Dear Linarra:

In my 6 years of daily communication with thousands of members, discussing childhoods and mothers with hundreds, I came across one mother who seemed similar to mine, and then came you, with a mother that seems identical to mine: every behavior that you described in regard to your mother is also true regarding mine. This is an extraordinary resemblance, which is the reason I am posting to you today, five days following your last post on this thread.

I am posting today so to process my own experience a bit further, with the thought that maybe this post will be of some positive value to you. I want to note that I noticed your strong care-taking inclination, and I really don’t want you to take care of me here, in the context of this post (in such ways as responding to each and every thing I share, expressing empathy for me, cheerleading me, etc.), so please don’t. Also, you are welcome to ignore this post, to stop reading it at any time if the content distresses you, if it bores you, and/ or for whatever other reason. I am okay if you respond to any part of it, and I am okay if you don’t respond to it all. In the post I will quote you and then, I will share my thoughts:

On July 29, you wrote: “Unfortunately.. My mother has been acting up, verbally abusing me actively again. She went as far as actually hitting me yesterday. Nothing too worrying, I was able to protect myself well enough and she stopped… My siblings aren’t coping very well, I’m worried about them. I’m doing well enough all things considered but I’m looking forward to the moment she’ll move on from her crisis and stop jumping me every time our path cross“-
-Your mother verbally abused you and hit you Wednesday July 28, and you posted the above the day after, Thursday July 29, while she was still in the mood of jumping you every time your paths crossed. Yet, notice how calm you sound, so well adjusted to her abusive, violent behavior, more adjusted than your siblings who “aren’t coping very well”. And notice:  you were looking forward not to the moment that your mother will no longer be living with you and your siblings- but for the moment that she will stop jumping you every time your paths cross within the household, while living with you.

It occurred to me as I read this quote a week ago that your best coping is within the household, living with your mother- this is where your excellence is. By excellence I mean your excellent adjustment to abuse/ coping with abuse, and living with a sense of meaning and power. It seems to me that the abuse itself provides you meaning and gives you a sense of power: you are the strongest in the context of your abusive household. It is outside the household where you are not coping well, where you feel no meaning and no power.

On July 30, you shared more about the excellence I referred to above, it almost feels as if you are comfortable living with your mother, not motivated and not in a rush to live without your mother:  “I am used to her aggressions and I am enough in control of my emotions.. I don’t feel much like seeking therapy. I do not necessarily feel in a hurry… I don’t feel in a rush, personally…  I am having normal reactions (being tired and having less energy) to abnormal situations (being abused). I’m not retraumatized, I am more jaded“.

Evidence of your excellence as well are your very well-structured, grammatically correct, thoughtful, attentive, logical, smoothly-written posts from the very first to the last, evident of calm, organized thinking done while living with an abusive mother, never knowing when she will attack you or your siblings next. (I read from anxious members who tend to write run-on sentences in one very long paragraph, with no attention to grammar, lots of misspelled words, hard to follow logic, etc.).

You and I share the following reactions to our very similar mothers, some of which are no longer true to me, partly or wholly: (1) we both zoned out (“I chose to escape and not suffer.. by zoning out“), (2) we both developed wonderful inner worlds (“My inner world has been everything during most of my life, I relied on it a lot. I had the conversations I couldn’t have outside… I found joy inside my own head“), (3) we both suffered difficulties processing information (“I have a hard time listening and gathering information.. or be able to process/ react accordingly. It makes me slow, and more anxious“), (4) we were both depressed and seemed lazy (“For my seemingly depressive phases.. I feel like sleeping/ resting despite having just woken up in the morning… My low energy/ motivation seems like laziness“) (5) We both preferred to be alone and were alone as much of the time  (“Most of the time I’m alone and I like that“), (6) When motivated, we were both overly focused on one activity, feeling a great frustration with the idea of stopping the activity and focusing on something else (“when I’m able to be on a motivated/ productive phase, I feel frustrated to stop and focus on something else. I can be very obsessive when I am in a good work dynamic“), (7) We both found joy in creative writing (“What saved me during my darkest times.. is creativity. I love writing… It makes  me happy, stimulated, and my love for it always gave my life meaning when nothing else could“), (8) We are both inclined to analyze people’s behaviors  (“From quite early in my youth, I valued analyses.. I was very intrigued and craved an understanding of people“), (9) We both became unlike her, not loud, not confident, but quiet (“She’s so loud, so confident. I’m so quiet“) (10) We both believed that we do not have the right to enforce physical boundaries (saying No to being touched, etc.) because we don’t want to hurt the feelings of the people who.. seem to need to touch us;  our empathy being with those who want to use us as objects for their pleasure (“I have difficulties making my boundaries be respected without feeling like I am a bad person who’s hurting friends who are just craving intimacy. I don’t like being used as an object.. too many people..  who feel lonely seemed to use me as an object.. one of my hurtful beliefs is I feel like my own boundaries could possibly hurt someone else.. my empathy (is) for others“).

My last note in this post is in regard to what makes our mothers so unique: it is in their desire to possess us completely, in each and every way. Their parenting mission is to own, or possess our thoughts, our feelings, our perceptions, our understandings, our words, our actions, our friends, our associations with others, out  minds, hearts and bodies… our everything.

You wrote: “Her touches don’t have sexual intents, she just doesn’t want to understand I don’t want her anywhere my ass, pubis or any sexual organs for that matter, playfully or not, affectionately or not“- if I am to project my mother into yours, I would say: her touching is not about sex, it is about her desire to possess you in every way possible.

This is the end of this post. If you would like to talk to me about any of these things, if you want to ask me questions, I am here. Otherwise, I wish you well.

anita

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