Dear Jenny:

I attentively re-read a few of your recent posts, and your most recent. I will comment on part of your today’s post. If you have a question, or questions, about any part of your post that I didn’t comment on, let me know.

You wrote that all your obsessive thoughts “are like streams coming out of this one umbrella thought..: I love him a lot- He left me- I was hurt- I wonder if he will ever regret letting me go”. You called this one umbrella thought, “this major obsession”, and “my major issue”.

“I keep thinking if I was bad because I question am I worth regretting”, you added. And you asked me: “If there is any other advice that you have in this matter as to how do I end this obsession with constantly wondering if he’ll regret anything, do let me know”.

I understand that you became aware of this umbrella thought after getting together with L, but I think that the origin of this thought is in your experience way before you met L. Let’s look at this umbrella thought:

“I love him a lot- He left me- I was hurt- I wonder if he will ever regret letting me go”- I will now rewrite this thought with a different pronoun: she, referring to your mother:

I loved her a lot- she left me- I was hurt- I wonder if she will ever regret letting me go.

You definitely loved your mother a whole lot, no greater love. And when she criticized you in the ways that she did (the look on her face, her voice, the words she used, the repetition of the criticism)- she left you. More precisely, her approval of you as an okay, lovable person/ her validation of you-  left you. You were very hurt, and you wonder if she will ever regret leaving you.

Your mother criticized your nature, you shared repeatedly (“criticized my nature”)- it was a heavy-duty criticism, it dug deep into you, and it is in the core of your “immense self-doubt”.

You wrote in a previous post: “Every morning while still in bed, I wrap my hands around me as if hugging me and say ‘I am a beautiful creation of God who is confident, intelligent and deserving of love, respect and all things good”- this is what you needed to hear your mother say to you, with a smile and a tender voice.

“But my self-doubt got really triggered since getting together with L only. Before that I think there was little in my life that I could become doubtful. Only good things were happening, school results, prestigious colleges, so I think I was getting validation”- no validation can replace a daughter’s much needed validation by her (invalidating) mother.  You needed her validating smile, her validating voice,  her validating words, such as: you are “a beautiful creation of God.. deserving of love, respect and all things good”.

School achievements did not, and could not replace your need for her validation. L’s invalidation of you triggered your deep hurt, that deep emotional injury,  about having been invalidated by your mother, and you became obsessed about him changing his mind and validating you, driven to make him change his mind about you.

If you “completely let go the ex”, of L, it is as if you completely let go of your mother ever validating you. The umbrella thought is about L changing his mind in the future, validating you some time in the future. But really, it is about your mother changing her mind about you.

What to do now, where to go from here: got to heal that deep emotional injury created by your mother’s heavy-duty criticism of you.

anita