I went viral on tiktok this past weekend. I actually enjoy making one minute videos for things I am attempting to deconstruct. I have one for my own personal rants — like on here, but much shorter.
No less personal; as,
That’s what makes me hot.
Fool.
However, I decided that I wanted a separate account in order for the deconstruction of my baptism Bible. I am crossing out all the passages that I do not agree with. And after I am done getting through it, I will light my baptism candle. And that’s really the purpose of the account.
I posted my first two videos and then proceeded to have food poisoning for the next two days. I did not check my phone and — one of those videos went viral. Currently, it is sitting at 260k views. And the comment section has over 1,500 comments.
I said some things — questionably “wrong.” Questionably correct as well. And the audience slammed in hard; discrediting the entire premise of the video because “Horus was the god of the sky not the god of the sun — Ra was.” At sunrise and sunset — Ra merged with Horus and two become one. So, was I completely in error?
If you are curious about the video, look it up — that’s not the purpose of this post.
The back and forth on tiktok had me thinking about the scrutiny I received as a child. It was an extreme judgment that came not only from my parents but from all the experts they hired.
I was now eleven and in special schools with six people per classroom because I did not do exceptionally well in the fifth grade (I was being molested and I was the “new girl” again).
This school was supposed to mitigate my learning disabilities that I had — as my parents had me tested and it seemed I had an auditory processing disorder (when in actuality I was chronically disassociating due to verbal and sexual abuse). So they put me in these schools because all these “tests” tell them this is going to “help me” some how? And they have an entire marketing pamphlet about how this elementary school will set any parents child up for success for $20,000 per year.
I was heavily scrutinized as a child, all in the name of help — as if that’s how one gains wisdom, by listening to the two cents of others.
And yet, they missed it. No one really bothered to ask me why all this was happening, and besides I couldn’t link the two events back then. I thought having a sexual relationships was normal for a nine, ten, eleven year old. I couldn’t fully understand and comprehend; and I was additionally terrified of getting in trouble. I felt like an island; alone, isolated with no one to go to for help.
I had parents, but telling them was expecting immediate ramifications and consequences. There desire to punish me was consistent — even though they strived to be even less tolerant.
I used to take everything they said about me as gospel. And they wanted me to believe the scrutiny that they hired was going to somehow see through all the things they could not. It felt like they saw parenting as a checklist of things to do and consequences. That word never got old, apparently. I had a relationship with my parents as a jailer had a friendship with the guard.
I was told I was genetically bad and maladaptive. When I offered an explanation such as, “I feel violated when my parents read my journals and then photocopy the sexual scenes and read that to psychiatrist.” But, it wasn’t understood through the cries a teenager makes attempting to get out words that haven’t formed yet. All that was heard was that I needed tough love because I was spoiled from all my father’s money.
My childhood ended when I left my home that cold November morning of 2007.
I guess, I craved an apology or a nod of everything I had been through — because of this “help” that was sold to my parents who were obsessed with labeling me some type of way.
How these two thoughts connect is upon reflection. The more I look at my parents strategy and “zero-tolerance” policy — the more fear I see in their eyes as they clench their fists a little tighter around that champaign glass.
My mother’s friend died sneaking out of the house at sixteen. He was drinking.
“He went down a bad path with a bunch of bad people,” my mom would say when she recounted finding out he died.
My mother believes that if you drink with the purpose of getting drunk — that is alcoholism. And perhaps, should I question much deeper why I got away to rehab prior to getting drunk twice?
When I was a child, I took their narrative as truth. It was like drinking poison that killed apart of the self I love dearly. Scrutiny was seen as “feedback” and “therapeutic” when given a gold price tag.
And I took on the opinions of others as if they saw the perspective that only I could.
Making errors scared me. Messing up was equated to punishment not growth. When a child tells fibs to distinguish reality from the mind — it was called a lie that would send me straight to hell.
What is authoritarian parenting teaching children besides how to pick themselves apart as adults?
So, I perhaps made a mistake on the internet. And I am sure I will make even bigger ones in the future — should that stop me from writing? Should that stop me from creating? It once did.
Judgment halts creativity.
And that’s really the majority of what I cultivated towards myself growing up— constant and chronic judgment. I hated who I was, because of my behavior. I hated that my mom didn’t love me because I wasn’t pure enough. I felt as if I wasn’t a “good enough” virgin. I felt as if I failed and could never climb up out of the pit I chose to jump in — me!
I was so purely evil; my mother would tel me this in our fights. And this replayed in repeat in the back of my mind. I searched for others to praise me; tell me that I was good. I craved love and affection — because of the lack of validation.
Yet, when starved from intimacy — I didn’t know how to open up? Or when I did, it spilled out like uncontrollable vomit. There was ((obviously)) a lot I wanted to say.
...and no idea how to.
I began stuffing my emotions in treatment as they yelled at me to “not” — as if they themselves were confused how this system functioned.
My mother told me I was stuffing my emotions when I wrote a seventeen page narrative about my day, multiple times per week. So, I stopped expressing myself and instead took on a maladaptive coping style (not saying anything at all) that they said was “better.”
How was this right?
I used to question myself a lot. Or over explain who I was or why I do what I do. It’s the pits I fall into attempting to peal off the leftover narrative of my parents and their expert friends. They projected onto me and had no idea.
I guess — there wasn’t a test to determine that.
Who I thought that who I was had to determined by other people. And it made me so fearful of what other thought about me, as that once played such an important role in my freedom. And now? Not so much.
I realized when I was getting so much critical attention — and I related that to how it all felt so similar when I was a child.
Today, I took in what could be useful to my mission and I discarded the rest. Who am I to care what others think about my behavior? I am a character acting out a part in a play. And I am moral, my aim is not to hurt anyone by my action. I too wish for the light to expose the darkness.
When I grew up learning that there was only one truth, I dismissed my own. As I mature in age and mind, I am realizing that there are many perspectives and all of them are true.
When my video blew up; the most exciting part was to be able to look into a well of my own reflections. I could see some of the people going at it and see how deeply my mind frame has shifted. I saw perspectives I used to have. I saw people I used to be.
And today I am able to dismiss judgment, because it just didn’t resonate with me.
So I can separate me.
From them.
And I can create, again.