't think I could if I wanted to... Maybe I could, but I've tried to change it for years and it hasn't gotten me anywhere but lost and miserable... I've been trying to be someone I'm not... I'd rather people hate me for who I am than love me for who I'm not... I'd rather die alone... But still, that would be painful...

...I have a lot of guilt... I've hurt a lot of people that cared about me and I feel like I overreacted a lot... I did it out of pain, but that still doesn't excuse it... I sympathize with myself, but I also hate that I caused people that much pain... I didn't want to take responsibility... I was scared to be myself, so I tried to be something I wasn't... I lost sight of what was important and that was the people who cared about me... It was also myself... I let myself down and hurt myself... Yet, with all this, I'm still not fully convinced that I won't fall right back into the same self-destructive pattern... I've been doing it almost all my life... I'm sick of telling myself that I'm "trying my best"... It's not true... I know I'm not trying my best... I know that I act like a coward and that it's completely my own fault... I know that I change it... But I'm scared... But I should be more scared of going down the wrong path than going down the right one... I know what I have to do... And now I have to do it... Only I can help myself... All other people can do is support me through it... They can't make my decisions for me... They can't change the harsh realities of life that I have to face... Just like I can't change it for them, no matter how much I'd like to...

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To anyone who bothered to read through all of that, I thank you... I felt the need to put it all out there and now I feel somewhat better about myself.

Hugs to you man.

I appreciate the gesture, lagan. Thank you.