melody5697
New member
- Joined
- Jul 4, 2022
- Messages
- 23
- Enneagram
- 6w7
- Instinctual Variant
- so/sx
I didn't have much luck on Personality Cafe, so I figured I'd try posting here instead. I'm gonna go ahead and just post what I posted on Personality Cafe (with a few small modifications) because I spent several hours on it, but if it's a bad questionnaire or something, feel free to suggest a different one for me to fill out instead. I really didn't know how to answer the questions without going into a lot of personal details, which I really don't mind sharing because I'm weirdly open about such things, but I understand that some people may be uncomfortable, so I figured I should just give a heads up that there will be mentions of child abuse, sexual assault (no details), self-harm, and suicide attempts. When I initially posted it, it was way too long, so I made a shortened version. Only the shortened version will be included here because I can't fit both. I think I'm either a 4 or a 6.
Prerequisites
What age range are you in?
I'm 25.
Any disorders or conditions we should know about?
I suspect I might have either autism or social (pragmatic) communication disorder. Multiple mental health professionals have said that they think I'm autistic, but I don't have an official diagnosis and I'm on the fence about whether or not I should try to get one. Maybe I'm just a normal socially awkward person and I'm just worrying too much, but actually unintentionally OFFENDING people just happens so much that I really suspect I might have an actual condition. (Granted, it doesn't happen as much as it used to, but that might just be because I spend less time around people now.) I have a history of severe depression (like, so severe that I attempted suicide multiple times), but I've been okay for the past 3.5 years. I used to have panic attacks, but I haven't had one in over five years.
Main Questions
1. What do you think your life is about? What drives you in life? This can be something like a goal or a purpose, or anything else that comes to mind.
I'm not sure... I know I want to be a good person. I want to convert to Orthodox Judaism, get married, and have kids. I want to be a foster mom so I can help victims of child abuse. I guess my current goals are moving out of my dad's house and converting to Judaism. But... I really don't know. Sorry.
2. What were you like as a kid?
I assume we're talking about when I was in elementary school or earlier, not when I was in middle school and high school? (If I should be including middle school and high school as well, let me know and I'll add that information.) The only description I've been able to get out of relatives is outgoing and creative. From my own perspective... Yes, I was outgoing, but only in very small groups, or in larger groups that were free to split into very small groups that did their own thing. I had no issue walking up to strangers and talking to them, but I was slow to warm up in larger groups. I loved playing with other kids, but I was also perfectly happy to play alone. I loved dolls, playing with friends, reading, exploring the woods, playing with Legos, watching Boomerang, and playing on the computer. I usually let other kids have their way when I played with them to avoid conflict. I was highly religious and sometimes rather intolerant of other kids' religious beliefs. I'd still be friends with them, but sometimes I would try to convert them and start stupid drama. I was home schooled until third grade and a bit socially isolated because my parents were doing it wrong. Before I started going to school, I copied characters from books. After I started going to school, I alternated between imitating other kids and basically being against anything popular. Sometimes it was a bit of both and I would imitate the annoying kids who nobody liked because I thought they were funny. While I didn't realize it, I really wasn't good with people. Sometimes I could be caring and want to help others, but other times I was just cruel.
3. Describe your relationship with your parents. Does anything stand out about the way you interacted?
My mom has untreated schizophrenia. Sometimes things were okay and she acted like a normal mom, showing affection and being there when I was upset and doing fun stuff with me. But she became abusive when I was in first grade. She may have already been abusive before that, but it was in first grade that it got bad and I actually remember what happened. She called me a retard and beat me because I wasn't doing my schoolwork. I wasn't doing my schoolwork because she was only teaching me writing and math and I wanted to learn about history and science and I was completely burnt out. When my sister (who is mildly autistic) started school a year later, Mom abused her, too. We were terrified. We would run off to another room and lock Mom out to get away from her. We never told Dad what was happening because we assumed he knew. One time I was crying and saying I wanted to run away from home, and my mom said, "Fine! Save me a million dollars!" When my dad made my mom move out and the CPS backed him up, she told me it was my fault she had to leave. Despite all this, I still loved her and looked forward to visiting her every other weekend after my parents separated, and I was upset when her visitation rights were taken away.
My dad is probably autistic and my mom was emotionally abusing him and isolating him from his friends and family. Despite his failure to protect me from my mom, I felt like I had a good relationship with him until the end of elementary school. He was affectionate. He spent time with me. He seemed to be proud of me when I did a good job. There were certainly things he could've handled better, but overall, he was a good dad. But everything changed at the end of fifth grade. He read my emails and found out about me having this creepy obsession with a girl at school (probably a crush; I'm actually straight but I was attracted to girls when I was younger), and he was super mad and forbade me from talking to her. I stopped trusting him, and he stopped showing affection. I really wasn't coping well with the guilt for everything I'd done to hurt people in elementary school, and I stopped doing my homework and started acting as annoying as possible in school. My dad was constantly mad at me. He treated me like I couldn't do anything right. He completely mishandled all the issues I was having and blamed me for his problems, even after I attempted suicide in eighth grade. He did actually seem concerned when I was in ninth grade when I stopped talking to people at school because I was so terrified of being what I'd been in middle school and my depression got so bad that I couldn't pretend to be okay anymore, but he still was constantly criticizing me and never, ever praising me and he wouldn't get me help. One of my suicide attempts was actually because I was so terrified of what he would do when he found out that I hadn't done a major project in school. I eventually had to go live with my grandparents for the sake of my mental health. All my visits with my dad were very stressful and I would throw myself into neopaganism afterwards. It eventually came out that he's a porn addict and that's what had him all messed up, and he was getting help and he clearly felt horrible about what an awful dad he'd been. He was sobbing and apologizing over and over. For reasons that made sense to me at the time, I moved back in with him after finishing Job Corps 3.5 years ago, but now I regret that decision. He frequently gets mad at me for being emotional, and it isn't fair that my sister doesn't have to contribute to the household. I can't wait to move out, and I honestly wouldn't be sad if I never saw him again.
4. What values are important to you? What do you hope to avoid doing or being?
Kindness, honesty, doing the right thing, freedom, I guess? I would like to avoid being a jerk or a liar. I don't want to be someone who isn't there to support the people I care about. I don't want to be selfish or evil. I don't want to be someone who puts people at risk by ignoring important regulations. (There's a backstory here. I worked in the bakery and deli at Walmart and I was the only person who actually cared about following sanitation guidelines and FDA regulations and stuff and I was constantly worried that customers would get sick and possibly even DIE because of everyone's failure follow the rules.) And I don't want to abuse my future children.
5. Aside from phobias, are there any fears that characterized your childhood? Have they continued into the present day, or not, and if not, how have you dealt with them?
Well, I was afraid of spiders. It's unclear if this was because of a scary giant spider in a movie or because I was obsessed with Garfield and Garfield was afraid of spiders. I stopped being afraid of spiders a few years ago when I learned more about them and found out how adorable jumping spiders are. Um... I believe it was in fifth grade that I started worrying about people secretly hating me. I got more paranoid about it in middle school, and it got even worse in high school. I often lashed out at people over it. It got better after a while when I went to live with my grandparents. But it's still an issue (but certainly not to anywhere near the same extent as before). I'm always worrying that maybe I did something wrong and people will hate me. I often freak out and start apologizing if I think I might've said something wrong. Sometimes I question the motives of people who are nice to me. I really haven't dealt with it. It's seriously holding me back from making friends and having a normal social life because I'm worried that I'll do the wrong thing and then people will hate me. And I guess that's it for major fears that originated in childhood.
6. a.) How do you see yourself?
I see myself as a decent person, possibly even a good person. But I'm very socially awkward, and I'm worried that I might not actually be good enough to convert to Judaism.
b.) How do you want others to see you?
I'd like to be seen as a kind, caring person who always tries to do the right thing. This is part of how some people have said they see me, so that's good.
c.) What do you dislike the most in other people?
I dislike people who are cruel.
7. Which habit do you most automatically act on? Rank the following habits from most to least automatic, on a scale of 1 (most) to 3 (least).
a.) Work for personal gain with more concern for self than for others.
b.) Strive for a sense of tranquility in yourself and the world around you
c.) Decide what is right for the betterment of something or someone else.
Um... 1. a; 2. c; 3. b, I guess. I'm not sure about that, though, and I hope I'm wrong, because that doesn't sound like a very nice way to be. My dad agrees with this ranking (though he says it isn't in a bad way). But my grandpa says CAB and he's very surprised by my dad's answer. My best friend also says CAB. Maybe my grandpa and my best friend are the ones who are right. I mean, deciding what's right for the betterment of something or someone else doesn't always mean successfully DOING what's right for the betterment of something or someone else. And my dad also said that it wasn't an easy choice and he really could've gone either way. So perhaps it is actually CAB.
8. Where does the wandering mind take you? What provokes this?
My mind may wander to random questions about the application of the rules of the religion I'm converting to, or I might overanalyze interactions I've recently had with people, or I might imagine interactions I could have with people, or I might just think about whatever it is I'm interested in at the time. There's probably other stuff, too, but I can't remember everything I think about. I'm not sure what's being asked here. What provokes my mind to wander, you mean? I guess my mind wanders when I'm bored or when I'm doing something that doesn't require much thinking. If I answered this wrong, please clarify and I'll fix it.
9.What makes you feel your best? What makes you feel your worst?
Hmm... I think I feel my best when I'm doing something to help people. I used to work at Walmart, and I found the customer service aspect of my job VERY fulfilling. I absolutely loved my job before I realized we weren't cleaning things properly.
As for what makes me feel my worst... Being in an extremely stressful situation in which I just experienced a traumatic event and I have zero control over my life and it seems like almost everybody hates me and there's no way out. The most extreme case was when I was a residential student at Job Corps and the other students were spreading nasty rumors about me and my roommates weren't letting me sleep. Out of desperation, I accepted an offer from a man I barely knew to stay at his apartments on weekends. I thought I could trust him because my friends trusted him, but he ended up sexually assaulting me. The staff at Job Corps told me that what happened was my own fault. I was coping okay at first because I had my friends to support me, but then they suddenly kicked me out of the meetup group we were all in without even giving a real explanation. This led to severe emotional instability, paranoia, lashing out at people, being so angry at my roommates that I wanted to kill them but I took out my anger on myself instead by cutting myself, and suicidal thoughts.
10. Let's talk about emotions. Explain what might make you feel the following, how they feel to you or how you react to the emotion:
a.) anger
I feel angry when a situation is unfair or when people are doing things wrong. So I get angry about my sister not contributing anything to the household other than doing the dishes while I have to pay $800 a month (or 40% of my income; whichever is less) to live here. My dad says I'm nasty to her about it.
And I get angry at my coworker because she keeps on doing things wrong and refuses to listen when I try to correct her. I don't mean to yell at her, but that's what often ends up happening. She thinks I'm really aggressive. Sometimes I just complain to our supervisor about her doing the job wrong or behaving in ways that make it more difficult for me to do my job. I try not to let on how annoyed I am at being told to stop complaining and focus on my own work when she's actually AFFECTING my work. It's also really irritating when I'm told to stop "blaming" her when I objectively explain how a problem occurred and it just happens that her actions were the primary cause. Again, I try to hide my irritation. I often end up complaining about it to a friend later, though.
b.) shame
I feel shame when I do something that harms someone else in some way. Like when my grandparents were visiting and my grandma mentioned wanting to go to Japan and I told her that I'd read that Japanese people are smaller and lots of stuff is built for small Japanese people and that might be a problem for her. (She's fat. But I think I've heard about it being an issue for foreigners who aren't even fat.) Everyone present got mad at me and I realized I'd said something bad (and I thought it was worse than it actually was because of how strong their reactions were), so I ran to my room, slammed the door, slid to the floor with my back against the door, and sobbed. My grandpa came down to talk to me and I asked what's wrong with me and why I can't learn how to not offend people. He reassured me that, while I made a mistake, I've actually improved a lot. I stopped crying after a while and apologized to my grandma and she forgave me.
c.) anxiety
I almost always have this feeling of dread, but it's kind of in the background and something I can just ignore in many situations because I'm so used to it and it isn't necessarily accompanied by actually worrying about anything. Not always, though. I'm so worried about making people hate me that most social situations are difficult for me. I actually was on the verge of tears once because I was too afraid of being rejected to just go up to some random people at a lunch and ask to sit with them. (I couldn't sit with any of the people who I would normally sit with.) When a friend says they'll be right back but then they don't come back, I worry that maybe they just wanted to get away from me. I tend to catastrophize a lot.
11. Describe how you respond to the following:
a.) stress
Overreacting to everything, negative thinking
b.) negative unexpected change
Um... I suddenly lost my job at Walmart a year ago because I had too many points for being late. There was a misunderstanding of how the points system worked and I didn't realize how many points I had. I started panicking when I clocked in, went to request PPTO because I was late (as long as you have enough PPTO and you request it properly, you don't get points), and saw how many points I had. I requested PPTO for the ones that I could, but it wasn't enough. I couldn't request PPTO for anything from more than a week ago. I still had enough points to be terminated. I was totally freaking out and I told my coworkers that I was afraid I was about to be fired. They tried to reassure me that surely I would've been fired already if I was gonna get fired (considering just how many points I had before I submitted the PPTO requests), but sure enough, I got fired. I called my grandpa crying. I was so worried that my dad would yell at me and I wouldn't be able to find another job. I ended up pretending to go to work for several days (but really using the computer at the library to look for a job). I did end up eventually telling my dad that I got fired, but I didn't tell him why because I knew he would be so mad at me for being late to work so much. He still doesn't know. He thinks I was fired because I was constantly freaking out about all the health code violations potentially putting customers in danger. Fortunately things went much better than expected and I got a job offer within two weeks.
c.) conflict
I try to argue and defend myself and stuff, but when it doesn't go well (and it usually doesn't because people won't let me speak and then I start yelling and then they start yelling), I get overwhelmed and start to cry.
12. a.) What kind of role are you naturally inclined to take in a group? Why?
Do you mean, like, group social situations? Mostly I just listen. I don't want to be judged and I usually don't have much to say anyway. But every once in a while, I'll have something to say, and if people let me, I'll go off on an enthusiastic monologue about whatever it is. If you mean, like, a group project in school, or some major collaborative project at work... I honestly haven't had to do anything like that since ninth grade. I guess I can say what I did in group projects back when I was in public school? I definitely never wanted to take the lead on projects. I lacked the confidence. I shared my ideas if I was asked or if I thought everyone else was doing it wrong, but mostly I just did whatever part of the work everyone else wanted me to do. There was always an expectation that I would actually be doing less of the work, though, since everyone knew I never did my homework.
b.) If put in power, how do you behave? Why?
I've never been put in power, so I'm not sure how I would behave. I don't think I'd be very good at it, though.
c.) Do you tend to struggle with others who have authority over you? Why?
I don't think so? I actually prefer being told what to do and being given specific instructions (preferably in writing). It's less stressful. However, sometimes the people in authority are wrong, and that's when problems may arise. Like, when I worked at Walmart, my team lead seriously did not care about health codes or even Walmart's own sanitation standards. I complained to my manager, and he didn't care, either. He told me to just teach everyone how to do things right myself, but that didn't work. Nobody would listen to me and I often had conflicts with my team lead and my manager over their failure to address these issues. I was just so worried about customers getting sick from eating our food.
13. What do you see or notice in others that most people don't?
I have absolutely no idea. Sorry.
14. Comment on your relationship with trust.
The only people who I completely trust are my grandparents and my best friend. As for everyone else, I worry that perhaps they're only pretending to like me.
15. Briefly: What religious and/or political beliefs do you have? Do you think they influenced your responses in this questionnaire?
As I stated earlier, I am in the process of converting to Orthodox Judaism. More specifically, Modern Orthodox Judaism. Modern Orthodox Jews are fully observant of Jewish law (well, not all of them are, but that's what the movement is supposed to be), but they also embrace the modern world. The point of Judaism is to acknowledge that the world sucks, but to also believe that it can be fixed and to work together with G-d to do so. Judaism is a religion that sees every individual as inherently valuable, because we're all made in G-d's image. While you might not guess this from the fact that there are 613 commandments, Judaism actually really values freedom. People are supposed to take care of each other. A lot of emphasis is put on learning. The Jewish people have survived for thousands of years without even having a land of their own as other nations rose and fell around them because they've never forgotten where they come from or what they've been called to do. The ideals of Judaism have been spread throughout the world by its daughter religions, Christianity and Islam (which, while certainly theologically problematic, have overall had a positive influence on the world by spreading ethical monotheism). I really want to become a part of this amazing people!
As for politics, I'm not really sure what to call myself. Libertarianism is what I was raised with. I rejected it in favor of democratic socialism when I was 15, but eventually I realized I was wrong and now I lean more libertarian again. So I guess I can call myself a libertarian? But I'm not sure I really know enough about it yet to confidently call myself that.
I don't think my religious beliefs influenced my responses. The kind of person I am influenced my religious beliefs. However, it's likely that the religious and political beliefs I was raised with influenced the kind of person I became. I was raised Lutheran (more specifically, LCMS).
Prerequisites
What age range are you in?
I'm 25.
Any disorders or conditions we should know about?
I suspect I might have either autism or social (pragmatic) communication disorder. Multiple mental health professionals have said that they think I'm autistic, but I don't have an official diagnosis and I'm on the fence about whether or not I should try to get one. Maybe I'm just a normal socially awkward person and I'm just worrying too much, but actually unintentionally OFFENDING people just happens so much that I really suspect I might have an actual condition. (Granted, it doesn't happen as much as it used to, but that might just be because I spend less time around people now.) I have a history of severe depression (like, so severe that I attempted suicide multiple times), but I've been okay for the past 3.5 years. I used to have panic attacks, but I haven't had one in over five years.
Main Questions
1. What do you think your life is about? What drives you in life? This can be something like a goal or a purpose, or anything else that comes to mind.
I'm not sure... I know I want to be a good person. I want to convert to Orthodox Judaism, get married, and have kids. I want to be a foster mom so I can help victims of child abuse. I guess my current goals are moving out of my dad's house and converting to Judaism. But... I really don't know. Sorry.
2. What were you like as a kid?
I assume we're talking about when I was in elementary school or earlier, not when I was in middle school and high school? (If I should be including middle school and high school as well, let me know and I'll add that information.) The only description I've been able to get out of relatives is outgoing and creative. From my own perspective... Yes, I was outgoing, but only in very small groups, or in larger groups that were free to split into very small groups that did their own thing. I had no issue walking up to strangers and talking to them, but I was slow to warm up in larger groups. I loved playing with other kids, but I was also perfectly happy to play alone. I loved dolls, playing with friends, reading, exploring the woods, playing with Legos, watching Boomerang, and playing on the computer. I usually let other kids have their way when I played with them to avoid conflict. I was highly religious and sometimes rather intolerant of other kids' religious beliefs. I'd still be friends with them, but sometimes I would try to convert them and start stupid drama. I was home schooled until third grade and a bit socially isolated because my parents were doing it wrong. Before I started going to school, I copied characters from books. After I started going to school, I alternated between imitating other kids and basically being against anything popular. Sometimes it was a bit of both and I would imitate the annoying kids who nobody liked because I thought they were funny. While I didn't realize it, I really wasn't good with people. Sometimes I could be caring and want to help others, but other times I was just cruel.
3. Describe your relationship with your parents. Does anything stand out about the way you interacted?
My mom has untreated schizophrenia. Sometimes things were okay and she acted like a normal mom, showing affection and being there when I was upset and doing fun stuff with me. But she became abusive when I was in first grade. She may have already been abusive before that, but it was in first grade that it got bad and I actually remember what happened. She called me a retard and beat me because I wasn't doing my schoolwork. I wasn't doing my schoolwork because she was only teaching me writing and math and I wanted to learn about history and science and I was completely burnt out. When my sister (who is mildly autistic) started school a year later, Mom abused her, too. We were terrified. We would run off to another room and lock Mom out to get away from her. We never told Dad what was happening because we assumed he knew. One time I was crying and saying I wanted to run away from home, and my mom said, "Fine! Save me a million dollars!" When my dad made my mom move out and the CPS backed him up, she told me it was my fault she had to leave. Despite all this, I still loved her and looked forward to visiting her every other weekend after my parents separated, and I was upset when her visitation rights were taken away.
My dad is probably autistic and my mom was emotionally abusing him and isolating him from his friends and family. Despite his failure to protect me from my mom, I felt like I had a good relationship with him until the end of elementary school. He was affectionate. He spent time with me. He seemed to be proud of me when I did a good job. There were certainly things he could've handled better, but overall, he was a good dad. But everything changed at the end of fifth grade. He read my emails and found out about me having this creepy obsession with a girl at school (probably a crush; I'm actually straight but I was attracted to girls when I was younger), and he was super mad and forbade me from talking to her. I stopped trusting him, and he stopped showing affection. I really wasn't coping well with the guilt for everything I'd done to hurt people in elementary school, and I stopped doing my homework and started acting as annoying as possible in school. My dad was constantly mad at me. He treated me like I couldn't do anything right. He completely mishandled all the issues I was having and blamed me for his problems, even after I attempted suicide in eighth grade. He did actually seem concerned when I was in ninth grade when I stopped talking to people at school because I was so terrified of being what I'd been in middle school and my depression got so bad that I couldn't pretend to be okay anymore, but he still was constantly criticizing me and never, ever praising me and he wouldn't get me help. One of my suicide attempts was actually because I was so terrified of what he would do when he found out that I hadn't done a major project in school. I eventually had to go live with my grandparents for the sake of my mental health. All my visits with my dad were very stressful and I would throw myself into neopaganism afterwards. It eventually came out that he's a porn addict and that's what had him all messed up, and he was getting help and he clearly felt horrible about what an awful dad he'd been. He was sobbing and apologizing over and over. For reasons that made sense to me at the time, I moved back in with him after finishing Job Corps 3.5 years ago, but now I regret that decision. He frequently gets mad at me for being emotional, and it isn't fair that my sister doesn't have to contribute to the household. I can't wait to move out, and I honestly wouldn't be sad if I never saw him again.
4. What values are important to you? What do you hope to avoid doing or being?
Kindness, honesty, doing the right thing, freedom, I guess? I would like to avoid being a jerk or a liar. I don't want to be someone who isn't there to support the people I care about. I don't want to be selfish or evil. I don't want to be someone who puts people at risk by ignoring important regulations. (There's a backstory here. I worked in the bakery and deli at Walmart and I was the only person who actually cared about following sanitation guidelines and FDA regulations and stuff and I was constantly worried that customers would get sick and possibly even DIE because of everyone's failure follow the rules.) And I don't want to abuse my future children.
5. Aside from phobias, are there any fears that characterized your childhood? Have they continued into the present day, or not, and if not, how have you dealt with them?
Well, I was afraid of spiders. It's unclear if this was because of a scary giant spider in a movie or because I was obsessed with Garfield and Garfield was afraid of spiders. I stopped being afraid of spiders a few years ago when I learned more about them and found out how adorable jumping spiders are. Um... I believe it was in fifth grade that I started worrying about people secretly hating me. I got more paranoid about it in middle school, and it got even worse in high school. I often lashed out at people over it. It got better after a while when I went to live with my grandparents. But it's still an issue (but certainly not to anywhere near the same extent as before). I'm always worrying that maybe I did something wrong and people will hate me. I often freak out and start apologizing if I think I might've said something wrong. Sometimes I question the motives of people who are nice to me. I really haven't dealt with it. It's seriously holding me back from making friends and having a normal social life because I'm worried that I'll do the wrong thing and then people will hate me. And I guess that's it for major fears that originated in childhood.
6. a.) How do you see yourself?
I see myself as a decent person, possibly even a good person. But I'm very socially awkward, and I'm worried that I might not actually be good enough to convert to Judaism.
b.) How do you want others to see you?
I'd like to be seen as a kind, caring person who always tries to do the right thing. This is part of how some people have said they see me, so that's good.
c.) What do you dislike the most in other people?
I dislike people who are cruel.
7. Which habit do you most automatically act on? Rank the following habits from most to least automatic, on a scale of 1 (most) to 3 (least).
a.) Work for personal gain with more concern for self than for others.
b.) Strive for a sense of tranquility in yourself and the world around you
c.) Decide what is right for the betterment of something or someone else.
Um... 1. a; 2. c; 3. b, I guess. I'm not sure about that, though, and I hope I'm wrong, because that doesn't sound like a very nice way to be. My dad agrees with this ranking (though he says it isn't in a bad way). But my grandpa says CAB and he's very surprised by my dad's answer. My best friend also says CAB. Maybe my grandpa and my best friend are the ones who are right. I mean, deciding what's right for the betterment of something or someone else doesn't always mean successfully DOING what's right for the betterment of something or someone else. And my dad also said that it wasn't an easy choice and he really could've gone either way. So perhaps it is actually CAB.
8. Where does the wandering mind take you? What provokes this?
My mind may wander to random questions about the application of the rules of the religion I'm converting to, or I might overanalyze interactions I've recently had with people, or I might imagine interactions I could have with people, or I might just think about whatever it is I'm interested in at the time. There's probably other stuff, too, but I can't remember everything I think about. I'm not sure what's being asked here. What provokes my mind to wander, you mean? I guess my mind wanders when I'm bored or when I'm doing something that doesn't require much thinking. If I answered this wrong, please clarify and I'll fix it.
9.What makes you feel your best? What makes you feel your worst?
Hmm... I think I feel my best when I'm doing something to help people. I used to work at Walmart, and I found the customer service aspect of my job VERY fulfilling. I absolutely loved my job before I realized we weren't cleaning things properly.
As for what makes me feel my worst... Being in an extremely stressful situation in which I just experienced a traumatic event and I have zero control over my life and it seems like almost everybody hates me and there's no way out. The most extreme case was when I was a residential student at Job Corps and the other students were spreading nasty rumors about me and my roommates weren't letting me sleep. Out of desperation, I accepted an offer from a man I barely knew to stay at his apartments on weekends. I thought I could trust him because my friends trusted him, but he ended up sexually assaulting me. The staff at Job Corps told me that what happened was my own fault. I was coping okay at first because I had my friends to support me, but then they suddenly kicked me out of the meetup group we were all in without even giving a real explanation. This led to severe emotional instability, paranoia, lashing out at people, being so angry at my roommates that I wanted to kill them but I took out my anger on myself instead by cutting myself, and suicidal thoughts.
10. Let's talk about emotions. Explain what might make you feel the following, how they feel to you or how you react to the emotion:
a.) anger
I feel angry when a situation is unfair or when people are doing things wrong. So I get angry about my sister not contributing anything to the household other than doing the dishes while I have to pay $800 a month (or 40% of my income; whichever is less) to live here. My dad says I'm nasty to her about it.
And I get angry at my coworker because she keeps on doing things wrong and refuses to listen when I try to correct her. I don't mean to yell at her, but that's what often ends up happening. She thinks I'm really aggressive. Sometimes I just complain to our supervisor about her doing the job wrong or behaving in ways that make it more difficult for me to do my job. I try not to let on how annoyed I am at being told to stop complaining and focus on my own work when she's actually AFFECTING my work. It's also really irritating when I'm told to stop "blaming" her when I objectively explain how a problem occurred and it just happens that her actions were the primary cause. Again, I try to hide my irritation. I often end up complaining about it to a friend later, though.b.) shame
I feel shame when I do something that harms someone else in some way. Like when my grandparents were visiting and my grandma mentioned wanting to go to Japan and I told her that I'd read that Japanese people are smaller and lots of stuff is built for small Japanese people and that might be a problem for her. (She's fat. But I think I've heard about it being an issue for foreigners who aren't even fat.) Everyone present got mad at me and I realized I'd said something bad (and I thought it was worse than it actually was because of how strong their reactions were), so I ran to my room, slammed the door, slid to the floor with my back against the door, and sobbed. My grandpa came down to talk to me and I asked what's wrong with me and why I can't learn how to not offend people. He reassured me that, while I made a mistake, I've actually improved a lot. I stopped crying after a while and apologized to my grandma and she forgave me.
c.) anxiety
I almost always have this feeling of dread, but it's kind of in the background and something I can just ignore in many situations because I'm so used to it and it isn't necessarily accompanied by actually worrying about anything. Not always, though. I'm so worried about making people hate me that most social situations are difficult for me. I actually was on the verge of tears once because I was too afraid of being rejected to just go up to some random people at a lunch and ask to sit with them. (I couldn't sit with any of the people who I would normally sit with.) When a friend says they'll be right back but then they don't come back, I worry that maybe they just wanted to get away from me. I tend to catastrophize a lot.
11. Describe how you respond to the following:
a.) stress
Overreacting to everything, negative thinking
b.) negative unexpected change
Um... I suddenly lost my job at Walmart a year ago because I had too many points for being late. There was a misunderstanding of how the points system worked and I didn't realize how many points I had. I started panicking when I clocked in, went to request PPTO because I was late (as long as you have enough PPTO and you request it properly, you don't get points), and saw how many points I had. I requested PPTO for the ones that I could, but it wasn't enough. I couldn't request PPTO for anything from more than a week ago. I still had enough points to be terminated. I was totally freaking out and I told my coworkers that I was afraid I was about to be fired. They tried to reassure me that surely I would've been fired already if I was gonna get fired (considering just how many points I had before I submitted the PPTO requests), but sure enough, I got fired. I called my grandpa crying. I was so worried that my dad would yell at me and I wouldn't be able to find another job. I ended up pretending to go to work for several days (but really using the computer at the library to look for a job). I did end up eventually telling my dad that I got fired, but I didn't tell him why because I knew he would be so mad at me for being late to work so much. He still doesn't know. He thinks I was fired because I was constantly freaking out about all the health code violations potentially putting customers in danger. Fortunately things went much better than expected and I got a job offer within two weeks.
c.) conflict
I try to argue and defend myself and stuff, but when it doesn't go well (and it usually doesn't because people won't let me speak and then I start yelling and then they start yelling), I get overwhelmed and start to cry.
12. a.) What kind of role are you naturally inclined to take in a group? Why?
Do you mean, like, group social situations? Mostly I just listen. I don't want to be judged and I usually don't have much to say anyway. But every once in a while, I'll have something to say, and if people let me, I'll go off on an enthusiastic monologue about whatever it is. If you mean, like, a group project in school, or some major collaborative project at work... I honestly haven't had to do anything like that since ninth grade. I guess I can say what I did in group projects back when I was in public school? I definitely never wanted to take the lead on projects. I lacked the confidence. I shared my ideas if I was asked or if I thought everyone else was doing it wrong, but mostly I just did whatever part of the work everyone else wanted me to do. There was always an expectation that I would actually be doing less of the work, though, since everyone knew I never did my homework.
b.) If put in power, how do you behave? Why?
I've never been put in power, so I'm not sure how I would behave. I don't think I'd be very good at it, though.
c.) Do you tend to struggle with others who have authority over you? Why?
I don't think so? I actually prefer being told what to do and being given specific instructions (preferably in writing). It's less stressful. However, sometimes the people in authority are wrong, and that's when problems may arise. Like, when I worked at Walmart, my team lead seriously did not care about health codes or even Walmart's own sanitation standards. I complained to my manager, and he didn't care, either. He told me to just teach everyone how to do things right myself, but that didn't work. Nobody would listen to me and I often had conflicts with my team lead and my manager over their failure to address these issues. I was just so worried about customers getting sick from eating our food.
13. What do you see or notice in others that most people don't?
I have absolutely no idea. Sorry.
14. Comment on your relationship with trust.
The only people who I completely trust are my grandparents and my best friend. As for everyone else, I worry that perhaps they're only pretending to like me.
15. Briefly: What religious and/or political beliefs do you have? Do you think they influenced your responses in this questionnaire?
As I stated earlier, I am in the process of converting to Orthodox Judaism. More specifically, Modern Orthodox Judaism. Modern Orthodox Jews are fully observant of Jewish law (well, not all of them are, but that's what the movement is supposed to be), but they also embrace the modern world. The point of Judaism is to acknowledge that the world sucks, but to also believe that it can be fixed and to work together with G-d to do so. Judaism is a religion that sees every individual as inherently valuable, because we're all made in G-d's image. While you might not guess this from the fact that there are 613 commandments, Judaism actually really values freedom. People are supposed to take care of each other. A lot of emphasis is put on learning. The Jewish people have survived for thousands of years without even having a land of their own as other nations rose and fell around them because they've never forgotten where they come from or what they've been called to do. The ideals of Judaism have been spread throughout the world by its daughter religions, Christianity and Islam (which, while certainly theologically problematic, have overall had a positive influence on the world by spreading ethical monotheism). I really want to become a part of this amazing people!
As for politics, I'm not really sure what to call myself. Libertarianism is what I was raised with. I rejected it in favor of democratic socialism when I was 15, but eventually I realized I was wrong and now I lean more libertarian again. So I guess I can call myself a libertarian? But I'm not sure I really know enough about it yet to confidently call myself that.
I don't think my religious beliefs influenced my responses. The kind of person I am influenced my religious beliefs. However, it's likely that the religious and political beliefs I was raised with influenced the kind of person I became. I was raised Lutheran (more specifically, LCMS).
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