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anita

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Viewing 15 posts - 1 through 15 (of 6,241 total)
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  • #457485
    anita
    Participant

    R U okay, Confused? Did U have the video 📞?

    #457484
    anita
    Participant

    I am sorry, Bernadette (Kadija) for this lousy reply more than 8 years ago. I just came across it so many years after and without looking too much into our communication, seems to me that right above, I projected my mother into you, and confronted my mother.. by proxy of you.

    I want to look into this further tomorrow.

    Anita

    #457477
    anita
    Participant

    You are welcome, Confused!

    “I started crying saying ‘not my baby, no!'”- this is an emotion that expresses a strong attachment, this is you NOT having checked out!

    #457475
    anita
    Participant

    Oh, dear Confused: I wish I could send courage your way in regard to the video call 📞 later today.

    Well, I can send it your way, here it goes: 💪 💪 💪 (the only emoji I could summon, regardless, Courage Ur Way!

    I’ll be back in a few hours.

    #457471
    anita
    Participant

    As I read the above, I’m becoming aware of how much what I recounted above felt like it didn’t happen to me. That I wasn’t there.

    And that healing- the filling in of empty spaces (‘ I wasn’t there’)- is about finally FEELING that really I was there.

    And then FEELING- finally- how I really felt, the girl that I was- to be told by my mother that I was “A Big Zero”. It finally landing again (50-60 years later).

    The girl I was- I was hurt beyond words can describe. It was a severe emotional blow.

    And then, her saying: “The only thing I like about you is that you don’t resist (the message, that ‘I am a – big-zero’)-

    The implications of this extra message: to submit- in adulthood- to abuse because that’s the only praiseworthy thing about me.

    More later.

    Anita

    #457470
    anita
    Participant

    How R U, Em?

    #457464
    anita
    Participant

    How time flies, Peter:

    It’s been almost 2 years since you posted your original post on “Blank Canvas”, June 20, 2024.

    Copilot: Here is Peter’s post rewritten in the simplest, clearest language, while keeping the meaning intact:

    Peter remembers a school trip to an art museum where he saw a painting called “blank white canvas.” It was literally just a white canvas. Next to it was a red canvas called “red canvas.” He and his classmates laughed at how silly it seemed.

    Recently, that memory came back to him after he read about an older man who was dying and said he was afraid. The man was scared of losing his identity and the sense of self he had lived with.

    Thinking about that, Peter wondered again: Is a blank canvas really blank?

    And why do we think a painted canvas isn’t blank?

    Then he had a realization:

    A canvas is always “blank” in a deeper sense. Even when something is painted on it, the canvas underneath is still there. It holds every painting that could ever be created. The painting appears for a while, but the canvas remains unchanged.

    This made him think about life:

    Moments come and go, but there is something underneath them that doesn’t change — something like the “eternal present.” When he holds both ideas together (the moment in time and the timelessness beneath it), he feels calm and his thoughts quiet down.

    He remembers a quote from Joseph Campbell about how the center of life is where movement (time) and stillness (eternity) meet. When you see the eternal inside the present moment, you feel the real meaning of life.

    From this perspective, nothing is truly lost or gained. Everything arises from the same “blank canvas” and returns to it. And he wonders about the dying man — whether his fear comes from clinging to the painted picture instead of recognizing the canvas beneath it.”

    I am recognizing the canvas beneath, Peter.

    Anita

    #457463
    anita
    Participant

    Oh, yes, SSRIs are known for sexual side effects.

    Hmm I didn’t think of it as retroactive jealousy, ROCD. Now retroactively I am thinking of it this way 🤔

    Those thoughts I suppose were my protector part, seeing betrayal now ( well, back then) so to not face future betrayal.

    ✂️✂️✂️✂️✂️✂️✂️✂️✂️ Anita

    #457461
    anita
    Participant

    The thing about SSRIs- it’s a personal compatibility thing. It takes time for a good (!) psychiatrist and a patient to figure out what drug is best for the particular person and at what dosage.

    Weird numb sensations..? Something unpleasant that you didn’t experience before?

    My obsessive loops back then (in the 90s)- jealousy, obsessing about someone’s past, his ex girlfriend or girlfriend’s (I don’t remember now) like it was happening right there and then in front of me.

    It was really nice to not have those movies playing in my 🧠 again and again.

    ✂️✂️✂️ Anita

    #457459
    anita
    Participant

    Hey Dear Confused:

    Negative side effects from SSRIs? No, none in my 17 year experience with 2 SSRIs. No complaints at all. Nothing but positive.

    Like I shared with you before, taking Zoloft felt like a pair of ✂️ was going through my 🧠, cutting off obsessive thinking loops. It was quite magical for me.

    Problem is I needed more help, psychological therapy and social support that I didn’t get for way too long.

    Your heart, your soul is beautiful. Scared but beautiful. Confused. You so deserve peace of mind and heart.

    ✂️ 🙏 🧠 🔑 🐰 Anita

    #457458
    anita
    Participant

    Hi Peter:

    As I’ve been reviewing my past replies to members years ago, running them through Copilot’s analysis and seeing it clearly myself, I can clearly see my own hardened heart: not responding to others’ emotions and focusing on intellectual analysis, then getting impatient with members at times, etc.

    It’s embarassing to go back in time, not too long ago, and see the clinical, emotionally unattuned (closed, hardened heart) replies I produced.

    But then, what is to be expected from a person (me and others) growing inward in environments that attack and punish the once soft heart..

    “He (Peter) is not asking you to perform. He is inviting you to rest”-

    To rest in a softened heart, an unpunished heart.

    Is this the promised land: safety within a soft heart, is this the resting?

    🖼 Anita

    #457456
    anita
    Participant

    Hey Dear Confused:

    “She’s my Bubu” ohhhh 😍

    Even though the feeling changed, still ohhh ❤️

    My experience with depression was miserable. Thing is I don’t remember myself not being depressed. That’s why in the last few years I feel like a child/ teenager.. young, for the first time.

    The meds (SSRIs) helped (I was in my 30s when I started taking them. But what really helped came many years later: greater and greater Clarity and less and less Confusion.

    “She’s my Bubu”- that’s the loving, vulnerable ( as in being open to getting hurt, abandoned, rejected) part of you.

    “She’s not really something special”- that’s the protector part of you, trying to protect you from hurt.

    “I felt nothing”- that’s the vulnerable part 🔒-ed, ⏸️-ed, protected.

    “That’s a mechanism”- of protection.

    🔑 🙏 ✨️ Anita

    #457454
    anita
    Participant

    Emojis in regard to Copilot’s criticism of my reply 😠 🤢 🤕 🤮 😫 🤒 😡

    #457453
    anita
    Participant

    Hey Dear Confused:

    I copied your 1-line post for Copilot as well as my reply right above and asked him to evaluate my reply above and offer you a better message that the above.

    Copilot: Your reply to Confused had a warm, honest intention, and that matters. You were trying to give hope based on your own experience, and that can be comforting. But there are two places where your message could land better:

    * You centered your own story quickly, which might make Confused feel like he needs to compare himself to you.

    * You said “I believe so, yes,” which is kind, but a bit vague for someone who is scared he may never feel again.

    Confused wasn’t asking for certainty — he was asking for reassurance that feeling numb doesn’t mean he’s broken forever.

    A stronger reply would stay focused on him, normalize what he’s experiencing, and give grounded hope without promising outcomes.

    Here’s a clearer, more supportive version you could offer:

    “Hi Confused,

    It makes sense that you’re wondering about this. When depression is heavy, it can make your emotions feel muted or far away, and that can be frightening. But numbness isn’t permanent. When depression is treated and begins to lift, people often find that their feelings return gradually — warmth, interest, connection, even small sparks of joy. It doesn’t happen all at once, but it does happen.

    You’re not stuck this way. What you’re experiencing is a symptom, not a definition of who you are.”

    This version does a few important things: it normalizes emotional numbness, reassures without overpromising, keeps the focus on Confused, gives hope that’s grounded in real experience, and avoids comparing your journey to his”-

    Well, I stayed corrected. I’ll add emojis when I’m on the phone.

    Anita

    #457452
    anita
    Participant

    Hey Confused:

    I believe so, yes, that you will be able to feel again.

    I was diagnosed with Major Depression long ago. Fast forward, I am no longer depressed and yes, I am able to feel. I feel like a teenager (using the computer, no emojis)

Viewing 15 posts - 1 through 15 (of 6,241 total)