I don't know about today.  It was a good day until I sent my uncle some articles about the VA and PTSD on facebook.  He never had anything to do with me or my Mom til his near death experience (heart attack) a few years back.  Since then he visits and calls and tells us he loves us and tells us all his problems ad nausuem.  It's creepy really, because he doesn't know or understand us.  He's filled with hate and self centered rage and very sexist.  He asked me why I care about PTSD.  I said I have PTSD.  He then blocked me facebook!  WTF?  So all that LOVE and shit was just for him to get attention?  We have to care about his PTSD from Vietnam, but he doesn't care about mine or his sister's?  Not only is not family, he's not even supportive of other people with PTSD. 

I went into a shame cycle, wondering what is wrong with me.  I got mad at myself for feeling shame, for having so much of my self esteem hinge on needing someone to care about me.  The last 4 years have been brutal and I have changed most of my friends.  I feel awkward and out of place.  I tried to meditate and tell myself I love myself and I know I am doing the right things, to have compassion for my uncle, I don't know what's up with him. 

But, dammit, I had to end all these friendships because no one wanted to deal with me dealing with rape recovery and now my stupid uncle who forces his way into my life with all this PTSD neediness, cannot even hear me say I have PTSD?  I am sick of having to hide having PTSD from everyone.  I know this sounds awful, but I wish that people with PTSD who are not veterans could get the respect that vets with PTSD are finally getting.  It is slow coming for them and not even that much, but it is way more than rape survivors get.  When I "had" bipolar I could tell everyone and they didn't care, but PTSD makes them nervous because I have stuff to talk about that threatens their safe little reality of what life is like.  Bad things only happen to bad people.  Before I had a chemical imbalance and that wasn't my fault, but being raped at age 14 on the streets is somehow dangerous for them to hear.

I keep trying to reconnect with the friends I lost in the last 3 or 4 years, the fashionistas, the stoned punks, the hipster rockstars, the self-righteous anarchists, but you know what?  Their stories of drama at the bar and rants about abstract political theories and what their band is doing and photos of themselves at nightclubs, it seems a million miles away.  It's not my world anymore.  I feel good about that, but I don't know what my world is now. 

I guess I am lonely and trying to feel good about myself when I don't have a mirror to reflect my worth to me and it gets hard being my own cheerleader day after day.  I hate how insecure I have become, how I doubt my worth now, how I think no one wants to know my reality or truths.  How I feel like no one understands.  I cannot go back to acting like I don't know what is in the world under the manic panic hair dye and punk LPs and hash - and I don't want to.  But I feel very isolated.  I know I bring down the party, but the party feels like a nightmare to me. 

I thought my uncle would be happy that someone understands what he feels - That he knows stuff about reality that people and the government wants to deny.  But he just blew me off.