Growth & Resilience
28 min readJul 17, 2023

The Encounter

Throughout my life, my worth, voice & privacy have been stolen from my life. This entry will detail my personal traumatic experiences while talking about a specific encounter in great detail whom I still care about & love. However, given our own unhealed trauma’s — There comes a time and place where we must disengage to protect our own peace of mind and wellbeing.

Throughout my life, I’ve undergone a lot of traumatic and re-triggering experiences and situations where I found myself to be vulnerable in ways where I cannot explain it. When I tried to explain the fear and the urge to leave a particular situation, my voice and power would be taken away and I would be held hostage for months and even for years. This has been going on all of my life and I’m still having that difficulty to disengage from situations and past experiences that have detrimentally caused more damage than I can even begin to explain. My mental and physical health have been impacted as a result of toxic encounters that have come into my life and possessed a certain type of charm to further exploit, use and take advantage of my weaknesses and vulnerabilities. This has been going on for far too long. It’s like there’s a sign on my back saying, ‘abuse mystic. She’s weak. She’s autistic and the perfect target.’ I am not sure why this has to happen and why people have to be cruel. The world would be a better place if we were all kind and genuine to one another.

Upon staying up all night with relentous thoughts in my mind, I barely slept last night and I will continue to write until I cannot anymore. I’m on 5 hours of sleep, my hair is in the messiest bun ever, and I am on many caffeinated beverages at the moment. When I write like this, I have a lot to say and it’s as a result of what I have been observing for the past few weeks and days even. I choose not to say anything because it’s better.

Throughout my own traumatic experiences, I’ve adapted a tolerance level to a point where I will disengage and self isolate when I need to. I would not take this as a sign that I am okay because I’m normally not when I self isolate. Everything gets to be a bit much when you are challenged and tested by toxic individuals who say that they care and love us when they do not know what love is themselves or how to be caring individuals. It’s even more narcissistic when you put your trust into someone that you think cares and they betray that trust altogether. I will give a few examples which will include opening up to someone but having those emotions and feelings dismissed to a point where you eventually shut down — And then when close friends attempt to check in on us when we self isolate from everyone, we don’t engage. We’ve been betrayed and because of the mistrust, we don’t know what else we can say or do and that is where we shut down altogether.

When I feel dismissed, it doesn’t feel too great, and I’ve felt this recently. I’ve felt this around someone that I thought I could trust, rely on and open up to. I felt an instant connection or so I thought I did. When I don’t feel heard, I feel invisible and it’s like butterflies are sitting in the pit of my stomach. You want to cry and express yourself so badly but nobody cares enough to listen. I’ve always been that passing face in the background where people would walk by and nobody notices me. On top of the bullying, it’s been one thing after another and I’ve never had a fair chance at anything. I don’t talk about this much in real life because I cannot. There isn’t an option to talk about my feelings and/or emotions as a result of shame and stigma and so that is why I keep everything in. That is why I’m on my anonymous Twitter and I give my utmost respect to the communities on there in which I have learnt and grown from in so many ways that I cannot explain. I’m just grateful for community and for my anonymous support in which I will defend at all costs if specific close people attempt to reveal my identity. I have the legal and human right under the human rights code in my state to further be anonymous. I have not tweeted anything terrible, misleading or deceptive but speak the truth and share my experiences.

Vulnerability is a sign of great strength.
It is your choice to show up & to be genuine. We need more of that out there.

I’ve been gaslighted on many occasions and it gets to a point where I often doubt my own perception and sanity of what actually happened. The narcissist knows what they are doing and what they are saying, and they know that everyone will listen to them or mostly everyone. Some people will do further investigating such as myself to know the facts of what has occurred. It’s better to analyze all points of a situation before perceiving an assumption or going on false rumors to mislead and deceive the public but also sabotage the actual victim at play. Think about that.

Narcissists will always have their enabler of followers to impose smear campaigns. This is used out of spite to intentionally sabotage their victims. On another note, the narcissist will typically target those who are the most vulnerable, preferably those on the spectrum for autism which is sick and deluded if you ask me. In the image below, this will depict narcissistic abuse and their relentous smear campaigns.

This is a game to the narcissist and even when we decide to go no contact, it’s still overwhelming because what had happened had already happened. It’s a lot to recover from without getting triggered, being on edge or having to walk on egg shells that the abuse will happen again or this person is only just an enabler of this other person that is associated with the abuser. But in lamens, that person is just an ordinary person and they’re not actually associated with that abuser. I hope I made sense there! I tried to explain that in the best way possible and I likely sound scattered. I do not and will never condone anyone that enables such abuse from someone being bullied to having false rumors spread about them.

I wanted to talk about something recent that had occurred and that’s why I’m on the short term leave of absence. I’m not too sure if I can return back to work given how vulnerable and unwell this particular individual made me. I do intend to return back to the workplace by a set date and that is my ultimate goal. I am not someone to take advantage of the benefits given to us unless I absolutely need those benefits. I’m someone all about consistency and structure, and I’m sure you have seen me tweet that out a lot. Without that consistency and structure, I do not have much to offer or implement in life. Life is about implementing a consistent life with reasonable goals, on top of reaching out for professional supports and trying to work on ourselves. We can do all of this while balancing a healthy work life too.

However, I have set a deadline for August 1st of 2023 to return back to work but that may need to be extended given recent circumstances, re-triggers and re-traumatization.

Upon taking my leave of absence, it wasn’t the easiest because I had to obtain documentation upon documentation. I had to call the assistant manager as I’m very close to her and somewhat find it in myself to open up about everything. When it comes to my profession, I keep everything very maintained. In a sense, I refuse to speak about my mental health and addictions in real life. I refuse to talk about these topics as there’s a lot of shame and stigma entrenched to mental health, addictions and with trauma in general. Before the leave of absence, I was constantly calling into my weekend shifts and then management started to get concerned as they know that I never call in sick and that something was wrong. I am that colleague that will attend her work shifts even on the worse, most vulnerable days. I am that colleague who will still attend work with a smile on her face and will try to cheer other people up when she is having the worse day possible. That has always been me. That being said, it is always the cheerful, giddy people that we should be the most concerned about — Those are the people fighting the inner most battles that we don’t talk about. I know I don’t talk about those battles especially when other people around me are struggling and I don’t want to burden or overwhelm other people. When I eventually got the documentation for the leave of absence, this took a while and it was overwhelming as I had to constantly check my work emails to make sure that everything was properly communicated. I did my best though and I’m grateful for a supportive and understanding workplace.

“Those with the kindest hearts & who appear to be the happiest are typically fighting the worse battles that nobody knows about.”
At times, we all need these reminders & I will happily provide this if needed. We’re all just human beings hanging on by a thread with a bit of hope and trying to get through every day life. It is not easy.

I wanted to briefly touch on what had happened to me on May 5th of 2023. I had briefly spoken on this on Twitter spaces, through my tweets, and I had blogged about this too. I had also deleted everything associated with The Poet due to having mixed and unprocessed feelings of what had happened. I was in a confused state of whatever. I’ve spoken to multiple people in real life and online; I do regret speaking about this in spaces and, in general, to online people when I should have been speaking about this to support lines for example. There are more appropriate resources to utilize where I can thoroughly analyze what had happened with a professional. I’ve been periodically speaking with one of my neurodivergent friends who is a lot older in age and she has been through a past abusive relationship that ended very violently. When I explained this particular situation to her, right away she told me to cut the contact and I refused to listen. I was stupid and careless to open the door back up on repeat occasions. I gave the narcissist the benefit of the doubt and clearly what they wanted which was attention to inflate their altruistic ego. They never cared or loved me as much as they would say that to make me feel better. Everything was fake — Nothing was genuine. The red flags were there from the beginning. I never clued into this because I was vulnerable and naive. I did not know any better and I feel ashamed and embarrassed to even talk about this but talking about this is needed.

Most victims are silenced in fear that we will lose ourselves in the end — But talking about these experiences gives our peace & voice back if anything.

I’m having great difficulty trying to find the right words especially at 3:38am.

I’m going to use his name as The Poet and, yes, if you have been following me for a while — You likely know who this individual is and I no longer care because I need to be talking about this more than anything. But you may not know who he is and you really do not want to know. I am afraid that after he moves on from me, he’ll move onto the next victim. I will soon be tossed to the side just like any other narcissist would do; it’s the classic disposal stage and that’s where the narcissist no longer see’s a purpose for their victims. It’s devaluation.

This is where awareness & education is crucial for potential victims who may be next in line. This is why talking about this is necessary. We need to be opening these conversations.
It’s almost like being tossed to the curb and treated as if we are nothing all over again. I’m used to it though.

I’ve talked about The Poet many times during therapy and my therapist is a great listener but people need to experience what I experienced in order to get it. However, they haven’t. On Wednesday, July 19th, I have a therapist session in which I plan to talk about the recent events that occurred from July 3rd to the 6th. These events are very recent and I’ve changed my contact number because of the narcissist. I cannot be associated or in connection with someone who views everything from their perspective and refuses to tune into and listen to other view points to further learn and grow. Life is not supposed to only be one sided — It’s about actively listening to work on the core issues together as a whole. It’s about implementing the constructive criticism and trying to self improve and make subtle changes when needed.

There’s still a lot of unprocessed feelings that I, honestly, do not understand.

On the morning of Thursday, July 6th of 2023, The Poet had left my house in the heat of an argument but he was the only one arguing. He was showing me a video on Andrew Tate and this guy is clearly for this individual. I understand that there is hype about Mr. Tate and there are people for and against him. I have my view points about the situation and I will only say this — I do not condone human trafficking but I do know a lot about the issues of human trafficking and other sex-related crimes. I’ve had clients, in particular youth, who have been human trafficked in the past. I’ve counselled those youth and gotten them into great programs and supports in their communities. I’m grateful I have been able to support anyone I could have supported even through active listening. These issues are prevalent in our society and we refuse to acknowledge them. I’m grateful to have woken up this morning, to have come across this space on Andrew Tate to further learn about his victims that were tortured, devalued and discarded of like garbage. How is that okay?

A part from that, that morning I made The Poet breakfast. For those few days that he was over at my house, I made him food. I attended to his needs when I did not have too. I would make him breakfast, lunch and supper, especially after he had disclosed basically starving himself because I spoke about what had happened on May 5th through Twitter spaces. Apparently he calls me a liar. However, my experiences are valid and so are his. I will still continue to write about this as that is within my right. Again, I’ve lost connections because of disclosing all of this and I do not care because the truth prevails over a lie.

Vulnerability, authenticity & consistency are everything.

When I first met The Poet, it was at an event called, The Coldest Night of the Year, on February 25th of 2023. If I had a reset button, I would not have invited him to the event because I did feel ashamed but I also felt sorry for him too. We were interacting for a while on Twitter spaces and he kept saying that he was from the same area as me and how he wanted to meet up. I felt nervous to meet up with him as I normally do not meet up with people from social media. As we interacted through spaces for a while, I remember getting annoyed because he would interrupt all the time and I wouldn’t be able to speak. Other close people from those spaces would remind The Poet to raise his hand and to stop interrupting. Admittingly, I interrupt as well but I’ve been using the hand and listening method a lot more. It is better to listen to others than to speak if I’m being honest. Eventually, I would give up and just listen or try to listen to what he would be saying. Most of the time, he’s speaking so fast that you cannot understand him.

At the event, everything went okay but I didn’t feel too great hanging out with him but I couldn’t say anything. Even in person, I still felt cut off whenever I would talk with him or we would talk amongst others at the event. I observed The Poet cutting off others whenever he would engage with them and I could see the annoyance and frustration on their face like, “what is going on? Why am I being interrupted?” There’s so much I wanted to say but I keep the majority of everything bottled up to a point where I internalize and have a meltdown after a while. My meltdowns are pretty intense too.

Throughout the months, we hung out with a close friend group on Discord and there were about six of us in there. He was in there too and he went by some name called poetryprince13 — Even through our interactions on there, I would feel dismissed and so I barely spoke in our chats especially around our friend group. You see, when I feel dismissed or not listened to properly, I go silent and I self isolate such as right now. I don’t speak when I should be speaking; it’s easier if that makes sense. During those interactions and on that server, I experienced a lot of sensory overload where I became frustrated and overwhelmed at some of the posts that he would put out there in the server. He would post degrading and offensive poetry and I would have these conversations about his poetry with him in the most honest way possible. I don’t think he understood clearly. He would reply back with something snarky such as, “my poetry may be rude but it’s real. This is what I write about. I write about my feelings and I’m not going to stop writing about my feelings.” I don’t think he realizes that by expressing and spewing out hate will further push people away.

We also argued a lot and these arguments were every so often and they didn’t make much sense. He lives in this fantasy world where everything has to be his way and only his way — You can try to have a conversation with him and it’s like you’re talking to a brick wall. This is how I felt for months during the interactions and arguments. During that time, I tried to look past everything and would debrief with the other friends in the server about the situation and we would try to mediate as a friend group. I had feelings for him and I disclosed my feelings to one particular person and she had promised to keep that secret but we don’t talk anymore.

We don’t talk anymore because she wanted to enforce boundaries due to both of us getting co-dependent on each other. She wanted space for a week and I respected that — However, she blocked me and does not talk to me anymore. On top of the wanting boundaries part, she also cut off the friendship altogether and labelled me as a stalker when I’m not. To stalk someone implies that you monitor and track their every movement. I have never done that nor do I want too. I’m not a psychopath. I just have co-dependent issues and I’m currently working through that in therapy.

She not only labelled me as a stalker in mental health collective spaces but has and is still trying to mislead the public about I don’t even know. However, I don’t have anything to hide which is why my profile is public. I just keep everything real and authentic as it should be. I do forgive her though especially after she carelessly blew up on me for no reason in a mental health collective space. She tried to dox my identity in which I covered up because, as I mentioned, I will always protect my anonymous identity as that is within my legal and human right. Also, everyone deserves to have an outlet and mine is anonymous Twitter, and I am going nowhere from the platform. On top of the boundary issues, she cut off the friendship for reasons because I had opened up about a traumatic experience which was the May 5th incident in which I will continue to talk about. Upon opening up about this experience, I have had close friends whom I thought were close leave my life and I’ve realized quickly that those are not the real friends that I need or want in my life at all; they were hypocrites if anything, people claiming to be advocates for particular topics and going against everything they have preached about and committed too. It is what it is though.

From February to about May, things were very rocky and the arguments got out of hand. I remember that we would argue, block each other, and then make up after. I thought that this was healthy and from my own unhealed trauma, I wanted more but I wanted more only from the friendship part. As I mentioned to The Poet on many occasions, I wanted to stay friends and how I was not and could give my committment to be in a relationship; I felt coerced into doing things that I did not want to do. How is that okay?

We would always involve our friend group to further mediate everything. These days, I don’t involve anyone. Sitting here right now, I don’t speak much about The Poet on Twitter or publicly but I will continue to blog about this and if people want to know the truth, you can read my truths! Very simples! I have nothing but hate and I do feel sorry for him. Apparently he feels sorry for me but he really shouldn’t. I may have my issues but I’m self aware of a lot of things whereas he isn’t. He’s currently on the brink of homelessness and about to lose his rental and as much as he has hurt me, I will still keep him in my prayers. He has a lot of issues that he needs to work on through his own self awareness. As much as he says that he is self aware of those issues, he is not and it prevalently shows. My close friend in real life is in agreeance about this — He lacks a lot of self awareness and refuses to get help.

Life is about obtaining that self awareness and trying to self improve and make subtle changes every day or every so often when given that chance to do so.

I had recently assisted him with a few things actually about a week and a half ago. He had stayed at my place for a few days, and I gave him so much of my time and energy to get little in return. The Poet was invited back into my life on July 4th of 2023 and stayed at my place until July 6th. We were clearly both infatuated with each other; I am no longer infatuated with him anymore due to the hate and vengeance spewed against me especially on my birthday on July 15th. My birthdays are already tough enough as it is and I do not need toxic negativity from anyone.

I had assisted him with his resume and implemented a cover letter for him upon his requests. He had asked me for help to make several social media accounts for his writing and general labor career. To add, he even asked me to be his social media manager or whatever; I had no idea what he meant for that and I didn’t really respond as I cannot commit to that long term given my own personal issues and commitments in my life that come with adulting.

As a social services professional and someone who legitmly wants to help and support everyone, I decided to help him out in support of his ambitions. I would always mention, “I can help you but you must do the work as well.” That is all I can really say; I cannot manage his life 24/7. He specified wanting to be established in his career and how LinkedIn would be a great start. I therefore created whatever platform he wanted to be on and I started with LinkedIn followed by Medium which are great platforms to be established for a potential writing career. I’ll be honest that upon creating a LinkedIn, he has obtained many connections from well known authors and writers from across the world. If you really want to establish yourself, take advantage of those that are supporting you and make the effort to further connect through an open mind and the willingness to learn and grow. That is, in my opinion, what writing is about — We’re constantly learning through constructive criticism.

We started off as friends but it was more so was a friends with benefits relationship if anything due to our mixed feelings. The many encounters did not even appear real and it’s like I’m still sleeping and stuck in a dream where I can’t escape due to my own unprocessed whatever. None of it appears real. It’s like a never ending nightmare. That is how damaging The Poet has been to my psyche and especially to a point where I am about to check myself into a psych ward because it’s bringing up a ton of suicidal feelings. I don’t want to concern anyone though. I remember trying to take my life after being sexually assaulted in 2016 and that year and the years followed afterwards were incredibly difficult.

I am okay but I do need to keep writing about this. As I always mention and if I go quiet from my anonymous support for a while, I am writing — I am expressing myself and writing helps with that and it helps to process everything altogether. I am not one to spew out hate against others; instead, I write the truth and I will be as vulnerable and open even if this entry is forty minutes long but hopefully not. Good luck reading and if you have come this far, thank you so much!

I had openly stated the need to only be friends and how I was not ready for a committed relationship. I know myself and I will always be honest when I need to be. If I am not ready for something, I’m not ready, and the other person can either accept that or they don’t accept that. His mindset was on about being in a relationship and I only wanted friendship. In a way, I felt coerced to do more with him. Upon writing about my traumatic experiences through this platform and by disclosing what I had been through to The Poet, it didn’t feel as if he was properly listening and that hurt if anything. If he read my blogs, he would further understand what I have been through and accept that I only want friendship and nothing more. He would just get it. I don’t think he understands what I went through with my father and what I went through in 2016 with Jeff Barrett. I have tried to talk about my sexual abuse from the past with the appropriate professionals and none of that is easy. I had a DASA (Domestic Abuse and Sexual Assault) trauma therapist for years. However, COVID-19 happened and my therapist had limited our sessions and I suppose, my therapist thought I was healed from what had happened when I was not. It’s not easy to talk about such issues and victims are often silenced, shamed and stigmatized to speak up about such things. It’s utterly pathetic. It’s like we do not have a voice. Healing from such experiences can take a lifetime and, often, we do not heal from such experiences and this depends on the extent of one’s trauma. This life has been incredibly difficult for me and not a lot of you would be able to endure what I had to endure.

A day without rape and/or sexual assault would most definitely be a better society with more humanity and kindness if anything. A day without rape and/or sexual assault would diminish a lot of the power imbalances at play in our society today.

On May 5th, I was inebriated and under the influence of alcohol. There was a ginormous wine bottle, Pinot Grigorio was it’s brand name, and it was right near my bed. The Poet noticed that the wine bottle was there and asked if he could have some. However, I don’t share my wine with people and that’s just a me thing. I’m very confused about that night and as I mentioned to him, I was scared but he refuses to understand and communicate about my own feelings and emotions. The fact that I had it in me to say, “I was scared. This is how you made me feel during that night,” and he disregards and dismisses my experiences and fears altogether — I don’t know what else to say to be honest. I had mentioned that from the short few days he was at my house recently from July 3rd to the 6th. Instead, he instills control and power to a point where I feel obligated to do what he says from time to time. This also has to do with my vulnerability and being autistic. This has to do with not being loved, wanted or appreciated from my past. This has to do with a lot of own unhealed trauma that I have tried to voice many times but it’s like talking to a brick wall most of the time.

That night brings on a lot of not just confusion but regret because if I hadn’t of been drinking — If I hadn’t of written poetry to him through a social application called Wattpad, I don’t think that night would have happened. As I mentioned to The Poet, I wrote poetry as I came to quickly realize how much of an outlet writing was. I used to read different works from well known and established authors and poets. I never wrote my own content before and I’m starting to. I’m impressed with what I have read. When I followed his account on Wattpad, I had so much motivation to continue to write. I did not necessarily follow poetryprince13 for him — I followed him because he was the only one I knew on Wattpad and I just wanted a follower to be honest and I thought we were friends in a sense. I started to write as openly and vulnerable as I could, and I think he thought I was writing towards him but I wasn’t. I also followed him to show my support for his writing and to try and be a good friend. I was writing for myself. There’s been an empty void of whatever within myself for many years. It’s hard to explain. I’ve kept a lot of bottled emotions and feelings inside to a point where I break down and then I’m experiencing a mental health crisis.

I remember writing on a topic about suicide but in poetry format and this entry really spoke to me a lot. I wrote about the topic with such passion and how others will shame and stigmatize someone else speaking about such feelings. I wrote about the cry for help and the need for others to label them as attention seeking when that is more damaging than anything. I wrote about being there and sitting with someone in silence rather than talking. Silence speaks volumes.

Everyone has a life worth living and I do not and I will never wish harm onto anyone even to my abusers. I will forgive and I will move on. That is ultimately what anyone can do for healing purposes. What is the point to dwell on a situation and hold onto anger, hate and spew out that anger and hate onto others who are battling inner demons that they may not even talk about. Often, some of us are silent because we do not want to burden or overwhelm others with our issues. I think that is fair but it is also not healthy to bottle up such emotions and feelings. As I always say, everyone deserves to have an outlet where they can properly express themselves. I have my alternate and it’s like a miniature diary to me.
I am not suicidal as I type this. I have a lot of anger, betrayal and confusion but I’m working on that through my own healing journey. But I have been suicidal and I have had multiple suicide attempts. I am immensely grateful to still be with you today especially making it to my 29th year.
You know, most of the time the suicide warning signs are right there in front of us. When I am experiencing a mental health crisis, I will be discreet about my own suicidal ideation. There are subtle signs and risk factors that we need to be vigilante for. Instead of calling someone attention seeking because they are expressing their emotions and feelings, we need to be direct and honest. We need ask, “are you suicidal? Do you have a plan?” They teach this to us in our field and I will openly talk about this here too for additional awareness & education.
One thing I have learned from The Poet is to tune more into men’s mental health. It is to further not label someone as a monster based on past experiences but to, yes, own your truth and attempt to have reasonable and just conversations about our fears and the inability to express such conversations at times. Those conversations can be quite challenging and intimidating. To acknowledge with the willingness to constantly learn & grow about men’s mental health is advocacy work which is vital for the work I do within my profession. I work with all types of client populations — I work with women, men, and those a part of the LGBTQ2S+ communities. I need to be learning more about this. I need to be talking about these topics in interviews and in my work. I am immensely grateful to have this knowledge and to continue to learn and grow every day.

Nobody should have to feel alone — There is help out there. Reaching out for help is a sign of strength.

Other poetical works I created had to do with my own abandonment and neglect issues from my father who wasn’t the greatest role model growing up. I wrote about The Poet being a reminder in appearance and personality, in relation to my father, which is screwed up and I’m aware of that. If you take a look at my father and compare his image to The Poet’s, there’s quite the resemblance. I also wrote about Jeff Barrett and how my addiction to substances started. Jeff Barrett and my father do remind me of The Poet — He was a monster in my eyes for many months. After July 6th of 2023, I do not paint him as a monster but as an acquaintance and as someone that I had attempted to support through kindness while being vulnerable at the same time. We both have our unhealed childhood trauma’s and I am not undermining that. Both of our experiences are equally valid.

When he gave me a key to his place, I accepted it. I accepted the key because I had offered to clean his place at the time. He had mentioned through spaces that he was going through his own depression for a few months to a year and that’s why I felt sorry for him. I wanted to help him so badly and I remember asking others in the mental health community whether or not this was a good idea. Regardless of what and how others responded, I still wanted to clean his place. Regardless of what and how my in real life connections responded, I still attempted to clean his place even though I was tired after completing a double shift from work. I would still bus to his place to help out a friend. I’ve cleaned hoarding places before — His was not that bad and I am grateful to have been able to provide that support to him because it gave him a sense of sanity and dignity. People experiencing bouts of depression need our support and society tends to ignore and mask these symptoms which is not okay. Even though The Poet has detrimentally harmed me, I still made the efforts to help him out because that is who I am.

Many people wouldn’t do this though especially without some type of compensation. I will always do this type of work for free if I need to because this is the difference I want to make out there. This is what humanity is if anything. This is how we need to be more of in society. Instead, we pass by people in the blink of an eye where they’re clearly struggling and needing the most support. In a nutshell, depression can strike anyone at any given time. We’re all just human beings hanging on by a thread with a little bit of hope and, sometimes, that thread breaks.

The Poet had offered me a second key upon losing the first one due to my ability to easily misplace items and the tendency to forget things which is literally ADHD 101. I did not know what to make out of that. He wrote me a card with a sweet note and a key inside. The key had beautiful butterflies on it. I was up in Cambridge at the time and we were messaging during that weekend from Friday, May 19th to Sunday, May 21st of 2023.

During my time in Cambridge, I was in a rough spot but I sought the support through friends on Discord and from where I was. After my friends arbitration hearing, I was very upset because of The Poet and I decided to get high and drunk at the same time. I took a long walk and ended up in some forested, construction area. While under the influence, I located some pretty cool area where I sat there for the majority of the night. That is where my night began before casually making it back to my hotel but I was only there in my hotel briefly to charge up my phone and then I went back out. After my phone was charged, I remember going back out and taking another walk at about midnight to the whole night — I reached out to many crisis workers and this was on Saturday, May 20th. From the six crisis workers that I had reached out to, I had intended to be admitted to a hospital up in Cambridge. I wanted to speak to the mental health crisis team. I wanted that support and I was clearly expressing suicidal ideation. I will just say it but that night was rough and challenging. I do not normally open up about my suicidal feelings and I tried very hard to do so.

I was extremely out of it that night and I was not messaging The Poet at all. It took five crisis workers as I messaged the 741741 Wellness support line. The fifth crisis worker had banned me from their support line when I expressed being suicidal and wanting to unalive. After wards, I called into Wellness Canada and spoke with a sixth crisis responder and requested to speak with the mental health crisis team in person. I had the expectation that I was going to speak with someone in person that night and that I would get the help I needed and to further talk about May 5th with a professional — But I ended up getting lost while on the way to my hotel and losing further trust with the mental health system in general. As a Social Services professional, I already know how flawed the system is and this has largely to do with the lack of funding. It’s detrimental to a lot of us experiencing bouts of crisis situations like this and we are not able to reach out for the proper supports and resources.

The next morning on Sunday, May 21st, I woke very hung over and I had my breakfast. I had no choice but to go back home that day as the hotel was getting to be very expensive. I told myself that I was not going to reach out again. Since then, I have reached out but through a different line which is Talk Suicide Canada. The difference between Wellness Canada and the Talk Suicide Lines — Wellness Canada is based on trained volunteers who are only there for volunteer experience to further network and to get their foot in the door for the career pathways that they want to pursue. With the Talk Suicide support line, you actually get legitimate human beings who are there to provide support and stay on the line with us until the crisis subsides.

About a week or so from Sunday, May 21st, I reached out again to the Talk Suicide support line upon being constantly encouraged and reassured that there are supports and that people do want to help us. I spoke with someone privately on Twitter who works through the Wellness support line and I had debriefed with her about my negative experiences in which she was surprised about. Upon debriefing with this user, I never got unbanned from the line and that is okay. I will utilize other means of supports as there are other support lines out there. I am grateful and happy to have had that interaction so that she is aware of my experiences in case others have potentially experienced this too.

So that was the experience up in Cambridge and, since then, everything has been hazy and I’ve been on this leave of absence while trying to find myself.

My birthday just passed on July 15th and I dreaded that day but I still made the effort upon being sick with a high fever to get out of my house and enjoy the day. A part from the outpour of rain on my birthday, I still managed to enjoy the day. I got a nice haircut, had pizza with sweet friends, and I managed to not cancel on my friends for karaoke. I find getting out of our comfort zones has to be done at times. We need to get out and embrace the feeling of being uncomfortable. If we’re afraid to do something, we need to get out and just do it anyway. That night during karaoke, I met a lot of great people and, yes, I will be going back there going forward!

While I was out with my friends on my birthday, I had read a vengeful birthday poem from The Poet which detrimentally interferred with my wellbeing. I debriefed about this further with my friends and they asked me why he was not blocked and why I had decided to unblock him. I then blocked him since July 15th and I think this will be permantely. Since my birthday, he’s been posting and advocating for men’s mental health which I do appreciate because we need more of that content out there. However, the way he is going on about his own advocacy, I don’t really agree with because it includes bashing and excluding others from the mental health community.

When I define community, I define it as a whole — Community is holistic and nobody should ever be isolated, shunned or excluded especially if they are experiencing a mental health crisis. We each have our mental health and it’s hard enough to talk about it.

From everything that has occurred on May 5th up until this point, I’m a lot stronger from everything and so are you. As a victim of narcissistic abuse, I’m only going to rise above this. I’m going to openly speak about such experiences to hopefully eradicated the shame and stigma that comes from mental health, mental illness, addictions, and trauma. It’s vital to talk about these topics and to further open up about our stories to bring light to our communities.

Everyone has a battle that they are facing regardless if we tell others or not. That is something to take in. These days, I don’t really speak but I am fighting a battle right now.

For many of those that do know my identity, thank you for being there and for hearing me out. I appreciate you guys more than you think. I appreciate the chance that I got for having a voice and for sharing my story.

-Anonymous user, Mystic

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Growth & Resilience
Growth & Resilience

Written by Growth & Resilience

- C-PTSD - ADHD - Central Auditory Processing Disorder - Autism Spectrum Disorder

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