Dear Cali Chica:

As to when will you “be able to accept that, live it, sink in it and not find ‘something to worry about'”-

My answer: maybe never. After all, your mother is not likely in her lifetime to change her mental habits. Most people don’t.

It is possible, but it takes work of such persistence, such patience, that few take it on. Of all the challenges in your life that you successfully overcame, such as all those leading to your medical degree and successful career, this challenge, healing anxiety, is the most difficult by far.

You wrote that you have awareness and the question now is HOW. Back to you waking up at one am, talk to yourself so that your voice is what you hear, over her voice. Replace her voice of delusion with your voice of reason and reality. The more often you do so, the faster you heal. This way you insert new neuropathways, new connection in the old, and over time, you rewire your brain.

Got to have patience. There should be another word for the kind of patience that is required.

anita

Thank you, cali sister, for your appreciation of my input. To your thread, next.

anita

Dear Cali Chica:

Maybe I will redo my  description: As  you sleep, your mother’s mental rep appears  above your bed and says: But look there! There is something wrong  there…!” You wake up to her voice and  look there.  And you do see something wrong, and as  you stay awake and  look around, you see  more that is wrong, more and more. Must not sleep, too much wrong yet to be  seen.

In my first description your mother disappeared  after  you woke up. In this description she stays.

Of course there is a whole lot of wrong in the world, inside homes, in the streets, in hospitals, in congress… anywhere and  everywhere. Of course, if you want to look for wrong, there is a lot  to look at.

But for what purpose?

When you do think of something  that is wrong in your life, a friend not responding to you like she used  to, for example, think next: is there something I need to do about it? If there is, make a note  of it and  resolve  to do  it. If there  is nothing  for you to do, release the  thought.

The  purpose of attending to what is wrong is to fix it. If  it cannot be fixed, or if it  is not worthy of being fixed, if the  problem is  of no significant consequence  to you, there is no purpose of looking at it anymore.

When your mother pointed to what was wrong, for her, in DisneyWorld, she did not fix her problem, meaning, she did not increase  the  number of family members she was  with there. And she created a problem: turning a happy  occasion for you and  your sister into a sad occasion.

All we can do in this full-of-wrongs world, is not create any more. And then, accept those we cannot change and change those we can.

In your case, the wrong in your life that keeps raining on your parade, is your mother pointing to other wrongs. When you find yourself ruminating about  the  wrongs she/ her rep is pointing to, having your figurative mental flashlight pointing  to those wrongs, move that  flashlight to the left, to the one  pointing, the rep herself.

anita

Dear Cali Chica:

Good morning to you too.

It is the  times we feel defeated, times we feel distressed that are the opportunities for healing, for  progress. First, by relaxing best you can into your current state of mind, not resisting it and not trying to escape it.

As aware as you believe you are, there is still much more awareness possible for you. This is why this process is so slow. You can’t  know today all that there is to know. It  is impossible. The awareness or knowing of reality is incremental, little  by little.

You wrote: “since she looked for others for validation and happiness outside of herself, so do I”- I  claim there  is more awareness required here: we all look for others for validation, can’t help it, born that way. In Disney it is not validation  she was  looking for  when she  made her comment. She was  looking for (temporary) relief from her distress. She  said  what she said to  feel better. That  is all.

You wrote: “why can’t I do a better job of shining that light like you said from the ‘problems’ …to my  whole happy life where I have so  much good”-

I didn’t suggest that to the left is your happy life. If you re-read my  suggestion, to the left is your mother pointing to wrongs. It  is your mother who is your problem.

All of Disney magic, all that money spent  on creating that happy experience, all gone because of a few  words this  woman said to you. This is  so because there is  no  one and  nothing more  important to a child than her own mother. All the Disney characters smiling and entertaining, all those rides, the colors, the  music… all are  nothing in comparison.

No, it was  not your mother’s search for validation that rained on your parade then and keep raining on it. It  is the same old same  old motivation: relief at the expense  of another. Like a  person angry and  breaking something, a relief. People break their children in a similar manner.

What I am writing here  is tough to read, isn’t it? Most people will run away from considering such things. And most do.

I didn’t  respond to  everything you wrote, maybe later.

anita

Dear Cali Chica:

You are welcome.

As to our quest for relief from distress: it takes many forms, and it takes place every day. Maybe every hour, every minute. You are a medical doctor: isn’t the body seeking relief from distress every minute of every day, equalizing conditions (homeostasis) every minute of every day, for as long as we are alive, so to avoid the distress of higher or lower than desirable body temperature and glucose concentration in the blood? Same with our mental (physical really) processes.

As to your last paragraph: what does it mean to you… What it means to me, ongoing, as my awareness increases daily, is healing from anxiety, increasing well being.

anita

Dear Cali Chica:

I didn’t mean that she looked at other families so to find relief from her distress. I think she told you so to relieve her distress. It is the telling.

People talk to relieve their distress. Most people have to have an audience to hear what they say, so to relieve their distress. Best is an empathetic audience. In psychotherapy a lot of the relief clients experience is just that: talk and have someone empathetic listen. The more caring, the more empathetic the audience, the greater the relief.

A mother knows how important she is to her young children. When she talks, they listen, and listen with great empathy. Your mother felt emotional pain as she watched other families in Disney. She told you. She saw an expression of pain on your face (empathy)- that was her relief, I figure.

anita