Nate, you are truly “fighting the good fight” if I may use a phrase from the religious past. 😉 Thank you for continuing to show up and speak your truth. It really is making a difference. When I need to know my healing journey is worth it, I look for your writing. Thank you. (From north Florida) 😘
I appreciate your diligence and authenticity to keeping this a safe space. I know from the depths of my soul, this is not easy. I left another platform due to safety issues. Thank you Nate. ❤️
Thanks, Diane. I have thoroughly enjoyed this space being much smaller. I know these spaces often have lurkers for all the wrong reasons, but it has a block button too. I hope you have a nice week. 🫶
“Something I have learned from posting publicly, is there have often been people who follow my work because they know if the people they’ve hurt find me, they will be in trouble. They do not follow me to embrace it but to keep their thumb on it and pretend they can control me.”
Before I understood about what is true & safe I was brought up by my parents & church community that was awash in hell, fire & brimstone.
My childhood brand of fringe cult Christianity did not believe in a physical hell. Or so they claimed. But damn did the fear of a god that was not good filled my windscreen.
About six years ago I experienced a mental health crisis that burnt my world to the ground. A bit like the hell I was threatened with as a child.
What has grown from that devastating experience is a life that is mine. The contours & edges are new & becoming familiar. A life that is respectful of what I have lived through & the understanding I will no longer tolerate the intolerable.
The description of that pastor & his comment I felt deep in my heart. I know that terrain. I feel those types of comments hitting my solar plexus.
I am glad you’re here, Nate. I would like to say more complimentary things but will refrain. Suffice it to say that there is more I could list.
"A life that is mine." I think you are touching on the intolerance I am referring to, too? I have no interest in educating other people who remain committed to beliefs and systems that almost destroyed me. And it would have, had I not walked away.
Your last sentence made me laugh... 😂 Thanks for always sharing such thoughtful feedback on your experience. I appreciate the depth and gentleness in them...✨
Thank you for this and all you are doing. This space is so gentle and healing for me and so many others. I am just wading into the CPTSD world at age 47, and your bravery and honesty feel like a guiding star for what’s to come and what can be. Thank you.
You are who I am writing for, Elizabeth. I hope you see other people's stories in this space and anchor yourself in hope. This process is complex (often simplified from bystanders who refuse to heal). There is healing. There is peace.... I'm SO glad you're here...🫶
Love this so much 💕. Blocking negative energies online and IRL is such a game changer. Curating your life helps preserve your one wild and precious life 🫶🏾
This speaks so deeply to my experience, Nate, I can think of a thousand memories where someone intruded in my space to redefine my reality for me. I learned from a young age it was safer to just keep quiet and I practiced that quiet for decades.
You have framed this into what I see as strong and protective boundaries (I’m getting there!), and it reminds me of an Elyse Myers reel where she tells a story about when someone overstepped with her and she said “I do not receive that”. That phrase sticks with me as so powerful. We actually have a choice to not accept a comment. Period. Here is the reel if it’s ok for me to post.
Oof! This video is brutal.... Entitlement in real time... I am glad this spoke to you, Lauren! This was foreign to me for many years... often trying to extend myself further to get someone to appreciate me... learned this as a child. This undoing, this ability to take up space... real healing comes from there.... Thanks for being here and for what you shared...🫶
Thank you Nate. Your work helps me a lot. I have spent the last few years working on healing from family trauma. Sharing your experience and knowledge is a gift to me and all your readers.
Thank you. I needed to read that. I walk away from church yetvmanybin my life ignore the boundary. This was helpful. We do not have to respond to those not on the same page
Soooo glad you blocked him And had a bite of sonething sweet before and after.
Not even in the same reality!
It’s so telling after someone shares something vulnerable and painful and another person says some bullshit like what he did.
I recently had to block someone who sent me and my Husband some pretty major, malicious words. I won’t be baited, ya know. I am not a scratching post for someone to work their projections out on.
Proud that I had a hard day, then the next day I decided to clean my space, tend to my plants, make a slow good meal and go for a walk. Feels good that there isn’t so much negotiating in my life anymore.
I feel like I discover anew on a semi-regular basis just how not healed from my childhood I am. I know what I want, I work toward what I want, and what I want right now (and what is keeping me afloat) is writing whatever I need to here or in a journal, and writing and recording music. The music is the most important thing for me. It has been since I was going to bed listening to Slayer on my headphones and trying to drown out external unwanted sounds.
But realistically, I don't think I will ever recover from what was done to me. Too much invalidation and gaslighting by my family, by therapists, by institutions, by an ex-friend (a longtime rock for me with whom I was going through recovery from alcohol; when I'd slip, she'd be right there) who chose the easy way out of a complicated interpersonal situation that was created directly by her newly-reified fiance. We were in the same online sober group, and she was also in the group and was a founding member I believe. When he wrote ignorant comments about me in the group, I let him know in the comments. (I did not know that I was experiencing hypomania at the time) His behavior directly compromised his fiancee's ability to be a moderator of this important space. It put her in an impossible position--he was calling me out for things I didn't do, and she saw the interaction, and not only was she a moderator she was close to both of us. This means that her emotional self was being torn at.
I know this because when I emailed her about it she said "I can't talk with you about it as I'm too close to the situation and I need to protect my energy." I replied with "That also means that you can't talk with him about it either, for the same reasons." She responded with vitriol, saying "don't tell me how to live my life" etc, and she cut me out of her life. Even though HE was the person who ruined all of this. She was living with him.
It was by far the easier decision to cut me out, even though I'd known her FAR longer and we'd shared so much and I was the first person to hold space for her when she had a manic episode--I could tell that night that her voice kept getting higher and her literal agitation was pronounced. I knew she was bipolar. So I gently said something like "I can tell by your voice that you're starting to experience some mania. I want you to know it's ok. We don't have to talk about it or do anything about it. We can just sit here. Whatever you want." She replied that no one had ever done that for her before, and that she was very grateful.
So when she threw me away, I collapsed and had to be hospitalized. That I'm not going into here.
But a month or two after I came out, I discovered hate for the first time. I had never allowed anyone to get close enough to me in order for me to hate them. But this did it. Because I loved her, as a friend.
I don't know if her fiance saw me as a threat. It's not the point. The point is I grieved for 2 months, and I won't let her back in my life (she has not tried) unless I get an appropriate heartfelt apology...which likely won't happen if she's still with him.
Why am I sharing all this? Because I keep reading that you have peace and are happy. I have times when I feel peaceful, but they are rare. My music is extremely angry yet compositional and poetic and at times simply spoken or layered with melodiousness instead of dissonance. I feel complicated things, and so I create complicated things.
I have not felt happiness for longer than maybe an hour at a time (and it's rare) in the last 28 years. The time I'm thinking of 28 years ago was involving an intimate situation with someone I thought was my friend. Turns out she just wanted a piece.
Over time, I have come to believe that one of the most important questions in healing is not, "Can I understand this person?" but, "What is this interaction asking me to carry?"
For many survivors, there is a period where we feel responsible for educating, explaining, translating, and creating understanding for people who have no real interest in understanding. We spend enormous amounts of energy trying to make our reality acceptable to those who are uncomfortable with it.
At some point, something shifts.
We realize that compassion and access are not the same thing.
We can wish someone well without giving them a seat at our table.
Reading this, I didn't see someone acting out of bitterness. I saw someone protecting a space that was built through years of hard-earned honesty, grief, healing, and trust.
I also appreciated your point that respect is not automatically earned through age, status, or titles. Respect lives in how we show up with other human beings.
The older I get, the more I see boundaries not as walls, but as guardians of what matters most.
Nate, you are truly “fighting the good fight” if I may use a phrase from the religious past. 😉 Thank you for continuing to show up and speak your truth. It really is making a difference. When I need to know my healing journey is worth it, I look for your writing. Thank you. (From north Florida) 😘
I'm glad you're here, Janeen! To more healing (boundaries, and cake)... 🍰🫶😉
I appreciate your diligence and authenticity to keeping this a safe space. I know from the depths of my soul, this is not easy. I left another platform due to safety issues. Thank you Nate. ❤️
Thanks, Diane. I have thoroughly enjoyed this space being much smaller. I know these spaces often have lurkers for all the wrong reasons, but it has a block button too. I hope you have a nice week. 🫶
This gave me goosebumps:
“Something I have learned from posting publicly, is there have often been people who follow my work because they know if the people they’ve hurt find me, they will be in trouble. They do not follow me to embrace it but to keep their thumb on it and pretend they can control me.”
Thank you for all you do!
Great to hear from you, Connor! 🫶
You too, Nate! I’ll follow up with you shortly with an update on my journey! Until then.
Same. Sometimes I withdraw from participating/engaging because I think they might see it. As of today, I am not letting that stop me.
Before I understood about what is true & safe I was brought up by my parents & church community that was awash in hell, fire & brimstone.
My childhood brand of fringe cult Christianity did not believe in a physical hell. Or so they claimed. But damn did the fear of a god that was not good filled my windscreen.
About six years ago I experienced a mental health crisis that burnt my world to the ground. A bit like the hell I was threatened with as a child.
What has grown from that devastating experience is a life that is mine. The contours & edges are new & becoming familiar. A life that is respectful of what I have lived through & the understanding I will no longer tolerate the intolerable.
The description of that pastor & his comment I felt deep in my heart. I know that terrain. I feel those types of comments hitting my solar plexus.
I am glad you’re here, Nate. I would like to say more complimentary things but will refrain. Suffice it to say that there is more I could list.
"A life that is mine." I think you are touching on the intolerance I am referring to, too? I have no interest in educating other people who remain committed to beliefs and systems that almost destroyed me. And it would have, had I not walked away.
Your last sentence made me laugh... 😂 Thanks for always sharing such thoughtful feedback on your experience. I appreciate the depth and gentleness in them...✨
Yes.
Some of the most intolerant people I have met have been religious. Such a strange cognitive dissonance to that.
Thank you for this and all you are doing. This space is so gentle and healing for me and so many others. I am just wading into the CPTSD world at age 47, and your bravery and honesty feel like a guiding star for what’s to come and what can be. Thank you.
You are who I am writing for, Elizabeth. I hope you see other people's stories in this space and anchor yourself in hope. This process is complex (often simplified from bystanders who refuse to heal). There is healing. There is peace.... I'm SO glad you're here...🫶
Love this so much 💕. Blocking negative energies online and IRL is such a game changer. Curating your life helps preserve your one wild and precious life 🫶🏾
Always great to see your face on here! 🫶
This speaks so deeply to my experience, Nate, I can think of a thousand memories where someone intruded in my space to redefine my reality for me. I learned from a young age it was safer to just keep quiet and I practiced that quiet for decades.
You have framed this into what I see as strong and protective boundaries (I’m getting there!), and it reminds me of an Elyse Myers reel where she tells a story about when someone overstepped with her and she said “I do not receive that”. That phrase sticks with me as so powerful. We actually have a choice to not accept a comment. Period. Here is the reel if it’s ok for me to post.
https://youtube.com/shorts/jSXkO5ehoOU?si=Lp4innp97KYu7wzv
Oof! This video is brutal.... Entitlement in real time... I am glad this spoke to you, Lauren! This was foreign to me for many years... often trying to extend myself further to get someone to appreciate me... learned this as a child. This undoing, this ability to take up space... real healing comes from there.... Thanks for being here and for what you shared...🫶
Thank you Nate. Your work helps me a lot. I have spent the last few years working on healing from family trauma. Sharing your experience and knowledge is a gift to me and all your readers.
🫶
Cake, yes please. Thank you Nate. 💚
🍰🫶😍
Good, I'm so glad you blocked him because you also know ig you didn't he'd probably go on a tirade that you must repent blah blah blah.
You built this so you have every right to protect your boundaries.
I'm curious to know, did the cake taste better after you blocked him?
Thanks for making me laugh!! Yes, it did. 🍰
Thank you. I needed to read that. I walk away from church yetvmanybin my life ignore the boundary. This was helpful. We do not have to respond to those not on the same page
We absolutely do not, and, I think, best not to....🫶
Thank you Nate! I am glad you are here! Your words have and are helping me to heal!
Thanks, Jennifer! I hope this week is a good one! 🫶
Soooo glad you blocked him And had a bite of sonething sweet before and after.
Not even in the same reality!
It’s so telling after someone shares something vulnerable and painful and another person says some bullshit like what he did.
I recently had to block someone who sent me and my Husband some pretty major, malicious words. I won’t be baited, ya know. I am not a scratching post for someone to work their projections out on.
Proud that I had a hard day, then the next day I decided to clean my space, tend to my plants, make a slow good meal and go for a walk. Feels good that there isn’t so much negotiating in my life anymore.
I feel like I discover anew on a semi-regular basis just how not healed from my childhood I am. I know what I want, I work toward what I want, and what I want right now (and what is keeping me afloat) is writing whatever I need to here or in a journal, and writing and recording music. The music is the most important thing for me. It has been since I was going to bed listening to Slayer on my headphones and trying to drown out external unwanted sounds.
But realistically, I don't think I will ever recover from what was done to me. Too much invalidation and gaslighting by my family, by therapists, by institutions, by an ex-friend (a longtime rock for me with whom I was going through recovery from alcohol; when I'd slip, she'd be right there) who chose the easy way out of a complicated interpersonal situation that was created directly by her newly-reified fiance. We were in the same online sober group, and she was also in the group and was a founding member I believe. When he wrote ignorant comments about me in the group, I let him know in the comments. (I did not know that I was experiencing hypomania at the time) His behavior directly compromised his fiancee's ability to be a moderator of this important space. It put her in an impossible position--he was calling me out for things I didn't do, and she saw the interaction, and not only was she a moderator she was close to both of us. This means that her emotional self was being torn at.
I know this because when I emailed her about it she said "I can't talk with you about it as I'm too close to the situation and I need to protect my energy." I replied with "That also means that you can't talk with him about it either, for the same reasons." She responded with vitriol, saying "don't tell me how to live my life" etc, and she cut me out of her life. Even though HE was the person who ruined all of this. She was living with him.
It was by far the easier decision to cut me out, even though I'd known her FAR longer and we'd shared so much and I was the first person to hold space for her when she had a manic episode--I could tell that night that her voice kept getting higher and her literal agitation was pronounced. I knew she was bipolar. So I gently said something like "I can tell by your voice that you're starting to experience some mania. I want you to know it's ok. We don't have to talk about it or do anything about it. We can just sit here. Whatever you want." She replied that no one had ever done that for her before, and that she was very grateful.
So when she threw me away, I collapsed and had to be hospitalized. That I'm not going into here.
But a month or two after I came out, I discovered hate for the first time. I had never allowed anyone to get close enough to me in order for me to hate them. But this did it. Because I loved her, as a friend.
I don't know if her fiance saw me as a threat. It's not the point. The point is I grieved for 2 months, and I won't let her back in my life (she has not tried) unless I get an appropriate heartfelt apology...which likely won't happen if she's still with him.
Why am I sharing all this? Because I keep reading that you have peace and are happy. I have times when I feel peaceful, but they are rare. My music is extremely angry yet compositional and poetic and at times simply spoken or layered with melodiousness instead of dissonance. I feel complicated things, and so I create complicated things.
I have not felt happiness for longer than maybe an hour at a time (and it's rare) in the last 28 years. The time I'm thinking of 28 years ago was involving an intimate situation with someone I thought was my friend. Turns out she just wanted a piece.
Ugh. I'm gonna go play games.
Cake, yes please. Thank you Nate. 💚
Nate,
Over time, I have come to believe that one of the most important questions in healing is not, "Can I understand this person?" but, "What is this interaction asking me to carry?"
For many survivors, there is a period where we feel responsible for educating, explaining, translating, and creating understanding for people who have no real interest in understanding. We spend enormous amounts of energy trying to make our reality acceptable to those who are uncomfortable with it.
At some point, something shifts.
We realize that compassion and access are not the same thing.
We can wish someone well without giving them a seat at our table.
Reading this, I didn't see someone acting out of bitterness. I saw someone protecting a space that was built through years of hard-earned honesty, grief, healing, and trust.
I also appreciated your point that respect is not automatically earned through age, status, or titles. Respect lives in how we show up with other human beings.
The older I get, the more I see boundaries not as walls, but as guardians of what matters most.