Growing up in public

[Sela]

Hi Portia:

Hopalong:
Thanks so much for the toxic shame direction. Much needed light shining on all of my emotions.

Ditto from me (Sela) Hoppy.  I've been really thinking about that since you posted (in regard to my stuff). Thanks.

Yeah. Feeeeling stupid is not being stupid.

Oh yes!!  I feel better already!!  Thanks P.  I needed that!!  I'm not stupid afterall!!!  I just feeeeeeeeeeel stupid sometimes!!!!!  I make stupid mistakes and then I feel stupid but it's not because I ammmmmmmm stupid!  Hahahahaha!!!  It's because I'm not perfect!!!  ( Just love that litte green guy!).

I want to know: how many people are like me/us. How many people are ‘balanced’.

Are you balanced???   (just kidding around eh!! )

Am I??? (don't know if I'm joking or not??  maybe I am?  maybe not?  ok....I am.  ).

How many people are like those closed up people?

Let's see.......1, 2, 3, 12, 22, 64, 77......wait.........I can't count that high!!!

What does that boil down to……where do I fit in? Meaning…..what is my role?

When you find out, let me know please?   I think some of us might be somewhere around the 60 to 70 % balanced mark and others...80-90....and then there's those under 50ers......and the odd........less than 20.  Ya.  I wonder what percentage feels what percentage??

On a scale of 1 to 100.....how do you feel?  (lately, most days).  For me.........I'm happy to report....about 75%.  That's a huge improvement over what I might have said......even a year ago!  Some days, I really felt like I was losing it!!
Now I feel like I've claimed a good bit back and still claiming!!!

What can I do that no-one else can do? yeah I guess I mean that. I am getting there.

Now that's a different question.  You can look at you and your behaviour and your feelings and your thoughts and you can actually spend time considering stuff.  Hahahaha!!  You can think Portia!!!  It's a talent P!!!  You have it!!!  Not a bad thing at all.  Much better than being.......numb or blind.  Some people are numb and blind.  Poor them.  Never think about a thing.

it’s okay to feel and do what I want to. Or what I don’t want to.

Amen Portia!

I’m going to practice: “No thanks, I don’t want to.”

Me too.  I'm too good with excuses, reason, explanations.  This is helping me too P.  Yep.

"No thanks".

How about that?  Just "No thanks".  Will I do it??  Will you?

Mother: "Would you like to attend and worship me?"
Portia:  "No thanks".
Mother:  "Why not?"
Portia:  "No thanks".

My Abuser:  "(Nasty, derogatory, manipulative, insulting, rude, b-capital-S question?)".
Me:  "No thanks".
My Abuser:  "Why not?"
Me:  "No thanks".
(even though I don't have direct contact........words start to play out in my head.  I can say:  "No thanks").

Like that a couple of little red engines:  "We think we can!! We think we can!!"

You help so much.

So do you Portia.    Thanks to you too.

Sela

PS:  Hoppy:

1. Left click and highlight the exact words you want to quote.
2. Right click and click "copy".
3. Place curser where you want to put the words in your post.
4. Right click and paste.
5. Left click and highlight again (what you've pasted).
6. Left click the little yellow quote thingy above.
7. The word quote in square brackets will appear at both ends of the words you pasted.

[Hopalong]

Thank you! That's brilliant! You do the quote thingy AFTER you put in the text! Holey Moley, who'd-a thunkit???? Dang, and I was feel so ashamed of being tech-challenged.

Did I say ashamed? I didn't say that. It was my Evil Twin Doris.

But while I'm at it, in terms of NOTICING anything, I just now noticed the word "More" next to the emoticons. ALL THIS TIME I've assumed that you, Sela, had a magical insider-knowlege supply (no pun intended) of secret super-special emoticons that Luddites like me weren't allowed access to!!!
Holey Moley! Well if you'll pardon just this brief exercise in emoti-delight...

 

(And you are both Sela and Portia very welcome for the toxic shame emotion link thought. Ain't a new idea but I'm glad I thunkit when it was useful.) I am definitely vulnerable to shame-triggers (anger and tears out of all proportion to the event or decision or remark usually clue me in...AFTERWARD, dammitall).

I am starting to think that if I tune in better I could actually feel the difference between appropriate guilt and toxic shame. For example, I felt very guilty for blowing up and using a curse word at my daughter once when she'd been criticizing me nonstop through a long phone call. I suddenly just roared "F** it! I'm a good mother! I'm a good enough mother!!" I don't LIKE talking to my child that way and I don't LIKE having exploded. It's not my usual doting tolerant MO. Anyway, she was needing to cut back the criticism but I did feel guilty for roaring. (I am anger phobic and horrified by roaring.) So...I felt really guilty about that. But it wasn't toxic shame.

I have felt that a lot when somebody accuses me of something that I could in any way interpret as a flaw in character. I think TShame feels like something cold and clutching inside. I feel slowed down, chilled, even a little frightened. (I don't feel that way with ordinary guilt, which I can think about clearly in my head untiil I figure out what to do to make amends. Usually a simple apology.) I think the TShame is about the early religious training which emphasized sin and evil so much that I felt if I did anything wrong I was horrible. (I know the teachings also included forgiveness and redemption, but I also got them filtered through NMom's blankness and my brother's bullying...and in some way, with those things going on, I internalized those "sin" messages in a creepy way.)

whew. Thanks for listening to all that.
Hops

Hopalong

[Plucky]

I have felt that a lot when somebody accuses me of something that I could in any way interpret as a flaw in character.

Hi Hoppy.  For years I walked around going from 0 to 60 whenever a criticism such as this cropped up.   One day I heard someone responding to some criticism like this:  "Well, I'm not perfect!"  Said with some calm humor and zero defensiveness.  This was a light bulb moment for me.  I'm not perfect, I'm not meant to be perfect, I have my flaws, that's ok, it's natural, I can admit it, the sky won't fall.....it was a nice blurb I can carry with me and trot out whenever I feel attacked.

I yell at my kids too and the only remedy is to take responsibility right away and say you lost it and there is no excuse but you felt very XXXX.    This is I think more instructive than just never making a mistake, right?  I mean, I'm not perfect!

Plucky

[Hopalong]

calm humor and zero defensiveness

Thanks, Plucky. That is definitely something to hold up in front of my mind.
(I can get very defensive when my daughter starts harping...and she's a chip off the old block so we trigger the same stupid cycle in each other. When we had the argument the other night we were literally talking OVER each other, neither one budging--so of course nobody got heard at all. It felt awful.)

I did apologize. She doesn't do that often, but when she realized how upset I was she was sweet to me later. I know she cares but sometimes she forgets just the little things that would show it.

I think part of it was I felt so sick and wanted comfort.

But calm humor and zero defensiveness would be a MUCH better way to go.

Thanks for the good guidance, or good thing to aim for.
(I am so relieved you aren't perfect either. My parents NEVER argued or raised their voices. My brother bullied me but it was silent, behind-their-backs terrorizing. So anger and arguing and shouting just never happened...so I don't know how to cope with them. Never too late to learn, I hope.)

Hopalong

[Marta]

There’s no hesitation now in me knowing exactly what my mother is like. I’m not analysing her in this event – not at all.

I don’t want to!!!!!!!! Shazzzam. Hahahahaha! Sorry folks, so simple, so trite and yet sooooooo about what I feel. And that it’s okay to feel and do what I want to. Or what I don’t want to.

Portia, I think these are really quite big steps. I mean really, really big. Hold on to what you've achieved and don't let anyone make you backtrack.

From what I remember of your earlier posts, you had issues around ignoring/being ignored. So your mother is manipulating her way through right into your issues, by making you feel that you are ignoring her. Hang on to this feeling of entitlement you've achived over your own time and attention.

HUgs, Marta

[Portia]

It's a biggie actually it's huge . I'm gonna cut it in half....

Hopalong:
You're one of those people who makes me feel stronger in myself.

I understand this now. I understand that it doesn’t have to be competitive!! Nothing has to be competitive. It’s not about black/white right/wrong good/bad better than/worse than…..wiser than/thicker than!!!!

Toxic shame infects and distorts every other emotion, even joy. Sadness. All emotions.

“I am the master emotion
I am the internal voice that whispers words of condemnation”

the whole meditation (I’d call it a poem) is right here: http://www.goddirect.org/mindemtn/writings/january/toxshame.htm

I don’t enjoy being picked out to shine. I had an experience where I was picked out to shine (at work) and I felt really very odd and strange. Like it was happening to someone else. (What, I dissociated from success??) Mind you, it was done in the form of a video which I watched so …. I wasn’t really shining as me, but as an image of me. Anyway, that’s by the by (maybe?). I can’t work out what was so odd about the feelings associated. In fact, I would say I didn’t know what to feel? ‘Okay’ about it? Modest? Proud? Rightfully happy to be chosen? (icky) Maybe I was sitting waiting for someone to say…….”Oh aren’t you the clever one?” “Hope you don’t get too big for your boots!” “Who does she think she is…?”…….

Hey I’d really like to have a copy of that video! I could watch it now and think yay, I did that! Hahaha. Maybe I’ll do something new instead eh? Yes.


If I can help you feel stronger, that makes me feel stronger too. Wow.

Hang on, toxicity. Can I try this out?

Sadness + toxic shame = ?? I feel that I am bad for feeling sad. I feel that I’m flawed in the way I feel sad. I can’t just be sad.

Joy + toxic shame = ? I feel happy happy! But it’s not genuine? My feelings are fraudulent? I know it won’t last? I might be a bit stuck here….anyone got other descriptions ??

Anger + toxic shame = oh well, easy. I’m really angry and …. I’m bad for feeling it! I’m guilty about my legitimate anger! I’m a bad person for being angry. Not just : I am angry.

That’s it isn’t it? With toxic shame there’s always the underlying feeling – I am bad/worthless/a mistake over-riding and muddying the plain emotion.

I am happy. I am sad. I am angry – they’re always followed by - BUT I’m bad….

Gosh!

Sela:
I wonder what percentage feels what percentage??
Hahaaaaaaaaaaa! Good point. And very funny.

How do I feel? More than 50% and that’s darn good. Anytime 50%+ is excellent! If -50% is numbed out, frozen, acting out, co-dependent, depressed…anything more is a bonus. Yep. I feel about ….. 60% maybe. Maybe more. That’s how I would judge myself against my image of the most self-aware, self-accepting person. Oooooo. Maybe that’s too high given that criteria? Hahaha this is not a good route to go down I feeeeel! Measuring, comparing ……

Ah maybe if we think of a new-born baby being at 100%? Okay (*thinks* *attempts to think* *tries harder*)….

…..(brain just tried to make a run for the door) ….

…augnnnneraughhhhh….nnnnnfff…

Sorry. No can do. Well okay. Maybe it depends on when, who, why….

Sometimes I feel 99% (studying something so closely, intently, that I lose myself: or maybe lost in a great big huge laugh)
Sometimes 51% (holding those toxic shame + anger thoughts inside my head and not letting them spill out of my big gob)
Less than 50%? It’s bound to happen every once in a while isn’t it? So I won’t feel bad if/when it does.

Glad that’s sorted out then! Major achievement.  Thanks, it feels good!

Mother: "Would you like to attend and worship me?"
Portia:  "No thanks".

  *hic* 

[Portia]

Hopalong…

 (I am anger phobic and horrified by roaring.) So...I felt really guilty about that. But it wasn't toxic shame.

My parents NEVER argued or raised their voices.

NEVER. ?? Maybe they did. Maybe when you were a wee baby? Maybe when you were a wee baby you felt all the anger and rage of their inner kiddies? Having a baby brings out the ..... you know.

Maybe they didn’t? Maybe it was expressly forbidden? Maybe it was deeeeeeply repressed? Not allowing us to express anger builds rage. Rage has to come out. Maybe you had a bit of rage for a moment there on the phone? Rage to me is out-of-control anger. Scary.

My brother bullied me but it was silent, behind-their-backs terrorizing.
Want to talk more?

So anger and arguing and shouting just never happened...so I don't know how to cope with them.

Anger is just dandy and fine. Arguing (disagreeing) is just okay. 
Shouting…well… I don’t like shouting, not necessary. Shouting = regressing. How old are we when we shout? About 5 or 6? Unless we’re shouting at that approaching tiger or bear…

To cope with them. Cope with your anger and shouting – or other people’s? Which makes you feel worse – your own or someone else’s?

Never too late to learn, I hope.
It’s not too late to feel the feelings and know where they come from and that it’s okay, they’re just feelings (even rage!), they won’t kill you or anyone else. And there’s nothing to be afraid of. (Well, unless you have a repressed anger so deep that the rage could be overwhelming and you could injure yourself or someone else….some memory here. Not good. Glad that’s over and done with.  Very glad.)

Oh by the way: which emphasized sin and evil so much that I felt if I did anything wrong I was horrible

What wrong things did you do? I’m serious, I want to know! Did you show your bits to the boy next door and he showed you his bits? (I did!) Who did you murder?

Have you done anything majorly wrong in your life? Have I?.....really…yeah I have. I beat up a kid when I was about 6/7 and I didn’t ‘need’ to do it (WTF does 'need' mean there anyhows? ). Why did I do it….is a question for me to find out the answer to. Mind you, the other little girl fought back very hard!


Marta; thank you!

don't let anyone make you backtrack
I don’t think they could!

you had issues around ignoring/being ignored.
Big ones.

So your mother is manipulating her way through right into your issues, by making you feel that you are ignoring her.
Umm. She doesn’t know that I have/had(?) those problems. I’m beginning to think that a big proportion of what I feel…is in fact….osmosisified emotion from her. What’s the proper term? Because I was enmeshed with her, for so darn long, I thought her beliefs were mine.

I’m sure she does feel ignored sometimes! But her own mother did it, not me. That’s why she ignored me. But seriously, she isn’t capable of manipulating me now. Only I can do that effectively!

Okay, yes, she is possibly trying to play a ‘poor me’ game with my uncle….to get through to me….but she doesn’t know me well enough to know I hate being ignored. I doubt it would enter her head! She doesn’t really see me as separate. What she feels, I feel. When I don’t react as she predicts, she is simply confused. She calls (in whichever way), she expects a response. Because of that mother-daughter bond she talks about! Very simplistic. Probably magical thinking too. The mysterious mother-daughter bond. Hmmm. Crap.

Hang on to this feeling of entitlement you've achived over your own time and attention.
Thanks (((((Marta))))) I will.

[Portia]

Thanks to a PM (thanks ), another realisation…..

I think I’m not okay with sex….but actually I probably am. So where did I get the idea that I’m not??? Ha. Bingo.

The simplest things are sometimes the most difficult to realise.

I am sexually okay! I am not perverse! I am not a sex addict! I am not a tease/promiscuous/etc etc.

I was told that I am (“you are sexually oriented; I am romantically oriented” projection followed by grandiose tosh)
I was made to feel things that I did not want to feel. Dirty. Bad. Evil.
I was made to feel that I was sexually ‘bad’.

I was the dumping ground for a load of projectile about her sexuality. She was the dumping ground for her mother’s (unconfirmed, possible) father’s incest.

None of this belongs to me. I can choose to not want it. Anyone else want this? How much would I get on Ebay?

[Healing&Hopeful]

Maybe not ebay....

How about putting it through the shredder, one bit at a time?

[Portia]

The mysterious mother-daughter bond. Hmmm.

It’s funny how things sometimes synchronise. I was listening to BBC Radio4 Woman’s Hour and a piece about a woman whose baby son had died while staying overnight with a child-minder (I deplore the term ‘child-minder’. Language shapes our thoughts and beliefs and that term does no good.)

The ‘child-minder’ had left the kiddie in his bath while she got down a second bottle of wine, on her own. Yeah she had issues, obviously. Binge-drinking (there’s another term that shapes our thinking and beliefs) being one of her activities. The kiddie drowned.

The mother was interviewed (the child died about 2 years ago) for her side of the story. She is now campaigning for better regulation of child-minders, better checks, rules for their employment. So that was the thrust of her interview.

She described what happened (from her point of view) when the child died: she didn’t find out until hours later (the minder had called the police, ambulance etc, child sent to hospital).

What’s interesting is that the mother said she didn’t know he was dead until hours after the event. BUT……. He died at midnight. She said: “I’m sure there are other mothers listening who will know what I mean when I say at midnight I had this terrible feeling that something was very wrong with him.”

To which I said to the radio, quite calmly (for me): “So why didn’t you do something?”

Either:
People’s brains will do the most amazing gymnastics in order to manage the great grief and guilt that that mother probably felt and feels.

Or:
There really is a magical mother-child bond, like an invisible umbilical cord that binds them together across the miles.

I know what I think. Actions speak louder than words.

Do I condemn the woman for her non-action? For leaving her child with someone she obviously didn’t know very well? For her blaming the lack of regulation and rules for her child’s death?

Yes and no. I wonder if she will ever understand why she does and says the things she does and says. Does it matter? I think so. If we can stop children dying.



Hey H&H
How about putting it through the shredder, one bit at a time?

Nooooo!  It’s all darn good material for The Book!!! It didn’t kill me, it’s making me stronger and I can live with it. It is part of me and my history….or herstory....

If I’m not back later, have a great weekend all.

[Hopalong]

Portia...
thanks for your thoughtful questions yesterday...just been too swamped.
Just want you to know I appreciate them and will answer.

H & H you too...you've said such prodding (in a good way) things about NMom that I haven't responded to...

Big hugs to you both and to everyone...
catch you asap,

Hopalong

[Portia]

Hiya Hopalong
thanks for your thoughtful questions yesterday...just been too swamped.
Just want you to know I appreciate them and will answer.

Thank you. Is it okay if I keep talking? Do you mind if it flips the page? Can you still come back to your stuff? Are there rules I don’t about yet….?

  Haha! Just a laugh. And I really enjoyed your spotlight on poor old Steve just then on H&H’s thread. I like watching brilliance in action. Soooo true.

Thanks for being you Hopalong. Hope you can take it easy a bit.

[Hopalong]

To me it doesn't matter if Steve was writing H&H's biodad directly or not...the effect of his answer is the same.

Anyway, Portia...I feel like I'm too exhausted to analyse my brother but he was a huge bully and his bullying wasn't uber violent, but he did things that many people used to blow off (when I talked about it years later) as NORMAL--kids fight. I know they do. But something was wrong with him &/or me because I never got over it and still feel uneasy around him (same brother, only one, who invaded my computer...last year, at age 58...so I think his invasive disrespect isn't something he grew out of the way some squabbling siblings grow out of their conflicst). Anyway, he just: pulled my hair, twisted my arms, punched me, tormented me in one way or another...

I was an oversensitive small-for-my-age little girl and I cried in the afternoons because I dreaded going home to him. My folks did nothing effectual, ever, to intervene. Because Happy Family Impression was all that counted.

One significant memory I have is that my 2nd H said of my brother as an adult after they met: "He has scary eyes." And he was right. He still does have scary eyes. I feel sorry for him now but do not have any desire to be with him ever at all. And dread his visits.

H & H, I feel you're utterly right I need more mental space free of NMom. I do not, honestly do not, have the option of moving out right now...but I can try to carve out more private space for myself. And time.

(Today she announced she's moving up to the 2nd floor again. She'd been in a first floor bedroom since her latest illness and it's foolish to risk the stairs. Not to mention I dread the additional intrusions...which are inevitable. She ALWAYS finds an excuse to knock on my door and break my concentration, even if I'm working ferociously on a deadline. So tonight she mentioned that "Oh I won't bother you at all...it's just hard sharing a house with all these RESTRICTIONS.") I sort of shrink inside because her promises to give me peace are meaningless. Anyway, there it is.

Feeling blue at the moment because I officially surrendered my old job to my friend today...and am sitting in my office feeling very isolated and with the 6-month clock begun. I must find a new job and there are very slim pickings.

Don't need solutions, just sympathy. (Ain't that annoying?) But it does help so much to vent. So thank you for listening.

Hugs,
Hops

[Plucky]

it's just hard sharing a house with all these RESTRICTIONS.

Yeah ma!  I feel the same way!  I can't work, I can't sleep, I can't relax, I can't go out......I hear ya. (Fantasy response.)

Hoppy, I just have one word for your mum.  Yuck!!!!!!   Once she is upstairs......could you move to the downstairs, preferably out of hearing range?   Perhaps you should try a little passive aggressive behaviour.  I know about this from my H.  Just act innocent, "I didn't hear you"  "I forgot"  "I didn't understand" "I can't find it", etc.  You're much too effiicent as a caregiver!

Plucky