Anita,

Can I ask why is that?

What can I do to still be in contact with you?

Thank you for the note Anita. I hope you take rest and feel better 🙂

Anita,

My mother mocking me, abusing me for so many years, created much anger in me, a hardness (lack of softness), great suspicion of people, focusing on the negatives in people’s words and behaviors. All these reactions to my mother’s abuse need to be further undone. I need to become Softer, and interestingly, Softer is Stronger.

This is my worst problem I think.. Since reading on bpd but also earlier, I knew I was focusing on negatives. I could be talking for someone for an hour and get stuck on some suspicious word, tone, whatever.. and obsess about it. Good I know it’s not real, I know I imagine this, but there were times I didn’t know that, not that long ago. I fear it may be never ending, I could fight it and it will sneak on me again..  But I focus on successes, even small ones, like you always say. I am aware of this and working on it.

Anita, could you elaborate on this one “hardness (lack of softness)”? Not sure I understand. Is it being too harsh, insensitive? I am thinking about my own behavior and that’s how I see it: me being sometimes too.. sarcastic maybe, not very nice. I noticed it when texting with someone when I start typing some answer right away and hesitate and delete because I think ” it’s not very nice”. That’s why I think my fear of offending people is sometimes justified.

Anita,

CoNgRaTuLaTiOnS for these couple of times. A couple of times is an excellent beginning!

Thank you.

yet, my mother never did this simple thing, not a single time. I wish she did…

My mother too couldn’t ever … do this simple thing. Perhaps that would mean giving up the role of victim and guilt-tripping the other person (among other reasons). I guess it’s too tempting.

by saying this, you are encouraging me to pay more attention to the mood and atmosphere I create- or add to- in other threads, with other members. Thank you!

Your welcome 🙂

feel a bit sorry for yourself, from time to time: that’s empathy, and you deserve it.

Every time I feel sorry for myself I remember that, you mentioned this one time and yes, it is good and I need this.

Anita,

Don’t worry about forgetting to ask me how I am, I forget things too! And I am fine, thank you

You make everything seem so… okay and simple. I am grateful for that 🙂

I don’t remember if we talked any about BPD, or if we talked about it at length. I don’t remember that you mentioned lashing out at people angrily, which is a hallmark of the disorder…?

I think we only did in context of our mothers and a borderline rage. And no, I never lash out at people angrily, but I do feel this anger sometimes, it comes and goes. Also this “splitting” – I think it happens too. There are times I feel angry at some people (once they do something to upset me) and cannot shake off this feeling for some time. I can be naggy and not nice and it’s because of this anger. I also had history of self harm. There are symptoms that I think I used to have/are not that intense like: Impulsive, self-destructive behaviors, Unstable relationships, Fear of abandonment.

Thank you for being so kind Anita, have a good and peaceful day 🙂

Anita,

 The projection of your mother into the neighbor was immediate. Living with your mother, you had to be hyper vigilant, so to detect her anger and mocking … before it got worse, so that you could emotionally prepare for it, and so that you can figure out how to respond so to lessen the damage to yourself.

True. And good that I am aware of it, but still it is difficult and happens often.

you were not crazy. When we are spaced out (not focused on the here-and-now), we drift to a time of no-time: no separated past, present and future.

That’s very well said (as most of your thoughts, Anita). I will remember that.

– When she told you these scary, disturbing words the first time, you were very scared and disturbed.. but then, over time, you got so used to these words, that you .. forgot about them. This is what dissociation is about: either forgetting words and events altogether, or forgetting what you felt when the words and evens took place. Personally, I have very few memories of my childhood (I forgot a ton of scary words and events), and of what I do remember of the scary words and events, only recently did I start to remember a bit of what I felt back then.

I too, have very few memories from childhood. I imagine it is weird to only recently remember how you felt in those moments. I am wondering whether I remember words and events or feelings too. I remember being in my pyjamas a lot, being cold, out of bed in the middle of the night, shaking because of the cold – that’s why I remember it probably. Can’t remember much feelings except of maybe being scared.

I wrote to you yesterday: “I had some memories (very few) but it was only a visual image of me in those memories, not me, the actual person“- the feeling gives memories a 3rd dimension. Without feeling, memories are 2-dimensional. (A visual image  is 2-dimensional, an actual person is 3-dimensional).

Does this mean memories (traumatic ones for instance) need to have this feeling, this 3rd dimension?  Sorry if I misunderstand.

you felt lots of fear when that event took place, an overwhelming amount of fear. The anxiety you feel now on a daily basis is .. what it takes to keep that amount of overwhelming fear below your awareness. There is no way to intentionally make yourself re-experience that overwhelming fear, nor would it be a good idea if you were able (it’d be too much). It takes a very gradual process to feel it in small increments, small amounts that you can endure.

So what I understand is the everyday anxiety I feel is a result of childhood trauma, not processed trauma, and that better to not re-live those situations, not face this overwhelming fear. How to do it in small amounts and would it be helpful in processing trauma?

What I wrote right above is true to me: I feel anxiety on a daily basis, I am still pushing down fear that threatens to overwhelm me. It’s instinctive.

I must say I am still thinking about this whole post. Not everything is clear to me but I agree with the quote above.

Anita,

“I immediately felt anger that.. he is mocking me… “- I very much relate. I felt that people are mocking me all the time, or very often, I should say. After all, my own mother mocked me and expressed plenty to me that I am.. mockable, not to be respected. It was enough for a person to look in my direction, for me to feel mocked, ridiculed, made fun of.

And I can relate to this so much: “It was enough for a person to look in my direction, for me to feel mocked, ridiculed, made fun of.” One time I met a neighbor when taking out the trash and she said “Hi” and I immediately thought: “is she mad at me? Do I look funny?” and then I thought “oh my god, am I crazy?… she just said ‘Hi’! for god’s sake..”.. It’s really ridiculous what thoughts come to my mind sometimes but at least I know that those thoughts are ridiculous and just my imagination, not real.

lots about me triggered my mother, so much did. There was no way for me to live and not trigger her.

So real for me too. I remember eating a carrot and my mother asking me to leave the room. (Not only one time, almost every time I ate loudly. I still trigger myself when I eat loudly)

My mother used to tell me: „when someone is a young mother and has a baby and this gets overwhelming and there’s this anger, this..urge that you want to almost throw your baby out of the window”. She used to tell me this over and over through the years, those exact words.

I never thought about this until recently that this is how she felt towards me – this anger, she hated me so much that she wanted to throw me out of the window, literally.. and she even repeatedly told me about this! Isn’t this amazing..how I never actually understood this is how she feels about me, even though she specifically told me this. 

the way I understand it is that when she got angry at you for laughing, part of you identified with her and got angry at yourself … Or said in another way: a young child is not mentally separated from her mother, so when the mother gets angry about X, the child gets angry about X. When because of a disturbing childhood, a child doesn’t get the opportunity to mentally separate from her mother, this lack of separation carries through to adulthood.

True.

 The way psychotherapy works (in my experience as a patient) is that first, the therapist teaches the patient emotion regulation skills/ distress tolerance skills which are about lessening the intensity of painful or disturbing emotions, and secondly, gradually reconnect with these (less intense) emotions in a way that works in the context of healing.

I am googling and reading about emotion regulation skills, coping skills, healthy ones.. I try to incorporate some of them in stressful situations, like the smell, seeing, hearing. But not sure if I do it right and use the full potential of those exercises.

you can’t reconnect, or re-associate with emotional experiences that overwhelmed you in the past unless you have the skills mentioned above. Only when you are not afraid of being overwhelmed yet again, you are able to get this feeling, that surprising feeling (in my experience) that it was really me who was there. Before this surprising feeling, I had some memories (very few) but it was only a visual image of me in those memories, not me, the actual person. Can you relate to what I am saying? I am asking because if you don’t relate, I would like to try explain it in a different way.

Not sure. I imagine myself in my bedroom, my parents yelling, I was shaking and having tics. I am trying to imagine it is me, there, but now-me, me as an adult and them at that time. But.. not sure what I should do next with this and whether I understand it. Maybe I need more time to read or perhaps you would like to explain it in a different way, maybe it would help. Thank you for bringing it up Anita, it’s very new and interesting to me.