So...women are built to be relational. We have strong relational needs. Our brains are built to need relationship.

Gifted people are different. We develop differently. That is a relational challenge. We may feel like aliens who cannot relate. We may become "overly dependent" on the few gifted people we know--our relatives and a few friends. If our family of origin is disturbed we may be stuck between, "these smart relatives get me, but abuse me, and those neighbors, I dont know if I can trust them because they dont get me or relate to me. My family causes me pain but the others cause me despair. "

I know I retreated to an abusive, emotionally incestuous family because I was so despairing of life away from other gifted people.

If gifted females are already "at risk" because we have relational challenges due to giftedness, PTSD with Its irritability, hostility, and general feeling of being cut off from humanity only drives us further away from the sense of belonging in community that we need.

In my patriarchal family, as in much of society, Men were allowed to express irritation and anger and women are not.

Being a gifted PTSD woman has isolated me and made me vulnerable. Ive suffered from lack of relationship with society. I dont fit into groups. I dont know how. I dont have practice. Maybe knowing, I cn l
arm.

Its worse to be a fundamentally kind compassionate empathic woman with flareups of scathing fury pr just cutting biting irritation than to be a total ladydog or a mean old curmudgeon. It hurts people worse and males them more afraid.

Sorrynfornthe streambof consciousness blog. Im suffering here. Writing helps me clarify and you may know the feeling of...sometimes we have to say It to someone.