Dear Lily Margarette:

“My husband is selfish. He can never put himself in any one else’s position but his own…   I kept my feelings to myself. But.. later today…on the weekend of our daughter’s religious presentation… I’m fuming… I’m really angry now… Now.. the sulking will begin, the slamming doors and being rude… How do I keep my cool? ..my daughter will be upset considering everyone else will be there with their families..”–

– You asked how do you keep your cool because you can put yourself in your 3 children’s shoes (ages 14, 11 and 8, this coming September), and you know how damaging expressed anger in the home is to children, your own children, more damaging than a father not showing up to a religious presentation. Your job, as a mother, is indeed to keep the home as calm as possible because this is what your children need.

Therefore, for as long as you live with your husband in the home, please see to it that your children are not threatened by slamming doors and rude voices and words. Perhaps you can see a medical doctors for a prescription to help you keep calm at this time, temporarily, for now?

Thank you for caring to keep your cool, this is what a good mother does.

anita

Dear Going Through Life:

I am doing well, thank you for being as appreciative and gracious as you are!

“I feel like just texting her again out of the blue, but that will be really illogical“- I agree, that would be illogical.

“I met someone else… Let’s call her SS. She’s nice and sweet and she’s smart too. It’s been going well with her till now but I haven’t come into a relationship with her right now. I’m still thinking about it“- it’s a good thing (!) that you are not in a rush with SS (an acronym for Sweet & Smart?)

“Apart from that my life has taken a busy turn and I’m much more focused on my goals at the moment“- I am glad to read that you are focused on your goals, and not rushing into a relationship!

* On Jan 30, you wrote: “I agree with the fearful avoidant attachment style… when I think someone will love me I will end up pushing them away. I’m scared of that deep commitment“- better approach the prospect of a relationship at a later time, when you are more prepared to manage the challenges of a relationship.

anita

Dear Kshitij:

You are very welcome, and thank you for expressing your appreciation!

“I want to free myself from this trauma and suffering, its been too long but I don’t know how to give myself peace and solace among these intrusive thoughts. I know I lack self-compassion, for I at times judge myself for obsessing over these intrusive thoughts“- the function of the emotional experiences of shame (judging oneself negatively) and guilt (judging one’s actions negatively) is to motivate a person to correct certain behaviors that need to be corrected, so to be a better person to oneself, and to others. Once the correction has been made, shame and guilt, having served their purpose, should be resolved and dissolved. When a person is stuck in guilt and shame, it’s like a festering wound in one’s mind and heart, filling the mind and heart with pus. There is no space for self-compassion when one’s mind-and-heart are filled with figurative pus.

Earlier in your thread, you wrote: “there was a point in my teens when I began to feel as if I had nothing good in me apart from my academic“- you felt- feel that you were not a good person, nothing (almost) good in you.

“I do not want to spend the two years of my masters consumed in these intrusive thoughts and struggling with my mental health because of them“- I think that being stuck in shame and guilt has been fueling your intrusive thoughts for a long time.

Earlier in your thread, you wrote: “As my best friend put it for me – ‘you think you need to suffer again and again that’s why you drag yourself back to those thoughts and situations‘“- like your friend said, it is your need to suffer (a result of shame and guilt), that’s dragging you to (fueling) your intrusive thoughts.

Here is more evidence of your shame and guilt (May 23): “I took that anger on myself…  taking some revenge by hurting myself… self-harming behavior (not physical harm) like discontinuing therapy, cutting off all friendships and relations, refusing proper diet and taking care of my physical health and even giving up my career aspirations… I judge myself“- you feel like hurting and harming someone you judge to be a bad person.  You wouldn’t be motivated to hurt, harm and take revenge against a person you judge to be a good person.

May 23: “I sometimes feel that lack of self compassion is the very reason I suffer so much from these intrusive thoughts“-  shame and guilt (the figurative pus I mentioned above) leave no space for self-compassion. Shame and guilt are fueling your intrusive thoughts and causing a mix of despair, depression, rage, hopelessness, and bitterness.

The sermons delivered by your father, was where and how shame and guilt were introduced into your mind and heart, weren’t they?

“I am not being able to tell my therapist about this. She has been so helpful over the last two years…“- I hope that you manage somehow to tell it all to your therapist: you can start by telling her why it’s so difficult for you to tell her.

When your shame and guilt are resolved, so will your unnecessary suffering, unnecessary because you are a good person, and good people should not suffer.

anita

Dear SadSoul:

You are welcome and thank you for the beautiful.

“if we make our immediate space the best it possibly can be, then where possible we help those around us, then the ripple has gone further than just us“- reads good to me, yes, let’s ripple!

“How are things after a good sleep? Thinking of you.“- didn’t have a good sleep, but not too bad. Thank you for thinking of me, I am sending you a ripple of good thoughts right now-

Sent!

anita

Dear SadSoul:

“I miss him a very enormous large gigantic mammoth amount”– very enormous, gigantic, mammoth, that’s a whole lot of missing.

“How are you doing?“- Sun evening here, still light outside, and green, as always. I am listening to people (YouTube News) in pain, gang violence in Haiti, war in the middle east, dead young people.

anita

Dear Going Through Life:

You are welcome. Yes, please, let us keep in contact. I will write more Mon morning (it is Sun evening here).

anita