Pain

when i was a kid, i was really into chaotic. i don't remember anything about chaotic, in the slightest. not a character name, not a plotbeat. nothing. i remember absolutely nothing.

when i was a kid, i was really into beyblade. i don't remember anything about it, but i think i liked that blue haired girl. i don't remember her name.

when i was a kid, i was really into yugioh 5ds. i don't remember anything about 5ds. i like yugioh nowadays, but i don't remember a single thing. only recently when i looked into it, did i find out about carly carmine. a character who, i'm assuming, is why i like girls with glasses like that and designed around them for the longest time, i don't remember.

when i was a kid, i was really into ben 10. i don't remember a single thing about it.

when i was a kid, i had a family. a lot of things happened. i don't remember any of it. i don't remember the majority of my life. two whole decades and change, but i remember absolutely none of it.

when i was a kid, i was into older adults. i do remember telling a single kid at the cafeteria lunch table that my girlfriend was twenty two. i might've been 13 or 14 at the time. i knew she wouldn't tell anyone. she was an awkward kid that nobody really hung out with, other than me. and i don't know why i told her this. i don't know or remember how she responded, she never really emoted. she never told anyone else, either, or at least it never got back to me. nobody ever did anything to help, and frankly i didn't want that. i did it to myself, or that's what i tell myself to make the way i was taken advantage of sting less.

when i was a kid, i did a lot of stupid shit, i think. sometimes, i get the chance to look back at old messages. not necessarily between me and someone else, but between two other people talking about me. i learn that people think that i am rude, that i hate them, that i want nothing to do with them. i think it is, or was, a coping mechanism for me. i am excessively anxious. i don't know how well that comes off if you dont know me well, because the way i cope with it is to get ahead of it. it's never helped that, consistently, in most groups i get involved with, i am viewed as the "annoying one" and i just have to deal with it, and when i do anything in respect to that, i get called rude. so i don't know. i don't remember any of this, the links i have to the past are my own archives and messages.

when i was a kid, i was groomed by someone when i was 8. and then 12. and then 14. and then 17. and inbetween all of that, i was abused by a lot of people. constantly. i don't remember most of that. i know it happened, i could go back to my saved pictures, text, backups, and look at it again. i could prove that it all happened. that i was hurt. but why? would that help me? i don't think so.

when i was a kid, i was bullied. i don't remember it. but it happened. when i was going for a job interview, i got stopped in the hallway by someone whose face i recognised, very negatively. they went, 'oh, you're deadname?' and i went oh, yes, no, though, no, my name is Maggie. i have somewhere to be. and that was that. and it's been stuck in my head ever since. that person hurt me. i recognise the face but not the act. i don't know what they did, i don't know if i deserved it, i doubt it. but i like to believe that i deserve everything that happened to me. it makes things easier for me.

i don't remember anything. i think it's part of why i struggle to hold grudges, because very quickly i forget what they even did to me. how can i be mad at something that i don't know happened? the problem is that i have muscle memory for it. my body and my brain know i was hurt, my mind just doesn't. i have kneejerk reactions to people, places, things, acts that i can't understand without sitting back and thinking hard on it. and then i have to grapple with the fact that everyone around me would just think that i'm overreacting. you get hurt sometimes, grow up, it's a fact of life. and that's true, i guess. but how can i get experience the normal that you do? how can i be like you?

when i was a kid, i related to characters like himiko toga. people whose love was wrong. like goreshit, but not like that. i didn't understand why.

when i was an adult, i put a razor to my skin and swiped, i watched this very unclean, crooked wound start to weep for me, bloody red tears washed away by the water in the shower i was in, and it stung. and i liked it. and i wanted more. i think i just did it because i was bored, or sad. i didn't do it because i felt i deserved it. i don't view it as a bad act. but in the moment, that was what i wanted to do. it felt right, to do, to myself. and still, to this day, it feels right. i know it's wrong, i guess. it's wrong to hurt yourself. but i don't understand why. you can give me a laundry list of reasons if you so please, but in the end, if i'm not inconveniencing others with it, i'm not ending up in the hospital, i'm taking care of my own wounds by myself and scarring my own body, how does that effect you? why should i stop? it's not like i'm trying to kill myself.

when i was an adult, i tried to kill myself. i barely remember why. stress, feeling trapped. something. i took a razor to my wrist, and i carved in it my intent of hitting a vein. or at least, i believed i was at the time. i don't fully believe this was a suicide attempt. i was not convinced this was a suicide attempt. i don't think i had the drive to kill myself, at the time, nor the means for it. i cleaned the cuts, disinfected them, bandaged them up nicely, and got into bed. i had been posting about this as it happened, to my private twitter. while i was laying there, getting close to sleep, there was a knock at my door. i check the doorbell camera. there's a man who looks like a cop knocking. i type in a chat i'm in, which i had been ostracised from for a while due to an argument, and i quote: "did somebody call the fucking cops on me?" to silence and then a northernlion clip. the cop made me show him my wrists, of which were perfectly bandaged, and then made me call a crisis operator to ensure them that i am 100% not intending to kill myself right now. i could tell they didn't care about the future. that's the nature of this sort of thing anyways, they're only liable for as long as they get involved. once i told them no, no intent, i was going to the mall tomorrow, i'm feeling fine, no i do not want to go to the psych ward, they left. i had to console my mother, who was bawling her eyes out about how it was her fault, that it wasn't. you get really good at lying when you grow up like i did. it's a skill that turns into a compulsion, and yet somehow i'm still too honest of a person.

when i was an adult, i relapsed. i had went 7 months without doing so, and then i started on an antidepressant, which made me immeasurably more depressed, and started me back on the vice of hurting myself to feel good. when i'm horny? hurt myself. when i'm sad? hurt myself. when i feel nothing? probably not hurt myself actually. but sometimes, i do it without thinking. it's a compulsion to me. i get the thought and have to do it. i hurt to feel, i hurt because i enjoy it, i hurt because i want to.

throughout my entire life, i have corroborated hurting with love. harm, to me, is intimacy. i wonder if it's because of my upbringing. tough love is generally not actually love. being around people who wanted to take advantage of and hurt me for their own gain might have made me think love is something wildly different than i believe it to be. but when i think about it, the majority of my relationships throughout my entire life are predicated on being hurt or hurting. it's something i think about sometimes, and it's something i don't know how to come to terms with. every person i'm in love with, it started with pain. i want to hurt others. i want to dig into someone's skin and see their blood, i want to see the deepest parts of them that they hide from the world and i want to taste it. i don't want this as a fantasy. i mean, i guess i do. i understand consent, boundaries, et cetera. i know what i can and can't do to others. but i genuinely want this. i hurt myself and i want others to hurt me, it's only in being hurt that i can feel what others describe as pleasure. but i want to do it to someone else. do you know how hard that is to fulfil? do you know how few people can stomach blood, or gore, or pain? do you know how few people actually want to let you see that deep into them? it's very little. and a lot of the people i can think of who do, i think would be bad for me.

i want to be normal. i don't want to be asexual. i want to experience the world as others do, i don't want to have my entire drive warped by a feeling that others don't have. at one point i felt like i was faking this, but i know it's certainly true now. i am wrong, i am broken, i am not a good person. bad people hurt others. good people don't. my mere existence, the things i want out of life, hurt others. and if that's all i can do, then i don't want to be around anymore. i don't want to have to deal with merely existing being a problem.

is this even anything that anyone can relate to? does anyone view the world i do? there's so many people out there who say they enjoy my writing, they enjoy my way with words. i appreciate it, but do you just like reading what i say sort of like a zoo exhibit, or do you understand me? i don't believe you understand me. i think what i say is just interesting, i think it means nothing to you. i think it will leave no lasting imprint on you. i think that what i am and what i do and how i feel is an entirely secondary thought to you. and that's fine. i deserve it, i do not deserve to be your first thought. and i don't understand why my feelings on this sort of thing are so scattered. i feel one way for people ive met in real life, vs another way for those i don't. the internet has warped my perception of others, and i don't know if i can ever do anything to fix this relationship or if that's just how it is, for me, forever. please don't let me be like this forever. please fix me.