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When it's SHAME

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Hopalong:
I just re-read this whole thread and was again, so blown away by the kindness and generosity every one of you flooded it (me) with.

THANK YOU, AMAZONS.

I felt as though you are a group of 3-D friends who just appeared one day when I was having a tough time and just made the support and UNDERSTANDING so very real. I felt valued and cared about and loved and can't tell you adequately how great you all are. I am mentally passing out excellent microbrews or vigonier.

Holy moly. I feel so lucky that in a time like this, I have y'all to talk to every single day, right here. I don't know how anybody gets through a pandemic without their own Board.

I apologize for not responding to each specific post in adequate detail; I'd prefer to. I think the topic was so vulnerable that I just felt drained afterward and wanted to let it sit. But I want you to know that I've read and re-read everything you said. Here are a few early reactions, too briefly:

Tupp, you talking about me needing a bit of help with home organization being like any other health care need was so helpful. It's true, if I needed some other kind of support due to a medical issue, I wouldn't shame myself for that. But for some reason I've beaten myself up for years over ADD traits I really can't help. Huh. And thank you for the empathy, which comes through as so genuine and heartfelt. So I can dish it out and need to learn to take it in, too. Thank you. And just for your tremendous, reflexive kindness. If I lived in your neighborhood I'd be on your stoop just like the little kids, the cats who know a safe zone when they feel one.

Amber, I didn't get it at first, when you wrote about returning shame where it belongs, and that maybe in some way I have been absorbing shame that belongs elsewhere. I wondered who, how, etc.

Then it hit me this morning as I tackle morning reading....I think on some deep level I've been feeling ashamed of America. I read so much news, I've always identified with the capital because it's within a day's drive and I spent a lot of time there at different points, full of awe when I was young (I recall the wonder I felt visiting my Dad at the Pentagon during his post-war assignments there in summers--those huge long halls and people so grave and purposeful) and all the beautiful institutions, and the Lincoln Memorial, the Smithsonian, museums...and in some way, watching the government now fail and fail and fail (especially fail its character tests) while so many suffer -- at times it feels very personal. Like, how can we go from a place that held such shining ideals, to THIS? I know what has happened and I know we'll eventually rebuild and/or reform, but a lot of lingering naivete is gone. Bitterness will get us nowhere, and I worry how many are stuck believing nothing can ever change. (I actually think it's more like the Chinese theory of chaos meaning opportunity, so I DO have hope. But jeez, how far can we push it.)

I really do think I've been feeling ashamed for America. And that's not my job! I've been a very responsible citizen. Even if not an activist (except through writing), I have always taken civic duties and community quite seriously. I need to do more, locally, and think once I restart that, even if it's just participating in a from-home voting phone bank to contribute to the election, that will recede. Helping reduces helplessness.

What you wrote about where does the shame belong is what got me started on that train of thought. Thank you. (And personally, there's no time like age 70 to check back on early childhood!...I recall telling my T last week that I think the dissociative anxiety I felt those few times that M really dressed me down verbally...came from early absorption of the religion on my poor mother's side. It wasn't explained or lectured so much as felt, emotionally, that the judgment (hellfire and brimstone, my tortured preacher grandfather's message) or something else terrible and deserved would be laid on anyone who wasn't perfectly good (and in her distorted personality, her anxiety was constant like an electrical hum). So when M would do his short but cold little "lecture" on what was wrong with my character, I think it took me back unconsciously to that place, where I felt paralyzed by a subtle horror of how a text, a speech, a flood of condemning language...could really actually condemn someone! I didn't realize how any of that religious sludge was still lingering in my psyche. I certainly no longer believe that way.

Hmmm. I might make productive use of pandemic time examining the shreds of my spirituality, even. I think there's some very-undefined good stuff that remains that I might be able to REclaim for myself, by making it my own and trusting it. Thank you for asking that penetrating question.

Huh. That might even fit in with why I feel shame at times over disorder at home. My Nmom was a fine housekeeper. Maybe I didn't realize I'm still comparing myself to her in any way. But when I think about HER anxiety, I have compassion. Time to give myself some.

Lighter, that's the core of your reminder too -- compassion for self. Thank you very much for reminding me. It's weird the way that's my biggest repeated message for everyone else in my life. And I somehow let it fall away for myself, even though it's the heart of my positive beliefs, and the heart of hope, and the heart of relationships and caring and community.

The way you work it through aloud (a-written) is really vivid and I can see how it works. AND how hard you work AT it. That's inspirational, even if the details vary in how one gets there. Thanks for modeling what you do for you. I can "see" you smirking at shame and unkind self-judgement and perfectionism, busting it for what it is. I know that perfectionism and fear underlie a lot of anxiety and shame, and it's good to remember that. Challenge the inner MAHTHA Stewart to shuddup and siddown. She's like Whack-a-Mole, isn't she?

CB, I don't compare myself directly in a shaming way to any individual, so no my dear, your life and the images of order and beauty I always find when I think about you...are NOT a source of shaming comparison, I promise. I just find you wise and inspirational, always, and one of the forms that takes is me fantasizing a lot of creativity and beauty (if not perfect order, okay!) in your home. I'm not there so I'm sure I'm making it up....but hey, not bad to be imagined that way, is it?

I talked with you sooooo much about my little house when I first got it, and you "saw" it with me so closely and happily. Also, you're a friend who really DOES see beauty (no coincidence you have done flower arranging professionally) and I like thinking about that when I think about you!

I'll bet you understand the toxic religion leftovers especially well. I'm inspired by how profoundly you have processed and untangled that...you were so much deeper into that life and it had such a massive impact on you. And yet I really do believe you that you stopped carrying the brainwashed shame. It's inspiring to me, and thank you for sharing your journey. You can't imagine how helpful that is.

((((G)))) You remind me of Winston Churchill. My favorite Churchill anecdote that always made me laugh, was the way he would answer a ringing telephone during the Blitz when he was down in the bunker. He would pick up the receiver and growl into it: "Come STRAIGHT to the point."

And you so often do that and I loved this:
Maybe some people have more energy and others less for reasons beyond our understanding.

I do like moving the pebbles around with my nose until I notice there's a path involved. But sometimes I just need to roll over onto the grass and stare up at clouds and let it all go, not understand every damn thing. Thank you!

hugs all,
Hops (Feeling much much better if not quite shameless. The shameless one is Pooch, who sleeps most of the day and never apologizes.)
 

sKePTiKal:
:D

Hopalong:
I lost my VESMB emoticons so I see a little square blue thing from Amber, and thassit.

:(

Twoapenny:
Hops, when it comes to health, I think people tend to divide issues (quite unconsciously) into those things you take pills or have surgery for - which we all seem to accept as being things we can't control simply through will or effort - and those things that are more about adapting or managing our lives differently.  Things like autism and ADD (along with lots of others) fall into that category, in my mind, and I think many people who have a neurological system that is more finely attuned in some areas than average often find either that they tire quickly or that there are other areas where the connections just don't happen as easily.  And for some reason we do often feel that we could overcome those difficulties if we just tried a bit harder.  Personally I think we've had many years of a lack of understanding of the subtlety and nuance that comes with things like ADD and the way it affects people, and I do feel a bit like the big pharma companies have kind of steamrollered over more gentle ways of managing health, like accepting you can't do things or resting up when you need to.  So yep, I get that you can feel differently about certain aspects of health.  I think it's also tricky because general public understanding tends to quite concrete, I find.  So if someone sees a fella without any legs in a wheelchair, they have no problem understanding that.  But when people see someone who is intelligent and accomplished living in an untidy house they often assume it's laziness.  A neurological condition isn't the first thing most people think about.  So it is hard, but hopefully it will get easier (to cope with, I mean, not to change the condition).

And Jeez, yes, the endless cleaning!  I do think a lot of that is society - if you were a man living in an untidy home people would assume it's because you were a bachelor, you know?  My mum's house was always immaculate, as was her car, garden, bank account, diary, wall calendar.  She never forgot anything, things were always posted on time, dinner was always ready at 6, laundry was ironed as soon as it came in off the line, I can tell you with absolute certainty that she never had to wear the same pair of pants twice because she'd run out of clean clothes.  But she was also an alcoholic living with an abusive man and carrying the weight of a thousand childhood incidents that had eaten away her soul.  I think I said something to you before about the work you've done on yourself and how much you help other people out because of all that work.  An untidy home but a beautifully polished heart and soul.  I know which of the two I'd prefer.  And you'd have loved being on my step this morning; one of the cats was in such ecstacy having his ears rubbed that he toppled over and rolled off down the steps like a slinky.  Lol.

I get the sense of shame over the way things are at the moment as well.  I don't know if I feel shame but I do feel a deep disappointment in human behaviour.  Lots of people have done very good things but I do feel it's been overshadowed by appalling governance, profiteering on basic supplies, panic buying and then having the brass neck to THROW AWAY ALL THE FOOD THEY PANIC BOUGHT BECAUSE THEY DIDN'T EAT IT!  Seriously, bin men were taking photos of bins overflowing with food that was chucked out a week after the shops sold out of everything they had.  What kind of idiot doesn't at least buy it and put it in the freezer.  And a missed opportunity, I feel.  I thought the pandemic showed how everyone needs access to good quality healthcare, how we all need a secure benefit system in place because you never know when you might lose your job, how quickly air quality improved when people left their cars at home, how many people offered to help out people they didn't know.  But all of that was quickly replaced by people desperate to get back to the pub and go shopping, and pharmacies selling Calpol for £16 a bottle when it usually only costs £2.  Bleurgh.  Yep, I get what you mean and no, we can't fix it alone.  We can each only do our own little bit and just hope that enough of us do that x

sKePTiKal:
Hops, I get the shame for how people are acting in our country. But I realize that's something outside of my realm of influence (or control). Everything exists all the time, right? It's just that sometimes there is enough critical mass of people who agree on basic values & manners - that the negative stuff seems "rare" and therefore managable. More importantly - I'm not acting that way, doing those things; I've chosen something different for me & mine. THAT I can control to a better extent, reach understandings about limits, boundaries & expectations. What goes on outside my "little country" here... as long as it's not directly affecting me or about to... goes to the bottom of the list. Why?

Because if EVERYTHING is of equal importance, NOTHING is "important". If EVERYTHING is OK; socially acceptable - then nothing's BAD. And that conundrum is mentally/emotionally overwhelming & exhausting to me. I don't think it's reality either. I suspect my "short-circuit" is similar to the lack of focus you might experience from ADD.

There is a side-effect to this experience of living with Hol. Some of her psychological quirks are still quite alive & well - and they're mostly self-destructive. Not so much sabotaging anymore - she's getting a good grip on that. It's the destructive stuff - and that's mostly sub/unconscious - because she still refuses to accept some basic tenets or facts. She goes through an episode of reliving or experiencing it again on a cyclical basis. And PART of triggering it, I think, is when she starts to beat up on herself mentally - comparing herself to other people, comparing her ability to move forward on the Hut at a pace that no one else can keep up with -- because that's what she did in production, when working. She's forgetting the toll that took on her mentally, emotionally and physically. She IS much healthier now... moving at a slower pace... without wasting so much emotional energy over perfection, timing, effectiveness.

She starts by critcizing and judging herself. The is always the implication that some else - who is more "perfect" - would be smarter, stronger, more effective. The mental tapes. What I call self-abuse -- because I internalized all those labels/tags stuck to me when I was highly sensitive and vulnerable and unable to protect myself. It's all starts with thoughts - oh! the cleaning lady is coming and she's going to react in horror at my pigsty mess - and then that triggers uncomfortable emotional reaction, and to cope we reach for our nearest self-soothing comfort strategy - which means we haven't really addressed anything about the topic and then we beat ourselves up for THAT. It's a self-perpetuating cycle; feedback loop.

Eventually, everyone finds what works for them to disrupt that automatic loop. For me, it was simply slowing down - taking my time to notice what I was doing, putting my attention into washing that one dish... or reseasoning that skillet so it wouldn't be so hard to clean next time... and if I did a little everyday there simply wasn't a lot of "big jobs"; the one-square-foot method. It even makes the most mundane task more enjoyable to me; and I remember them and the pleasure derived longer. And that creates a NEW feedback loop.

(Oh, and I think there's probably an admin setting in the software that turns on/off the emoticons; it must be off.)

:D

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