See you in the Fort.

Cheers Fuckers!

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Brains develop cellular connections based on reinforcement and punishment. When a brain cannot receive reinforcements for its normal behaviors, it learns new ones. When that is a pervasive experience, being socially punished for the ways it functions, it learns to constantly edit the ways it’s allowed to “perform”.

This leads to an ongoing sense of fear and uncertainty that needs to be dispelled with social reassurance, reinforcements, or guidance, in order to feel both safe and acceptable.

And that leads to entire lives built on shame, anxiety, co-dependence, and personal unfulfillment.

Hey Fuckers! Good to see you back here. Good to fully be back.

Great to be free of 1 more cage I put myself into – school is finished. Please call me M.S. Jess from now on… jk, do not ever. Thanks.

MessofaJess or YerMFJess, Okay. “UncleJess” the preferred proper noun. Pronouns? Whatever you want.

Anyways, I was pretty surprised that the end of this thing- my degree program in Behavioral Science or applied behavioral analysis – brought up some heavy times and trauma memories. Like, a lot of laugh-sobbing as soon as I completed my final final.

And then I realized, yeah……. During the last two years since the start of the program, everything in my life has been trauma. I’ve just been white knuckling my way through, waiting to be able to regain any control of my life again, and bottling up everything in order to do it. Performing my way through an education, this trauma support project, an attempt to support my family through loss of my dad, my own loss of my floppy puppy, living in about 6 different unstable places “slash” the woods, and a dumpsterload of interpersonal relationships that are not good for me but controlled my head anyways.

And, just to… How Trauma Life typical is that, aye?

Working endlessly for others, for a sense of acceptance, to help THEM…

Earning shiny new creds in the ways that feel safe – for me, that’s school…

Putting your own wants, needs and a life so far on the back burner and then being illogically surprised when the pot has burned into a tar pit.

Can we say… Yeah that’s a life pattern inspired in so many ways by relational abuse? Because I’m saying it.

Always worrying about everyone else. Always trying to prove worth or agreeableness or utility. Always being productive towards something that others might actually be able to acknowledge because it’s in their best interest. Just… A very effortful, exhausting, isolating existence, at the end of the day.

And at that sun setting moment, you’re also might find yourself asking “for fucking what tho?” what am I really doing all of this for? It’s not even feeling good for me, or about me, ever.

Hell, I don’t even know who I am. I’m just reacting in all the ways I know best as I flail my way through fulfilling obligation after obligation.

Probably not really tracing the whole lifestyle back to patterns that you were trained to adopt early on, as you tried to adapt all of the – let’s say “demanding” personalities around you. At last, not immediately. Because the wrapping is a little different, hiding the same shit-nuget underneath.

And I thought… you know, reflecting on this for a few days now, maybe this is a good way to actually stop and introduce my brain around here.

Because since restarting this public platform last fall – clearing it out so it was easier to get your immediate trauma learning, but removing all the extra titbids that were sewn in… Uh… I haven’t actually told you who I am, the voice who’s preachin to you.

1. Does anyone really care? I asked
2. Am I allowed to? Close followup
3. It would be really inauthentic to provide the basic overview of externally viewable facts. Pre-med degree, background in cellular biology research, various jobs and interests and adventures, uh… messy history with musicians. Broken animal rehabber. Now, this psychology stuff. I decided.

It all sounds like the life of a – maybe TOO highly functioning person.

And that’s because YEAH. It. It it.

And you shouldn’t be impressed by that.

Because for all the functioning to be mentioned, none of it is really for me. Nearly all the steps that bring us here, where we meet now… have been some real trauma bullshit.

Just the continual trials of an alien trapped in a human meat suit, attempting to avoid being spit on by everyone, the way that everyone (historically, pervasively, blatantly and covertly) hacked at it so far for 32 years.

So. The outside views are one thing. But the feels from inside are – you know, usually inaccessible. But when they’re here, they’re not often good.

I don’t FEEL like the person people assess me to be. At all. Which creates a lot of challenges for both of us. In the past year or so, again, I just feel… I’d say, “nervous and busted” all the time.

And that’s it. That’s a life built on relational trauma and emotional abuse.

That’s a brain, taught to ask “what am I doing wrong and what SHOULD I be doing instead” literally every second of the day.

That is the outcome, in one set of circumstances where “getting smart” was the safest niche available.

Raised by dysregulated people, surrounded by their opiate addictions and alcoholism, chaos-aholism, neuroticism, workaholism, vulnerable narcissism disguised as being “self-sacrificing martyrs.”

And taught to dance to make everyone happy. OR, at least, trained to make them less AWARE of you, in general, so you’re less likely to get the family slap when they’re inevitably NEVER happy.

The result?

Yeah, I did the things. Got a late start putting my poor ass through community college and transferred into an ultracompentitive pre-vet program via retail work. Then became a peer-reviewed published scientist by like 23. Managed a state of the art multidisciplinary research lab by 24. Had a “solid core friend group” and a ton of “good acquaintances” all over in cool places. Plenty of serious romantic relationships. Kept up appearances, did some vanity modeling in there. Then became a “wonderful stepmom,” moved across the country, worked logistics at a sweet brewery, left the terrible relationship that brought me there.

Then started a new life. Quit that job. Started a trauma support thing, eventually went back to school, slayed that academic shit.

But also… returned back home for family reconnection which turned into family obligation when my dad died, got kicked in the head by all of them for a year and a half, adopted my disabled souldog and lost him within a year, went on a self-dependent journey living in a tent to get away from it all… and here we are.

I graduated with a 4.0 and I guess I’m supposed to say….Yay.

The thing is. This might all seem neat. Unless you know that from the inside, almost none of it felt like accomplishment or – really – anything besides horrifying. All of it felt “required” as some terrorized attempt to reach an unattainable goal of being “safe” or “secure” or, again, “not shat on.” Most included toxic relationships bubbling in the foreground as a crutch.

And, really, it comes down to the fact that I’ve always felt alone and hypervigilantly mortified to exist.

Which, I NOW know, all came from that early family or origin programming, and spiraled out in a vast array of dizzying, looping, self-destructive patterns of work and relational overcompensation from there.

As we just talked about recently, those things will break you eventually.

And let me also say, if you REALLY want to know about these early-abuse patterns that might be manipulating your own life? Go spend two years immersed in your family as an adult with a decade far, far away… and a few years of trauma recovery under your belt. Seee what happens.

“Balls, it turns out that they all contributed to novel aspects of this shit brain, not just the loudest of them I had been treated for. “ANNNND I have an entire life-narrative to rewrite, I didn’t choose any of this, did I?” was one of the discoveries, several times over.”

What a pandemic it has been.

Anyways.

My name’s Jess. I’ve always been “too sensitive” and “silly” and ugly and “generally wrong.” I worked really hard to become none of those things. Resulting in an emotionally dissociative, productivity-aholic, who gets into self-abandoning caretaker roles in EVERY relationship, and feels like trash every single day by birthright. So, “chemically medicate about it.”

These are the traits I was successfully turning away from back when I started this thing in 2019, as I also turned away from a family-abuse-esque romantic partnership. These are the automatic behaviors I had removed from my daily programming when I got into podcasting about it in 2020.

BUT. These are also the trends that progressively re-emerged after re-programming them via return to my home-environment shortly thereafter.

Goodbye to thinking I was “healed” – Hello, the covert emotional abuse trauma that was in me all along.

Fitting unintentional podcast material though. At least we all learned from it.

AND although I’m glad I got to do these deeper trauma-excavations for everyone’s education around here – self included – uh… I am back to re-wiring them out of my brain again now.

Generally, always feeling like unwanted, unlovable, hated, “wrong,” garbo the whole time. And, uh, still trying to show up, show my face, and be honest about the whole mess on at least a weekly basis.

So. That’s me. That’s this guy’s story.

At least… so far.

Two years and two months ago, deeply in a good place when I quit my job to go back to school and pursue this trauma support community project, I asked myself “what’s the WORST thing that can possibly happen? I – what – wind up, like, at my neurotic mom’s house for a while, or homeless when that doesn’t work out?”

Hahahaha… yeah. That’s exactly what happens. And your brain can be scrambled by loss, overwork, and interpersonal abuse in increasingly head spinning, destabilized conditions the entire time, too.

But you know what?

At last you can come out of it, more certain than ever… that you’re a real motherfucker.

For whatever the fuck that’s worth. A little bump of confidence that you’ll always figure shit out, and a fire in your gut to keep going, mostly.

But that IS worth something in the brain healing game.

You just might have a lot of catchup work to re-do, to get back to feeling like your REAL, full, self. It turns out.

SO. Done with the degree. Got a 4.0. Now, I’m focusing on the harder thing. Re-re-wiring me into an associated whole.

And that’s what we’re talking about this past week or so in the Patreon Private Podcast Feed. Re-finding and re-instating your… self. After trauma times have left you splintered.

You know, rather than operating out of the fucky programming in your stupid, survival-based, trauma brain. Which has been blueprinted by everyone BUT you with reinforcement and punishment to an extent that you can’t even begin to remember fully.

Something I think every human needs right about now – even those of us who are definitely aliens among men – in this globally fearful time that’s sparking all manner of mental shittery, huh? Yeah. Let’s escape from the trigger-entrapped brains we’ve become, yeah?

Sweet.

While you’re there, there’s about 250-probably past shows to explore. It’s $5 for a solid two years of listening. They dive into the details of everything we cover casually here. Call them, a living book I’ve been writing while living in real time… a combination of academic and experiential research on living through and moving past trauma. You know, from the past few years of nothing but.

Recommend you start at the beginning of the living audiobook to follow the information and life developments. Even when I’m not talking directly about life events… I am. In research form. Just saying, it’s been a real ride.

AND we’re about to start on an old favorite rollercoaster conversation – tearing into relationship dynamics and the obstacles they present to co-trauma recovery. Because let’s be honest, we TMFRs only really pair up with similarly synced brains. And that’s not really good news, even when it feels amazing. At first.

So let’s hit up intimacy issues and codependent confessions, along with ways to start talking about mental illness constructively together.

Crowd faves. If there’s one thing this MF can dish about, it’s bad relationships. Theoretically, conceptually, and what happens trauma-realistically. With musicians. Mostly.

Still maintain, punk is the trauma genre.

SO. See you in the Fort, linked in the episode notes for my next round of humiliation for your education. Also, be sure to check out the charity of the week while you poke around there. Yemen needs your help.

And, um…

Thanks for this opportunity to get acquainted. Minus the achievement-centric facade that makes people assume I’ve got a great thing going on between the ears. You know, cuz that area solely developed based on wanting their reinforcement.

Hope to hear about your old life on trauma soon, too. Hit me up. But, I hope yours is in the more-distant past, so your full self is ready to rise with less of a trauma-brain-based fight.

Either way. We’ll figure it out. We always do.

Cheers, friends.

One more cage escaped.

Next we tackle the zoo.