vague Big Thing (unsettling! unwanted!) . . . | . . .
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Content Warning: Shitty & abusive parents. Mention of "female hysteria" argument. Suicidalness that extends to plan-making (but no intent to follow through). Hospitalisation mention. Mentioned ableism directed at autism.
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Hello! I was not planning for this to be the next post, but there really isn't any more time to post other things...
So! I have been referencing some vague Big Event that has me kind of worried, and it's time to tell you what it is! Tomorrow, I will be moving! I'm doing an impressive job of not being sick right now!
Honestly, it doesn't really feel like it. I was having breakfast with my grandma, and she started asking if my phone worked. I was confused (and slightly worried that I was supposed to use my phone sometime earlier and didn't or something), and said yes. Then she started talking about how I should call her when we go back to Australia.
It struck me then that this might be the last breakfast I had with her. (We're leaving tomorrow evening, but moving day can be hectic, or is supposed to be monumental, so we might not have breakfast with her 'cus of time or because we dine out).
It could've been really meaningful to her. But I didn't think of that at all because I expected there to be many more breakfasts to come. I straight up forgot we were moving!
I haven't even packed yet. Me and my mum are supposed to return to Australia, so our bags will be small anyway. I suppose that makes me feel like I don't really need to pack, or put a lot of effort into packing. If there's not much to pack, and we're coming back anyway, why not wait until the last minute?
Aghh, that's not good though. I'll pack later today. I just want to finish this first.
Hhhg. Let me give you some context. It all makes sense to me, but you don't have the information I do. I imagine that would make all the floating fragments of things I've mentioned quite confusing.
Okay! So! My family has been pinballing between Australia and the United States for ages. When my mum's family moved from El Salvador, they settled in the US. When my dad's did, they settled in Australia. This is why we move between these two.
My parents met in the US, and my dad convinced my mum to move to Australia to be close to his family.
Ha. Saying that feels. Idk. But know that I'm restraining myself right now! My parents love to complain, so whenever parts of this story comes up they stuff it to the BRIM about how much they hate each other and how shitty their partner is and how they caused horrible things to happen. Like they don't stop talking about it.
And the thing is it's absolutely not needed context to understand the gist of the story! But I want to throw everything they say about each other in anyway because that's always how the story is told. Telling it like this feels like I'm paraphrasing, condensing.
But that's not true! All the complaining is entirely irrelevant! Well, some of it is relevant in a personal context, but not in this context. Most of it is completely irrelevant, it's something different that's been added onto the story, not bits of the story that's been cut out.
I also want to mention all the stuff they said because I want to complain about it. I love to complain. But, eh, I guess I kinda feel like that would make me like them. Which it wouldn't, they had a captive audience, meanwhile if someone doesn't want to hear me complain they can simply stop reading. But still. Now I feel like in order to prove a point and be Better than them ('cus I am), I can't mention what they'd say.
Eh, whatever! I have a diary and this will be better for conciseness anyway. Okay! Back on topic!
So, my dad convinced my mum to move to Australia to be close to his family. But my mum has been dissatisfied with being so far away from her family numerous times. So we will sometimes move back to the US so that she can have emotional and financial support from her family.
(My dad said this latest move to the US was so she could escape debt which I straight up do not believe, but on the off chance there's some merit to that I'll leave that information here.)
("Emotional support" has always been funny (aka: strange and confusing) to me since my mum has never had a good relationship to her parents. They were abusive. I mean she literally tries to avoid them right now and wants to move back in part so she can escape them again. I don't understand why she wanted to meet them again. Maybe she thought things would be different? I mean they have offered her financial support.)
Now here's the thing: our dad never stays with us when we go to the US. He's in Australia right now. Here's another thing: I hate my dad. I'm scared of him. I never want to see him again (he's a massive bigot). Here's a last thing: when we moved here, there came a moment when I realised I didn't have to force myself to keep up with him over text, and cut contact with him. I made it known I despised him.
That's all well and dandy when you're far away from him, and know he has no ability to contact you (Well, for the most part. Sometimes I'd get scared he'd fly over here to pay us a visit. He hasn't*, thankfully). But it's an entirely different thing when you're moving near where he lives, and there'd be a very good reason for him to meet us at the airport (his children are there and he can make it), and despite the fact that they (parents) promised he wouldn't do that, you know there'd be no actual way of enforcing that, and your parents actually want you to meet and reconcile, so there's a good chance they'll forget they promised that or hope you forgot and won't call them out, and trying to stay away from your dad feels like a BAD joke when you're literally gonna make me STAY AT HIS MUM'S HOUSE, HELLO????
AAAAAAHHHHHHHH.
*Which is for a really stupid reason, btw. My mum wants him to come over here to visit us and/or move in. My dad wants us to move in/visit him. He doesn't want to visit us for two reasons (which are kinda the same reason), 1) he doesn't want to "give in" to my mum and lose pressure for 2) his holding visitation captive unless we move there.
I'm not sure if that makes sense. I mean it like this: my mum really wants us (particularly Baby (whose actually a toddler (4yo)) to have a relationship with our father. My dad knows this, so he's using that as a bargainning chip to add pressure on my mum to move us all to Asutralia. He won't visit us in order to see us. If you (mami) want your kid to have a relationship with me (papi), you have to come here. It's like that.
It's definitely not a money thing at least, since he's offered to pay for tickets for his kids (but not mami lol. My dad is sooo petty. Okay Mr. "I don't have female hysteria unlike your mother, I'm cool and logical". He sucks so bad).
AH. AHH. Anyway.
I got this really cute phone charger for my phone, since the old laptop chargers have been breaking down. To me the pattern is representative of meadows and cloudy blue skies. I think cloudy blue skies are beautiful. Much more beautiful than a cloudless blue sky, in any case, which is why it always confused me when stories would say "there was not a cloud in the sky" like it was a good thing. Clouds are beautiful!
The best part of the charger is that it's all mine, and I won't let it get bent! I really like this charger. It's so cool.
Anyway. Anyway, anyway anyway. UGH! AGHHFffff! f! Okay. I'm gonna be normal again *smiles serenely*.
Okay!!! So!!! We will be moving back. Financial troubles here. Unsustainable. Lots more financial aid in Australia. Much easier to live.
I really do love Australia. Or "love", at least. Saying I love Australia just now kinda felt incorrect. Point is, I want to go back. I want to be there. But not like this. I hate my dad. I'm scared of him. When I go back, I want it to be without my parent's knowledge. I don't want them to know where I live. Maybe even when there's no way they'd ever recognise me (transgender style, aka in a situation where I've gone no contact with both of them and they're provided with NO pictures of myself while I transition, so in the unfortunate event where we bump into each other on the street, they wouldn't recognise me. And maybe, I wouldn't want to recognise them, either.
I don't want to go back like this!
Ugh. We've been talking about moving back for years now. I remember I felt a lot more scared before. I suspect I might not feel that sick because it doesn't feel real. To be fair, I found out we were moving at most a month ago, but likely 21 days ago.
Y'know, when we moved here (u.s.), I wrote in my journal every step of the trip. I think I'm gonna live blog it this time (omitting some things in the blog, of course. So perhaps I'll journal digitally (as opposed to pen and paper like last time), then copy-paste some portions here. Oh, I so do want to write physically though, but it'd be too much effort to transcribe. Hmm, I guess I'll just have to pick up journalling again since I want to do that). So you guys will have that to look forward to.
Hmm. Anyway. I have asked, repeatedly, to be left behind in the US while everyone else continues to Australia, since everyone else wants to go and I don't. I had already talked to my grandparents and they agreed to house me.
HOWEVER! STUPID THIIINGS HAVE CHANGED!!!! I was suicidal enough to make multiple plans. I wasn't planning on trying any of them and hadn't attempted to work out the kinks/flesh out the plans into something actually usable at the time (don't know if that would've changed). But it was enough that when I talked about it during intake for a therapist (as in, meetings I had before I would be assigned a therapist, so that I could be processed as a client), I had to be assessed for my risk.
I was determined to have a low risk, but they still suggested I be hospitalised. I agreed to be hospitalised 'cus I wanted to be (are you kidding? So much better than whatever the fuck was happening at home!), and thusly I was hospitalised. I felt so sad when I left </3. I hope I meet the people I met in there again <3.
After that, though, my grandparents wouldn't let me stay anymore, since they're not at home all day (sadly, they still have to work. I hate capitalism), and they and my mum are convinced I'll try to kill myself.
Girl I WON'T! Maybe I wouldn't have been so suicidal in the first place if you (mami) had let me go to therapy instead of your ableist ass pulling me out of it 'cus you were convinced they were trying to turn me autistic! I acknowledge that "I won't kill myself" is not always something you should take someone's word for, though, so I guess I don't really blame them for not believing me, as frustrating as it is since I know I won't.
Sidenote: I'm doing much better now, I felt awesome for a long while after hospitalisation, although I'm sure I'll get worse again soon. But there's no evidence thus far that I'd get that bad, so it's best not to worry.
Lots of back and forth happened that I don't remember, but eventually we came to an agreement: I would come with everyone, but me and mami would eventually go back so that I could go to trade school. I had hoped to go to trade school earlier to avoid this entirely, but I guess I didn't end up doing that.
My biggest issue with this agreement is that the time it would take to return is (intentionally, imo) unspecified. My mum's already hinted that she wants me to become persuaded to stay by spending some time in Australia, so I really don't trust the time being unnspecified.
Second biggest issue is that I'm literally gonna stay in my dad's mum's house!? How the fuck am I gonna avoid him!? Like, he doesn't live with her, but it'd be an easy thing for him to visit. Oh god. My siblings are staying there too, why the fuck wouldn't he visit? Hhnn, that's scary. Okay.
My mum and my two youngest siblings are gonna be staying in an apartment somewhere. Girl take me with you! I might have to pester her about it, but given that she wanted the youngest to visit papi the most, that might not be a safe place to be. But mami doesn't like papi either, I think she wants to avoid him, so maybe it'd be safer there?
Oh god. He's definitely gonna visit Mama [redacted]'s at least once. How could he not? Oh god. FUCK, I'm just doomed then, huh? Oh well. God. Oh well. I guess the only thing I can do is brace and wait for it to be over. I hate this <3. God.
Well, I guess that's the gist of the situation. So now you have the context.
It's just...! My usual strategy is to interact and engage as little as possible and not let any of my resentment show, so that I can get as far away from all the bad stuff as I can. But I fucking STAKED MY CLAIM..! I made it clear that I hate him! It's gonna be so embarrassing when it'll be obvious how easy it is to make me cower! How much I don't defend myself! My instinct is to brace and leave as soon as possible, not fight back/be defiant, because why would I waste my time being around and engaging with someone who SUCKS or trying to change their mind when I don't care enough about our relationship to do so? I'm not gonna stay and fight, I'm gonna leave and find someone better. Someone who's safe to disagree with, and I'll figure out how to engage in conflict then.
But it's gonna be soo embarrassing when instead of being defiant and sticking to my guns, I'm just meek and scared! Ugh! Whatever! I guess it'll be strange and confusing. That sounds nice. I hope he'll be confused (and also that I'm the only one thinking in these terms). And y'know, maybe it's not embarrassing to act like I do. I said my piece and now I'm just gonna avoid you. I'm not fighting you. I want you to leave me alone.
Uhff,, whatever,, no matter what it'll be a bad, stressful experience. I guess I can only hope to brace well and find things that bring me joy to offset the bad. I'll try to visit more parks, this time. Actually, given I won't have a bus pass, I don't think that would be possible. I don't know which parks are close to that house (except for one, which is very close, and yet I have never visited). I guess I'll have to go on regular ol' walks to nowhere. Those can be exciting. Leads you to discovering brand new places in familiar locations.
Y'know, when we moved here this time (~end of 2021), we actually left some luggages for our dad to send over later. I wonder if they're still there? He was supposed to clean out the rest of the house after we left, too, but apparently he refused. I wonder what became of all that stuff. Mami said something that made it sound like there were things of our past belongings to collect. I wonder what she meant. Maybe she meant in storage?
That storage place was really cool alone at night. Felt very liminal. It was awesome.
Sorting through those items will be something to do. Could be fun. For example, when we were leaving, I had a lot of books I didn't know what to do with. If I had known about little libraries* back then, I surely would've tried to put them in there. If they are still present, I shall do that.
*"A Little Free Library is a “take a book, share a book” free book exchange. They come in many shapes and sizes, but the most common version is a small wooden box of books. Anyone may take a book or bring a book to share. Little Free Library book exchanges have a unique, personal touch. There is an understanding that real people are sharing their favorite books with their community; little libraries have been called “mini-town squares.”
The flight will be cool, at least. I am looking forward to flying on that plane and checking out all the stuff I had stored up on my phone. Looking forward to live blogging it too. Maybe I'll liveblog my reaction to Koisenu Futari, if there's time (a great aromantic show, I've only watched one episode so far but it was awesome, check it out! If you can't find it, dm etheralamoeba on tumblr about it, that's what I did! :)
Hmm, actually, if there's time I might get to some blogging topics I wasn't able to get to instead.
Hmm, either way, I suppose that's something to enjoy. I'll do my best to continue looking for joys like that.
Well, this whole thing is kind of dour, but that doesn't mean I can't wish you all a happy day! I hope you all have a good one, see you next time folks!