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Voicelessness and Emotional Survival Message Board / Re: FACING CODEPENDENCE, What it is, Where it comes from, How it Sabotages our lives

« Last post by Hopalong on May 08, 2025, 11:07:32 AM »

A boyfriend's father once told me, after a very long leisurely conversation on a summer evening, that even though I was 17 he thought I had "the mind of a 35 y/o." Back then I was soooo flattered my ego puffed up. Then, life. I'm glad he didn't praise me by implying male thinking is more powerful, though. I still love men and am still intensely feminist. That's the justice I used to believe we'd see in our lifetimes.

Other topic: I'm thinking I've been codependent with Poet the Whole.Damn.Time.

Because I still feel so lonely or alone in the real world, despite a few friendships. I don't know how to share with anyone how bleak it feels sometimes, and don't know how to go out to play in order to find new people. Despite my delighted social energy at my party, I don't come away from that rare event feeling more connected. I just watched others connect, honestly. There WAS a lot of affection expressed for me and I don't know why that doesn't sink in to the deeper level where I'm loneliest.

Maybe that's just how I've always been wired (it's sure how I recall childhood: torturously lonely) and I need to focus more on making peace with my solitude, letting my home and surroundings nurture me instead of abandoning them to act out how I feel abandoned.

End of pity party. Damn. I'll head back over to the Friendship thread if I need to talk more about it, but for now, I'm good.

hugs
Hops

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Voicelessness and Emotional Survival Message Board / Re: Farm Journal - 2025

« Last post by Hopalong on May 08, 2025, 10:27:34 AM »

Enjoy your brief solitude, you've earned it over and over!

The happy art hunt caught my attention because when I was selling everything I could to increase my down payment, one thing was a very old edition of a book illustrated by Rackham, with those loose (except at one end) color plates in it.

I have in my bedroom a limited edition Sendak print that he inscribed for me and signed when he visited the University for something. That was exciting. It's the lion indoors near a door, looking back over his shoulder at the viewer with a small white dog by his side. From Where the Wild Things are. I also got a wonderful kitchen scene with chefs and tools he did but believe my ex wound up with it.

That bathroom sounds beautiful. Maybe except for skulls, but I lack the happy associations with those that tattoo artists understand. And what a cool thing to create with Hol in mind.

Enjoy the kid-free, other-people free time, and those fabulous kitties. Kuckles too. Wish I knew what he looks like, since I am dawg obsessed.

hugs
Hop

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Voicelessness and Emotional Survival Message Board / Re: Friendship Moments: good or bad

« Last post by Hopalong on May 08, 2025, 10:08:03 AM »

I know. You're both spot on. I don't understand the "honesty and giggly" part though, Lighter. I'd love some honesty from her but not more laughing things off.
But there'll be no tool or code word because I do not want to do the work for her.

Likely losing my closest friend for years is going to hurt, but I do not want to be around or try to manage her volatility, and be cursed out in my own home or even mocked unkindly for something physical I can't control (long story but hearing got damaged by a dentist's saw). I bent my head toward her while driving to indicate I didn't hear what she said (soft voice plus accent) so she yelled it AT me nastily. I've gotten a look at the mean streak, and I'm too damn tired as well as fragile to do battle.

I'm pretty close to done because in an emotional sense, she's unsafe. And I do not see any signs that she wants to be accountable for it. Or come out of her denial and tendency to act-and-distract her way out of finding insight. (Act meaning put on a mask and perform, not take action.)

If something new and encouraging happens I'd be thrilled for us both, but I think she's getting ready to let go of life, honestly. It's something she talks about every time she has to deal with any amount of being alone, and people willing to cater to her are quite few. She has a new support system of writer pals though, so maybe she's able to form new healthy friendships. I hope so.

I'm isolating again, just dealing with the aftermath. House is a wreck. I'm physically feeling quite weak. My evaluation of myself is pretty shaky right now.

hugs
Hops

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Voicelessness and Emotional Survival Message Board / Re: Farm Journal - 2025

« Last post by sKePTiKal on May 08, 2025, 09:18:38 AM »

Spring is being leisurely and hanging around for a whole season (instead of 2 weeks) this year. It's been really pretty, if on the cool side - but that's IDEAL for me to get some work done! Bugs haven't sprung up yet. Now, if the pollen would just get it over with... pine pollen is still yet to come and that might knock me down awhile. Don't know yet. I need to get some more children's claritin; the adult dosage knocks me out just like benedryl.

Almost all the herbs are planted; I still have a lot of clean up/ transplanting etc to do there. Too early to plant much in the big garden - and I'm not sure I'm strong enough yet to manhandle the tiller.

Hol & C got the structural redo of the studio powder room done last week. We finally have a vanity IN the bathroom, instead of outside of it! Plumbing has moved, new lighting, drywall - and two of the walls are painted in the same peachy pink as the rest of the room. After painting the trim today, I'm hanging a large-scale, black & white line art wallpaper. It's an intertwining pattern of roses & skulls; a bit of homage to Hol's previous life as a tattoo artist. I believe the paint will help the roses "read" pink - won't know till it's up. And I'm starting to look at art now... Aubrey Beardsley, Arthur Rackham, Maurice Sendak... "of" the era but not the familiar poster images of the big guys like Mucha. I'm also looking at new artists... just looking so far.

Hol will be taking off this evening to go help C with the house he's rehabbing through the weekend. I'll have my good buddy Knuckles for company. And all the kitties. They are healed up enough that I can start exposing them to the outdoors. Lucy might take to it; Pickles is almost too much my velcro cat and a scaredy cat... to want to be out much. But she does play and run vigorously with Lucy. Whatever - they're cats; they'll find their own level of interaction. They're big enough now (tho still small kitties) to take care of themselves. And they have the 3 big boys to mentor them, take them on tours of the best hunting grounds and where the nightly patrols go to "guard mommy". LOL. Freddy is still the general and most times can be found occupying B's porch chair, napping but he will take a patrol or two in inclement weather. Doesn't bother him like it does the other boys.

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Voicelessness and Emotional Survival Message Board / Re: Friendship Moments: good or bad

« Last post by sKePTiKal on May 08, 2025, 08:48:57 AM »

Methinks too many people are carrying around some sort of "super-secret" (they think) life or death level intensity over their personal situations/problems - that they neither accept or try to resolve (Tupp called it on that one!). Instead of laying all those cards out on the table, airing them out, they try to stuff it even further deep down into a dark, dank well of yuck. Unfortunately, that breeds resentment that leads to hair-trigger emotional reactivity. I've been seeing this from some surprising people lately.

And I'm just not interested in being around that these days. Once someone starts accusing, blaming, making mountains out of molehills... they stop hearing. And aren't even saying anything communicative... just ranting until they run out of steam, and fall into "woe is me".

Better to have some space between you for awhile... time will help... and maybe take a step back from "close friendship" to being a bit more formal or removed? If it's meant to be close, it will be - but perhaps it isn't a constant state of things; maybe it will vary over the years.

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Voicelessness and Emotional Survival Message Board / Re: Friendship Moments: good or bad

« Last post by lighter on May 07, 2025, 09:37:41 PM »

Well.....
sounds like her stuff rubbed up against your stuff, Hops.  Not personal.... feeling's aren't right and wrong. They just are.

And....it sounds like shame is behind Poet's outburst......and she's course, loud and unable to be a considerate guest.....  So much for class consciousness.

That she didn't break down, apologize, then giggle with you about it, means......
she ain't over it.  And maybe has zero sense of humor. Can't be sure, from here.

I do think it's mostly about her tho, Hops.  That mean streak, of hers, would repel any thoughts of seeing her, face to face, anytime soon, unless she
got
real
honest and giggly about it.  I've been on both sides of it, with female friends.  Maybe come up with a secret code word for when the wheels start coming off.  A "take a break" code word.  I suggest pineapple, but you do you.

I'm glad the wine night went well.  Sounds so nice!!!

Lighter

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Voicelessness and Emotional Survival Message Board / Re: Friendship Moments: good or bad

« Last post by Hopalong on May 07, 2025, 11:31:44 AM »

Welp, things came to a head with Poet.
Good news to start. She made her annual visit to see me and celebrate my bday, and to reunite with poet friends here. I was very happy she was coming. I planned a "Lazy Women's Open House/Winery" from 2-5 that Sunday, said RSVP appreciated but not required, and 20 dear people came. For me there is nothing, really nothing, happier than seeing people I love meet and enjoy other people I love. That's exactly what happened and it was my PHamily and all holidays I avoid transmogrified into one happy occasion. Several wrote me afterward to say what a wonderful group, etc.

The not good news was that Poet became more irritable with each day and near the end of the week blew up at me after I nicely asked her to use the bathroom fan (steam) and not hang damp towels on the (antique) bed. I think she's unhappy generally, has gained a lot of weight so doesnt feel beautiful, and is struggling to deal with aging vulnerabilities.

I get it. But she can also be controlling and condescending and issues lectures all the time. Errrgh. For me, the thing that hit was being railed at about "not knowing the proper social protocol for how to treat a guest who should be left the fuck alone!" Meaning, don't ask me about wet towels.

I was speechless but got her to the airport graciously. Still, it festered. So I wrote her a letter explaining exactly how I felt about her railing and cursing at me and a few other moments. Maybe it's because she's British but she's very class conscious, so when I introduced her to the immigrant cleaner who is an angel in my life she brushed past her with a grunt.

Anyhow, she wrote back saying we just need "not to dwell" with more manipulative stuff, and I didn't budge. She said she spent a lot of money to come, blah blah. I replied I feel no guilt about what she chose to spend any more than she should feel about my expenditures to host her, get her list of groceries, treat her to meals (she took me out for a nice dinner) or drive her out to her favorite nostalgia places in the country. Because she bailed out of her promise to rent a car, I drove. Then she said she needed to visit a different friend next year and I said that was a good idea.

Later she apologized and after a couple of tries I told her I do love her but not her denial and minimizing. I'm letting it go, but am in no hurry to host her again if ever. The lecture on propriety combined with a nasty verbal attack was the last straw. Last visit it was her blowup over me not having a "normal" lifestyle, etc. I've fforgiven but not forgotten.

So there it is. I'm glad I stood up for myself. She's very sad about it now and I'm sad too. But not half as sad as I'd be if I didn't say anything.

Depending how it goes, I'll find out if I still have a close friend or if it all was an act. Either way I'll be okay. I hope she will be too because I do care about her. But when the T a year or so back said, "I think she takes too much," now I know what she meant.

Hugs
Hops

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Voicelessness and Emotional Survival Message Board / Re: FACING CODEPENDENCE, What it is, Where it comes from, How it Sabotages our lives

« Last post by sKePTiKal on May 05, 2025, 07:58:14 AM »

Yes, in some large way - and many more small ways - people are realizing that their belief and trust in much of "institutional ideals" is misplaced; that they're not all they're cracked up to be. Regardless of political beliefs - and in some cases, even those are being questioned/analyzed. How much of that trust and belief has been "conditioned"?

What Firesign Theater was getting at, so long ago, with "everything you know is wrong". People react very differently to that revelation/experience given "who they are". And, IMO, we are living in "interesting times" per the old Chinese curse. It is also somewhat true, I think, that we are living in a time with massive energies of change - which, as far as I know, can't be controlled by mankind any more than the weather can. It's a situation that must be "surfed", as best one can.

Bringing it back down to micro, yes there are more overt and visible incidents of mysogeny. Yet it's DIFFERENT than where it came from. Being born in '56, I got the traditional female conditioning when I was very small. But even then, I heard about "exceptions" - where women HAD to fend for themselves, like during the Depression and WWII. The pioneer women were full on partners carving out homesteads and ranches. Brothel owners became weathy influential business people on the frontier. If not for Sacajawea, Lewis & Clark would've died.

So, I'd at least "mentally" come of age when the bra burnings started & the counter culture flooded the airwaves (along with body counts from Vietnam). The "you can have it all" Virginia Slim marketing (conditioning) that fooled a lot a women into they could compete in the business world and STILL do the amazingly complex and sensitive job of raising children. (I rue my participation in this...) Some good has come out of those eras; some things haven't changed a whit.

And this is a topic that is weighing on Hol's mind these days, as well. Being 20 years younger she has a different perspective. One of the most important things she's said about today's mysogeny is that for some men, they don't see women as PEOPLE. That observation smacked me upside the head and got my attention. The correlation with "objectification" is clear as day. And now I suspect there is possibly a lot more dysfunction going on than simply mysogeny - which never really went away. We've been dealing with this the whole time, since June Cleaver days.

As such, it's simply been a "given condition" in the environment I live in. Only once, have I experienced a man who indulged in mysogeny to a high degree - and I still have nightmares about that boss. Most of the men I've had opportunity to get to know - definitely see me as "people"; a "person". Maybe that was luck of the draw, but it also had something to do with my competitiveness and wanting/needing validation and earning respect from men. Professionally and personally. I did work at it. But then, I LIKE men. One of my co-workers paid me a cherished compliment (to me, anyway): he said I was one of the few women he knew that THOUGHT like a man. LOLOL.  That would probably insult some of the women I know, and both men & women were slightly afraid of his ability to express himself sans "manners". He was a truth speaker. I know Hol would take issue with it.

People can and do impact all of those other people around them, in so many ways. It's just a fact of life. Like the
Buddhist's say, if you're breathing something died to permit that. Whether we admit it, accept it or even recognize it... we are all, men and women, interdependent. I think we actually NEED each other despite our varying viewpoints about fairness and (in)justice. We each find our own way through the complexities of engaging and interacting, and working together. Interdependent does not equal the dysfunction implied in "co-dependent" - yet they are so similar, that there seems like there is some overlap between the two definitions.

Maybe our definitions are becoming too persnickety and granular - and perhaps we're mis-defining things too.

I dunno. But I enjoy these kinds of discussions, and you've contributed some new ideas to my thinking Lighter.

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Voicelessness and Emotional Survival Message Board / Re: FACING CODEPENDENCE, What it is, Where it comes from, How it Sabotages our lives

« Last post by Hopalong on May 04, 2025, 12:59:28 PM »

One of the biggest tragedies of this culture, imo, is the internalized misogyny of so many women. They go trad, they vote, they adore their male leaders at home and elsewhere. And they don't fight for themselves even when the oppression is obvious. But as you say, this is acculturated, not necessarily a personal failure.

I just went thru a difficult thing with friend Poet, but I'll yak about it over there. Your post made me think of a lot of nuances (and denials) that led up to this.

hugs
Hops

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Voicelessness and Emotional Survival Message Board / Re: FACING CODEPENDENCE, What it is, Where it comes from, How it Sabotages our lives

« Last post by lighter on May 04, 2025, 12:00:45 PM »

Yes, Amber.  Some grow out of childhood conditioning.....the one's capable of self reflection, me'thinks.

In my OP, I was thinking of co-dependence...... poor coping strategies......resulting in dysfunctional relationships and FOO systems as human conditions, mostly installed during early childhood.


I was thinking about how our culture tends to view these complicated systems and unconscious beliefs as shameful/personal failure and choices, as though one selects these system errors and mindfully builds a framework on them. 

It seems unfathomable, from here, right now. 

It's unhelpful , particularly as those suffering abuse are more likely to seek/accept mental healthcare, than those inflicting it, IME.....more likely to be the "identified patient."

And we're all capable of doing harm.....I suspect every human does, bc we can't do better, till we know better.

Many people don't want to know. I'm thinking of parents who sabotage T for their children. Most don't have the ability to turn and face themselves, bc it's human nature to flit from one distraction to another, avoiding pain and suffering. Just human. Not judging, but feeling the sometimes terrifying weight of trying, and sometimes, succeeding.

And when one's avoidance harms other people..... it's........what IS that? 

I'm trying to see it with some distance, here.

I've done it.  I've watched FOO do it.  Experienced it.  Held it against my parents and their FOOs and extended family members. Watched my children hold it against me.

We experience trauma.
We do trauma.
We examine both, just the trauma done to us, just the trauma we do/are accused of, or maybe we examine nothing at all.

Some point fingers OR remain confused, while repeating patterns without understanding or care t understand, change, suffer less.  It's resilience in a child, fate, luck or what?  To question, or not question.

I want to examine motives, at this point, but, as you said ( I think) everyone is doing their best. Right? Seriously.....they are, despite how dreadful/harmful/toxic some human's manage as best....
right?

This morning DD22 said......
"Have you ever noticed how you bend over backwards, concerned with hurting men's feelings, while they stomp all over yours with impunity, Mom?"

She went on.....
"That's misogyny."

I write this, as I digest breakfast, in a chair facing a window, looking on to the street, where the cowboys live, where the police were called, again, last night.  DD22 saw the blue lights, this time.  We were both out front when a cab arrived this morning, either dropping off or picking up the cowboy.

I'm writing this, bc I feel I'm unable to stop looking over my shoulder, in their direction.  Some of it's old trauma..... not knowing what an enraged, entitled man, with many guns, is DOING......but constantly reminded he's making threats and moving through the world in anger.....with entitled purpose....DOING things, saying things, threatening things in anger.

The 3 elderly lady wives pow wowed in the retired nurse's drive yesterday.  I didn't join, mostly, bc I already assume nothing can or will be done, but.....I might should have joined.  If cowboy wants cowgirl dead.... she'll likely be dead.  The same thing my second civil attorney told me in my situation.  It's accepted and how things are.


That's a reality, two doors away.....it feels like a dark dangerous energy, pressing in.

Obviously, this is me, struggling with acceptance. 

A personal failure..... all my own.  Of my own making. Right?

Noting familiar preoccupation with justice/lack of justice. Another personal failure, right? 

  There should be something, beyond yellow crime scene tape, IME.

A societal, systemic failure, but I'm "co-dependent.". I admit it.... even though I know safety and justice are only imagined constructs, I think I need, at least the illusion, they're real.

Does it, become personal, the moment "good" men, women, citizens do nothing to counter........
what should we lable interpersonal terrorism?  I know, I know.  It's just "normal" stuff people do, kids suffer, cops allow and Judges ignore.

I know better than to count on the police/ safety nets and the courts.....but that doesn't sit right. 

There's discomfort. 

And there's complicated lives with complicated stories/med histories/FOO trauma/misogyny and addiction involved. Condemnation of the gay son....

No safety nets for that. Maybe the imagined safety nets/ignorance around the laws/justice system will soon drop, like a curtain.

Willful ignorance won't be so easily sustained.


Lighter