replaying N wounds blocks healing

[Gaining Strength]

I hear you judging yourself very harshly.   That is so odd.  I don't hear it at all but I know you are right.  I do hear it in other's voices that I have taken in but I am certain that I do it too myself as well.  Really there is no difference because once I internalized other's critical voices they became MINE.  I am keeping them there in my own little mind.  Thanks for that insight.

I am definitely on a crusade to conquer that self-condemnation and to let other's role off my back.

We just need patience, faith.  You are on the right track, know that it will come when you are ready for it and that will be whenever you are ready for it.  Believe in yourself & love yourself.
  You are so right.  The negative stuff actually holds me back.  Thank you for pointing this out.  I am definitely at a place where I can focus on what I am doing right. 

For a couple of months I have been aware of the "shift" that I can make - sort of like flipping a switch - to toggle between "victim" and "moving forward".  This appearance and disappearance of this switch depends on whether I am "conscious" of it or not.  I am doing much better at keeping this option in a conscious place.  Your post here helps me shift some more things.

Yes, you have grown by leaps & bounds, you are not the person you were, you are a different person, a new person. Thank you.  Your words are a gift of immeasurable strength and encouragement.  I am much more able to take this in and own it.  Believing this makes it possible for me to make yet another step forward up out of the pit of self-hatred and self-doubt and self-condemnation that I was dwelling in when I first came here.  Thanks again.

The fact that our FOO  failed to give us the support we needed was CRAZY MAKING.  So,our FOOS made us feel shame for wanting support and then made us feel crazy when they didn't give the support we needed.
  There is no doubt about that.  I remember a dear and actually helpful therapist (with a national reputation) once said to me, "Perhaps you need too much."  I can still feel the shock and hopelessness I felt when he said that.  I saw it as a truth - that I needed too much.  My reaction was, "What now - what can I possibly do if I need too much."  Not a very therapeutic statement by him.  That's for sure.

Oh, SS, you sound great, you're growin like mid-summer grass. Thanks Ann.  Your comments have pushed me in a very good direction.  They are a boost just at the right time.  I have been a little blind to my own self-judgment but you have shone a light on some of it.  They have been holding me back and now that I am aware of my own judgment I can replace it with thoughts that will propell me forward.

I am making great progress and getting such help from my friends here.


CB Thanks!
I just wanted you to know that I am being so encouraged by this thread and all the insights you are reaching.  I have wanted to get involved in the discussion because what you are discovering is so similar to what I struggled through.   I really appreciate your words.  I am at a point where I am about to let go of my fear of feeling good about myself.  My father so successfully taught me to NOT feel good about "progress".  He could really destroy any self-esteem that I took in working towards a goal by pointing out all the mistakes and flaws and shortcomings.  THAT is what has stayed with me.  But that made getting to success absolutely impossible. 

I will never forget the first time I heard the concept the outcome was not what was important but the journey along the way.  I argued with myself about this and was so aware of how this ran completely contradictory to what I had been taught.  I could see the point that if we devalued the journey that we would be devaluing much of life but I couldn't make the transition.  NOW my life actually depends on valuing the journey - each step along the way and letting go of the outcome.  Not because it doesn't matter but because the steps along the way are critical to the ultimate achievement.  IOW, if I don't values the steps I will never get to the end.

I have this quiet yet powerful voice criticizing me each step along every path, "not enough, not enough, not good enough" it whispers.  Well NOW I am talking back - loudly, "YES IT IS!  YES IT IS! YES IT IS."  That will certainly help.

Thanks so much.

[sKePTiKal]

Perhaps give yourself time for your mental image of yourself to catch up with the 'New You'?

Ann! what an excellent idea! I've read it at just the right time. Thank you!

My old mental image of myself is based on the lifetime's worth of CRAP that was projected on me, inaccurately assessed of me, etc. Old verbal abuse, even.

I need an extreme makeover of my mental image.... need to replace the old crap in my head about myself, with what I know now, to be true-er of me. Little by little, it's been happening of course - but I hadn't quite visualized the "new me", how she acts, what her habits are... how she speaks.

I really needed a design/creative project! THANKS! 

[Hopalong]

Wowsers. This is a gift, SS:

I have this quiet yet powerful voice criticizing me each step along every path, "not enough, not enough, not good enough" it whispers.  Well NOW I am talking back - loudly, "YES IT IS!  YES IT IS! YES IT IS."  That will certainly help.

Thank you for sharing it.

love to you,
Hops

[ann3]

Thank you, PR.  Yes, I am re-vising/re-viewing the image I have of myself.  I am a new me.

The negative stuff actually holds me back

So, true, SS & I am learning this in therapy:  Trauma gets lodged in our brain & so we keep replaying the trauma over & over and this disables our brain from finding and fashioning solutions to our problems.  So, when we get bogged down in negativity, we can't access that part of our brain (neocortex?) that comes up with creative solutions.  So, being bogged down by our trauma & negativity leaves us feeling stuck,hopeless, immobile and all that bad stuff

xoxo,
ann

[Gaining Strength]

CB your post has provoked alot of thought for me.  It touches an issue that has interested me for some time - the critical point between passive healing and individual determination, active healing.

I could write an essay on the subject.  There are so many significant aspects to this.  In fact I did write a lengthy response and who knows what happened - it disappeared. 


The debridement analogy is a powerful one.  I am at the point in my healing where I must be willing to actually choose to go through the pain necessary for a true recovery.  I am at the point where I must opt to do the excruciating work.  I thought that having forged through the issues of shame that I was at the point of forging through issues of judgment but as I was writing my disappearing reply I realized that the issue for me is the fear and resentment of having to push through the mess I have on my own without support from a spouse, parent, friend, collegue.  I am angry about that and filled with resentment - both attitudes that are like albatrosses around my neck.

When you wrote about "buck up" CB, I thought of my response while watching the Olympics during which I heard Michael Phelps say on more than one occasion that when people taunted or criticized him he was spurred on to swim even better.  I knew in an instant that such criticism stops me in my tracks - it resonates and affirms in me my own parents' criticsm and belittlement and judgment of worthlessness.  Why can't I flip a switch and respond like Phelps?

This weekend I heard Dr. Bernie Seigal describe an address he gave to an audience of neuro-scientists about the mind-body connections.  Most of his audience were sceptics.  He read to them a lurid passage and then asked them if they still believed there was no mind-body connection.  Point made. 

My mind creates a negative reaction when criticized.  Phelps body creates a positive reaction.  I have what is referred to in EFT language as a "reversal."  I see my responsibility at this stage, because I desire to break through, to be willing and driven to experience the pain of "debridement" if you will in order to get to the goals I have for myself and my family.

I can do this.  I do not need support of others - though I would like it and would welcome it but do not need it.  I must be willing to walk through the fire and am at long last healed enough to have the strength to do so. 

I DO NOT want to stay where I am.  I have done enough work to get to a level where I can finally push through.  I am strong enough.  I can do it.  I can root out all of my fear, all of my wounds, all of the hidden infection.  I have the courage and the strength to do this.  I chose to be single minded about this. 

I have made significant progress slowly but surely during my time here.  I have identified issues that were holding me back and gained ground in surmounting them one at a time and now I am at that critical mass stage where I must shift from the passive healing to the painful, painstaking determination to push though the agonizingly difficult stages left ahead.

The next process is certainly a bitter pill to swallow.  I can opt out or I can endure the bitterness for the rewards at the end.  I can look back and see that my entire life has been leading me to have the courage and strength to get through this most difficult stage ahead.  I can do it and have chosen to move ahead.

Thanks for your post CB.  I has actually helped me focus several thoughts and ideas.  I came online today to write about overcoming my reactions to judgment but in processing the ideas in your post I realized that I am in quite a different and enormously more significant place than I had thought.

Pushing through the pain will be difficult and will take more dedication and discipline than I have demonstrated until now.  I don't have a plan, don't know how I will do it, I only know that I will and that I will begin immediately.

Thanks to all for your help, your thoughts and your encouragement.

[sKePTiKal]

SS: an image occurred to me this morning and it relates to your description of the healing process as painful - CB's abrading a burn.

Falling down the rabbit hole (of gaslighting, abuse) was painful ALSO; and getting back out will also be painful - but it's a different kind of pain; not immobilizing - empowering. Like giving birth - with all the positive consequences of that event.

[Gaining Strength]

Thanks such a great point PR.  It is so important to keep in mind that there is something positive as a result of this type of pain.  If I can keep that in the forefront of my consciousness I am certain that I can push forward. 

I will never forget that there was a time when I began psychotherapy that had I known it was more than a six week or six month progress then I would have never started it  - but once I began - there was no turning back.  That is where I am now - half way down the birth canal.

[Hopalong]

I realized that the issue for me is the fear and resentment of having to push through the mess I have on my own without support from a spouse, parent, friend, collegue.

I can do this.  I do not need support of others - though I would like it and would welcome it but do not need it. 

((((((SS)))))))

Is there NO women's support group of any kind in your area? I doubt the Jr-Leaguers will frequent one.
Do/did either of your parents drink too much? Then there's ACOA.

Last night I went to my women's Covenant Group (a church mini-group). There are 8 of us. We've been together, twice monthly, for a year. There is such deep and real support there. We become known. We care and are cared about. We don't "fix" each other; we hear each other. And if anybody needs us, we're there. I just signed up to continue with them, indefinitely.

It's become such a rich source of comfort and connection in my life.

Don't you deserve that, in 3-D too?

love to you,
Hops

[Gaining Strength]

Great suggestions Hops.  I tried ACOA years ago.  That was a bust - in great part because of some of the wacky personalities.  But I am in the process of getting of getting a group together at my church of single parents. I definitely think that would be the kind of support I need.  I never really thought of it that way.  Who knows.  So many of those who are interested seem to be on much more solid footing than I am but that's neither hear nor there.

Thanks for the suggestion.

[ann3]

TT,

Thank you for posting this.  I found Dr. Carver's answer confusing & I didn't like what he said. I think if a past memory or experience haunts us, we should look at it, name it, & explore it.  That way, we remove the mystery, we see it in the clear light of day, we can accept it, own it, process it & move on.

The way I read his answer, I think he's saying forget it & with that I disagree.   I think by forgetting it, it becomes the boogie man in the dark closet & we can't let go of our fear of opening the door, letting in the light, cleaning out the closet, throwing away the junk.  Pardon my metaphors.

Thanks, TT,

ann

[teartracks]

Hi ann3,

Forgetting it would have never worked for me either.  However, I can't help but admire  a person who can suspend or make a conscious decision not to explore further if suspending doesn't add to the problem.  Personally, I had to see it to the end.

tt

[ann3]

Exactly, tt.  I couldn't forget & let it go because then I'd never know what was wrong.

For those that can, they are lucky.  I wonder how they do it.  Like the letter writer, I tried to forget, but it didn't work, so I had to remember.  bummer.

love,
ann

[Izzy_*now*]

This is very interesting, as for the most part it is me.

I visited and re-visited the past so many times to finally have my own spin on my present. I too have NCd my family

So I reached his point

We can have a happy life with a variety of medical conditions as long as we have a strategy to manage our symptoms when they appear.

I have examined my life (An unexamined life is a wasted life--Johnny Cash)

I have viewed it from so many angles that I (might have said this before) at the present time, I think my 4 siblings are hiding within their marriages, about our parents and grandparents ad infinitum.....and I might be the most sensible of the lot for examing and talking about it and seeking therapy.

I would n't talk to them seriously now, if they begged me--- been through my asking them, to no avail.

Izzy