Duchesstopaz - Essence

i don't want to make this month about discourse, because most discourse is arbitrary and pointless at best, and self-destructive and dangerous at worst. but happy pride month to all queer people in the community that have been targets of exclusion, abuse, or erasure by certain jerks in the community.

trans people, intersex people, black queers, aces/aros, mspecs, neopronoun users, xenogender people, transhets, gnc queer people, multigender people, people who use microlabels, mspec lesbians/gays, polyamorous people, queers with split attraction, and any other groups who have been targets of abuse, exclusion, or erasure by other queer people who should have had their backs.

i don't need to tell you that you're valid because it's not for me or anyone else to decide that your way of describing yourself is "invalid." you are the only person who can label yourself in a way that is fulfilling to you- and if that means not labelling yourself at all, that's great too! but i love you. i'm proud of you for existing, despite the fact that you have to deal with some queer exclusionists hating you on top of the queermisia from non-queers. your existence is beautiful. your queerness is beautiful. be proud of yourself, because you deserve to be.

love you. have a wonderful month, because you deserve to celebrate it just as much as every other queer person <3

and to the exclusionists in question: you don't get to blame the rest of us for hating you when you help make queer spaces unsafe for queer people. worrying about how other queer people identify is such a waste of time, because they're going to identify that way no matter what you think. your opinions on other peoples' validity means absolutely nothing. you are wasting valuable time that you could be using to be proud of your own queerness instead of reveling in your misery about other queer people daring to exist in a way you don't like. so try changing and growing as a person and stop spending all of your time worrying about what other gay people are doing.

*Trigger Warnings: Mentions of death and passing, grief, loss of family members, illnesses, and emotional breakdowns.*

Thursday, Oct. 27th, 2022 Part 2

4:46pm

Last night, Angel asked me about Granny (my great grandmother) and I told her about Granny’s conditions. After I answered, Gem asked me a lot of deep questions about how I felt about the situation. I’m not ready to witness Granny’s conditions firsthand, even if it’s over the phone. I feel this fear and pressure about addressing the situation. After I finished expressing that vulnerable feeling, she asked if she could give me a suggestion. I had the immediate thought and feeling of apprehension to say, “Not at this time.”, but instead, I nodded my head because I wanted her to feel that she had the space to support me. And, because of the pressure of her being Angel’s partner and the choice of saying no, seemed like a possibility for either of them to feel hurt by that. 

She then proceed to tell me things she wished she had done when time was leading up to her grandmother’s passing. She was extremely triggered and started to sob as she spoke. Then, Angel shared about her experience grieving her grandmother by celebrating her life, with photos and altars, and finding comfort in the qualities in herself that she got from her grandmother. Gem brought up her grandfather afterwards, and talked about that time while crying as she relived it. Angel was getting up and leaving, finding things to do around the apartment, through that part of the conversation as Gem spoke.

Once she finished, I told the both of them that I appreciated what they shared with me, and thank you. But, I really didn’t mean it. I appreciated that they wanted to help and support me, but what transpired and what they said was not what I was expecting or what I needed/wanted in that moment. When I said that I wasn’t ready and as I shutdown when thinking about what they were saying, I thought that it was understood that I also did not want to get in too deep either. Gem inserting herself in my moment of vulnerability with Angel at first, then speaking about her periods of grief while crying, shifted the conversation out of my comfort zone, worsened my fear and anxiety of my Granny’s health, and centered the conversation from me to her. It was triggering and much more emotional than what I wanted. While she and Angel spoke, it was so hard to stay present and not disassociate. I wasn’t trying to go through that and it left me feeling empty and numb afterwards. Throughout that conversation, all I was doing was imagining the many different scenarios of confronting Granny’s illnesses, her death, and after, I almost cried too as she spoke about her grandfather. It was filled with such heaviness. I wasn’t ready then, and I’m still not ready…

Part 1

ITS PRIDE MONTH FUCKERS PAY UP 💵🤲

Happy Pride Month, everyone!

*Trigger Warnings: Descriptions of physical abuse, mental abuse, emotional abuse, parental abuse, verbal abuse, child neglect, threats, anxiety, panic attacks, violence towards children.* Monday, June 19th, 2023 Part 3 6:32pm

When I went to the high school 5 minutes away from our house, I was in the Honors Academy and still in the Band program. I was busy, with afterschool rehearsals and homework that I couldn’t easily breeze through. It threw a wrench in how the household functioned because you relied on me to pick up your slack as a parent and to take the pressure off my mother. You asked my mother to make me quit the Band program, and when I refused, you made me pay for everything myself and forced me to find a ride home every practice or show. 2 months later, you asked my mom to take me out of the Honors Academy because you thought it was “too difficult because it took so much time”, to which we both refused. But, if it was a sport, would you have reacted the same? I doubt it, considering that you jumped at the fact that Anthony started playing basketball. You blatantly tried to sabotage my high school career and life to take advantage of me. Not to mention, you didn’t graduate high school and you don’t have a GED because you went to jail instead, so why would you try to disturb how well I was doing; the top 5 of my class and the first chair of my section, when you should know what you missed and sacrificed?

By that time, the girls were in elementary school, the same one my mom works at, and now I do too. You made it a personal responsibility to show up for every parent event that they asked you to, and you bragged about how you were making time for it, or how much money you spent taking them out to eat before going. Way to go! I hope you are so proud that you make your kids feel like a burden with how much you speak like that. ALSO, how you rubbed it in my and Anthony’s faces because every time we invited you to “Doughnuts with Dad”, you refused and said it was a waste of time.

I wasn’t allowed to hang out with my friends because it took me away from my responsibilities at home and because my friends were girls. I was bullied because my closet was made of glass, I didn’t know how to connect with my male peers, and I was one of 3 black kids in my grade in the Honors Academy. Neither you or my mom were checking in on me or my grades or how I was doing in high school. You never taught me how to make friends, didn’t warn me of discrimination in a conservative, racist area, and didn’t teach me that there was nothing wrong with me for being me. But, that’s because you didn’t make me feel safe at home and made me feel like I was crazy for thinking that our home wasn’t right. You took and manipulated my mother right in front of me for years, until I realized there was no point in hoping or wishing for a support system. Yet, when we’re out in public, we’re one large, happy family with an amazing life, but behind closed doors, we all shiver with anxiety under the wrath of the king with no visible throne. Things couldn’t be more twisted.

Every day, you walk in the door and immediately call out everything that was wrong. This shoe is out of place, the washer is being used, there’s a tissue box on “your” counter, when everyone, except you, has allergies. Or, did you forget after all this time of your wife needing weekly shots, and all of us kids needing to take medicine every morning and night? 

You consistently pride yourself on being an “observational” person. You’re not “confrontational”, so you “sit back and take note of what’s going on around you”. I think you mean to say that you look for all the problems that bother you, and when you explode about this thing or that we need to clean up “this mess”, you excuse yourself from having to get involved and parent your kids by saying you’re not “confrontational”. 

We are a 7-person household, where all of us kids sleep in what is supposed to be the living room, and you have one of the bedrooms monopolized as your “workout room” that you don’t even use. We don’t have the space to have a properly organized and clean look. You disregard functionality for presentation, and as soon as you hear the context of the situation after we repeat it for 8th time, you deflect and say to just throw it away. But, you’ve been promising that we would get a new house since I was 10. I’m 20 now, and look, same house AND same behavior!

Daily, you find something that frustrates you and instill fear in everyone. You have such a superiority/inferiority complex with your family and the public that it leaves you with such a scary pattern of irrational violence. You never take the time to teach your kids the same standards or lessons that Anthony and I were expected to meet, and then, you throw a tantrum when they don’t do things the way you want them to. You’re an adult and a parent, we’re kids. We don’t understand how to establish a routine of cleanliness and organization isn’t a talent, it’s a skill. But, you’re so observational, yet you haven’t realized or noticed that the problem isn’t us, it’s you. Because you have such high expectations and such extreme outbursts, but you don’t raise your children to understand and teach them how to meet them and avoid what you call a “consequence”.

Part 1 -- Part 2 -- Part 4 Part 5

The orange kitty presented...

*Trigger Warnings: Descriptions of harassment, panic attacks, PTSD symptoms, anxiety, threats of physical violence. Mentions of trauma, abuse, bipolar depression, PTSD, anxiety, coping, self deprecating thoughts, dark humor.* Sunday, May 28th, 2023

12:06pm

This is the letter that I wrote to my older (half) sister, before the texts in Part 1 the next day.

Here’s what I said to her:

“Hey Angel… I think it’s time we talk about the distance that we both have experiencing. Honestly, I don’t even know how the distance started, but it’s something that I fell into and followed. I would like to talk when you’re ready because it’s necessary that we do. That we talk about everything for as long as we both need, and that we come into this conversation ready and willing to hear each other out. Just let me know.”

“I was in such a dark place when this all started. I think after looking back on it, that I never took the time to properly explain what happened, what’s been happening…

As you know, I’ve had such an extensive amount of trauma, especially from my supposed father-figures. It was September… I was on a shuttle, trying to get to my rehearsal for dance on a Sunday afternoon. I stepped onto the shuttle, wearing my headphones, listening to the same playlist that I do before I dance. It’s my… ritual, the thing that grounds me, calms me, but also, psyches me up to go. And, that’s the paradoxical thing about having anxiety as well as bipolar depression; you have to calm yourself down in order to build yourself up to feel excited.

In that process, I missed the driver telling everyone to not get on if they were not going to the next stop, which would unfold in our confrontation. 

I got on the bus, and when we arrived at the next stop, I didn’t get off the bus, which was odd, but not too unusual… until I noticed the yelling. I took out my earbuds to hear the driver yelling, and it took me a second to realize that he was yelling at me. He was trying to force me off the bus because I apparently wasn’t supposed to be on otherwise.

I was confused, and shocked, and frightened, but I found the courage to ask why. I didn’t know at the time that he had said that he would swing back around to get the people going to main campus. I got frustrated with how he was acting, because we would get there eventually ‘cause the route is continuous, as all bus routes are, but he kept getting more aggressive as he was trying to force me off. His reasoning was, “because he said so”, instead of any semblance of reason. It reached the point where other students were getting on to return home, and that spurred him to park the bus, say that he wasn’t moving until I got off, and threatened to call the police or physically removing me himself. I was panicked, so I did what my mind told me to do in the moment. I made my way off, asked for his name, which was like pulling teeth, and tried to call the office to make a complaint. He drove away, I was officially late to rehearsal, and then, I realized that I had no idea where I was.

My anxiety was building exponentially as I called the transportation office 3 times with no response before I realized there wasn’t going to be, because they are closed on the weekends. I then tried calling all my friends, with cars, to see if they could pick me up to no avail. Then, I had my first panic attack on the curb of a parking lot in an unfamiliar place, while people walked by with odd stares and no concern for me.  Then, I tried calling all and any family I could, my mom, you, Camille, and Auntie Roz and Auntie Julie, but no one answered.

Cue my second panic attack.

A friend called me back, I explained the situation, but they couldn’t come get me. So, I made the decision to call an Uber with the last $11 I had. On the drive, my mom called to see what was going on. She responded to the story by saying “Get over it”. Not understanding how triggering it was for me, or caring for how upset or shaken I was. I got out of the Uber, had my third panic attack in 40 minutes, and after, I noticed the time.

Rehearsal was over, and I cried.

I called my professor to apologize and after I explained what happened, he Venmo’d me for the Uber, but that’s where the resolution of the incident stopped. I did end up filing a complaint, and they took my side, but didn’t act on any of the solutions I asked for. After that, well, I spiraled.

Part 1 -- Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7