Deconstructing Self-Abuse Patterns

[sKePTiKal]

When I googled self-abuse, about all the links that came up dealt with the phenomena of "cutting" as a way to release emotional intensity or frustration. So maybe this isn't the right word for this... but my experience and the work I've been doing since therapy started in '05 (and ended in '08 or 09; hard to remember since I've continued working on my own)... my experience has been that my brain and way of being "me" is chock-full of these patterns and reflexes of abusing myself - the same way I experienced emotional abuse as a child. It could be called a self-destructive script; fear of intimacy; social phobia (even one on one); or simply bad habits that I haven't been able change or to maintain any changes in those habits. And to me: not being able to consistently choose to be nice to myself, enjoy myself and relationships with others without periods of total withdrawal or shutting down, and being able to sustain the emotional commitment of myself to what I know is rational, healthy living habits.... is self-abuse.

I have not yet answered some questions posed in therapy. Why can't I make a committment to my self? Why can't I trust my self? And my reason for continuing therapy, was to find out why nothing worked when I tried to quit smoking; why did that set up such huge anxiety and flat out terror; why was smoking "the devil I knew" and lesser of two evils? How f'ng hugely evil was the OTHER evil anyway???? (and what was it???) OH yeah: and "what was wrong with me" since other people didn't seem to have any problem at all being nice to themselves and changing their habits...

So, I've processed out all the horrors of "OMG - my mom actually did X, Y, Z...." and the anger about it, the losses & grief, the child who "blames" the incapable parent. I've processed through the trauma of the vengence rape I experienced because of my dad - and the dissociation that came with that experience. I've finally understood, that the violence and shattering of that early abnormal/normal life experience is the PAST... and the details of that story only remain relevant when they help me answer the questions I posed, above. That leaves me sitting here typing. ME and what am I gonna about me now??? How can I finally "fix" what was broken so long ago (40 years ago)?

The starting point, it seems to me, is with breaking down these patterns, reflexes and ways of "being" (or not) and that means I have to be ruthlessly honest with myself - and rely on you all to point out when I start "dancing away or around" something. When I throw up a shield of avoidance or resistance or denial... all the defensive moves I learned so well from and dealing with my mom. I have internalized - incorporated into myself - somehow let my mom's way of interacting with me get inside my head.... along with all her warped justifications and explanations.... and so, that experience of consistent "failure" every time I try to quit smoking or make some other lifestyle change... keeps returning to the image I have of some faceless impish demon dancing around saying "I told you so" or some other self-defeating or self-fulfilling prophecy.

But I know that imp isn't my mom; that's me too. And it came to life as a reaction to my mom's treatment of me in that story from 40 yrs ago... so my theory is, that if it is "me"... then I should be able to control it, train it, persuade it to be on my side and cooperate... or at least get out of my way, if not out & out GO away. It's as if I'm trying to find some agreement with my mom; some connection... to "prove" her right about me, you know? When I know she's not right - I have a list of evidence to the contrary.

40 years ago, the only choice open to me; presented to me to survive and "go on with my life" was to take the wounded, grieving, and agonized part of me and lock it away. Hide it, in other words. What no could predict and I wasn't aware of at the time, is that a whole lot of the good emotional parts of me - that are the flipside of so much negative - went right along into hiding with it. In therapy, I was able to find the dark corner this part of me had been hidden in... and pull all that stuff out into the light and claim it all for my self. It no longer threatened to blot out the sun in some kind of eternal post-nuclear winter. So I consoled my inner me - who I called Twiggy to separate the child me from the adult me and allow me to have a relationship with my self. I gave her treats and special occasions - allowed her to come out into the real sun and play and feel safe again. I spent hours and days and months listening to her - letting her "get it all out" no matter what "it" was and sticking right next to her, validating her and her experience and teaching her what I've learned, since the days I was her. She was emotionally, a feral child but intellectually adept and precocious... she learned pretty quickly. And in some strange undescribable way, I slowly began to feel that we were becoming the same person... I was integrating her memory; her thoughts and feelings; into "me". And she was maturing... growing up... becoming more emotionally mature. (Note that this was like re-experiencing the gawkiness of adolescence all over again and there were lots of very embarassing & hilarious & frustrating consequences of this merging integration...also frightening moments... but we "stuck" together through the process.

What is left, however.... is this "hangover" set of self-abuse patterns.

Why can't I make a committment to my self?

There is an inner power struggle going on... between what I feel like doing (the angry inner hedonistic needy-feral brat) and what I know is the adult thing or healthy thing to do. I can almost hear the whiny "but MOM let me do it!...." now. Or the harder to refute: "I'm not hurting anyone but myself - and you can't tell me what to do in this case." Negotiations. Persuasion. Bribery.... sometimes these things work; sometimes not. Part of the reason this fails, I discovered, is because my mom would tell me those dysfunctional ways of coping were "for my own good", "it'll make you feel better and if it makes you feel better it can't be bad", and "well, it could be worse".... prime example: mindlessly eat this whole bag of potato chips... it'll make you feel better. Sure, the repetitive motion of nibbling continuously and "checking out" mentally - withdrawal - while stuffing all those empty calories into my mouth (she didn't have to cook, you see...) did occasionally let me restore and rebalance myself. Operative word: occasionally. By accident even. It was a substitute for what I really NEEDED. A pacifier, sometimes. A diversion, other times.

So many of my bad habits are a direct reaction to the ever-present message my mom gave me (explicitly and implied sub-text):

go away and take care of your own needs and leave me alone

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' nuff for now... jump in anywhere... and I'll be back to add more later...

[Sela]

Hello Amber,

Just wondering if you have tried meditation or relaxing your entire body, clearing your mind, visualizing and making suggestions (a kind of self-hypnosis--it used to be called)?

Years ago, I took this quote to heart:

"Happiness is not a circumstance, but a choice." which I believe is a shortened version of:

"Happiness is not in our circumstance but in ourselves. It is not something we see, ... Happiness is a choice that requires effort at times."
Scottish Proverb

It got me to thinking about who is in charge of my life, my brain, my behaviour anyhow and so I went seeking information on how to make some big changes  (which the most promising of the info seemed to be the "self-hypnosis" thingy, at the time.......so I tried it).  Both the quote and the technique have helped me over and over, time and again.  It does take persistent and consistent effort though.

Assuming that your ultimate goal is to be content/happy (with your self and your behaviour), I wonder if it might be something to look into?  If not, pitch the idea.

Sela

 

[sKePTiKal]

Thanks for jumping in!

Sela - yes, I am pretty well-versed in meditation and have a routine I follow. But, you've got a great point... part of the "why" behind the behaviors I'm trying to change involves feeling OK - or content - at the moment. I'll come back to that.

Guest - LOL! You hit the paradoxical "kicker" about this, right in the head. And then nailed it to the floor, so I can take my time looking at it. Let's talk smoking for a minute, for a specific example. (Yes, Hops, I remember all you've said about addiction and I do consider that in my pondering, too...) We can agree that smoking is bad. And I can "wish" that I didn't smoke... and further - I've researched all the methods for quitting, both assisted and not, and have even gone through the actual attempts more times than I can count. I know I can be a non-smoker, because I didn't smoke for 2 years. I know the CBT methods backwards and forwards and won't bore everyone with reciting them. I've tried most of the NRT stuff, too..... and know the self-hypnosis routines.

And the flip side of wanting to stop smoking, is beating myself up about it. Shaking a mental finger at myself; lecturing myself; throwing all the "shoulda, coulda, oughta's" at myself... even shaming myself.... and this is a critical piece of the whole process of what I'm calling "self-abuse". Substitute anything for smoking: losing 10 lbs, exercise more, keeping the house clean, practicing healthy boundaries.... anything can be part of this crazy circular, self-restricting and defeating loop. And it all points to "something I need to fix about myself"... or something "I need right now" ... and it keeps the whole loop going. Fact is, there are a lot of things that fit in here... and I can link them back to my old experience and trauma; there is a very strong connection in fact.

That connection is through emotions... and how they built - over time - beliefs about myself... and my inner understanding of whether I "can" or "can't" [fill in the blank]. And there is also (I've discovered after a lot of self-observation) a big connection or correlation to my emotional "needs", specifically needs that went unfilled - or in some cases, were used to hurt me.

Discussion in therapy, about those beliefs and the connections, kept coming back to those two questions:

why can't I make a committment to my self?
why don't I trust my self?

I gotta admit, committment and trust (for starting & follow through), are sorta prerequisites for attempting the kind of change (active) I keep talking about, but never do. The answers to those questions are closer to what river was talking about... about having 2 wills. I've noticed, for instance, that if I make any clear, overt, determined decisions about not smoking.... I smoke even more. (I am currently tracking how many I smoke - without setting any reduction goals - because the goals are counterproductive. And yes, "not setting a goal" somehow "magically" reduces how many I smoke - but there is also something else going on*.) This is what is maddening... and "abnormal" or dysfunctional:

it's as if my relationship with myself was broken, specifically around "what I need". 40 years ago. And so, I have a whole lifetime of weird workarounds, make-dos, and substitutions (coping/defense mechanisms) to unravel and remodel. And that's sort of what I've been doing since therapy. More of the "inner" work... and I feel as if I'm close to being ready to tackle the outer: except for this problem of the 2 wills and the huge resistance (and even vengence) of one will.

*I'll try to describe what else is going on: it's an integration process - a melting into - merging - of my Twiggy self and "me" - Amber.... which is, accordingly with the laws of nature... morphing or evolving or simply growing into someone who is both - and not completely either one. And no, it's not like multiple identities; it's not nearly so extreme - way more subtle.

-------------

In my inner child work with "Twiggy", I realized that she was as skittish and defensive as a feral cat. And I had to coax her to even get her to tell me all her secrets. Too much pressure or too strong a demand - and I had a fight on my hands or she'd go "hide". Basically, I put out the offer to listen, like placing a bowl of milk for a kitty - and then waited. Eventually hunger won out over fear. Even when I'd ask her, about cooperating and assisting me in a specific change... sometimes I'd get the "you can't tell me what to do" and "I can do what I want - so there!!" (Twiggy was my 11-12-13 yr old me; sound familiar?). She was frightened; hurt; grieving.... and I've spent years now going through all of that with her and she has "grown up" over time - except for this kind of resistance: the separated will to self-destruct; to sabotage; to screw things up or hurt herself.

And I think, in order to change anything external - I have to start right there. It involves what the professionals call "alienation of affection", parentification, and what Twiggy & I have always called: brainwashing. It involves what I call "negative attachment" - which is being family-connected to and powerless to change, a person you love (or think you do/should) who consistently hurts you - or runs over you, violating boundaries... either intentionally, or because they themselves are totally messed up. edit in: OH YEAH - I forgot; it also involves creativity and rationalizations....

But I'll have to come back and go on from there.

[Hopalong]

Hey PR,
I could not judge you LESS for all the circles you go through over smoking. Glad you do acknowledge the big bio-part.

For me, emotionally, there was also a ton of self-abuse over the addiction/habit/failure/otherpeoplequitwhydon'tI stuff. It distorted my whole relationship with myself.

I'm not sure, but what I think helped me begin to turn the corner was that one inner voice finally got just-enough louder than the abusive one. Eventually, I started to hear under that ending judging rant noise: I want to live. I really want to live.

Then my anguish over smoking became not about who I was or had failed to be. It was more direct. Grief over the risk I was taking. Grief because of love. I love life. Even when I struggle, my ultimate love is life. It is amazing. Stunning. It's a miracle. I am awash with wonder.

I want to be here.

No magic but I think it ultimately did come out of love. Big whole love.

Not so much, love (or approval) of "self"...but just, this is what I really feel about life.

I am so lucky to be alive. I don't feel it when I'm sad but other times, if I ask myself honestly...I love life. It is amazing, this world. Being a human being in it.

And, my baby did it too. I wanted to not die on her.

My in-person clinically certified hypnotherapist (good luck me doing it on my own) addressed this part of me:
Your homework before our hypnosis session is this. Go home and sit in a quiet place and write a letter. The letter is to explain: "Dear D, This letter is to explain all about why I chose the soft white sticks over being there for you. I am sorry I will miss your: _______, _____, _____, ____, and ______, but it is more important to me to put these soft white sticks in my mouth and breathe in the satisfying smoke. I love ______, ________, and ______ about smoking, and I love it more than I love you."

He asked me to write it in a heartfelt, honest way, really speaking to the essence of her from the essence of me.

I couldn't make it through the letter, bawled my head off. And I am very grateful to him. He wasn't shaming me at all. He was helping me pre-experience a real consequence of my choice.

The "soft white sticks" was my own twist on a description, taken from an Anne Sexton poem. She was obsessed with cigarettes. I saw her a few nights before she killed herself. She read in a blood-red gown, holding a cigarette, and had that image in one of her poems: "soft white sticks". That depersonalized them some for me.

love,
Hops

[Sela]

Hi again PR,

A couple more thoughts:

Keep trying.  Since you quit for 2 years, you know you are at least capable of quitting for 2 years again, as you said.  I think it's detrimental to battle the negative voices, refuse to listen to them, cut them off quick, shoo them away, fight to substitute positive alternatives until it becomes habitual and so constant that you just won't allow the nasty self-abuse stuff to show it's face for long or carry much weight.  Not easy but nothing worth achieving is, eh?   And that's not to say that you will never have a negative thought about yourself again but it will become more common to stick up for yourself, even to yourself (which I wonder if that isn't what many of us hoped so badly for, which never happened as kids, which morphed into the underlying tendency to abandon "loving" ourselves as adults?  No one stuck up for us so are we reliving that over and over, unconsciously hoping for a saviour, soothing ourselves in unhealthy ways -- not loving ourselves because we were trained to believe we are unlovable and no one has prooven otherwise to us?  No one will.  Retraining is necessary, in that case).
 

Also, I smoked a pack and a half a day for 30 years and have been quit now for almost 5.  I have lost over 70 pounds  in the last year and a half so I probably qualify as somewhat successful at overcoming some of my crutches.  Sometimes it just takes someone saying something that really computes/hits home to get a person to decide it's time.
For me, it was when this woman said to me:

"It's all how badly you want it."

I guess, I decided to start telling myself that, over and over, as often as possible, every time I could think of it:  "I want (blank).  I will (blank)."  Whether I was relaxing and trying to visualize it or shopping for groceries.  The thoughts began to dominate the urges.

My new mantra has since been:  "It all starts in your head." 

Hope this helps, even a little.

Sela

[lighter]

It's so nice to follow along with your journey, Amber.

I really enjoy lreading lessons you share: )

Lighter

[river]

Thanks for brave and honest share.  ID ID ID   ++++  identify with a lot. 

Ive found some words which describe my experience which seems to match yours: 
 
Introject~spliter
Intrapsychic stucture~ emotional anatomyl
The above are professional matched up with home-spun

Me 'internal saboteur' you 'the imp'.   
I had this distinct feeling the internal saboteur was not part of me.   Then I found this concept 'introject'.   I think N.s have a hidden agenda for the other person to fail.   The implication is that the N. needs someone to act out their disowned shame. 

I'll try to get back to this later, maybe - enough for now. 

[Hopalong]

the N. needs someone to act out their disowned shame

Oh my.
I could think about that for a week.

Thanks, River.

Hops

[sKePTiKal]

ah... river - YES: the word "introject" is right. And along with that: projection. That was the connection between your posts and my experience that I was picking up on. More on that, as I go along.

Hops, Sela, Guest - (Hi Lighter!) - I guess I've been a little incoherent. This thread is less about the struggle of "quitting smoking" and how to do that, than it's about the fact that I'm finally making progress with this. I'm trying to talk out/through what I think is going on "behind the scenes"... and then see if it applies to all the other ways I sabotage myself or self-abuse. It's important to me to understand what is changing and maybe even figure out why. Maybe there's a common element in all that, that will connect with others (maybe river), and help throw some light and clarity onto what is a very fuzzy, weird, almost supernatural experience in one's experience/relationship with one's self. At least, it was/is for me. It helps to have concrete examples... symptoms... and for me, smoking is the main one; my main self-destructive, self-abusive method. You all remember a lot of my Twiggy-stories; I don't think river was here then... and there are new sub-chapters anyway or new ways that I've come to understand some of the pivotal points, in what happened.

It's a hell of a lots words, granted. I sort of have to talk myself in - to a state where I can look/think/feel about this and then keep talking, writing, until I've moved my observing eye out far enough to find the context of all these details, on all these layers or levels of experience; till it finally settles into "meaning" and makes sense. Maybe it's useless spinning mental wheels... but it's worked before. I do understand, if y'all get bored with it or just tired... you oughta be on this side of it!!!!  LOL  

---------------

Introject:

River, I have a distinct memory that's mighty disturbing - I remember my mom whispering to me... telling me (on the one hand) what to think and feel about my dad. And on the other hand - asking me judge and decide which of my parents was the "better" parent. She wanted me to take sides and support her against my dad. She would challenge me to abandon my dad - as she was doing by divorcing him - in my own feelings for him. And ask me to play God or Solomon... and judge him solely on his outward behavior as a "bad person"... when I knew (even then) that he didn't want to act that way, that my mom in so many ways... didn't give him much choice and frustrated him beyond the limits of patience and understanding or tolerance. This is what's called "alienation of affection". (It wasn't even a term, back in 1969 - much less a mainstream, understood bad thing to do to kids in a divorce situation. I ran across this in my own research and so related to it and the consequences on the development of kids and adolescents.)

And of course, Nmom whispered about how natural it was for moms & daughters to always love & take care of each other; it was like some law of nature, she said***... and that all men only ever cared about was their anatomies & sexual satisfaction... and they had no feelings at all. (I already knew this was warped; I had a brother who cried alot; I had lots of friends, who happened to be boys. We talked - a LOT. It was much harder for me, even back when I was 6 or 12, to make friends with girls. I was instinctively afraid of being judged and criticized by them... and afraid that they'd "trick me" into being their slave.)

*** hmph! at the time she was whispering these things, it was already clear to me that I was doing most of the caretaking - and I knew better than to ask for any emotional connection or express any emotional needs. The response from her was always: go to your room and you just think about that; about why you're bothering - irritating - trying to hurt - me. You can come out, when you're ready to say you're sorry.

At some point, when the burden of guilty feelings started to drown me - she told me that this was my "conscience". She talked about my conscience as if it were an entity with it's own thoughts, feelings and volition.... contained somewhere IN me.

This was how she "parentified" me - persuaded, coerced, suckered me into taking care of her. And resistance to that un-natural relationship simply brought forth her anger, which she wielded like club to decimate my already vulnerable self-identity and to instill the guilt - convince me that guilt = having done a wrong to her and that I was "bad"... and needed to say I was sorry..... and of course, do what she wanted.

I felt like puppet - and she was the one "pulling my strings". At the time, I only knew I didn't like this. I spent as much time away from home as I could - with friends and their parents. And I noticed the differences. What I didn't know - and didn't have any way of knowing - is that she had groomed me to not have any boundaries, where she was concerned. Somehow, I was strong enough to try, anyway... to have my "own" self that wasn't her. But it was fragile, soft, and it had to be a "secret" or I'd risk the punishment that she dished out. But this is the source of what I call "negative attachment". I of course, was a good girl and did as I was told; smart enough to anticipate her expectations, too. But, it wasn't until I was over 50, that I realized that this connection with her was toxic to me and hurt me; it broke my heart when I finally realized that my mom simply didn't love me; she only loved the version of me that she created. The upside of this? Yes, there is one. I didn't feel obligated to cherish and love her anymore either. The liberation that followed that realization is still running through my life and changing things.

SIGH. How I possibly tell anyone all this - in 1969 - without getting myself committed to an insane asylum? At 12? What happened to kids at the hands of their parents - as long as there were no bruises, they were fed & clothed - was the parent's business. Things have thankfully improved, but there's still a ways to go, I think.

So at the end of the whole divorce saga - the months & months of anxiety, sadness, and this brainwashing campaign - she won me over to her cause. There was violence; and trauma while no parents were home - I had a near-death experience. And yet, when I came to my senses after all that - I was still functioning fairly normally, mentally. I found a hiding place for my brother and made food for us - to stay safe. And of course, when my mom returned I had to explain what I was doing in the attic; what was wrong with my brother (his behavior had regressed to infantile and he didn't speak for months after what we went through)...

the coup de grace - what finally did me in - was the fact that when I told my mom what had happened she flat out didn't believe me, and she started in on me about manufacturing some wild imaginary story that eventually evolved into a theory that I was trying to get back at her; hurt her; because she was divorcing my dad. I was in a no-win situation... and even though I had evidence to back up my story, and tried to enlist the people who knew to help me out... and all my protests about "I know what happened" were overridden by her insistence that it didn't'; when I pointed out that she wasn't there - I was - then she upped her game of abuse to force me to submit. She is still in denial about this episode and continues to tell me things like "you won't remember it right".

So, in the end, I had to submit to her... to survive. I had to split off the part of me that was in agony and needed help - because there was no help. I had to create an "appearance" of me that didn't violate her definition of who I was... and that created a crisis; conflict of self-identity... which became, eventually, a lifelong generalized anxiety... which was only temporarily soothed, via Camel tobacco. I'd found a way to mirror and mark myself (attachment) though smoking - to validate my own feelings and thoughts and memories... essentially to mother myself with what I knew prior to the trauma was a deadly, stinky, self-destructive vice. It was fitting, don't you think? An appropriate symbol to provide an inescapable clue to solving the mystery of my self - through an attachment (this time addiction) to something I used to make myself feel real, cared about - that would ultimately kill me.

There are other examples of ways I'd try to self-destruct. Smoking is just the most persistent one. But you know, river - your description of having two wills is just so perfect especially for this habit, it really connected with me. The "me" that was split off back then was still in total agony when I reclaimed her 40 years later. She truly wanted to die... it really couldn't be any worse than being faced with the fact her actual parents were alive and they absolutely didn't care what happened to her; she would've been better off if she'd been orphaned because that level of rejection was the one that almost snuffed her existence out with that level of pain, anyway. But at the same time, she had a really high level of desire to survive; to fight and win; and it was this aspect of her that I have - over a long time now - been reaching out to; validating; appreciating - and reminding HER of her own inherent ability to do survive just about anything.

Just like with a feral cat - I've had to win her over and slowly introduce other opinions than those that were whispered to and about her, so long ago. I've had to praise, acknowledge the difficulty, grieve the losses - and basically walk through all the different places of her story with her, over & over. And slowly but surely, she's beginning to believe that I am committed to her... and she's beginning to trust me... and instead of being two wills opposing each other.... we're becoming only two aspects of the same person. One that lived 40 years ago; and me now.

And the interesting thing is, that it's this merging - morphing into each other process that seems to be responsible for the fact that I'm not smoking nearly as much... without a plan, effort, or intention. This is the part I really want to try to figure out!! I know how the split happened; how I went into hiding... but this healing part is indistinct, gradual... almost without "steps to re-unite"... but I think it's important that I try to find words for what constitutes this process. Operative word: try!

[lighter]

I think it's important you try to find the words too, Amber.

::looking forward to reading them::

Light

[river]

hmm, yes.  Theres such a lot there, and I was talking  back to you as I was reading.   Im not sure which bit now to go back to and reply, so I think Ill just steam ahead ... somehow.   

You kept part of you apart and safe, and nomatter, even when you gave in, would it be true to say there was still this bit of you kept clean, kept away and safe? 

I experienced same pattern with NM getting in the way of relationship with father. Same affected by deeply laid guilt.     Also I went into the world without any boundaries, or in fact any clue whatsoever of how to live life.   As a child I was co-opted, I didnt know any better.  At 13 1/2ys old, one incident was a trigger for a sudden moment, and in a split second, anger woke in me, and I felt revulsion, it took me the rest of my life to find understanding and the beginnings of resolution of this.  Which is up to today.  .....

My main blocks on which Ive built recovery are:

• 12 step recovery
• the Masterson approach to the disorders of the self

• victor Frankl

Vi
[/list]
 

[river]

Some concepts I've got from these: 

That changing ourselves is out of our power, 'we do the footwork, God brings the result' ~ is the phrase I've heard.  God, or whatever you call whatever it is that is a power we cannot control. 

#The 'defiant power of the human spirit'.   The 'noetic' within us knows what's right from wrong.

 This is also part of whats called the 'Real Self'.  When the mother exerts a 'relational bargain' on the child, a Disorder of the Self is created. 

Recovery involves a revitalising, and recvory of the Real Self.  ~ list of the real self qualities in here:  www.selfinexile.com   the real self page

the particular disorder of self I had is the one  common when an N mum is involved, this one is a back and forth between the 'slave/master' relationship ~ ie everything from the being used part with N.M to the no boundaries, no rights in other relationships part, ~ AND ~ the other half of this D.O.S, is the 'self in exile'.  Picture of this + info at www.selfinexile.

i needed  this undedrstanding. everythi esle for me was trying to defy gravity.   

[river]

  sorry about above spoonerisms, dislexic spelling, its late here, I'll shut up in a minute....

One more thing, I needed to (no, 2 more things), I needed to understand this it wasnt just about Nism, or some dysfunctional family.   I could see that there is a dynamic between all the disorders, one giving rise to another, and it perpetuates until someone sees it and stops the buck.  As hopefully we are doing here. 

the other thing I needed was someway to connect into the world from the place of this understanding, and not be blocked off with it all, 'the only one to see'. 

So, you, or anyone whose interested, Id like to talk further about .... Im interested in creating proper paths to healing with these models 

                any way, Im up too long, its after Midnight.....  :  0    see you in the morning : o )    and thanks for communicating all this...

[sKePTiKal]

Thanks for the link, river - there's a lot to digest there. A quick scan of the info, confirms that a good bit of it will apply to me - either as I used to be, where I'm at in my journey/struggle now, or maybe a seed of an idea will germinate into something that will blossom, later on. Thanks!

I know I'm waaaay better than I used to be, but I'm still working on some things. And it doesn't matter how you say things... if I don't understand, I'll ask you about it. Funny thing, tho... I totally get what you're saying (I think), just the way you said it. For instance: "the only one to see". Yeah. I felt like that a LOT. I also felt that I could have a total emotional meltdown in public and scream about how I was being treated and point at my mother - only to be treated worse and that no one would actually hear the words or believe me. I got close to this kind of imaginary scene, in reality, a couple of times.

I understand being co-opted; being told how to think, feel and breathe. I understand how one always fails at this, because one is oneself and not the person pushing these unfair expectations, requirements and demands on one. I think I fit into the slave category on the website you suggested; then. Not so much, now.

Yes; I kept my "self" safe... but it was in a way that was more like being buried alive. That self was dangerous - because it got me in trouble with my mom; it brought forth her anger, abusive attention to me. That self has been set free and what I've discovered is that other people actually, really like and connect with her. That is the self that is merging... morphing... into my more adult personality/identity. That is the process that really interests me.

And as you've suggested, this process is "magical" or "spiritual" or "supernatural". I'm not "doing" anything specific and definitely not directlt, intentionally working on it; there's no replicable method to it. I guess that's why I'm so fascinated with trying to describe it. My techniques were learned in therapy - a form of self-hypnosis that functioned as a call out to and listening for - that real self. Body work, in the form of tai chi - because it was a direct experience of boundaries, practice in "control" of myself, and being comfortable in my own skin. Oh yes. And writing. I have 16 journals that I wrote over the course of several years. Some of it written in the voice of my adult self; and sections where my previously hidden "self" was given free rein to rant, wail, whine, accuse, blame, cry, rage, feel absurdly sorry for herself - until she realized she had other choices (not always good ones, mind you) and till she'd completely realized that I was allowing her to be - her.... but the current journal is already about 2 years old. That stream of writing has slowed down to a trickle... because I guess, it's not needed as much anymore. In a way, I acted as my own "dedicated, trusted witness" with the journals - which is a technique that the Alice Miller folks like for healing. I guess that's one way I've been learning to trust myself.

It's a long process, undoing the conditioning, imprinting, etc that made me "the way I am" and re-growing up a bit more "normal". Patience helps. So does giving myself a lot of slack - forgiveness for the difficulties I have just being "me", sometimes. I'm pretty pragmatic; except for my unconditional belief that tai chi helped me re-organize all the pieces of my "self" back into a more "normal" order and hierarchy of precedence... I understand that everyone has to find what works - for them. 12 step programs turn me off and only stimulate more resistance - but that doesn't mean they don't work or are valuable for other people.

and YES!!!!!!!!!!!! I want to keep discussing this. I'm at the point where I know my own "stuff" pretty well - how it connects and the dynamics of it; now it's sort of percolating up into the higher processing parts of my brain (and could easily go back down that spiral...) and I notice a lot of little things "going on" with me... that indicate the time is now, for finally addressing this, writing the "final report" and summary, and being done with it. Maybe by comparing notes with each other we can suggest ideas that we haven't thought of before... give each other a gentle push in the right direction.

For me, the last piece involves how I cooperated, exacerbated, participated in the funky, warped, perverse relationships of my FOO and WHY. And why... was self-sabotage... self-abuse... an attractive "safe" place???? That is the paradox inherent in negative attachment. I suspect, that when I finally spit it out after all these words, my reaction will be a forehead-slapping moment complete with a self-assessment of "Well! That was pretty dumb!!" Up till now, it was a frightening place to look at... but no longer.

[SallyingForth]

Amber:

Adding to the discussion on smoking...

Years ago I went to this seminar and one of the instructors there said to think of smoking as a smoke screen. In other words, ask yourself "What am I covering up when I smoke?" I know one man from the seminar who quit smoking when he discovered the habit covered up the rage he felt toward his parents. After he started to confront the rage his desire to smoke completely stopped. He lost his taste for it.