Dear Cali Chica:

It is clear to me that at this point you need to show your husband that you are very serious about no longer lashing out at him by doing something different, something you didn’t do before, be it taking mood stabilizers and/ or attending psychotherapy. Your Word and intent are not good enough in this regard.

I just took out my folders, I will type “NOTES” every time I copy from my notes. Everything that follows NOTES is writings that were given to me by my therapist 2011-2013, as handouts or as recordings (none of it is my writings or comments). I have the notes on paper, so the copying is reading and typing. I will start with a poem that meant so much to me, you can find it online, but I will type it here for you just as it appears in my notes (it is all about the practice of Mindfulness). Feel free to respond to any and all.

NOTES: Hokusai says (by Roger Keyes)

Hokusai says Look carefully

He says pay attention, notice.

He says keep looking, stay curious.

He says there is no end to seeing.

He says Look Forward to getting old.

He says keep changing,

you  just get more who you really are.

He says get stuck, accept it, repeat yourself

as long as it’s interesting.

He says keep doing what you love.

He says keep praying.

He says every one of us is a child,

every one of us is ancient,

every one of us has a body,

He says every one of us is frightened.

He says every one of us has to find a way to live with fear.

He says everything is alive-

shells, buildings, people, fish, mountains, trees,

Wood is alive.

Water is alive.

Everything has its own life.

Everything lives inside us.

He says live with the world inside you.

He says it doesn’t matter if you draw, or write books.

It doesn’t matter if you saw wood, or catch fish.

It doesn’t matter if you sit at home

and stare at the ants on the verandah or the shadows of the trees

and grasses in your garden.

It matters that you care.

It matters that you feel.

It matters that you notice.

It matters that life lives through you.

Contentment is life living through you.

Joy is life living through you.

Satisfaction and strength

are life living through you.

peace is life living through you.

He says don’t be afraid.

Don’t be afraid.

Look, feel, let life take you by the hand.

Let life live through you.

Dear Cali Chica:

I think the following is from April 2011, A’s handout for me, his words, NOTES:

1. I’d like to outline our treatment plan going forward, get your feedback and see how you might want to change it and how we will proceed.

2. The anxiety and depression you feel, as well as the anger you feel, can all be treated successfully. But it’s important that we work from a good diagnosis.

3. I don’t think this is bipolar disorder. In fact, I think you’ve been voicing that as well, though ultimately I’d like a physician to make an assessment…

4. I believe that how you feel, think, and behave have largely to do with the way you were abused as a child. Your mother left you with a legacy of pain, fear, and emptiness that can seem impossible to overcome. The painful legacy she left matches the depth of the abuse.

5. Yes Anita, I truly believe that this legacy of pain can be overcome (In fact, I believe you began making steps toward this before we even met.)

6. It is sadly all too common that people who grow up with the suffering your experienced learn that it is too risky to trust- to trust even someone you love. And that when love does appear, it must be verified again and again. Does this seem familiar?

7. It’s understandable that, with the abuse you were dealt, you might find it hard to believe that you are worthy of love, or that you may not always feel trust for those who say they love you. Again, your very difficult childhood comes to mind.

8. getting better, feeling better, having better relationships are all possible. But we must be honest: the work that needs to happen is significant. The effort that is needed to help you tolerate and alter the pain, and change the angry or compulsive behaviors takes time and practice. We can go as fast or as slow as you need, but it will not be easy or comfortable some of the time.

9. What makes the work hard is that to survive the abuse you’ve been through you have had to develop survival habits, almost like skills, that assured you would live through the trauma.

10. Now you must unlearn those habits and try new skills. Can you see how this might feel risky? Here are some of the things you must unlearn…

11. For example, you learned to disassociate- to separate yourself from the pain you were going through. That was the only way to bear the pain.. to  separate your body and mind from it.

11a. In therapy you will learn skills to regulate your emotions, to keep them from becoming too intense, and even to tolerate them. You will learn/ know that these intense feelings will pass, and to focus on changing that thoughts that might be making the pain worse.

12. You also learned deep skepticism and distrust of people who say they love you. After all, who loves a child more than its mother? Yet what kind of love did/ could your mother show? So love itself might seem like a dangerous idea to you..

12a. In therapy, you will learn to be in loving relationships, to develop trust and communicate assertively. Your needs are important, how to get them met is a skill set we can all learn more of, and maybe you weren’t given a chance to  learn that well.

14. Finally, to survive, you had to decide that whatever “felt wrong” in the present might be a replay of what happened in the past. Even if the present situation is very different than the past.

14a, in therapy, you’ll  learn skills to make wiser decisions about what is happening, balancing your emotions with your intelligence and your instinct.

15. Are you willing, even a part of you, to learn some new skills to replace the ones above? Are you interested in a new way to see the world?

Dear Cali Chica:

I will now focus on interpersonal relationship skills. Here is a worksheet used in couple therapy, it is called “I WANT- THEY WANT’ ASSESSMENT”- you get one, husband gets one, the two of you fill it in individually/ privately. It consists of four columns. First: “I want & need”, what it is that I want and need in the relationship. Second: “Outcome”/ How well my need is met. Third: what do I think that husband wants and needs from the relationship. Fourth: do I think that he gets his needs and wants met.

After filling these in individually, privately, the two handouts are compared by the two of you (the therapist is there, facilitating this, but I suppose you can do this without a therapist)

Here is a note I wrote on a paper following this exercise (July 2011), it seems to be very relevant to you: “By applying learned and yet to be learned interpersonal skills and other skills, I can detect anger when it starts, communicate it in a non threatening way, avoid escalation into aggressive/ aversive behavior, and in so doing allow (husband) the secure environment he needs to be and become himself”.

Here is a summary I made of a handout A gave me titled “Basic Interpersonal Effectiveness Skills”, it is a copy of a chapter 8 of some book. My summary (July 2011): “The most necessary and important interpersonal skill is assertiveness, which is the ability to 1) Ask for what I want. 2) Say no. 3) Negotiate conflict without damaging the relationship.

Mindful Attention: Relationships require attention. Noticing your own feelings can help you figure out what needs to change in the relationship before you blow up or run away… When you pay attention, you notice trouble coming-  before it overwhelms you, & also gain time to ask clarifying questions that can help you correct misperceptions. You can ask: How are you feeling? How are things between us? I noticed ____, is that accurate?

Passive versus Aggressive Behavior: Long term, passivity is the royal road to interpersonal disaster. When you give in to others & abandon your own needs, it creates frustration & resentment that builds inside of you. Eventually, the relationship becomes so painful that you blow up, collapse into depression, or run away. In comparison, aggressive behaviors also destroy relationships because they push people away.

I Want- They Want Ratio: Every relationship consists of two people trying to get what they need. For relationships to succeed you must be able to do the following: know and say what you desire, Notice or find out what the other person desires, Negotiate & compromise so you can get at least some of what you want, Give what you can of what the other person wants.

Key Interpersonal Skills:

1) Knowing what you want.

2) Asking for what you want in a way that protects the relationship: put your needs into words that are clear, not attacking, and ask for specific behavioral change.

3) Negotiate conflicting wants: start with a clear commitment that there won’t be wines or losers; be willing to compromise so that each person gets some of what he or she wants.

4) Getting information: find out what the other person needs, fears, hopes for, & so on. Don’t falsely assume that you know what the other person wants; avoid projecting your own fears, need & feelings on the other person.

5) Say NO in an assertive style that validates the other person’s needs & desires while setting firm boundaries around what you will or won’t do.

6) Act in your relationships according to what you value.

Exercise: Identify your interpersonal values:

List a behavior that diminish self respect and emotionally damages you or another person…

My values of how people should be treated…

Here is a handout called “Goals and priorities in interpersonal situations”- “Use this sheet to figure out your goals and priorities in any situation that creates a problem for you such as ones where 1) your rights and wishes are not being respected 2) You want someone to do or change something r give you something 3) you want or need to say no or resist pressure to  do something 4) you want to get your position or point of view taken seriously and 5) there is conflict with another person…

Prompting Event: .. who did what to whom? What led up to what? What is it about the situation that is a problem for me?

My WANTS and DESIRES in this situation; OBJECTIVES: what specific results do I want? What changes do I want the person to make?

RELATIONSHIP: How do I want the other person to feel about me after the interaction?

SELF RESPECT: How do I want to feel about myself after the interaction?…”

You fill one form per situation.

* Here is some work on Core Beliefs I did September 2011 my writing: “Negative, False, Unrealistic Core Beliefs: 1) Intimacy is bad, dangerous thing and should be avoided. Attachment & empathy cause pain and fear. Detachment and indifference will prevent pain and will protect me”.. 6) Other people are the enemy: they will reject me and hurt me. Can’t trust anybody. Nobody wants me for me, only for what I can do for them, or what they can get out of me.”

I am done with copying notes and such for today.

anita

Dear Cali Chica:

So much material. When I copied notes regarding interpersonal skills, an amazingly similar thought about you occurred to me, similar to what you expressed here: “being that I am engaging ‘social butterfly’ I was tricked into believing I have excellent interpersonal skills. Yes, I do- when it comes to certain things”, it occurred to me how lacking your interpersonal skills are in the context of your marriage.

It also occurred to me as I typed the notes, how not assertive you are with people, this is why you lash out. I figure a lot of your social butterfly activities are not what you really want to do. So you do and do and then explode.

I am exhausted reading some of my many, many notes, folders and folders. Most after therapy. Regarding my therapist, I remember that I asked him about online therapy while being in a different state than California and he said he is not permitted to do that,  except if I lived in CA and went on vacation to another state of country. Which happened, I was out of the country and continued online therapy with him (free of charge). But since I reside in another state, he can’t be my online/ phone therapist.

anita