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  • in reply to: not sure what to do with the husband #376074
    Tee
    Participant

    Dear patelh,

    your situation reminds me of my cousin. Her in-laws never accepted her, were telling she’s not good enough for their son, because she’s a few years older, hasn’t graduated from college, and that she’s messy and doesn’t keep order at home. Well, that may be true, but she’s a good person otherwise and was a good match for her husband. They did well and had 2 beautiful daughters together. The husband was loving in the beginning, but then started to criticize her more and more, falling under the influence of his parents. Eventually he filed for divorce, and they did get a divorce. She was devastated but she’s survived, and probably she’s better off now without the constant criticism and put-downs by her husband and in-laws.

    The problem is that he was a weak man, insecure in himself, and didn’t have the guts to confront his parents and defend her. She had low self-esteem issues, and so she tolerated his criticism, and partly thought she deserved it. He was the superior one, she was inferior. She believed it.

    I see a lot of similarities with your situation, because as you say, your husband doesn’t respect you and agrees with his parents and family that you’re inferior. It could be that he’s specially rude and impatient with you nowadays because you’re not working and decided not to look for a job at the moment. My cousin’s husband was similar – he didn’t like that she stayed more than one year at home after the birth of their 2nd daughter. He thought she was lazy.

    My advice is to separate from your husband because it probably won’t get better. It could in theory, if you move somewhere else, where he’s further away from his family. But it’s not a guarantee because they can still influence him – and he seems very susceptible to their opinion. If he doesn’t respect you, that’s a huge and No1 problem. Another problem is if you don’t respect yourself…. You’d need to work on your self-esteem and decide that you’re good enough, there’s nothing wrong with you, and that you don’t want to tolerate this kind of attitude.

    I guess if you’d like to separate, you would need to find a job, so it’s not the best timing for you now. But this situation with your husband isn’t really sustainable and will only make you miserable.

     

    • This reply was modified 4 years, 3 months ago by Tee.
    in reply to: Feeling shame #376026
    Tee
    Participant

    Dear Jane,

    “He now has the chance to put his life back together without any interference.”

    Is he open to getting help, such as attending AA meetings, or he refuses everything? If he doesn’t even want to try to help himself, you can’t really do much but to keep him in your thoughts and prayers, and hope that he will turn around some day.

    You said his partner is a toxic person too – is she also a drug addict or alcoholic? Because if so, their child might be in danger and might need help of the social services?

    in reply to: Feeling shame #376008
    Tee
    Participant

    Dear Jane,

    “I think back then I was trying to accept some responsibility for the way my son had grown into the person he was. When his father and I split I didn’t handle it well. At that time in my life I was dealing with so much other stuff maybe I overlooked the impact it was having on him. He was a teenager at the time and we had always been close, but eventually he went to live with his father. He always blamed me for the split.”

    You and your late husband’s divorce must have impacted your son a lot, especially since he was in a sensitive age. You say you were close before, but then I guess he got distant, to the point he chose to live with his father? There must be a lot of anger and resentment on his part, which he hasn’t processed.

    You say he has mental health problems – what kind of problems, if I may ask? You said he’s claiming there’s nothing wrong with him, and that professionals say there’s nothing wrong with him either. Has he visited at least one counselor?

    I must say I feel compassion for him, and maybe I am partial, because I know that people often engage in self-destructive and irresponsible behavior, because they haven’t received something from their parents. They’re in pain and their behavior is a mirror of that pain. It doesn’t mean you should blame yourself for his actions, since he’s an adult and is responsible for his own life, but just perhaps try to see him beyond his current demeanor and understand that he might be hurting.

    in reply to: Conflicting myself much #375997
    Tee
    Participant

    Dear Neverdyed,

    By vague language, did you mean that I hadn’t admitted my real feelings towards him?

    No, I meant you sometimes use vague language here on the forum. For example, you asked ““Can there be a friendship which I keep in touch with somebody without leading to a formal romantic relationship?” – you asked in general terms, when actually you wanted to ask if you can be friends with this particular man.

    Other parts I had trouble understanding are probably due to your language style, and not because you wanted to sound vague on purpose. But anyway, I could understand everything once you’ve clarified it.

    As for those questions, I can answer them for sure, but maybe it’s more important for me to feel/experience good again, right?

    Yes, but if you know what made you feel good back then (let’s say you felt appreciated and important – just as an example), you then know what it is that you’re missing in your personality. If you miss feeling appreciated and important, you’d need to develop a sense of self-worth. If you miss feeling loved, you’d need to develop love for yourself. And so on… The way you felt in the “good old times” is an indicator of what you want to create for yourself in the present, but not by waiting for another man to give it to you, but by developing it within your own being.

    Wishing you a nice weekend too!

    • This reply was modified 4 years, 3 months ago by Tee.
    in reply to: Life obstacles #375990
    Tee
    Participant

    Dear Inquisitive Soul,

    It appears to me you’re caught in a conflict of whether to choose yourself or others. When you’re with others and socializing, it usually turns out to be a bad influence on you and you’re forced to cut them off. In other words, if you open up to others, it might cause you harm. But if you’re alone, in your “shelter”, you feel lonely and you harm yourself in different ways, by e.g. indulging in video games. So you end up feeling bad in either scenarios. Am I guessing this right?

    You say: Whenever mom sends me a message “how I’m doing?” I always answer “okay”. I’ve read your other thread, and based on your discussion with Anita there, it could be that you’re repeating the pattern you’ve seen in your family. They were trying to protect you from family problems, and now you’re trying to protect them from your own problems, by not telling them the truth of how you’re feeling. But the price of that is loss of closeness and intimacy.

    Maybe you’ve got that pattern going on with your friends and acquaintances too – perhaps you’re showing a particular “front” to them, e.g. of a busy person, or a successful person, while you’re not really sharing your deeper thoughts and feelings, perhaps your doubts and struggles too. This might be why you attract a certain type of friends, which later turn out to be not the best influence on you.

    Do you think this might be a part of what’s going on?

    in reply to: Feeling shame #375985
    Tee
    Participant

    Dear Jane,

    In your 2019 thread you said that it was your fault that your son turned out like that. You said: “It is my fault- I have been a negligent and incompetent parent, but yet I maintain healthy relationships with my other child, my grandchildren, my siblings, my nieces and nephews and my friends and their children. Just this one I have failed in and am judged by.

    Could you tell a bit more about why you believe you’ve been “a negligent and incompetent parent”? Because if you’re blaming yourself for how you’ve brought up your son, probably that’s one of the reasons why you feel shame for cutting him off now.

    in reply to: Maladaptive daydreaming #375957
    Tee
    Participant

    Dear c,

    it’s reassuring to know that maladaptive daydreaming is indeed related to childhood trauma and that it can be healed by working on our traumas. It’s fantastic that you’ve managed to heal it, and are now able to regulate yourself with breathing and centering, when you feel the tendency to “escape”. Good work! I hope Javairia can benefit from your experience too.

    in reply to: Emotionally Unavailable or is there hope? #375907
    Tee
    Participant

    Dear Michelle,

    I can understand your struggle in on one hand, not wanting to pressure him or scare him away, and on the other hand needing reassurance and even a guarantee that this relationship has future and that eventually, you’ll get what you need from him. You say:

    “There is no guarantee and yet our hearts want the stability of something everlasting.”

    Yes indeed, there’s no guarantee that someone will love us forever and would never abandon us. Maybe after many years of a deep, committed relationship, having been tested through various hardships and challenges, we can be pretty sure that this is it, that we’ll be together until death do us apart. But simply getting married isn’t a guarantee at all – many marriages end up in divorce. Sure, the willingness to get married tells something about the person’s intentions, so it would give you some security, but not the ultimate security.

    You and Anita have spoken about your anxious attachment. Probably your need for a guarantee that he loves you and will stay with you forever comes from a childhood wound. I know you’re a psychologist, so probably I’m just repeating things you already know, but anyway, I believe the solution would be to work on that and give your inner child the love and stability she yearns for. Promise your little girl that you’ll be there for her always. That you won’t abandon her. So basically, give yourself that what you expect from your boyfriend. That’s when the “grenade” will be deactivated, I think.

    “Sometimes I wonder though if we could get to a place where we could express that and not have it be riddled with anxious undertones or fears.”

    This is another problem – his side of the equation. On your side, there’s abandonment anxiety, on his there’s something else, but definitely something that would need to be solved if you want a healthy, long-term relationship. Tip-toeing around him won’t give you satisfaction, even if you solve your own issues. But I guess you’d first need to deal with your side of the equation, and then see how and if the dynamic changes and how you still feel about the relationship.

    in reply to: Conflicting myself much #375905
    Tee
    Participant

    Dear Neverdyed,

    thanks for clarifying. Anita once noticed (and you confirmed it) that sometimes you use vague language, because you don’t want to reveal that you still care about this man. You’re a little ashamed that you still have feelings for him. But please know that the first step in healing is actually to admit all your feelings, even if they’re immature or inappropriate or illogical, or whatever. We can’t switch off our feelings on command, because they reflect our deeper needs, our wounding, our hopes and dreams. We need to work through and process those feelings, and only then can they transform. Only then can we let go.

    I’m sure that there can be a friendship between a man and a woman, because I do have such a “pure” friendship going on, just wondered if I could be like that with that man, and you probably would agree that it’s not too possible as long as I still “hold on” to a degree.

    Yes, as long as you have feelings for him and e.g. expect him not to contact you when he’s with other women, it means it hurts you when he’s with other women, so clearly, it can’t be friendship on your part. If you would be honestly unaffected and could even be happy for him if he’s happy with someone else, that would mean you could be his friend. But you don’t need to be his friend. It’s okay not to be friends with men you’re attracted to, where you cannot necessarily keep a “pure” friendship.

    And yes, it upsets (or upset) me to think if he has chosen other women over me, I think it left me feeling not good enough.

    OK, so one issue could be your sense of not being good enough. Do you often criticize and judge yourself that you’re not good enough?

    As for what I need from him, I read the question as “what did he give to make me stuck on this connection?”, and thought the answer were the good old times, but what I remember better now are those bitter moments.

    What was good about the “good old times”? How did the relationship look like? How did you feel back then? Answering these questions will help you identify what it is that you really miss now.

    Tee
    Participant

    Dear Ryan,

    although this relationship hasn’t worked out the way you hoped for, I think it’s actually not a bad thing that it happened, because as you say yourself, you could be open and vulnerable, without slipping into the old defense mechanisms. This shows you’ve grown and aren’t the same man who has 2 failed marriages behind him. I say this in response to these words of yours: “there remain the issues that have led me to be twice-divorced, where I have yet to have an intimate, long-term relationship, in my 45-years of life. I certainly have a lot of work to continue to do.”

    You don’t necessarily have so much work to do any more, neither you’re the same man you were before. Yes, there are still things to work on but you’re much more aware now and have the help needed. You’ll get there, for sure.

    “I also need to work on my self-worth after working much of the past 10-years on my self-esteem.”

    Actually, I think self-worth and self-esteem are one and the same, whereas self-confidence is a slightly more superficial thing, in that people may have self-confidence (due to their skills and accomplishments), but deep down, they may still feel unworthy. A typical example is an athlete who’s built his self-confidence around performance and winning. When they have an injury and cannot perform any more, they may become depressed because they based their worth on some outer thing – excellence in sports – and without it, they feel worthless.

    The sense of worth is at the core of our being, it’s something that should be there simply because we exist. In childhood, if the message we’ve received from our parents was that they don’t appreciate us that much, they’re not happy to have us, that we aren’t that important to them – that’s how our self-worth gets damaged.

    Based on my own experience, I believe that my mother criticizing me damaged my self-confidence, but her expressing that she didn’t want to have me (because she was afraid to have children, she felt incapable of being a mother) was what actually caused my lack of self-worth. When the child feels unwanted, this is how the wound happens. Interestingly, I wasn’t aware of my lack of self-worth until much later in life, I was only aware of my lack of self-confidence.

    Anyway, now that you know what to work on, it doesn’t necessarily need to take a long time to heal it. You may start valuing and appreciating yourself already now, not because your outer achievements, but just because you’re valuable and worthy. We all are. This is how the sense of inferiority/superiority gets resolved too. You lose the need to compare yourself with others, you focus on your own life and growth, without looking what others are doing.

    I wish you a happy new chapter in life, and keep us posted how you’re doing…

    • This reply was modified 4 years, 3 months ago by Tee.
    in reply to: Maladaptive daydreaming #375819
    Tee
    Participant

    Dear Javairia,

    you’re welcome. Yes, if you could slow down and notice all the little details around you, plus enjoy the fresh air, that would be winning! 🙂

    Tee
    Participant

    Dear Ryan,

    good to read from you again. Also, I am glad about your job prospects – are you planning to accept the offer?

    Did you have the chance to talk about the savior complex during your therapy session? Because I believe this is an issue. In a previous post, you wrote:

    “I wanted to be someone different for her here in the small town in the middle of nowhere. Someone other than the country boys that abound. Someone who does more than drink, hunt, and fish. Wanted her to know that it’s okay to lean on others. That those she lets close aren’t going to let her down. That men see more in her than just a sexual being.”

    It seems to me you wanted to be special for her, but also better than the average “country boys” in “the small town in the middle of nowhere.” There’s a sense of superiority there, like you’re better than the men there, you’re sensitive, you talk about your feelings, you’re not seeing women just as sexual objects. You come from a big city to this God forsaken place in the middle of nowhere, and you feel so much better than the local guys. Does that ring true?

    You also said:

    “I suppose my torment comes from a sense of rejection by her. Not in the romantic sense but it of the almost consistent rebuff by her.”

    It appears that the greatest pain is that she rejected you, not necessarily as a romantic partner, but as this special person in her life, who could be a stable rock for her, who could give her what other men cannot, and eventually, who could save her from her demons. It’s almost as if she refused your uniqueness, she didn’t recognize how special you are, and this seems to hurt you the most.

    If this is true, you’ve got issues with self-worth, which often goes hand in hand with the savior complex. Because you’ve grown a lot as a person and are much more self-aware than before, much more able to show vulnerability etc. So you made a definite progress, and this makes you feel better about yourself (and it should). But if there’s a deeper issue of lack of self-worth, we’ll start taking pride in being more “mature” than some other people whom we’ll then try to “save”, all in an attempt to prove how special and valuable we are.

    This all happens subconsciously, but the result is that we’re attracted to “damaged” people, whom we then try to save, unsuccessfully…

     

    • This reply was modified 4 years, 3 months ago by Tee.
    in reply to: Conflicting myself much #375797
    Tee
    Participant

    Dear Neverdyed,

    no worries, take your time 🙂

    I must admit I had trouble understanding parts of your post, for example this:

    “And I tried to see if I’d avoid interacting with my married male colleague, the result seemed to be no, probably because I’m aware that nothing can develop between.”

    Have you interacted with you married male colleague, or you’ve avoided interacting? What was the nature of this interaction – romantic or just friendship?

    “Can there be a friendship which I keep in touch with somebody without leading to a formal romantic relationship?”

    Are you asking if there can be a friendship between a man and a woman without it turning into a romantic relationship?

    “These days I’ve been so over the “connection” or the idea of reconciliation (even though I’m sure that I will neither initiate nor respond to him further), it still upset me a little when reading something suggesting a third party.”

    Are you saying it upsets you that he was seeing other women as well, and not just you?

    It seems you’re having a hard time letting him go, and it means you still need something from him. In my previous post, I asked you what is it that you need from him, and I speculated that if might not even be love, but respect. That’s because you seemed quite disturbed about him not replying to your chats, suggesting that it means he doesn’t value you as much as you do him (“in the last contacts, I noticed that he’d respond in rather long hours (please note again that in the first year, he replied quickly and almost daily), which is opposite to what I often did, and that shows an imbalance of how I and he values the connection. Maybe I simply expect to be valued equally.“).

    By him not replying, he showed he values you less, and this seems to be the most painful part for you.

    “Can you please give me an example of “start valuing yourself”?”

    Valuing yourself may manifest in e.g. not accepting an open relationship but looking for men who are capable of a committed relationship. Valuing yourself can also mean expressing your needs in a relationship and not keeping quiet, fearing that your needs might be selfish.

    • This reply was modified 4 years, 3 months ago by Tee.
    in reply to: Where to find strength #375749
    Tee
    Participant

    Dear Felix,

    I am sorry you’re suffering so much. But also – and I am saying this without my pride being offended or anything like that – you didn’t respond to anything I or other members suggested. You keep repeating that you’re trying, you’re doing everything you can, but you’re stuck. Now you say you aren’t punishing yourself for missteps (“I don’t punish myself if I eat more over a few days or if a I skip a day of looking for a new job or studying.“) But in previous posts, you did say you’re punishing yourself, perhaps not if you eat too much but about other things.

    I offered a possible explanation of what might be going on, but you haven’t commented on it whatsoever. What do you think  about it? Does it resonate? Or is it off the mark and you don’t feel like that at all? I won’t be offended if you think it doesn’t apply to you, I didn’t write it for myself, but to try to help you. But you completely ignored it. How come? It seems as if you’re desperate looking for help but at the same time rejecting it.

    in reply to: Unhealthy friendships #375681
    Tee
    Participant

    Dear Nar,

    you asked me:

    “Do you have any residue of anger left towards your mother? Would you say you have forgiven her completely?”

    No, I wouldn’t say I have any residue anger, but it didn’t happen over night. I used to get triggered by her a lot: she would make nasty comments, and I would explode and start yelling and tell her nasty things too. Then she would accuse me of how horrible daughter I was, claiming she didn’t mean anything wrong, when she was clearly provoking. The result: I would end up being the bad guy, and she would be a poor victim.

    I’ve realized she could provoke me so easily because a part of me believed in her accusations. A part of me believed that I was no good and hopeless, and then the other part of me came to rescue by attacking her. But it wasn’t balanced, I’d lose my cool and later felt bad about myself. It just kind of confirmed how “bad” of a person I was.

    Now looking back, I think two things helped me change this dynamic: one was to start valuing myself more and stop believing her depictions of me, and the other was to work with my anger in therapy.

    For dealing with anger, there was one particularly useful exercise where you need to separate the good qualities of your mother (e.g. the caring, the financial and material support etc) from the bad qualities (criticism, shaming, not having faith in you etc). The “good mother” was represented by one pillow, and the “bad mother” with another one. The task then was to push away the bad mother and to embrace the good mother. That helped me to sort out the ambivalence and the love-hate relationship I had with her. Because I do love some of her traits, but I don’t love and don’t need those other traits.

    That also helped me keep my boundaries better and to stop her (calmly) when she starts condemning me and shaming me. She isn’t able to do that any more, because I don’t let her. But as I said before, all that resulted in being distant from her, keeping guard, and hardly communicating with her.

Viewing 15 posts - 1,891 through 1,905 (of 1,947 total)