Anger Vs. Depression

[Ami]

I have realized that I always had a" depression" oppressing   me. Once I realized that my M was a 3 yr.old, a big part of it left.
 Now I am facing the deep anger I have at my M and I think that the rest of the depression is actually anger at her.( all of it probably was)
   I can see how since I became  the 'top dog", she is running from me. That makes me more angry that all this time I was trying to be "nice" and forgiving",she was really just "bullying " me. NOW, she is afraid of me and running. On the website about N mothers ,it says that only ONE can be the "top dog".( in the N mother's mind)
  This gets me so angry.ALL this time I let her bully me b/c I wanted love and connectedness.. Now, she is running. It reminds me of the cartoons where one is chasing  another.   Then they make a fast U -Turn and  it is reversed..UUGHH                                    Ami

[Poppy Seed]

I read once that depression is anger turned inward.  I am not convinced that this explanation covers all depression but I thought of it when I read your title.

Does her running make you angry?  Or does it give you space to heal?  Sounds like it is just another reminder/reinforcer that she isn't capable of the love and connectedness you needed so badly.

Poppy

[isittoolate]

"Anger turned inward becomes depression"--a quote from somewhere, so I heard.

but are you angry/depressed that the roles have changed and you are uncomfortable as yet, with this change?

[Ami]

Part of what gets me angry was how "easy" it was to back her down and turn the tables and have HER be the coward.
  It was so easy and ALL this time I was the abused one when I could have just turned it around and been the strong dog.
  I could hear her quaking when she heard it was me on the phone. All my life since 14,I have sucked up to her, twisted myself for her, given my heart ,soul and body to her and all she wanted to do was BULLY me.
  Now that I have gotten strong, she is quaking.. It was so easy.
  I don't really understand all of it. My depression is leaving.It was a carrying of her -- somehow and someway.
  The huge big bully was so easy to back down.
   It is really big but  I don't really get it.
  I guess that if a man abused you all your life and you finally stood up and he ran scared. You would feel such a strong assortment of feelings like"Why did it take me so long?"How dumb  could I be to have put up with it for so long? and shock at how easy it really was to be strong and stand up for yourself to s/one who you thought was invincible.
  I still don't really know what I am trying to say.It is confusing,but the more I write the more my depression is leaving.

[Ami]

My Former cop b/f used to say that in order to heal an emotion, you had to get a "gap". A gap was a place where you could "see" how your thinking worked without being actively involved in it. It was a moment of detachment.
  I am seeing how my M programmed my core to be one of shame. Then I was always running from the shame in to people pleasing, shopping, looking for approval, over eating, (anything to push away this shame b/c it hurt so badly and it felt like it would kill me)
 I was running and running. That type of running can make us sick-- emotionally and physically.
 I am at the level of facing this shame core.I have never done anything like this before. I am just going forward .(Send a rope down if I don't come back--UGGGG)

[sally]

Ami,

I do agree that depression is anger turned inward.

So, this is a great step forward.  Congrats!!!

How did it happen?  I guess you saw that the King (Queen) had no clothes and so you are no longer afraid of her, so you feel empowered.  Perhaps we tend towards depression when we feel powerless and we tend towards anger when we feel more powerful.  Just a guess.

Do you feel more powerful?

It was so easy and ALL this time I was the abused one when I could have just turned it around and been the strong dog.

As the saying goes:  "when the student is ready, the teacher will come".  Ami, you just weren't ready to turn it around until now.  You needed to build up to the point where you could turn it around and that point has come.  Congratulations!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Love,
sally

[Ami]

Thanks Sally
   I was so used to this same depression that I did not even notice that I had it. I used to buy things all the time to make it go away.I thought that if I looked good and got approval that I would BE "good"
 I stopped buying things b/c I realized that my being "good" has a new definition.I want to be whole-- not search for compliments ..
   I want my insides to be whole.
   So, as I started doing the inner child exercises,I started feeling real feelings. I started wanting to trust myself and feel what I was feeling rather than "medicate" it.
   I  am in the middle of this process. It is like being in a new "land' --like Mongolia. It is so different but I know that I will come out the other side ---one of these fine days                   Love  Ami

[Poppy Seed]

My Former cop b/f used to say that in order to heal an emotion, you had to get a "gap". A gap was a place where you could "see" how your thinking worked without being actively involved in it. It was a moment of detachment.

Man, this idea has really helped me.  I have found myself SOOO emotional lately. GACK!  If I can just step out and get objective I see a whole lot better.
And I can get my thinking under control faster.  This last two weeks I have been much calmer.

The shame is so deep, isn't it?  For me, it goes deeper than any other part of my struggle. It hides and does sniper moves on all my happy stuff. Like how you say "shame core".  It is definitely at the core.  I think the shame drives my "running" too.  The running with my head cut off.  I absolutely stop myself in my tracks when I start the running.  I don't always know what to do next but it opens me to the objective observing thing or "gap" and then I can implement the practicing of tools.  Sometimes I feel like my core is so damaged with shame that I need to throw the whole thing out and start over.  Act like an innocent.....maybe....and rewrite.

[Ami]

You know one lady came to my house b/c she had a company that I needed a service from. She was very late for the appointment.It might have been even on the wrong day.
  However, what shocked me was that she did not berate herself at all. She just said,"I'm sorry" and that was it. This woman was not operating form a shame core(not in this instance anyway)
   I think that the root of our problems is this shame core. It feels so hard to even see it and touch it.It is like "fire" in that it burns and hurts and you just want to run away and medicate it. Even "crisis "medicates it b/c it takes you away from these feelings of deep worthlessness( the shame core).
  I really feel like Marco Polo. I am going in to uncharted waters and just going by the light of the Scripture about facing the truth( about myself , life and God) and I have a promise to be free.
   I am convinced that the first step to getting whole is simply taking out the trash. Already,I have felt God's presence more b/c I have more room for it.
  My cop b/f gave me a book. In the beginning  he wrote a quote about what good is  the outward life if you ignore the inward journey.( Can't I just buy something and be done with it?)
                       Love    Ami

[sally]

I really feel like Marco Polo. I am going in to uncharted waters

Ami,

you are a foreigner in a foreign land so that one day, you can come home and find yourself there.

Can't I just buy something and be done with it?)

Yeah me too!

love,
sally

[JanetLG]

Ami,

For me, the biggest 'Aha!' moment was about a year ago when I realised my mother was an N - and the strongest emotion I felt was anger at all the wasted years. It flattened me completely. I was in tears for weeks.

It does seem so easy, ONCE YOU REALISE. But it's the coming to the realisation that HAS to take the time. Your subconscious wouldn't have let you 'know' until you were ready to deal with it.

So, you must be ready, now. This is just the next stage. But it's a big one!!


Janet

[Ami]

Thank you everyone for responding.
Thank you Sally for understanding what a big step it is to move from depression to anger and for your  love and support.
 Thanks Poppy for being so willing to express your self from your deep, scary places.
Thanks you Janet- for having walked through many steps and providing a light and a hope that I can get there,too. One thing with you, Janet is that I CANT say that you don't understand which I always think with 'other'(not board)  people.If outside people tell me some version of "get over it",I always thing,"Riiiight, you have no idea about My M.
  Today.a huge part of my 'normal" depression is gone--not all of it. However, this shows me that I have to still keep doing the inner child exercises b/c they work for me and I trust this modality(more than therapy,for example)
  (((((((((((((Sally,Poppy, Janet)))))))))))))))))))                       Love  Ami

[tayana]

I don't know that depression is solely anger turned inward.  Some of it is.  Some of it is anger turned inward because we've never been allowed to express anger at the people who deserve it.

There's a lot of things caught up in depression, or at least there is for me.  There's a lot of guilt, misplaced guilt.  There's a lot of sadness, a lot of silent rage.  I have been very scared of my emotions for a long time, and now that I'm allowed to feel those emotions, I'm still scared of them.  I think fear is part of it too.

Ami, I'm so glad you are able to see what the root of the depression is.  I think that a major part of healing, and of overcoming it.  And your comment about buying things to make it go away resonates with me, because I did/do the same thing.  I don't feel guilty when I buy something to make my house nice, but I do feel guilty for making an impulse purchase simply because I deserve a treat.  My nmom used to do that.  She'd not speak to me for two weeks, then she'd buy me something and be all nice and sweet, like that was supposed to make up for the hurt.

[Poppy Seed]

I think it was on one of the recent anger threads that talked about the anger that comes from powerlessness.  Sometimes I feel like my depression comes from powerlessness as well.  Feeling like the pain was so overwhelming and the shame so acid like.  Not being able to make progress or to make effective change.  I feel my depression release the more healthy power I can embrace and the letting go of the stuff I can't and shouldn't seek to control.  I am finding that a great balm to the anger and depression.

Ami,

I was just thinking about your description of the firey and searing nature of the shame.  I don't know what it was that shifted in me, but I am not afraid to look at my shame anymore.  I feel like I don't have any real reaction to it other than to recognize it....feel the bite....and combat it the best way I can today.  Now that I know exactly how to identify the shame voice and feeling.....I can call it out of the shadows and label it a lie!  That seems to be giving me more power over it.  I am not sure I am as good at doing that when I am with triggering people or intimidating circumstances.  That is why I am avoiding them for now.

[Ami]

I am really glad that this topic resonated with so many people.
 I have had many breakthroughs even since last night.I have also had some "sad" things.
One of the 'sad' things is that my M won't even talk to me on the phone. I told the 'truth"  when I got strong. She could not twist me at all. I just stick to the truth like a defense lawyer.
  She gave up and wants nothing to do with me. Once she could not twist me to her reality ,she  totally rejected me. I think that I always "knew" that this would happen( my whole life).
  I think that ,down deep, I always knew that the "penalty for seeing and saying the 'truth" was total banishment. It is so sad. I think that I knew that I "had" to take her reality b/c what might she have done to me as a kid? Now, she is soooo angry that I "told the truth",but she really can't "hurt" me.
 I am so,so,so sad. It is so painful to have a M who makes you chose between "mental illness( a skewed reality) or a relationship with a M.I guess that I have to grieve the "sadness" of it.I guess that I chose to be 'crazy" b/c I did not want to be "alone'. Being  warped was the price for a relationship with her.I was trying to tell her to see Dr G b/c she lives in Boston. However, whenever she goes to a shrink( 30 yrs). My M TELLS the shrink what is wrong with her. The therapy is what my M wants it to me. So, My M wants to go to therapy to work out her relationship with me( my F told me). However,it will be more of the same.I am unforgiving. My M "used" to be "bad" ,but now she is good. and I am unforgiving.
 I never felt so sad about the whole thing.It feels so final. It feels like I was on a journey and I got to the "end of the road. The  map "ended".Now, I am sitting by the side of the road and the map ended. The map is my whole journey with my M.  It is deeply, deeply sad.
  Now, I need to get a whole new map for my life-- not based on her(her needs, her ideas, her crazy way of looking at me and herself)
 The good thing is that I got a real sense of how much of our core of shame is just LIES. I look at life. So much of what we are taught about life( by society ,our families etc) is a lie.
  I can 'see' my core of "shame". I see that I got mine mainly from  my M. However,people who had good M's still have a core of shame( most people). My kids don't have the M issues. However, they had the F issues. They still struggle with feeling unworthy.
. I saw myself as the 'worst". I just had my core of shame made in my particular way.Other people can get their's from other things-- racism. poverty, bad F, bad siblings , etc etc  I see it as simply lies that I believed ( and still do).
  I don't see it as so "hopeless' b/c I can face the  lies using the inner child exercises. I already have face many of them ..
  I still have a depression,but it is not as heavy.
  I know that I have made some steps toward wholeness. I am happy in a way and sad in a way--but not as hopeless, for sure. Thanks to everyone who wrote about this topic.It is so much easier to heal when you can do it with others                   Love  Ami