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humor – what do you do to bring it in your life ?

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Viewing 12 posts - 16 through 27 (of 27 total)
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  • #81862
    Sann
    Participant

    Hi Anita,

    Thank you so much for your replies.
    I have actually, in the past, confronted my parents, when i started to realise that these things did cause me some hurt. Especially my mother, i said some very, very harsh things to her (probably the worst things that a child can say to their mother), then i switched the phone off and didn’t take contact for a year or so. Then we had a talk with the therapist in the hospital where i was, and then some on and off contact again (in a bit an awkward way), and a few years later she died. I can’t even dare to start to imagine what that must have been like for her.
    Perhaps i am putting so much emphasis on understanding her, because i still feel guilty for that.
    Almost a year after she died i had another job that didn’t work out, and then i started a day therapy, that was the Linehan, 2 days per week. About half a year into that i became suddenly very suicidal and desperate, i come out of it but i still think that it was all the guild for saying these awful things to her and treating her like that. I couldn’t cope with that.
    So i don’t know, but i think that might be (a part of) the reason that i am so afraid to go really into it, more than just with my mind. I might still be afraid that i will have to deal with these words of mine and not being able to deal with all the self-hatred and self-blame that comes up.

    And also about the dwelling in the past, i do feel that i have said so many times already: this and that is the source of my problems, and it feels like each time the same song. That i should focus more on doing interesting things and learning things, because now it seems that i have almost only that to talk about. But i guess i should find a good therapist, who helps me to EXPERIENCE these things, instead of just talking about it.

    And yes, i want to be too nice, what you say about figuring out my mother’s reasons. I always do that: i want to call other people good and try to only see good things about them. Even though they are assholes i don’t manage to see that. Because i find myself so unimportant and low, that i find it very hard to say: somebody did this to me, i was hurt and that damaged me. I guess you have to be able to give yourself some kind of importance to say that you were treated the wrong way.
    Even when i’m in terrible physical pain or if someone is unkind, unfair to me, i used to just say: oh it’s nothing, and put on a big (forced) smile. I have that less than it used to be but it is so difficult for me to just acknowledge that something is not well for me.

    These several quotes that you take from me, about ‘maybe’ and ‘probably’, might be because i find it hard to take myself so serious, to say: these things damaged me and i need to work with that. Because i still find it hard to respect myself enough to really look after myself. As long as i can keep going, and i am very strong with getting out of bed in the morning and do everything i need to do, and keep pushing myself. As long as i can do that (There are times that i can’t do it at all anymore if i have pushed myself for too long and too hard – and then people probably just say that i’m lazy, but i don’t think it’s laziness at all), i can push away the need to look into myself, and to face that i’m unhappy and breaking down inside, and to look at what i can do to become happy.
    It is still a big drama for me to pay much attention to what happens inside of me. The thing that matters is, how i come across to other people, and yes, am i pleasing other people, am i doing what they expect from me.

    This evening i was feeling terrible again. Now i’m trying to make a little bit of chat at work, but of course it feels awful. I don’t even dare to make eye contact and i feel so extremely clumsy. I feel that it’s so forced and that i’m probably making a fool out of me. Of course it works contrary if i put so much pressure on it.
    I phoned this telephone helpline, that i have phoned a lot in the past already, and i told him also about your suggestions, about this kind of therapy, going into it. And he also suggested that it would be a good idea.
    He adviced a kind of therapy where they work with roleplays, where we would go into situations with family, or also in situations with collueges that feel uncomfortable, and that way learn to relax more with those people.
    I don’t know much about it but i will remember his advice. He seemed to know what he talked about.

    So i won’t write: perhaps i should do that – i always tend to write and talk with these kind of words, which is maybe not good -. But i guess it’s time to look for an other therapist. Also i moved to an other country a few years ago so my contact with my therapist is not always through skype. It might be better to talk with somebody in real life, although she notices quite a lot through skype, it does create more distance.

    So that’s 2 very scary things: i have to talk to my therapist about stopping and i have no idea how to start about that. And then i have to let go of that contact, while i’m not good at letting go of things.
    And second, finding a new therapist. How do you go on about that. Finding someone that fits with me, that i feel good with. I saw one therapist here about 2 years ago, and i remember that i didn’t feel too much confidence in her, maybe i should try her again. I did a quick google, and found someone that looked very qualified, but askes for a big fee, more than i can afford. So should i just go to some random person and see if it works for me, and if he/she can offer me what i look for? Kind of trial and error?
    I don’t know. But i think it’s time to look for some phone numbers and after the weekend call at least somebody, and not keep postponing it…

    Thank you for reading all of this.
    It is all quite scary but i think it’s time to take some steps. Stop avoiding and put a kind of film over myself (don’t know if it makes any sense this expression, it kind of makes sense in my mind…) and trying to change little things about myself.
    Although i don’t know if that is a good thing, for somebody with borderline, but maybe i need to do what i think that i need, and not what some doctors tell me that i can or can’t with my borderline-diagnosis (which is after all, just a diagnosis, and not even a truth. perhaps i have these borderline symptoms because i’m not allowing myself to fully be. does that sound reasonable?)

    #81863
    Anonymous
    Guest

    Dear Sann:

    Your fear about feeling again the intensity of your guilt regarding your past confrontation with her- that fear of the guilt, fear of pain- I understand that fear. Because I have no way of being there for you, holding your hand, walking with you through- I have no right to suggest that you do this or that. You need the support that you need to do the scary things that will be good for you in the long run. You need some support, a relationship with a person who sees you and is able and willing to be there with you enough to … give you the courage to do what needs to be done.

    You do what you can handle, at your own pace, considering the support that you do have. Take as little steps as is reasonable to take considering the amount of fear you are facing and the amount of support you have- or not.

    I have more to say about you and your mother and questions I could ask but I don’t want to because I don’t want to trigger your fear and distress… because I am not there to provide you with the support you need to confront such again, on a deeper level.

    I found it very interesting that you wrote: “I guess you have to be able to give yourself some kind of importance to say that you were treated the wrong way.” I think it is very insightful and something I became more aware of myself recently.

    It was easier for me, personally, to take on the belief that I deserved bad treatment, and therefore received it than to think that my mother meant to hurt me. It was easier for me to believe that she only reacted, automatically reacted to my defectiveness, faultiness then to believe that I was innocent and good as a child and the evil was her action, her initiative, not an automatic reaction.

    I think the reason it was preferrable for me to believe that she didn’t initiate hurting the good little person that I was, is that once I thought of myself as bad, faulty, then there was something I could do to get better treatment: change from bad to good. The alternative, that she was … bad, that she intended to hurt me when I did not deserve it meant there was nothing i could do, no power to make things better. That option meant I was indeed a perfect victim. Taking on the guilt meant I was not a perfect victim, that I had some power.

    Reality is that I was a perfect victim as a child, with her. My delusion helped me survive that time. It had a function. But delusions are helpful only when temporary, as temporary coping mechanism. On the long term, they harm. Healing is about peeling off delusions.

    I suppose I did talk about mothers and guilt after all. I hope this is not too distressing for you, is it? I wonder if I should erase what I just wrote…

    Yes, the diagnoses – Borderline. I assure you it is not something one is born with. It is nothing but a collection of symptoms. The origin of all those diagnoses in the DSM book is HURT and fear in childhood and then it goes on like a snow ball down a mountain, gathering more and more snow, more and more problems, and individuals ending up with individual collections of sympotms to fit in the hundreds of diagnoses (or more.. how many are there at this point…) But the origin is how a parent or parents hurt us.

    In the animal kingdom, the animal knows who the predator is and has no guilt about running away from the predator- or fighting- and the young animal knows safety is with the parent. It is all clear: parent= safety. Predator=danger. Running away from a predator is no problem because the animal doesn’t live with the predator. In humans, where often the parent attacks its own young, child, the child gets all confused: safety=parent. Danger=parent. What the hell?

    Here I am back to mothers and guilt, again. Please go back to my point of dealing with what you are able to deal with, fear and support. I assure you that if you post again here, I WILL respond and as long as I have access to the website I will respond to every one of your posts (if I don’t although having access, I must have missed it somehow, hope not- I will look).

    Regarding what therapy and how you know- when you get together with a therapist- CBT I hope, with DBT and mindfulness (what I had)- i would look for a therapist who will give you an initial free session, who will talk about giving you after a few sessions a written plan with his or her evaluations of where you are and what you need, his or her objectives- how to define success of therapy, all typed up. I would expect a therapist who will give you homework in between sessions, maybe some email communciation in between. I wouldn’t go to one who seems like the only time she remembers you is during the 50 minutes or so you are there. i would need one- like the one I had- that is concerned about me, has a sense of responsibility for her patients or clients, a hard working individual, one that doesn’t apply a magical kind of insight but HARD WORK. Notice how hard- he or she is willing to work for you- or not.

    anita

    #82098
    Sann
    Participant

    Dear Anita,

    Thank you for your reply. I am a bit late in replying – i had actually already written this reply a few days ago, on an other sleepless night, but i felt that because of the sleeplessness, i’d better read it again first, but i’m too tired these days so i’ll just post it now. Even though it’s maybe a bit too long.

    You say that you understand that fear – fear for the guilt and the pain of the things i said to my mother. Did you have something similar? (I assume it is ok to ask you this because you are talking so openly about your things, so i assume that they won’t trigger you.. If it does, please tell me and then ignore my question..)

    You are welcome to write or ask me things if you’d like to, i think i can cope with that 🙂
    If not i will tell you.

    I’m not sure if i understand what you say with this: “That option meant I was indeed a perfect victim. Taking on the guilt meant I was not a perfect victim, that I had some power. ”
    Maybe i’m too tired to think clearly at the moment. I will read it again later when i manage to get some proper sleep.

    I recognise what you write about seeing yourself as faulty, i have perhaps never thought it through as thoroughly as you, but i think that is a normal thing to conclude if you are treated right. As a child, you form your perception of the world, so if people – well especially the ones who have the biggest role in your life, which are usually your parents – treat you like you are unwanted, you go believe that. I feel different than you because i don’t think my mother was bad and she didn’t want to hurt me. She was in too much fight within herself and couldn’t cope with herself. She probably wasn’t ready or able to raise a child but she was not bad.

    Yes it works as a coping mechanism, to make beliefs about yourself at that time. It must be heartbreaking to face each moment of the day, knowing that you are a good, innocent and love-needing and love-deserving child who is being denied this most basic human need. And you can’t change anything for what’s happening to you for a long time, so you end up too frustrated and too bitter if you’ll face it that way the whole time.
    But, that is the time that you learn what life is about, and if nobody ever told you or showed you, that you are good, just like anyone else and deserve love and care just like anyone else, where are you going to learn this?
    People seem to be different, some people/children seem to get more rebellious when they’re not treated right. Me i got into the victim role, and adapting role very easily, trying to become a good little girl that tried not to bother anybody (which i’m still doing for the biggest part, it has become me). So i don’t know, does that have to do with our previous lives (if you believe in reincarnation), that some children seem to have a stronger sense of their worth and rights, and react more powerful when their needs are not being met? Perhaps I learned similar things in my previous lives, that i wasn’t very valuable or perhaps i was living in a lower rang of a society, or perhaps i did some wrong things which i’m paying for now with my reduced power.

    No don’t worry, it is not distressing to talk about it at all. If it was, it is up to me not to reply to it.
    What i meant was, that i just assume that i am staying so at the surface of this, maybe the reason for that is that i am scared to go deeply into these things i once said to her – with a therapist. To write about it on a forum doesn’t touch me too deeply because i’m quite distant from these things inside of me.
    And actually i don’t know if it makes sense, that that is the reason, because if i do decide to look for a therapist to look into these things deeply, it will probably be a slow thing, building up thrust and if it’s a good therapist, he/she will probably also take the time to consider my pace.
    And, as far as i remember, i kept distance from myself, didn’t want to look into these things or couldn’t manage to find myself important enough to go into that process to acknowledge damage that was done to me, and my need for healing.

    You are suggesting me a certain kind of therapy:
    “Regarding what therapy and how you know- when you get together with a therapist- CBT I hope, with DBT and mindfulness (what I had)-”
    And i’m wondering why you say that now. Because earlier on you suggested me to find a therapist who would help me to experience, and feel again the experiences of then, to learn to acknowledge it. And that sounds quite far away from CBT and DBT (i assume that is cognitive behavioral therapy and dialectical behavioral therapy?) – the DBT therapist i have now, doesn’t go much into these things. She mentions it sometimes, but i feel it’s more as a way of explaining why i have such difficulties with certain things, more in an intellectual way.
    So that seems to be a bit of discrepancy, of course you don’t know me and you can’t advise me a certain kind of therapy, but i’m interested to hear why you’re suggesting this.

    It’s interesting that you write this advice about a therapist. To look for somebody who offers more than just the hour every week. My initial reaction is very typical: why would i expect somebody who is willing to occupy his or her time outside of the hour that they get paid? As if i’m so important? And if i do find a therapist, that i think might work, i wouldn’t be so arrogant to think that they are not good enough because they don’t want to spend more time or energy in me outside the pay-hour.
    You wrote this: ” I wouldn’t go to one who seems like the only time she remembers you is during the 50 minutes or so you are there. i would need one- like the one I had- that is concerned about me” So you are saying, you would like a therapist that sees and treats you like a valuable human being, that is important enough to care about during other times as well. I’ve heared other people saying that, and my current therapist is like that actually, and i’m seeing her now 8 or 9 years and i still find it difficult sometimes. Although she keeps insisting that i can always phone her or mail her, and mail her exercises in between sessions, i do it but still find it hard and often with a lot of apologies. Although she has always replied very caring, she almost always respond to my phone calls even when she was on a holiday or very busy (which makes me wonder what kind of superwoman she is), i still find it hard to accept. Hard to accept care for me?
    So, you say you’d want a therapist that treats you like a human being and makes time and effort for you, which is probably what a lot of people want, but for me it is still so scary, to be treated like a human being. It is much easier to be treated like a put-away thing and that’s what i usually look for, people to treat me like that.

    Anyway, i think i’ll take it easy with a new therapist. I will talk about these things with my current therapist, about maybe needing to look into certain things more deeply and about the contact being mainly through skype, and what she thinks about it. And if i/we do decide that it is better to change, than i think i’ll take the time for it. The contact with her is too valuable to just put it away

    #82104
    Anonymous
    Guest

    Dear Sann:

    Following reading only the first three paragraphs of your post: Thank you for your concern that I don’t get triggered by sharing about my mother. It is okay for you to ask and for me to answer honestly. I am afraid of being triggered. I am afraid of the raw feelings I felt before, feelings that were too intense and therefore overwhelmed me and over time severely damaged me, hanging on to my neurons reeking havoc. I am not able, nor do I want to feel that intense fear responsible for so much suffering in my life.

    i will sahre what I can- I will try to keep it short and not elaborate and when feeling uncomfortable, I will stop. I may share from a detached, intellectual viewpoint, perspective so to protect myself, but do not misunderstand: the emotions have been intense and I still fear their intensity.

    Guilt has been persistent in my five decades and caused me immense suffering, guilt about my belief that I had hurt her. In my mind’s eye, I saw her as my victim. I saw her as the innocent little girl that was hurt …by me. The guilt was enormous. she told me of her sad life story repeatedly, how people hurt her throughout her life and still at the present and that I was adding to her pain. She experessed her pain histrionically with intense crying spells, wailing for hours, talking about suicide, threatenting to commit suicide right there and then at times. I split from myself sometime along the way. I didn’t see myself as being hurt. i saw her as the one hurt. Her hurt was all that mattered. I lost myself and didn’t know it until recently. I was sick for five decades, immense suffering. Now I see that although she did suffer, she was not the only one suffering- I SUFFERED TOO. I WAS THERE. And I saw that SHE inflicted suffering on me, NOT THE OTHER WAY AROUND. I found out it was her responsibility to be a good enough parent to me, that it was not my responsibility to ne her parent, that I was not her parent, that i was not the adult, that she was not the child. I was the child.

    And I am getting myself back, that child that I banished for allegedly inflicting massive amounts of pain on her.

    I simply BELIEVED what was not true. As long as I didn’t see the truth, I suffered.

    This is it, now for the rest of your post: I will read it later and post another comment, a couple of hours or so, most likely.
    anita

    #82109
    Anonymous
    Guest

    Dear Sann:

    I will be away from the computer for hours. Will look for same/ new post by you on this thread if you would like to write more, when I return.
    anita

    #82110
    Sann
    Participant

    Thank you Anita.
    Right now i’m an emotional mess because of some other things, so i don’t even mangage to read everything you wrote. Hopefully tomorrow. But then i don’t know if i will have the energy/find the right words to reply immediately. Thank you for being concerned. I’ll reply as soon as i can.

    #82141
    Anonymous
    Guest

    Dear Sann:

    No need to rush with replying as far as I am concerned. In our correspondence here, I do not have the need for help from you. I benefit from our correspondence, but I do not feel any desperation on my end. So, please take your time and respond if and when it is helpful to you to do so…
    anita

    #82186
    James Ng
    Participant

    Sup Sann,

    Don’t stress yourself too much. Everyone has a unique sense of humor, whether it be dry, sarcastic, unintentional, or funny facial expressions (sorry I don’t know the names of all those types of humor). Just like anita said, you just have to relax into yourself and be you.

    You cannot fake it and force humor because then that would be a called a “force of humor”, no pun intended.

    I’m not even sure if I used that correctly, but anyway, what might help is to hang around with funny people or those who are always laughing/saying something stupid. The moment you start to laugh, your thinking stops and any tension disappears. Think about it, no one stresses about any thoughts during times of laughter. Laughter is contagious so you will probably contribute to the laughter naturally without thinking about it.

    Just remember this…Buddha had a belly,
    -James

    #82720
    Sann
    Participant

    Hi, I am sorry for my late reply here. I kept thinking about it, but i was so tired with my work, that i couldn’t find the energy to go into that. I am sorry to hear how much suffering you went through Anita, and how you blamed yourself for all of it. I recognise quite a few things what you write, although i still find it hard to see that it wasn’t my responsability.
    And i still feel guilty most of the time for being around other people, wasting their air and their view. Although i can now see that these are one thought patterns that are strong because i have built them up over so long time, i don’t seem to manage to let go of them for longer than a while.

    When we were writing these posts i was thinking about looking for an other therapist, who could help me to look into all of these feelings. But at the moment i’m just continuin with my therapist in my home country.
    Maybe i feel that there is still a lot to gain for me with DBT, maybe i’m just scared to go into all these things. Because i’m a bit scared, that i wouldn’t know how to cope with it all and how to get out of it.
    Often i just feel like, just stop bothering about those things, and get on with my life, do something useful and open up. Although i already feel, while i’m writing this, that it’s not really going to work, it seems that i’m still in the denial phase. I find it difficult, the idea of going through such and emotional therapy, having no social network where i could find support, and having to be able to manage my job – a very easy job, but when my emotions get out, i can get really messy and unproductive.
    I guess i’ll keep it in the back of my mind, and perhaps i’ll do something with it later.
    Thank you very much for sharing your story with me and for making me think 🙂

    #82721
    Sann
    Participant

    Thanks jng15. I guess you are right.
    These days i am the whole time stressing and worrying about ‘what am i going to say when i am at work, when i see this or that person’, and that makes that i can not be relaxed or real at all. On moments that i do get to relax even a little bit, it’s all ok and i can be funny or whatever (i don’t need to be funny the whole time anyway).
    I need to learn to be in the moment, to be with what i am doing, and then i will be able easily, to know what to say or how to lighten up the situation, in the moment itself, without preparing it.
    It’s difficult because it’s such an automatism, as soon as i’m awake in the morning, my mind is already going to ‘what should i say this morning…’, during breakfast and in the shower and on my bike to work, i’m already making imaginary conversations with whoever i think i might meet during that day (which doesn’t make sense because situations in real life are always different than how we imagine it), and that goes on the whole day. It’s so exhausting. I’ll have to train myself to focus on what is here now and meditate more again – that seems to be the main remedy for most things that come up lately, so you’d wonder why i don’t do it properly..
    And i guess i need to give myself permission to be ‘normal’ , that it is ok to have boring days, where i don’t even know what to say. I am still so much trying to fit into the ‘social norms’ – or what i think the social norms are, that i have to come across intelligent and funny and witty and spontanuous the whole time or i am not good enough for the others… I don’t think that is realistic and that is not what i am.

    Thank you for your contribution 🙂

    #82725
    Anonymous
    Guest

    Dear Sann:

    Your response to me seems reasonable to me: you will keep some things in the back of your mind because you do not have the social support you need to deal with those things now. You do need emotional support from another to deal with such, so I understand. You are welcome and take the best care of yourself in your circumstances.
    anita

    #82889
    Sann
    Participant

    Thank you Anita 🙂
    I will see where the road brings me later on. But in the meantime i am still working with my CBT therapist and trying to get back more into the meditation and mindfulness and that does already a lot for me.
    I am trying to take more care of myself now, of what i think i need, it’s going on and off but at least i’m trying 🙂

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