Dear miyoid:

You read in a spiritual book that “if someone’s air element is not in balance, then that person might have some troubles with flatulence”, that kind of sentence made you “even more skeptical” about what’s in the rest of the book. To me, this sentence is a poetic kind of sentence with no practical or scientific meaning.  Better we talk practicality and science (if you don’t have the time or the patience to read the following, please postpone reading it to a later time):

Neurotransmitters are chemical messengers. They transmit messages from neurons (nerve cells) to target cells (other neurons, or muscle cells, or gland cells, etc.) across a synapse (a meeting place/ connection between neurons, or  between neurons and other cells), and they regulate all  our functions, including our thinking, emotions, motivations and behaviors. Three examples of neurotransmitters: Dopamine regulates motor behavior, pleasure related to motivation, and emotional arousal. Serotonin regulates appetite, sleep, memory and learning, mood and behavior. Norepinephrine regulates sleep patterns, focus and alertness.

Some neurotransmitters transmit messages from neurons to endocrine glands. Endocrine glands  produce and release hormones into the bloodstream. Hormones, like neurotransmitters, are also chemical  messengers. They transmit messages from the glands where they are produced to organs farther  away from the glands, like the liver, heart and brain. Like neurotransmitters, they too regulate different functions, including emotions and behavior. An example: when you believe that you are in danger, your pituitary gland located in the base of your brain releases a very powerful hormone called adrenocorticotropic hormone (ACTH). This hormone travels to your two adrenal glands, located on top of your kidneys, triggering your adrenal glands to produce another powerful hormone called cortisol.

Cortisol then stops your body’s non-essential physical functions like digestion, triggers your liver to produce glucose (a sugar), your blood sugar concentration then goes up, you feel a burst of strength and energy and are better able to deal with the potential threat. Cortisol also increases your emotional arousal, and you feel strong fear and/ or anger.

Cortisol is released not only when we face danger, but in lower levels all through the day an night, normally reaching the lowest level late at night, around midnight, then gradually rising to its highest level early in the morning, peaking around 9 am, when we feel most alert,  and then it declines again throughout the day and into the night, when we are least alert and able  to sleep.

When you were a child and your mother used to sit by your bed, putting you to sleep, you were relaxed enough to eventually fall asleep, but because you were already an anxious child, fearing that your mother is not there with you, your cortisol level was too high to make it possible to remain asleep. So, you woke up,  saw that she wasn’t there, your cortisol level shot up some more, and feeling alert and in danger, you got up and looked for her. Once you found her, your cortisol level went down a bit, she took you to bed..  and repeat, you woke up, looking for her, etc. Fast forward, as a teenager and an adult, your cortisol levels are still too high to fall asleep and/ or to remain asleep at night, so you stay up in front of the computer, alert.

You stay up at night because your body has formed a chemical habit of keeping you alert at night. It is a chemical habit involving not only your ACTH and cortisol hormones, but other hormones, as well neurotransmitters and other chemicals, a very complex physiological dynamic .

Everything about you that is habitual- the habitual ways you think, feel and behave- is a result of chemical habits formed long ago and maintained since.

Any and all your rational understandings of your childhood, of your relationship with your mother, of how your chemical habits came to be- will not change these chemical habits (This is true to everyone). The rational understanding of your childhood etc., can at best motivate you to continue your emotional healing process that only starts with rational understanding. The healing process, at one point and onward, has to include changing your chemical habits, and forming new chemical habits. This is possible to do but it requires a lot of time, persistent effort and patience. You started doing yoga recently and it made some difference in the way you feel, correct? If you make yoga a new habit, you will also make how you feel doing yoga a new habit.

Doing yoga and persisting in it, is a beginning in the process of changing the old chemical habit of anxiety into a new habit of calm.

anita

Dear miyoid:

“He feels like family”-  like the family you have or the family you didn’t have?

“He feels like family but it simply doesn’t work”- He feels like family, and like (your) family, it simply doesn’t work.  Is my editing of this sentence accurate?

I wonder how you are feeling right now, as you read my post:  is it still “very painful to even try to let go of him”, and do you “desperately need him” still? Maybe you will feel better if you edit your own thoughts in a similar way to this:

It is “very painful to even try to let go of him”=> It is very painful to even try to let go of the idea of him, of what he represents to me: a family I never had.

“I desperately need him”=> I desperately need the idea of him, what he represents to me: a family I might have some day, a family in which I feel safe and peaceful.

Imagine feeling safe and peaceful not just at night when you stayed up in front of the computer, knowing your mother/ boyfriend slept in the other room, but every day- so safe that you could soundly sleep at night.

anita

Dear miyoid,

I try to be more modest, nicer around people. I don’t demand much. I sometimes cannot even demand what I need, or want. This happened a lot when I was a child. I used to go to my dad’s home, and he lived alone. I remember just preparing myself for minutes and minutes in order to ask if I could open up the computer and play with it for some time. It was hard for me to ask this. It was hard for me to speak my mind. It got easier in years, but I still have hard time demanding. Although, most of the time I don’t know what I need or deserve. Therefore, I cannot demand much.

I can get jealous of some attention from someone I care. But only, if that attention is being given to somebody else instead of me. This could be a boyfriend, an older sister, mother.

You don’t demand much, unlike your older sister, right? If I remember well, you mentioned once she too was narcissistic, like your father. She could demand stuff for herself, same as your father could. How did your sister behave around your father? Did she have a problem expressing her needs? And around your mother?

It seems that in your family, your father had the biggest right to demand things, then came your sister, then your mother, and then you. Your mother couldn’t demand things from your father (e.g. she couldn’t demand that she visit her father, or that your father help her with the household). She tolerated the poor treatment and probably suffered in silence. She didn’t demand anything from your father. Is that correct?

But from you, she demanded not to disturb her with your “minor” problems. Perhaps it wasn’t a direct demand, perhaps she didn’t tell you “Stop bothering me with your problems!”, but she did downplay them, she said they’re nothing compared to her problems. So the effect was the same – she wanted you not to disturb her, i.e. not to demand compassion and understanding from her. I can imagine your sister was different and demanded things more freely from your mother? And got her attention too?

This makes you feel jealous – because your sister was loud enough and rude enough to get what she wants, without even deserving it. While you silently accepted rejection – you accepted that you won’t get what you want, neither from your mother nor your father. You probably feared that you’d be abandoned if you demand anything (and this fear started very early, when you were a baby and woke up soon after your mother would put you to sleep).

Recently, when you’ve shared with your mother that you’re depressed, and when you refused to back off, what you got at least is her attention. She got worried about you. You didn’t get her compassion and understanding, but at least you got her attention for a moment, because you didn’t back off immediately. You backed off only after you made your point. That’s when you told her the usual – not to worry, and that you’ll try to get better.

But still, you made a step, you expressed yourself, so try to appreciate that and get the feel of how it is to express your need without immediately retreating. Actually, I think it’s better in this instance that you reassured your mother that you won’t do anything stupid and that you won’t harm yourself, so she doesn’t worry. However, try practicing expressing your needs more often, and demanding that what is yours, without immediately backing off. You can practice it in imaginary situations first, if you don’t feel like trying it in real life. Practice what you would say to a person (perhaps to your sister?) who you feel doesn’t care about you and doesn’t take your needs into consideration.

Btw, it’s a normal phase in a child’s development to be very selfish and e.g. not want to share their toys with anybody. A child needs to go through the phase of “it’s mine, give it to me!”, because that’s a key for a healthy personality development. It appears you skipped this phase because you were afraid you’d be abandoned if you demand things for yourself…

I might want to feel more spoiled or more lucky

More spoiled – like your sister? I think you have the right to demand what’s rightfully yours, by all means. It doesn’t mean being spoiled, but simply having legitimate needs. So I encourage you to be more “spoiled” and as a first step, allow yourself to feel the need inside of you, and to say to yourself “I want this and I deserve this”.

most of the time I don’t know what I need or deserve. Therefore, I cannot demand much.

Do you know what you need from a relationship? As an exercise, you can write a list of all of the things you’d want in a relationship (you may or may not share it here). And then think – do I deserve this? I bet that most or all of those needs are legitimate needs, and you absolutely deserve them.

Dear miyoid,

happy birthday! Although you’re not feeling too happy at the moment, I know…

I am sorry about your sister – she had a tough time too. You say she’s stronger, maybe in the sense that she left home early and never came back. I guess she became independent from the family earlier? However, you said earlier that she has troubles in her relationships:

She gets overly attached, then she spends the rest of the relationship with the fear of losing, and then she eventually loses the person. … She lives alone, currently single, with lots of failed relationships.

It appears she too fears abandonment, but in spite of that, she gets abandoned often and ends up alone.

Regarding your mother, don’t expect that she’d change. It appears she’s getting more and more obsessed with cats and even willing to sacrifice her marriage for that. You’ve noticed it well – it’s her coping mechanism, to distract herself from pain (and from the need to change).

I’m continuing my life that I’ve been living without the emotional support I need from her and other people as well.

Your mother has never given you emotional support, miyoid. She might talk with you and listen to you, but she usually minimizes your problems. But I understand that you now worry what might happen if you’ll have to take care of her. Till now, you didn’t have to take care of her much – either emotionally or physically, did you? Now there’s a threat that she might need your help.

I believe what you can provide is support in terms of helping her find a place to stay – so concrete, physical actions. But don’t try to provide emotional support, because she’s not really open to it and it would only drain you further. I don’t know if she complains to you or pities herself? But try to separate yourself emotionally from her.

I don’t know what I feel, maybe resentment, maybe just pity for myself. I cannot get angry with anyone, I just feel helpless. I wish my mom had healthier coping mechanisms.

I know you wish she’d change, but unfortunately it’s not in your domain. Only she can decide that, and right now, it appears she isn’t willing to change. So your possibility to help her is limited. I think you definitely cannot help her emotionally, but as I said, maybe you can offer physical, material help, but also respect your boundaries. Don’t take on more than you can bear, e.g. don’t allow her to move in with you with her 8 cats. Have compassion for her, but also protect your boundaries.

I might be feeling resentment towards people that tried to love me but then eventually quit. Such as my mother, ex-boyfriend, and so on.

When you say it like this, it sounds like those people tried to love you, but they quit because of you. As if you were unlovable. You know that’s not true – your mother “quit” because she wasn’t able to meet your emotional needs. You said she abandoned you both physically and emotionally. It wasn’t your fault, but her inability to meet your needs as a child.

I was spending my time alone at the house in the evenings, and she was working. I remember a night, before a huge exam which was about the entrance to high school. A child is supposed to get to bed early those days, cause we have like 6 or 7 big exams in our standard education life. But I remember her not being able to return home for a long period of time and I felt a bit bad. I wasn’t able to sleep cause I waited for her.

You obviously spent a lot of time alone, your mother was working till late in the evening, and you were happy to find someone to chat with online, because she was not really available. When she was available physically, she wasn’t available emotionally. She wasn’t there for you. Then your mother met her second husband. And probably she was even less available? Maybe at that time her second husband became her priority, like now her cats are? You were never her priority.

I know it’s painful, miyoid. But if you believe it’s your fault, you’ll sink into helplessness and self-pity, like you tend to do now. None of it was your fault! You deserved to be cared for, and your mother neglected you. Try to say this to yourself out loud: “I deserved it! And I didn’t get it!” See if you can feel the power of speaking those words. See if it fills you with anger. Because it should. Instead of sinking into helplessness and blaming yourself, allow some anger into your system, which will give you the power to stand up for yourself.

Let me know what you think about it, and how it felt if you tried speaking it out loud (to yourself, privately, not in front of your mother or anyone else).

Thinking about you again, miyoid. Hoping that you are okay!

anita