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anitaParticipantExcellent advice, Jany: comprehensive, thorough, organized… thank you!
anita
anitaParticipantContinued:
The coyote scared me, but he (or she) did not hurt me. He considered it.. but it didn’t happen. I vividly remember him looking at me up and down, assessing me as potential prey. I’ll never forget it.. it was clear, in his eyes, that it was strictly business, the business of nature, nothing personal. But he didn’t prey on me. Following the two encounters, on two different days, I resumed my walks, there was no pain and injury left over from the encounters.
On the other hand, my mother- my emotional predator- did hurt me. And it was very personal. There was pain and injury carried on from one day to the next, and to the next. It was emotional pain (hurt, shame, guilt, loneliness, despair), and it was physical pain and distress: there were occasional beatings, but mostly the physical pain I am referring to involves a whole lot of physical discomfort and distress aka anxiety which is my experience almost every moment of every day, when I am awake. Like right now (right shoulder twitching and in pain, being sore from the tics, breathing interrupted, unnatural).
My mother was my monster, not a mother. She or it.. was not for me; it was against me. She didn’t kill me, but it would’ve been less painful to me if she did. And throughout it all, I craved- deep inside- to one day make her a mother. This craving, this hope kept me close to the monster, forevermore craving her absent love… stuck in a vacuum of love, stuck in the absence of a mother.
To be continued.
anita
March 8, 2024 at 11:20 am in reply to: Telling the difference between gut and fear in relationships #428499anitaParticipantDear Seaturtle:
“suddenly, this N guy appears in my mind and It’s like I had a vision of ripping a green vine off a branch, as if it was premature, and not ready to be discarded, and I listened to that vision and decided to give N one more chance” (July 29, 2023)-
– suddenly, this N guy appeared in your mind, and it was like you had a vision of making wine out of sour grapes?
The sour grapes being F’s/N’s inability to connect with you positively and genuinely?
In the image, it was premature to give up on creating a positive, genuine connection with F by proxy of N (N as a substitute for F), so you decided to give F one more chance (by proxy of N), and you ended up with an unpleasant tasting wine…?
anita
March 8, 2024 at 10:28 am in reply to: Telling the difference between gut and fear in relationships #428498anitaParticipantDear Seaturtle:
I hope that you are well this morning and that your incisions are healing, and that soon you’d be able to do hot yoga. We communicated for so long, often very long posts, that we.. or I end up going in circles sometimes. For example, on Oct 19 last year, I wrote about the “Teflon Mind (TM)” in regard to N. Fast forward to yesterday, March 7, I was back to the same concept, calling it “chronically numb“, going full circle back to the same concept as if it was a new idea.
Here is what I wrote on Oct 19, 2023: “his version of mental strength is what I call the Teflon Mind (TM)… This is the difference between the two of you: you let things in, you let them stick enough to analyze them, so to understand better… the TM does not want to understand itself; any opportunity to understand (himself or you)- if it feels distressing to him- will slide off him like oil slides off Teflon… (N) doesn’t see you, not beyond the superficial, like you suspect. Your feeling UNSEEN has its roots in childhood (as is true to many people) but it is also happening presently in your relationship…
“Some people want to talk about emotions and understand better; others don’t.. or can’t, it’s not something that they are able to endure. So, when growing up with a TM, or being in a relationship with one, you get to feel alone and disconnected in their presence..”.
Fast forward almost 5 months to today, I still believe the above to be true. Plus, since I wrote the above, I found out along the way (the 33-page way) that N has been a heavy-duty, daily consumer of weed for a long time, which is Teflon on top of Teflon. And that he did weed with his father since he was a teenager, which means that weed Teflon-ed his developing, adolescent brain!
N reads like a nice guy, like when early on he brought you soup and flowers when you were sick, and when he supported you quitting your job and doing art when you lived with him, and otherwise, being generous, taking you out to nice restaurants, etc. But there is a severe lack of compatibility: he is too different from what you need a partner to be, and the result: you were miserable a lot of the time when living with him, and you wanted out. So, you got out. You did the right thing for yourself. I hope that you come to peace with your decision.
anita
anitaParticipantContinued:
I slept well and shortly after I woke up, I noticed an elated feeling (I still feel it now, 20 minutes or so later) that I don’t remember feeling in the longest time, for decades. It may be, this youthful elation (a mild elation but oh, so very pleasant), what I felt at times (rarely) in my 20s… when I felt hopeful. This may be what Happy means, a mildly happy feeling.
Still in bed, before getting up, I thought: is this the day after? As in, the day after the decades of my life frozen in time? Did I leave the past in the past and woke up to.. the day after the past?
I definitely don’t want to be carried away with this and expect what wouldn’t be realistic to expect (any happily-ever-after kind of expectation), but it’s nice, and I am definitely motivated to continue my work here.
anita
anitaParticipantDear Eva: thinking about you, hoping you are well.
anita
anitaParticipantIt’s been ages (a month), wondering how you’re doing..
anita
anitaParticipantThinking about you, Nichole.
anita
anitaParticipantThe reason I feel this anxiety whenever I am alone in the evening, is because she used to work and I was waiting for her alone, in the evening, anxious as hell, worried that she will never return, that she is dead and (my) life would therefore end that same night.
Notice I use the present tense: she is… Past indeed extends into the present, decades later.
To be continued.
anita
anitaParticipantContinued:
When I was confronted by the coyote less than 3 years ago, it felt like time stopped. But Time resumed on that same afternoon, some time after the confrontation was over (the coyote ran away and into the brush). I haven’t been significantly afraid of being confronted by that coyote or by any other coyote since, and resumed my regular walk- including walking through the same stretch of road- a couple of days after the confrontation (although with some weapon in my hand, pepper spray or a stick). It all seems so far away now, a memory that is secure in the past.
On the other hand, even though I didn’t see my mother (who lives in another country) in close to 13 years and didn’t talk with her for 11 years (my choice), I am still significantly afraid of her. I’d be afraid to be in the country were she resides in fear that I will find myself in her presence, accidentally. My memories of her are far from being secure in the past. Time has stopped in this context, past is one with the present. I indeed lived in the past for too long.
Fear stops Time for a little while; Anxiety stops Times for decades; too often, it stops Time for a lifetime.
It is beginning to get dark as I am typing this, sitting in bed, looking at the stillness of the outside through the window, alone. Whenever alone, at this time of the evening, I feel anxious, fearing that my mother will die. Not because she is old now, but because when she was 25, and I was 5, she said (in a very emotional, convincing way) that she was going to kill herself. I am re-living now what happened decades ago. In my mind, I am still that 5-year-old, afraid that mother will die.
Anxiety extends the past into the present, and the two are one. Healing is about securing these memories in the past; removing these painful/ scary memories from the Now, and seeing a Now that doesn’t have her in it.
anita
anitaParticipantDear Peace:
“No matter what I do, they think I’m bad. It’s like I’m always in the wrong… Neither of them said sorry, even when they hurt me. They acted like nothing happened. They thought it was normal to treat me, my husband, and his family badly. They expected me to still treat them well… No matter what you do, you’ll be criticized, judged, or called names…And it’s not just me; it’s the same for everyone, including other family member“-
– Family is supposed to support, encourage and help family. Family does not have the right to mistreat and abuse family, not any more than strangers have such a right. Their behaviors are Wrong. Can you cut ties with all abusive family members? I mean, wouldn’t you be better off without them in your life?
anita
anitaParticipantDear Lisa:
This morning, I re-read most of your posts on this thread and a few of my long replies to you. Your started your first of two threads, the Alone thread, back on May 1, 2017, and I replied to you on that same day. You wrote back then: “I am female and 48 years old. I have never had a relationship. I have always longed for one. Every day since I was a teen I have imagined being in relationships“.
By the end of your 26-page Alone thread (Jan 1, 2019), you were optimistic: “Happy New Year!! I would like to take your advice Anita and start a new thread. I think I have said all I can say in this thread about my insecurities, frustration, jealousy, hurt….I am just going around in circles. I would like to make a more positive tone thread… I want to start with what is going on right now and talk about and being more proactive in reaching my goals. I am very optimistic right now but I have not come up with a name for my thread. I will think about it today. It will be optimistic“.
Two weeks later, on Jan 15, 2019, you started your 2nd of two thread, this one, titled Choosing Love, indeed an optimistic title: “I want to start this new thread to open myself up to the truth about why I am alone and what I can do to change that… I call this thread Choosing Love because I feel that maybe I have rejected love… I want to change my focus from wondering why love does not come to me to why I am obviously pushing love away“.
Today, 5 years, 1 month and 21 days later, I want to reply to the above in the simplest way I can: you ‘ve been Alone for five+ decades because people hurt you too much and for too long, too early in your life. It started before you were even born, when you were still in your teenage mother’s womb, and it continued throughout your childhood aka your Formative Years.
And throughout those years, no one protected you; no one helped you. You were truly a child/ adolescent Alone. Emotional pain and severe anxiety were Formed into your brain-body (expressing as ADHD and OCD early on). Understandably, as a child and onward, you’ve viewed people (in real-life, not in your threads) as dangerous. Therefore, you reject and push away people=danger.
Except when daydreaming, something you’ve been engaged with as an adult: when daydreaming, you accept (not reject) people and love, people= love (not danger)… in your daydreams: “I have an even bigger obstacle, something called maladaptive daydreaming. I have been relying on this since I was around 12 years. Anyone who knows how old I am knows how long I have been using this coping mechanism. I am completely aware of what is real and what is not so it’s not delusional… I do not engage in maladaptive daydreaming when I am with other people but a great deal of my time is spent on it. This is a challenge because I have become quite accustomed to it.” (April 7, 2019)
Feb 14, 2020: “I am right now alone in my misery again… human beings are insensitive creatures… vile disgusting hateful creatures to ever walk the planet. I hate humans. I hate them. No one stops these creeps from stomping all over the world and do whatever they want. No one protects the helpless“- back to pessimism, back to people=dangerous creatures, and Lisa alone vs dangerous creatures.
April 14-17, 2020: “I am alone with no one to help me…. I wish I had someone in my life to help me along the way… I don’t know what to do. If only I had that one lifeline growing up“- Lisa Alone vs dangerous people.
Jan 21, 2023: “Nothing to report except more of the same. People whose only goals in life are the same as reptiles…crushing the hopes and dreams.. they are free to break rules, oppress, ban, and spread lies about others“- people= dangerous reptiles.
March 2, 2024: “There is not much I can say right now. I would just be saying the same things I have said before“- a childhood experience re-lived.
Back to the title of your 2nd thread, Choosing Love: is there a way for you to choose love outside daydreaming: to see a single person in real-life as Love, not as Danger: to see a person not as a bully or someone who supports bullies (the two kinds of people you described), but as something else, someone who can be trusted..?
I hope so, it is my dream that it will happen in your life.
anita
anitaParticipantDear Kshiti:
You are very welcome and of course it’d be okay for you to share your values and goals in a couple of days, or whenever you have the time and the state of mind to do so. I wish you well in your studies!
anita
anitaParticipantHow are you, Kshiti?
anita
anitaParticipantDear Lisa:
No requirement that you answer this post, it’s just that the topic of your thread caught my eye this afternoon, Choosing Love., after reading in another thread the sentence “Love is a choice”. Interestingly, on March 15, 2019 (in 9 days, it will be five years ago), you wrote: “I absolutely believe in the subject of this thread“.
anita
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Though I run this site, it is not mine. It's ours. It's not about me. It's about us. Your stories and your wisdom are just as meaningful as mine. 