Parasitic vs symbiotic
I have a parasitic relationship with the mycotoxins in my body in the short-term, but a symbiotic relationship with them in the long-term. The mycotoxins will be referred to as âsheâ from here on out.Â
She drains my energy and keeps me from living a life that many people around me get to experience. She creates so much inflammation in my body that the only way for me to keep the inflammation from completely physically disabling me is for me to severely limit my diet and avoid most indoor public spaces that I would otherwise frequent. She made my life incredibly small in many ways. She is controlling and fearful of my autonomy over our body. My autonomy makes her feel like she doesnât have space in my body to live. But itâs my body not hers.Â
She keeps me questioning. Everything and everyone around me. She infiltrates my thoughts. The more space she takes up, the more suspicious and anxious my thoughts get. Not about her, of course, but about the people I love and the things Iâm able to do. She makes me doubt myself. I thought for decades that I was just dummer and more anxious than everyone else. It turns out she was keeping me in such an overloaded cycle of anxious thought rumination that I barely had space to wonder. She kept my body in a state of hyper vigilance.Â
At first, there was just the fatigue. And even though it affected my everyday life, it was a soft launch of the abuse that was to come later. So that by the time I was barely functioning - by the time that I couldnât form full thoughts or speak coherently - I had long forgotten where we had started and what it felt like not to have her around. But of course when it all began, I wasnât conscious that it was her pulling the strings. I blamed myself, because everyone else did.Â
What about the symbiosis though?
It was hard earned. And we swing in and out of it even now.
She forced me to come to terms with how little I advocated for myself. How little I was taught to, anyway. She forced me to overcome an entire societal norm of a womanâs place, of a firstborn daughter with an expectation to be a parent, an internalizing autistic woman with an expectation to be neurotypical and socially communicative in a world that prioritizes externalizing ways of self regulation.Â
It was too much for me to take on at age 15, but happened nonetheless.Â
I swam in the dark for the next decade plus.Â
Only in the last few years have I reaped the benefits of our relationship. I am able to see that she forced me to prioritize our body and sense of self over the crumbs of validation I thought I needed from men I had monogamous relationships with. The crumbs helped me through the extreme pain that she put us through. The crumbs were all I had at the time, or at least so I thought. No one else was coming to help me or take the pain away. Certainly not those men. No expert, no doctor, no friend or parent. Not because they didnât try, but because none of them even knew of her existence. She taught me that I had to stand up and fight with her for some space. Paradoxically, that fight looked like leaving toxic relationships, resting, and prioritizing long term goals instead of short term relief. Not beating myself up. But it was a fight to do those things. Itâs a fight in this world to rest. Itâs a fight to find peace.Â
The idea of âreaching happinessâ is a myth. She taught me this.Â
The better we (her, and I) get at reaching the sense of self I was born with, the better we realize itâs about being able to dance in the rain, or ride the waves so to speak. The waves will always crash. It will never end. We live on earth for fucks sake! Learn to surf.Â
She taught me that my experience is not unique. No oneâs experience is. We think they are, and in the detail, yes our experiences are unique. Iâm one for detail, but in this case, getting lost in how unique our pain is will only increases it.Â
She has taught me to see this type of pain that others carry. Sometimes with more clarity than they are aware of. One of my greatest strengths. And to understand the collective nature of everything.
Most recently she has been teaching me that just because our relationship is at a specific point, it doesnât mean that other people are at that point in their relationship with their teachers. And that telling people about my experience with her wonât hasten their journey to symbiosis. It may help them in the long term to know about her existence, but just like me, they will struggle against it for a long time first. They will have to learn to surf on their own. But I will be there to watch them when they stand up.
