Dear Cali Chica:

Excellent practice of Mindfulness yesterday.

These are the core beliefs you listed, somewhat restated by me (“I”  stands for Cali Chica):

1. I am never enough.

2. It is a sad, lonely and unlucky to have down time. I must keep trying, always, never cease trying.

3. Other people are fine, whole and they don’t need me; I am flawed, unlucky and I need them.

4. What I have at home is not good enough.

You wrote, “it is the job of the parent to protect us.. she was in no condition to protect me”, in no condition to protect you from others, you mean, as opposed to protecting you from herself?- I will elaborate on this point:

Your mother in her communications with you used the pronoun “we” and “us”, suggesting there is a group of we and a group of they. We are unlucky, they are lucky, and so on. That would not have been a problem for you if the “we” was really a we, if there was a group facing the hostile outside group.

Problem for you is that there was only her, your  mother, an “I” and everyone else was the “they”, you included. There was no we. I think this is why your father has been her puppet for so long, he doesn’t want to be “they”, for her. I think that the reason you and your sister are suffering from so much anxiety is because each one of you was in her “they” group.

anita