Dear Anita,

” I wanted to make her happy, to make her dream come true. And so.. I destroyed my own dream: to be free from her.” ” After that, the pattern was that I made progress living away from her, but every time I traveled to visit her, all that progress was reversed. Eventually, those wings I felt I had- flying in the clear, blue sky- nothing was left of those wings.”

You still loved her and wanted to make her happy somehow. And her power over you lasted despite being so far away because you were coming back to her.. because the ties weren’t entirely cut.

 ” For a child: if X upsets her mother, X is a bad thing.”

Everything potentially upsets my mother. So everything is a bad thing to her. I had a fight within me. Because I hated her. But any rebellion/standing up I would do she would put shame on me. Sometimes playing the victim very well, making ma a bad girl. Making me feel like a victimizer for… having any feelings/actions that she doesn’t agree with.

“Her criticisms of your friends and her other messages are all part of the big picture. To undo a confused picture, you have to simplify it, part by part.”

Quite a difficult thing to do, but your inputs are helpful.

” I believe that you are enough of a person, I believe that.. you are a lot of a person/ human. I understand that my belief isn’t enough: that you need to believe it!”

Thank you. I do not know what it would take for me to believe it. Not only intellectually but emotionally. It makes sense though, emotions are a big thing that makes a person feel like a person, feel alive. And the shutting down of them has been participating in this difficult to see me as a person.

“I like you as more than enough of a person. An object could not be having this amazing conversation with me. Do you feel shame for having read what I just wrote?”

No, I smiled when reading this. And no, I do not feel shame right now. Though it is unlikely such phrases would be a shame trigger. After all, how you feel and what you chose to say is up to you. You considering me as a person isn’t something that would make me shameful.

Me hoping for it though, is a bit shameful. It isn’t rational… It is a needs, the need to be considered as a person, the need to be respected, or wishing for appreciation to be mutual. It is normal, and kind of a pre-requisite for healthy interactions/relationships. Yet something messed up has been put into my mind, making me feel ashamed for normal things. And well, thankfully I’m not messed up enough to feel shameful when a person does respect me or consider me as a person. I do still feel shameful for growing attached though. Or afraid. Or both. Probably because attachment is another level of intensity. More troublesome than basic respect… less rational, more emotional.

“I mentioned before being gentle and patient with yourself, but I didn’t mention being respectful toward yourself: when you talk to your friend, don’t apologize for how you feel about staying with her. In general, don’t apologize for how you feel about anything: you don’t choose how you feel, therefore there is no wrong doing and nothing to apologize for.”

Well that’s at least one thing I’ve been doing right. I don’t have the habit of apologizing for how I feel (maybe because I rarely even talk about how I feel, I rarely even know how I feel). Be ashamed, sure, but apologizing is another thing.

“When you speak about your feelings, including shame, to your friend or to anyone, speak with an air of respect toward your feelings. Instead of saying something like I-feel-shame with a weak, shaky voice, or with a numb, “dead” voice, say it with a strong, confident voice: that’s respect for how you feel/ for you!”

Hmm, this one is a bit harder. I don’t pay much attention to how I speak of my feelings, but I think most of the time it’s more neutral/monotone (I guess is could seem numb, I don’t know). It’s is more of an analysis and hypothesis about how I feel than… an actual feeling of my feelings. If it makes sense. Because I don’t feel a lot lately. I do feel some things during my communication with you but otherwise, it is mostly numb. So it is hard to speak with confidence.

For the update: I spoke to my friend today. She was very understanding, she said she didn’t take it the wrong way and I didn’t have to feel obliged to do anything. She said I could take the time to think about it and she would follow my pace. She did offer, though, if it could help me evaluate, that we could try over a for only weekend. I think she would be understanding even if it didn’t work out. I trust her on that.

Linarra

Dear Anita,

” she put shame on almost all of you, having shame stick to everything…”

Shame on almost everything I am, and fear on almost everything that exists in the outside world. A perfect trap. And she doesn’t expect me to ever get out. She shames me for who I am, but without this shame I wouldn’t be so much of the things she shames me about. Without the abuse and the neglect, I would have been different. And I would have felt free to go, I would have more strength and courage, I believe.

She is at least partly responsible for what she accuses me of being, and in the end she doesn’t want me to escape her, so her shaming me is like a tool to keep me trapped. Whether she’s doing it intentionally or not (depending on her mental illness) the result is the same. And I cannot afford to let her do that to me, letting her affecting me more.

“except for your daydreaming/ fantasy life because she didn’t have access to it”

I really should reconnect with that. I disconnected from my daydreaming and fantasy a while ago, because I feared bad consequences… I started to think, maybe it was escapism preventing me to learn to exist in the real world, and preventing me to heal and evolve.  So I disconnected. It wasn’t a conscious choice, not really, since depression caused the disconnection.

However, the depression was a consequence of realizing that maybe I wouldn’t be able to save myself with my current goals, no matter how hard I was trying. Maybe I wouldn’t get anywhere following that path. And I’ve been sacrificing/neglecting/trying to kill my other needs while following this path (other needs being, real human connection? Belonging somewhere real? Existing? Being a person? They are really abstract needs, not the kind I could plan actions to get them… They don’t tell much about myself except I still am a living being somehow.)

Anyway, my daydreaming/fantasy made me feel things, it was telling more precise things about me as a person even it was getting much reflection into the physical world. Casting it out isn’t a great idea… I should reconnect and find a way to balance my life in a way I can get both my inner world and… existence in the outside world.

” Clearly, what it would take for you to believe that you are enough of a person is.. emotions, your own emotions coming back to life. But there is no rushing of the emotions, they shut down if you rush them.”

I agree.

” it is important that you remember that your emotions are not completely shut down (it was an emotion brought a smile to your face). Make it a habit perhaps to pay attention and acknowledge the emotions that do come up for you.”

Maybe I could make it an exercise, write down in my journal every time I pay attention to an emotion (in order to recognize them better). That would change from my analyzing/organizing/mental puzzle-solving kind of journaling which doesn’t make me pay much attention to my emotions.

” this made me smile, an emotion of.. what comes to mind is something like feeling proud of you, an appreciation of you, more like it.”

It feels good to read you felt proud of me/appreciation of me. It makes me smile. Very different from when my mother show appreciation (which felt twisted, when she felt proud of me she was actually proud of herself for owning me, it wasn’t an appreciation of me as a person, she wasn’t glad for me, she was just using me as a trophy). With you it is different, I am able to feel appreciated as a person and not a possession, and it feels good.

I also feels good, what you said : ” In general, don’t apologize for how you feel about anything: you don’t choose how you feel, therefore there is no wrong doing and nothing to apologize for.” Because it means that maybe I am allowed to not feel guilty about how I feel either? If feelings are not a thing one should apologize for, then they also shouldn’t be a thing to feel guilty about, right?

“if we talked on the phone, I could hear your voice and the tone of your tone and maybe you can practice feeling your feelings and expressing them verbally to me.”

Oh.. Yes, it could be something good.. This suggestion makes me both anxious and curious.

“she sounds quite promising!”

Yes. We’re doing it next week, I’ll probably tell you about how it goes then. Until then I’ll try to prepare mentally for it.

I wonder how is your sleep and if your intestine is feeling better?

Linarra

Dear Anita,

I am sorry to read about this change of room, as it seems it will cause more troublesome insomnia until you get used to it.

“I wrote to you all of the above not so that you help me with it, but so to help myself, writing it helps me process it. Also, I thought that it may help you to read it, particularly the SHAME part being attached to the fear/ anxiety. The shame part-  feeling like a freak/ inferior to others, deserving their pity- greatly increased my anxiety in the past, but yesterday at the taproom, as I talked to myself out of the shame part (#3, 4 & 5 above)- my heightened anxiety.. disappeared within a short time. Back home, I felt uncomfortable on the other bed, other room- but I did not feel nor do I feel now the heightened anxiety of yesterday afternoon.”

It is helpful to read about your experience and how you talked yourself out of the heightened anxiety. I am glad you do not feel it anymore. I agree the 4th and the 5th, about not being alone in this distressing experience and not being a freak for it, can be really reassuring sometimes.

Reading or writing about anxiety makes me think of my mother at the moment, because not later than today she came into my room to speak about the anxiety she was feeling about my brother’s driver’s license exam. This week she also called the cops on him an evening (and disturbed the peacefulness of the house, waking me from my sleep) because he decided to spend some time of his evening with his colleagues and “only” warned us by sending texts so she went crazy to believe he was kidnapped and someone was using his phone to make us believe he was safe, she was screaming all over the place and was telling to my sister and me that she would kill us if anything happened to him.

Whether she goes crazy or not, I cannot empathize with my mother’s irrational anxiety… while I know I am more understanding of anyone else’s anxiety. I think the main difference is… her anxiety causes her to creates more problems, upsetting my siblings and me, and it removes the safety and control we have over our life. My brother had to go home after 2 hours of hanging out with his colleagues after he discovered she called the cops, and everyone’s evening was wasted while my mother went to bed without an apology for any of her actions.

My anxiety, even the heightened one, never made me act like she is acting. It can make me freeze and being not very helpful in case of emergency I admit, but make the situation worse or even creating a situation? Not that I remember… except for the times (especially when I was a teen) when I yelled at my mother for creating or worsening the anxiety within me by… pushing through my limits, insulting me, and forcing me to do things I was afraid of, against my will. But I guess it is different, as it was more often than not a reaction to her and I wouldn’t have done it to anyone else because my usual reaction to anxiety is shutting down and isolate myself so I can cope.

For long, I felt guilty for not being able to empathize, for yelling at her when she was hurting me. Now, I’ve built a wall but I still feel part of the guilt lingering, just not as strong because I know… I remember times I was able to empathize with her (while still hating her and suffering from her actions), the pain was so great, the self-hate… There was no possibility for healing for as long I was putting her feelings before mine… Yesterday, as I was showering, she came in and started talking to me, trying to make me empathize and feel pity for her, trying to win me over. Really, she looked pitiful, anyone would have had sympathy (maybe if you forget the fact she invited herself as I was showering, breaking intimacy… but intimacy doesn’t exist in this house), it always makes me wonder if I am the one with a problem, as I don’t feel empathy, as I say her “I don’t care” when she’s speaking of her death. It makes me wonder if I am really the abuser she tells me I am, as those scenes would make me look as one without the knowledge of everything else.

Since I wasn’t acting with empathy, she acted even more as a victim. As if I actively wanted her death (I don’t, I just don’t care and don’t feel like lying), or wanting her to leave. As I was in the shower, calm but still wondering if I was an abuser, I wondered what you would think of this. To be safe, I acknowledge the fact the might be mutual abuse going on, that way I keep the door open to learning and becoming a better person. In the end, I told my mother “If I am bad to you, you would agree it would be better for us to not live together, right?” I don’t remember what she answered or if she even answered, because she often doesn’t answer directly to what I say. Our conversations don’t lead anywhere. And I think she doesn’t want us to be apart because her life has no meaning when she has no one to have power over.

Alright, there were not many clear points with these thoughts and stories. They weren’t very well-structured thoughts like yours about yesterday’s events. But at least it can help me process and see what thoughts it brings up to you.

“she is a terrible person. Can you imagine you doing to a child what she did to you, and to her other children.. would you have the heart to do it?”

I don’t think I would. It’s been a long time since I started to think I didn’t want children. Because my mother made me feel like an incapacitated and bad person, I wouldn’t even think of risking being responsible for a child and maybe causing harm. I did have much thought about children’s needs while trying to understand the needs that weren’t met for my siblings and me, and maybe figure out how to make up for them.

These thoughts lead me to understand parenting was really difficult, and I decided I wouldn’t ever have a child if I wasn’t able to make sure all their needs were met, and they would have a lot of different support other than myself so they aren’t alone and stuck with me as an only model. Diversity of resources and supports seem very important factor to me, if only to diminish the power anyone can have other them (myself included). Being a flawed person, I can make mistakes, but having different models (hopefully good ones) would allow a kid to not suffer too much from modeling on my mistakes and repeating them, or be stuck with me. It would provide choices, opportunity, and an escape if I happened to be bad or not good enough.

Such a healthy environment though, I cannot even provide for myself. I wouldn’t even have the heart to impose that on a child, so I wouldn’t have the heart to make them go through the extent of abuse and mental destruction I went through.

“I remember being a huge daydreamer as a teenager, but the daydreaming stopped at one point […] REALITY is too interesting and there is so much of it to occupy my mind that I don’t have the time or desire for fiction/ fantasy/ day-dreaming.”

It is understandable it could become uninteresting for someone. Daydreaming is sometimes a coping mechanism or a replacement for what reality is lacking (mine has been and is still really lacking), but sometimes it is also my reaction to interesting reality. Daydreaming is part of my creative process, and creativity is my way to have fun and interact with life, from my experience I am more likely to feel emotions this way, so I can’t imagine feeling fulfilled without having it being part of my life. When I get very excited about something, my imagination can’t be helped.

“let me know if you manage to reconnect, or resume day-dreaming, will you?”

Sure, I will.

“my idea is that I will call you, so you don’t have to worry about making the call yourself and paying for it, etc. I think that it will be very, very inexpensive for me”

Oh, I didn’t even think about the prices (since my friends usually call me through internet connection) or the arrangement yet… which, oops, give me more to worry because it’s a bit more concrete. But that’s alright, I’m going to avoid overfocusing on the details. My anxiety was more about the conversation itself. When talking with a new person over the phone I cannot predict how it’ll go or if my brain will no fail me. Speaking isn’t an activity I do regularly enough to be confident about it, doing it in english even less. But it’s alright, there’s anxiety coming with everything new.

Before ending this message, I’m reminding myself of removing the shame and the guilt of my feelings, just as you wrote in your message, but thankfully I feel no shame or no guilt talking with you at this moment.

It is 10:11 pm here, and 1:11 pm your time. As it is another long message, a little reminder again you don’t have to read it or reply today if you don’t feel like it. (If I’m not mistaking you tend to read the beginning and ending of posts when you don’t feel like it so hopefully you’ll see it even if it’s at the end?)

I wish you a good afternoon, and good luck for tonight, I hope the night won’t be as long as the previous one!

Linarra

Oh, I can just add that I feel a bit sad tonight after writing last post, since I said I would try to pay more attention to my emotions. I am unable to elaborate further though, I’m just sad. Not intensely so, but it’s there.