Dear Lacienaga:

You wrote: “Situations that I would otherwise find outright harmful are neutralized by… returning to these people… and ‘forget’ that another adult just insulted me because I don’t want them to be ‘mad’”.

It reads to me that this has been your strategy since childhood: to neutralize attacks against you by pacifying the attacker. Not to Fight, not to move away (Flight), but Pacify, neutralize, prevent further escalation of the attacker’s anger, and in so, prevent future attacks or worse attacks.

Is the origin of this strategy in your interactions with peers at school, or did you practice this at home, in your relationship with either parent?

I ask this to examine this strategy further and to examine, in future posts here, other possible strategies.

anita