important events in 2015 / learning and growing in the midst of spiraling anxiety and loneliness
Mar 02, 2016 23:59
icon: "progressing (a deeply, vividly green forest of thick vines and trees, with a tunnel running through where unused train tracks lay)" 2015
"Shriek" [image description] An abstract fractal in christmas green, coral orange, and bright rose red with accents of fuchsia, peach, and capri blue on a black background. At the top in the center is what looks like a snarling cat or hissing cobra, in profile facing left. Just underneath is another could-be face, this one like a dog, facing right and sniffing the 'air' of colored light, which you can see swirling into the dog's nose. In front of the dog's face is a bowing-out bubble of swirling blurry colors. Above that bubble behind the cat/cobra's head is a fragmented reflection that could be of the cat/cobra or the dog or both. In front of the cat/cobra's face is a misshapen cone of green light, with some flecks of other colors: it looks as if the cat/cobra is exhaling this and it is pouring down over the back of the dog's head. Neither creature has a body.
January 1-4 -- visiting biofam: racism, discussing sexual abuse history, misgendering, prompting family to grow 2 -- visiting Anika: having deep talks w Anika & energy work * Unethical behavior: loopholes out of agreements, poking people's sore spots * 4 -- ritual for Nuit and Renenutet, Topaz keeps me company 7 -- I make a friending meme -- trying to develop closeness with Anika 11 -- have a somewhat-disastrous crafty party where a new attendee says things that are very problematic and hurtful to Allison 17 -- I decide to require require gender-neutral pronouns in reference to me 18 -- ritual with LilyWolf for connections 24 -- met up with Cass and had our first meaningful one-on-one conversation * 5-step educate or eliminate / when I realize I'm wrong / reducing privilege effects * -- hung out with Heather at least once a week
February 2 -- Kei-won-tia has a major crisis, I find out through Abby, try to get in touch w KWT but can't. 4 -- meet Jezza for one-on-one conversation 6 -- have a great birthday night with Topaz, Kylei, Sydney, Heather, and Lilywolf; Allison, Nick, and Hannah drop in. I set up a photo-booth of sorts with weird colorful lighting and take some photos of people. 7 -- went to Heritage Park with Sydney & Topaz 9 -- met Kayla for dinner and conversation * forms of intimacy and societal assumptions made: there is no highest form of intimacy * 11 -- my grandmother is in the hospital; I see my aunt and cousins for the first time in years 12 -- have intense conversation w Anika and Kei-won-tia about openness and intimacy and assumptions * overwhelmed and ineffectual / cowardly and shit at making friends * 14 -- I get up in front of a huge number of people and speak a short poem about trans erasure. ** the intersection of openness, intimacy, and privacy as it relates to me ** 20-24 -- Topaz and I go to the last Xenacon, which is worth it but emotionally very difficult because I can't bring myself to talk to anyone and I'm allergic to the air. 27 -- Heather casts runes for me on my next romantic relationship: I get 'wait wait wait' 28 -- art swap at Jezza's: my sorta-kinda first show of my fractals. -- conflict with Kei-won-tia continues throughout the month, ends in them telling me they need to be able to lie to their friends.
June -- stressssssss 1 -- TransParence gather at my house: Jaime, Jazz, Jude, Hope, Serah, Allison, Michelle 4-10 -- Elizabeth visits! we do alllllll the things 5 -- shopping & Kirtan at SEWA w Elizabeth 6 -- Etowah Mounds w Elizabeth & Jaime, then chill game night w Elizabeth, Heather, Jaime, Topaz, Allison, Jonathan 7 -- Big Trees w Elizabeth & Topaz, then Cracker Barrel for dinner & Breakfast on Pluto with dessert. 8 -- to Margaret Mitchell house and Marietta square with Elizabeth. 9 -- to carlos museum then revolution doughnuts with Elizabeth, then Topaz makes us dinner. 10 -- take Elizabeth to airport. 13 -- intense videochat w Anika about the lack of balanced investment in our relationship -- scattered ??? ** why I identify as demisexual / what makes sex worth the effort / sexual vs sensual touch / kissing **
September -- dealing with name change paperwork, lots of trips to courthouse and notary -- exhausted and overwhelmed, lonely -- topaz' family has health troubles -- run out of hope for being close friends with Evelyn * lonely in any crowd / spirit-to-spirit contact / conflict is a tool of intimacy * 23 -- feeling terribly unwanted 27 -- OPALS meeting w just me & Garnet -- make chant booklet for my reflection beads
October 1 -- worst I felt in a year, unwanted, useless 15 -- present about appropriation at Sex Down South, no energy to go the other days * how I manage my neuro-atypicality in relation to others * 31 -- walked Springer Mountain w Topaz, then had a bonfire at their place w Topaz, Heather, Brian, Cass, Kelsey, and Elliott -- spending more time w Topaz' family -- reading The History of White People
2015 started off in an intense but growthful way for me, as I had my first ever real conversation with my biosib S, visited Anika and had deep talks with them. I also did a ritual for deities (something I had never done before), and another ritual for connection, connected in new ways with Allison and Cass, and spent a lot of time with Heather. Then Kei-won-tia had a major crisis and I was very worried about them but didn't really get to talk to them until two weeks later. They got very upset with me for talking about my worries to Heather, and there was a whole huge mess which finally ended when they said that they need to be able to lie to their friends. During the same month as the KWT conflict, I had a bunch of other really intense experiences -- Xenacon, my first art show (sorta), speaking about trans erasure in front of loads of people, gma in hospital, interacting with family I hadn't seen in years.
March was more nourishing and less draining, with my first kirtan, my first protest march, and my first time taking Anika to Big Trees. April turned sour with a huge conflict between KWT and Anika, and otherwise intense school stress. In May I had some good connected time with friends and experienced my first zikr, but overall I was exhausted. Lilywolf moved out which was sad and relieving and stressful, and I started working at my university as a student assistant. June started out with a bang, a trans-connection party followed by a wonderful visit from Elizabeth (which included my first visit to a Sikh service), and then became scattered and lost under stress, mostly shared/reflected stress from how awful Topaz' job is, I think. In July I hosted a 'cuddly communion' which was wonderful but otherwise that entire month was empty of nourishment. In August I had some connected times with friends, and spent 6 days with my biofamily which is both good and exhausting; August marked the first of monthly breakdowns, though I don't notice this pattern until later. In September Topaz' family started having health troubles, and I dealt with the laborious process of applying to change my name.
October I felt the worst I have felt in a year, managed to present at Sex Down South but felt so socially anxious I couldn't talk to anyone and couldn't participate in the conference; I went home crying. I started spending more time with Topaz' family (which is nourishing in some ways but a lot of added stress) because they all seemed to be feeling the need for more company with each other due to the health worries. I started actively building a friendship with Cass around this time. In November I was massively stressed and overwhelmed, but seeing bell hooks and getting to attend TBC gave me enough energy that I was able to give three talks and speak on a panel, and handle some very difficult emotional conversations and realizations with Topaz. But November ended with me finding out that my name change was denied, which is massively crushing. December started with me finishing my 2 huge final papers and giving a presentation for school, doing a shitton of paperwork and hoop-jumping to get my minors made official and my name read correctly at the ceremony, then finally graduating (where my biofamily mostly flaked out and I realized that my dad was planning for a graduation present for my cousin but didn't even congratulate me). I only had three days to recover before Solstice, which was the best ever though hugely energy-consuming. Then I had an intense conflict with Cass, then Arizona visited me briefly which made me miss them a lot, then Anika broke up our friendship by attacking me, then Gabe (my emotionally-adopted little brother) revealed that they're transphobic by choice not by ignorance, then I spent Xmas with Topaz' family which made me realize how bad my biofamily is, then I spent an intense morning with Abby and an intense evening with Abby and Topaz, and finally I had a massive terrible crash that negatively affected both Abby and Topaz and lasted almost through the end of the year. Honestly, reading over December I'm amazed that I made it through without falling apart much more. That was so much, way too much.
Looking back over this, I feel like losing KWT set off a sharp increase in my social anxiety because when we initially became friends, it was built on mutually valuing intimacy and openness -- I actually felt that KWT was better at being open than I was, that they were more willing to take risks in sharing. To have them do such a complete turnaround and say that they value lies in friendship and they want to control who knows what about them was so shocking and confusing that it made me feel like I can't know people, I can't believe them, and I can't find ones that I can genuinely connect with. A similar thing happened with Anika -- I can’t explain because it would be a breach of their privacy but even though it wasn’t the same on the surface, it felt very VERY similar. That followed by the OPALS meetings falling by the wayside and getting very hopeful about a new friend only to have that vanish -- by the time I got through September I was feeling so deeply sad about friendships that despite my repressing, I was having at least one multi-hour crying jag a month about it.
So overall, 2015 brought me a huge increase in social anxiety although the relationships that I currently have are mostly at all-time highs and are overall very nourishing. I think I learned a lot through my black feminisms class in the spring, my internship, my whiteness class in the fall, and TBC, and I made a lot of progress in designing my spiritual practice, but I feel like my interpersonal life stalled out in most ways, and I lost myself as far as my social self goes. This year I will regain my social self.