Twiggy's Checklist

[lighter]

I've noticed that I can give up coffee...

but when certain thoughts enter, I want it.

 It's soothing and breaks up the thought pattern.... something to do instead.

The ritual of grinding the beans, drawing fresh cold water and mixing the right amount of sugar and milk all bring relief of distraction.

I still drink it with certain people..... it's part of our social ritual and I enjoy I'm giving that part up.

When I'm alone...... I simply resist bc it stains my teeth and causes more anxiety than the ritual dispells.

Mo2

[sKePTiKal]

Ah... well. Twiggy was "holding out" on me... seems she had one more deep dark secret that only today she let out.

It explains why my mother permitted the smoking and said "it could be worse"...
It explains the "fear" behind the resistance to quitting smoking... which is "magically" going away rapidly now...
It explains why I was banned from going to Ruths' (my substitute mom)... and why I felt rejected by her...

and actually, it explains a LOT of my mother's actions and reactions to me. She still is, as far as I'm concerned, an undiagnosed BPD with a lot of clinical depression. Twiggy may very well remember more... but this piece is extremely significant; the keystone.

It's a very, very important piece of the story, because - everyone misunderstood and no one would listen to me; take me at my word; BELIEVE me. And at the time: I did what I did, because I wasn't sure I believed me, either.

I mean - who would believe a kid who said that her mother "invaded" her whole being? It was like a horror movie or the Twilight Zone... some mental, emotional, psychological infection... toxic as all get out... terrifying, because I thought I was going insane - schizophrenic, even. Or that I'd come under some kind of evil influences - some mystical power that was taking over. Even though I was experiencing it, that explanation didn't sound sane... and I couldn't stop - ever - being afraid of it.

I had written about the "poison dart"... and the chinese water torture of this internal drip-drip-drip...I called it brain-washing... the whispers and innuendos that my mother poisoned me with... slowly replacing my version of reality with her big lie - the gaslighting. Her version - her lie - left me with no explanation for my emotions. My version made sense to me and connected emotionally... even though, in 1969... it wasn't common knowledge all the things rape victims experienced in the aftermath. The conflict of this was excruciatingly painful coupled with the pain of identity hijacking... and when my aunt who KNEW and BELIEVED, because I had spoken with her just before this second trauma occurred and also processed some of the feelings with, AFTER...died... I lost any concrete form of touchstone... I had no one in my corner to help me sort things out emotionally or contradict the insidious whisper campaign of lies... she had said: no one knows or knew why your mom is this way.

I have no words... Twiggy has no words to describe the pain; the only image that comes to mind is of being on fire - physically burning in hell - unrelentingly - no death. So Twiggy snuck into Ruth's house one night and tried cutting on her wrists. She was too weak - no food (why???) to do much more than scratch at them and cause some minor bleeding. She'd been hiding from her mother in her closet - which until that time - had been full of "monsters" that scared into not sleeping at night. It was safer hiding where the monsters lived... than letting her mother see her. Because the evil... the infection... was coming from her mother.

Twiggy hoped that she could drain the evil (her mother's projective identification) out of her system. That the "angel" would come back to protect her from her mother. She wasn't trying to kill herself.

But of course, that's what everyone thought. No one knew about "cutting"... or how common it was in young girls who'd been raped... and the relief from emotional flooding it provided... and how it was "cleansing" - getting the "evil" out...

SIGH... so this is what Ruth couldn't deal with; Twiggy just sat there with her wrists bandaged on Ruth's couch while Ruth - who never raised her voice - gave Twiggy's mom, Holy Hell - tears just rolling silently down her face without end... letting everyone come to the wrong conclusion - because if she'd said what she was REALLY running away from - the pain and from whom - no one would've believed her. Even her Dad had said she'd be better off with her mom...

and I remember looking at the scars... even new, they were faint; the cuts were simply in skin - but it FELT GOOD... better... and now, it's practically invisible to the eye, but I can still just barely trace it out.

This is where a lot of the shame & guilt comes from - the assumption on the part of the adults in my life that I was trying to kill myself. That was absolutely not true. But their ignorance (lack of knowledge) and flat out STUPIDITY (not able to move past their first assumption) made them extremely - EXTREMELY - dangerous to my well-being... as I found out, later. Part of the massive stupidity was in my mother's adamant denial of what I told her had happened to me. It's one hell of a volatile potion, you know?
That denial rendered me voiceless... because if I were to begin talking... I'd have to tell the whole story... and who would believe that the stuff about my mother could be true - especially since I was having a hard believing it was my reality. But there was no escaping the pain, you know.

While hiding out in my closet - I found my secret stash of cigarettes. Tobacco slowed down racing thoughts... pushed the emotional flood beyond the rush of dopamine and nicotine... gave me a chance to think one thing at a time and try to figure out what the hell had happened to me... unravel the tangle of lies of the gaslighting... maybe instead of cutting...

and of course, that's when my mother got serious about making me "forget" - the witch doctor who hypnotized me into putting Twiggy into a box and locking her away... the shunning. But I remembered the tobacco... even after Twiggy didn't "exist" any more.

Ironically: it is my mother who can't help giving me these keys... these clues... through talking about her current projections onto my niece, nephew, brother and SIL... she is convinced that my SIL is abusive (no; depressed maybe - but NO) and told the niece to "not do anything desperate"... and she is constantly asking ME for advice on how to help those kids. (Yes, I want to throw up.) I am selfish enough to let her talk... and to wait for the clues... to my own history - because the story she tells about my brother's kids - IS MINE... and she is projecting it all out onto this new situation. I often wonder how closely it fits with something in her past, that she has buried beyond knowing.

Twiggy spilled the beans about this latest, because I've been asking which one of us wants to quit smoking and why it's so important. She finally trusts me enough to tell me this because she knows I won't reject her - no matter WHAT she tells me; or make her go away again. And when I comforted her - the shame of the misunderstanding of her intent behind the action was so great - a huge, huge sense of relief started to settle in. Clarity... no "bad" feelings anymore... understanding... how it all got so twisted around and crazy... and why she was so, so afraid of - yet stuck to - her mother.

She wanted to tell you all. She was tired of carrying this secret alone. She knew she wouldn't be shamed for it - or misunderstood again. She knows many of you went through something similar with your moms... sort of the Invasion of the Body Snatchers horror story. She's ready to "put it down" and "let it go"... but it had to SAID first.

[Gabben]

Hi Amber,

Just wanted you to know that I read what you wrote. Thanks for sharing your jouney. I love your determination and your voice of truth.

Peace and hugs,

Lise

[seasons]

But of course, that's what everyone thought. No one knew about "cutting"... or how common it was in young girls who'd been raped... and the relief from emotional flooding it provided... and how it was "cleansing" - getting the "evil" out...

SIGH... so this is what Ruth couldn't deal with; Twiggy just sat there with her wrists bandaged on Ruth's couch while Ruth - who never raised her voice - gave Twiggy's mom, Holy Hell - tears just rolling silently down her face without end... letting everyone come to the wrong conclusion - because if she'd said what she was REALLY running away from - the pain and from whom - no one would've believed her. Even her Dad had said she'd be better off with her mom...

and I remember looking at the scars... even new, they were faint; the cuts were simply in skin - but it FELT GOOD... better... and now, it's practically invisible to the eye, but I can still just barely trace it out.

This is where a lot of the shame & guilt comes from - the assumption on the part of the adults in my life that I was trying to kill myself. That was absolutely not true. But their ignorance (lack of knowledge) and flat out STUPIDITY (not able to move past their first assumption) made them extremely - EXTREMELY - dangerous to my well-being... as I found out, later. Part of the massive stupidity was in my mother's adamant denial of what I told her had happened to me.

Dear (((Amber))),
Thank you, it's very clear, understandable and believable.  As sad as it is, it makes complete sense to me. I don't think I would of been capable of knowing such truth.

Love and admiration, seasons

p.s. just a quick note, last week on the news they were going to take electric smokeless cigarettes off the market. Pretty sure that's what I heard. So please check it out yourself. I wouldn't want you to get hurt if their is a malfunction or something. xo

[teartracks]

Hi PR,

She wanted to tell you all. She was tired of carrying this secret alone. She knew she wouldn't be shamed for it - or misunderstood again. She knows many of you went through something similar with your moms... sort of the Invasion of the Body Snatchers horror story. She's ready to "put it down" and "let it go"... but it had to SAID first.

Thank you (and Twiggy) for all you've shared of your 'story'.   

You're a gem.

tt

[Hopalong]

PR, sweetheart.

....And there you sat. You had cut to relieve the pain and were pouring tears because there comes a point when someone denies your reality so profoundly that there are just not enough ways to express the pain. Particularly for an adolescent who doesn't have philosophy, vocabulary, or community.

I don't know how you survived it. Rape and repression. And the worst betrayal there is.

I am completely awed by this, Amber. I bow my head to you.

Of course smoking was a voice. It was a backwards voice, but it's as though you started to pull the smoke in because it was too threatening to let your own voice OUT, because you knew nobody was willing to hear it. Smoking is anesthetic. It numbs. It's like speaking down your own throat.

I would want to slaughter your mother, should I be saying "How do you do," except that I know she is so twisted up and primitive that there is absolutely no more point trying to get a person like that to be accountable and realistic than there is reasoning with the Taliban about women's freedom.

love, much,

Hops

[sKePTiKal]

Thanks, Hops... especially for this:

you started to pull the smoke in because it was too threatening to let your own voice OUT

It's obvious, it's simple... it's the plain truth, I think. I broke up the first leg of my trip with a stop in my old hometown... where Twiggy had moved to and where she disappeared and became someone else. My best friend from HS still lives there and I hadn't even gotten into town, before she was calling: a band we used to watch back then are still together and were playing downtown. Got to see some other folk from HS - but it was a good thing that my friend was explaining who was who!! And of course, she was ready to paint the town red...

Anyway I smoked twice as much that night than normal and wasn't able to make sense of my behavior. We were out being silly old ladies kicking up our heels - not exactly red hat style.... more like we used to... only 20+ years older - LOL!! My friend is the social butterfly... I am not. I'm the people watcher, observer, I like small groups... not a lot of chaos & cacaphony. And through all that, I was still self-observing... trying to figure out the riddle...

I wannna smoke/I don't wanna smoke

at the same time...

and maybe it has something to do with that singular experience of voicelessness, which is of corporeality ("I am") and of what you described (the "I don't matter"):

It was a backwards voice, but it's as though you started to pull the smoke in because it was too threatening to let your own voice OUT, because you knew nobody was willing to hear it. Smoking is anesthetic. It numbs. It's like speaking down your own throat.

Today's my big meeting; by afternoon I'll be officially a partner of my Dad's business along with my brother. I gave myself the afternoon/evening off... maybe I'll go walk by Lake Michigan... and then 2 more days of driving to get back home, when I'm going to think about this. I think you've helped me more right down to the bottom of this, Hops.

It almost seems as if that part of me is still voiceless - as if it's just flat out easier for the "me" that wants to smoke who is still not pain-free enough or confident enough to allow the other "me" to just be.... without the nico-prop -- the smokescreen. It's gotten better, though.... a lot better, except in some situations and I need to think about those difficult situations and ask the "why" and ask whether anything "bad" will happen, if I don't smoke in those situations.

And maybe that's also part of the puzzle: I simply didn't open my mouth and try to explain... I couldn't speak... the humiliation and frustration and pain were too much... and so I let them draw their own conclusions - which weren't correct. In other words, something really bad happened because I couldn't speak; be believed; or make myself understood...all the rest of Twiggy's nightmare.

Before I go... tt was asking about the original posts of Twiggy's story, which I deleted last year. I've been thinking that it might be time to rewrite this out in the members' section - but from the new perspective of this latest memory... because all the other stuff that happened - as bad as THAT was - I think we're right down to the atomic/molecular level of where I maladapted. And it is mostly certain situations... certain conditions... that trigger this compulsion - any other time, it's simply a manageable addiction. I really need to pinpoint those and what those conditions are, I think.

Bless you, Hops!

[Hopalong]

You're welcome, dear.

Please don't forget PART (a huge part) of the discomfort of not smoking is pure brain craving. That's physical dependence, not psychological/emotional.

That's about drug withdrawal.

The behavioral part you can totally defeat. I think your vulnerability is in focusing on psychological/behavioral/emotional while discounting the force of the physical.

(Which, too, can be managed and/or treated, and is as neutral as gravity or rain or sun. It's bio-nature, the physical addiction. Nuttin' to do wid you or Twiggy. Strategize THAT part, and you can do the rest.)

I'd bet on it.

much love,

Hops

[lighter]

She wanted to tell you all. She was tired of carrying this secret alone.

... but it had to SAID first.

I heard you, Twiggy......

(((Amber and twiggy)))

it's OK.

Mo2

[sKePTiKal]

Ah.... Mo2.... YES.... it is OK.

Hops, that's the funny thing.......... I REALLY don't have the physical stuff of withdrawal so much... I went for hours in meetings today without every noticing - but if something hits me emotionally, or I think I need I need a little space to process emotional stuff... then OUT I go... it's where I am now, even. It's surely linked with the brain craving - no doubt, there - but it's the emotional need that comes first.... the cigarette is purely a substitute for the emotional need that I can't meet at that specific time - any other way - or so I'm convinced, ya know? It's like a NEED for emotional "space".... an excuse for withdrawal to process in private... to disengage... and reconnect with me.

Apart form that is the conditioning of habit... and to change that isn't so hard. I've been working on a NEW habit, where I can do the emotional processing and still stay engaged... not withdraw... not seek out solitude (and the attached shame) of going to smoke. There's is a lot I need to learn about my capacity for this....

[Hopalong]

(((Amber))), I remember the reflection that felt built in...I do.

I remember being literally terrified that vanquishing the habit would remove my ability to write good poetry.

I had the habit totally entangled with thinking/feeling. All through school writing papers writing my thesis writing journals writing poems reading poems ... all my work...

(What a relief it was to find out after short-term muzzyheadedness, I was intact.)

Thanks for not bristling at my repetitiveness, which says a LOT about you.

love,

Hops

[sKePTiKal]

Ah, Hops... you know I don't deny the physical addiction part of all this and your reminders about that are quite helpful! But the main thing... the "nut to crack" is like you say, how twisted up this damn habit is in thinking/feeling... and I'd add PERCEPTION. In other words, I "perceive" that "it's time for a smoke" more than I crave the nicotine itself.... I quit for 2 years with absolutely no withdrawal symptoms... and bought a pack when faced with a voiceless, powerless situation... because I "PERCEIVED" that my emotions were "out of sync" in the situation - I was being forced to do something that I strongly felt was wrong... and the feelings were still there and I was being pressured to change my feelings and "just do it"....

and this is where the tangle is. Helen asked about mirroring and it got me thinking at a subverbal level and I don't have time this morning to put it all out here - I need to get on the road - but, in a "nutshell"...

smoking functions as my emotional mirror... it's the mirroring effect of creating or re-establishing mental/emotional need for equilibrium. You know - what a mother does for her baby - responding with a "you're OK" physical or emotional or verbal cue to a distress call... it applies in other types of situations, too... but this is the most important one, I think because that kind of mirroring provides a context for the infant to "be" exactly who they are and the "it's OK" (thx again Mo2) to be exactly who they are.

Since I didn't have much of that - if any at all - I found a way to re-establish my context in the world, to accept & process my feelings, to tell myself that I was "OK"... by putting fire to cigarette...

You are geniuses! I just have to listen carefully! 
More later - be home again late Wed - so it'll probably be Thursday a.m. before I have a chance - space - to think about this and put it into coherent sentences...

[Ami]

Does your H mirror you, Amber?                 Ami

[sKePTiKal]

Yes, he does, Ami. He's a large part of the reason why I was able to process a lot of stuff pretty quickly and not get "lost" or too "stuck" in places of unravelling my story. The third time is most definitely the charm for us. (I'm his third wife and he's my third husband - I guess practice makes perfect, huh?)

I can't stay long this morning - just got home and have some errands to run and chores to get caught up on. But I'll be back to say a lot more - all good news - and something important has changed. It wasn't intentional on my part - except that I'd told Hops I thought I needed to stay "emotionally engaged" with people - that was more intuitive, than intentional.... and oh my, I had no idea how right that intuition was!! 

[sKePTiKal]

imagine:

instead of a physical joint that's been wrenched out of it's normal place... that your emotions have been twisted, yanked, and distorted way past the point of bearing the pain so that you "just don't go there"... and then, one day - by chance, accident or miracle... it pops back into it's normal place... That is what happened to me on Tuesday, at my best friend's house.

I've known her since the 7th grade... when I was not Twiggy anymore... I didn't know who I was, really - just making it up as I went along. Her 1st husband and she double-dated with me & my boyfriend of the day; her husband was my HS class president. They raised a son and were close, even after they divorced. He died last year, of throat cancer - and no, he never stopped smoking even after he knew he was terminal. The man was crazy - in a very reality-based sort of way... funny as hell... and could always make me laugh so hard I peed myself or snorted through my nose. We didn't like each other very much, by the way... tolerate, yes... and he always made me laugh.

She is single now - and loving it most of the time. I would've graduated with her class, except I was allowed to graduate a year early, because I had enough credits... both her and my class reunions are this weekend. So when I returned from my business trip to her house - we celebrated: nice dinner, a few drinks, and back to her house to just have girl time... something I seldom do these days. We connected and mothered each other through so many things and Tuesday, we just let ourselves drift back. We never had any secrets from each other, because we were able to tell each other our secrets... without fear of being judged. And we aired a few more...

even though we were outside on the deck where I felt "permitted to smoke"... I was able to tell her my idea about staying emotionally engaged... and how that relates to smoking. It was a long night... and the next morning, I found most of my pack intact - I forgot all about them while we talked. They were there - but I just didn't remember... didn't perceive I had a NEED to smoke... and things got intensely emotional as she continued her grief processing over her ex-husband and I tried to talk about therapy. We watched some videos of his stand-up comedy. And I laughed with and at him... rolling gales of laughter until I almost peed myself - again!!

After we went to bed - I found myself sobbing uncontrollably. Dealing with my own grief - he was significant in my life even if we gave each other plenty of space... imagining how deep her grief must be... for this man who died... and much, much more. Eventually, I fell asleep and woke the next day feeling quite different. Me... but different. And when I checked the pack of smokes, I was totally amazed. Any other time I would've had a conversation that intense, I would've smoked twice as much as normal... but I'd only smoked half as much. I just DIDN'T smoke. I wasn't even aware of it.

But what I did do, was stay emotionally present; engaged and interacting and FEELING all at the same time. I didn't need a buffer between rational me and emotional me... the smokescreen.  I didn't need smoking to BE ME. It was OK to be emotional. It was OK to daydream out loud about the next transition in my life... or talk about old stuff... it was OK to bawl like a baby over stuff that is sometimes considered "just life" - because it involved people and situations that I CARED about. And I didn't have to smoke to do this...

and that, my friends, is the key for me. Because then, I can tell myself "no, you don't need a smoke" when the habitual routine of prompts/perception tell me... "I need a smoke". That has been the "missing piece" of this puzzle for so long. And it WORKS!! It works while driving long distance... it works at home with hubby (who also smokes) during our morning "connect time"... it works while I'm totally alone. And yes, I think it will work even if I have to work through some other intense, complex personal issue. (and yes, Hops... because this works I'm able to see the part that is just physical craving... and for that I have many, many replacements - things that meet real physical needs... other than nicotine)

The crying was a "letting go" for me... and when I told my friend, she said why didn't you wake me up???... but there was just so much being let go... totally non-verbal... I was giving up and giving in... and just riding it out. It was completely, totally, necessary and GOOD. A huge relief from all the stuff I've carried all these years, the Twiggy Files... and more... she said, well at least you felt comfortable enough to do this here... she gets it, without me trying to explain.

It wasn't the emotional me that was considered "weird" by people (excepting, of course, my mother who thought I was weird for being emotional). It was the me that tried to fend off feelings and pretend I wasn't emotional... she was the weird one... and truth is, I was lousy at that type of pretending and the pretense is what I noticed as a "problem"; what made people uncomfortable. Somehow... that night... I got the dislocation popped back into place.... and there's no reason for pretense anymore. And no reason to obsess on smoking, either: the more I practice "being" without smoking... the closer to being a non-smoker, I'll be.

It's all good.