upmc poetry: empathy

from the shore, I see you struggling through rough waters.
from the field, I hear you trudging through the woods.

Many have called out to you, seeking to guide you, but
their words are landlocked, mowed clean as a lawn.
They speak of destination, not distress.
You cannot remember that language,
and they cannot see a clear path.

The problem is, there isn't one.
The solution is, there is still a path.

But it's soaked by waves and billows,
pierced with thorns and briars.

The path is painful, and difficult,
but it is there,
and it leads to right where you are.

I know, because I have been there.
I know, because I have walked it before.

So I dive into the sea, and I press through the hedges.
I see you. I recognize this place.
You are not alone.

Take my hand; let's leave this painful place together.

prayer journal 05

You only have to ask to receive God's Wisdom.
How can you gain wisdom? Where do you need insight?

Wisdom can ONLY be gained FROM GOD, because its source IS GOD. The fallen world, and the fallen nature of natural man, CANNOT BE WISE, no matter how hard they try to pick everything apart to "intelligently" label it. Fallen "wisdom" can kill the soul! To be TRULY wise, we MUST "become foolish in the eyes of the world," and rely ONLY on the Wisdom of God, revealed in Scripture & the Magisterium, and strengthened by sincere & frequent prayer. I need wisdom every moment, to make choices that honor God! I need Wisdom to discern what matters to HIM, what affects eternity; what is LOVING.

PRAYER REQUESTS...

+ To not resist/ fight/ despair/ dissociate/ etc. this process of weight recovery, ESPECIALLY in how it keeps emphasizing "natural femininity" & its characteristics. I'm legit terrified; I DON'T WANT IT, and didn't want it in my youth, either. The very thought of being "womanly" has me suicidal. And I don't know how to cope. I DO know that I probably WILL relapse into restrictive behaviors & maybe even hyperexercise, if upon my return home, the "reality" of the body changes are too traumatic & unbearable. But I STILL DON'T WANT TO OFFEND GOD. I'm just equally terrified that He "will force me to live like that," in a way that clashes catastrophically with EVERYTHING I can feel & say about my self. Is that the point? Does He WANT me to sacrifice "myself" and "learn how to be a woman instead"?? I have NO wisdom here at all. I must pray for it as I pray about this fear, and I must CAREFULLY LISTEN & DISCERN His Voice, then WRITE IT DOWN. I must ALSO turn to Scripture, where WISDOM SPEAKS, and write down what it says & teaches me, too. God, I trust You. Please help me.

UPMC journal 101822

+ All right so OUT OF THE BLUE I have been SLAMMED with body dysphoria this morning. I'm honestly suspecting that it's because I figured out that Team wants me to hit like 120LBS, AT LEAST??? I literally have NOT been that heavy in OVER 13 YEARS. And I am ABSOLUTELY TERRIFIED at the thought. I don't know HOW to even think of that number/ weight WITHOUT immediately associating it with the SAME terror & shame I felt at age 13 or so, when this hell started. I don't know how to handle this weight-- this size-- without also feeling like it has doomed me to that hell of abuse all over again-- abuse that ONLY began AND continued BECAUSE of my body. I've effectively been at war with it since then for that same reason. Starving & purging to "become small" again was my ONLY voice, my ONLY protest against the horror of feeling like I was trapped in the body of a whore. I DON'T EVER WANT TO FEEL THAT AGAIN.
...The problem is, it's already started. The body shape is shifting, becoming terrifying & threatening, trapping me again. The hack nightmares have returned. The dysphoria is DEAFENING, already.
I don't know what to do. THIS IS WHY I WAS TRYING TO STARVE THIS BOY INTO EITHER "SAFETY" OR DEATH. This horrific fatness, PERSONIFIED IN EVERY ABUSER, is synonymous with rape. That's it, that's the blunt confession. It feels so WRONG. I would rather die than live like this because THERE IS NO ESCAPE FROM THE PHYSICAL HELL OF A ""HEALTHY"" BODY.
...Not being able to feel my bones feels so wrong. Having this "solid thickness" to my abdomen feels WRONG!! I feel like a brute! I feel like a wall, like a boorish bully, like a stubborn arrogant forceful CRUEL HARSH ABUSER. obtrusive & offensive. "Shove this weight around." It's like what TBAS always said about why they hated THEIR weight, too-- that it was this horrible, thick barrier between the outside & inside-- like the TRUE "him," the REAL "Oliver," his heart, was being SUFFOCATED & BURIED beneath a hell of flesh & fat. They couldn't reach theirself because THEIR BODY WAS IN THE WAY. ...And now I feel like that, too. I feel that thick heabiness & it feels ANGRY, VIOLENT & MEAN. I miss being small. I miss being THIN ENOUGH TO FEEL MY SOUL INSTEAD OF THIS BODY. I wrap my arms around this abdomen and I can't feel myself anymore; all I feel is F*KING "FLESH." FILTH SIN UGLY HEAVY WRONG DISGUSTING FAT
I'm too far away. I feel like my identity is being devoured by the body's sheer weight, its "force," its... "inherently abusive" quality. Thick, brutish. Ironically there's an even worse fear. Being a "whore." The bigger this body is, the more other people CAN use it & grab it & take it & destroy ME. The hellfire won't go away. I WANT TO DIE. WE WOULD RATHER THIS BODY DIE THAN TURN INTO A WHOREHOUSE

I desperately keep trying to find other options. exit doors that aren't starvation.
BUT WE MUST BE SMALLER WE MUST BE PURE & CLEAR & LIGHT & SAFE & GOOD
AND UNTOUCHED, UNUSABLE, UNDEFILED, UNADULTERATED
BY EITHER FOOD OR THOSE F*KING WOMEN


God please
please do i have to be a w*mn??
do i have to be like this forever?


what do we do, right now, WHAT DO WE DO
----- we can barely write the terror is so intense we just want to SCREAM and THROW UP

WE WOULD RATHER DIE THAN LIVE LIKE THIS!!!




We've noticed that in "trying to find hope" we default to TRAUMA MECHANISMS, which involve further "fawning/ imitating" & self-annihilation to "survive the unbearable." the MOST LETHAL "hope" is "GIVING IN" to the R*PE of "femininity" And FORCING the ABUSE
it would be to "give up fighting" and "just do what we're told/ expected to do & endure" by "accepting" the body changes
NO

WE CAN'T, WE WON'T, THAT'S REAL SUICIDE!!!


she's right. that's the hard but (God please) profoundly relieving truth.
WE DON'T "HAVE TO" PLEASE WE CANT. PLEASE LISTEN
JUST LISTEN TO US IT WOULD KILL US.
YOU KNOW THAT. WE ALL DO!!!
so what do we do.      EVEN THE ABUSERS
THAT'S WHY THEY DID IT
THE ABUSE ONLY HAPPENED BECAUSE THEY WERE ALL FORCING US TO BE "

I CAN'T SAY IT



but it all comes back to this.
our childhood, our innocence, our purity, our LIFE, our very SELF was FORCED TO DIE
SO THAT THEY COULD TURN OUR BODY INTO "A F*KING W*MAN!!!!!"

NO
NEVER AGAIN!!!!




we're at an impasse
we're stuck, trapped, terrified, lost, so so so scared make it stop
but
the changes Are here alrEAdy
we cANt EscApE

THE KIDs ARE fREAKINg ouT

AND WITH GOOD REASON

I CAN HELP

NOT HERE, THEY WON'T LET YOU

Is that truly our only remaining option?

GOD I NEVER THOUGHT WE'D EVER HAVE TO SERIOUSLY CONSIDER RETRIBUTION AGAIN.



there has to be another way.



infi's function broke, ze doesn't know how to handle this either
nobody does


LISTEN CAN WE GET AUTOPILOT OUT FOR A WHILE
TO JUST GET SOME DATA DOWN
TURN OFF THIS TERROR FOR A BIT
I Hope



WE'VE GOTTA FIND HOPE, DAMN IT. THAT'S OUR ONLY WAY TO SURVIVE THIS.


(dissociating)
                                (shutdown?)





ETERNITY
ETERNITY
ETERNITY
INFI LET THAT BE YOUR NEW CORE
REMIND US OF THE BIGGEST PICTURE
"THIS TOO SHALL PASS"
MEANING EVERYTHING OF THIS WORLD
ESPECIALLY THIS HELL.
(MATTHEW 22:30)    (MATTHEW 19:12)
this can't be forever
but even so
what do we do now?



the bottom line is always the same intolerable stupid awful admission that we can't seem to change without a notably deadly degree of forced dissociation, dishonesty, and self destruction.
our "inmost" conviction of identity/ "selfhood" is not a woman. arguably it might not even be "female," at least, not as long as that term is sxually defined.
our biggest, morally compatible hopes, all come from catholic mystics. all the meditations and visions and "ecstasies" that TRANSCEND GENDER & SEXUALITY YET REMAIN VIRGINAL.
And God we NEED THAT. Our soul cries for it. We KNOW we ARE that way, undeniably, at our very core. AND IT'S MORALLY LEGITIMATE. SEVERAL ACTUAL SAINTS both wrote about AND lived it!!
THERE IS NO "GENDER BINARY" / "SEXUAL DIMORPHISM" IN HEAVEN!!!
OTHERWISE CHRIST COULDN'T BE EVERYONE'S BRIDEGROOM
(also matthew 12:49-50? and 22:30? & 1 corinthians 7:34, 6:17? romans 8:4)


...honestly though I CANNOT "try to justify" this OR "make excuses." like it or not, "God created them MALE & FEMALE."
even if our souls are untouched by sexuality (& gender???), our bodies ARE. and I MUST learn to ACCEPT & LIVE WITH THAT.