So… I’m feeling kinda ashamed of a thing I’m doing. But I’m not sure if it’s bad. During this pregnancy I’m thinking a lot about Future Middle Child as AFAB. (Assigned Female At Birth) I’m doing this because the physical sensation of my current pregnancy is so different from my previous pregnancies and I’m sorta obsessed with wondering if it increased testosterone.

So I care about the chemical soup I am floating in during pregnancy when a set of genital configurations were present.

I know that it doesn’t tell me what my kids gender will be and I know that they may or may not grow up and keep whatever set of junk they are born with. That’s all totally cool.

But when I’m pregnant and trying to figure out my place in my story… the AFAB part seems relevant because if this currently growing child is AMAB that means this pregnancy probably is partially different because of that part of chemical soup and that’s interesting for my future medical treatment.

But I feel like I’m reinforcing a binary view of my kid. I don’t believe they will always be as femme of center as they are right this minute. I think they are going to have a complicated life. And I’m on board.

I’m just… thinking about the chemical soup I swim in while I’m incubating.

I wish that didn’t make me feel like I was erasing my child’s identity. I know you are nonbinary. I will help you in whatever way you need on that journey. But there were these few months where we shared a blood stream and you were my me-not-me and you changed me and I’m trying to understand how that works in the larger scale of my chemical soup.

I’m wondering if testosterone supplementation is something I should consider after I finish having kids. I’ve flat been offered it by one doctor in the past. It would mean a drive to San Francisco but… I could take bart. And visit Sarah.

I don’t think I am trans even slightly. But I think that testosterone might be something I could use a wee bit more of.

How do I talk about this without talking about this. The CPS call is really… intense. The specific phrasing that came up “Kids explore. Kids try games. Kids make choices we really wish they would’t make because they have to learn.”

I’m trying very hard to turn this into a reparenting moment for myself. I did stuff that was worse than what my kids have done. I was also younger and acting upon the explicit directions of my parent.

This feels like one of those life moments where I really need to forgive myself. I was five when I raped a little boy. I didn’t know what rape was. I didn’t know what consent was. I thought I was supposed to do that to everyone. Kids explore. Kids try games. Kids make choices we really wish they wouldn’t make.

A lot of my friends have spent over a decade trying to talk me into believing that I’m not a terrible, horrible person because I fucked up so completely when I was five. I have not been interested in nor able to absorb their words.

Am I more ready now? CPS didn’t come down like a ton of bricks. There was no blanket condemnation. There was a resigned sadness to the fact that kids do shit and it doesn’t make them beyond redemption it just means they need concentrated extra lessons on why they can’t do it again.

I was up half the night thinking about my father. I genuinely don’t know how to feel about him. I was also thinking about my mom.

I’ve spent most of the past couple of years feeling guilty and ashamed for breaking contact with my mom. I owe her.

But even though my mom only beat me a few times and even though my mom was “unaware” of the sexual assaults… My mom told me to my face that marriage meant becoming someone’s whore and never having a choice about sex again in your life. I was young. I was what, 12? 13?

That’s fucking up my marriage in some complicated ways. Growing up to believe that sex is supposed to be painful and my enjoyment is… not the point anyway… I’m a hole to be filled.

That fucks up a marriage.

Because I want to change it. I sure as shit don’t want to model that horror to my children. So what does that mean? I no longer want to believe that being married means I’m a whore who owes sex in exchange for the roof over my head and the food in my belly. This is hurting me so much.

I’m not saying this came from Noah. I walked into this marriage with the belief it would be that way. Noah didn’t object to the idea that it would be ok for him to have sex when he wanted regardless of how it felt to me.

That became a problem. Which isn’t his fault but seriously alters our relationship anyway. Because if that is all I am in this relationship then I need to go have other relationships where I am not this because I cannot bear the mental load of deserving to be fucked painfully for my whole life as just what I deserve.

If what I am in this house is a whore who owes service for my food and board then I need to have relationships where that is not what I am. Because I need to be something different. I need to not just be a worthless whore for my whole life.

Yeah, I blame my father for this. It seems legit.

I need to “get over” so much. I need to get over feeling haunted by the fact that I was brought into this world because a rapist wanted to hurt a woman he viewed as a whore who was getting too uppity. My existence is a punishment.

I was not brought into this world in love or joy or desire. I was born from hate and malicious intention. I was born because my father wanted another whore to rape.

It is incredibly hard to feel like that isn’t my burden to carry. It is hard to feel like it isn’t my fault. I am evil. I was brought into the world to be a weapon and a victim.

My mother wanted to abort me and she couldn’t for religious reasons.

Just about 36 years later that shouldn’t matter so much. But I’m still crying.

I’m tired of being told that I am rude and disgusting for asking my friends for help when help should only come from family. If I asked for more help from my children that would start crossing lines. It would be getting close to emotional incest and no that’s not an acceptable trade for “not being rude” to my friends. I’m needy and I’m pathetic and my friends are willing to put up with that.

I’ve been thinking a lot about the folks who broke off friendships with me in the last year. I love them very much. I’ve put 7 and around 12 years of effort into those women. But the thing is I’d say the rude, judgmental shit I said again. I don’t think I was wrong. Even with the consequences. So I get to feel sad about the fact that there are consequences for actions and I don’t think there is another way for this to work out. Life is like that.

I was talking to a friend about the people I have problems with in the bdsm community. The funny thing is… if I did get along with the people I actively avoid… I would know for sure that I wasn’t a good person. I would know for sure that I was scummy and low.

I don’t want to know that for sure about myself. So I’m ok with having large conflicts with some people.

I don’t believe it is ethical to “mentor” an 18/19 year old and line up your nasty old men friends and tell the young person now they have to fuck all these people “in order to learn”. I don’t need to get along with people who will act that way. That’s disgusting.

I don’t have that many conflicts with people. Not considering how many people and communities I know. I feel like I mostly have conflicts for good reasons.

The thing is, my friends don’t hesitate to tell me when I’m fucking up because they want me to be healthy. My friends call me on it when I’m too harsh with my kids. They tell me to be nice to my husband. They tell me to be nicer to myself. They judge my choices and tell me that some of them have a poor chance of working out.

I want that from my friends. I wouldn’t want friends who watched me set my life on fire and they sit around “minding their own business”. That’s not a fucking friend.

If you hate me because I say in front of you and your child that hitting children is wrong and indicates that an adult is out of control and the ADULT needs to be removed before they cause damage…

I can live with that. I don’t feel bad even a little.

Even though you hate me for “shoving my culture down your throat”. I will cheerfully shove the culture of “don’t beat your children” down EVERYONE’S THROAT AND I WON’T FEEL BAD.

I feel bad that I exist because I am a weapon and I’m intended to be a victim. I don’t feel bad about most of what I do with my agency while I happen to be alive. Despite my extreme dysregulation… I think I make a lot of good choices. Not alllll of my choices are good, that’s so true. Which is why I’m glad I have friends who watch me and say, “Krissy you are fucking up. Stop it.”

I have a really hard time with the fact that most of my life, most of my measurable “success” at anything in this life is going to be my motherhood.

I really wanted to be bigger than that. But I’m not really.

I’m not a real sex educator. I organized education for a convention that people flew to from all over the country, but whatever.

I’m not a real teacher because I hide at home and educate my children but my efforts aren’t any more substantial than “all mothers think constantly about their children” so what I’m doing is just… nothing.

I feel worthless and pointless and I’m in so much fucking pain.

Pregnancy is really shitty. And this is my easiest pregnancy ever.

None of the reading I do matters. None of the work I do matters.

I don’t matter.

Even if my fuck up when I was five was kind of understandable. Even if I can forgive myself for that action (which I really don’t know if I can do it or not at this point) I don’t know that I can forgive myself for being born. I shouldn’t be here.

It’s interesting talking to the kids’ therapists about ancestral trauma. That’s a real thing. My kids carry within them the weight of all that happened to me and all that happened to my mother and my father and my grandparents. Some truly horrendous shit has happened to my family. And my kids carry that in them.

How can I help them feel like they are not a weapon and a victim?