Hi GS,
Your post really resonated with me. These are things I’ve been thinking about too. I do pretty well in changing my thought patterns to healthy ones when I’m away from my mother, but when she starts her games the old thoughts and fears overwhelm me again and I can’t seem to stay where I was before having to deal with her again.
I’ve been thinking since I got home about why the fears take over and why I feel panicked and unsafe when she’s around despite knowing that I’m safe and doing okay now. And it always takes me a week or so to feel back to normal after I’ve been around her. And I was thinking about how as children we are trained. These things would happen over and over so feeling fearful in what feels like the same type of situation happens almost automatically. So even though I know I’m safe now, the feelings are the same when I am around her and she’s pulling her old stunts.
Then I started thinking about a program I am working to help me declutter my house. (This may seem off topic but bear with me, it applies). In this program, flylady emails reminders to members inboxes. They are the same reminders every day and a lot of them are just one line reminders. One of the reminders is Shine Your Sink. Every day this comes to my inbox. I’ve only been in the program a few weeks, but these daily reminders stay with me throughout the day.
So I started thinking that the things I was taught in childhood, especially things I fear, were taught to me over years and years. Learning that when she would act a certain way I wasn’t safe, knowing that I was trapped and could do nothing about it. When I came home this last time and started thinking about all that I was feeling as things were going on, I recognized the same childhood feelings, and saw her playing the same type games and felt trapped even though I knew I wasn’t.
Then I thought about retraining my brain… I thought about how helpful it would be to create emails to myself that repeated each day. Just little one line reminders that remind me over and over that things really are okay now, that I’m free to be me and my self worth isn’t based on how my mother treats me. I learned to be fearful because I was trained to be over and over and as a child, but now maybe I can retrain myself over and over as an adult, and hopefully, next time I have to deal with my mother these things will stick. I spent a good part of the day yesterday trying to figure out how create reminders in my yahoo box that would repeat automatically each day, and I haven’t figured it yet, but plan on working on it again today. Some of my reminders are You are not trapped, You have a right to speak the truth, It is good to take care of yourself etc. etc. I figure by seeing them everyday and adding to them as I learn new things, they will become stronger in my mind just like the flylady habits are becoming stronger. I’m hoping they become so much a part of me that they become my automatic thoughts when my mother starts her games.
When I read your post it seemed you were working in this area too and I thought this idea may be helpful to you. If you’re interested, when I figure out how to get these repeated reminders to work, I could post the instructions on how to create them. If you don’t think it would be helpful, no worries… I understand that we all have to walk our own path and different things work for different people. You may be further along in your recovery and may not need this.
You sound good GS. Your persistence and effort are paying off for you.
