Author Topic: A letter to my mother on the anniversary of dad's death.  (Read 30370 times)

Wildflower

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A letter to my mother on the anniversary of dad's death.
« Reply #45 on: April 23, 2004, 12:28:56 AM »
Hi Rosencrantz,

Hope you’re getting a good night’s sleep after all that tough work today.  

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Dear Wildflower. If I say there's nothing you could say that could hurt me, does it mean to you that I'm not listening? I'm listening.


Caught red handed.   :oops:  :D Talk about reading me like a book.  :D But I’ve got to work on that, don’t I?  That and worrying all the time about hurting people.  :wink:  So it’s my issue and it’s been duly noted to self.  No worries.  But thanks so much for posting that.  :D

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My poor H got used as a therapist this afternoon. I sobbed and sobbed and shouted all this stuff about wanting someone else to love my mother for me. It's real enough.


I think it’s great that you said out loud to your H that you want someone else to take over the job of loving your mother.  Great that you said this out loud and great that you said it to him.  Has he heard this from you before?  Does he support and understand how much of a drain your mother is on you?

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I'm not even sure she DOES need me.


So, I just want to change the emphasis a little here.  Does she need YOU?  What does she do if you’re not there?  What did she do when you got away?  What is it about YOU that she needs and can’t get from anyone else?

I took another look at that passage, and on second reading I’m not so sure it applies, but in any case, it’s on page 72 of When You and Your Mother Can’t Be Friends.  This book is so great, by the way.  Thanks for recommending it!!! :D

Thanks for supporting and filling out the ideas in my posts, Portia and CG.  I felt like the Zorro of posters today (who was that masked poster?) :D

Wildflower
If you want to sing out, sing out
And if you want to be free, be free
'Cause there's a million ways to be, you know that there are
-- Cat Stevens, from the movie Harold and Maude

rosencrantz

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A letter to my mother on the anniversary of dad's death.
« Reply #46 on: April 23, 2004, 02:46:04 PM »
Hey guy, this thread is giving me a headache.  Wanna come and play???

I want to come back and respond to all the thoughts and support.  I've got so much out of this.  Thanks again.  But I 'skipped out' today.  :shock:  The opportunity came up to go to town and I grabbed it!!!!  And I bought pressies for my son and more clothes for me.

And one T shirt I shall probably never wear but it has the most elongated elegant  little cat you have ever seen as a white outline on a black background, sitting as upright as could be with a little pink diamante-studded collar. And she is ME!  [I'm sorry guys but she's also got a pink diamante studded pink tiara - can we forget that bit!!!!!]  

Of course, the contrast between me, for real, and that little cat couldn't be further apart but I'm gonna keep this somewhere I can see it, cos she has the BEST expression on her face and she just brings a smile to my soul.

She is SO pleased with herself, but has good reason to be and is quite beautiful.  And you just know she brings pleasure to all who cross her path. Even if she is a bit princess-like.   :wink:

Gee - I couldn't share that with anyone else - I know you won't hate me for it.  (Agh - I hope.  :oops:  Having a 'hot moment'.  Struggling a bit here!!)  Anyway, it's who I was 'meant' to be and might be yet!!  

THE END - for now - is that OK?  Any unfinished leftovers - if I've inadvertently left you in the lurch - see you in Healing or somewhere new.  You can ask me what you like, if you want.  Just...somewhere else. :-)  OK?  I just need to get out of here. :D

Hugs, hugs, hugs, hugs, hugs, hugs, higs, hugs, hugs, hugs CG, Portia, Wildflower.  :D
"No matter how enmeshed a commander becomes in the elaboration of his own
thoughts, it is sometimes necessary to take the enemy into account" Sir Winston Churchill

rosencrantz

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A letter to my mother on the anniversary of dad's death.
« Reply #47 on: April 25, 2004, 10:13:10 AM »
I am still the child from whom my mother's mental health was kept a secret.  

Did other members of the wider family ever know?  Was it ever called a 'mental health' problem?  Not that I'm aware.  But things were 'different then'.

My father was too afraid of losing her to the mental health system.  Like her sister had been before her : in and out of hospital, pills, drama, containment, control, divorce, lost children.  I felt sorry for my aunt - why couldn't she spend her money as she wanted, see who she wanted; what else did she have?  But 'the family' did not approve.  Self-righteous prigs.  Were they all hoping for a bit of her money when she died??? (The diagnoses changed over time.  She was probably bipolar - or perhaps NPD.) So my father wasn't about to have my mother 'in hospital' or 'treated' for 'mental illness'.  Mental hospitals weren't very nice in those days.

When I was in my teens my mother looked at me and said I was depressed and that I was making it all up to copy her. I guess that absolved her from guilt, or having to 'deal' with it.

What she did was define me twice (four times?)  over - as depressed and as making it up and as copying her and as not depressed.  It's that convoluted kind of statement that I still get lost in. It just won't be pulled apart for me to make sense of and work out what applies and what doesn't. What she implied was that she was depressed.   (Should I have understood what that meant, at 16? In the 60s? Probably not)   But I didn't realise that this was a mental health issue.

I tried to get help for her (against my father's wishes) - but they just said 'well, your daughter's here now'; I wrote and they didn't reply and my mother's reactions just got more out of touch with reality.  And then my father started to become irrational (new word!) as well.  Then I was really lost and alone.  I still didn't realise that it was a 'mental health' issue.    Or that it can be 'contagious' if you live with it.

It stopped me from doing many things I wanted to do and from getting close to others. I was always afraid of being 'found out' - as being the wicked daughter or of being the one with the mental health issues!!

And then 'I wouldn't have told you if you hadn't phoned' said my father.  My mother was in hospital having electric shock treatment.  I sent a greetings card every day but when we spoke on the phone, she complained that I hadn't written 'love from me', just 'love, me'.  I rolled my eyes - 'that's typical of my mother'.  But I still didn't realise that it was a 'mental health' issue.  :shock:  

Nobody sat down with me to explain, to discuss the implications, to apply a label.  Well, it's not nice to apply labels to people is it?!  She didn't complete the course of treatment.  She was still 'depressed' because of 'me'. I should have been shocked myself but I didn't accept her 'diagnosis' of the reasons seriously, so I didn't take the rest of it too seriously either. No-one actively 'involved' me in anything other than as a scapegoat.

And now I assume that I am the adult from whom my mother's mental health is kept a secret.

But it's not a secret, is it?  It's not a secret any more.  It says so on the Attendance Allowance application.  Mental Health Problems.  And I'm going to have to get my head round that, find a new persective on it without the guilt of not having understood through all the years.

But no-one else understood, did they?  Or at least, nobody sat down with me to explain or explore.  My father seemed to think I was the enemy, going along with my mother's definition of 'it would be all right if only my daughter would be different'. This was all my fault in one way or another.  He was angry with me because my mother's refusal to let go meant that I'd come between them. It wasn't my choice, Pa!

I guess he finally mellowed.

I said my final goodbyes to my parents about five years ago on the occasion of a special wedding anniversary.  Or at least, I thought I had.  I didn't realise it's what I'd intended.  I made one last final try to reach my father.  It wasn't to be and so I 'said goodbye'.  I was so startled last year to realise I was going to have to open up old wounds to say goodbye again!!!  Family expectations.  Family phone calls.

Well, yes.  I'm glad I did, of course.

What my father had really wanted to do in his last years was revisit the places he served in the war (in France).  :cry:  I wanted to take him but couldn't face handling my mother.  What my mother really wanted was a party - to be the star of the show.  She got her wish - a funeral wake.

What lives people create for themselves.  I shiver.

And the daughter?

Well, that's not my life.  I gave up their life a long time ago.  I refused the invitation to carry the 'mental health' burden on through the generations.  I refused it a long time ago.  This last year I thought for a while it was my only option again - to 'carry' her mental illness for her so she could be well - but I've had to refuse it again.  Sorry, Ma!  The buck stops with you.

Whatever my life is, it's not dark and enclosed and sheltered and alone and contained and small and lonely.  It's VAST.  People I've known, places I've seen, lives I've lived!  I have space and views and summer and companionship and love.  And laughter.  Lots of laughter.  And a whole load of pain, I admit.  And talent to use.  And more people to meet.  And money and hope and...mess.  A whole load of mess, too.  There's too much of 'me' and too much of my things and clothes and paper and books and just 'things'.

But it's a start.

Thanks, Ma, for what you gave me that was good.
R
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
It's never too late to be what you might have been.
~George Eliot
"No matter how enmeshed a commander becomes in the elaboration of his own
thoughts, it is sometimes necessary to take the enemy into account" Sir Winston Churchill

rosencrantz

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A letter to my mother on the anniversary of dad's death.
« Reply #48 on: April 25, 2004, 06:06:02 PM »
PS And tonight I wore my pink pussycat T shirt - and my son loves it!  :wink:
R
"No matter how enmeshed a commander becomes in the elaboration of his own
thoughts, it is sometimes necessary to take the enemy into account" Sir Winston Churchill

Anonymous

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A letter to my mother on the anniversary of dad's death.
« Reply #49 on: April 27, 2004, 02:08:31 AM »
Gee Rosencrantz, I was so enthralled by this last post of yours, no not the pink pussy cat T-shirt one, although I thought about that too, like, "GO ROSENCRANTZ, YEAH, you wild girl, GO!!!"

But the one before. I had an image of you of stepping back. Kinda'  takin' it in, in a bigger view than ever before. You know what I mean. That is how I see it. Time, distance, healing, and WAMMO - the perspective changes, and makes more sense in a whole lot of detailed ways. There's wholeness that comes from seeing it as a whole, I think?????Duh????

Gosh that's powerful what you talked about!! I got a clearer picture of the struggle.

And I wanted to add on the other thread, but didn't want to break into (not too much anyway) on the workings between you and Wildflower at the moment, but you don't miss me (minutely) at all. I'm sorry for giving you that impression, and I can see I have.  :cry:  I just feel like a board-hog sometimes, 'cause I talk too much. I've rejected the notion of commenting on every way you have helped me and HIT-ME (in a good way) right between the eyes, but I can see I should and I'm so so so so so so so so so so so Sorry!!! You put a lot of time and effort in helping me sort out some serious shit!!! Now I just had to include a swear word or it wouldn't be me, I can't legitimately wear my 'Warning this body contains adult themes, nudity and strong language' T-shirt tomorrow. HAHAHA.  :D

Like Wildflower says, I value you and what you have to say. All of it, even if I'm a thicky and don't get it right away. I love your style. 8)

(((HIG)))

CG

rosencrantz

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A letter to my mother on the anniversary of dad's death.
« Reply #50 on: April 27, 2004, 05:56:57 AM »
Thanks for the great big belly laughs.  And...you always make everything OK.  How do you do that!  I wish you were around as part of my permanent 'friends' network.  You'd always bring 'perspective' and fresh air and 'moving on'!!!  Make me laugh at myself when I'm getting my knickers in a twist of embarrassment and hope and pain.  'You wild girl', indeed!  LOL LOL LOL  I don't have words enough for that!  Being mocked with love is a good experience!!!  LOL LOL LOL!! (You're right, I couldn't cope with wearing any of your T shirts!  Bit I'm aware that I have this T shirt in remembrance of you tho, just as WF has her fish!!!

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I've rejected the notion of commenting on every way you have helped me and HIT-ME (in a good way)
I want to hear that too much in my life generally.  It should become less important (yet more valuable somehow) from now on.

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I'm sorry for giving you that impression, and I can see I have
I wasn't quite sure what you were saying - but you are missed very much.  Be a hog, please.  I've been a much bigger hog.  I need someone to catch up and take over to keep me in my place LOL. (Hogs, higs, hugs, what theme do we have here, Mr Freud?! Triple  :wink: For ONCE I'm not being serious!!!)

Which reminds me, the word for what I am is not 'serious' but 'earnest'.  YUK!

But...to complete the thought I started with...friendships are so 'complicated'.  Especially when I seem to be this 'hello, here I am, car smash' kind of person.  And the people around me seem to implode or explode into millions of tiny fragments. (ooh, I just 'heard' myself again then - that means something and I don't know what it is!!! Fragments, fragmentation.  Is that my mother again...hang on, doing a web search...

See Portia - I need my books!!

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A fear of fragmentation of the personality, also known as disintegration anxiety, is often observed in patients whenever they are exposed to repetitions of earlier experiences that interfered with development of the self.  This fear may be expressed as feelings of falling apart, as a loss of identity, or as a fear of impending loss of one's vitality and of psychological depletion.


Do I really do that to people???  Or did I do it to my mother, just by 'existing'.  Maybe I do do it to some people in the present - but if so, that's their issue, not my 'fault'.  And with the vast majority of people, I'll just be misinterpreting what's happening for them (so I'm not such a lethal weapon after all LOL)

Just a minor teeter on the brink of 'is it me or is it her'...Nope, I really, honestly and truly do not think I have the kind of problems that relate to mental illness or personality disorder.  If I did, I've worked through them a long time ago and live a pretty adult life inside my brain, inside my heart, inside my soul.  Just currently dealing with a whole load of misapprehensions that resulted from the heart and mind of someone who 'meant well' but who was too often 'ill'.

I've been 'avoiding' the concept of Borderline Personality Disorder for some time but all the arrows are pointing that way now.  I've just found a website with a series of articles and every other article has a title that's setting off bells (and alarms!).  I'm off to have a good read!!! (Not because I'm after 'labels' but just to find a better understanding of 'what' and 'how')

Toodlepip
R
"No matter how enmeshed a commander becomes in the elaboration of his own
thoughts, it is sometimes necessary to take the enemy into account" Sir Winston Churchill

Anonymous

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A letter to my mother on the anniversary of dad's death.
« Reply #51 on: April 27, 2004, 08:28:28 AM »
Thanks Rosencrantz for all that positive re-inforcement, feed-back, affirming. You said so many lovely things and I'm wanting to say 'TA  :oops: ' I hope to be friends for a long time, here/now and in the future.  :D

Now I'm quickly off that, feeling awkward  :oops:  

I heard something that pierced me the other night. I was watching a doco on the real bridge over the river kwai story. A survivor was talkin' to the interviewer, 100,000 people died building that rail line for the Japanese in WW2. This guy who survived, had shared some of the most blood-chilling, tear wrenching, heart-breaking stories that I have ever heard. He's still alive today, but he suffered terible inhuman brutality everyday, many times a day. Being beaten to keep working, not being able to stop, watching friends dropping dead from exhaustion or beatings, trying to keep going. Having to work with malaria and dysentary, and if slowing down they'd get whipped with wire.

This part really made me sit up and think. He said as his final comment on the documentary, "When the Japanese officers and soldiers surrendered to our troops who came into our compound to free us, I thought about freedom, what new meaning freedom took on for me. I realised then what freedom really means. Freedom means/is the right to say NO."

I thought isn't that powerful, and I'm still thinking on it.

Just wanted to share that with you. Don't know why????????????

(((HIG)))

CG

rosencrantz

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A letter to my mother on the anniversary of dad's death.
« Reply #52 on: April 27, 2004, 11:12:06 AM »
Just following on from my post about the Borderling info...I came back in to borrow one of your HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAs - the biggest most strident cackle you've got please.  HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

What a brilliant description of me I found amongst the borderline literature.  After me saying nope I really don't think I've got that kind of problem.  HAHAHAHAHA.  It's fun being a mental hypochondriac!!! (Read that two ways!)

Ach well - if we've got personality, we're all on a continuum between healthy and unhealthy, ordered and disordered.  Personality is, after all, the human condition.  And we're humanly not 'ordered'.  It's just that some of us whizz along to the top of the scale too easily.  That's probably why we talk about being 'centred'.  Not too far up the scale towards 'dis' order and not too far down the scale towards 'too' ordered!!  Just nicely human, thank you!!

Now then CG - did you mean you didn't know and were kindly inviting me to find my own reality or DID you know???   :wink: I want all the feedback I can get.  I'm worn out with trying to work it all out myself.  I don't listen straight away but it bores into my soul and finds a place and then eureka!  it leaps out into consciousness!!!  :wink:

I'd take a guess that I haven't yet acquired the freedom to say 'no'. NO NO NONONONONONO!  Actually that didn't hurt much at all.  No mother, I don't want to.  Thank you, but no.  See, it's quite easy to say in isolation and I think I have the freedom to say no.  I didn't phone my mother in the finish.  No thank you mother.  Not today thank you mother.  I think I won't get collared today thank you.  But I need to learn to say no quicker and earlier in all sorts of situations.  

But the borderline stuff is quite enlightning.  Especially the stuff about containment and projection.  I've been busy 'containing' stuff for other people all my life.  Criticising myself for trying to be everyone's therapist was post-rationalisation - I was trained in it as a child!!!  

I like this :
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One treater said, “I hope you know, all this anger you are projecting on to me is not my anger, it is YOUR anger.”  The client coolly said, “Can you think of anything better to do with it?

www.toddlertime.com  HAHAHAHA!  Indeed!

Very, very soon I'm going to have to pluck up my courage and talk to social services and the community psychiatric nurse again.  I do need to find out a bit more about what these mental health issues are/were all about.  But I go into a total panic every time I think of it.  And I'm not entirely sure why.  It takes me straight back to a year ago - and a rug that was pulled from under me...

TTFN
R
"No matter how enmeshed a commander becomes in the elaboration of his own
thoughts, it is sometimes necessary to take the enemy into account" Sir Winston Churchill

Portia

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A letter to my mother on the anniversary of dad's death.
« Reply #53 on: April 27, 2004, 12:16:02 PM »
Hiya R

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Very, very soon I'm going to have to pluck up my courage and talk to social services and the community psychiatric nurse again. I do need to find out a bit more about what these mental health issues are/were all about.

I'm not going to come in with tough feedback, I just want to ask: why? This is about your mother, right? Is she deteriorating and causing you more problems? Is that why you have to talk to those people? Or are there other reasons? I just wonder and I am interested, for you.

And as for feedback...I still have that 'bad thing' to say about your Dad (signalled in PM, not on the board). My take on something you've said, but not until you want to hear it, if ever.

But interested in you talking to the services - why?

Anonymous

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A letter to my mother on the anniversary of dad's death.
« Reply #54 on: April 27, 2004, 06:18:51 PM »
I'm confess, I'm thick. Who is the borderline stuff for? YOU? I could find if I kept sufing that I have every disorder known to man, and some they haven't nailed don't yet, so I flick my hair, turn my back, walk away holding middle finger firmly high. And go and play, have some fun. Go skating, did that just last week, and made a paper mache money box too.

I'm gonna be well and happy if it kills me!!hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahha

Hey, how about this for a T-Shirt "Say NO to mental illness!"

((HIG)))

CG

Wildflower

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A letter to my mother on the anniversary of dad's death.
« Reply #55 on: April 27, 2004, 06:25:41 PM »
Quote
Hey, how about this for a T-Shirt "Say NO to mental illness!"


 :lol:  :lol:  :lol:

Okay, PLEASE.  You must make that shirt.  How much do you want for it?

Wildflower
If you want to sing out, sing out
And if you want to be free, be free
'Cause there's a million ways to be, you know that there are
-- Cat Stevens, from the movie Harold and Maude

Anonymous

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A letter to my mother on the anniversary of dad's death.
« Reply #56 on: April 27, 2004, 08:41:42 PM »
What a good idea :idea:  I might just trot (HEE-HAW) off to the little printers and get an iron on stencil made  :D

(((HIGS & Double HIGS)))

CG

Anonymous

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A letter to my mother on the anniversary of dad's death.
« Reply #57 on: April 27, 2004, 08:45:40 PM »
PS,

Just be my luck that the little dame at my printers will get the wording wrong as usual, if I order it over the phone. She doesn't speak english very well, and reads it even worse. If I don't write it out clearly for her, I'll probably end up with a T-shirt that reads,

"Say 'NO" to Mental Health!"

hahahahahahahahahahaha
hey, I like it!!!

CG

rosencrantz

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A letter to my mother on the anniversary of dad's death.
« Reply #58 on: April 30, 2004, 08:02:00 PM »
Hi Portia - Why I'm talking to the services?  Cos they're the only ones who are likely to have any kind of description/label for what's going on with my mother.  The context for this is only just fully realising that my mother has ALWAYS had mental health issues.  I thought it still all had to be secret.  I suspect that it's the 'symptoms' that have been 'dealt' with on occasion eg 'depression' (not seen as simply a tantrum of mega proportions at not getting her own way!).  Anyway, that's why.  And I need to do it soon before she comes off their lists and it'll all be too late.  I can see myself setting that up for myself!!!  Remember : my mother wants me for a zombie!!!!  :shock:

BTW Love's Executioner arrived - very readable - opened it right at a page about an old woman who had just lost her husband!!!!!  Can you remember why you recommended/mentioned it???

Hi CG - I was looking up BPD to see if it could help me understand my mother better - BIG abandonment panic issues.  I don't really think I'm BPD but there were a couple of descriptions which sounded eerily familiar!!!!!  Can't find the page now...Clearly not important enough  :wink:  

Hi WF - What is it about YOU that she needs and can’t get from anyone else? Woo-hoo!  The answer came in a woosh - she needs me to collar me, and shake me, and give me a good metaphorical beating, to take all her rage out on me - so she doesn't have to take responsibility for what she's chosen to do with her life.  I'm this great big HUGE comforting momma that can take all the rage and look after it for her.  And, of course, provide her with all the good things she thinks she's put into me that I've stolen from her like her confidence.  You know she even sounded 'amazed' that I'd got a husband and son, like I'd even stolen THOSE off her, too!!! (Scuse me, but they're mine!  I worked for them and this is one lot of MY things you're NOT having)

Well it's amazingly late again and I've been on this PC practically the whole day.  I'm coming back up for air after an incredibly fragile month.  Just bought a second hand laptop so I can go on holiday and pack you all up and take you with me!  Now that IS scary!!!!!!!  :wink:
R
"No matter how enmeshed a commander becomes in the elaboration of his own
thoughts, it is sometimes necessary to take the enemy into account" Sir Winston Churchill

rosencrantz

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Re: A letter to my mother on the anniversary of dad's death.
« Reply #59 on: October 13, 2012, 01:02:39 PM »
I don't know how I alighted on this thread - but it was the first one I saw with my name attached. 

Since then, I've been through cancer twice.

The first cancer was a wonderful journey, the second came after some terrible (mental, emotional) knock backs (you may remember gaslighting et al on this board when I came back in a tizz). Never quite managed to recover and the second very aggressive cancer followed.  After a year of treatment, surgery followed.  In a weird way, surgery not only got rid of the cancer, but scraped out all the depression and angst as well!  Yay - life reborn!  Only a couple of months out of that wood, only to discover there was another one festering away in the background. 

So I'm revisiting past friends and acquaintances to say thank you, expressing gratitude to those of you who responded to my posts - I know many have moved on but there are still some who will remember me and I see names here that I remember.  It seems I will be bowing out in a few months.

I always said I had asthma symptoms because the way people treated me 'took my breath away'.  It seems that thread in my story is the one which is killing me.  I think I'm all out of fight and resources for this one.

Thank you so much Dr Grossman for having made this board available and making the learning and sharing possible.  It made such a difference to my life. You know that because I've shared my thoughts with you in the past.  Even the horrendous bits were fabulous, etched in my mind.  Double rainbows. Sliding down a helter skelter ride so fast I couldn't stop.  Working through shame invisibly - I'd never have been able to do that face to face with anyone - and it made it possible to come out and be counted as 'me'.

My son is 18 now and has been through some extremely challenging times but I do believe the light at the end of the tunnel is widening. He's lovely.  Made my life worthwhile because it brought him into the world.  And made it worthwhile having him because he made my life bearable - he is the source of the few bright moments in my life.  Sad thing is - there's nobody else I will 'miss', that I am sad to leave.  I've already had to leave so many people behind or been left behind. I know I've had a positive impact on some  people so I can feel I have left some kind of legacy.  But I also know that there has never been anybody for me, that I can turn to or rely on. I've never managed that trick. So I guess I'm off out of it.  I hope I don't have to come back to earth to live an earthly life again because it sure sucks! ;-)  Dark humour will get me through!! ;-)

Not true there is nobody I miss. I  miss CG especially. Always have. But she is already gone. We were in touch for a while but then something happened and I never heard from her again. The chaos of my own life may not have helped but I shall never know.

Bye for now.  May see you on the other side!! ;-)

PS All those problems with my mother?  She had Aspergers Syndrome.  No empathy!  People with an ASD can have empathy - or strive to - so don't write them all off!  And see if you can educate the ones who don't. ;-)
« Last Edit: October 15, 2012, 03:54:12 AM by rosencrantz »
"No matter how enmeshed a commander becomes in the elaboration of his own
thoughts, it is sometimes necessary to take the enemy into account" Sir Winston Churchill