Dear Elise:

In my previous post to you I explained that when children feel distressing feelings (fear, anger, shame, etc.) too intensely, they disconnect or disassociate from the intense feelings. Another way to explain it is that when children feel distressing emotions (another word for feelings)  too intensely, they automatically repress those emotions, that is push them down, or push them away from awareness.

Emotions are Energy-in-Motion,  When pushed down, they don’t stay down because by nature, they are always in motion. Being in  motion they affect how we think and behave.

When we repress intense emotions, we no longer remember them, and therefore, we are surprised and confused when we think and behave certain ways, not understanding why.. feeling like we are weird and bad..

The solution is to reconnect to the emotions we disconnected from; to re-associate with the emotions we disassociated from; to bring back to our awareness the emotions we repressed/ pushed away from our awareness. When we do that, we have a clear picture of ourselves, we understand what motivates us, we understand what brought about certain thoughts and behaviors.

When we understand ourselves, we are no longer weird in our own minds. It is to avoid or continue to avoid behaviors that are harmful to ourselves and/ or to others, and proceed in the healing process.

Post again anytime.

anita

* Dear Ana Marie:

“I was punished and beaten almost weekly, much fighting between my parents almost daily. That was my life for 16 years. That was my normal”, you shared.

When you told your therapist the other day that you realized that for the last 16 years “the underlying emotion for me has been FEAR!!”, she asked you “why”?- did she not know of your 16 years childhood experience of being beaten etc.?

anita

* Dear Ana Marie:

If you want, you can start your own thread by clicking FORUMS at the top, choosing one of the Categories listed, then scrolling down the page to the empty boxes, and type there. I will be glad to communicate with you further in your new thread.

anita