wixbloom's journal

BTW didn't comment on this but the guy in qiestion is like, the Most Problematic guy not in the sense of being a dick but in the sense of having the most unchecked and fucked up mental health issues, and his circumstances are the most tragic - he's disabled, unable to work, suicidal, has really bad anxiety and lives with family who still misgender and deadname him and insist that he is and always will be a girl.

When he said that I look like a lady, I replied "I'm sure you have at one point been told the same thing; I imagine that you don't like hearing that, and I don't either". And his reply was "I'm sorry if I told you things I wouldn't like to hear from others but it was without prejudice and just trying to understand," which was a clumsy but well-intentioned answer. I've been focused on my frustration and sadness, which is valid, and it's important for me to acknowledge and validate my own feelings, but I understand that he's a victim of the exact mentality he spewed at me, and he also called me a brother in this fight, and I'd like to be able to genuinely think of him as such as well.

 

Spoiler: nsfw

when you watch some hardcore porn that you like but you're suddenly struck by the possibility of it not being acted by consensual participants but rather depicting actual real sexual violence and you feel disgusted at it and at yourself and keep having horrible intrusive thoughts of it :)

 

From my journal, where I get overdramatic and poetic about falling in love:

tell me that you love me, tell me that you know my name, tell me that you've seen me from the first and that you can see that I'm real and tell me that you've always known me

tell me that you're scared of me and that your hands can't stop shaking just like mine, tell me that you're not preternaturally good at relating to others or to me, confess to me that you know nothing of my heart and all you can do is to try, as I'm trying, tell me that you're naked and trembling in the dark of the unknowable continent of me, tell me you've been alone so long that you don't know if you can relate to me at all, tell me that you're human tell me that you're trying.

 

2 things:

1. Met with my former thesis advisor, who's one of the few people in the world that I feel truly know me, and he complimented my outfit, I recommended him the book I was reading (The Last Unicorn), we talked a bit about our lives and he hugged me and I feel good now

2. As I was getting lunch, and thinking back to the journal stuff I posted above, I also remembered many years ago in therapy (c. 2009) I was having this persistent theme for many months of the Inherent Wrongness of My Body And How Different It Was From That Of Other Women which in retrospect I can very clearly see was about gender dysphoria. Specifically, I had a lot of worries about sex and intimacy and how others would react to my body.

At one point late in the year, in the middle of discussing those concerns, I went to an interview with writer Tom Wolfe, followed by an autograph session. Tom, an elderly and frail man, would just quickly open each book, sign the cover page with his flourished name, close it and move on to the next one, often without even speaking or looking at at whoever was holding it. The book I took to get autographed, however, was a dime store find, a 199something translation of Bonfire of the Vanities, which at the time of purchase had been missing its front cover, so I'd made a new front cover, spine and back from colored paper, markers and clear plastic adhesive, the "front cover" being glued to the facing page so that the book no longer had one, instead going straight to the index. Tom Wolfe did a bit of a double-take at the book, opened it, saw the index, and gingerly looked up to me and asked me with a bit of hesitation if that's where he was supposed to sign. I said yes, and he did so, and I still have that book which has significantly increased in value because of his signature.

I told this story to my therapist, and she said that my body and that book had a lot in common: they bore the marks of the unusual history that had led them both to that moment, standing before Tom Wolfe's autograph desk. They'd had unusual roads to get to that point, much more interesting but a lot less common than brand-new, recently bought tomes with sleek covers and pristine facing pages. And she said that when people came into contact with it, they might react in a similar way - with some doubt and hesitation, because it looks different from what they expect - and they might have to ask similar questions: where do I touch? Where do I mark? How does it work? Not because it looks wrong, but because it's different.

I remembered this conversation from years before I realized I was trans, and was amazed in retrospect at the wisdom and the simplicity of saying that, and at how helpful it is, even now.

 

Spoiler: nsfw

I don't usually experience uncontrollable sexual lust, but when I do, I am entirely unequipped to deal with it and just squirm silently wherever I'm sitting and sigh a plea to the gods of sexual frustration to leave me be

 

This morning, I woke up at 6am after falling asleep at midnight, graded 20 papers and took a long bus journey to drop them off fueled only by 3 mugs of strong black tea and 2 paçoquinhas because I didn't have any actual food at home, and arrived to work 2 hours late, at 10am, and have now had a chicken pastry and a diet coke (more caffeine!! yay!!!) and in 2 hours I'm leaving to go have lunch and go to class, and after that to the meeting I thought was last week in which I'll get officially affiliated to an art studio, and after THAT, I'm lecturing my crush and some of his friends on Transgender Issues for an art project they have, and after all that I'm probably getting home around midnight to eat something and crash into bed and wake up early tomorrow for another day as hectic as this one. This is all good things but also I feel slightly maniatic right now.

 

Slightly maniatic as in "everything is at least a little bit hilarious, most things are significantly hilarious, and my legs can't stop moving".

Also the phone at my office keeps ringing IMMEDIATELY AFTER the funniest jokes in Critical Role so I have to take a moment to get a grip and stop laughing... which is hard because in my current state I find the mere idea of trying to get a grip so you can answer your phone to be funny.

 

I straight up just replied to a phone call with "nurses' office... pfftbwaha... how may I help you?"

 

Update I have survived a significant portion of my day (it's 3pm) and have eaten a salad and some water so hell yeah I'm ~healthy~. Now to sit in class and space out for a few hours then head to the studio meeting.

 

I had forgotten that being in love makes me absolutely useless. I keep idly browsing YouTube trying to find a specific kind of music (romantic and dramatic with lots of strings) but none of the examples I can think of actually do anything, they're not the song that's in my head.

 

"Oh (you will say) to hear the stars! Surely
You've lost your mind!" And I will tell you, however,
That, to hear them, I often awaken
And open my windows, pale with wonder...

And we talk through the night, while
The Milky Way, with its open robes,
Glistens. And, when the sun comes, full of tears and longing,
I still seek them in the desert sky.

Now you'll tell me, "My mad friend!
What do you say to them? What sense
Does what you say have, when they're not with you?"

And I will say, "Fall in love to understand them!
For only lovers can have ears
Capable of hearing and understanding stars"

- Brazilian poet Olavo Bilac's "To Hear Stars", translated by me with no regards to rhyming schemes or metric ;)

 

In 2 hours I'll be going on a well-deserved month's vacation from work :D

 

a list of things my crush has written to me this week, in chronological order and also in order of how much they made my heart melt:

• I hope I can always talk more with you so we can get to know each other better and I can learn about this wonderful being that you are, and if possible share the things I have! I'm truly very happy with the prospect of us working together in the studio.
• [on my sendoff event on facebook, apologizing for being unable to go for being sick] Since we're seeing one another again tomorrow, I'm content knowing you won't travel without a hug from me! Have fun wildly (but responsibly)...
• [on me leaving for Portugal for 3 weeks when I just joined the studio] Know that we'll be awaiting your return eagerly and with open arms, dear!
• [on the same subject] You are already in my heart and you won't leave it easily.

 

Can you believe it's gonna be 3 weeks until I'm able to resume my ongoing operation to kiss this guy.

I'll make like a regency era romance novel protagonist and take comfort rereading his words - and his assurance that I have a place in his heart - during our time apart :3

 

Less than 24 hours before my flight. It's finally sinking in. I knew it would. I keep looking at my cats and getting this panicked little voice in my head saying "I can't believe I'm walking out on these sweet beautiful animals". I've said goodbye to as many people as I could but I wish I could've said goodbye to more. I'm a bit panicky because there's so much still to do: I have to call my bank tomorrow, and maybe go there in person, I have to download some podcasts to listen to on the trip, I have to do my dishes, I have to take my shoes and medicine to my mom's and I have to show up at her door tomorrow around noon. And I also decided that I have to get a haircut before I leave otherwise in 3 weeks I'll be looking laughable.

My crush, as it turns out, besides saying many a sweet thing, also said the thing that, while it doesn't sound the least bit romantic, is helping me the most right now: "I want you to travel without a thought to your tracks here" - my tracks, in context, meaning my life and relationships. It isn't helping as much as I wish it would, but it is helping.

Excepting possible (but unlikely) airport updates, you won't hear from me until Tuesday at the earliest. Wish me luck!

 

Note to self, hairdresser's opens at 8:30AM, we can go there and then to the bank and be home by 11AM or so if we wish to.

 

... wait did I... did I shower today... shit I dont think I did... heckity

 

Few things are as darkly funny as thwarting my mom's carefully staged narcissistic tantrums.

The other day she tried to have one while I was in the bathroom with a bad bout of diahrea. She started shuffling stuff around and telling me in more and more panicked tones that she couldn't find her wallet and I had to help her. I yelled out "maybe wait until I stop shitting out streams and then I can help you look" and she "found" the thing immediately.

This time she decided to bang on my door aftetr I had gone to bed and turned off the lights, to scold me because I used Her Towel and now it was wet and she had apparently only realized that after drying hersef on it and wrapping herself up (?). I just asked her why she hadn't used the other, dry one, or even touched it to see if it was dry, and she confessed that she didn't even remember which one was mine. I laughed and told her good night.

She then, amazingly, tried to scold me for having locked my door, which I did because I know she likes to barge into my room without waiting for me to respond when she knocks and I was jerking off and didn't want her to catch me in the act. I told her I didn't want to be bothered and she amazingly told me I was being oversensitive and "surely you're not made of sugar and can stand some things happening to you". She said that, wide eyed and wrapped in a wet towel with frizzy hair and looking absolutely pathethic and ridiculous. I just laughed it off and locked the door again.

But I wanted to reply "as far as you're concerned, no, I'm not made of sugar, I'm made of locked doors".

 

Ressurecting this thread because I hit a bit of an Epiphany and need to journal and sadly didn't bring my paper journal with me.

I was listening to The Adventure Zone and reached this very lovely bit (with accompanying music):

And I listened to this one a couple of times over, while thinking about how much, this year, I repeatedly thought on the subject of me not being able to love, not knowing how.

Here's the thing: from the time I was 17 or so, my ability to love, and to love a lot, and to dedicate myself tirelessly to people I love, and to nurture and care for them and be there for them, was the thing that defined me to myself as a person. It justified my entire existence, it was often the only certainty I had about myself. Needless to say that doesn't necessarily make for healthy relationship dynamics with others, and this year, as I've mentioned plenty of times, I've really been doing some Hardcore Introspection because what I want the most is to be able to love and be loved without being consumed by that love and losing myself and defining myself solely in relation to it, thus not doing hard, necessary work on myself that is often uglier and less inspiring than ~I'm a being of pure love uwu~

And today, I thought a lot, cried a lot, and realized 3 things:

- First, that I have lived the past year and a half in fear that my capacity for love has in fact decreased, and while that's stupid, it also comes from the fact that I find it hard to love and be loved As Me, if... that makes sense? If my identity is now (thankfully) formed by a lot more than raw capacity for love, I wonder how capacity for love fits into all this other stuff.

- Second, that while this line of questioning has been pretty healthy for me overall, I already know that honestly, nobody's ever "truly ready" to love and be loved, or to do... any major thing in life, honestly. People do these things they're never 100% ready to do, with courage and love and a healthy dose of foolishness, and that's how they change careers, medically transition, have babies, fall in love, get a college degree, or fall in love. Almost anything of any significance in life, we prepare for the best we can but ultimately learn more through doing it. And then, hilariously, I thought "sure, when I like, get on a bus to work I'm generally 100% confident of my ability to ride a bus to my destination, and even then I sometimes make mistakes..." and I remembered that last week I took a wrong bus and ended up half an hour late to my first therapy session with a new therapist. And that's OK! That's human!

- Third, I realized that I've been carrying a lot of guilt in my heart for how things turned out with... several people if I'm being honest, but mostly my friend Gui who fucked off to Germany. Not the fact that he attempted suicide twice and then fucked off to Germany per se, but the fact that I let enough of my walls down and got emotionally invested in his wellbeing and sanity to the point of it really wrecking me when it all went sideways. This guilt is more "I should have seen it coming, I should have protected myself further, I should have realized I was falling into codependency patterns a lot sooner than I did, I knew I was risking myself but I did it anyway, why did I do that, I should have backed off sooner". But I realized that, while of course it's important to reflect on how one can improve oneself and transcend certain toxic repeating patterns et cetera, I also just... what I was doing in my efforts to protect and help my friend, who was genuinely supportive of me and my goals, was OK. It was loving, and hoping, and those are entirely human things to do. And while it's healthy that I'm trying to learn healthier ways to relate to others, I also deserve forgiveness for how I've acted. I was a wise, kind, earnest person putting their faith and their love in somebody, and yeah that's risky, but it also brought me a lot of joy, it changed my life for the better, and I need to respect that more. I have learned, and I continue learning, and next time I'll do better, but the risk of being heartbroken and having regrets is part of the package of love, and not some horrible punishment for my own personal faults.

 

The gates of hell are opening. And by hell I mean 4th semester art school enrollment.

It starts tomorrow. I'm taking 32 credits all of which are practical drawing and painting disciplines. I'm gonna make a shitton of artwork and do almost nothing else! Wish me luck.