The Alchemy of the Unexitable Loop: Someone behaves toward you in bullying, degrading, diminishing, or disruptive ways, then denies it or explains it as a consequence of who you are. Literally: they turn their own behavior into evidence against you.

I am wired to sense shifts in energy. I don’t mean that in some mystical way, and I don’t mean that I am being paranoid. I am attuned at a sensory and emotional level to things other people may have the luxury of not noticing.

Cold, detached silence. Avoidant eye contact. Being ignored. A change in tone. The almost imperceptible shift from being in connection with someone to being very clearly outside of it.

I’d sense it.

And because nothing had been indicated, I would ask. What’s wrong?

Nothing.

And the coldness intensified. Naturally I would ask again. So fkn earnest.

And now the inquiry itself was the only issue. Suddenly there was something concrete to point to: my questioning. My inability to leave it alone. My insistence that something was wrong when I had been clearly told there wasn’t.

And there is the loop.

I experienced the tension. I inquired directly. My asking was labeled as escalation. The heightened tension was then used to explain the tension I had originally asked about.

Therefore, apparently, I had imagined it. Or caused it. Or manufactured chaos where none had existed.

And now my behavior could justify whatever came next.

There was no direct confrontation. No, “I’m angry with you.” No, “I didn’t love that.” No, “Can we talk about what happened?” No good-faith request to understand. Not even a simple statement of displeasure.

At least not to me.

The displeasure was expressed elsewhere, to others. So while insisting that nothing was wrong, an entirely different conversation could be unfolding outside of my participation. Because gossip and triangulation are somehow more dignified and “peace-keeping” than openly addressing friction?

There was no opportunity to acknowledge the discord, clarify anything, take responsibility for what was actually mine, or repair the relationship.

Instead, the grievance traveled laterally.

Triangulation. Gossip. Division.

And if it eventually did come directly to me, it wasn’t offered as information that might help us understand each other. It came with teeth, delivered for maximum injury.

Not: Here is what landed poorly for me.

More: Here is what is wrong with you.

There was a negative space where repair should have happened, while a narrative developed without me.

By then, the equation was complete.

I had detected something I wasn’t supposed to detect. I had asked about something I was told wasn’t happening. My asking became evidence that I had created the problem.

And having created the problem, I had apparently earned whatever harmful thing followed.

Another person’s harmful reaction gets explained entirely by my character.

That’s the alchemy.

Have you ever been in a relationship with someone whose coldness you could feel, but when you asked what was wrong, you were told nothing?

And asking only made things worse.

Whatever happened next became the thing you had coming to you.

For being this way.

Literally: their behavior gets reassigned to your character.