Dear Clover:

When a child grows in danger of being attacked by a parent at any time, not knowing when, the child focuses on the dangerous parent (or parents) so to be able to predict the next attack, or better to prevent the next attack. The child is not safe enough to experience life otherwise.

Every living thing’s first priority is to survive. I live in a wooded area where there are deer and elk. When they hear a person approaching, they stop what they were doing  before, eating, usually. They stop and turn toward the noise they heard, the approaching person. Fully alert, they focus on the source of danger.

This is the same as I did as a child, focusing on the source of danger, my mother. And then, as an adult, like you, this focus on others, “‘The Me’ is not at all there”, was how I experienced life. It was all about what do other people think, what do they feel, as  if that was all that mattered.

“How do I stop doing this and focus more on my emotions? How to differentiate that their emotions are not mine?”

First step is to get away from the people who are still a danger in your life, physically and otherwise.

You wrote about your father: “, used  to even slap me  and pull my hair and throw me around. He still does that sometimes”- how is it that your father has  access to you; do you live with him/ with your parents, and if so, is there a possibility for you to move out and live away from them?

anita