The Strong (but not silent) Type

People you've been before
That you don't want around anymore
That push and shove and won't bend to your will
I'll keep them still.
[Elliot Smith]

A year ago, or so, I read a very interesting article in the New York Times about resilience. The article was discussing a "resiliency" gene, a genetic trait that makes its bearers more likely to rise up to overcome personal tragedy. The article followed a pair of sisters who had both been sexually abused for an extended period of time. While one of them went on to lead a fairly successful life, the other one seemed to flounder and become lost. When tested, the first had the resiliency gene, and the second did not.

The idea that an aspect of our personal strength can come from our genes is amazing, simply mind boggling. However, like most things attributed to genetics, there is obviously a large contribution from environment as well. One of the questions in our Darkness to Light training was to the effect of "Describe a time as a child that you lost power. Describe how it made you feel." My answer was about my own abuse, but I am curious to know what others put. Looking back on my life, I can't think of a lot of times when I did show personal strength. Kid wants to bully you all through the fifth grade? Sure, why not let him? People want to cheat off of your paper in middle school, your freshman year of high school? Sure--they're bound to fall off sometime from their own lack of knowledge, right? I spent a lot of time as a youngster thinking that it wasn't my job to set things right--that the universe, or God, would tip things into my favor if I just sat back and waited.

However, I never quite grew out of these tendencies. They continued through most of college. I didn't fight the decision to fire me from my job, although now the people who fired me admit that they were wrong. I didn't fight my parents the first time they implied that they thought I wasn't bipolar, that this therapist bit was a waste of money. I didn't fight the people who pushed me around, who didn't respect me, who used me for grades and homework help without contributing anything positive to my life. A year ago, I described myself as someone who was not strong, and I wore that like a definition, a really fucked-up and detracting feather in my fucked-up hat.

A year later, a year different, a beautiful world of different. I'm coming into my own strength, and it feels awesome. It started when I insisted on going back to therapy, on going to testing--no matter what it cost--to figure out what the fuck was wrong with my brain. And it has only improved since then. Today, I had a decently lengthy talk with my community preceptors about all the ways in which Darkness to Light training made me furious. I left feeling empowered, like my anger and defiance was going to change something. Tonight, my tutoring group continued to be far too large, much larger than it is supposed to be, and I refused to go to lab with them. I don't deserve to be shoved into a clusterfuck of people where I can't learn. Instead, I studied radiographic anatomy with Thomas, and we went to the lab later. There, I was able to talk things out, and I came out with a world's [or abdomen's] worth of knowledge that I probably would have glazed over if I had gone with my tutoring group. Add to that knowledge my hour spent with radiology and a cup of strong coffee: I had a good night.

So, why the change? What has made the difference, has slowed and reversed an entire lifetime of inability to say what I felt? Well, first--I have this one amazing guy in my life, this perfect sweet boyfriend who has always insisted on giving me what I need. The respect and love he has always given me, that I have only perhaps in the last year come into full appreciation of, is the only impetus I really need to know that I am a person with feelings and needs that must be met. The other day, he was so supportive and assertive when I was upset with the training, and his words to me, so simple and perfect, "I'm confident that you will be strong enough to do what needs to be done" were all I needed to know that much was true.

There are compounding factors, too. First, I've gotten rid of the detractors in my life, the people who didn't respect my feelings, the people who ran over me while I tried my damnedest to please them. I've added to my life some extraordinarily positive people, funny wonderful people who assert that I don't deserve to have to try to see over 20 people in my own fucking tutoring group, who encouraged me to take my Darkness to Light concerns to higher powers. These are the people I've always needed in force in my life, who I had in tastes but needed in droves. The people who may scare the shit out of me in haunted jails, who may yell about olives and love alphabet books about small children meeting hazardous ends and poke me in class, but who will be there to pick me up and take me home and to accompany me to Disney on Ice. The people who will read me to sleep, no questions asked. The person who will tuck me in and toss and turn and tell me that it's alright, that I am stronger than I ever thought I was.