Recent posts
#1
Recovery Journals / Re: dollyvee's recovery journa...
Last post by dollyvee - Today at 08:47:23 PMThank you Chart - I'm glad to hear you could relate to some of the things I wrote. I always learn a lot from her videos. This is the one I was watching yesterday. The videos on toxic shame and fearful avoidant attachment are also interesting to me.
Why Limerence Can Be Harder To Get Over Than A "Real" Relationship (And How To Do It)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VWvSsp1zkfg
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I read somethhing in thhis book that is kind of blowing my mind tonight.
"In observing rejected infants, the author has noted an important characteristic in their mothers that appeared to damage them. This was the mother's (unconscious) refusal to let herself be affected or moved by the emotional experience of feeding or caring for the child. Other observers have noted that this type of mother seems to avoid her baby's loving looks at the point when the baby first begins to recognize her. This avoidance is usually detrimental to the baby's subsequent emotional development." I feel like this is/was my mom's behaviour in later years. I'm sure it wasn't different when I was an infant, only perhaps being "loved" when I did things she liked
The symptoms in such an infant are a general dissatisfaction, often consisting of whining, an inability to relax against the mother's body (or, on the other hand, a desperate clinging to the mother), excessive crying, and a "spaced-out" or pitiful, pinched look on the face. Later, the child appears to avoid love and affection and may have a tendency toward behavior that provokes anger or hostility in others. Sensitive adults may even sense within themselves hostility and feelings of loathing toward an unloved child.
"feelings of loathing toward an unloved child" I guess it's the recognition that I was an unloved child and that it was a fantasy bond in the family trying to hide that that was the case (and from myy gm to try to make up for it in a way, probably having to do with her own feelings of guilt as a parent). I guess it's just connecting the dots. If I had to put my finger on it, I would probably say that there was a lot of that feeling unloved under the surface as a teenager/young adult. That's the thing you don;t want to talk about or feel and people are pretending isn't going on. I think in naming it, there's also a feeling of wait a minute, I can love myself. But it's that initial wake up of, I was an unloved child. Thank god I had my dad or I don't know if I would be the person I am today.
No wonder I go into these romantic situations too, and feel that it's devastating when something happens, it ends, or whatever. I'm left with the feeling of being unloved/that no one is going to love me, which I guess is related to feeling I have the right to exist if they care about me. But I understand too, on some level, that I will be ok and survive without them. There's just this pull of old feelings and I think this is what it is - that I am unloved and it brings up all of that old stuff that I didn't have a name for, was told didn't exist.
It's kind of crazy because I remember my m saying to me, you do know I love you right, and this is the same woman that I threated to call the cops on the last christmas we spent together if she touched/hit me, which doesn't feel like my life but it is.
Why Limerence Can Be Harder To Get Over Than A "Real" Relationship (And How To Do It)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VWvSsp1zkfg
_____________________________________
I read somethhing in thhis book that is kind of blowing my mind tonight.
"In observing rejected infants, the author has noted an important characteristic in their mothers that appeared to damage them. This was the mother's (unconscious) refusal to let herself be affected or moved by the emotional experience of feeding or caring for the child. Other observers have noted that this type of mother seems to avoid her baby's loving looks at the point when the baby first begins to recognize her. This avoidance is usually detrimental to the baby's subsequent emotional development." I feel like this is/was my mom's behaviour in later years. I'm sure it wasn't different when I was an infant, only perhaps being "loved" when I did things she liked
The symptoms in such an infant are a general dissatisfaction, often consisting of whining, an inability to relax against the mother's body (or, on the other hand, a desperate clinging to the mother), excessive crying, and a "spaced-out" or pitiful, pinched look on the face. Later, the child appears to avoid love and affection and may have a tendency toward behavior that provokes anger or hostility in others. Sensitive adults may even sense within themselves hostility and feelings of loathing toward an unloved child.
"feelings of loathing toward an unloved child" I guess it's the recognition that I was an unloved child and that it was a fantasy bond in the family trying to hide that that was the case (and from myy gm to try to make up for it in a way, probably having to do with her own feelings of guilt as a parent). I guess it's just connecting the dots. If I had to put my finger on it, I would probably say that there was a lot of that feeling unloved under the surface as a teenager/young adult. That's the thing you don;t want to talk about or feel and people are pretending isn't going on. I think in naming it, there's also a feeling of wait a minute, I can love myself. But it's that initial wake up of, I was an unloved child. Thank god I had my dad or I don't know if I would be the person I am today.
No wonder I go into these romantic situations too, and feel that it's devastating when something happens, it ends, or whatever. I'm left with the feeling of being unloved/that no one is going to love me, which I guess is related to feeling I have the right to exist if they care about me. But I understand too, on some level, that I will be ok and survive without them. There's just this pull of old feelings and I think this is what it is - that I am unloved and it brings up all of that old stuff that I didn't have a name for, was told didn't exist.
It's kind of crazy because I remember my m saying to me, you do know I love you right, and this is the same woman that I threated to call the cops on the last christmas we spent together if she touched/hit me, which doesn't feel like my life but it is.
#2
AV - Avoidance / Re: Stuck in shut down
Last post by Kizzie - Today at 06:47:13 PMAww Phoebes, so sorry to hear this. Here is one place you don't need to feel different or uncomfortable. It can be difficult and frightening when you are shifting into a person who is not as prepared to be a people pleaser. We're OK with you changing so post away and let us reinforce that it's OK and then maybe you can carry that out into your life and it won't be quite as unsettling.
I hope a hug is OK.
I hope a hug is OK.
#3
AV - Avoidance / Stuck in shut down
Last post by Phoebes - Today at 05:50:12 PMI've been stuck in dorsal vagal shut down for a while. I haven't been on here. I think I wrote one discombobulated post that I deleted because I didn't even understand it myself. 
Feeling overwhelmed and have events coming up I really don't want to go to. Having trouble staying true to myself and boundaries. Yesterday Myself in a situation where I once again fawned and stressing over whether or not to say something and if so, what?
I think I've just changed, for one thing, and have a hard time with other peoples projections and discomfort. This is why I isolate, I often feel uncomfortable around others. My boundaries are often crossed because I've always been a pleaser. I don't want to be like that anymore, but I struggle to assert myself in a functional way. Then I just shut down and isolate and people think I've ghosted them.
Why can't I just tell them how I feel and let the chips fall where they may? That is just a terrifying notion to me, unfortunately.
Feeling overwhelmed and have events coming up I really don't want to go to. Having trouble staying true to myself and boundaries. Yesterday Myself in a situation where I once again fawned and stressing over whether or not to say something and if so, what?
I think I've just changed, for one thing, and have a hard time with other peoples projections and discomfort. This is why I isolate, I often feel uncomfortable around others. My boundaries are often crossed because I've always been a pleaser. I don't want to be like that anymore, but I struggle to assert myself in a functional way. Then I just shut down and isolate and people think I've ghosted them.
Why can't I just tell them how I feel and let the chips fall where they may? That is just a terrifying notion to me, unfortunately.
#4
Other / Re: Dissociation (I don't get ...
Last post by woodsgnome - Today at 05:46:22 PMJust a personal opinion, but it seems as though dissociation is often considered a problem, when as Armee points out, it's a normal, natural alright part of Cptsd's aftereffects.
I also had an experience with my T a bit like that, and I started to apologize to her when she calmly, almost nonchalantly, said it wasn't so much a problem as an opportunity to note. In my case, she went on to congratulate me for at least recoggnizing what had happened. I felt relief -- I wasn't 'bad' for experiencing a natural process, and I could go from there, adding that knowledge to my discovery toolkit.
Dissociation still happens in my life, but I tend to catch it better when it happens, and not blame myself for it; just digest it, if necessary, and move on to a new blameless frame of mind about it.
I also had an experience with my T a bit like that, and I started to apologize to her when she calmly, almost nonchalantly, said it wasn't so much a problem as an opportunity to note. In my case, she went on to congratulate me for at least recoggnizing what had happened. I felt relief -- I wasn't 'bad' for experiencing a natural process, and I could go from there, adding that knowledge to my discovery toolkit.
Dissociation still happens in my life, but I tend to catch it better when it happens, and not blame myself for it; just digest it, if necessary, and move on to a new blameless frame of mind about it.
#5
Other / Re: Dissociation (I don't get ...
Last post by Papa Coco - Today at 05:15:20 PMSlashy,
I feel your concern. I've always been easy to blame things on because my own dissociations have always made me wonder if I had done something bad but didn't remember doing it.
HOKEY SMOKES! I have taken the blame for so much because I don't trust my own memory. I was 3 years old in Seattle when President Kennedy was killed in Texas. My lifelong joke is "if you tell me I was the person behind the grassy knoll, I'll believe you and confess even though I don't remember doing it." I've always attributed these dissociative moments as part of the gaslighting done to me as a child and young adult.
I agree with Armee. The dissociative actions, like you, forgetting that you'd pressed the button on the wall, are part and parcel of C=PTSD.
I've lived it many times. The story I like to tell most often is this one:
During the distress of my FOOs' final months, I remember pouring a cup of coffee. Then walking into the dining room, and suddenly, the coffee cup in my hand vanished. VANISHED. Like on TV shows where witches can wiggle their nose and things vanish, that's literally what happened. I looked down at my hand and the cup was just gone. I could still feel the heat of the ceramic mug's handle in my hand. I looked everywhere for that cup. It was gone. VANISHED into thin air.
Two weeks later, I went to the answering machine to check on calls. There was the coffee cup. Mould was growing on the surface of the cold coffee. Suddenly I remembered: I'd poured the coffee. Took the hot cup to the answering machine, set it down, then checked for voice mails, then walked back into the dining room and noticed the cup was gone. I had NO memory of checking the voicemails, which I had just done seconds ago.
In the second and third grades, I would wake up in class after lunch having ABSOLUTELY no idea where I'd been for two hours. The first time it happened, it scared the living bejessus out of me. After the first episode, it just became normal. But man...is it scary to realize that I can dissociate and forget doing things WHILE I'm DOING THEM. It set me up for a life of not trusting my own memories, or my own thoughts.
It's trauma. For me, it only happens while I'm in traumatic states of distress or EF. I'm pretty alert when I'm my healthier self. But when the pressure is on: I could wake up at any moment wondering how I got here and where my coffee cup went.
Today I mitigate this problem with transparency. During times of distress I won't drive a car anymore. My wife knows this, and she chauffeurs me around when I'm not sure I can keep myself associated. I don't use power tools or do anything dangerous anymore unless I'm feeling "in my right mind." I even worry about my posts that I write when I might be in a dissociative trance, so I avoid the forum when I'm feeling this way.
I hope your therapist is able to help you find some peace with it. We don't hurt people. We are hiding from our own pain. Pushing buttons and losing coffee cups seems to be as bad as it gets with us.
I feel your concern. I've always been easy to blame things on because my own dissociations have always made me wonder if I had done something bad but didn't remember doing it.
HOKEY SMOKES! I have taken the blame for so much because I don't trust my own memory. I was 3 years old in Seattle when President Kennedy was killed in Texas. My lifelong joke is "if you tell me I was the person behind the grassy knoll, I'll believe you and confess even though I don't remember doing it." I've always attributed these dissociative moments as part of the gaslighting done to me as a child and young adult.
I agree with Armee. The dissociative actions, like you, forgetting that you'd pressed the button on the wall, are part and parcel of C=PTSD.
I've lived it many times. The story I like to tell most often is this one:
During the distress of my FOOs' final months, I remember pouring a cup of coffee. Then walking into the dining room, and suddenly, the coffee cup in my hand vanished. VANISHED. Like on TV shows where witches can wiggle their nose and things vanish, that's literally what happened. I looked down at my hand and the cup was just gone. I could still feel the heat of the ceramic mug's handle in my hand. I looked everywhere for that cup. It was gone. VANISHED into thin air.
Two weeks later, I went to the answering machine to check on calls. There was the coffee cup. Mould was growing on the surface of the cold coffee. Suddenly I remembered: I'd poured the coffee. Took the hot cup to the answering machine, set it down, then checked for voice mails, then walked back into the dining room and noticed the cup was gone. I had NO memory of checking the voicemails, which I had just done seconds ago.
In the second and third grades, I would wake up in class after lunch having ABSOLUTELY no idea where I'd been for two hours. The first time it happened, it scared the living bejessus out of me. After the first episode, it just became normal. But man...is it scary to realize that I can dissociate and forget doing things WHILE I'm DOING THEM. It set me up for a life of not trusting my own memories, or my own thoughts.
It's trauma. For me, it only happens while I'm in traumatic states of distress or EF. I'm pretty alert when I'm my healthier self. But when the pressure is on: I could wake up at any moment wondering how I got here and where my coffee cup went.
Today I mitigate this problem with transparency. During times of distress I won't drive a car anymore. My wife knows this, and she chauffeurs me around when I'm not sure I can keep myself associated. I don't use power tools or do anything dangerous anymore unless I'm feeling "in my right mind." I even worry about my posts that I write when I might be in a dissociative trance, so I avoid the forum when I'm feeling this way.
I hope your therapist is able to help you find some peace with it. We don't hurt people. We are hiding from our own pain. Pushing buttons and losing coffee cups seems to be as bad as it gets with us.
#6
Recovery Journals / Re: Papa Coco's Recovery Journ...
Last post by Papa Coco - Today at 04:02:51 PMBecomingMe, Slashy, San, Hope, StartingHealing, Dolly,
Thanks for the hugs and kind words. I live for them. I'm not ashamed to say that positive reinforcement from people whom I respect, like you all, means a lot to me. I need it. It's so helpful. Kind responses, no matter how long or short or complex or simple, are like food for me. I need someone to tell me that I'm with friends every day. I need to hear people say nice things every day. I'm not ashamed of that.
Thanks for your comments, they mean SO much to me.
Thanks for the hugs and kind words. I live for them. I'm not ashamed to say that positive reinforcement from people whom I respect, like you all, means a lot to me. I need it. It's so helpful. Kind responses, no matter how long or short or complex or simple, are like food for me. I need someone to tell me that I'm with friends every day. I need to hear people say nice things every day. I'm not ashamed of that.
Thanks for your comments, they mean SO much to me.
#7
Letters of Recovery / Dear Dad, I need to let you go
Last post by Papa Coco - Today at 03:50:23 PMDad, I love you. I've always loved you. I've always pursued your love and tried to be whatever I believed you needed me to be so I could take care of you. I didn't know that I didn't need to take care of you. I mistakenly "knew" that I was responsible for your happiness. So, to honor what I thought was reality, I carried that burden of your happiness for more than 60 years.
Dad. I'm dying here under this burden. And today I realize...it's never been my burden to carry. That's what's wearing me out. I'm still living MY life surrounded by YOUR fears and YOUR drama.
You were the strongest man I've ever met. Not the brightest, but the strongest. And I worried incessantly about not hurting you. If that sounds crazy, it's because it IS crazy. How does a small boy come to believe that his big, strong Dad needs me to keep him strong? The only reason I felt that is because you put all your grief onto me. Somehow, I felt responsible for all your misery and all your mood swings. We were symbiotically tied together in a mess of entangled emotions and Teflon surfaces. When trouble came to you, it slipped on your Teflon surfaces onto me and I carried that misery for you. With you.
You had so many regrets. Today, Dad, I'm dying because of how I'm still carrying the colossal weight of your confusing mess of emotions and Teflon surfaces. You pushed your pain onto me. I was blamed for too much. Even now, as I write this, every time I approach the topic of me taking the blame for your misery, I feel a gigantic, and cluttered mass of swirling, poisonous energy swirling in my chest and arms. Filling MY body with YOUR fears and regrets.
I feel weak. SO WEAK. I'm so exhausted that I don't do anything for myself anymore. I just feel suffocating and overburdened. I search for ways to relax and hide from the burdens. I have no energy. I barely sleep. I'm living how you lived, but not because of my own burdens, but because of yours.
Like I'm dying on the battlefield. Dad, is that you? You lost so much in the war. YOu lost your arm. You were the only survivor of your entire division. THat has to be a heavy burden, but Dad...it was YOUR burden that I somehow took on for you.
Am I feeling your fear of dying on the battlefield? Dying from not being strong enough? Dying from not being allowed to be who I am? Mom gave me a lot of her fears too, but somehow when I write to her, I don't feel any pressure in my chest. But Dad, when I write to you, I feel a lifetime of fear and regret and remorse bubbling up like lava in my chest. My arms go weak. My knees hurt. Dad, I've carried too much of YOUR burden for far, far too long. If I don't give that back to you now, I'm not going to survive much longer. I can't even breathe when I sleep, so I have to use CPAP machines and all sorts of tricks just to sleep at night. I feel fear of things that aren't even a part of my life. I recognize now that I feel fear just for the sake of feeling fear. And I look JUST LIKE YOU when I'm feeling it. I realize now, that all those years of putting your regrets and fears onto me to carry them for you has become who I am. I'm a guy with a great life who feels like I have a horrible life, because I feel fear within me just for the sake of feeling your fear for you. I was your scape goat, but that has to stop.
You and I were tied together at the heart, and it wasn't good for either of us emotionally or spiritually. It was great, physically, because you taught me how to be self-reliant. YOu taught me how to build houses and cars and furniture, and how to take care of a family and earn a living and save for retirement. Physically I learned so much good from you. But emotionally and spiritually, you put a monkey wrench right in the middle of my own right to be who I was born to be. You made me into a mini-you. You taught me how to regret and sulk and fear, fear, fear. You taught me how to give my best and expect the worst in return. I get sick in my stomach just writing these words. I now know that you are the person I need the most professional help to let go of.
Dad, I am drowning in your fears. I don't believe that while you were alive, the dad character would have been able to process what I'm saying now. This letter would make no sense to you when you were alive. I don't believe you had the spiritual awareness to grasp what I'm saying now. But you are with God now and I hope, that as a spirit now, as a ghost, a soul from the other side, that you DO understand what I'm saying.
Your burdens were heavy, and I appreciate that. But I also know that your burdens were yours to deal with, and that putting them on me only damaged both of us. You didn't heal because you were able to blame me for your misery. Your Teflon coatings slid YOUR lessons onto ME and as a result, neither of us learned. I didn't heal from my own traumas because I wasn't focused on MY problems, while at the same time I wasn't authorized to learn your lessons for you. Dad, you had lessons to learn, just like I have them to learn. But I can't learn YOUR lessons. Just by trying, I'm furthering the agony and terror that you and I share.
Dad, I can respect your traumas but I can't live them for you. I think that I've proven, through 63 years of terror, that I've tried and tried and tried to live in your trauma, but in the end, it doesn't work that way.
People who pay others to do their homework for them get good grades but learn nothing. So it is with you and I, Dad. Your lessons were yours to learn. I can carry the weight for a while, but I can't learn about me while I'm doing your homework for you. Neither of us wins when I try. We both lost that battle in the end. Siblings 2 and 3 came in at the end to take your money, which they took by destroyed everything you and I had built during our long, complicated entanglement as father and son. I carried your burdens. I took all the blame for your traumas, and in the end, my siblings, who'd always treated you like you were an idiot, swooped in and took everything from me as spoils for themselves. This just proves to me that evil wins when good doesn't run its proper course. If I'd have learned my own lessons, and if you'd have taken responsibility for your own problems, you might have not had to end your life in the chaos and disgusting violence that your bad children were able to push onto you.
You didn't run your course. You put your terror onto me and I felt it for you. That was a mistake that hurt both of us. Neither of us learned our own lesson because we were tangled up in each other's lessons. And now, since I believe in Karma, I believe that you have to be reincarnated to live your own lessons all over again. You won't move forward until you learn today's lesson. Neither will I. And, Dad, I do NOT want to live this life over again. I'm exhausted. I've grown weak from carrying other people's burdens. I can't do this again.
I love you, but I'm breaking up with you. (lol). I'm not going to carry your burdens for you next time. I'm focused on my OWN PERSONAL RELATIONSHIP with God and with myself.
In the end, Dad. I still love you. Now that I see how much pain you lived in, I respect you more. However, I also see that our entangled lives were not healthy for either of us, so, as I said, I'm breaking free from you. I pray you will be able to move past this pain in your next life. And I pray that I am able to move forward, for the first time in my own long life, to live my own life. I may be too old to start over, but even if I get ONE day feeling free from your burdens, that will be "living the rest of my life on MY terms, not yours"
I love you Dad, but I need to heal without your burdens on my shoulders anymore. The weight of YOUR burdens has compromised my knees, lungs, heart, strength. I need to rebuild my own life. It's the only way you and I will both become free. If you'll carry your own burdens, you will finally find healing, and so will I.
Dad. I'm dying here under this burden. And today I realize...it's never been my burden to carry. That's what's wearing me out. I'm still living MY life surrounded by YOUR fears and YOUR drama.
You were the strongest man I've ever met. Not the brightest, but the strongest. And I worried incessantly about not hurting you. If that sounds crazy, it's because it IS crazy. How does a small boy come to believe that his big, strong Dad needs me to keep him strong? The only reason I felt that is because you put all your grief onto me. Somehow, I felt responsible for all your misery and all your mood swings. We were symbiotically tied together in a mess of entangled emotions and Teflon surfaces. When trouble came to you, it slipped on your Teflon surfaces onto me and I carried that misery for you. With you.
You had so many regrets. Today, Dad, I'm dying because of how I'm still carrying the colossal weight of your confusing mess of emotions and Teflon surfaces. You pushed your pain onto me. I was blamed for too much. Even now, as I write this, every time I approach the topic of me taking the blame for your misery, I feel a gigantic, and cluttered mass of swirling, poisonous energy swirling in my chest and arms. Filling MY body with YOUR fears and regrets.
I feel weak. SO WEAK. I'm so exhausted that I don't do anything for myself anymore. I just feel suffocating and overburdened. I search for ways to relax and hide from the burdens. I have no energy. I barely sleep. I'm living how you lived, but not because of my own burdens, but because of yours.
Like I'm dying on the battlefield. Dad, is that you? You lost so much in the war. YOu lost your arm. You were the only survivor of your entire division. THat has to be a heavy burden, but Dad...it was YOUR burden that I somehow took on for you.
Am I feeling your fear of dying on the battlefield? Dying from not being strong enough? Dying from not being allowed to be who I am? Mom gave me a lot of her fears too, but somehow when I write to her, I don't feel any pressure in my chest. But Dad, when I write to you, I feel a lifetime of fear and regret and remorse bubbling up like lava in my chest. My arms go weak. My knees hurt. Dad, I've carried too much of YOUR burden for far, far too long. If I don't give that back to you now, I'm not going to survive much longer. I can't even breathe when I sleep, so I have to use CPAP machines and all sorts of tricks just to sleep at night. I feel fear of things that aren't even a part of my life. I recognize now that I feel fear just for the sake of feeling fear. And I look JUST LIKE YOU when I'm feeling it. I realize now, that all those years of putting your regrets and fears onto me to carry them for you has become who I am. I'm a guy with a great life who feels like I have a horrible life, because I feel fear within me just for the sake of feeling your fear for you. I was your scape goat, but that has to stop.
You and I were tied together at the heart, and it wasn't good for either of us emotionally or spiritually. It was great, physically, because you taught me how to be self-reliant. YOu taught me how to build houses and cars and furniture, and how to take care of a family and earn a living and save for retirement. Physically I learned so much good from you. But emotionally and spiritually, you put a monkey wrench right in the middle of my own right to be who I was born to be. You made me into a mini-you. You taught me how to regret and sulk and fear, fear, fear. You taught me how to give my best and expect the worst in return. I get sick in my stomach just writing these words. I now know that you are the person I need the most professional help to let go of.
Dad, I am drowning in your fears. I don't believe that while you were alive, the dad character would have been able to process what I'm saying now. This letter would make no sense to you when you were alive. I don't believe you had the spiritual awareness to grasp what I'm saying now. But you are with God now and I hope, that as a spirit now, as a ghost, a soul from the other side, that you DO understand what I'm saying.
Your burdens were heavy, and I appreciate that. But I also know that your burdens were yours to deal with, and that putting them on me only damaged both of us. You didn't heal because you were able to blame me for your misery. Your Teflon coatings slid YOUR lessons onto ME and as a result, neither of us learned. I didn't heal from my own traumas because I wasn't focused on MY problems, while at the same time I wasn't authorized to learn your lessons for you. Dad, you had lessons to learn, just like I have them to learn. But I can't learn YOUR lessons. Just by trying, I'm furthering the agony and terror that you and I share.
Dad, I can respect your traumas but I can't live them for you. I think that I've proven, through 63 years of terror, that I've tried and tried and tried to live in your trauma, but in the end, it doesn't work that way.
People who pay others to do their homework for them get good grades but learn nothing. So it is with you and I, Dad. Your lessons were yours to learn. I can carry the weight for a while, but I can't learn about me while I'm doing your homework for you. Neither of us wins when I try. We both lost that battle in the end. Siblings 2 and 3 came in at the end to take your money, which they took by destroyed everything you and I had built during our long, complicated entanglement as father and son. I carried your burdens. I took all the blame for your traumas, and in the end, my siblings, who'd always treated you like you were an idiot, swooped in and took everything from me as spoils for themselves. This just proves to me that evil wins when good doesn't run its proper course. If I'd have learned my own lessons, and if you'd have taken responsibility for your own problems, you might have not had to end your life in the chaos and disgusting violence that your bad children were able to push onto you.
You didn't run your course. You put your terror onto me and I felt it for you. That was a mistake that hurt both of us. Neither of us learned our own lesson because we were tangled up in each other's lessons. And now, since I believe in Karma, I believe that you have to be reincarnated to live your own lessons all over again. You won't move forward until you learn today's lesson. Neither will I. And, Dad, I do NOT want to live this life over again. I'm exhausted. I've grown weak from carrying other people's burdens. I can't do this again.
I love you, but I'm breaking up with you. (lol). I'm not going to carry your burdens for you next time. I'm focused on my OWN PERSONAL RELATIONSHIP with God and with myself.
In the end, Dad. I still love you. Now that I see how much pain you lived in, I respect you more. However, I also see that our entangled lives were not healthy for either of us, so, as I said, I'm breaking free from you. I pray you will be able to move past this pain in your next life. And I pray that I am able to move forward, for the first time in my own long life, to live my own life. I may be too old to start over, but even if I get ONE day feeling free from your burdens, that will be "living the rest of my life on MY terms, not yours"
I love you Dad, but I need to heal without your burdens on my shoulders anymore. The weight of YOUR burdens has compromised my knees, lungs, heart, strength. I need to rebuild my own life. It's the only way you and I will both become free. If you'll carry your own burdens, you will finally find healing, and so will I.
#8
Recovery Journals / Re: Forging New Paths
Last post by sanmagic7 - Today at 03:00:52 PMhooray for the progress, blueberry. and another hooray for the great self care. keeping to yourself instead of responding to others, i mean. well done! 
love and hugs
love and hugs #9
Recovery Journals / Re: Healing journal (tw) Anger...
Last post by StartingHealing - Today at 02:57:26 PMHello dollyvee,
I accept your hug. Thank you
Is one of those things. F-ing amazing what happens when a normal kid gets put into a sh-t situation because of decisions of the adults at the time.
I have understanding on much of it. The why adoptive father became Dad (a title he earned), my person, is that his actions were consistent, he was consistent, he took me on warts and all, he claimed me as his. Period. That is just the way it was and anybody that said different, well, there was the knowing that saying things contrary to that would have repercussions up to and including physical violence. My Dad didn't brook no foolishness from others in many regards.
The person in the role of mother. Sigh, that's a different barrel of monkeys. The common thing is "they were doing the best they could at the time" and yet.. I really don't know how accurate that is in regards to her. Yeah, she was there mostly when I needed patching up from something, yeah she took me to the doctors, chiropractors, dentists, complain though, seriously, it was like she was the one that got the pitchfork tine through her foot instead of me, {no lie, when I was having growth spurts, I was clumsy, h-lla clumsy} shaming, guilt, the need to be right, not insults per se, lots of comparisons though to her 4 natural borns that happened before I came along. 1 older brother (20 year split twixt us) then 4 years to a sister, 3 years to the next, then 4 years to another sister, and then 4 years to me. I've heard it stated something like this: " When I was a baby, I was given a job. That job was to attempt to fulfill an adults emotional holes. As such there was no room for 'me'. it was all about them."
Lots of criticism there as well. How much criticism for how long did it take till I said "f it"? I remember making the decision to not take home any crafts that I did from public school, vacation bible school, etc. Why? Most "parents" would see that the kid was doing it as a way to show love towards the them. I know with my daughter, I made sure to put every single item she brought home, or gave me on the fridge. It would stay on the fridge till a new one, and then the old one was saved in a special box. I would always thank her, and hug her when she would give me something. Even now, I still have a collection of the things she's done and gave me. It's not as large as it once was. Attrition of the years, the paper breaks down, etc.
With the person in the role of mother: there was always something to pick at. Didn't stay close enough in the lines, used the wrong color, the macaroni, sigh, wrong direction, didn't stay in the lines, had to many differences in sizes, construction paper cuts weren't smooth enough, yada, yada. yada. Then the comparisons to how f-ing great the natural borns were. This sister did this so good, why can't you be more like her on this, that sister did so good at ______, why can't you be like her in this. So I stopped. Wasn't worth it. Yeah, would get a lil bit of a thank you, but the ratio of gratitude to b-tch, after a while, flat wasn't worth it.
After I stopped bringing things home, it took a while, then the person in the role of mother, she had to have said something to my Dad about it, because he came to talk with me about the situation. I explained as best as I could as a wee kid, dont' know if it hurt his feelings or not, he never let on. Memory is a dam-ed funny thing. I remember bringing things home and giving them to him for a while, then something happened, and I just stopped.
I tried as a child. I gave it so many tries to get the acceptance, dare I say approval? from the person in the role of mother. In the different realms of artistic expression. Till finally, I think I was about 7,8,9, I quit chasing that all together. Flat got tired of never being able to produce something that was acceptable enough to her that she would accept it and tell me that I had done a really good job, give me a hug, and as the English say "Put in a place of pride".
D-mned if it was a year ish? after I stopped, then the last pastel drawing I had done, ended up in a frame, and hung on a wall. Most kids are not going to be Leonardo da Vinci, Rembrandt, you know? Too little, too late. Every artistic avenue, whether music, drawing, sewing, photography, any area, that she had turned a hand to, or the natural borns had turned a hand to, wasn't worth the b-tch or the excuse that it was too expensive.
This from a person that would drop 50$ or more, at least once a week, in thrift stores for dolls that she would clean up, add to the collection, and not do another thing with. She could have worked that collection and made some $$$$. And this was back in the day where gasoline was under a buck a gallon, and 20$ was more than enough for a dinner and a movie for a date with a tank of gas!
I wanted to play music, and that turned into accordion, then organ, then saxophone, instead of the sax, I wanted to do drums. Could not do that. Nope. Stuck with the sax for a while in school band, which ultimately ended up with me dropping it. Why that arc? Because the accordion was already there and one of the natural borns had done it. Same with organ, same with the sax, no sh-ts given of what I was interested in learning how to play instrument wise. Left a bad aftertaste for a lot of years.
Yeah, projection and now I think that she had a preconceived role that she was trying to force me into.
Very much an independent kid. I learned fast. I learned how to cook, clean, do laundry, sew buttons back on all by the time I was 4. Also learned fast on how to doctor myself when crap would happen. There was a line of being hurt that I figured out pretty damn fast on if I needed outside help or if I could deal with it myself. Anything to reduce the b_tch that would come any time I needed her to help patch me up.
Where I'm at now, I really don't know if I would have reached out to her if she was still here. There was a time where with dealing with the former spouse and them, something had to give and it was them, I went incognito with them for many years.
I savvy that biologically, there are times that critters won't take on another little one (of the same species) because of the wrong smell, or something. Or if they do, the one that gets taken on is treated differently. Genetic competition and all that. The thing is the dichotomy twixt Dad and the rest of them. The stark and at times shocking difference between one, the provider, the patriarch of the clan, full acceptance and the conditional? Provisional? Almost like they were caught in cognitive dissonance, bouncing from ownership / family?
Goes back to being part of, yet not belonging to.
The paradox of this realm is when you get to a point where you don't "need" ______________, that is when it shows the h-ll up. I reckon that once I get my braincase fully withdrawn from my rectal orifice AKA healing and get comfy with myself, then the universe will shift and there will be a group that I will belong to/with.
Wishing all here, all the best.
I accept your hug. Thank you
Is one of those things. F-ing amazing what happens when a normal kid gets put into a sh-t situation because of decisions of the adults at the time.
I have understanding on much of it. The why adoptive father became Dad (a title he earned), my person, is that his actions were consistent, he was consistent, he took me on warts and all, he claimed me as his. Period. That is just the way it was and anybody that said different, well, there was the knowing that saying things contrary to that would have repercussions up to and including physical violence. My Dad didn't brook no foolishness from others in many regards.
The person in the role of mother. Sigh, that's a different barrel of monkeys. The common thing is "they were doing the best they could at the time" and yet.. I really don't know how accurate that is in regards to her. Yeah, she was there mostly when I needed patching up from something, yeah she took me to the doctors, chiropractors, dentists, complain though, seriously, it was like she was the one that got the pitchfork tine through her foot instead of me, {no lie, when I was having growth spurts, I was clumsy, h-lla clumsy} shaming, guilt, the need to be right, not insults per se, lots of comparisons though to her 4 natural borns that happened before I came along. 1 older brother (20 year split twixt us) then 4 years to a sister, 3 years to the next, then 4 years to another sister, and then 4 years to me. I've heard it stated something like this: " When I was a baby, I was given a job. That job was to attempt to fulfill an adults emotional holes. As such there was no room for 'me'. it was all about them."
Lots of criticism there as well. How much criticism for how long did it take till I said "f it"? I remember making the decision to not take home any crafts that I did from public school, vacation bible school, etc. Why? Most "parents" would see that the kid was doing it as a way to show love towards the them. I know with my daughter, I made sure to put every single item she brought home, or gave me on the fridge. It would stay on the fridge till a new one, and then the old one was saved in a special box. I would always thank her, and hug her when she would give me something. Even now, I still have a collection of the things she's done and gave me. It's not as large as it once was. Attrition of the years, the paper breaks down, etc.
With the person in the role of mother: there was always something to pick at. Didn't stay close enough in the lines, used the wrong color, the macaroni, sigh, wrong direction, didn't stay in the lines, had to many differences in sizes, construction paper cuts weren't smooth enough, yada, yada. yada. Then the comparisons to how f-ing great the natural borns were. This sister did this so good, why can't you be more like her on this, that sister did so good at ______, why can't you be like her in this. So I stopped. Wasn't worth it. Yeah, would get a lil bit of a thank you, but the ratio of gratitude to b-tch, after a while, flat wasn't worth it.
After I stopped bringing things home, it took a while, then the person in the role of mother, she had to have said something to my Dad about it, because he came to talk with me about the situation. I explained as best as I could as a wee kid, dont' know if it hurt his feelings or not, he never let on. Memory is a dam-ed funny thing. I remember bringing things home and giving them to him for a while, then something happened, and I just stopped.
I tried as a child. I gave it so many tries to get the acceptance, dare I say approval? from the person in the role of mother. In the different realms of artistic expression. Till finally, I think I was about 7,8,9, I quit chasing that all together. Flat got tired of never being able to produce something that was acceptable enough to her that she would accept it and tell me that I had done a really good job, give me a hug, and as the English say "Put in a place of pride".
D-mned if it was a year ish? after I stopped, then the last pastel drawing I had done, ended up in a frame, and hung on a wall. Most kids are not going to be Leonardo da Vinci, Rembrandt, you know? Too little, too late. Every artistic avenue, whether music, drawing, sewing, photography, any area, that she had turned a hand to, or the natural borns had turned a hand to, wasn't worth the b-tch or the excuse that it was too expensive.
This from a person that would drop 50$ or more, at least once a week, in thrift stores for dolls that she would clean up, add to the collection, and not do another thing with. She could have worked that collection and made some $$$$. And this was back in the day where gasoline was under a buck a gallon, and 20$ was more than enough for a dinner and a movie for a date with a tank of gas!
I wanted to play music, and that turned into accordion, then organ, then saxophone, instead of the sax, I wanted to do drums. Could not do that. Nope. Stuck with the sax for a while in school band, which ultimately ended up with me dropping it. Why that arc? Because the accordion was already there and one of the natural borns had done it. Same with organ, same with the sax, no sh-ts given of what I was interested in learning how to play instrument wise. Left a bad aftertaste for a lot of years.
Yeah, projection and now I think that she had a preconceived role that she was trying to force me into.
Very much an independent kid. I learned fast. I learned how to cook, clean, do laundry, sew buttons back on all by the time I was 4. Also learned fast on how to doctor myself when crap would happen. There was a line of being hurt that I figured out pretty damn fast on if I needed outside help or if I could deal with it myself. Anything to reduce the b_tch that would come any time I needed her to help patch me up.
Where I'm at now, I really don't know if I would have reached out to her if she was still here. There was a time where with dealing with the former spouse and them, something had to give and it was them, I went incognito with them for many years.
I savvy that biologically, there are times that critters won't take on another little one (of the same species) because of the wrong smell, or something. Or if they do, the one that gets taken on is treated differently. Genetic competition and all that. The thing is the dichotomy twixt Dad and the rest of them. The stark and at times shocking difference between one, the provider, the patriarch of the clan, full acceptance and the conditional? Provisional? Almost like they were caught in cognitive dissonance, bouncing from ownership / family?
Goes back to being part of, yet not belonging to.
The paradox of this realm is when you get to a point where you don't "need" ______________, that is when it shows the h-ll up. I reckon that once I get my braincase fully withdrawn from my rectal orifice AKA healing and get comfy with myself, then the universe will shift and there will be a group that I will belong to/with.
Wishing all here, all the best.
#10
Poetry & Creative Writing / Re: To My Father - a poem abou...
Last post by Chart - Today at 01:58:53 PMBecomingMe, We could almost be siblings... seems we had nearly the same dad... I'm with you on getting through it and beating it and living our lives free of the toxicity we developed in.