Wasted so many years of life
I'm battling depression.
It stems from realizing just how much of my life has been wasted, trying to just survive in a hostile environment and working my ass off to make others richer (while tolerating abuse and condescending hostility and amusement from them) while yet others tried to micromanage everything about our life - without our best interests at heart.
Every since I moved to this hellhole of a state, it's been that way. Shit, it was that way before I came here - even while I was just out of high school (single with no real relationships - another story of abuse).
I feel like it started much younger - like about when I entered puberty after moving to Virginia (and was treated to bullying so severe that I still don't understand how I survived). Every time I tried to do something that would improve MY situation, I faced some of the stiffest and most hostile resistance imagineable - from family, from the other kids, from adults - you couldn't ever predict who would be angered or offended that I wanted something nice for myself. (For instance, attempts to fix up "my" pickup were blocked because parents didn't want me to "throw away money" on the piece of shit pickup they bought for me - ugly as sin with crumpled fenders and rust everywhere and using my money that I had earned. The thing is, my dad admitted he'd treated me as he had been treated - the man who 'raised' him was a bully and bigot, and my dad reminded that man of his real father, who was part Indian. Oh, and my dad wanted a pickup available if he needed something to haul stuff, so he took MY MONEY and got me the ugliest piece of shit he could find - that still was driveable (he bought the pickup I made the mistake of showing dislike for). I was never so glad as when I got rid of that thing, and very rarely have I ever owned something I really liked - usually we ended up with what could be afforded, which wasn't much.)
That continued through the years and got far worse when I hit this hellhole. Every time I tried to take a break (and do something I wanted to do - or WE wanted to do) others would try to convince me/us that I really didn't want to do it or that our needs weren't important, if not place actual barriers in the way. For instance, taking a break or vacation. It was a major battle every time we tried- sometimes they'd even be successful - and I've always caught hell for things like trying to take a break.
A couple of examples - a customer had his lawyer try to force me to forgo a vacation because their machine was down, even though the part had to come from Japan and would not show for at least two to three weeks. That actually happened (and I never got paid for the work and was put through a major asschew by the owner). Never mind that the machine could NOT be fixed until the part arrived, and there was nowhere else it could be purchased. We did leave and when we got back the part still hadn't arrived, and they were ballistic. Since part of their plant was down, NOBODY was supposed to have anything nice until they were back in full profitable operation. (Yep, part of the asschew.)
The churches we attended considered vacations and so on to be luxuries, and we actually got pressure to donate any saved or borrowed money for the vacation instead of taking a needed break from the constant stress.
One time we got into a real jam and had to borrow money from a person we know. We were told, and I quote "You aren't allowed to do anything fun or spend money on anything nice until you pay me off!" Never mind that we've always paid our debts off and were rarely late. (Admission - we did end up not paying some debts to corporate satisfaction, when medical bills and lack of income while in the hospital forced us into bankruptcy. We paid off the principle, but they wanted their obscene profits too.)
We both have now realized it all was due to the churches we both have been involved with all of our lives. Both of us had to walk away from Christianity to escape the abuse. In fact, Sue and I were talking last night and we both agreed that we both still were not used to being treated decently. The decent treatment started when I was in my mid-to-late 30s and Sue was in her early 40s... when we both learned we were part Indian and started hanging around with our kin in the tribe (that experience was ruined by the "Good Christian" church which took over the tribe and made us both feel unwelcome there, because we refuse to convert to fundamentalist "independent Southern Baptist"). Then we started going around liberals - the very people we'd been taught if not programmed to fear and hate and had always avoided at the behest of our preachers/priests, and to our astonishment were listened to and treated like human beings (they even tried to help me find ways to function in spite of my physical limitations!!!).
We both have learned that we have to un-learn almost everything we'd been taught, especially by the churches. Sue is converting to Judaism, me - I don't know what I am but Christian I am not. We both avoid Christians as much as possible because of their tendency to preach and rant and get offensive.
The thing is, I realize that the churches (especially the fundamentalist Pentecostals and Southern Baptists) have controlled our lives and more-or-less dictated our decisions for over 35 years. Only after leaving the churches and returning to school did I get (back) on the path I should have been on back in the late 70s, and that was only a little over 10 years ago.
IMO they stole all those years - especially since I found out that the "Good Christians" in this hellhole had been (1) blocking decent employment and creating problems with employers, especially in the early years, (2) trying to micromanage our lives and dictate our thoughts and deliberately keeping us from experiencing anything different, and (3) making decisions for us and blocking opportunities and in essence deliberately slamming doors in our face, because we had to learn some sort of lesson or "accept our place in life" - which for both of us was uneducated, boring grunt labor. (Oh, and I also learned some of this was punishment because I'd dared to walk away from the Assemblies of God and even worse - went against their "prophesy" that "God meant for you to remain single" and married a woman. I also dared to prove from the Bible that one of the big-name "Pastors" in Tampa was completely wrong when he started ranting hatefully -about "Last Days"- at a Roman Catholic woman who attended a bible study he was leading.)
Anyway, the anger and rage over all of this is a bother, but it's also natural and I'm tired of people ranting at me that I must forgive (and forget - I now realize they were saying "bend over so we can rape you again!"). I resent the loss of all of those years, including about 50 weeks or more worth of vacation time that we both needed (prescribed by a doctor believe it or not) but never could take. (No breaks has harmed both of us in our health.)
The Pentecostals and their Southern Baptist converts (and their infiltrators of the Episcopal churches) owe us both big time IMO, and if there is a God, I ask for justice for us!
It stems from realizing just how much of my life has been wasted, trying to just survive in a hostile environment and working my ass off to make others richer (while tolerating abuse and condescending hostility and amusement from them) while yet others tried to micromanage everything about our life - without our best interests at heart.
Every since I moved to this hellhole of a state, it's been that way. Shit, it was that way before I came here - even while I was just out of high school (single with no real relationships - another story of abuse).
I feel like it started much younger - like about when I entered puberty after moving to Virginia (and was treated to bullying so severe that I still don't understand how I survived). Every time I tried to do something that would improve MY situation, I faced some of the stiffest and most hostile resistance imagineable - from family, from the other kids, from adults - you couldn't ever predict who would be angered or offended that I wanted something nice for myself. (For instance, attempts to fix up "my" pickup were blocked because parents didn't want me to "throw away money" on the piece of shit pickup they bought for me - ugly as sin with crumpled fenders and rust everywhere and using my money that I had earned. The thing is, my dad admitted he'd treated me as he had been treated - the man who 'raised' him was a bully and bigot, and my dad reminded that man of his real father, who was part Indian. Oh, and my dad wanted a pickup available if he needed something to haul stuff, so he took MY MONEY and got me the ugliest piece of shit he could find - that still was driveable (he bought the pickup I made the mistake of showing dislike for). I was never so glad as when I got rid of that thing, and very rarely have I ever owned something I really liked - usually we ended up with what could be afforded, which wasn't much.)
That continued through the years and got far worse when I hit this hellhole. Every time I tried to take a break (and do something I wanted to do - or WE wanted to do) others would try to convince me/us that I really didn't want to do it or that our needs weren't important, if not place actual barriers in the way. For instance, taking a break or vacation. It was a major battle every time we tried- sometimes they'd even be successful - and I've always caught hell for things like trying to take a break.
A couple of examples - a customer had his lawyer try to force me to forgo a vacation because their machine was down, even though the part had to come from Japan and would not show for at least two to three weeks. That actually happened (and I never got paid for the work and was put through a major asschew by the owner). Never mind that the machine could NOT be fixed until the part arrived, and there was nowhere else it could be purchased. We did leave and when we got back the part still hadn't arrived, and they were ballistic. Since part of their plant was down, NOBODY was supposed to have anything nice until they were back in full profitable operation. (Yep, part of the asschew.)
The churches we attended considered vacations and so on to be luxuries, and we actually got pressure to donate any saved or borrowed money for the vacation instead of taking a needed break from the constant stress.
One time we got into a real jam and had to borrow money from a person we know. We were told, and I quote "You aren't allowed to do anything fun or spend money on anything nice until you pay me off!" Never mind that we've always paid our debts off and were rarely late. (Admission - we did end up not paying some debts to corporate satisfaction, when medical bills and lack of income while in the hospital forced us into bankruptcy. We paid off the principle, but they wanted their obscene profits too.)
We both have now realized it all was due to the churches we both have been involved with all of our lives. Both of us had to walk away from Christianity to escape the abuse. In fact, Sue and I were talking last night and we both agreed that we both still were not used to being treated decently. The decent treatment started when I was in my mid-to-late 30s and Sue was in her early 40s... when we both learned we were part Indian and started hanging around with our kin in the tribe (that experience was ruined by the "Good Christian" church which took over the tribe and made us both feel unwelcome there, because we refuse to convert to fundamentalist "independent Southern Baptist"). Then we started going around liberals - the very people we'd been taught if not programmed to fear and hate and had always avoided at the behest of our preachers/priests, and to our astonishment were listened to and treated like human beings (they even tried to help me find ways to function in spite of my physical limitations!!!).
We both have learned that we have to un-learn almost everything we'd been taught, especially by the churches. Sue is converting to Judaism, me - I don't know what I am but Christian I am not. We both avoid Christians as much as possible because of their tendency to preach and rant and get offensive.
The thing is, I realize that the churches (especially the fundamentalist Pentecostals and Southern Baptists) have controlled our lives and more-or-less dictated our decisions for over 35 years. Only after leaving the churches and returning to school did I get (back) on the path I should have been on back in the late 70s, and that was only a little over 10 years ago.
IMO they stole all those years - especially since I found out that the "Good Christians" in this hellhole had been (1) blocking decent employment and creating problems with employers, especially in the early years, (2) trying to micromanage our lives and dictate our thoughts and deliberately keeping us from experiencing anything different, and (3) making decisions for us and blocking opportunities and in essence deliberately slamming doors in our face, because we had to learn some sort of lesson or "accept our place in life" - which for both of us was uneducated, boring grunt labor. (Oh, and I also learned some of this was punishment because I'd dared to walk away from the Assemblies of God and even worse - went against their "prophesy" that "God meant for you to remain single" and married a woman. I also dared to prove from the Bible that one of the big-name "Pastors" in Tampa was completely wrong when he started ranting hatefully -about "Last Days"- at a Roman Catholic woman who attended a bible study he was leading.)
Anyway, the anger and rage over all of this is a bother, but it's also natural and I'm tired of people ranting at me that I must forgive (and forget - I now realize they were saying "bend over so we can rape you again!"). I resent the loss of all of those years, including about 50 weeks or more worth of vacation time that we both needed (prescribed by a doctor believe it or not) but never could take. (No breaks has harmed both of us in our health.)
The Pentecostals and their Southern Baptist converts (and their infiltrators of the Episcopal churches) owe us both big time IMO, and if there is a God, I ask for justice for us!