8:56 AM - Thurs 3.28.24
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When I think about my past, I've always considered being taken from Mrs. DeHaven - My first foster mother - as "the defining trauma" of my life (I'm about to turn 63, and I still think of it as the worst thing that's ever happened to me...at least so far).

Intellectually, I know things weren't all sunshine and puppies before that (A fact my case files back up), but since I don't remember much of those early years, it's never quite registered emotionally.

I haven't really "taken it on" as genuine trauma sustained long before being taken from the only mother I'd ever known.

But it's struck me lately - thanks in part to conversations with Jane R. - that a lot of behaviors I've always thought were "just who I am", because they seem to have been with me "forever", are likely more symptoms of lifelong anxiety and depression than whatever personality I was born with.

I'm not an expert in early childhood development, but my first years seem almost like an experiment in "How To Create A Deeply Unhappy Child".

In my first year, I was neglected to the point of malnourishment and pneumonia, in and out of the hospital, left so often with a full diaper and untreated diaper rash that blisters ran down my buttocks and thighs. Which then caused so much pain - along with the Epsom Salts baths Mrs DeHaven used to treat the rash - I didn't walk for years (I was also slow to talk. Which makes sense - Why bother talking when it was clear no one was listening?).

And because I was so slow to develop, it was generally assumed I was mentally retarded - I'm going to use "The R Word", since it's the word they use in my case file (In my case file, only one social worker ever ponders the "nature vs nurture" question) - so when I was school age, I went to a "special school", and was thus a year older than my classmates when, after it was determined I was not "retarded", I finally started grade school,

(And, somehow, some of the kids knew I had come from the "special school", so teased me about being a "retard" - Apparently, "Young Jim" was more of a "fighter" than a "lover", so I didn't take the insults with the gentle good humor I would now.)

There's more, but you get the idea.

A lot of shit happened before I went on my "permanent vacation" (My separation from Mrs. DeHaven was framed as a "summer vacation").

Part of me wants to say, "Jim, why are you re-hashing all this...?".

And it's old news, granted, but it's hitting me with new force that I didn't just have "one bad year", then everything was great till I was taken from Mrs D.

And it's kind of startling to realize, maybe for the first time, that I wasn't just born depressed, anxious, and angry.

I was created.

For at least the past decade, if not longer, I've been wrestling with the feeling that, if life is a game, I have pretty clearly lost.

I don't want to rule anything out, so I'll just say it seems very unlikely at this point that my prospects for love, romance, home, family, career, money, friendships, etc are going to improve moving forward.

And that being the case, I've sometimes/often felt like, "Okay, so what now?".

What remains to fight for, to work towards?

To hope for?

Those are not happy questions, because, at present, I don't have any happy answers.

But it did strike me the other day that, realizing I'm not going to be the successful person I wanted to be, that my life hasn't really "worked out" the way I envisioned, is a little sad, but it also "takes the pressure off".

My needs are relatively small now. No one is depending on me, so all I have to do is keep myself fed and clothed, one way or another, and do what I can to be happy.

Good things can still happen - How do I know they won't? - but at this stage of the game, I think I'm better off if I just relax, and take what pleasure I can from the life I have right now.

Not the one I imagined when I was a kid.

(Till next time)

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