Dear Anita,

Hi there – how have you been? Firstly I would like to say thank you for your support towards me via Tiny Buddha over the past three months. Since December you have been so consistent with following my progress and continuing to communicate with me and share your insight and experiences – it has really helped me a lot. In all of my medical assessments I have stated the fact that using Tiny Buddha has been helping me to manage my emotions and understand them better, and I think you should be really proud knowing that you help others on a daily basis.  When I scroll through the topics, I see your name on nearly almost all of them, as the person who has last commented. To put so much time and effort in to understanding other people’s situations and lives, and taking so much time to reply in depth is so, so selfless and helps people more than you realise. Thank you so much.

In response to your last message: Yes, being a promoter/ doing the music gigs has given me a way to be able to form healthy connections and relationships with people through that. When I was at uni, up until I did the music gigs, I used to see club/ gig environments as being quite hostile environments. Whereas since doing the gigs I have been able to create a really open, friendly environment which is needed. And to approach bands, artists, promoters, venues with a respectful, open approach which has gotten me quite far. I have a lot of gigs lined up until July, and more opportunities continue to present themselves to me.

What is difficult for a child who has been betrayed, is this: (from my experience). When my emotions as a child were mistreated so ruthlessly, I began to lose hope and faith in that happiness. My parents would make me apologise profoundly for things that I hadn’t done, they would retract their love, and make me and my sister beg for their love again. It made us both feel that happiness, and love would never be returned. We grew up watching a relationship where 2 individuals were so co-dependent on each other, that they focused all of their energy and time on each other. I think this is why me and my sister struggle with interpersonal relationships and put all of our time and focus on our significant other.

Me and my sister also realised that because we grew up watching a relationship with no love whatsoever, I think deep down we had the desire to fix that and to create a relationship with an overwhelming amount of love. Which would also explain why we are so intense with our SO’s. And when we feel rejected by the SO, we return to that state we felt as a child, of feeling abandoned/ end of the world/ happiness will never return.

I am trying to learn and practice more and more to be present in every moment and to feel emotionally stable when not with a SO, or when doing things by myself etc. It is going to be hard to unlearn that not every moment needs to be lived in fear of rejection and abandonment, but I am trying my best.

In terms of my life now: I am currently on annual leave, for another week I believe. I had an occupational health appointment, and a phased return to work is going to be in place – so I work 50% of what I was doing, then 75% and then 100% again in time. This will be good for me to practice having that emotionally stability on shift, and to gradually build that up more and more.

I have a medical assessment on 4th April – to try and pinpoint a diagnosis for my mental health. I hope this to be progressive. My sister has been diagnosed with both bpd and ptsd, and I have an inclining that I experience some of those traits.

In the past month I have developed a relationship with a guy – we shall call him Noel. We talk openly about emotions and he has fast become one of my closest friends. The friendship is romantic also. Noel is very inwards, lacks self belief and is extremely humble. Sometimes I feel as though I have never met anyone with a more beautiful soul.

I hung out with Noel last weekend, Friday – Monday. It is strange, because of how much I feel when I am around him, it is almost overbearing, and sometimes I feel like a child again. I am Noels first relationship, so I guess he may find it difficult having a first relationship with someone who can be emotional unstable. We had a misunderstanding on the Monday before I left, which snowballed in to quite an emotionally extreme situation for me. I saw him yesterday and we talked through our emotions together, and got the trust back/ got things back to how they were.

He is scared because he is so used to self-doubt. Although I seem to bring out more confidence in him. It has been difficult because he tends to retreat if something happens with us, and at points he has said that he doesn’t know if he is emotionally ready (despite showing me that he is). It was a long emotional conversation, but he found the bravery to say that he loved me, and that he wanted to work through things and for things to be good with us.

I am aware that he is super sensitive and fragile. Mainly due to going through school, college, uni being extremely shy, humble and lacking in self belief/ confidence. He has said to me that he appreciates my encouragement and would like me to continue encouraging him to step outside his comfort zone. I am very aware that this relationship needs to be treated with a lot of mindfulness and consideration, and so it’s important that both of us do have a lot of space away from each other, and to treat every conversation with consideration.

It has been a lot. I guess there is a fear that Noel will retract and suddenly abandon me. But over the weekend that I spent with him, the number 44 kept appearing. I showed him this and he was in awe and was outstanded when it kept showing itself. At the beginning of the weekend I said “okay, so if we see the number 444 this weekend, it means that we are on the right track” – low and behold, on the Sunday, I checked my phone when I was with him and the time was “4.44”. I showed him as soon as I saw it and he couldn’t believe it.

When we had our misunderstanding, I was in 2 minds about seeing him and trying to fix things, but I kept seeing 44 that day and so I went and fixed things. During writing this explanation I looked at the time and it was 9.44 too.

I can only hope that with patience, mutual consideration and understanding, that our relationship continues to grow and blossom.

I plan on remaining true to myself/ open/ working on feeling secure by myself/ in my life and treating my relationship with Noel as secondary and with a lot of mindfulness.

I am moving to Bristol this coming Saturday.

Cat

Dear Anita,

You’re welcome. I think it takes a lot of strength to be able to step back from a situation/ step back from emotions and see things more clearly. I think this is something that you are really good at. Too often I get devoured by a feeling – be it panic, despair, sadness etc. I find that coming on here and explaining things to you really helps me to remember the bigger picture and to remember the positive things, even when things seem like there is no way out.

I am now currently in Bristol, sat here in my new bed, typing away. Last weekend was insanely busy. I put on a gig in Bath on the Friday, packed and moved to Bristol on the Saturday, and then played a gig in Bath on the Sunday. After that I took a few days out to catch up on sleep.

Right now, I feel quite scared/ overwhelmed. I had an occupational health appointment a few weeks ago – and t was agreed between me and the Dr that when I go back to work I’d be doing a phased return – doing 50% of my shifts, then 75%, and eventually going back to full time. My manager advised me to stay off work until after my move, so I had enough time to do that, and said that I’d still be getting full pay and not to worry about that.

I spoke to him yesterday, and he said that HR have said that when I go back, doing 50% of my shifts, I’d only be getting paid half my wage. I explained that this wasn’t enough for me to live off of. So the only option was to cut down my phasing time. Now I’m only going to be doing one week at 50%, one week at 75%, and then back to full time – just so I can make ends meet. I’m going back to work today (I was informed all of this yesterday). I got the call yesterday morning, and I nearly had a panic attack about it all. I tried calling my sister but she did not answer, then I tried calling Noel and he didn’t answer. I managed to speak to my friend Fran which made me feel better. I just needed to hear a friendly voice.

Thank you for your offer, and yes please I think I do need the guidance with Noel. There’s a lot of care there, and I encourage him and motivate him all the time and supported him to a health appointment too. When I didn’t receive any support yesterday I did feel disappointed. He messaged me in the evening but I felt too upset. I told him how I felt this morning about being disappointed. But then apologised and said its because I’m scared. This is true – I tend to procrastinate and stay in bed, or have a cigarette because the idea of showering, going to work etc. is super super scary.

I’m going to try and motivate myself to do this now.

Cat

Dear Anita,

Apologies for the delay in my replies. If I’m being honest, most of the time I am spending my time messaging my friends, and giving them support, about their own emotional problems via facebook. I have spent the past 2 days – literally. Sending a lot of messages, having a lot of phone calls in order to try and sort out a situation between my two friends who are in a relationship. Tonight I also got a message from my sister saying she was really low etc. (again). I tried to remain calm (I have taken alot of influence from how you interact with me) – and I tried to remain professional an support her that way. She is safe and we are going to talk on the phone in the morning. I will try and remain logical and rational, and offer her a plan of action if she is ready.

I have realised tonight how much time I spend supporting my friends and sister, and this is something that I am learning to organise/manage/drive/plan well (I am struggling to find the right word – because the emotional and spiritual support that I give is 100% self-directed, and 100% from my own heart/mind. For some reason I feel like my honesty and ability to empathise with others really helps people, and is a gift that I can give to others). Such as yourself, and the spiritual work that you do here on Tiny Buddha.

I have actually learnt a lot from our interactions. And over the past few months I have found that being open, honest – taking time to understand and empathise, and to step back from situations without judgement, has allowed me to fix relationships in my life, and also allowed me to form healthy relationships with people too. Thank YOU Anita – I have learnt this skill from you, your kindness, understanding and patience.

You have helped me to change my life. (I had a tear of happiness whilst writing this).

Going back to your earlier message. In the past couple weeks or so, I have found myself being able to separate myself from my feelings/ emotions and not being devoured. I have begun to recognise more and more my thoughts/ feelings in the moment and to remind myself of what I am doing in the PRESENT – such as getting a bus to work. I remove my focus from the thought/ feeling and focus purely on the present moment – standing outside, watching the people walk by, the physical feeling of being in my body etc.

When you talk about being ‘devoured’ – you say that you were ‘too scared to do what needed to be done’. – what exactly are you referring to here? What was it that was needed to be done??

I have begun the ability to find that calm place, as you have talked about 🙂 progress is very much being made.

As for Noel – he is also a very patient, open person, and if anything arises, we talk through it afterwards. We are very much in love and we both love and appreciate each other alot. I feel very lucky to have been blessed with such a loving, caring relationship, that is founded and grounded in such openness and honesty.

For now, I am managing. Tomorrow I need to talk to my sister and continue unpacking my room.

Thank you for being a positive influence in my life,

Cat

Dear Anita,

Thank you for explaining that – I understand now. And yes, I can empathise here completely – I guess in my situations the things that I’ve needed to do is – to remove myself away from harmful people who aren’t good for me (such as Clarence), move out ASAP, and start putting my own health and wellbeing before trying to support others/ fix other peoples problems (!) – This is something I am only just starting to recognise, and act upon.

Do you think – that throughout your life, and these situations – that maybe you didn’t act upon these things at the time, because you weren’t fully aware of the harmful impacts they were having?? There must be so many reasons why people stay in certain situations – abusive relationships, drug addictions, toxic friendships etc. – I guess this could come from a lack of awareness of how sacred our emotions are? And how every situation has an impact? Or not having knowledge that we deserve better – that we deserve to look after ourselves/ protect ourselves etc.

Were you okay after the car crash?!

It is interesting gaining more insight in to your experiences, as the image that I have of you continues to build. At the moment, the image I have of you, is of being a very thoughtful/ contemplative/ considerate woman, sat at a table and looking out at the garden, watching her dog whilst contemplating. (Because before you have mentioned your dog). I also get the impression that something spiritually and emotionally monumental happened to yourself at a young age too, and I feel as though this may be the reason you are able to discuss and empathise with people and their emotional journeys so well (in the same way that I do).

In response to your question: I guess I am referring to that calm, rational tone – that I’ve needed to learn to do for my own job (support work) and that I’ve heard from other people when I phone suicide helplines/ domestic violence helplines etc. As because she’s my sister, it’s easy for me to get emotionally involved, and talk to her from a place of emotion, rather than logic. If that makes sense??

This weekend I spent a long time trying to understand two of my friends who had a miscommunication. Yesterday I was too emotionally drained to talk to my sister. I will do at some point today. It can get tiring seeing the same situation with her wife occur again and again and again, and me giving the same advice – but alas, all I can do is remain logical/ rational and hope that one day she can see for herself that the relationship is unhealthy, abusive, and love herself enough to take the necessary steps to leave.

It is very difficult to watch though. To feel like you want to hand someone their self-worth, self-love, but to know that it can only be given to them by themselves. She is doing alot of self-analysis and realising a lot about herself and her past behaviours though. I hope that this continues and that I can be as good of an influence as I can.

It’s nearly 6am here in England. I am just having a coffee before getting ready for work. For some reason I was inspired to get up a bit earlier and write out some emotionally intelligent/ helpful messages to my friends, and replying to you before starting my day – feels great!

Sending spiritual solidarity to you,

Cat

Anita,

I can’t write everything out right now but I need some immediate guidance.

I’ve had a massive breakdown in Bristol. Last week I was not eating, sleeping, drinking recklessly and starting fights.
I attacked a girl on a night out, and now I’ve lost Noel.

Everything happened so fast and so quickly. I’ve been trying to apologise for everything.

Noel said he needed space but I was too manic and intense and didn’t give him that space and kept messaging, and I was mean, and he’s not even staying in his house cus he’s scared of me :'( It’s really really really bad.

We talked on the phone yesterday and I was trying to explain everything that happened and why it happened etc. but he had a go at me and said he didn’t want to talk, and he only phoned to say that he needed space. Then said that I didn’t understand his mental health and that I don’t care about hurting him, and that it wasn’t going to work :'( :'( :'(

He knows how special he is to me, and he knows that he’s the only person who has managed to touch my heart in the way that he has, and I’ve told him that he is the love of my life :'(

I’m in despair Anita. What we had was so innocent and beautiful, and now it’s gone and I can’t do anything to change that.

Cat

Dear anita,

i cant explain everything right now, but i’ve had a mental breakdown in Bristol.

I didnt eat or sleep for 2 days, abused alcohol. I attacked a girl on a night out and lost Noel.

I was mean to Noel on the phone and called him names.
I didnt know what I was doing, and next day tried to fix things but he said he needed space.
I’ve been too manic and trying to fix things so I went to his house, been messaging, calling frantically etc because I’ve been having a breakdown.

We spoke on the phone last night, and I tried apologising and telling him how much he means to me, but he said he only called to tell me that he needs space. Then he said I don’t care about hurting him cus he needs space, and that I don’t understand his anxiety. And he said it wasn’t going to work and that he didn’t want to be my boyfriend anymore.

I’m so upset because he has an image of me in his head of a person that I’m not, and I’ve been trying to fix that.

I’ve ruined everything, and it sucks so much because before last week we were good. we were beautiful, and we said that we were in love with each other on the phone :'( :'( we were so respectful to each other, and now it’s all gone :'(

Cat