• @HardlightCereal
    link
    English
    11 year ago

    I couldn’t really provide the social needs this person needed without completely denying my own needs.

    I don’t believe in that. I think you made the right choice moving away and I’ve had to make similar choices in the past. Our abilities are not limitless. But I don’t believe in what you said, either. Life experiences and an inquisitive mind have given me a tremendous ability to deal with BPD and NPD people. I learned how other people and myself think with these disorders, and now I can see straight through all the trauma mechanisms and the bullshit, and I can manage people who have it. I don’t think this ability is inherently beyond anyone, it just takes the right experiences coupled with tenacity and curiosity. I don’t believe you had access to those experiences and I hold your accountable for nothing that happened. But I am frustrated with the unwillingness of some neurotypicals to deal with NDs that comes from statements like this. Inclusivity is a skill. It can be taught and learned. Nobody is beyond help from a mentor with the right skillset.

    • schmorp
      link
      fedilink
      English
      31 year ago

      I don’t believe in that. …

      That you would dismiss my inner reality and ‘kindly’ reframe it as ignorance feels rather condescending, but here we go:

      I’m ND and wouldn’t dream of forcing anyone to deal with me and how I am. Why some people think others are obliged to deal with them and whatever they bring to the table I cannot understand. What part of other people’s time do you feel you are entitled to? Please mind I’m showing my ‘wtf’ reaction in my writing here but I am very interested how this inner reality of yours looks.

      I’m also not sure this is what inclusivity means.

      Inclusivity for me means that I don’t have to give any kind of performative attention to others - and this very thing seems to explicitly trigger people with traumas like yours - they feel shunned, left alone, like this - violently in bits.

      I think this is the discovery of a very archetypal conflict in relationships and communities. I’m glad we are discussing this in a space that invites thoughtful discussion.

      • @HardlightCereal
        link
        English
        11 year ago

        I don’t have to give any kind of performative attention to others

        When I hurt someone’s feelings, I say sorry. When I meet a neopronoun user, I learn and use their neopronouns. I think apologies and pronouns are forms of performative attention.

        • schmorp
          link
          fedilink
          English
          11 year ago

          Apologizing and using pronouns is all part of being a decent human being, nothing wrong with that.

          But for example, I was once trying to work on a project together with someone who was trying to convince me that yelling at me was part of her creative process. For me one the other hand, being yelled at was not part of my creative process, so I ended the common project.

          Or the night my ex-partner wanted to discuss the problems now and kept me forcefully awake for that while angrily gesturing at me. No thanks.

          But it might be that you put the right people together and they yell at each other while creating great art, or yank each other out of bed at night fixing their relationship. Not going to judge, I’d be happy for them. It’s just not my intensity level of being. So, what can be part of a decent performance level for one person can be felt as emotional abuse for another person. Which leaves us in a situation where nobody has to be the bad guy, we just have to match the right people to each other.

          • @HardlightCereal
            link
            English
            11 year ago

            Yelling and forced awakeness can often be violent. Your creative partner owed you the performative attention of quietness, and your romantic partner owed you the performative attention of patience.

            Failing to accommodate for your volume and sleep needs is a failure on their part to accommodate for your lack of ability. Needing sleep isn’t a disability, it’s completely normal, but it’s still a lacking ability that they failed to address. My points that performative attention and accommodation for disability are owed apply just as well to your abusers as they do to you. I hold them to the same standard and I hold them accountable for choosing violence. I believe they had the potential, under the right circumstances, to learn to get along with people who enjoy quiet and sleep. Just as I had, and fulfilled, the potential to get along with narcissists and borderlines. I believe all these skills can be learned by anyone.