My Truth

[Meh]

Next question to self:

Who do I answer to?


I know this is an important question to ask myself, I just can't write about it at the moment...next installment.  

[sKePTiKal]

If we know what our needs are... it's our "task" (should we choose to accept it) to suit ourselves...
the only person we HAVE to live with... is ourselves... and once we learn how to live with ourselves (even un-completely healed)... we are the only person we have to answer to.

We don't need to explain or make explanations or excuses... to other people... unless we want to explain...

we just ARE who we ARE... and that's just OK...

the hard part is that learning to live with ourselves, I think...

[Ami]

Hi! Ami!

I sent you a personal msg.....

Thank you  Helen!             xxxoo    Ami

[Meh]

On the subject of losing dignity


I am a mild-mannered person, I swear to god, I feel like nobody will believe anything I proclaim about myself, I know I am. I like to garden and read books while sitting under trees etc. It’s just who I am I’m a peaceful person mostly. I do get pent-up anger, rarely, but it’s there.

So, A few weeks ago I was in church. I saw a woman with a couple of friends, they sat down a few rows in front of me. I didn’t see the person’s face but the hair cut and earrings and shape of the shoulders and even the jacket she was wearing looked exactly like one of my co-workers. I was looking intently at the nape of her neck and trying to glimpse the side of her face. I no longer could concentrate on what the church pastor was saying, the verbal stream of the sermon faded into the background. I could feel my body tense. My mind imagined this scenario of a b*tch fight there in church. How embarrassing that would be! I don’t b*tch fight but these coworkers went too far. These coworkers were friends with the Narcissist coworker who used relational aggression against me at work. It brought out my voicelessness, the voicelessness that I had thought I conquered once and for all when I started that job.

I'm thinking: "How dare she go to church that hypocrite! How dare she go to the same church that I go to, can’t she find her own church? Oh, how can those people live with themselves. Don’t they see how much suffering they inflict, why don’t they see all of the pain they cause. Liar!!! You F’ing Liar!!! You Phony!!!!"

I’m picturing that I’m going to act like a rabid wild animal, if she walks by me and looks at my face with a gloating expression, trying to see my face twist into an expression of pain, then I’m going to pop up out of the Pugh and hurtle myself towards her, bang. And I’m on top of her, pushing her down. I’m ripping her flesh apart in my teeth like a mountain lion. I’m ripping her hair out, slapping her, I’m screaming all sorts of things that don’t make any sense because I’m so angry I’m stupid. I’m jumping up and down on her, trying to break every bone in her body, trying to break her as much as my spirit was broken by her. I might even be roaring. That’s how I feel.

I know these coworkers must be afraid of me on some level, I’ve seen them around town. They think it’s a joke but they also know there is rage built up inside of me. They want to see me blow up, they want to see me lose it. They want to see me lose control and look bad, so that they can validate all the bad things they said about me.

There is another way for me to regain my personal power. There is and I’m gonna find it.

I imagine what that primal fight would look like in church to the other congregants. They would say that she didn’t do anything to me. That it was unprovoked. They would shower sympathy on her for ever after. I would be the crazy one. I would be banned from that church. Nobody in the church would understand why I did it. If any congregants recognized me on the street they would look at me with fear and ostracism in their eyes.

I’m a little repulsed by the idea of hurting someone, I don’t get pleasure from it.
I know for a fact that I don’t have it in me to really hurt someone. I think my co-workers know that too, they know how nice I really am, and that is part of the reason why they choose me to hate, because they counted on me not retaliating. My limbs just don’t function, even if I have that emotion, my body is weak and would not do that. My arms and legs would refuse to cooperate with my emotions. My body would be flaccid but my anger would be raging. I think my coworkers can’t stand my niceness, I think it makes them feel bad about themselves. I am sort of Pollyannaish at work, I do it to cope with the stress of work. I blast goodness around me at work to try and create a safe little bubble that will protect me from sarcasm, speculation, and gossip and everything else.
It turns out that the person sitting in front of me was not the co-worker.
If it had been, I probably only would have gone home and screamed. I might find some object to throw in the garbage.



It’s an all-beliefs are welcome church. I’m not a big follower of god.
I’m unclear about my own religious beliefs, they are a mish-mash.

I think I believe in the Tao, I took an online-“what religion are you” test and I think the result was that I’m a “quaker”. Ok, whatever.

[Meh]

Pheonix Rising,

Yes, I couldn't agree with you more.

[Ami]

On the subject of losing dignity


I am a mild-mannered person, I swear to god, I feel like nobody will believe anything I proclaim about myself, I know I am. I like to garden and read books while sitting under trees etc. It’s just who I am I’m a peaceful person mostly. I do get pent-up anger, rarely, but it’s there.

So, A few weeks ago I was in church. I saw a woman with a couple of friends, they sat down a few rows in front of me. I didn’t see the person’s face but the hair cut and earrings and shape of the shoulders and even the jacket she was wearing looked exactly like one of my co-workers. I was looking intently at the nape of her neck and trying to glimpse the side of her face. I no longer could concentrate on what the church pastor was saying, the verbal stream of the sermon faded into the background. I could feel my body tense. My mind imagined this scenario of a b*tch fight there in church. How embarrassing that would be! I don’t b*tch fight but these coworkers went too far. These coworkers were friends with the Narcissist coworker who used relational aggression against me at work. It brought out my voicelessness, the voicelessness that I had thought I conquered once and for all when I started that job.

I'm thinking: "How dare she go to church that hypocrite! How dare she go to the same church that I go to, can’t she find her own church? Oh, how can those people live with themselves. Don’t they see how much suffering they inflict, why don’t they see all of the pain they cause. Liar!!! You F’ing Liar!!! You Phony!!!!"

I’m picturing that I’m going to act like a rabid wild animal, if she walks by me and looks at my face with a gloating expression, trying to see my face twist into an expression of pain, then I’m going to pop up out of the Pugh and hurtle myself towards her, bang. And I’m on top of her, pushing her down. I’m ripping her flesh apart in my teeth like a mountain lion. I’m ripping her hair out, slapping her, I’m screaming all sorts of things that don’t make any sense because I’m so angry I’m stupid. I’m jumping up and down on her, trying to break every bone in her body, trying to break her as much as my spirit was broken by her. I might even be roaring. That’s how I feel.

I know these coworkers must be afraid of me on some level, I’ve seen them around town. They think it’s a joke but they also know there is rage built up inside of me. They want to see me blow up, they want to see me lose it. They want to see me lose control and look bad, so that they can validate all the bad things they said about me.

There is another way for me to regain my personal power. There is and I’m gonna find it.

I imagine what that primal fight would look like in church to the other congregants. They would say that she didn’t do anything to me. That it was unprovoked. They would shower sympathy on her for ever after. I would be the crazy one. I would be banned from that church. Nobody in the church would understand why I did it. If any congregants recognized me on the street they would look at me with fear and ostracism in their eyes.

I’m a little repulsed by the idea of hurting someone, I don’t get pleasure from it.
I know for a fact that I don’t have it in me to really hurt someone. I think my co-workers know that too, they know how nice I really am, and that is part of the reason why they choose me to hate, because they counted on me not retaliating. My limbs just don’t function, even if I have that emotion, my body is weak and would not do that. My arms and legs would refuse to cooperate with my emotions. My body would be flaccid but my anger would be raging. I think my coworkers can’t stand my niceness, I think it makes them feel bad about themselves. I am sort of Pollyannaish at work, I do it to cope with the stress of work. I blast goodness around me at work to try and create a safe little bubble that will protect me from sarcasm, speculation, and gossip and everything else.
It turns out that the person sitting in front of me was not the co-worker.
If it had been, I probably only would have gone home and screamed. I might find some object to throw in the garbage.



It’s an all-beliefs are welcome church. I’m not a big follower of god.
I’m unclear about my own religious beliefs, they are a mish-mash.

I think I believe in the Tao, I took an online-“what religion are you” test and I think the result was that I’m a “quaker”. Ok, whatever.

YOU ARE AN iNCREDIBLE WRITER  , HELEN. I am blown away. I go crazy over good writing. I have a passion for reading good writing.
You sound like Slyvia Plath in the Bell Jar as I have said before.
 Helen, you were born to write!!!!!!!!       Ami

[Meh]

This is more of my "stuff".

On Coworkers

Coworkers

When one of my coworkers got a promotion, she wanted me to be jealous of her, I could see it in her eyes on numerous occasions, she would look at my face closely for a sign of defeat. She hungered to see that face of defeat. When she couldn’t find it in my face she was confused.

I had a greater personal meaning in my work that goes beyond money and status. The thing was, I wasn’t jealous. She was disappointed.  She couldn’t see any envy in me because there was none. I live in my own little world, I compete against myself, I know that I have won when I empower myself, not beat another person. I decide what I want based on me, not on the effect it will have on others or my social status. They did not get this.

This coworker, got pissed off that I was not jealous of her, and then she escalated that into more openly verbal attacks.

It was as if she couldn’t enjoy her own achievement without me being jealous!

It was as if she needed my jealousy to validate her. And since I did not validate her with my jealousy she upped the pressure on me.

It was all some twisted enjoyable game to them. My lack of jealousy clearly dumbfounded them.

The whole time I did not want to play their game, I wanted to be myself, be empowered, find meaning in my work. I had found that, I had found the meaning in my work, and the empowerment. Then these co-workers slowly, incessantly eroded my self esteem. By the time I left that job my head was hanging low, and now here I am unemployed during an “economic crisis” with crappy references. Even though I had co-workers and other managers who liked me very much at that company, the company controls references.
It’s damage control, the company is afraid of getting sued.
It doesn’t dawn on them that if the company did the right thing more often they would be less likely to cause lawsuits. Ah, duh? Ok, that is too naïve.


So, I had convinced myself that I had meaningful work and talked myself into this belief.
Upon the loss of my job, the meaning I had mentally constructed was destroyed.
It left me searching for a different type of meaning in life.
I’m confident that I will find that sooner or later.

Geeze, I'm so glad I was able to articulate this finally.

[Meh]

Ami, thanks much for the complement.

I haven't been able to articulate these experiences of pent up rage until just now, It's a relief, like I'm finally getting my head together.

[Ami]

You have got to read the Bell Jar. I will send it to you!!!         Ami

[Meh]

Little Kid thoughts seem to be coming out of me.

A type of kid’s toy came in gum-ball dispensers, where I put the coin in, turn the crank and out comes a plastic container and inside is the toy, in this instance it’s a goopy sticky gummy blobby glop of a little hand on the end of a long arm that stretches way out and sticks to flat surfaces for a moment before snapping back.

Along with purging emotions kept inside of me since childhood are some little kid thoughts I notice I’m having. On my walk today around the ‘hood, up in the sky were clouds reflecting pink light, you know like “cotton candy”. Well, as I stood staring out at them, I visualized me having this really long, long, tongue like I'm a strange super-powered frog, and my tongue shot out all the way up to the clouds and I wrapped my sticky tongue around the clouds and pulled them down to earth into my mouth so I could eat the pink light.

I think this is good, I was so uptight as a kid, I wasn’t silly, my childhood was too serious for me to feel silly.

The sadness and stress is a giggle-thief. So maybe I’ve even been repressing silliness.
I’m rather fond of this unexpected discovery.

I see some little kids giggling, and the giggles are an uncontrollable cascade of jubilance.
Kids are overpowered by their own mirth, some times they even fall over with it, kids can have seizures of laughter just because “it’s good to be alive”.

[Meh]

Letting Myself Cry

I was watching a movie (August Rush), I cried a little without struggling against myself, usually I’m unconsciously trying to suppress it which makes it worse, half the time I don’t even know the emotions are trying to come out, the muscles on my face trying to do two things at once, cry and suppress. Half of the struggle or maybe more of the struggle is trying to block it from happening.

Tonight I cried without suppressing it, just let my face scrunch up and let the tears out.

It’s ok I guess, even if I cried a little bit every day for the rest of my life that’s ok. Maybe I would be better off if I let myself cry a little every day.



On a different note, I wonder if any person is immune to Narcissists.

Oversensitivity: This means that unexpressed, hidden, repressed emotions have all been pilled on top of one another and then all it takes is a leaf to drop and the emotions overflow. I can respect my possible “oversensitivity” even if other people can’t.
This makes a lot of sense to me to think of it this way.

Children of Narcissists just did not learn to process their emotions properly consequently we have to teach ourselves as adults.



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lKkG8Xbb8Fc&feature=PlayList&p=BF0A5711F98D0A38&playnext=1&playnext_from=PL&index=26

[Meh]

Oscar the Grouch and James Taylor:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2uQa4dvrg1E


How sweet it is to be loved by you:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lnt2kMLz1CQ&feature=related


Shower the people you love with love:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xWnjEMbFFME&feature=related

[Ami]

Dear Helen,
 I cry when I watch Disney movies or listen to the music. I love Little Mermaid , Alladdin and Beauty and the Beast. Our deepest heart longings are expressed .
 As far as the NM calling us overly sensitive,mine did the exact same thing.
 She decimated   my feelings.I was TOO dependent, fearful, sensitive, selfish etc.
*I* was  the bad one and she threw all the unacceptable parts on me.This is called Splitting.
 So, we are left hating ourselves cuz WE are all black(bad) and they are all white (good).
 It stands to reason that we would reject our feelings and most everything about ourselves. We had to in order to survive childhood with them.
 Then, we had them in our heads(introjects)
 I think I am getting better so there is hope.          Ami
 

[Meh]

Breaking Bad Habits

This is me rambling on about my “stuff” in an attempt to get my head together. It is really just me still coming to terms with the fact that I would be better off thinking of my mother as “The Narcissist” rather then “Mom with forgivable issues”

I have built up a “Mom” image that I have had throughout my life, it’s an image of niceness, it frustrates the f*ck out of me because it’s illogical. I’m gradually accepting the “Narcissist” as more accurate, it’s cold, hard and accurate. I feel guilty and bad for seeing my mother as a Narcissist. Dam! we children of Nar-parents are guilty and shameful about every single thing! F- the shame and F-the guilt. SHAME and GUILT are social control devices. Since I feel more shame and guilt and sadness then I do other more warm emotions in regards to my family that tells me that it is mostly just an issue of power and control and loss.

I have quit my relatives in stages (I think I said this before), as a last resort for my own wellbeing. The thing is blood is thicker then water and often they want to reconnect even years later after successfully having zero contact. Some of them even seem to try to contact me at the very worst times, maybe they think at those moments I am weak and have let my guard down. Disconnecting from them has been painful but staying connected is even worse. My communications have been nil or few. In my mind I disowned them just to cope, but when I do occasionally have contact with them I can’t treat them as if I’ve disowned them.

The screwed up thing about all of this is that me and my brother have never felt welcome in my mother’s homes, we have mentioned this to each other, the feeling is a palpable feeling of being an intruder or unwanted guest even though we are responding to their invite. I might as well be a door to door sales person trying to sell them something they don’t want. There is a real feeling of “go away”. Yet when I try to go away by finally getting fed up and not contacting my NM and her husband anymore…well she throws a fit, she tells all the relatives about it in a distraught manner. I know this is all a Nar-cycle.

If I didn’t cut her off I would end up finally having to tell her how angry I am at her and then she would tell that to all the relatives and I would look bad. So I either end up looking bad or looking bad with the relatives, not much of a choice, so screw it.

Maybe I need to reclarify my boundaries to myself. I still feel guilt sometimes. I think it is probably better to be angry then guilty. So I can just remember my anger I guess. I’m allowed to have my own life. At this point I no longer owe them anything, I will have to keep telling myself that until I really believe it and it has more strength then my guilt does. My relatives use familial pressure together as a group to maintain control.   

It hurts that I really can’t count on them when it matters like a lot of people can count on their families. I have this feeling that my relatives are trying to goad me into doing things that are really against my own best interests, it doesn’t feel right. If I succumb to this I’m not acting of my own volition, essentially my own instincts are ignored if they get their way.

My relatives have made some real messes before that did not involve me and I observed. My relatives can take a situation and turn it into a scenario that snowballs it’s way to hell and misfortune. Curiously not all of them screw-up their own lives. What gives them the right to screw up my life…

There is nothing that gives my relatives the right to screw up my life and I don’t have to feel guilty about that. There, that statement makes me feel strong.

I will just go with the flow, whatever, only contact minimal enough to prevent my NM crisis from escalating but NO MORE. I feel embarrassed about my mother’s crisis.
I feel ashamed by the way my relatives interact with me it is disrespectful and it shows in a subtle way how very little they value me. Gee what a surprise.

Their words (we might care just a little) and their actions (your going down) don’t sync up.

Blah blah blah, ok my next thought is my weaknesses, me looking at my weaknesses….I have some real ones, I may have power to change some but not all. Maybe that is my next writing session. 

[Ami]

Breaking Bad Habits

This is me rambling on about my “stuff” in an attempt to get my head together. It is really just me still coming to terms with the fact that I would be better off thinking of my mother as “The Narcissist” rather then “Mom with forgivable issues”

I have built up a “Mom” image that I have had throughout my life, it’s an image of niceness, it frustrates the f*ck out of me because it’s illogical. I’m gradually accepting the “Narcissist” as more accurate, it’s cold, hard and accurate. I feel guilty and bad for seeing my mother as a Narcissist. Dam! we children of Nar-parents are guilty and shameful about every single thing! F- the shame and F-the guilt. SHAME and GUILT are social control devices. Since I feel more shame and guilt and sadness then I do other more warm emotions in regards to my family that tells me that it is mostly just an issue of power and control and loss.

I have quit my relatives in stages (I think I said this before), as a last resort for my own wellbeing. The thing is blood is thicker then water and often they want to reconnect even years later after successfully having zero contact. Some of them even seem to try to contact me at the very worst times, maybe they think at those moments I am weak and have let my guard down. Disconnecting from them has been painful but staying connected is even worse. My communications have been nil or few. In my mind I disowned them just to cope, but when I do occasionally have contact with them I can’t treat them as if I’ve disowned them.

The screwed up thing about all of this is that me and my brother have never felt welcome in my mother’s homes, we have mentioned this to each other, the feeling is a palpable feeling of being an intruder or unwanted guest even though we are responding to their invite. I might as well be a door to door sales person trying to sell them something they don’t want. There is a real feeling of “go away”. Yet when I try to go away by finally getting fed up and not contacting my NM and her husband anymore…well she throws a fit, she tells all the relatives about it in a distraught manner. I know this is all a Nar-cycle.

If I didn’t cut her off I would end up finally having to tell her how angry I am at her and then she would tell that to all the relatives and I would look bad. So I either end up looking bad or looking bad with the relatives, not much of a choice, so screw it.

Maybe I need to reclarify my boundaries to myself. I still feel guilt sometimes. I think it is probably better to be angry then guilty. So I can just remember my anger I guess. I’m allowed to have my own life. At this point I no longer owe them anything, I will have to keep telling myself that until I really believe it and it has more strength then my guilt does. My relatives use familial pressure together as a group to maintain control.   

It hurts that I really can’t count on them when it matters like a lot of people can count on their families. I have this feeling that my relatives are trying to goad me into doing things that are really against my own best interests, it doesn’t feel right. If I succumb to this I’m not acting of my own volition, essentially my own instincts are ignored if they get their way.

My relatives have made some real messes before that did not involve me and I observed. My relatives can take a situation and turn it into a scenario that snowballs it’s way to hell and misfortune. Curiously not all of them screw-up their own lives. What gives them the right to screw up my life…

There is nothing that gives my relatives the right to screw up my life and I don’t have to feel guilty about that. There, that statement makes me feel strong.

I will just go with the flow, whatever, only contact minimal enough to prevent my NM crisis from escalating but NO MORE. I feel embarrassed about my mother’s crisis.
I feel ashamed by the way my relatives interact with me it is disrespectful and it shows in a subtle way how very little they value me. Gee what a surprise.

Their words (we might care just a little) and their actions (your going down) don’t sync up.

Blah blah blah, ok my next thought is my weaknesses, me looking at my weaknesses….I have some real ones, I may have power to change some but not all. Maybe that is my next writing session. 

I wish I knew all this about the N family while I was young and still had my mental health.I blamed myself .WE took all the BAD  on ourselves and that is what we have to get rid of now. I think that is what we are doing here.       Ami