Spooky-Bizarro-Karmic message from the universe

[sKePTiKal]

OK, my morning work routine is to start with my email - clearing out all the silly, trivial stuff. Only this morning, something turned up that was at the complete other side of the continuum:

It was a friend request from Facebook - from the friend who NAMED ME TWIGGY. Back in '68-'69.

He was my last connection to me "before"... and was my last "loss" before the whole "shunned" period. He sent me a letter back then, saying he couldn't be my friend anymore... and the isolation into non-reality/insanity with my mom, began and lasted until I could escape back into school, make new friends, etc.

I really do think that this is a message, that all that is over, done, complete... if it's possible to get "there" - then I'm there. It'll be interesting to see what "unfinished" business there might be between us... and then I think I want to delete my whole facebook account!  There are more people out there, that I'd rather NOT find me...

The only reason the account exists was for school purposes - it was an online communication source between me and some other administrators at other schools; not a social thing. I rarely use it... never visit it... and I'm still in shock that I was "found" this way. At least it's someone I want to talk to...

[lighter]

I hope that communication brings closure and peace for you, (((Amber)))

[debkor]

Hey Amber,

This was a good thing for you to be able to tie up loose ends.  It can also Open a Whole Can of Worms and disturb Sleeping Dogs. 
In my children's case it led their father to them but they turned him away.  He has respected (well) one of them, my son.  Let me correct myself.  He contacted my Son (at his job) and never pursued my daughter for contact and has left my son Be. 

Also I hear that now when you open face book I think it's like a *person is on line*and others Know you are There and Instant Message comes through.  I think.  The cousins have nailed my son before he was aware of this had taken place.

Beware of the people like you say that you don't want to talk to.

Love
Deb

[Hopalong]

Shudder.
I avoid those networking thingies like the plague.

Mark me a dinosaur. Marks the generational shift, I know.

But I'm going to stay on the unnetworked side of the line...

will never forget my brother's glee at using it for his ends.

Hops

[sKePTiKal]

Yep; I agree that caution is the thing right now. While I welcome this particular contact, others may not be so benign.

I'd forgotten all about the facebook account - until recently. And truly, I value my privacy more than the ability to connect with long-lost people from different eras of my life. My friend and I have had a couple of interchanges, so far - the alumni descriptions version of our lives - 40 years described in 50 words or less. I don't know what prompted him to contact me - perhaps only curiosity, as I disappeared from his life almost as abruptly as Twiggy stopped being. He did say that he was very sad when I moved away. He was literally my last contact with my own self - before - and I vaguely remember he expected me to be my old self and didn't understand the "new me" after I returned to school. So, he may have questions for me, too - and those might be very uncomfortable or not answerable.

So, if the conversation continues, I'll send him to my email account - and then the facebook account will disappear, to the best of my ability. Sometimes it's impossible to remove those accounts; I've had many a heated conversation with tech support about just this thing. There are many places in my past that I have absolutely no desire to revisit or be reminded of - let sleeping dogs lie, as Deb said.

I'm also on guard against myself, in this situation, though. I can see that I have hopes that he may be able to help "fill in the blanks" in what is a spotty chronology of memory time for me. He mentioned that my 5th grade teacher is still alive, too. He still sends her birthday & Christmas cards (that's the kind of guy he is). She was ever so kind to me in that time; I remember her helping quite a lot. My caution to my self, is that it's not really fair for me to hope or expect "help" of this nature from people that I literally do not know now. People change quite a lot in 40 years.

But wouldn't it be something, if he still had my letters to him - from the time after I'd moved???? During the shunned period????  It's all very tempting and I'm asking myself: does it matter? am I really done with it? can I simply call this message a coincidence and LET THE PAST GO? Is there any point, anymore, to sifting through the fossilized poop yet again, from another perspective??? Sometimes, more pain is just more pain. And this "message from the universe" may be an opportunity for me to walk away from the past - gently - and into the future.

Doesn't make the abuse any more/less abusive; doesn't provide evidence to prove anything beyond a shadow of a doubt; doesn't vindicate, validate, or even heal any more than the work I've already done. And I wouldn't want to cause him pain by way of trying to gain some shred of memory to complete the time-line, if he doesn't know what happened.

[sKePTiKal]

OK. I asked my long lost friend to tell me what he remembers of Twiggy...

He's going to think about it and see what comes back. Maybe I won't find any new "memories" from that time period, or anything more than a better picture of who Twiggy was "before"... and maybe it'll help; maybe not. But I have discovered by talking to him, that I have very few memories of 5th grade - which he seemed to think was the basis for our friendship. I just HAD to ask... how often would I get a chance to actually talk to someone who knew me then... about me? It was 40 years ago!! It's an amazing, rare chance to validate what I've remembered about myself.

How fortunate is this? I get the overall impression that the universe WANTS me finish up this healing process, and in short order! I think I'm going to cheerfully cooperate.

[lighter]

Tingles all over, Amber!

Very interesting to see what your friend says he remembers about Twiggy.... good if he could write it out or you could record it to go back over again?

I agree, the Universe wants you to heal.  ::nod::

[Gaining Strength]

I love reading about your journey Phoenix Rising.  I am amazed at the timing of the reappearance of your lost friend.  It is "other worldly." 

I am interested to read if he is able to come back with something helpful to you.  I believe he will - regardless if it is what you would expect or not, I have an intuitive sense that what you get back from him will help you move further along on your path.

[sKePTiKal]

Just an update on this connection from Twiggy's past.

He has memories I don't - TT's group "context", for sure. There is nothing in his "wayback machine" about me going through a trauma at home. But he did remember that I used to call him before going to school and we used to talk a lot about current events. There were a lot of current events in the 60's. He says I drove discussion of them at school. And I think this was my way of trying to voice what I was thinking, feeling and going through at the time. We're talking 5th/6th grade now. It would be much easier to express feelings and opinions about social and political events than to make it personal; about me.

A feeling-thought came to me, while trying to see myself on the phone with him in the mornings. I relied on him for the validation of self, that I wasn't getting at home. He was my "reality" touch-stone. He accepted me as I was and didn't judge me and that was my "breakfast" every morning. That was how I transitioned from the topsy-turvy home reality to functioning in the school-world. At some point, I know that fell apart - but then, I was kept out of school.

Putting these pieces into the picture... it seems like Twiggy managed to function pretty well "in spite of". It wasn't until isolated with my mother, and her projections, and being faced with interactions that triggered the old scary mom attachment problem (my needs only brought abuse on me) that I caved and fell apart... and learned the habit of "pre-abusing" myself. I guess it worked so well, that I clung to it for dear life until it simply became just one powerful warp-thread in the whole cloth of how I saw, felt, about "me". And I know it was the only way I was able blame her; try to make her responsible and accountable for "me".

Given my mom's angry, resentful, nastiness about how "you couldn't ever be told anything", and "you always did do what you wanted"... I guess she never really had me completely under her control. It was just the blame game - blame being the ball we tossed back & forth - that was our relationship... the "control" and also the great "fear" of out & out challenging her warped reality-view. It was the stupid game that controlled me... by being the substitute for a real relationship.

So, maybe it was just coincidence that this friend shows up at this time... to share memories... and undeniably prove that my life - outside of home - wasn't bad at all. It was actually the "antidote" to toxic parents. It just might be a way to letting all the bad stuff "go"... and recede into the mists of the past... finish the task.

So much depends on whether I can see the glass as half-empty or half-full. I dismissed this truism, for a long time.

[sKePTiKal]

Update again:

This connection to the past, has proven to be the key to the future. Pheonix is flying.

We're coming up on the anniversary of my rape - 3/15. I mentioned some time ago, that I seem to be actually reliving some of the same kinds or parallel situations. 40 years ago, I had a lot of things forced on me. Reliving these similar experiences now, I have the ability, the power of choice to do things differently. See the situation differently and feel the things that I was denied, the first go-round. And be my self, throughout. As if I'm tapping into the power of "now" - and the past is just a bad dream of being forced into an asylum of lunatics.

I was forced to give up the friend who found me. Forced into so many unfair, unhealthy things. Not allowed to grieve my losses - including the loss of what had been my identity, myself - forced to like, to participate in, things I didn't want; role-reversal for one - and to accept a belief that I wasn't important; didn't matter; and forced to accept that I was to care for my mother without expecting the same in return.

This week, I had a similar experience of being forced into giving up - again - what is very important to me, at work. I am in transition from "life in the asylum" at work with inmates who KNOW the insanity we operate in (and support each other, mostly), to my new life as a business owner and more well-off than I ever expected to be, financially. I was denied leave to go to very important business meetings next week, after having made all my plans and not hearing a thing about the leave not being approved. Yeah, I was FURIOUS - I thought my head would explode - and I very nearly quit my job in that very instant. As anyone would be.

It was my reaction to that moment of clarity, that they couldn't tell me what to do anymore, so why couldn't I go - that opened up the reality of the current situation to me and linked it to the past that I've been so attached to. My reaction was on the verge of being dissociated and giving UP. Mentally confused and exhausted, emotionally drained & overwhelmed, completely & totally triggered... what I wrote yesterday to tt about feeling like I was alone in the dark and needing to hear your all voices. That's over now; it didn't send me over the edge.

See, I'm being advised that I can't give notice yet; timing is very important due to the timing of the wrap-up of the estate and restructuring & transfer of the business. I am literally between two worlds again. Pretending to be engaged in my job, secretly tidying everything up for whomever takes over for me, and trying to protect my trainer - who will shoulder the total burden of my absence, until replaced. At some point, I will be forced to make my intention known, so that I don't become responsible for additional tasks that I won't complete.

That's the logistical side. Emotionally - I finally got to the realization that I will being saying goodbye and letting go my fellow inmates. And BINGO (as Hops says). I'll also be letting go my negative attachment to the boss I love to hate; the overwhelming job that should be managed by 3 people; and the absurd expectations, rules, and other "requirements" of working in this place.

I'll be letting it all go on MY TERMS. And so, also, letting go the attachment to my mother - the original "forcing" agent.

And intentionally letting go the self that feeds it's self-importance on blaming others, playing the negative attachment games, and feels powerless to do otherwise. It isn't me - and wasn't then. It was a disguise - a spell of "glamours" - a smokescreen - meant to keep my mom at bay; get her to leave me alone. I've always been claustrophobic and territorial... especially where boundaries are concerned... thanks to Mom's lack of boundaries and projective identification. But, instead of self-defeating functions, this aspect of me will get put to much more appropriate use now. And will fade away where it doesn't belong.

Problem with spells, is that there's a boomerang effect - and she who casts the spell is changed and affected, also. Twiggy knew that, but was cornered, trapped, isolated - had no choice. All this came up, because my old friend asked me when I knew I was moving in 1969 and my current circumstances overlapping. But it came back as the way out of this perpetually repeating cycle, instead of just more of the same.