Reading rosyxxx's journal

You'll excuse me if I am confining myself to my journal. Some people may think of it as a form of "blogging", but for right now, it's been a place to quickly type through an issue, in a place where I know my writing will not be lost, even if my computer goes kerfluey. That issue has reached a sort of resolution, and the peace it brings to my heart is immense.

Peter Levine talks about how those who have been abused have a tendency to want to repeat the original trauma. I wouldn't necessarily say that what happened this past Wednesday was an attempt to repeat. It was more like shitty luck. :/ But the upshot is that I was handed an opportunity by accident to do with as I chose. It came down basically to two choices. Rage vs. Forgiveness.

I chose to forgive. In an odd way, it was actually easier to forgive him than some people I have known for ages, and then again it was also, paradoxically, one of the hardest things that I have done. After the attempted rape, he kept leaving me text messages. It became more and more apparent that he had been so drunk the night of the attack, that he didn't even remember doing it. It was my 'hunch', and I was right. I wonder, how many full-blown rapes work out that way? And the woman, or man as the rarer case may be, can't calmly stand up for themselves, and gets further abused by being accused of lying? Probably way too many.

Fortunately for me, that did not happen. The man kept leaving messages, he kept calling...and so finally I picked up the phone determined to tell him calmly that I was not okay with what had happened. I did tell him that. I also told him what he had done.

At first, he denied it. He said that he would never treat a woman that way, that he had never even gotten into a fight. I said that may well be, and something like this may never have happened before, but he did do it. I told him how he'd ripped my coat off, how he'd made veiled threats of violence in his friend's apartment, that could both have easily been written off as lack of depth perspective and drunken morbidity. I told him that after that he had stood in my kitchen and forcibly tried to remove my clothes. That each time I managed to pull my dress back down, he would grab and twist my nipples painfully. That he forced my hands onto his cock and kept them there. That as I stood there wanting to cry I kept telling him to just go home and get some sleep and call me for coffee in the morning. That he'd finally released my hands so I could remove them from his cock, and walked away and muttered that this was bullshit. That he stalked out of my apartment.

He remembered none of it, and I believe him. I know he doesn't remember. BUT.....It happened. I told him that any chance at a romantic relationship was now over. I told him that he was in no position to deny what he had done, since he was so drunk he was slurring his words at the time, and I was stone cold sober, and have been for over a year. He said that he was so sorry, and begged me to forgive him. I said that I would, but that that did not mean I was ever comfortable being alone with him again, and that he is not allowed in my home. If he knocks on my door, I will not answer. I will not open it. He accepted this.

He asked if he and I could at least be friends, and maybe really have coffee sometime, because he just really enjoyed my company. I told him that might be possible, but not right now. He wanted to call in a few days and invite me to coffee. I said no. I said that he should not call me, that if I felt comfortable inviting him to join friends for coffee, to let me call, and not to put any timeframe on it. It could be a very long while.

I also explained that the only way I knew for him to avoid doing something like that again to a woman was for him to spend a great deal of time doing some soul-searching, and to discover what inside him would prompt that behaviour. I told him that if he clung to wanting to speak to me, that could short-circuit the process. That he needed to own what had happened, and not shove it under the rug and pretend that it did not. And then when he had done that, when he had gone deeper into his own soul he would likely find that he wasn't a bad person. That he'd just made a terrible mistake, and someone had helped him stop, and had been kind enough not to yell and scream and call him a demon, because he was not one. Just human and fallible. And drunk at the time. :/

I talked to him about some of the funny conversations I had had with friends over stuff the past few days, and how all my guy friends had been there for me through this, but had no idea who he was...and that I would keep it that way for now. I told him how much the experience, oddly enough, had allowed me to grow to love and appreciate my friends here in St. Louis that much more. That I had chosen to get something positive out of all of this, and then I just let him talk about literature. I didn't want him to forget how serious this all was at its core, but I didn't want him to hate himself either, or feel that I thought that what he'd done was unforgivable. Because it is forgiveable.

And yet, the trust he had implicitly upon first meeting, the level which I might give a total stranger is not there. He has a harder road to climb to get that back, let alone the kind of trust I extend to those whom I've known and been able to trust for years. I think he knows this...but, no matter what, he is aware that I will not socialize anywhere but in public with him, in large groups of people who are not intoxicated, and he may not knock upon my door and expect to gain entry.

And I am at peace with this. The feeling inside my heart right now, is almost as if the event never happened. The shaking and crying I needed to do, I did within my friend John's arms. And he held me like a friend. He helped to remind me, in that irrational phase of healing, that all men are not like this. He put a band-aid on my soul, and so did Bob, and Mike and Joe.

And now the band-aid is off, and the wound has healed mostly. There's a scar, but it's healing fast. Being able to have that talk with him, and to know that he heard me, not only healed the pain of his assault, but it seems it has allowed me the opportunity to heal so many others from youth. Here, as an adult, was an opportunity, with a sane adult to call him out on his behaviour, to be heard, to be validated, and not to be threatened or belittled.

In a very real sense, what he has done from start to finish, is to allow me to heal much more than what he had done. It is regrettable that such a fascinating person would have broken my boundaries so harshly, but he has given me a gift, actually, far more valuable to me than a potential intimate relationship. Peace. He gave me the opportunity to have it, and I took it...by standing up for my self, calmly, with no tears, and with compassion and caring in my voice, not pity, nor rage. And he put the final healing balm on the wound by saying he was very, very sorry, and asking my forgiveness. He has it. Now the trust is the only issue.

At some point, maybe years from now, I would love to tell him how what he had done has allowed me to use the situation positively to heal so much more than what he did. Maybe someday it will be appropriate, and I can trust him enough to do so. I hope so...very much. Forgiving feels so much better than hating.

I would certainly not go out actively looking for an experience like this one to learn from, but I am not deluded into thinking that obstacles of varying kinds will not appear again in my future. I think the key, according to Pema Chodron is to 'hold your seat', and in doing so...the waves that come and knock you down don't disappear, but they actually get smaller and smaller, and less of a potential to cause you harm, not because their intensity is reduced, but because you will not allow them to affect you as you have in the past.

What she has to say about this process in her book: "The Places that Scare You" follows below, and sums up what I have been trying to do. It's not easy, and I stumble a lot, but it is still worthwhile:

The most straightforward advice on awakening bodhichitta is this: practice not causing harm to anyone-yourself or others, and every day do what you can to be helpful. If we take this instruction to heart and begin to use it, we will probably find that it is not so easy. Before we know it, someone has provoked us, and either directly or indirectly, we've caused harm.

Therefore, when our intention is sincere, but the going gets tough, most of us could use some help. We could use some fundamental instruction on how to lighten up and turn around our well-established habits of striking out and blaming.

The four methods for holding our seat provide just such support for developing the patience to stay open to what's happening instead of acting on automatic pilot. These four methods are

1. not setting up the target for the arrow,
2. connecting with the heart,
3. seeing obstacles as teachers, and
4. regarding all that occurs as a dream.

I have left out much, which resides on pps. 109-112.

....These four methods for turning anger around and learning a little patience come to us from the Kadampa masters of eleventh-century Tibet. These instructions have provided encouragement for fledgling bodhisattvas in the past, and they are just as useful in the present. These same Kadampa masters advised that we not procrastinate. They urged us to use these instructions immediately--on this very day in this very situation--and not to say to ourselves, "I will try this in the future when I have a bit more time."

If mountain goats like living at high elevations, why do none live in high rise apartment buildings?

This post was edited by rosyxxx on Feb 27, 2006.

This is so hard. I know I asked for my heart to be broken wide open, to be able to love with the deepest of compassion. I know I asked to be able to care about others more deeply, to be able to forgive. I know this. And the opportunities are all there. They keep coming, wave after wave after wave...

The good and the bad.

The friends who have held my hand, held me while I shook and cried. The one's who make me laugh, and laugh at my jokes as well. Those who truly love me, and allow me to love them. Old friends long gone have come back...Isis is back, and Saturday we just kissed like long lost lovers. And it felt so nice to have it be only what it was...no sex, just affection. And Moon with her loving little self coming back from Cambodia with that chunk of amethyst. Sonny hugging me, knowing instinctively that something was hurting. I mean I smiled, I've healed so much in the last few days but he saw through. He asked if I was okay, and I hedged and said: "It's only that I've found out just how much every single one of my friends here is really a true friend." He didn't ask for an explanation.

But when I came to him later, with tears in my eyes, because one of the "friends" of the guy who tried to rape me was at my stage, and I said I had told him I did not allow men I knew outside the club to come to my stage, but he just kept his distance and stared intently at me from all over the club, in a way and for such long periods of unbroken stares that it freaked me out...and that what I had been referring to earlier was how people there at the club had helped me through this attempted rape...Sonny just hugged me. They wanted to kick the guy out. I said it would just create more drama, because this guy was the next-door neighbor of one of my friends, and his friend, the one that tried to rape me, lives in my building, and I really had to handle things the way that I did, both for my own piece of mind, as well as protection.

They let me leave early, and Isis was there holding me in her arms, telling me how none of this was my fault. She hugged me, kissed my cheek, held my hand. And Ashley was there offering words of advice. She knew why it creeped me out so much to have this guy just positioning himself at a distance and staring it me. It would creep me out if I was actually 'seeing' his friend, and it creeps me out now, having just stood up to his friend and demanded respect after he almost hurt me.

The only person though, who I am really angry with right now, is my girlfriend who lives in this building. Everytime she promised not to tell her friends that I was stripper, and then broke it and told everyone, everytime she wanted to bring her friends to the club and exhibit me like a freakshow, so that I finally had to tell her she was not allowed in my club or I would never speak to her again...everytime she bemoaned the fact that I wouldn't go out and meet people outside of the club industry as much as she thought I should just makes me angry. She's told me how she doesn't want to be cynical like me, and believe that people would disrespect others like some of the things I have told her about. I just have to say, if I'm cynical, she is sheltered, and trying to live in a utopia. And the true word root meaning of "utopia" is something that never comes.

She is living in a dreamworld more than I. After telling her that I had two men stalk me in this building after they found out I was a stripper, that a doctor I had known for a year solicited sex after finding out I was a stripper, that a massage therapist I had known for two years, twice positioned my foot right next to his balls and would not let me wriggle it away to where I could feel his private parts quite distinctly...all because they knew I was a stripper; she still doesn't get it.

I ask you all, if I had come here from day 1 and told you all immediately that I was a stripper, would you have really taken me seriously as a good writer? Not all of you can say that. So many people misjudge. So many people assume that they know who you really are: A slut, a whore, a piece of disposable ass. But you know what? Those who work in the industry, for the most part, with a few sick exceptions...know better. And they've been my friends. And they've held my hand.

There's only one, who makes a better friend than someone to date, because he is kindhearted but would never marry a stripper, just fuck them. Strippers aren't good enough to marry in his book, he's said as much, and yet I can't even hate him, because I know he's just running scared. I feel sad for him, that his mind is so closed. And I hate that I feel pity and sadness for him rather than compassion. Compassion is what I want to feel. It's just not there today. I just keep focusing on how angry I am with naive little girls who do stupid things that could actually cost me my life.

Right now, I want so bad to call up her spoiled yuppie ass, and say: "Do you want proof of what happens when you tell people right off the bat that in addition to selling yarn, you strip for a living? Do you believe me now? Do you realize why I can't be friends with you if you tell every motherfucker you know that I'm a stripper, against my wishes, at your discretion not mine, when it should be my decision not yours? Do you realize why I am so angry with you for betraying my trust, promising time and again not to tell everyone you meet: 'Oh this is my friend Heather, she's a stripper?' Never mind the repercussions of telling people who probably can't handle that info in an adult manner...you promised over and over, and you continually break your promise. So I decided to try it your way, and tell people up front, thinking maybe you were right, and I was unessecarily wary. And look what happens. And no, the answer isn't quiting my job. I really like my job. I'm able to do it in a way that I enjoy, and I get more respect there from the people in my industry, than I do out here, even when no one knows what I do." I wish I could trust her, but I can't. I can't trust the man who tried to rape me, either.

But I can trust Bob, Mike, Sonny, Isis, Ashley, Moon, Jennifer, Joe, Paul, Dan, Teri, John, finally Rick, and my Dad. At least to be my friends, and that's enough. And the only two people in that group whom I didn't meet through the club, are my Dad (obviously), and Paul whom I met at the Venice Cafe, reading poetry. So...here's all these people from the stripclub, my father, and a dude who is a self-professed schizophrenic, which freaks some people out but not me. I trust him implicitly. I have never been given reason not to trust him. A lot of people would consider every one of these, except my father, the dredges of society...and yet they are true, loyal friends to the end. And I suspect there are quite of few of you on here, online, another place that people can look down upon, and think is only the province of fuckups and freaks, who are really and truly true friends. Null springs to mind as the most obvious, but I'm not dissing anyone, I just realize that this could sound like a roll call.

I'd rather be friends with people from unorthodox places who have my back, than friends with rich, arrogant predatory jerks, who've never known any real pain in their lives, and love to victimize others. I'm tired of trying to fit into society's idea of who I should be. I know who my friends are, and I love them. I'm trying so hard to love my enemies, and those that betray me....but it is so hard. Today is a rough day. Today I am really fighting the urge to hate and to rage. Forgiveness is not coming easy, but I'm trying so I know eventually it will come. I just have to hang in there, and hold my seat...as Pema Chodron says.

And I will. I'll keep trying. Today is just a bad day. It's definitely a spliff day. :/ The good news is that I know who truly loves me, and whom I love with my whole heart. I've found out just how deep that love runs....and in addition, my sister just sent me a thank you note. That's actually better than a spliff. I've been waiting so long to communicate with her. It's a start. I really do love my sister. Very much. I'd like to add her to the list of friends whom I know that I can trust. That would make me so happy. Very happy. She and I have been through so much that I don't even remember...it would be nice if we could truly love each other from the bottoms of our hearts.

If mountain goats like living at high elevations, why do none live in high rise apartment buildings?

This post was edited by rosyxxx on Feb 28, 2006.