Looking back, I notice how often I gravitated toward people who couldn’t tolerate my pain but expected the world to organize itself around their pleasure. When they were uncomfortable, everyone rushed to soothe them. What’s especially painful is this: humanity
Coercive control is a strategic pattern of behavior used to dominate another person and strip away their sense of autonomy. It is not defined by a single violent event, but by a continuous web of intimidation, isolation, and micro-regulation of the
The Path that Formed Me I didn’t “pick bad people.” I picked familiar nervous systems—people whose emotional vacancy felt like home, because that’s what I learned from the people I loved and needed most. I’m tracing a path laid out
I’m finally recognizing how validity gets measured not necessarily by the truth of what’s said, but by the composure of the person saying it. My sister recognized this dynamic early on. As someone deeply sensitive and reactive, I was easy
The Truth That Cannot Be Erased For over a decade, this space has been my witness. For a multitude of reasons, outside of what has been designated as my willfullness and lack of gratitude, I have never been a pleasing
The Binary World I Grew Up In In my family, things weren’t simply liked or disliked—they were either the best or the worst. No middle ground, no “not for me.” If you didn’t love something, you had to hate it.
Across my closest relationships—mother, sister, husband, children—harm was never something to repair. It wasn’t acknowledged as harm at all, but reframed as my perception, my fault, my failure. Peace was never on offer. If I stayed, there was no peace.
In connecting with other survivors of similar dynamics, I’m recognizing a pattern that seems less personal and more structural. In families and systems which rely on scapegoating, it’s apparently simpler to remove a wounded person than to acknowledge and repair