Thank you both for your kindness. And I'm glad you got a laugh out of my friend's comments. Yes, it would be great to have that moment in a gilded frame!
I think I'm getting a bit stronger now. Reading this board is a little easier (the first few days I had panic symptoms) I'm coping a bit better the last two days. Have been able to do some errands without mentally "freezing" too much (physically freezing is a different matter - the weather's been cold here, haha)
Rain, you're right - no sprained ankles yet. I do tend to overlook what worked in favor of what was a roaring disaster. It's important to count the little things, too.
Just the other day, something that was interesting (to me, at least) came to mind. Even having thought so hard about how I'd describe myself and how others have described me, I'd managed to forget something that was amusing yet disconcerting at the time it happened, years ago.
I was in the grocery store and heard the song "Kothbiro" on the music system. This is an eerie and haunting tune to hear while shopping for produce, to be sure. But it triggered a memory, because the song was used in the film "The Constant Gardener". Well, I remembered at the time that film came out, our friends who'd seen it kept coming over to check on my husband and me, because the couple in the film had reminded them so much of us that they worried about our well-being. (Maybe this doesn't need a spoiler warning but: very bad things happen to this couple.) This concern was kind of amusing, because well, H and I are nothing like Ralph Fiennes and Rachel Weisz, and y'know...it was only a movie. After this happened several times, we decided to see the film. Our reaction after seeing it (aside from being distressed by the film itself) was to become very worried about each other! Neither of us could see ourselves in the characters, but we could definately see each other in the characters. We were nervous about the other leaving the house alone for a few days.
I mention all this because of how surprising it was that I'd forgotten it. This had been back in the time I'd been happiest and most distant from my FOO, but even then I didn't imagine I'd ever been as outspoken as the wife in the film. I can be secretive as she was, yes (who wouldn't be, with such a dysfunctional upbringing) but to be so assertive? Not likely. Discussing this with H, he disagrees. He says that no, I won't back away from my principles, and I know when someone is BSing me and won't accept it. The one exception to this is with my mother, who has a way of breaking me, clouding my mind until I can't think. I realized then that the character of the wife in the film is of the "truth teller" variety, which is what I was in my FOO. It's often the "truth teller" who becomes the scapegoat in a dysfunctional family.
Becoming the truth teller was never intentional - it just seemed to be my nature. The only way for my mother to deal with this, I suppose, was to terrify me into silence. But even then, the effects of this displayed in my behavior, showing everyone that something was wrong in our house. Mother tried very hard to recast me as "crazy" which I didn't resist too much, because I certainly felt crazy (as mentioned in my initial post) - it just took a long time to realize that this is because mother is crazy-making. It was a therapist who pointed this out the first time, actually, when I struggled to describe the series of double-binds that mother had used to "tie" our whole family.
H says that mother will work on me, intentionally pushing buttons until she finds the one that transforms me into a frightened 5-year old, unable to defend myself. The one who accepts mother as the ultimate authority. He says it's disturbing to watch this tranformation from principled adult woman to terrified child. And it's true - when she does this, I do forget who I've been all these years, that I'm an adult , that I've dealt with things that were truly harder, scarier and more important than mother ever was, in objective sense. Instead, I'm 5 years old all over again.
When this happens, it wrecks me for days (it's the emotional flashbacks, I guess) and I do wish there was a way to keep my adult self/adult mind when she attacks. The only way that works is if it has to do with my kids - I can keep my adult self together is if the kids need protection. Otherwise, I fall apart.
This is a digression, but I'm just reminded of something I'd heard from friends who'd left a religious cult years ago. They were counseling someone who was considering leaving the church but hadn't made the break yet. They said this fellow, who was wealthy and powerful by any other standard, who could have gone anywhere or done almost anything he'd wanted, stood in their hallway shaking and trembling, literally afraid to move. "What if the church finds out? What if they know I'm here?" he kept saying. He could have gone anywhere in the world, but couldn't move because his mind was in prison.
And it's worth noting that the church this man was so afraid of actually needed him, far more than he needed them. This church needed his money and power, the church was nothing without its members. But of course, the man couldn't see that, he could only feel the fear. That's what brainwashing does to a person.
Maybe that's not a digression, really, but something that needed to come out. Maybe what I'm dealing with - the fact that I lose my principled, adult self, is a part of the brainwashing mother worked on me. That it is a mental prison. And also that a bully (or a manipulator) needs a victim to succeed in what they do. Otherwise they would have to go around threatening inanimate objects and that wouldn't be very satisfying to them, would it? :p
There's something in this mess of words that might be important, but I'll have to wait for a bit to figure out what it is.
One day, I hope to leave my FOO in the mental ward of their choosing, too.
I think I'm getting a bit stronger now. Reading this board is a little easier (the first few days I had panic symptoms) I'm coping a bit better the last two days. Have been able to do some errands without mentally "freezing" too much (physically freezing is a different matter - the weather's been cold here, haha)
Rain, you're right - no sprained ankles yet. I do tend to overlook what worked in favor of what was a roaring disaster. It's important to count the little things, too.
Just the other day, something that was interesting (to me, at least) came to mind. Even having thought so hard about how I'd describe myself and how others have described me, I'd managed to forget something that was amusing yet disconcerting at the time it happened, years ago.
I was in the grocery store and heard the song "Kothbiro" on the music system. This is an eerie and haunting tune to hear while shopping for produce, to be sure. But it triggered a memory, because the song was used in the film "The Constant Gardener". Well, I remembered at the time that film came out, our friends who'd seen it kept coming over to check on my husband and me, because the couple in the film had reminded them so much of us that they worried about our well-being. (Maybe this doesn't need a spoiler warning but: very bad things happen to this couple.) This concern was kind of amusing, because well, H and I are nothing like Ralph Fiennes and Rachel Weisz, and y'know...it was only a movie. After this happened several times, we decided to see the film. Our reaction after seeing it (aside from being distressed by the film itself) was to become very worried about each other! Neither of us could see ourselves in the characters, but we could definately see each other in the characters. We were nervous about the other leaving the house alone for a few days.
I mention all this because of how surprising it was that I'd forgotten it. This had been back in the time I'd been happiest and most distant from my FOO, but even then I didn't imagine I'd ever been as outspoken as the wife in the film. I can be secretive as she was, yes (who wouldn't be, with such a dysfunctional upbringing) but to be so assertive? Not likely. Discussing this with H, he disagrees. He says that no, I won't back away from my principles, and I know when someone is BSing me and won't accept it. The one exception to this is with my mother, who has a way of breaking me, clouding my mind until I can't think. I realized then that the character of the wife in the film is of the "truth teller" variety, which is what I was in my FOO. It's often the "truth teller" who becomes the scapegoat in a dysfunctional family.
Becoming the truth teller was never intentional - it just seemed to be my nature. The only way for my mother to deal with this, I suppose, was to terrify me into silence. But even then, the effects of this displayed in my behavior, showing everyone that something was wrong in our house. Mother tried very hard to recast me as "crazy" which I didn't resist too much, because I certainly felt crazy (as mentioned in my initial post) - it just took a long time to realize that this is because mother is crazy-making. It was a therapist who pointed this out the first time, actually, when I struggled to describe the series of double-binds that mother had used to "tie" our whole family.
H says that mother will work on me, intentionally pushing buttons until she finds the one that transforms me into a frightened 5-year old, unable to defend myself. The one who accepts mother as the ultimate authority. He says it's disturbing to watch this tranformation from principled adult woman to terrified child. And it's true - when she does this, I do forget who I've been all these years, that I'm an adult , that I've dealt with things that were truly harder, scarier and more important than mother ever was, in objective sense. Instead, I'm 5 years old all over again.
When this happens, it wrecks me for days (it's the emotional flashbacks, I guess) and I do wish there was a way to keep my adult self/adult mind when she attacks. The only way that works is if it has to do with my kids - I can keep my adult self together is if the kids need protection. Otherwise, I fall apart.
This is a digression, but I'm just reminded of something I'd heard from friends who'd left a religious cult years ago. They were counseling someone who was considering leaving the church but hadn't made the break yet. They said this fellow, who was wealthy and powerful by any other standard, who could have gone anywhere or done almost anything he'd wanted, stood in their hallway shaking and trembling, literally afraid to move. "What if the church finds out? What if they know I'm here?" he kept saying. He could have gone anywhere in the world, but couldn't move because his mind was in prison.
And it's worth noting that the church this man was so afraid of actually needed him, far more than he needed them. This church needed his money and power, the church was nothing without its members. But of course, the man couldn't see that, he could only feel the fear. That's what brainwashing does to a person.
Maybe that's not a digression, really, but something that needed to come out. Maybe what I'm dealing with - the fact that I lose my principled, adult self, is a part of the brainwashing mother worked on me. That it is a mental prison. And also that a bully (or a manipulator) needs a victim to succeed in what they do. Otherwise they would have to go around threatening inanimate objects and that wouldn't be very satisfying to them, would it? :p
There's something in this mess of words that might be important, but I'll have to wait for a bit to figure out what it is.
One day, I hope to leave my FOO in the mental ward of their choosing, too.