Dear Cali Chica:

(This is a long post but I believe a very important one. It requires your patient, focused, reading)

“there is no omnipresent being that judges… the mother voice to me IS that being”-

A walk in memory late- January 2018: “at Disney World at the age of 10 or so, my sister was around 3 years old. I remember we were posing for a picture and a classic picturesque Disney World moment. My mom looks to the side and sees a family abundant with many family members 10 or 15 or so and says to us, wow are they so lucky they have such a huge family here with them wouldn’t that be nice”-

– Mother is not looking at ten year old Cali Chica and saying: wow, aren’t I lucky, I have you CC! Cali Chica is sad that her mother is looking over there for happiness, not over here, where CC is. Two decades later, as CC tells the story, her focus is her mother, not herself. The camera in her memories screen is pointed to her mother, not to herself.

Jan 2018: “I always wanted to know – what does it feel like to have a sense of relief – that (aah) feeling. Sure at the end of a yoga class I do feel slightly better, less tense in the muscles, more uplifted. But what does it feel like to take a deep breath in and out and let off some steam and feel a release.. and it makes sense why. Because my baseline has always been suffering and anxiety. I have no idea what it feels like to even come back from vacation and feel ‘lighter, more relaxed, at ease’ (sure some relief from headaches or muscle tension, and 10 percent better mentally but what does it feel like to REALLY FEEL better. Like oh you just got married – wow must be a huge sense of relief.-nope, don’t feel any better just the same (like body is tensely holding onto something unable to let go) ”

– Cali Chica’s life experience has been the same no matter her life happenings and changing circumstances because she has been re- experiencing her mother’s (perceived) life history, a life history told to Cali Chica repeatedly, a story that is in the past, over and done with- no wonder Cali Chica’s life experience doesn’t change with her own changing life circumstances (vacations, marriage, etc..).

CC has been re-experiencing something that never changes because it is a two dimensional story that she heard repeatedly, not something she experienced herself.

(Jan 18): “inability to ever daydream, feel excited about the future – as above the baseline state is tense and not ever relieved, my mind doesn’t fathom anything different“- there it is, CC’s inability to experience anything different from how it feels to re-experience the same old, same old bad story that never changes, never becomes something different.

“We always thought of it as: Mom’s life was so bad, everyone was bad to her, she had this magical childhood and life before she got married and moved here, and it all went downhill because how much others caused her harm.”

– this is the bad Story that CC has been re-experiencing, a story that does not allow a different kind of experience.

“I have been feeling as though my trauma and pain is stuck in my body (body aches, tension, headaches) and no amount of running, yoga, lifestyle changes will release it unless I work on ’emotional trauma release.’ What does that mean exactly?… I am breathing and ‘functioning’ but I am not living.  And I feel it boiling inside me recently – I feel this strong feeling that I want to explode – strong tension in my upper back, my body screaming.”-

– the trauma and pain that is stuck in CC is her own story (not the mother’s story) screaming to be heard, her own muted voice (not the loud mother’s voice) aching to be actualized- In Disney World it is the sadness she experienced. What does it mean, “emotional trauma release”- it means you hear your own voice, experience your own life experience, not your mother’s. That “body screaming”- is your own Voice wanting to tell your Story.

It’s all been about your mother, her alleged and perceived pain and suffering, her childhood, her marriage, even her affair, always her. What about Cali Chica, what about CC’s pain and suffering, childhood, marriage? No space to experience her own life when what is dominant in her brain is her mother’s story.

Your mother’s life has always been a story you heard. Only a story. True, fictional, doesn’t matter.  Wherever you were, what you did, even no-contact, you have been re-experiencing a Story.

“The first thought that comes to mind, is sad – very sad. Something like this: ‘my poor mother suffered a terrible life since she came to America, she dealt with abuse from family and others”- the Story that has kept you from experiencing something different. Notice the focus= mother.

(Still Jan 18): “my poor mother.. and her focus then was me – yes it is toxic and has continued to be in adulthood – but she relies on that so much to the point she cried a month ago when I left .’How could I hurt her like this'”- you only imagined that your mother’s focus was on you. Reality has been that your focus was on her, so much so that no space has been available for you to experience anything other than Her Story.

“The idea of losing her daughter is crippling to her.. when she felt she was ‘losing me’ even over the last year bc of her delusions related to my in laws – she was besides herself”-

-CC’s real-life trauma is the idea of losing her mother. She only imagines it to be the other way around. It is CC who was “besides herself” over the fear of losing her mother, this is why she was so scattered as a child, forgetting things.

“She would likely get our whole extended family involved, maybe even end up hospitalized due to deep despair, hysteria, and psychosis related to the idea of ‘losing me'”-

-This is how desperate in real life CC has been for her mother; she only imagined it was the other way around. After all, fast forward- after a long time of no contact- last I heard, your mother came back from yet another vacation overseas, most recently, from Spain. No despair, hysteria or psychosis (not more than before NC). No hospitalization. No looking for you in the streets on nyc. I don’t think she even wrote and sent you a letter, did she.

“If I wasn’t at a family event she was sad, If I was coming, she would be excited and her whole day would revolve around it… my mother made it her whole life that she ‘needs my help.'”-

-no, it was CC who  was sad when her mother was sad, it was CC who  was excited to see her mother happy. It is CC’s life that revolved around her mother’s sadness and happiness. Not the other way around.

It is CC who  “made it her whole life” to help her mother be happy- so that she can finally be seen and heard by her mother, no longer invisible and mute to her mother.. and to herself.

In your many posts I don’t remember you ever mentioning that as a child you were happy to  see your mother, missing her, wanting to be with her, needing her. You wrote a lot about her being happy to see you, needing you– see, your own voice is mute and you inaccurately project it to your mother.

“My mom was trying to live vicariously through me”- no, it is the other way around. Even long after No-Contact.

Here is how it happened that CC’s own life experience became invisible and mute:

June 2019: “I thought about young Cali Chica, She brought her mother a flower. Mother said: oh I used to have these in India all the time – these flowers.’-

– She made your act of bringing her flowers not about you. She made it about her, her  life in India. Her story.

“(CC) grew up: She brought her mother her new shiny engagement ring, thinking oh yay, my mother will be so happy and proud! Finally I got to the goal she wanted me to, a nice boy, and a nice engagement…Mother replies: oh I too am going to get a new diamond ring…she doesn’t even look at Cali Chica’s…Cali Chica then tries to say, oh you know my fiancé designed this and did this – shows the small details…her mother: not a glance, not a care.”-

– you see, it is not true at all that your mother’s life revolved around you- you were invisible to her. She was blind to you as you interacted with her, made it all about her Story. She didn’t say: I like your choice of flowers, of a ring, of a nice boy. Tell me what you like about these flowers, this man..?

-No, she turned it all around to.. Her Story.

No wonder your focus has been on her story and not on your own life. She made it all about her- no acknowledgement of you as an individual person with your own tastes, feelings, thoughts, motivations, values. Do you see how it is farthest from the truth that her life revolved around you? She didn’t even see you or hear you. (And so, you didn’t see yourself or hear yourself).

“At 22 I recall feeling that ‘breakdown’ and I usually went to my friends for the typical ups and downs – but I remember it was so bad I instantly called my parents. I recall talking to both parents and they said things like: we don’t know what to tell you, ever since you were young you’ve always had a problem. You came out of the womb crying and you continue still. We just don’t know what to do with you. This is too much you’re an adult now. I had totally forgot this until 2 weeks ago, something on TV reminded me and I told my husband and he was horrified.”

cali sister’s recollection of the same event (posted on your own thread, not on hers): “I remember being there when my sister came home and finally opened up to my parents. I remember where I was sitting. I remember feeling tight. Like I wanted to explode. Like I wanted to elicit a stronger response from them… I saw my sister- coming for help. And like she said, all they continued to talk about even after she left was – how she’s always a problem. Never focuses on herself. Always focuses on friends and boys”-

– you wrote “breakdown” inside quotes because you.. didn’t think it was a breakdown since your mother/ parents did not treat it like a breakdown? Is it that the breakdown became invisible because it was not seen as such… Definitely, there was no empathy for you, no visibility of your pain. Cali Chica was dismissed, once again, at 22. Unseen, unheard. Cali Chica’s is dismissed.

In the context of a dismissed CC, her mother’s story became her non-changing, painful life experience, and her mother’s voice is what she hears, not her own.

To experience something different (Accel, is that the word you chose?), it will take speaking your voice, point the camera away from her story and to your real-life experiences of past and present. Have your life center stage in your life, no longer her two dimensional story.

In your posts today you wrote (quotes from here on are from today): “I would return home.. my mother’s face would light up.. My mother’s energy lifted.. .. robotically ‘dumbing’ myself down… we unite.. ROAR at them together”- the focus is on her being happy while you were robotic and dumb. And the “we unite” and “together”- there was just her, no “we”.

“My loyalty and understanding of being a ‘good daughter’ or person perhaps/a righteous one – involves never being those people who are unaware.  I must at all time be so aware of all the pain and suffering in the world, and that others cause us – and vocalize it”-

– this is it: being a good daughter meant that you at all time be so aware of .. her Story. The camera pointed at all times (wherever you are, no matter what is happening in your personal life) to her Story. And what is her Story: her “pain and suffering.. and that others cause (it)”.

Notice, you wrote: “I must at all time be so aware of (her Story).. and vocalize it“- it is her Voice that is vocalizing her Story.

“my mother had troubled relationships with her siblings.. it was the majority of my childhood that was focused on this“- this being your mother’s Story, chapter (whatever): Troubled Relationships with Her Siblings.

“my mother always spoke.. She always said… She would NOT have the luck of having people still flock to her and want her… She would be forgotten. She may even be criticized”

“and then there is US.. We are unable to do this. We would not get away with it”- there never has been an us or a we. There was only her and an invisible, inaudible, robotic you experiencing a two dimensional story that is not yours.

Cali Chica- we have to stop retelling Her two dimensional (and quite fictional)Story and start telling your three dimensional true-life story.

anita