Dear Anita,

I am very relieved because the cream from the other vet works a treat and the wound seems to be finally closing!

Yes, your summary of the real reasons for that acute stress is spot on.  It is so great that you drew my attention to this because it has brought me so much awareness regarding my emotions.  I’m now starting to actually register the high emotional reactivity which I’d read is a result of insecure attachment.  I’m a pretty peaceful person so it was hard to relate to that at first, but with your help a new window has opened and I’m starting to realise what is going on under the surface.

For practise, the universe gifted me another “stressful” experience yesterday, as the landlord sent builders to repair the roof and they dislodged some bird’s nests.  I only found out by chance when I went to see how things were going and saw all these baby birds on the floor!  Thinking of my cat, I rushed to put them in safety, but then I realised there was nowhere to return them to, so I had to quickly learn how to feed baby birds and keep them warm etc.  I eventually found a bird sanctuary and was able to take them there, thank goodness.  That was a long day!!

When I first found the little birds, I observed how I started to get extremely stressed and panicking that I couldn’t feed them and it would be “my fault” if they died.  But then I noticed this felt very similar to the situation with my cat recently and I was able to totally step out of all that critical thinking and fear, and I said to myself, “keep calm, do your best, it is good enough”.  And it really worked!  It was then so rewarding when I actually got the little dears to eat, it’s quite amazing to play Mummy to little birds, but feeds every 20-30 minutes are very time consuming!

Then another very stressful thing happened, namely on the way home from the bird sanctuary I telephoned with my husband and he told me not to drive back through the village he lives in because there were signs that they’d be spraying disinfectant from the air.  In that moment I just believed him, I’d had a headache all day, was tired, hungry, overheated …  So I had to drive a further 25 miles to avoid that area, but then the access to the motorway was closed.  A policeman explained how to get to another motorway access and I commented that I was only there because of the disinfectant in ** village.  He said he’d not heard about such a thing.

I nevertheless took the motorway, being already far out of my way, but then I started to wonder how that could be true if the local traffic police didn’t know anything about it.  So I drove to my husband’s house.  Everyone in his village was driving around quite normally, taking walks, etc., and my husband was watering his garden.  I asked him why he’d told me such a lie.  I saw that look of dishonesty sweep over his face but he flatly denied it, was offended, the victim, “was only trying to help”.  I didn’t say any more, just went home.

Precisely this kind of behaviour is what used to make me feel really ill living with him.  I so often had the feeling that he was lying, yet it was about such ridiculous things it felt confusing due to the lack of logic.  He’d never admit to it, and like with this, it was often about really bizarre things.  It often made me doubt myself though; sometimes he’d deny he’d even said anything at all, i.e. I must be having hallucinations.

I was so happy to get home and felt so strongly how utterly imperative it is that I get that man out of my life.  I wonder what you think about his behaviour?  My conclusion is that he says such things to get a power trip.  Namely he not only said to avoid his village, he said to keep myself and the cat indoors when I got home.  I know he used fear-mongering to control me in the past and I assume this is what he imagined he was doing.

I have been doing acupressure on myself and deep breathing to help calm my body, as I get so much tension from the interactions with my husband.  I also found some very helpful information and guided meditations on a Mindfulness website which really speak to me and are specifically geared for learning to deal with difficult emotions.

Recently I saw a photo of us from years ago and a lot of emotional confusion arose, because it looked so normal, I thought we were quite normal, yet now I see his behaviour much more clearly and know it is anything but normal.  I am so glad to now have a meditation to work through that kind of emotional fog which will inevitably arise when I see him.  And I am so glad to be feeling so clearly again that my goal is to never have to see him again!  But it is good to know I will be able to deal with people like that in the future, and any emotional reaction I may have.  That is a good feeling. That makes me feel more secure!

Juanita