Do you ever just realise you're broken?

user7994326 · 2022-03-07T13:48:40+00:00

I barely cry. I try to remain strong. And then something clicks once in a while, I remember the traumatic abusive childhood and I think, fuck I'm so broken. It's kind of hidden because I mostly function well but fuck, I'm just a broken little girl inside. I feel like I'm crying out to relive my childhood and have just one person to love me

FayCarew · 07/03/2022 14:52

Likewise

Mamamamasaurus · 07/03/2022 15:06

I don't have wise words OP, but have these until someone wiser comes along

Original poster

user7994326 · 07/03/2022 16:35

@Mamamamasaurus thank you x

And sorry to hear you feel the same. @FayCarew

OP posts:

Dembones292 · 07/03/2022 17:12

Yes, for different reasons to you but I feel numb most of the time, on autopilot, I don't cry, I power through and then I have moments when the worst feeling in the world floods over me. Its like a terror, broken, panic, like a white heat. It's horrible but I push it down and then the numbness comes back. I like the numb feeling, I'd rather feeling nothing than the fear.

RedRocketGirl · 07/03/2022 17:18

I remember reading Damage by Josephine Hart where one character says to another something along the lines of 'damaged people are the strongest because we know we can survive'.
Always struck a cord with me.

badlydrawnbear · 07/03/2022 18:32

@Dembones292

Yes, for different reasons to you but I feel numb most of the time, on autopilot, I don't cry, I power through and then I have moments when the worst feeling in the world floods over me. Its like a terror, broken, panic, like a white heat. It's horrible but I push it down and then the numbness comes back. I like the numb feeling, I'd rather feeling nothing than the fear.

This. I was trying to find the words to describe it, then I noticed that you have them. I put one foot in front of the other relentlessly, but every so often I feel completely broken. I prefer the numbness.

Spongebobsmartypants · 07/03/2022 18:34

Yes i am broken and i too walk around numb, untill the darkness washes over me, this can stay a while before the numbness returns. The numb feeling has become my safe place as its the lesser of the two

jesusmaryjosephandtheweedonkey · 07/03/2022 18:51

I hear you ! To the outside world I'm a capable fully functional adult. Inside I'm exhausted by the trauma of life and described as strong by all who know me.
I have to be as if I thought about the trauma I could not function at all.

TooManyPJs · 07/03/2022 18:51

@RedRocketGirl

I remember reading Damage by Josephine Hart where one character says to another something along the lines of 'damaged people are the strongest because we know we can survive'. Always struck a cord with me.

Honestly I hate shit like this. I also feel broken. And what the OP says really resonates. As many says I am just getting on and some days I feel like "you know, I've fucking got this". And then it all falls to shit. But I NEVER feel strong. I feel like like any good state of being is on a knife edge. Any feeling of safety, security, well-being or happiness could all be ripped away at any second. I never feel safe, not properly. Not like my DH feels safe and like he's secure in who he is. That he's a worthwhile person deserving to be alive. It's all so fleeting and unstable. So no, I don't feel strong. I feel weak, and incapable, and like I have no foundations. I have days and days at a time when I'm not coping (often inside). I hate this sort of rhetoric because to me it's another way of failing. The whole "what doesn't kill you makes you stronger" etc etc....except what if it doesn't?

Spongebobsmartypants · 07/03/2022 19:38

I agree. I live life on the knife edge. Always waiting for it to go wrong. Never sure who i am.

Howmanysleepsnow · 07/03/2022 19:44

For different reasons, but, yes.
Can I leave my favourite quote here?
“We are all broken- that’s how the light gets in.”

Dembones292 · 07/03/2022 19:51

For those of you who feel broken, do you also feel that your life is an act? I feel like every day I wake up and put on a show. In work, to my parents, my DH, my DC, my friends. No one knows who I really am or how I really feel.

ParkheadParadise · 07/03/2022 19:58

For different reasons to you, yes I'm broken.
To friends and strangers, I look like I have a good life, a lovely home nice car no money worries but my DH and family know what its really like.
I have spells when I can carry on and other times I'm in a very dark place.

Spongebobsmartypants · 07/03/2022 19:59

@Dembones292 absolutely. I feel like i put on a different act for each situation i am in and no one knows me

Dembones292 · 07/03/2022 20:03

Spongebobsmartypants same, I know whats expected of me in different scenarios and I play the part well. My favourite time of any day is when I'm alone, I can drop the act. I fantasise about living on the coast, in an isolated cottage with my dog where I can be as broken as I want to be.

Prettynails · 07/03/2022 20:03

I think I too am broken but my trauma counselling, children and achievements like a smashed a broken plate have started to glue it together and then I’m applying a gold glaze over the top. The glaze is covering a break but I’m perfectly imperfect and still beautiful

ToooOldForThis · 07/03/2022 20:06

I heard something recently that really resonated; I'm paraphrasing but they basically said you can't just "mute" one set of feelings...so if you mute the bad stuff you mute the good stuff too..
So you can't experience happiness etc if you're "muting" other stuff...I think this is very true

Dembones292 · 07/03/2022 20:06

And also, I don't feel suicidal, I'd never do that but I do find myself wishing I was older, wishing I was near the finish line. I'm just so tired.

Sending love to everyone on this thread. Thankyou OP for starting it.

Lacedwithgrace · 07/03/2022 20:13

Yes, I compartmentalise the section of my life I don't want to think about so when it comes to the surface it's a lot to deal with. Counselling helped me come to terms with what happened, I didn't need a coping mechanism just some validation. If you haven't already sought it and think it would help, I'd really recommend it.

itsnotdeep · 07/03/2022 20:13

It sounds like the Freeze response - Pete Walker - have you read this? He writes about the 4 F responses to trauma.

I can relate to the freeze response - I spent most of my childhood in a daydream world, just existing behind a mask. Even now, I'm often accused of this. Pete Walker

Alonelonelylonersbadidea · 07/03/2022 20:52

"So no, I don't feel strong. I feel weak, and incapable, and like I have no foundations. I have days and days at a time when I'm not coping (often inside). I hate this sort of rhetoric because to me it's another way of failing. The whole "what doesn't kill you makes you stronger" etc etc....except what if it doesn't?"

@TooManyPJs so true. I remember my mum spouting this shit at me (when she herself had caused me so much pain) and I replied, 'but what if it cripples you instead?'. She just looked at me. Like I was an idiot.

I am broken @user7994326 . I only realised that I am beyond repair in the last 3/4 months. Now I know that I feel like I can hold onto something and work with it. I can't repair or heal, the best I can do is acknowledge the breaks and move on.
Maybe do that gold kinsugi thing with them, like the Japanese.
I'm so sorry you are broken too. I am sorry for all of us.

felulageller · 07/03/2022 21:05

Yes even being middle aged I still learn new things that I realise are warped thoughts because of my bizarre childhood.

I'll never know what 'normal' is.

redastherose · 07/03/2022 22:27

I'm broken in a different way. Spent 28 years with a narcissist and looking back I married him because my Mum was a very similar character. Basically I have realised since separating from him 6 years ago (5 of which I've spent divorcing him as he made it so difficult) that I don't feel properly about things now. I don't love deeply anymore I feel liking but no strong emotions really. I think I'm just so damaged from years of pain and suffering I just can't feel.

TooManyPJs · 07/03/2022 22:31

@Dembones292

For those of you who feel broken, do you also feel that your life is an act? I feel like every day I wake up and put on a show. In work, to my parents, my DH, my DC, my friends. No one knows who I really am or how I really feel.

Yes I often feel as if I’m acting. Not with my DH. I am me warts and all with him most of the time. But with everyone else I act probably the majority of the time. It can be really exhausting. If I behaved as me, I wouldn’t go out most days, and would probably have been sacked from work by now.

Frolicinameadow · 07/03/2022 22:34

Yes OP, I feel this too. My childhood was pretty bad, then I was gaslit by my parents into believing I imagined all of it. Through a series of near deathbed confessions by family and family friends I realised I was right all along. I found a therapist last year that I gel with and we take things slowly, getting through each piece at a time. I tried therapy before but my life has been so ott with drama that I always felt judged as if I was responsible for it or something? But I was a child I had no culpability in the dramatics.
As an adult I shy away from drama, confrontation, anything likely to spark fireworks.

The therapy is helping but yes there are still days I catch myself walking through the world rigid with the tension of holding myself together, holding in the scream that wants to come out. The rage at the unfairness and the burden of never knowing what love feels like because I am always scared the right will be pulled from under me.
I wish I had advice or wisdom but all I have is a shoulder to cry on, a hand to hold. I’m sorry you and others have experienced this hell x