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In therapy today my T reminded me directly and indirectly of methods I've used before that actually work for me and which I would do better to integrate more into daily life.

I do well with imagination work, which I've posted about elsewhere (Screen Processing, Bank Vault, Inner Safe Place etc). It's fairly quick to do and effective in the short to medium term, once you know how to do the methods. Today my T made me aware of additional situations in which I can implement these methods.

Another is increasing resilience, which is kind of connected to the 'stabilisation mantra' in trauma-informed therapy in the country I live in: stabilisation stabilisation stabilisation, have a peek at something traumatic and process possibly, then stabilisation stabilisation stabilisation, rinse and repeat till healthy. Stabilisation can be very short-term like pushing off walls to get back into body or it can be a longer term thing. For the latter it's important to know: what does me good, what helps me keep going? Then build up resilience by focussing on these. That includes my garden, some of my freelance work, being in nature, singing, movign around to music, healthyish friends, laughing, sense of smell, sense of touch. 

And finally: protecting myself from trauma which means not reading so many descriptions of it, including here. I don't have to read everybody's posts! I do sometimes, to pass the time? or to dispel loneliness? or to put off actually acting on my own healing?  but I really don't need to, not even as Mod. It also means being careful how much I write about what I experienced, what was traumatic for me. My T said today it isn't good for me to think or say "I was SG in FOO". With the abbreviation it's not so bad, but in general it's not good because I'm repeating to myself what FOO did to me. A lot of the abuse was verbal and psychological. My T said it's good instead to visualise myself putting my hands and arms up to send the 'message' away and even saying to myself my country's equivalent of Return to Sender to the Inner Parcel Delivery Service. Except it's not literally 'return to sender', it's just 'I refuse to accept this delivery' which is better for me. Not send back to FOO, just don't accept it.

Here goes nothing. It's time I did some negotiating with a FOO mbr on a topic important to me. I'm noting it here so that I'll actually start and not continue to prevaricate and read around the Boards and answer other mbrs' posts.

Not even sure what to call this. I seem to be taking ages breaking away from FOO. Probably I don't really want to know what FOO really thinks of me. I know some of you might say that that doesn't matter. But I haven't yet got to the place in healing where I can say: 'the * with FOO'. For one thing, as posted before, I'm still getting financial help, for another I have a small FOO godchild and none of this is her fault. I was going to try and write to her father, my B, stating what I want in order to be able to continue some sort of a relationship with her. My T says I shouldn't beg, I should state.

For me in FOO, stating is really hard (my T knows this for sure). The more I think about what to write, the more futile it seems. Somebody over at our sister website OOTF pointed out to me that it seems in my FOO as if I'm damned if I do and damned if I don't. Whatever I say will be manipulated around to make the rest of FOO look good and me unreasonable, crazy, difficult.... So I can wrack my brains for months and I'll still probably lose all connection with my godchild. My FOO is certainly not a place where it would be useful or sensible to say "I feel hurt by..." because they already know I'm hurt, they don't care. They never really have. If I told them that, some of them like enF, would hotly deny it, others would shrug or find reasons to blame me for them not caring. "It's because you (Blueberry) are so-and-so." or "It's because you (Blueberry) didn't explain properly."

Well, the one good thing I do know is that I don't harangue myself about wasted time, like taking so long to remove myself completely from FOO. I accept that it's taking the time it's taking.

I'm very late for work. I got up, made a large mug of tea and went back to bed to drink it, and then stayed in bed for 3 hours. (not a success)

Once up again, I thought I'd come on here and post under Difficult Day, so at least tell someone. Then the mere thought of OOTS somehow got things going in a healing way!  I asked myself "for whom is everything all too much?" A small IC answered. So immediately all these old imagination exercises came up. They just led from one to the other.

I told this little one that no way does she have to cycle all that way. She can go in a baby seat. She would prefer a trailer bike, Ok, she gets to be a bit more active and independent if she wants. Then at work she doesn't need to work with me. I suggest running around in the lovely meadows, but she would feel lonely, so I say she can follow me around at work but it won't be too fun. Then I suggest inner safe place with Hen babysitter. She feels too big for Hen. I suggest a playground, then a number of other ICs turn up too, they all want to go to the playground with small IC. That's fine. They're older and can look after small IC a bit, since Hen won't be. Small IC can come back to me at work sometimes too just for a cuddle and then go back to the playground.

So just the thought of OOTS and all you great and supportive people here was enough to show me the way. 

I'm quoting sanmagic here, who posted this to Elpha:
"she (the T) continually tore away at my very being, attacking many levels of my 'self', down to my soul until i couldn't stand on my own anymore.  after spending 8 years with a t who was supposed to be a healer, a best friend, and a concerned boss, i ended up ... feeling less about myself than i ever had before.  something intrinsic in me had broken because of what she'd done to me. ..

big t trauma?  yes, i believe so.  anything tangible?  not one thing.  it wouldn't come under any category of what is normally seen as big t." (I'm so sorry, san. )

I didn't want to hijack the thread so I'm putting this here.

Thanks san for posting this. It really speaks to me for what FOO did to me. There was also what is considered relatively minor CSA and CPA, but the worst (I think) was the emotional and it was a type and to the degree that  "continually tore away at my very being, attacking many levels of my 'self', down to my soul until i couldn't stand on my own anymore".

Except since it happened in my childhood, I didn't ever really learn to stand on my own. Not really, or at least not in all ways that you'd expect from the young adult woman I was 20-odd years ago. Or I could stand on my own, but not for long. I was constantly 'crashing' then working my way back up onto my feet, then crashing again (just with major depression and feelings of utter hopelessness, and complete exhaustion).

Also this "broken". Something broke in me very early. Part of me was broken. I yelled that once in group therapy to the person standing in for my F: "Can't you see I'm broken??" In that kind of therapeutic setting I'm in touch with my emotions and yelling what I really feel.

Therapists used to dig around looking for the 'real' trauma. This was it. The words and mockery continually tearing at me and my thoughts, my ways of being, my ways of acting, my very physical presence and how I demonstrated it (e.g. the smile on my face or how I ran - completely innocent activities) until I didn't want to exist.

I'm now back, and back to Moderating.

Thank you Sceal for doing so much while I was gone and to Kizzie for being responsible for everything  . Also huge thanks  to those who I asked and who had time, energy etc. to do Monitoring, as well as Responding to newbies, Difficult Day, technical enquiries etc. Great job everyone   

It was great having a good few days not on the forum and of course those couple days at the end on a healing retreat. 

I'm taking a break for the rest of the week (unless I come back on to post something for self this evening). I need it. As of tomorrow I'll be completely offline till Sunday because I'll be in places where online isn't possible.  That includes a long weekend of healing retreat and man do I need it.

Many thanks to those on here who are doing Temp. Monitoring work! You know who you are.  You're doing great. I see already where and how you're helping out.   

Any other members are welcome to help out by checking http://cptsd.org/forum/index.php?topic=9386.0

Blueberry

I'm reading Lawson's "Understanding the Borderline Mother".

I find it fascinating but it also is obviously really difficult for me because it triggers impulse for a type of SH I developed as a child to deal with the CSA. That was done to me by my mother and although I can't remember off-hand any graphic descriptions of CSA in this book, apparently just reading about what I presume is my mother's mental illness and how it affects a child and often seeing myself in that child is too much.

NTS: take it easy, do IC work, self-soothe, and don't read anymore till back from healing retreat

[all members to help keep OOTS safe and welcoming]

Dear all,

As an addition to Kizzie's message under NEWS, I'd like to ask all members to help keep OOTS safe and welcoming. Many of you welcome new members already and that's great! Thanks so much. Please keep it up  Also if you can reach out in any way to someone posting on Difficult Day, that would be much appreciated.

If any posts strike you as maybe not adhering to Member Guidelines ( http://cptsd.org/forum/index.php?topic=1616.0 ), simply click on Report to Moderator button and give very brief explanation. Nobody except Admin and Mods (Kizzie and I) will be informed. I personally prefer too many than too few, so trust your gut feeling and don't be shy   

Two Moderators have stepped down recently so Kizzie and I are the only ones. In addition Sceal helps out as Monitor (Thanks!)

See here for more info on being Monitor http://cptsd.org/forum/index.php?topic=8548.0

Thank you everybody!
Blueberry

Today I saw some ground in the garden had been cleared, it's right next to my rose bush but not technically my garden. I assumed it was one particular neighbour and her mother and spoke fairly gruffly to the mother about it. Turned out it wasn't them. It might have been, not out of character for them, but it wasn't.

I apologised but not very well.

I should have gone away and done some deep-breathing or something. I know it sounds a very minor thing but sudden changes in the garden seem to trigger me. To my neighbours I think I just seem kind of erratic and maybe a bit obsessive-compulsive. For a long time I had nightmares about the garden being dug up and / or concreted over, or my plants removed and replaced with other peoples'. I haven't for a long while now. Idk what's up that i'm being re-triggered. Maybe just more FOO stuff. It seems connected to people just coming and doing stuff in my space. Like B1 in my childhood / teenage years.

[is]

   

I thought I made it pretty clear in FOO that I don't want phone calls from the adults. (The Littles are too small to phone of their own accord but that could change). B informs me his wife (who usually sends out the photos in their family) didn't think I wanted any emails so didn't send me photos of little niece's birthday.  B. sent them now. 

How can intelligent people be so dumb? But I suppose either my 'wants' are just not that important to them and life is too 'busy' to remember. Actually not 'either / or'. That one's a given. My 'wants' / 'needs' aren't important in FOO. If they had been important at last FOO get-together, Horrendous Event wouldn't have occured.

Or I suppose that there might be some sort of reason to do with manipulating or shutting me even further out. I sent little niece a card and present, and an Easter present. How can SIL think I wouldn't want photos?? She used to send and I used to thank her for them. So why the change? I can hear her in my mind talking to B and setting a deadline "If your S doesn't do xy by blah blah then we're not sending photos. She plainly doesn't want anything to do with us". It's tricky. I don't want anything to do with her but that doesn't extend to my niece. My niece is not her. My niece is also my god daughter. And my niece little as she was asked to be able to come and say goodbye to me at Horrendous Event. As my T says, there is actually a relationship there. I'm trying to keep that going without destabilising and further damaging myself, which phone contact to FOO would do.

They probably don't really want to understand. Then they'd have to question my scapegoat role.

This is a biggie. I work freelance. It's good to get yourself and your work out there so people can see what you have on offer. This evening I was checking something on the website of my professional association and it hit me again that I still don't have a photo of myself there although probably 90% of people do. It's highly recommended for your own marketing just among freelance colleagues. I like getting a picture of my freelance colleagues myself, seeing what they might be like based on their photo.

But my own picture? No. It's not so much a technical problem of how to upload, although that's there a bit too, but it's much more a problem of - I can't put my picture there. Dangerous. Somebody might see me. There's so much wrong with me physically, appearance-wise according to FOO. But that's still what sits - FOO's out-of-date opinion.

The really crazy thing which occurred to me again this evening is: quite a few other members of the association have pictures of themselves standing or sitting out in nature, surrounded by wild-flowers or relaxing in a chair in the garden. Not everybody by any means is sitting there in a fancy suit and/or heels and makeup with a standard photo backdrop. The latter is not my 'look' at all and is not how I dress. But I haven't so far managed to allow myself even one of the less formal type photos either.

Also I could have made more advertising and marketing-wise of an opportunity I had at my disposal for a good number of years but soon won't. But obviously I wasn't able to make more of it. I remember sometimes people nicely suggesting this and that but I know if my internal impulse is SH (even if I don't actually do it) then that tells me to stay away or work on the topic with T. But not force myself through it with no support. Not when SH impulse is as bad as it was with this topic.

I actually accept this topic fairly well, accept my limitations here.

I have a friend with whom I have a lot of phone contact. But recently due to one thing and another we haven't had much contact. In fact apart from a couple of emails, no contact. This has been a relief quite frankly. No phone calls from her in the evenings.

I got back from my farm work 2 hours ago, tired because it's fairly strenuous work. Message on voice mail. "I've been doing well past few days but today I was really sad and now I've collapsed and I really wanted to hear your voice. Please phone back."

Considering last time we spoke she made quite clear right at the beginning that it was to be a short call because she couldn't handle much (understood: from me) but then was rather miffed when I ended the conversation because it was getting rather long due to what she was telling me, I'm feeling rather used! As if how she feels dictates whether or not she wants to phone me at all and how long we speak. It's OK for her to chat longer when it's doing her good but not for me to chat when I'm doing well and am bubbling up with my energy. That's too strenuous for her. But if and when it's too strenuous for me and I say so, she's disappointed putting it mildly and says this.  It all seems a bit unbalanced in terms of how much she is willing to listen and give compared to how much she expects from me.

Considering also that last time we actually tried to meet up, she was absolutely unwilling to meet in the middle between our two towns, she thought absolutely nothing of demanding we meet almost in her backyard. No willingness to compromise at all. Considering all that, yeah, I feel a bit used. Time to reconsider a few things, set some limits, nicely request a bit of a change or else we'll be continuing to have reduced contact.

I'm not quite sure if this is the correct place for my post. I'll see.

Today in therapy I mentioned my terrible gut-wrenching and heart-wrenching pain at the deaths of my Little Furries. The last occasion of this was so bad that I decided to stop keeping Little Furries, at least take a longish break. Recently I was considering getting some again, but then I thought of that pain... Combined with this pain there was almost always the feeling that I'd failed in not managing to keep Little Furry alive and then the feeling that I was a failure because of that.

Logically, you can't simply keep people or pets alive by sheer will-power. But when did logic ever play a role in getting over effects of CPTSD? People or pets can sometimes keep themselves alive way beyond medical prognosis by sheer will-power. One of my Little Furries did that. She just kept going inspite of everything. Hers was the first death where I didn't feel like a failure. I like to talk and think about her and her amazing will-power. 

My T's comment on this topic: Sounds like the pain is actually due to my FOO failing me. I didn't literally die as a child, but parts of me died psychologically-speaking and with that a lot of potential. Lightbulb! It's like the shame and/or blame we take on for FOO. I took on the failure too. It was their failure! They failed to protect me, they failed to make the best out of me. Apparently good parents see the strengths in their children and build on that while helping them get over / deal with weaknesses in a constructive manner. That so did not happen in my FOO. They failed to look at their own weaknesses and how these were playing a role in the family dysfunction etc etc.  Heart-wrenching pain at parents' complete and utter failure to protect me and my life energy.

Then I remembered I used to have kind of a affinity for death and dying. The topic kind of drew me always.

My Little Furries - for a long time they were a reason for me to keep going, to not get too involved thought-wise in giving up, throwing in the towel. No, the Little Furries needed me. I read that dogs and cats take on a kind of child role, Little Furries like rabbits and guinea pigs take on more of a baby role, for their owners that is. With the amount of energy that I put into my Little Furries it was as if I was putting it into myself. I looked after them where I couldn't really look after myself. Internally "allowed" to look after Little Furries and treat them halfway decent, but not self.

Once on a weekend therapy retreat I was distraught because a Little Furry had recently died. At first there were others who couldn't understand that at all and said so. Like, "how can this be such a problem?? If you had kids, you couldn't possible see it this way. "

But later on when it was my time to do individual work, the sentence I was working with (repeating and letting the emotions flow) was "Keep on going, Little Furry, you've almost made it" which mutated spontaneously into "Keep on going Blueberry, you've almost made it". The therapist suggested I look around the circle at that point. Everybody got it, they all had tears in their eyes. All the Little Furries including that one who'd rather tragically died, way too young, were stand-ins for me, for my inner children.

This breakthrough in my understanding is more the opposite of SI, the other side of the coin so to speak. But also detailing my years of struggling to keep going, to want to keep going. Keeping my Little Furries going, looking after them - which gave a lot of meaning to my life, my adult life (!) - was a method of keeping my thoughts and impulses away from SI. I couldn't - my Little Furries needed me!

I'll look at this again tomorrow when less tired. Maybe even condense it a bit. (or discover it should be in a different sub-forum).

This afternoon is difficult. I had therapy this morning and by the afternoon / evening I'm usually exhausted after therapy. Same thing today. Doesn't matter that therapy was good. Exhausting anyway.

I do say to myself I 'should' read thru Difficult Day posts and answer them , as well as check for any Newbie posts. But I'm not going to.

This topic has been moved to [Welcome to OOTS] because it's an introductory post.

http://cptsd.org/forum/index.php?topic=9209.0

I picked up "role of designated patient" in somebody else's post today. Sorry can't remember whose. I was responding to the post and then realised I was writing for me not the other person, so removed it. Putting it here instead.

Role of designated patient - that's me! Everybody else in FOO is quite 'normal' thank you very much, just Blueberry causes all the family problems.

Well, I've had it with that and with them!! They're not going to change. So, they lose me. They've lost me.


Up till now I've only been able to think that. I haven't actually been able to write that FOO has lost daughter, sister (niece, cousin) because they're happy to see me and keep me in the role of designated patient, family burden-bearer, scapegoat. I can't yet write it to them in the form of a Recovery Letter (Unsent Letter), writing it in 'you' form, addressing them, but that too will come.

I've had it with them.

The sentence is apt because it was one B1 used in late teens and early 20's. Of course he said "I've had it with you!" and "I've had it with this!" He was listened to, F made M apologise "if she ever wanted to have contact with B again". I won't be listened to, I know that.  That's what happens when you're designated patient, family burden-bearer, scapegoat.

So I've written it here at least. They've lost me through their own                'pigheadedness' is the word that comes to mind.

As I mentioned somewhere else on here, I'm considering applying for a P/T job. Yesterday I asked at the farm for an honest opinion at what they could put in a recommendation for me. So I was explaining what I needed it for and then also explained in my unfortunate JADE fashion (Justify, Argue...Explain  see OutOfTheFog for further info) that I could never do a real P/T job at the farm because I can't even drive a car never mind the market van or a tractor.

So the one I was speaking to said that actually when their present P/T employee retires they need somebody to make the two products he does, not drive the market van. And he didn't say "Blueberry, you're right, no way could you do this!" He even looked momentarily taken aback at my remark of "I couldn't do a real job, couldn't really be employed by you guys." As in, I'm OK for volunteer / paid-in-kind work but not real work.

While I was doing my afternoon slightly meditative work there, I got to thinking. Maybe I really could do that job? Just because their P/T employee always does one of the markets doesn't apparently mean that his replacement would need to. Things can change, and things do change at this farm. I've done work on and off or else just visited as customers can for 20 years and I've noticed changes. 

I note it's really hard for me to put this breakthrough into words, even harder to write it down. Once it's written down, it's fragile. Somebody could come and destroy or ridicule it. Not that FOO is on here (B1 is passing through my mind rn) but good to know what the underlying fear is. And of course I know that nobody on here would act that way. But the cognitive knowing doesn't erase the long-standing fear brought about by years of FOO ridcule and put-downs.

A couple of weeks ago in therapy I worked on my fear of / reluctance to change my printer cartridge and the underlying issues with even minor manual tasks. It's not a problem of physical dexterity or any kind of physical issue, it's psychological. It's usually about something a little bit technical that I need to do with my hands. I just block. I end up not being able to do it. Often. If I do manage it, it's brilliant. I praise myself and a whole host of Inner Children! My printer is still signalling that the ink is about to run out, but it hasn't yet, so I haven't needed to change. But I can feel how the anxiety has got less just since yesterday. So it seems connected to this idea that maybe I could work at the farm after all, as a normal employee. Why connected? Working at the farm in place of the P/T employee would involve some slightly technical manual work that was an unsurmountable barrier until yesterday. Now I'm thinking - maybe I could?!

The automatic internalised FOO response of 'no way! Blueberry couldn't do that because she is too dumb, too impractical, she is lacking this skill and that qualification' is at least reduced all of a sudden!  It's not just because of the reaction of one of the farmers, it's because things have been moving internally, things have been progressing. 

Link to an old article on emotional abuse which has been revived at OOTF. I relate to a lot of it. I'm posting it here as well because some mbrs have said there isn't enough information or enough posts on emotional abuse.

It's extensive and could be *** Triggering *** for some people.

http://www.vachss.com/av_dispatches/disp_9408_a.html

I'm doing another piece of contract work. I can really feel how today it's emotionally much easier than it has been for a long, long time. Even though this piece is a lot easier than the one I had to finish yesterday, it's no harder or easier than types I've been doing for years, on and off, but all of a sudden, I'm not questioning myself and doubting my decisions and doing SH without noticing etc etc. And my brain isn't blanking, blocking or going mushy.

I finished yet another piece an hour ago, that'll be collected later today. For the past few years I've needed a break of a few weeks to get over one short piece of contract work. This week, no. For me this is huge.  And jsut one of these changes that come from work done in trauma therapy rather than any kind of practising.