I have this boyfriend of two and a half years. He has a lot of great qualities---loyal, honest, reliable, caring, clean...but he has a *, bitchy temper a lot of the time. He just ruined a backpack trip that was supposed to be for two weeks. It was nonstop bitching and complaining....even when we were do what he wanted. This is the 3rd trip he has acted out on, and I will never go on another trip with him again.
I have confronted and set boundaries many times. I have asked that we or he do(es) therapy---but it just does not seem important to him. He tells me he is aware of sabotaging things, but that he just can't help it.
There are a lot of things I admire about him, but the low level mal contented, bitchy attitude is very triggering for me. I have a really big thing about men who yell and get pissed off, as the men in my life up until recently, including family, were very abusive.
But looking at myself---I think a lot of my growing has caused me to outgrow our relationship. I have successfully controlled much of my dysregulation, gotten into shape, and have improved a lot of areas of my life. Men, in many ways, have just brought me down. If I could find a partner that was a serious about having a clean, disciplined life as me, that would be great.
Understand, I have had to make a LOT of sacrifice that most people would find too extreme. No gluten, caffeine, or dairy....allergic to all of them. No TV or netflex. Few possessions. No high heels, credit cards, or contact lenses. No hair products, little makeup...again sensitive to a lot of things being an rehabbed person with aspergers. I will say that I look really damn good and I am in the best shape in my life. Responsible, but very austere.
But let me tell you...after 30, when habits become entrenched, I am finding that most men have behaviors too unhealthy to be around. When you work hard at becoming healthy, you realize what a small club you are in.
Quote from: marycontrary on January 13, 2015, 01:57:09 PMWhen you work hard at becoming healthy, you realize what a small club you are in.
When you get so ill in the first place, that's already almost everyone out of the circle of empathic people. Narrowing that down to shared values and mutually beneficial chemistry...don't stop believing, I say. Compromise isn't required, especially if you feel that it's just not worth it. The best advice I ever heard about these transitions is to "love them on their way out of your life."
This is wisdom. You are seeing yourself grow where he is not.
Two and a half years - be aware. The time to act is when these things become obvious, lest it become 3 years, 8 years, 20 years. Oops.
I don't know what opportunities you have to meet healthy people, but I find that they tend to travel in packs. There are healthy (mentally and physically) men out there. Don't settle for less than you deserve.
You guys speak much wisdom.
"love them on their way out of your life."....wow, deep wisdom I will carry with me. Thanks.
Wingnut...I know this. I am absolutely not desperate, and really I need time to concentrate on my art and my small business. *, F__K buddies are even too much drama, even though I could really use the sex. I am grateful to live in a beautiful city, beautiful country, with lots of options.
But like I said, I am not desperate and not really looking. When it comes, it comes....
Thanks so much again!
Marycontrary...firstly congratulations on getting into such good shape and successfully swimming against the dietary, sedentary tide of our age. Superb work! I am sorry that the bar to secure long term relationships are set high when we improve but ultimately that's a good thing. I'm lucky as my wife is the sanest person I have met. But the most important relationship in my life is the one I have with my traumatised brain. I have learned to see it as my wound and not my enemy and so live a life full of compassion and insight, even love towards all it's jumbled, pained and dissociative spasms. It kind of feels like I have a sane mind running parallel to a cptsd brain...but being able to very slowly bring it under calming influences...without this primary relationship going on...wound not enemy relationship with my cptsd then my current relationship would be another disaster waiting to happen.
Anyways...sorry! I digressed a bit. But I just wanted to say that I think you are absolutely right...and what's more have earned the right to be right! Seek to bring others up to your level, through practical example rather than just words, and don't let them drag you down to theirs!
Flook, thanks so much for the deep insight and kind words. I work to be really disciplined because, as you might related, it is really the only choice. The medication route was a total disaster. After a score of failed therapists, I have a great one, but he is $80 an hour, so I have to really be choosy when I can go and have very clear questions lined up.
I can only get better with lifestyle modification, totally inside and out. Every day I work like a demon on this trauma damage. I simply can't afford to screw up. I am so glad you have your kind spouse---makes all the difference, I know. I cannot fathom a spouse that does not totally bring me down. My boyfriend has done a lot of wonderful things, but his dysregulation is damaging my recovery, and I told him that.
Yes , self compassion with the tangled brain is indeed the key, my friend.
Once one's compass is set aright, no matter what the obstacles and obstructions success is assured. It may not always be in the way that we imagine ("make plans and watch God laugh") but it will happen once we have that key.
Once I was the implacable enemy of my implacable enemy. I hated myself and tortured myself...I even attacked myself for being so weak and weakened myself further! But in a way my trauma became, amongst other things, a mirror. If I showed it aggression, fear and hate, that's what I got. Only by understanding it as a wound and not an enemy could I ever hope to break out of the darkness I assumed to be my "natural" home. Now, when the voice of cptsd arises or an EF flashes up, I remember (through long practice) to be kind and compassionate towards it. In that moment of love, I am re-found. Gradually over the years the intensity of the trauma has lessened somewhat, so I assume I must be doing something right! Well, at least it works for me. There's no way I'm being prescriptive. Others will find what works for them and as long as it works that's wonderful!
Flook, I had an evil SOB inner critic as well. You do it poetic justice---you hit it right on the head. I literally sat with him for over a YEAR just watching and feeling (like a movie) him run his course. That SOB had s strong, strong lockhold on my autonomic fight or flight system. That was his literal, mechanical power. The power over my sympathetic nervous system. Nothing else.
I have worked really hard to "decouple" the SOB from that part of my nervous system. For the first time in my life, I actually like and try to respect myself. I don't cringe when I look at the "mirror" anymore. You are so totally right about the mirror. And understanding it as a wound, not as a human pile of excrement. I don't know if you see this in yourself just yet, but for the first time, I really respect the work I have done in my life. A lot of people in our situation just repeat the trauma, and destroy our kids and our relationships. I mean, if that does not gain entry into heaven, or generate a big pile of good kharma, I don't know what does.
As far as romantic relationships---I am realizing that I have to be REALLY anal retentive about being exposed to bad habits of other people. Seriously, a man has to REALLY have his sh... together before I can be serious about a relationship. Notice I did not say rich, degreed, or handsome. I offer really super high partner qualities (just from the self work and discipline, not from genetic gift we can't control) and I expect the same. The inner critic would once have said that I have my standard toooo high, "no body is perfect", etc.....but I tell him to go screw himself. To be in a romantic relationship, I need somebody who works on themselves just as hard as I do. Who works at self knowledge, gratitude, sustainable development.
Thank you Mary Contrary. One of the deepest regrets I have from those years of seeing my trauma as a terrifying powerful enemy and not a wound is the cost in my personal relationships. Only after I changed my view and thence relationship to the crap could I begin to see what a confused, angry, selfish co-dependent mess I had been. That hurt. But only the truth helps. It may be smelly and have appalling table manners. But only the truth helps and for that reason I have lost my fear of it.
So I only got up to the mark of being a half decent partner a few years ago. My great good fortune in meeting a very sane partner is appreciated on a daily basis. She is all about fearless moral inventories and not making one out to be special because of ones differences. "Just because you're different doesn't make you useful" gives you an idea of her * intolerant world view. Humility as perspective rather than pretence...and the confidence to strike when a positive difference can be made.
You are so right to keep your standards. We elevate or degrade ourselves by the company we keep...none more so than our partners. In Hinduism this is called "darshan" - positive company of positive people. That has to be a disciplined policy as random bumping into people and just allowing them in rarely leads to darshan. In my experience at least.
Flook, thank you so much. You take what I am feeling and add such poetic justice. I was too angry and very codependent as well. I had put up with and put up with for all of my life, so I was very bitter.
Finally broke up with my boyfriend this weekend. It was friendly. I told him that if he could get a handle on his anger, we would have a chance. But I am not holding my breath. I don't expect anything. I feel total compassion for him, as he is a very good person.
Just can't stop crying. Just one more thing on the huge pile of loses. Can't say I have a * of a lot going for me. No family, no stable home, no partner, no pet. Can't keep a damn thing.
Oh, Mary. :hug: I'll be thinking of you today. I hope the clouds clear up very soon.
Some things, like your ex boyfriends anger cannot be kept and happiness ensue. It is so easy after the event to focus in on the good things that have been lost rather than remembering why we chose the path you did. Deadwood is tough to shake out of the tree because some always falls on your head. But them's the rules. I expect I may have recommended "when things fall apart" by Pema Chodron before. But please forgive me if I do so again. Given the loss that cptsd peeps accumilate around ourselves or have inflicted on us I think it should be de riguer reading! I hope you finf deep consolation and comfort in the many small but wonderful things of life...as well as in the bigger stuff too. Don't want to see a friend hurt.
Hi, Mary,
hope you're feeling a bit better today. :hug:
I had a bit of a sh*tty weekend myself and had a good cry yesterday. Sometimes crying is the best thing you can do for yourself. It's a sign of self compassion.
I am sorry you've suffered so many losses in your life. I admire how you are honest and authentic and the main reason behind your life decisions seems to be the drive to keep yourself sane and healthy. It shows you have compassion for yourself and others. I am just sorry that the necessity to keep yourself healthy has forced you to break up with your boyfriend now.
Please be good to yourself and allow yourself time to grieve and heal. Sending good thoughts and hugs your way! :hug:
kf
Thanks to all of you. Some real words of wisdom. I am very familiar with Pema's work and dharma talks. I know, these are things I just don't need in my life. I know this. It is very hurtful to realize that a lifetime of busting my a**, caring for 4 family members till they died, being faithful and loyal, practical, frugal, having integrity, being intelligent, and staying out of trouble have gotten me jack s***. Zero.
All Pema Chodren had to contend with is a cheating, lying husband---that was enough to send her into nun-hood and to write a book (don't get me wrong, love her stuff).
I see loving families everywhere I go down here. People with strong roots, living in the same neighborhood for decades. That is a flat out alien reality for me. It is alien to me that I can ever trust a man with sharing money affairs or business affairs, I have been burned so many times. It is alien to me the idea that I will not become suffocated by the relationship with a man. The idea that a close person is not there to destroy my soul or to try to run a hustle scam is alien. I have been burned by employers so many times, lied to, cheated out of pay, that I cannot fathom going back to science or teaching....my real calling. Sleazebags. Literally nothing I have done to build things has made any material impact.
The only thing I seem to be really good at is tossing toxic people into the dumpster with relative ease. And this bothers me, as there appears to be so damned many of them.
So this loss seems to have scraped the scabs off a few other wounds, if I'm getting this right? Something along those lines happened to me too, a few times. It's like our subconscious says: "oh, you're grieving a loss? Whoa-hey, let's grieve ALL THE LOSSES EVER." As if ONE wasn't enough. What you're going through sounds very exhausting and difficult. I hope you're okay. Take care of yourself! :hug:
Oh, I am doing what I can to baby myself. Since it is so affordable, I got a massage from a chiroproactor/physical therapist, and some acupuncture from the public health clinic. Got a few of my ethnic food snacky treats here at the market this morning. Went to sit a the central park. Set up education training for a business idea I have with a craftsmen here in town. And handled some snaggy little problems with my supplier without a skip. This is the most competent I have been in years. The last 2 weeks, my stress caused memory problems started to vanish, and concentration (was dead and gone) is roaring back. Again, it has been many years since functioning like this.
So I am functioning quite well at this moment, despite of all the stress.
I cured my thyroid disease, lost weight, got in good shape. The problem is, I can't get situated. It's like I am constantly doing triage putting out proverbial fires all the time. Damage control. I don't get it. What is the higher power trying to tell me? I feel like the butt of a practical joke.
And thank you so much, SC.
Hello Mary,
It's painful, but I hope those tears help to wash your heart and bit by bit reduce the sadness. Your newfound abilities to embrace your feelings and walk through them to the other side will help you during this time of difficulty. And know that here you have a community of people who are willing to just sit with you while you feel what you need to feel. Te apoyamos y te entendemos.
For the first time in my life I am 2+ months without a husband or bf. The weird thing is that during those times without (lasting 1-2 months) it felt like foreverrrrr!!!! Como siempre amiga! Now that I'm getting healthy I'm beginning to feel the "need" for a couple relationship less and less. I hope that the healthy me several months (or years?) down the road is able to meet someone to simply walk this path of life together. Like you said, someone healthy and willing to grow. I don't care about degrees or money either. I've always felt those were my responsibility anyway. No drugs, no alcohol, relatively fit & nutritious eating, faithful, honest and kind. Then I make things more complicated by looking for someone who has a multicultural world view, is over 45 y.o., preferably fluent in Spanish, and accepting of unique religious perspectives. I've lately decided I'd kind of prefer someone who is a little chubby?, ugly?, nerdy? In a wheel chair? Blind? Insecure?...just something unpleasant that gives him the humility we all need to stick with it and see the positive without the distraction of his ego.
At the beginning of learning to regulate my anxiety around intimate relationships I read that often people who've been raised with healthy attachment look for, find and commit to a healthy relationship earlier in life, and it sticks. I wanted to scream. What about those of us who could commit and provide a wonderful partnership, but learned it later on in life? Or who will feel anxious, but just need a bit more reassurance than other people? What about those of us a bit more wounded? We deserve love too. We deserve a healthy relationship too.
My adult daughter and I had a good conversation about relationships today. She's decided that it's very important that the person who she meets be "kind"...that is her first priority. I suspect she might've met someone recently, but time will tell! ;)
I've seen from your writing that you have grown a great deal and continue to value personal growth. You've developed wisdom and the ability to discern which people can reciprocate a healthier friendship. You don't need to be around someone who's frequently angry, complaining and unhappy.
But that void, even if it was sometimes filled with unpleasantness, still exists. It hurts. The feelings of abandonment relived.
I know that you're very careful about media, but have you read or watched Wild!? Empowering movie. It was just what I needed when I was going through my recent break up, although we never had "the talk"...we both just stopped. But my heart knew and the movie helped.
Finally, I just want to say that you've put in words here what I'd intuited all of my life. It's emotionally safer in Latin America. People know how to love and support one another. It's an "easier" environment. And for those of us who've lived with so much trauma that might be exactly what we need. On the other hand being an "outsider" around so many healthy families can feel alienating. I hope that there are some people whose company can bring you comfort. Often Latinos reach out quickly when they know that someone is in pain, like a "break up"...I hope that perhaps you have some people like that around you? Neighbors? Other friends or aquaintances?
And what Cat mentioned rings true, this is bringing up grief on many levels, career & friend & family ...
So, across the continents in "Mexico, USA" te deseo lo mejor, lo mereces ;)
Thank you C. (and the rest of you guys). Man, this is really a great group. Just a really rough day yesterday. Flook and C, the poetic way you guys express yourselves is just amazing. Really appreciated.
I find sexy a man who has his "stuff" together. Good manager of his life, takes responsibility for things. I have to wear the pants all the time, as so many situations ans people are toxic and I have to be the super brave adult with brass balls to get out of them. I just think it is HOT when the guy can wear the pants and be a man. Like you, I really don't need anybody, and I really need my own space at this moment.
Like a lot of people here, I have had to go to extreme measures to try to recover. In a way, it is almost like I live like a Buddhist Monk or Nun (There is Pema Chodren for ya'), as even small distractions like a TV or gaming system mess up the recovery, as it takes up so much time for me.
A guy is going to have to appreciate this, and not come in a trash the scene up (I mean literally and figuratively). Cant do older men anymore, unless they really have it together. Most are in horrible physical condition, and ripe for placing preventable liabilities on the relationship (I will not be somebody's nurse maid). This sounds really calculating, but from experience, I do not need a person who is a walking liability and disaster. I don't think any of us in our recovery really need that.
I don't think it is ever too late to develop decent relationships. Yes there are some people who strike out and hit the jackpot because of better attachment skills learned as a baby. But unless they have had to really learn that "humility" you talked about, you will find strange and bizarre character deficits of another kind.
I have cousins that have been married for a long time, and get along, but scratching a little past the surface, you find some strange, destructive, delusional, codependent tendencies. Really, it does not appear healthy at all.
I have known very few people who have true healthy relationships.
I think (and somebody else said it here) that the more you improve yourself, the better magnet you become. The process of becoming self possessed. Really having priorities in order. Not just bending over to the will of the machine.
You daughter sounds like an awesome woman!
Hallo there. I once told a friend that if I ever found the perfect relationship I was going to quit it. "Why?" they asked. "Because I'd only spoil it" came my punchline. I think we place on others a burden that only we ourselves can discharge; to bring our happiness into being. Of course one cannot or should put up with glaring imperfections and damaging flaws! But, as they say, no ones perfect and no one else can *make* me happy. That's an inside job. I'm lucky now to have a marriage where I seek to share the happiness I have rather than my previous modus operandi kicking in. Which was to sit on top of the relationship and suck out the happiness like a co-dependent vampire I was.
Yes, I'm not a perfect husband and my wife isn't the perfect wife. We argue about physics and drink just a bit too much wine (but never to drunkeness). She can be sarcastic to a breathtaking degree and I can be practically dysfunctional to the point of inflicting mental pain on the poor woman. But we are so lucky because we just ask ourselves to be friends and take responsibility for our own happiness. The better to then share it.
This condition has cost me so much in relationships. So much. But has it made me mindful of getting and keeping it right.
I hope I haven't come over smug or anything. Nowt worse than "you're down so listen to how together I am" but if I'm to talk about relationships whilst in a relationship I suppose I run that risk. If I have annoyed you on that count, please forgive me. I just wanted to illustrate my points with a practical example.
Flook, I am so happy you have healthy companionship, and you got this later in life. Seriously, I need to hear about mechanical aspects of non dysfunctional relationships, cause honestly, there aren't that damned many of them to model oneself after.
Right now I am really sensitive and I have a few small good things that are precarious, like recovery (did you see my thread on this?). I really do not want anybody to crash in and * my * up. Screw up all of the hard, hard won progress I have made neurologically. Honestly, if there is a guy out there whom having a relationship with would be synergistic and not tear me down, I would kiss his feet forever.
I have special needs---see here what I have had to do (near the bottom of the first post).
http://outofthefog.net/C-PTSD/forum/index.php?topic=896.0
The typical westernized guy just won't cut it. The typical guy is waaayyy too much of a liability.