Hi Adam,

how have you been? I am sorry for disappearing, I had health issues and a related health anxiety, and it was weighing me down.

I hope you are well…

Dear Dafne,

thank you for your kind words and welcome!

I am sorry to have been slow to respond, but as I’ve said, I’ve been dealing with health issues this whole year, which I believe triggered an old childhood trauma. And this made it harder to deal with the chronic pain and the roller-coaster of getting better only to get worse again. So it’s been both physically and mentally/emotionally draining. But I think I am starting to see the light of the end of the tunnel. I haven’t been seeing a therapist, but have been watching some really good videos on health anxiety, which helped me a lot. So I am feeling a little better at the moment 🙂

I’m still experiencing some post covid symptoms & anxiety is one of them. I’m trying to stay positive but it is not always easy. Especially when you do not have a strong support system of your family & friends.

Is your anxiety health related? That you’ll never heal completely or something to that effect? I know it’s much harder when you need to go through those challenges alone… You earlier mentioned a friend of yours, whom you talk a lot about dating and relationships – is she around to help you?

I’m trying to apply your advice step by step but many times my fear is stronger. I did learn to say ,no’ & to set some boundaries but I still feel really isolated & find it hard to trust people & open my heart again.

I am happy that you’ve learned to say no and set some boundaries. That’s already a big improvement! It’s better to guard your heart from the people who would like to take advantage of you. You gave many opportunities and a benefit of the doubt to that policeman, and yet, the only thing he wanted was sex. I am glad you managed to say No to his conditions!

Most men I’ve met miss the ,spark’ they felt with their exes and their hearts are not available to me. Even after the brake up of their relationship, they still long for that feeling with someone new. Or they do not want to settle down at all.

I am sorry about that, Dafne. Have you been dating some more since the policeman?

Recently, I spoke with my father (after many years of absence). I told him how I felt, about my childhood pain & broken hear. He replied that he doesn’t want to feel criticised and that it was between him and my mother. Also he said that I’ve chosen this life for myself before I was born. I wrote my destiny. Everything is my decision and he will not care about any consequences of it. He also said that he has nothing do with my bad partner choices. For him it is a nonsense and how psychiatrist make money.

It seems your father doesn’t want to take any responsibility for his own behavior and for having hurt you. My mother is also like that – she feels she was a great mother and did nothing wrong in my upbringing, whereas the truth is that she was emotionally abusive my entire childhood (and would still be, if I let myself be abused). I tried to explain to her how she hurt me, but she flat out refused any responsibility and is claiming that she was a good and sacrificing mother. So I know that it doesn’t make sense to try to convince her of the opposite, or to try to get compassion and understanding from her.

It seems it’s a similar situation with your father: he flat out refuses any responsibility, even to the point of claiming that you as a child asked for it (asked for abuse and neglect) and “wrote your destiny”. As if parenting has nothing to do with the child’s mental and emotional health. Whereas exactly the opposite is true: a large study (called the ACE study) has proven that children exposed to emotional abuse and neglect have a much greater chance of having life-long physical and mental health issues.

By claiming that he had no negative impact on you and that you chose your own destiny, your father is heavily gaslighting you, washing all responsibility from himself. That’s toxic behavior.

It also shows that unfortunately there is no point in trying to get any empathy or understanding from him, because he isn’t capable of that. Trying to get him to see how he has hurt you will only hurt you more, so my advice is not to talk to him about that any more. I’ve realized that about my mother too, so I am not attempting to get from her what she isn’t capable of giving me (I had been trying for many many years, but have finally given up, realizing that it is only hurting me).

He never supported us emotionally or financially in any way. And now, he has a small piece of land near his place that he wants to sell. So he proposed that I could buy it from him as: ,nothing comes for free in life’ (his words).

Since he isn’t and has never been a loving father, and since staying in his proximity will likely only hurt you, I wouldn’t buy this piece of land. I wouldn’t tie myself to him in any way. Because I can imagine a scenario in which you end up taking care of him in his old age, while he is emotionally and verbally abusing you. I mean, I don’t know him, but I see no compassion on his side. I only see self-interest. Maybe he isn’t needy and wouldn’t demand you to take care of him, but in any case, I wouldn’t like to live near him.

Apparently, this proposal is a hot deal & he won’t hesitate to sell it to someone else. I felt like it is a business proposal and not loving reconnection after years. I felt disappointed but couldn’t really say much.

Sorry for responding only now, I hope you haven’t bought it in the meanwhile. It does feel cold and calculated, like a business proposal. No wonder you feel disappointed. But it’s better not to be close to him physically, when you cannot be close emotionally. And his stance is really hurtful.

I am sorry, Dafne. You definitely deserve more than your father’s kind of “love”. Which isn’t love at all. Some people aren’t capable of love, and so they come up with all kinds of excuses why selfishness and lack of empathy is normal (“nothing comes for free in life“). When again, let me refute that claim, because as they say, the best things in life are for free.

So everything that your father is claiming about love and life is probably untrue… and it needs revision.

Tee, what would you say or do in my place?

For starters, I wouldn’t buy that piece of land. And I wouldn’t try to get any empathy from him either. When he tells you that “nothing comes for free in life”, you can say “the best things in life are free”. You can say it out loud or just to yourself. But it’s important that you start refuting those falsehoods about life and love that he taught you (you don’t need to refute it to him, but to yourself), and learn a different set of beliefs – beliefs that will help you love yourself more.

Dear Peace,

I am sorry for not responding earlier. I have been struggling with health issues and health anxiety related to that, and this has been weighting on me. But I want to say I feel for you and I understand your sadness and your difficulty to accept some of the harsh realities about your family (“I’m still processing a lot of these harsh realities.”)

Why were they so selfish, making me feel utterly worthless and devoid of meaning?

It’s hard to say why some people are selfish, but many factors can play in, including the belief that money can bring one happiness, or that money will make one accepted and valued in the society. So perhaps seeing money as a key to happiness and a sense of worth is what causes your family to be so money-thirsty, at least in part. And so they’ve put money and social status on a pedestal, while disregarding true values, such as goodness, kindness, care and compassion. I don’t know, Peace, but this could be why they are glorifying false values and diminishing you, whom they should love and care for.

However, what you need to do is to stop linking your sense of worth to how they treat you (making me feel utterly worthless and devoid of meaning). This is a child in you, wanting to be loved and valued by her family, and believing that if they don’t value you, you are not worthy. That’s a false belief. Every child believes it though, and that’s why so many of us feel unworthy, because our parents and siblings made us feel unworthy.

But now, as an adult, you need to start believing in your own worth, disregarding of how your family sees you. They shouldn’t be your measuring gauge, since they are unfortunately people with crooked values and crooked priorities. Your sense of worth shouldn’t be dependent on them.

I know it’s hard to accept that you might not be as important to them as they are to you. It hurts. But it doesn’t mean you are not important at all. It doesn’t mean you’re unworthy as a human being. Their treatment of you doesn’t say anything about you – it says a lot about them. Try to tell yourself (your inner child) that you are worthy, special and unique, and you’ll see how your sense of worth will start changing.

Trusting anyone again seems difficult; I feel sad, disappointed, and betrayed.

It’s okay to feel sad, disappointed (in them) and betrayed (by them). Because they have indeed betrayed you. They’re not treating you like a loving family should treat one of their own.

But please, know that your worth is not defined by them and doesn’t depend on them. And that other people are not like them. You have found a husband who is not like them. You can trust your husband, even if you shouldn’t trust your own family. So don’t measure other people by how your own family is.

Now, they’re arranging a wedding for me, Even though i should be happy but i feel broken .

I get you. The people who have betrayed you are arranging your wedding. But don’t feel broken about yourself. Because as I said, you’re a good person, and they are crooked. Instead of feeling broken and unworthy, perhaps feel a little angry at your family. Just a little, so it can give you strength to stand up for yourself.

When you feel better about yourself and more empowered, you can then decide how you want your wedding to look like, how much of their involvement (and their pushing their ideas) you want to allow, etc. It will be also easier for you to decide about the financial matters. Once you start feel worthy and strong, rather than worthless and guilty, things will become more clear.

We can talk more about the practical aspects (money, debt etc), but I think the most important at this point would be to improve your sense of self-worth, which is independent of how your family sees you and treats you.

Dear Peace,

I am very glad to hear that your studies are going well, and that you’ve secured an internship which might turn into a full-time job once you get your diploma. And that you are financially independent. Well done!

And also, I am thrilled to hear that you are happy with your husband, that he loves you, respects you and is supporting you every step of the way. That’s really precious and I am so glad things worked out for you in the love department!

Sorry to hear about struggles with your family though. They haven’t changed much, on the contrary, their behavior is appalling. First they were vehemently opposing your husband, being super racist, then seemingly “tolerating” him if they can get enough gold from his family. When their appetites haven’t been satisfied, they started again with baseless insults and defamation of your husband and his family.

They are leading a vicious campaign against this good, innocent man and his family, which seems to be an okay family and don’t deserve to be treated like that. Your husband certainly doesn’t deserve to be treated like that. You neither, of course.

You’re seeing it very well that they want to make you their slave, fulfill all their wishes, they want to control you completely (In their eyes, making them proud meant becoming their slave because they wanted to control my decisions.). And even if you do everything they say, even if you sacrifice yourself for these mean, selfish people (sorry, I have to call them like that), you’ll still never be good enough for them. You will still be beneath them, and they will always find faults with you – each time you don’t do what they tell you. That’s how big their “love” is.

I lost trust and felt betrayed and used during that time.

They did betray you and have been emotionally abusing you for quite a while now. No wonder you feel betrayed. Because they initially helped you to get to Germany and financially supported you, only to turn against you because you don’t want to follow their dictates. You want to be independent and happy, leading your own life, and not be their slave.

To be honest, I don’t think you should stay in touch with your family. Or you should reduce contact to a minimum because they are quite toxic. But before cutting or reducing contact, I would settle the debt. If I were you, I would repay the debt – separately to each of your 2 sisters. Make a break down of the costs: how much each of them gave you, and how much you gave to each of them in the last year. The difference is how much you owe to each of them.

Your brother is a separate category – he didn’t give you any money, right? Instead, you’ve been helping him, but now it’s time to stop financing him. He is an adult man, older than you, and should be capable to take care of himself and his family. If your mother is living with him, you can pay for her expenses. I don’t think you should be paying their bills, but you can pay for your mother’s upkeep and help with her medical bills, if necessary.

If I were you, I would only pay for my mother’s expenses – not for any of my siblings’ expenses. It’s not your duty to financially support your adult, able bodied siblings.

So my advice is to insist on repaying your debts and financially separating yourself from your family. Because they are using your debt to financially exploit you and as you say, use you as an ATM machine. That’s why they say “no, you don’t need to repay it now”. But the very next day they come with requests for money….

That’s why I think it would be very important to clear your debt. Insist on repaying it, and do repay it, even if they object. And then stop giving them more money, except for your mother’s expenses.

I expect they won’t like it and will try to blame you and guilt trip you, portraying you as a selfish person. But please know that it’s not true – you are a good, honest person, and they are selfish, manipulative, mean people. So try to stay strong and cut as many ties as possible (first starting with financial ties).

How does this sound?

Hi SereneWolf,

thanks for checking on me. I had a long vacation and some of my main symptoms luckily improved (yay! 🙂 ). But now I have some eye problems, which make it hard for me to use the computer. I am going to have that checked with the doctor, but in the meanwhile I am taking it easy and letting my eyes rest as much as possible. That’s why I haven’t replied to you – sorry.

How have you been? How is your job search?

Dear Kodi,

You are spot on about learning to worry about about health issues from a parent.

Yeah, if our parents (or one of them) is a worrier, they can’t calm us down, but make us even more anxious. Because we as children are helpless and totally dependent on our parents. And so if our parent is worried and anxious, our anxiety goes through the roof. There is no way we can calm ourselves down – since we need them to do that for us.

And this stays as a pattern, not just the mental pattern of catastrophizing and thinking the worst will happen, but also as hypervigilance in our autonomic nervous system. Our amygdala constantly firing and ringing the alarm bell, even if there is no danger at all.

I very much relate to this, because my mother is a worrier too, not so much about health but about everything else, always thinking in negative terms. So I’ve learned to worry too, nowadays it’s primarily about my health, because I do have some health issues which objectively make my life difficult. But I see how sometimes I start catastrophizing over the slightest little pain that I have, and it fills me with terror. In those moments I feel like a helpless little child, believing that something terrible is going to happen and I will be doomed.

Maybe you feel something similar when you start worrying about your son’s illness:

Whenever my son gets a fever I freak out and am afraid he’s going to die. … I’m utterly exhausted from all the fear, frustration, anger, depression, irritability, guilt – basically every negative emotion you can have.

Maybe when your son gets a fever, you start catastrophizing, and the alarm system in your brain (amygdala) starts going in overdrive and it spirals out of control. What helps me is to soothe myself in those moments, to tell myself that it’s going to be okay.

Because what I’ve noticed is that I have 2 parts active in those moments: one is the anxious voice, who is thinking the worst thoughts and believing that the pain I am having means something serious and potentially irreversible. That’s the internalized voice of my anxious mother, telling me that I should be worrying. The other part is my inner child, who is listening to this anxious voice and is freaking out, because the child is helpless and depends on the mother’s protection. If the mother is worried and anxious, then of course the child is in utter terror. And that’s how I really feel in those moments, when the worry gets out of control.

I’ve recently become aware of this mechanism, and so now when something happens, I tell myself that it’s going to be fine and not to worry. I am trying to soothe my inner child and be the calm, soothing parent to my inner child, rather than the anxious, catastrophizing parent. With that I am hopefully interrupting that automatic loop in my brain that activates the amygdala and gets me in the state of terror.

Perhaps you could try something similar? Of course, various relaxation techniques might be helpful too. As well as creating that safe, calm space within your home, as Roberta suggested.

Your mother-in-law (who you said is very calm and loving and loves to laugh) can be an anchor point for you as well, in the sense that not only you visit her regularly, but also, when you start worrying, you can imagine her telling you it’s going to be fine. So perhaps she can serve as that calming, soothing parental voice inside of your head, when your fear gets triggered.

Hi Kodi,

yes, it is perfectly okay to want to be happy, even if there is so much suffering out there in the world. It’s a natural drive of each person, but sometimes this drive is blocked. One reason is that we feel guilty if we’re happy, because e.g. our parents weren’t happy and we felt sorry for them and their suffering.

You said anxiety and depression run in your family, which is a quite possible reason why you’re suffering from it too. For example, if we have a depressed mother, we naturally want to make her happy and do everything in our power to help her. But we inevitably fail, because it’s a problem that we didn’t cause and that we as a child cannot solve. And because we fail to make our depressed parent happy, we start feeling bad about ourselves, because we believe we’re not good enough or worthy enough – again, blaming ourselves for our parent’s condition.

Also, if our parent is anxious, they can’t give us proper emotional regulation and soothing. For example, they may get worried easily over each little child’s disease we have, and this makes things much worse because if our parent worries, we feel totally helpless and in terror. Perhaps that’s why you have the tendency to worry about your health excessively, because you’ve learned the pattern of excessive worry and there was no one there to calm you down and tell you that everything’s going to be fine?

I wonder if you’ve experienced something like this in your childhood/youth?

Hi Beni,

sorry for the late response, I am on holidays and am not spending much time at the computer. Also am having some health issues, which are bogging me down, so I am not in my top form…

Yes, I listen to the audiobooks many times and close to everything on youtube. It’s a great tool. I really enjoy to text with you Tee. It’s nourishing and you have a harmonious way to do it. How did you learn it?

Thanks Beni. I’ve never really learned NV communication per se, just always tried to understand the other person’s point of view and put myself in their shoes. That always helps have more compassion and understanding. And I’ve been a good listener too, always asking people how they are, inquiring about them. But I have to admit, now that I am suffering from health challenges, it’s not always easy because I have to deal with my own pain and have less capacity to deal with other people’s pain.

Yes, that’s true I tend to stay. Ah, I haven’t made that connection yet that this exact situation means that I’ am stressed.

Glad you’re noticing it now – that when you feel you don’t have options, it’s actually a stress response, not the reality of the situation. So in those situations, try to slow things down (e.g. do some slow deep breathing), and give yourself time to answer.

I mean, if someone asks you something you don’t necessarily want to do, you don’t have to give your answer immediately. You can say you have to check your calendar and will let them know later, or something to that effect. And then you can process your upset when you’re alone, and then when you’re calmer, you can decide whether you want to go or not. Keeping in mind that you don’t have to please everyone and that “if you meet someones needs against your own needs, everyone is gonna pay for it“.

I think I know what you mean. Being loyal and standing true to your word. I belief the most important is the intention behind, what if I do it out of fear? Which is something I observe.

Yeah, that’s not a good motivation. If you do things you don’t want to do out of fear of being rejected, that’s not a healthy place.

I think somethings I might have to “mess up” to learn by doing and to reconnect. I belief that’s where the fear is coming from. I did not understand why I had to do things and was manipulated into being afraid instead of showing me why it is important and valuable. I had to them to be accepted.

You mean your parents intimidated you into doing something which is otherwise important and valuable (e.g. visit a sick grandmother), and you felt pressured to do it? Whereas if they would have explained, you would have done it more gladly?

It just occurs to me that we need to first have compassion for ourselves, and only then can we have compassion for other people. If we are forced to do something while our own needs are not taken into consideration, what we’ll feel is anger and resentment. And then even if something is worthwhile and kind (such as visiting our sick grandmother), we’ll see it as a burden and have resistance towards it. Not sure if you relate to this?

I want to do it in a way which nourishes the connection rather than drains it. I can communicate it in the way we spoke about earlier.
I need to be very careful who I do this too because if I mess up with someone I trust that does not have the capacity it can break my heart.

I’m just thinking that I want to ask people to do this in a more playful way. It’s actually too scary to do it in real life. I feel that the effects would be similar when played. In the end I think it’s about to learn to take things less personal and that it’s okay when people get angry. (Mom and Dad still love me even if they’re angry).

Well, we can’t please everyone. It sounds like you’re afraid that if you say No, people will get angry and you can’t bear that. Actually, there might be people who will get angry with us if we set boundaries – because they’ve learned to abuse us and exploit us. But good people – people who are your true friends and who are non-manipulative – will never get angry if you set healthy boundaries. They’ll respect those boundaries. So if you set boundaries and someone attacks you and blames you for that, they’re not a good friend.

I belief acceptance can be above everything. It’s like telling someone: “I don’t like you, go away” also you’re looking into each others eyes saying: “I accept you”. It differentiate here between acceptance and tolerance. Tolerance to me is to say go away.
If I tolerate people which act out of my values it closes my heart somehow. If I don’t accept them it makes me loose myself and I loose compassion to the other person. It feels like I betray myself. Can you help me to understand this?

I hear what you’re saying. You want to be loving to everyone, you don’t want to close your heart to anyone, right? And you feel you need to close your heart to people if you want to set boundaries?

This might be if those people are manipulative and can’t just accept your boundaries, but blame you for it. And so you start feeling angry with them and inevitably you close your heart, because it hurts to be blamed…. Is that what is happening?

Thanks for handing this back to me. I’d like to set boundaries with my mother. What I mean is that often the best I can do is, do it in ways which are not nourishing and make her feel rejected. I only want to do it in ways which are more harmonious, if I have the capacity to do it.

Do you feel she is blaming you and guilt-tripping you if you set boundaries? Because that’s what might cause you to feel rejected, and you might want to go against your wishes and do it anyway, because you don’t want to hurt her?

When I make me do it, it actually feels like the thing I talked above when I write “self betrayal”, “making me do things I don’t want to do”. It has to do with the impulse to do things perfect even if it’s against my boundaries.

Yeah, it could be that you do betray yourself because if you’re being yourself, you get blamed and rejected, and you don’t want that. We as children are totally dependent on our parents. And so we often betray ourselves because we need to stay in the relationship – it’s a survival instinct. And we keep that in our adulthood too.

So you might be doing something similar with you mother – desperately wanting to stay in the relationship and feeling that the only way to do it is if you betray yourself? (or at least that’s how it was the past?)

Yes, I mean it in a selfish way. I remember quite some situations where I do it in a selfish way. I’d choose this words for it. I do it to cope with the fear of loosing autonomy.

Sometimes we believe we’re selfish (or people accuse us of being selfish) if we want to respect our own needs. People pleasers believe they are selfish whenever they say No to anything. So I would reevaluate those instances where you felt you were selfish. Maybe you said it in an angry tone and lacking diplomacy, but your basic impulse was to protect yourself and your own needs?

My minds great in finding every way my doing can hurt other people and it’s getting better at recognize healing things I do.

Yeah, it seems you are very careful not to hurt people. But sometimes people will be hurt because you’re not letting them to take advantage of you any more. In reality, you’re not hurting them, but they might still accuse you of hurting them…. so that’s a challenge you’ll need to deal with.

Wow, this is bigger than I thought. It feels like this is connected with why it’s rather difficult to organize meetups with people. I need connection and I know how to get connection without empathy. Hihi, to get connection without empathy. That sound like a crooked and painful concept.

I think that real, genuine connection can’t exist without empathy on both sides. If you care about people, but they don’t care about you or your needs, that’s not real connection. With some people we just can’t have a genuine connection, because they don’t have empathy or understanding for us, but rather, they want to manipulate us or take advantage of us. I don’t know if this has been your experience, but I am just saying: it’s impossible to be open-hearted and unguarded with everyone because some people will take advantage of that.

Yes, “schnieef”. I connect to the words you write. Again connection and autonomy

Yes, we need to have both. We shouldn’t sacrifice ourselves in order to stay in an abusive or manipulative relationship.

My mom thinks everything is her fault and her responsibility.

But it seems she somehow shifts (or used to shift) a part of that blame on you? Or you felt sorry for her because she seemed helpless, she was pitying herself (you said she was in the martyr role) – and so you gave up on yourself so she would be less upset and less miserable about her own life?

I wanted to say that in this situation she does not know how to meet her needs yet and what I think she really needs.
I think she’s working on herself. She’s not reaching out to me.

Good. If she’s learning how to meet her own needs, rather than expecting you to do that, that’s a good sign. I hope she’ll keep working on herself and also that you’ll be able to set better boundaries with her, not feeling selfish for doing that.