When your past as a child, follows you as a mother, as a person.

[Copabanana]

Copa, I wanted to say how very proud I am of you. I am so happy for you. You said that M was enthusiastic...how did you feel?

At first I felt like I could not get out of there fast enough.

It seems what he wanted was attention.

It actually kind of felt like a date. We each seemed more attractive to the other. He looked so handsome. (I do not know how I looked, but he looked happy with me.) We laughed, even. Almost flirty.

I guess I am saying is that our moods got lighter.

I think just my being there made him feel appreciated. Excited to work, not burdened by it.

And I was glad to be with him. He seemed happy.

I think he wants me to treasure him. To cherish him. To want him. And to value him. To appreciate him.

I think he is tired too, of everything being so hard.

He is such a good man. At least I hope he is. I will be disappointed if he leaves next week.

COPA

 

[New Leaf]

Hi Cedar and all.

Cedar, I read through your post and will respond shortly.

I want to tell you guys that I did leave the house at 11 am, brought M his lunch and coffee, helped him make decisions. He was a changed man. Enthusiastic. I did not return to the house until 4 pm, doing errands the rest of the times.

Thank you,

COPA

Bravo Copa, bravo, what a day you have had!

I am sitting at my dermatologists office waiting to get my ear checked (squamous cell spot cut out three months ago) and probably have him freeze off some barnacles (dry scaly spots, keratoses he says) on my face.
He loves that, with his telescopic goggles, gloves, and cylinder of pain in hand, nitro, he says, let's just freeze that spot off.

That is what I get from years of tropical sun exposure, way before sunscreen was even invented. Remember Coppertone (tan don't burn) and baby oil mixed with iodine? High school years spent literally baking in the sun?

I am paying for it now, with my "old broad" dark spots, wrinkles and scaly areas here and there that need to be frozen off by Doctor Freeze.Talk about aged and decrepit!

Thank you for your post, Copa. It is reassuring to know that others understand the impact our childhood experiences have on us.

My sister won't allow me to speak of the past and how it has influenced me. She won't acknowledge that it has anything to do with what makes me, me. Would she object to me speaking of the good things I recall? If good things help build our character, how is it that the bad memories mean nothing?
Her acknowledgement does matter, and it does not. If she did acknowledge it, we would have a better relationship. I could be so much more open with her. She won't, so I will now and in the future, keep the subject closed altogether when speaking with her.

I have proof by my own experience, several articles written by psychologists and my new cyber friends here, that our childhood experiences do play a large part in shaping us. The articles I speak of are about siblings bullying, and how the effects of said bullying can be devastating, even long lasting to the victim. As opposed to schoolyard bullying, a child bullied at home has no safe place to go to. Reading this was sort of a vindication for me while at the same time I was like "Well duh! Of course being bullied at home is a horrible thing, could have told you that." These are recent studies, the explanation being that sibling rivalry was thought of as a normal thing, a way for children to figure out how to make their way in the world. Hhhmmmppphhh. So, nobody really took the time to study it, only now that the subject of bullying is so widely read?

The fact that you are broaching this, to try to understand the cycle you are in, to rise above it, is a major breakthrough.
I think you are being way too hard on yourself, Copa, for saving yourself where your family is concerned.

We should not be punishing ourselves. Our childhoods have "punished" us enough for one entire lifetime already. We are nice people. In fact, very nice people.

Yes, such nice people! Stop the punishing, so NOT deserved.

We all seem to make our own "cages".

Yes, Feeling we do create our own cages.

I agree with Cedar about loving yourself enough to leave the security of your safe haven.

I agree as well Copa, and by your post today, I can see that you have made that effort. YAY!

Maybe there will be something you can learn from M, Copa. Mosaic tiling, maybe. Unless I chicken out, I am going to tile our bathroom here next year.

I would like to try tiling as well. It does not look that difficult, but I do not want to turn my bathroom into a "Pinterest failure".

He brought up how impossible it is with the computer clicking all the time when he is in bed with me.

M says if I restricted the computer to 2 hours a day he would feel good. He thinks his rival is the computer

husband is upset with me too, for being on the computer.

Funny you both should mention this, my Hubs considers the computer his rival as well. In my defense, he does not like to talk, and certainly does not like to hash things over. So, I plead the need for communication and understanding, to get what has happened with our G-F-G's out. Sometimes I will stay up very late on my computer, and I will suddenly feel a presence lurking beside me, it is the Hubs, frowning at me, I call him the "dark shadow", sneaking up on me like that.

I am so mad at myself. Too buoy up my mood and to pass the time (in bed) I buy stuff online.

I am an Amazon shopper. My Mom taught us the "joy of shopping" or as Sister would say "shopping therapy". Consumerism has got us all by the pockets, convincing us if we have this or that, we will all be so content. Now, we don't even have to leave the privacy of our homes to shop-dangerous!

As I have aged I have become decrepit: My eyes are bad. My hearing is bad. I have arthritis. You already know my other ailments.

I have phobias. I am afraid of freeways. Of big rig trucks. I am afraid of heights.

Sometimes I cannot make it to the toilet in time.

I have to look for the elevator if I am in a subway or airport. This will really affect me in NY.

All of these things eat at my confidence. They reinforce my fear. I am not saying I cannot do it or I will not. But it all gets rolled up together. No wonder it has been hard to get going.

The age thing. Ugh. Before my aches and pains and arthritis came along, I used to picture myself in my minds eye as 35-ish, until my reflection snapped me out of it. "MOM?" Oh crap, that's me in the mirror!
I went through a period of weight gain. I just got more miserable, more sore. Then I said, heck with it, I am sore anyway, I am going to exercise and have something to be sore about! So, I did. I ended up going back to canoe paddling, I was coaching kids, so why not? I ended up with baby steps then going all the way, training, jogging, swimming, and crossing the Molokai channel with 20 and 30 year old women. I missed this year due to a stubborn ear infection, but hope to be able to cross again September 2016. It turned out to be a godsend, not making it this year, the race was cancelled due to rough conditions, stranding 700 or so women on Molokai. Not able to paddle the 41 miles to Oahu, they had to fork out additional bucks for a plane.

I hate freeways and big rigs. I remember long ago, driving in L.A., my hands tightly wrapped the steering wheel in a death grip. It was the same driving on our recent trip, freeways in Hawaii barely top 55, on the East Coast people are doing 80, and can be very aggressive in their driving. My poor children, I had my girl switch her phone-talking GPS on, we called her "Glinda". Trouble is, Glinda got a little confused sometimes, and she doesn't know that certain off ramps are actually on-off ramps, folks are trying to get on the freeway in the same lane we were trying to exit.The folks that designed that one must have stock in auto body repair.
I am convinced that there should be a talking GPS app especially for people my age, instead of "Exit right in 30 feet" in a robot like voice it would say, "Now honey, be prepared for this next exit, as people are trying to enter, and have your passengers be on the lookout to help you, because holy *&%# it can be scary, and by the way your exit is really curvy so slow the heck down!" Her name would be "Maaatha" or "Gertrude" and she would have an East Coast accent.

I don't know if you can call fear of driving a phobia Copa, it can be crazy out there.

The Hubs has road rage from the passengers seat, I won't let him drive me, because he is an offensive driver, dodging in and out like he was Mario Andrade or something. I do not like sitting in the passengers seat pressing the imaginary brake while my fingernails dig into the upholstery.
So he sits as I drive, making acidic remarks on how idiotic this or that other car maneuver was. Commenting on my "granny driving", trying to make me bend to his will with corner of my eyesight miniature finger movements, pointing left or right. I can feel his blood pressure rising and I have to "create the bubble" so as not to absorb the tension of it. I tell him that no matter what he says I am in control, steering wheel, gas pedal and brake. Then I laugh an evil laugh "Buwaaaahaaahaa".

Heights is a whole different realm for me. I do not like them. I am convinced that was inculcated in me as a young child. My father, brother and sister climbed up a metal observation tower, as my mother nervously watched, carrying my little sister as a babe, while repeating to me in a sort of incantation,"That is waaaaay too high for you, you cannot go with them." I learned heights were BAD. I found later that in high places I was mesmerized and drawn to the ground, and would concoct all kinds of imaginings that if I fell (jumped?) I would somehow survive.

Not making it to the toilet in time- boy, after five kids, a sneeze, cough or sudden laugh, well you know the rest. There are panty liners and products for that my friend.

I have always been struck dizzy in high places. Any high place, even a stairway. I was certain it was something anxiety related. I beat myself up mercilessly. Then? I realized the dizziness is a result of sinus and inner ear problems.

Logical people with inner ear balance issues related to chronic sinus problems having to do with allergic response

I, too have sinus problems. Misery. Hearing loss-What did you say? Tinnitus, CONSTANT ringing in the ear. I should write a symphony to it. I have had to ignore it, if I focused on it I would surely go mad.

You know, Cedar, besides the deterioration in my hearing, I have bad sinus too. And about 20 years ago I had Labyrinthitis.

Labyrinthitis, I had to look that one up. I envisioned David Bowie as I read it, remembering an old movie he acted in (Labyrinth). I wonder if that is what I had this summer past, an inner ear infection that would not go away. Two rounds of antibiotics, no swimming. ugh.

I have an appointment with the ENT practice the first week in November. I will be curious to see what they find.

I went to an ENT this summer, I wanted to know if my ear infection was connected to my outer ear squamous spot.(Mom kind of put that in my mind-"Is it the same ear you had the cancer?" ) Nope, said the doctor. She did tell me by the CAT scan results I have had chronic sinusitis. Constant sinus headaches had confirmed that for me years ago. I have been on allergy medications and nose spray forever, which she told me to continue. "Isn't that bad for me?" I queried. She didn't think so, but I wonder about sudafed, because they make crystal meth from it.......

Health issues will always be there for me, as I grow older, more challenges. I am thankful for being blessed with reasonably good health in my youth. Surfing, body surfing and paddling were my escape and joy.
My doctor tells me after a hip problem that I have to learn what I can and can't do. Maybe no more jogging, okay walking? When I am sore and have inflammation, I take it easier, finding that when I am swollen, I get injured more readily. I guess it is all about making adjustments as our bodies age. The saying is true, body in motion, stays in motion. Once we stop moving, it is hard to get movement back. I would try yoga, but never was able to sit criss cross apple sauce. My hip joints just don't go that way.

Our physical mobility is important. Exercise, exertion creates endorphins, a greater sense of well-being. I find walking in the early morning hours to be soothing, a time to sort things out in my mind. I take a big walking stick with me, it is amazing how cars that once zoomed by so frighteningly close (some areas I walk have no sidewalks) veer far, far away when I have my big stick. Power-ROAR.

I cannot control the way others choose to see, or what they choose to do, or how they justify it. I learned and was able to accept, down where we don't have words, that what motivates other people is just what motivates other people. It was after that, that I could trace where I was holding myself in contempt, and how that all went together, and clear it.

I am often quite amazed at how people seem so, well, comfortable with themselves. It is admirable. To like yourself, to be confident in your own skin. I am no wallflower, even brazen at times, but my inner voice was always condemning. I am trying now to tame that voice that speaks badly of myself. "What a stupid thing, how clumsy I am, what an idiot!" We have enough going against us to be so harsh on ourselves. I wonder too, is that my inner voice, or the memory of my sister, taunting me? Am I taking on her role of putting me down?

I no longer grieve or resent or even, condemn the situation in my family of origin. I am at peace with all of it in a way I have never been, before. I don't understand why it is the way it is. I no longer believe there must be some way, some word or phrase or action I could take to help us all come together. There is some sadness in that acknowledgement, but the driving grief, the sense of failure surrounding all of it that I once felt, has dissipated.

I am still working on this. I am not done because I am still discovering things that I have buried.

I have deep regrets over not being there when my Father passed. I had been traveling to be by his side at sisters insistence, that "this is it", for six years. My Father was very stoic, and kept to himself. He was more and more silent, as he battled his illnesses. I desperately wanted to know him, to have discussions with him. Each time, I had this immense feeling of sadness that I had come all this way, to sit by his side while he read his books, watched t.v. and said a few things, every once in a while. He was so inside of himself. I would have to settle for that, it is what it is.
My brother would come over with his four girls and my Dads eyes would literally light up, he would become animated, they were his joy. I do not mean to sound petty, I love that my nieces did that for him.
I could not help but think that I was not worth the ...effort? When my Dad became more seriously ill and entered hospice for the third time (we called him the miracle man, he always bounced back) it was an extremely busy time of the year. Closing up my office, coaching several children's crews, the excuses sound lame and weak to me now. I am ashamed to admit, that I felt I couldn't stand by another time and feel like such an...outsider. I will regret not going to my Fathers side for the rest of my life. He lingered for three weeks, I feel guilty, I feel like he was waiting for me. Yet, there was no great epiphany, my sister tried to enter the forbidden zone of memories, to open the book as she would call it, and Dad would have none of it. He was busy about dying, later his spiritual counselor would tell me over a phone call that his biggest regret was that he made mistakes and was not perfect. That he was hard at working through memories of his entire life, trying to reconcile that. My Mom and siblings try their best to console me, saying that I was spared from the horrific ordeal of watching a loved ones body slowly decay, while the mind would simply not let go. I made a mistake, I should have been there. I cannot redo that, but I can be there for my Mom. So, now, when my boss chides me about my jaunts to the East Coast, I tell him to be ready, for when my Mom needs me, I am gone in a flash.

So Copa, we are feeling guilty about opposite but similar circumstances. I was there while my Father was somewhat well, but not at the end. You were there for your Mom when she needed you.

Then there are sisters. I do want to be clear that I love my sister very, very much. She has done much for me. We have spent some wonderful times together. We have had some tough times together. As long as everything goes the way she wants it to go, all is well........

Sister is very wrong, to be making those choices today, as an adult. These may not be conscious choices for her, now? But on some level, she knows what she is doing, and why.

And she is doing it, anyway.

With a vengeance.

An eye rolling vengeance.

roar

After the death of our Father, my sister was convinced through signs and portents, that she was supposed to move to Hawaii. She would hear a Hawaiian song on the radio, a strange phenomenon on the East Coast. Folks would walk in the bar she worked at with Hawaiian shirts on. This happened to her constantly. She was especially grief stricken at my Moms diagnosis just two months after Dads passing, lamenting that she could not watch Mom waste away. We had become friends over the years, and she was certain our Father was telling her that she needed to be with me. She knew about my situation with my G-F-Gs, I had confided much to her. I suggested she come and visit, to see if it was what she wanted, that life was not easy here. "I will be the Aunty and tell them to straighten up." "We are supposed to be together." We spoke on the phone for months, planning her arrival. She busied herself working and downsizing, she came to me at first in bits and pieces, boxes mailed over, chats of gardening and walking the beaches together, living our lives out as sisters should. I have never felt closer to her. I thought that I would finally have her as a dear friend, something I longed for my entire life. She arrived, lock, stock and barrel, car, dog, everything in Hawaii. It did not take long for her to realize it was a huge mistake. Within a few weeks, she had decided to go back home. I was devastated. I was angry.
"Can't we just spend our last week together being happy?" she said. I could not bring myself to feel happy. I felt so alone. I have no family here, they are all back on the East Coast.I told her that I could not, would not mask my feelings, that I was hurt, I could not get over it while she was here, I would not pretend to be okay.
It took some time for me to accept that it just was not meant to be. Now I see that she has found her calling, and is happy in what she is doing. I am glad for her. She is closer to my Mom, and visits with her. She is a remarkable horse woman and is busy with her friend rescuing these beautiful animals from slaughter. She has found her niche. It is good.

Pray for their peace and therein, find our own.

I am at peace with the move, it was for the better, in the long run. I am also okay with her not wanting to hear my lamentations over the past. She will be herself, and I will be myself.

I am sorry, Copa. I know how hard it is to acknowledge these things that are true about our families of origin. I know how stupidly wasteful it seems that those harmful patterns set up then should still be viable, today. It makes everything seem so hopeless, once we no longer have that concept of Family Dinner. It is a very lonely feeling, to let the hope of it go.

It is over, and cannot be undone. But what we can do is see with clarity and reclaim internal versus external locus of control

I shall have to study this-internal, external locus of control.

I believe that I have come far here in examining the past, finding who I am, to better direct who I shall become. I think it is important work. It is hard work. Perhaps never ending work. I have many, many good memories of my family life. Peppered with being very lonely, feeling unwanted, having incredibly low self esteem. I do know that I am extremely sensitive, and I am very weird and quirky in a good way, I think, and sometimes I am very misunderstood because of that. Maybe my weird, quirkiness invited teasing? Who knows.

Now, I can celebrate my individuality.

I do not want to be at my death bed, trying desperately to find peace within myself before I meet my maker.

But I was thinking about M's and husband's contention that the computer time we've devoted to ourselves this summer was not as valuable as it seemed, to us. The time we have spent here together has had great meaning for me.

I agree that we have put other aspects of our lives on hold to accomplish a goal...but I think we each have made enormous progress

I have thought about the hours I spend here on this site, reading over content and posts, replying here and there. At some point it is as if I am speaking to myself as much as to others, seeking answers while responding. Since I have been here, I have given my friends at work a break, that is for sure. There are not too many folks there who have stories of difficult children. I often apologize to my main confidant, telling her I owe her therapist fees. While my G-F-Gs were at home, I was so filled up with the craziness, the drama. I had not realized how much I was affected, well, infected. Maybe, what I had experienced as a child made me feel that I was broken, that I was meant to fix my broken adult children. That my brokenness caused theirs?

It was hard to continue on, working, smiling, trying to live a normal life while everything fell apart at home. But doesn't that sound familiar? Didn't I live that already? By grasping this concept, that we are destined to repeat these familiar, even familial patterns until we recognize them and break free from them, I am able to set a different course for my life.

I am able to look at my home and say,

"This should be my sanctuary, a place that I have peace."

And now, to work at achieving that peace and maintaining it.

I hope the same for all of us my dear friends, Copa, Feeling and Cedar and all those on this site.

Leafy

 

[Scent of Cedar *]

I want to tell you guys that I did leave the house at 11 am, brought M his lunch and coffee, helped him make decisions. He was a changed man. Enthusiastic. I did not return to the house until 4 pm, doing errands the rest of the times.

Again, my mother made me responsible for her emotionally. I remember a co-worker/friend at that time who would hear me at work speaking to her commented: Your mother sucks the life out of you. You carry her emotionally. I remember this because of how jarring it was. I was not ready to hear this at this time. Or still.

Do you feel the co-worker made an accurate assessment, Copa?

But little COPA had not confidence or support. She served to serve. And to reflect well, when she could.

Yes. And those characteristics that enabled you to triumph in spite of the way you had been taught to see and interpret and value yourself are the characteristics that will see you through this time of healing and enable you to reclaim yourself, now.

I see you beginning to see the bravery in that little girl you were, Copa. I am happy and proud for you that this is so.

Can you feel the shift in perception from seeing her through your mother's or your stepfather's eyes (or your sister's) to seeing her through your own?

That is internal locus of control.

Do you know the concept "negative grandiosity", Copa? That comes into play, here. It has to do with the way the mother has been taught to see herself, and with what she was herself given, or not given. She has only what she was given to give her child because the child is hers.

Reflections in a darkened mirror.

Remember the story?

Once upon a time, in a faraway land where time and distance had lost all meaning, there were born to the peasantry a generation of female children whose task and whose talent it would be to unravel the tangled skeins of deceit, viciousness, and trickery that bound the hearts, the souls, and the bloodlines of those families into which each would be born.

It is a choice that an adult can make. I will try to get there.

It was hard for me, too. And for Serenity. I am still working very hard on this business of seeing myself through compassionate adult eyes. You are coming through already, Copa. It's a process, a conscious and determined choice we can make, if we are fortunate. Remember that Shakespeare quote?

How poor are those that have not patience? What wound did ever heal, but by degrees.

Brene Brown's concept of sitting with the feelings helps me stay steady state, when I have been aware enough to stay with the feelings and be real instead of role. The thing I am learning is that the anxiety of doing without those automatic roles behind which we assess what is happening to determine who we need to be is a short lived thing. We can do it, can sit with it; can so easily choose to remain present.

It's exhilarating.

And that is when I understood I was already home. When I could sit with the feelings, I could understand that I was already healed. It only requires that small courage of presence. We need to do battle with the negatives to stay present instead of slipping into a role comprised of what someone else needs us to be. The negatives will come through in the voice of the primary abuser. They will contain her tone and nuances and will include things so much worse than, in her right mind, she would ever have said. That is the other thing I am coming to understand, as I heal. We are so hard on ourselves that it would break our mothers hearts to know it.

They loved us.

When we can see our healing in this light ~ and I think this is an absolutely true way to understand it ~ we can know that our mothers would celebrate our healing with all their hearts.

Each of us can remember times when we were loved. That is why we are strong enough to do this, now.

When we began this healing and I was so angry about what I was seeing, I posted that if we were doing this correctly, we would come through it with compassion for all of us. It was scary going through it though. There were times I wondered whether I was going to be stuck forever in hatred and anger and rage. I felt like such a mess. I held faith with that concept of compassion, though there were times I wondered whether it would ever really be possible to get there. Because Serenity had come through, I was able to hold faith that I would, too.

I am coming through now, Copa.

You know how hard it was for me, but I am coming through and into compassion for all of us.

You will, too.

Cedar

 

[Scent of Cedar *]

I am often quite amazed at how people seem so, well, comfortable with themselves. It is admirable. To like yourself, to be confident in your own skin. I am no wallflower, even brazen at times, but my inner voice was always condemning. I am trying now to tame that voice that speaks badly of myself. "What a stupid thing, how clumsy I am, what an idiot!" We have enough going against us to be so harsh on ourselves. I wonder too, is that my inner voice, or the memory of my sister, taunting me? Am I taking on her role of putting me down?

Yes.

This way of seeing ourselves through the eyes of others was learned through trauma. Whatever the traumatic events involved, we saw the reason why we were being hurt in the abuser's eyes and incorporated that understanding of self to justify why we were being hurt. This was done in a child's effort to make sense of what was happening. We were little kids. Without the protection and affection of the adults around us, we would die. When physical abuse is involved, or any traumatic punishment, that is the horror that seals those truths inside us: fear of mortality.

Most little kids don't come face to face with that on a regular basis.

When soldiers are brainwashed or traumatized, they are adult males who know that if they survive it, they will be going home.

We were little girls (or little boys).

Without military training.

And...we were home.

That is the mechanism of how we learned to see ourselves through the eyes of our abusers. That is the trauma feeling we encounter now, as adults, when we go back to unthaw and have the feelings and heal those traumas.

But the thing is, the abuser was not in his or her right mind. Whatever we learned there about ourselves was a wicked lie. And never was true, at all.

We were thirty to fifty pound little girls or little boys at the mercy of adults in the grip of something they didn't understand, themselves.

We are meant to be whole.

It's a matter of giving ourselves permission, and of having a supportive environment for the times the negatives are too intense for us to clear without witnesses to help us understand that what happened to us should never have happened ~ not to anyone, and not to us.

It sounds so easy, but it is a very hard thing, to face those negatives down.

We are doing it, Feeling and Leafy. We didn't know, when we began, whether it would work or leave us in a worse place than we were when we started.

It worked.

We have been pretty intensely committed for something like five months. Not only posting to one another, but referencing research. This information is included in Family of Origins threads. Only the beginning threads will not be there. We elected to share our processes publicly so others could know, if it did turn out to help us, how we did it.

I am happy you both are here. There is information on shunning, on the shunning in place that happens in dysfunctional family systems, on sibling relationship, on shame and on narcissism referenced in the FOO Chronicles threads. There are clips from The Wizard of Oz, and the Rocky movies and the strangest conglomerations of things that helped describe for us what we felt as we came through. There are reading lists, and links to sites we found helpful to us.

:O)

Cedar

To go back to the comment with which I began this response, Leafy. Two years ago, my only New Year's resolution was to be kinder to myself. Not kind; kinder. That was so simple a thing to remember, and it had amazing effect.

That is a good place to begin.

A simple resolution to be kinder to ourselves. Not kind ~ that is too much pressure. Kinder. The negative tapes were so destructive, Leafy. For the longest time, once I had given up on trying to do my hair or prepare myself for the day, I would tell myself: "That'll do, pig."

I thought that was so funny.

It's a line from the movie Babe.

"That'll do, pig."

It was light years better than the things I had been telling myself around the issue of appearance. After we had been working here for several months, I was able to hear the terrible contempt in that phrase, and to stop using it.

I was able to feel compassion for the way I beat myself up every time I was getting ready to go somewhere.

Every time.

Isn't that something. How have those of us who learned those things about ourselves as children managed to function in the world at all?

We are very brave, I think.

It is difficult to recognize global condemnation, and so hurtful, when we do.

To this day, that tool to be kinder ~ not kind, but only kinder ~ to myself, enables me to take very small steps away from those ways I learned to see myself when I was a little girl. If we can witness now for those children we were, we heal. But we need a supportive environment because without it, we cannot counteract those truths we were traumatized into believing in our efforts to explain why what was happening to us was happening.

Welcome to FOO Chronicles, you two.

 

[New Leaf]

This way of seeing ourselves through the eyes of others was learned through trauma. Whatever the traumatic events involved, we saw the reason why we were being hurt in the abuser's eyes and incorporated that understanding of self to justify why we were being hurt. This was done in a child's effort to make sense of what was happening. We were little kids. Without the protection and affection of the adults around us, we would die.

Yes Cedar, this is true. I think that by my parents telling me constantly to ignore the ill treatment, my siblings became more brazen, and I learned that I should swallow my feelings and readily forgive those who treated me badly. There was something deep inside me, that knew it was not right. I was in conflict with that for the better part of my life. Trying to prove that I was worthy of being treated kindly, but not really believing it, putting myself into impossible situations, then struggling to get out. A see-saw of emotions.

That is the mechanism of how we learned to see ourselves through the eyes of our abusers. That is the trauma feeling we encounter now, as adults, when we go back to unthaw and have the feelings and heal those traumas.

De ja vu, I have been here before. A time machine we are forced to enter until we recognize and fix what is broken. To find out that we were not broken at all, just made to feel that way constantly.

We are meant to be whole.

It's a matter of giving ourselves permission, and of having a supportive environment for the times the negatives are too intense for us to clear without witnesses to help us understand that what happened to us should never have happened ~ not to anyone, and not to us.

It sounds so easy, but it is a very hard thing, to face those negatives down.

We are doing it, Feeling and Leafy. We didn't know, when we began, whether it would work or leave us in a worse place than we were when we started.

It worked.

Yes, for me it is working. It is such a simple thing. For my sister, hard, because she does not want to face the fact that she was my tormentor. I cannot hold her wholly responsible, because she was allowed to be domineering. I do not think my parents really knew how repressing the experience was for me, how it was affecting me.

We elected to share our processes publicly so others could know, if it did turn out to help us, how we did it.

I believe that is a very important part of the process. The ability to remain anonymous has it's merits, I do not wish to cause my family grief or shame. I love them. I have found that I cannot process this with them, they will not validate it, become resentful and irritated by it, they don't want to hear of it.
I think that is their pattern, I was viewed as a child as over sensitive, "Oh God, there she goes crying again." That sensitivity is a gift, and a curse. It allows me to look at the world with different eyes, with an intense desire, a need to express, to paint, to sew, to sculpt, to write poetry. My sensitivity was condemned, they tried to knock it out of me.
My son is the same. He is a very sensitive caring boy. His sisters used to complain that he wasn't "tough" enough. I told them that most women yearn for men who will understand them, and talk with them. Here their brother was showing a sensitive caring trait, and they wanted him to be something else, a tough "little man". I put a stop to that. As a young child, up to the age of ten, when we went to the bank together, he would sit at the table and write me little notes on the bank scratch paper. I still have them. Hearts and flowers and "I love you Mommy". I taught him to be a gentleman, and at 14, he holds the door open for me and others, and will give up his seat for women and elderly.

I am happy you both are here. There is information on shunning, on the shunning in place that happens in dysfunctional family systems, on sibling relationship, on shame and on narcissism referenced in the FOO Chronicles threads. There are clips from The Wizard of Oz, and the Rocky movies and the strangest conglomerations of things that helped describe for us what we felt as we came through. There are reading lists, and links to sites we found helpful to us.

I must look into these previous posts. As I wrote before, the Wizard of Oz is one of my favorites. I went to the see play "Wicked" here. It was beautiful.
I often wonder if the authors of these creative, fantastic stories were really writing about their FOOS? How smart, to create characters based on your childhood experience, but to make them so fantasy oriented, that no one would know that it was based on real life?

To go back to the comment with which I began this response, Leafy. Two years ago, my only New Year's resolution was to be kinder to myself. Not kind; kinder. That was so simple a thing to remember, and it had amazing effect.

That is a good place to begin.

A simple resolution to be kinder to ourselves. Not kind ~ that is too much pressure. Kinder. The negative tapes were so destructive, Leafy.

Yes, Cedar, that is a good start, kinder. Our inner selves were so negatively trained by our adversarial FOO relationships. Bad person, bad, bad person. So deserving of ill treatment.

For the longest time, once I had given up on trying to do my hair or prepare myself for the day, I would tell myself: "That'll do, pig."

I thought that was so funny.

It's a line from the movie Babe.

"That'll do, pig."

It was light years better than the things I had been telling myself around the issue of appearance. After we had been working here for several months, I was able to hear the terrible contempt in that phrase, and to stop using it.

I was able to feel compassion for the way I beat myself up every time I was getting ready to go somewhere.

Every time

Love the movie Babe. That'll do pig. It was a compliment to the pig from the seldom spoken farmer. So not an appropriate self analogy. I am glad that you saw the contempt, and stopped. Good work Cedar. Nobody deserves that kind of talk, not from anyone, especially ourselves.
From my experience, I learned to be compassionate towards others, but not towards myself. I was, and am still, my own harshest critic. I often wonder, since my father was so consumed by being perfect, if that has rubbed off on me. I was born with syndactylism, third and fourth finger conjoined on my left hand. My mother, the nurse, did not discover it until two weeks after I was brought home! In fact, she told me this trip, that my brother was the one to notice, he would have been three. Did that trigger something in my Dad? I was imperfect? I remember hiding my left hand, and being really embarrassed by it for a long time. Now I say that I was meant to be a water person-Aqua girl.

To this day, that tool to be kinder ~ not kind, but only kinder ~ to myself, enables me to take very small steps away from those ways I learned to see myself when I was a little girl. If we can witness now for those children we were, we heal. But we need a supportive environment because without it, we cannot counteract those truths we were traumatized into believing in our efforts to explain why what was happening to us was happening.

I am so thankful for the "FOO Chronicles", it is an affirmation and a validation of what has been denied for most of my lifetime. I wrote in a different thread of my sister recently posting a quote on Facebook that stated all of our decisions and choices were made by us, had nothing to do with anything else, past relationships, weather, etc. Poppycock! I am sure that was meant for me. She can believe what she wants. She is not me. I will have my opinions, perspective and understanding. I do not need to carry it with me, or hold a grudge. I do see the necessity to research what I grew up with, to know myself better through my childhood history, to heal myself and learn to set new patterns. There must be a reason why I am thrown back into time by songs, scents, feelings.

Welcome to FOO Chronicles, you two.

Thank you Cedar for sharing your story, your thoughts and being so wonderfully kind. You have such a way with words, I have been comforted tremendously by your responses.

 

[Copabanana]

we saw the reason why we were being hurt in the abuser's eyes and incorporated that understanding of self to justify why we were being hurt.

Rage, envy, exhaustion, betrayal, humiliation, jealousy, frustration.

While directed at us and felt towards us. These were their feelings about themselves and others...which they directed towards us only because we were there and small and their own.

Kick the dog.

It may have had nothing in the world to do with us.

We were targeted because we were there, and small, and dependent. We may not even yet had the capacity to speak, let alone talk back....That was why we were chosen--for our dependency...and vulnerability and need. Of them. We would not leave or hurt them. We were part of them. If we bore the feelings, they would not--so much.

We were helpless to them. That was why we were chosen as targets. The only thing in their lives completely beholden..who could not, would not leave them.

Utterly indispensable, yet completely expendable. Regenerating automatically, to love them again, to forgive them again.

And all of it, as if frozen in time, in who we are now, and who we have been:

Cleaning. Refusal to clean.

Undeserving. And angry about it.

Dependent upon the approval of others. A need so strong that the greatest of gifts is to create smiles and pleasure in others. Feeling personal power by doing so.

Pain. Shame when we fall short. Self-blame. Guilt. Falling short. Not enough. Fear of being abandoned. Constantly monitoring the other. Are they happy? Am I funny? Are they mad?

Avoidance of conflict.

Digestive problems. Stuffing it.

Compassion. Forgiveness.

How little is devoted to holding others responsible.

But the thing is, the abuser was not in his or her right mind. Whatever we learned there about ourselves was a wicked lie. And never was true, at all.

Yes. This points the way for me. I do not have to abandon or reject my mother at all. By standing up for myself I am doing so for her.

For her and myself.

I was the stand-in for her: for the ways she may have felt belittled or small or powerless or humiliated or abandoned or hurt....

The feelings she did not have the strength or flexibility to feel...and had to transfer to me...to feel the effects.

We were thirty to fifty pound little girls or little boys at the mercy of adults in the grip of something they didn't understand, themselves.

Yes.

A simple resolution to be kinder to ourselves. Not kind ~ that is too much pressure.

The crux of the matter seems for me to be tied to loyalty to the mother I have lost.

A lifetime of loyalty to her. An unwillingness to abandon her...preferring to abandon myself.

The need to stand with her. And her values. Her needs. Over myself my own.

To speak in our own voices, compassionate, loyal...to our own is to speak for her. When she could not. In a way she could not. That is the shift. To see it this way.

I was able to feel compassion for the way I beat myself up every time I was getting ready to go somewhere.

Every time.

And in that way, to show compassion for the mother who was similarly trapped. And to stand by her, with her. Instead of the mindless repetition of cruelty to self, that she could not or would not feel or acknowledge. And was compelled to repeat.

We are standing up for them, as well, if we are willing to do so. Without rancor. Without blame. We speak for them. As well as to them. To ourselves.

For my sister, hard, because she does not want to face the fact that she was my tormentor.

There is no incentive to do so. As Cedar points out, it works for her.

She felt she had the license to do so, from your parents, who poo pooed it, as a childless nothing. It worked. To elevate herself.

The problem for her as it solidified into a rigid stance. She has become a bully. Intolerant of her own vulnerability of reciprocity with others, of vulnerability to others.

Maybe she would have had a chance if your mother had confronted it. Maybe not. A trait borne into her. Unfortunately.

I think that is their pattern, I was viewed as a child as over sensitive

Yes. Each of us seems to have been marked as such. Perhaps there is truth to it. A gift, not a debility, as we were taught to see it.

Day dreamer. Lost in fantasy. Distracted. Absorbed in my own world. Easy to be hurt. Feeling.

COPA

 

[Copabanana]

Her acknowledgement does matter, and it does not. If she did acknowledge it, we would have a better relationship.

It is what it is.

She is who she is. How wonderful for you that you love her.

chats of gardening and walking the beaches together, living our lives out as sisters should.

How great that you could have anticipated joy having her with you in Hawaii to garden together and walk on the beach. Even if it was not to be. You could have this hope. Many cannot.

She is a remarkable horse woman and is busy with her friend rescuing these beautiful animals from slaughter. She has found her niche.

She is physically active, too. Was this part of your childhood, New Leaf? I am happy for her that she has this purpose. And friendship.

I ended up going back to canoe paddling, I was coaching kids, so why not? I ended up with baby steps then going all the way, training, jogging, swimming, and crossing the Molokai channel with 20 and 30 year old women.

I have ALWAYS wanted to do open water swim. Not canoeing. I would still love to do it. I grew up on the water. I would love to do this. In my birth
City, San Francisco, there is an open water swim club. Mostly men. There are men in their 80's that swim to Alcatraz.

I won't let him drive me, because he is an offensive driver, dodging in and out like he was Mario Andrade or something.

M is too. I am terrorized by how he will cross an intersection if there is a 10' opening between cars.

He drove in Guadalajara Mx where the traffic is impossible. You seize opportunities where you can. We live in a lazy, small City. He cannot get it through his head, that driving is not dog eat dog, here.

trying to make me bend to his will with corner of my eyesight miniature finger movements, pointing left or right.

At least he does not speak the commands, which is my situation.

Surfing, body surfing and paddling were my escape and joy

I want to surf, too. Do you still surf and body surf, New Leaf?

At some point it is as if I am speaking to myself as much as to others, seeking answers while responding.

Yes. This is exactly so.

Maybe, what I had experienced as a child made me feel that I was broken, that I was meant to fix my broken adult children. That my brokenness caused theirs?

I think this is so, too.

I think that when we could not succeed, we may have felt that this was a confirmation that we had deserved to be targeted so long ago.

This brought up the long-suppressed feelings of isolation, loss and even terror. Most of all, it made us feel desperate, without control. Even helpless.

In my case I became angry at my son. My son became my tormentor, as my parents and my sister had been long before. And I became his victim.

A terrible repetition. Horrifying, really.

Do you feel the co-worker made an accurate assessment, Copa?

Yes. I do, Cedar.

Do you know the concept "negative grandiosity", Copa? That comes into play, here. It has to do with the way the mother has been taught to see herself, and with what she was herself given, or not given. She has only what she was given to give her child because the child is hers.

You know, I only partially understand this, I think.

Is it this? My mother repressed her negative feelings about herself and acknowledged the positive.

My mother grew up in horrifying circumstances. Her father hated Rose, his oldest daughter. I believe he had only married my grandmother, because she became pregnant. I believe he had been in love with another girl and intended to marry her.

My grandmother had been separated from her parents at 11 years old, an indentured servant. She was sent alone thousands of miles away. Eventually she was brought to Canada by her sister.

My grandparents lived as enemies. They were violent to each other. My mother said they chased each other with knives.
My mother said she would get off at the street car stop past her house so she could look down her street to see if her parents had this day killed each other. If the police and ambulance were there, she would know.

My mother, unlike her older sister, was adored by both parents.

But the thing is, inside her was the horror.

But somewhere in her existed the sense of responsibility that she had caused this chaos. And that this was her fault.

She was a beautiful, brilliant little girl. But she became frozen in narcissism. She was acknowledged for her beauty and her wit and warmth. The rest was frozen out. She was not a full person. Really.

So negative grandiosity would be the sense in her that she had caused all of this chaos, and conflict and fear and violence. She took responsibility.

And so, when her little child acted out...she could acknowledge this as her little girls fault. In spades. It was not her. (But it was.) It was her and not her.

But because her little daughter was her...her own...she over-reacted to any demonstration or feeling that the little girl was exhibiting the feelings she would not acknowledge in herself.

And when chaos and overwhelm and conflict would happen in her own life...she would quickly transfer the feeling and the responsibility to her little girl.

So those little girls became convinced that they were responsible for many, many bad feelings in their mothers and in their mother's and their own worlds.

What a great deal of badness for little girls to carry. Sweet and adorable little girls.

COPA

 

[New Leaf]

How great that you could have anticipated joy having her with you in Hawaii to garden together and walk on the beach. Even if it was not to be. You could have this hope. Many cannot.

Yes Copa, I looked forward to having my sister by my side.
Even though memories of my sister and her treatment of me as a child were sad, if I can forgive myself for my mistakes I made in my patterning, how can I hold her accountable, for she was a child, too. I suppose a part of that joyful anticipation of her move here was my intense desire all along to have her as a friend. She has many wonderful qualities. I think part of her inability to revisit that part of our past, is that she regrets what happened, but cannot do anything to change what occurred. I hope one day, she will know that I do not hold the past against her, that my need to study it, to understand it, embrace it, is to help me understand myself.

She is physically active, too. Was this part of your childhood, New Leaf? I am happy for her that she has this purpose. And friendship.

My father was very athletic. His high school football team were State champions. He was a collegiate all American hockey player. He taught us to love and respect the great outdoors.He instilled love of the ocean into us. He introduced us to surfing when we came to Hawaii. My father and I enjoyed jogging together when I was in high school. He ran marathons in his mid fifties.
My sister loved horses as a child. She became a horse woman on her own, teaching herself how to ride and care for these beautiful creatures. I have a fear of them, due to some unfortunate mishaps that are probably related to my fear of them. Horses have an incredible sense of humans.
It is exhausting work, rescuing and caring for horses. I know my sister and her friend find great fulfillment in it, but there are so many horses sent to slaughter. The sheer numbers of it are quite daunting.

I have ALWAYS wanted to do open water swim. Not canoeing. I would still love to do it. I grew up on the water. I would love to do this. In my birth city, San Francisco, there is an open water swim club. Mostly men. There are men in their 80's that swim to Alcatraz.

How awesome to have this as a quest. There must be recreational centers in your area, where you could go and start swimming. Swimming is exhilarating. There is a freedom being immersed in water. Perhaps a sensory memory of our early beginnings in the womb?

I want to surf, too. Do you still surf and body surf, New Leaf?

I have not surfed or body surfed in some time. I have it on the back burner, to get back to it. Surfing is great exercise, so much FUN. It does take some practice, it is a matter of getting out there, working out the kinks and doing it. I have been so caught up in canoeing on the water, that I have not made the time to get back in the water. Maybe it is because when I am actively involved with surfing, it is hard for me to find a balance with it. That is all I want to do.

M is too. I am terrorized by how he will cross an intersection if there is a 10' opening between cars.

He drove in Guadalajara Mx where the traffic is impossible. You seize opportunities where you can. We live in a lazy, small City. He cannot get it through his head, that driving is not dog eat dog, here.

The same for my Hubby. He spent many a year driving with a limited time frame, racing to the next job. This is ingrained in his driving habits now, no matter where he is going. He is always in a rush to get from point A to B.

We differ so much, the hubs and I. I am slow and methodical, he is impatient and driven to get things done. He goes in to "sergeant" mode, firing off commands. It is great for getting the job done, but I must admit, causes some anxiety with me. But, that is a whole different thread!

Sweet dreams Copa!

 

[Scent of Cedar *]

Oh, roar. I have to begin preparing for us to leave tomorrow. I cannot respond at length.

Copa, I loved that you posted how fortunate Leafy is to love her sister. How fortunate Leafy is, to love.

Where is our Feeling Sad?

Here is what I know about negative grandiosity: Looking into her infant's eyes, into her toddler's, into her adolescent's eyes or into the eyes of her adult child, the mother reflects for the child his or her grandness, his or her wonderfulness. In her happiness at her child's existence, the mother transmits happiness in his own existence to the child.

This, I think, is how D H and M are as they are.

They each have been the focus of the mother's eyes, as she loved and was amazed at, the wonder of her child's existence.

For mother's who have been hurt, the child, who is her child, who is come of her body and is hers in some way nothing in all the world has been or could ever be, hers...a certain percentage of those reflections of grandiosity consist of a negative, shame filled reality. A negative grandiosity that the child incorporates as easily as every innocent being incorporates from the eyes and the understanding of its mother.

And of its society.

Racism, or the kinder understanding of say, The Special Olympics.

A matter of perspective; a matter of valuing.

Add to these ways of thinking the concept that there is generational memory. That generations of trauma or light or love or hate vibrate within us like a kind of intergenerational music.

Here in America, where there are so many kinds of intergenerational music, we are creating something, some kind of music, altogether new.

That is what I see and hear, in the chaos of what is happening.

Think of an orchestra, warming up. Each musician, tuning his instrument to play with intense clarity and thereby, create the whole.

So Leafy, there is the imagery you described in an earlier post. Nothing normal about it and yet....

Something that resonates, after all.

:O)

Cedar

roar

Now I have to go.

I will be back sometime next week or thereabouts.

Unless I can find a minute, tonight. You guys are too fascinating.

 

[Feeling Sad]

Copa, how are you doing, my friend?

Roar???

 

[Copabanana]

Hi Feeling,

I may have only a minute, because of the clicking. M is sleeping. I am sad. I miss Cedar already. I am worried about my son.

Just a pervasive sense that something is wrong. On the bright side, I was out today. M is finding busy work for me so I had to go to the other house to make a decision. Then we went to his sister's to eat Sopes. Really good. The house was full of kids. Nice.

Another bright thing: I am looking at reading lists for Psychological Anthropology. I want to think about how cross-cultural factors influence the understanding and treatment of mental illness.

I heard a great talk (most of it) by a psychiatrist Peter Breggan, I think it is spelled. He is an advocate of compassionate therapies and a nay sayer to many medications. I just bought his book called Guilt, Shame and Anxiety. He was talking about how in Lapland, they have virtually eliminated schizophrenia because of how they respond socially to the first manifestations of psychosis.

I can hardly really believe it, but he was so smart and kindhearted I was moved to learn more of his thinking.

From the time I was a young woman I gravitated toward psychoanalysis. I am a doubter now.

I do not think I ever had the strength before to be a doubter about much of anything.

When I get up tomorrow I will respond more fully. Thank you for asking about me.

What do I do if my son does not call by Wednesday, which will have been 3 days?

I hope you are well, Feeling.

COPA

 

[Feeling Sad]

I am exceedingly proud of you for going out. Keep up the good work.

'Positive' strides...pun intended.

I was worried about you. Take care.

 

[Feeling Sad]

Do what you feel is best for your son. I am not in the same position. I have found that none of my sons like being nagged. I try to subtlety suggest...ha ha ha.

Ask, if you call, very matter of factly, then change the subject. Last as long as you can without calling him to show you have transferred the adult responsibility to him.

Besides...you are a busy woman these days. Places to go...people to see...

That is excellent for your SON to see! It drastically changes your dynamics in a very positive way.

Did you ever question that he perhaps is worrying about YOU?

Anyway, remember is is acting like he does not care, but he is probably even more afraid that you.

Off to sweet dreams...I hope!

 

[Copabanana]

M is making me go out every day. And I cannot refuse because he gets up early and goes to work. How can I refuse to go and help or to opine about this or that?

Yesterday with a spatula I removed 60 year old wallpaper. I think he was surprised I stuck with it. It only took me an hour.

Thank you for checking in with me, Feeling.

COPA

 

[New Leaf]

Hi Copa and Feeling,
I am glad to know that you are getting out Copa, removing 60 year old wallpaper in an hour, my goodness. Sometimes in the most mundane tasks, we have accomplished much. The tenacity.

I have a confession. I think that I am improving, while at the same time regressing, one step forward two steps back. I wrote to you Feeling about joy, and I truly want that for you, but it will come on your time. It was an inappropriate, insensitive response to your dilemma, your processing, and I am truly sorry. I feel as if I took on my sisters role with you Feeling- "Can't you just be happy the last week we are together?" And I couldn't, the sadness was just too powerful. It took me a long time to build myself back up.

In recognition of that, I realize Feeling, that you need to take the time to feel what you feel, and when you are ready, in your time, you will build yourself back up.

I think that is my regression, back to that child state that was supposed to "cheer up", put on a smile, while I was hurting inside.

I am processing so much, and trying to stop old patterns, but they keep coming through. Yesterday was my G-F-G's birthday. I wrote to another poster that detaching has been peaceful, and it has, but there has admittedly been a dark void. I am not overwhelmed by it, but still the same, it is there. I said several silent prayers for my daughter and my grands throughout the day, I miss them. I suppose I am waging a silly inner battle, detachment does not mean no contact. I know my daughter is stubborn, and will not call me. The manner in which she left was outrageous and completely, undeniably hurtful. I do not want to be the one to make the first move. Am I being strong, or stubborn, prideful? I feel that it is on her to make that move to pick up the phone,yet, I am her mother, yet she is an adult. I do fear what will be said on the other end of the phone if I call, she can be quite mean. I suppose I could just call, but feel that I may be setting myself up for disappointment.

Confusion.

I will pray on it.

Impulsiveness is one of my major weak points dear friends, I have got to think more before I act, and allow time to mull things over......

Copa I am glad you are getting out. It must feel so strange. You are brave.

What a time we have all been through.

My thoughts are with you warrior friends.

Leafy

 

[Copabanana]

joy, and I truly want that for you, but it will come on your time

There is truth to this.

"Can't you just be happy the last week we are together?" And I couldn't, the sadness was just too powerful. It took me a long time to build myself back up.

New Leaf, you are hard on yourself. Your wish was that Feeling not suffer. That she (and I) take the steps that will bring us towards peace or at least less pain. That was all I ever read in your posts, caring.

I have been thinking a lot about role. About how it is to be without playing some kind of part. Kind, warm shopper. Compassionate professional.

I am having compassion for myself and how I was so defended most of my life.

I am seeing my sadness and vulnerability now as a glass half full, not empty.

I see that I revealed myself so very little in my life.

I am forgiving myself for my pain and desperation and anger at my son as he turned on me in those years...as he grew up...How utterly distraught I was. How unprepared for the hurt...that came after loving him so utterly.

I am proud of myself to have finally made myself vulnerable to being loved. M covers me up so tightly when he leaves in the morning, like I am a mummy. I do not wake up when he wraps me but feel so toasty. And when I awake and see my mummy self, I feel glad.

Yesterday on Public Radio there was a show with Dr. Peter Breggin, a psychiatrist whose works centered on compassionate therapies, and not the drugs which he believes are harmful.

He talked about people so harmed by their child experience that they will not open up to care.

He discussed much of the same things we do, how children who cannot not feel loved (or they will die) develop a rationale about life, that everything is my fault. My parents love me but they treat me this way because I am a bad, bad child. If I try harder, they will love me more, and treat me better.

And those children become adults so guarded that nothing gets through--they cannot accept even the love they needed so long ago. They are so afraid. They they have sealed themselves so tightly, so that their badness stays inside, they cannot trust themselves enough to accept love.

I believe I was one of those children. And became one of those adults. Until finally, I changed enough to live a little bit differently.

And so today, feeling sad, (not Feeling Sad), I feel grateful. I wonder who I will be now that I am more real.

COPA

 

[Copabanana]

Impulsiveness is one of my major weak points dear friends

Speaking quickly, without censor, you speak from the heart. Speak truly, without plan and artifice.

You know your intention was not to judge, criticize or cause pain. Anybody who knows you will know this. The learning for you New Leaf is to not second guess yourself and to have confidence in your audience.

There will be people who misunderstand. Or not. But you cannot control them.

People have a right to dislike us. We need to like ourselves enough to give them that chance. That is the risk. To be who we are. Even if others decide to leave. Or to be mad.

When we were children, we believed that the madness or meanness of others to us was our fault.

That is what we believed (falsely) as children. That we are responsible for the responses of others to us. And if we just tried hard enough, worked harder, did better, they would be kind and show us favor. Or if they did not, we were at cause. Not true.

The world is not your sister, waiting to pounce.

New Leaf. M says everything has its good and bad points. (I am referencing here your spontaneity, a much kinder word than impulsiveness.) Everything.

A saying of his is this: There are no bad things from which good cannot come. No hay malo que bien no venga.

I try to trick him by asking him, and this? What good can come of this terrible thing? Like last week his niece's young male boxer dog died (we think he ate rat poison that M's stupid brother in law buried 4' below the ground in the yard.)

And just the moment before I had said, now we know we can never let them take care of our animals.

And M answered, "See. Is that not a good thing? To learn that?"

We, each of us, is learning to love ourselves, no matter what. We have each come through the hardest of times. This has revealed to us parts of ourselves, like new skin instead of that which was toughened and callused.

The challenge is that over the years we have learned near automatic ways to talk to ourselves about ourselves that can be harsh and accusing. They no longer fit with our new tender, pretty pink skin.

We need to find tender and soft ways to speak to ourselves about ourselves so that we do not need to become calloused and defended again, with all that fibrous tissue.

You are a new leaf.

 

[Feeling Sad]

New Leaf...good name for our tender NEW skin.

Feeling Sad....good name because we are allowed to FEEL now.

Copa...good name because we are learning better ways to COPE.

Cedar...good name because it is STRONG and invisible to outside elements.

Four truly noble warrior sisters...

"We are women,
Hear us ROAR!!!

My next conference is about to begin...

We are blessed to have found each other.

 

[Feeling Sad]

Greetings, ladies. How are we doing? Are you both trying to decide whether or not to call your child? I know that you are both in turmoil about what you should do.

I am not the one to ask, because i am in a very desparate place. But, I understand your dilemmas. I hope that you find peace and that you do what you feel is best.

My prayers are being sent out to both of you.

If you have called, may you be strong no matter what happens. But, it is okay to feel weak, confused, or sad. Just be 'strong' in the resolve that you have always done the best that you can.

It is so very difficult being a parent to a troubled child. Remember how easy it was when they were little?

I have been reading about complex ptsd. It can be brought on by continued trauma...it stated that constant bullying by a sibling where one is not protected by parents can cause complex ptsd.

It also stated that continued trauma can cause a person to stay in bed and not get up.

Mine, living with several mentally ill people where your safety or life is in danger, can also cause it.

New rule for the four strong warriors...no apologies allowed!

Feeling that we have done something wrong...when we haven't is the first thing out the door!

If you agree, ROAR...

No more. We were made to feel badly about ourselves. It stops now. Wonderful, caring, supportive people, never have to apologize.

No more saying that we are sorry. I have done it all of my life. People have asked me why I always apoligize. It is a horrible, demeaning habit.

It ends tonight.

 

[New Leaf]

New Leaf, you are hard on yourself. Your wish was that Feeling not suffer. That she (and I) take the steps that will bring us towards peace or at least less pain. That was all I ever read in your posts, caring.

Thank you Copa, thank you for understanding and seeing me.

I have been thinking a lot about role. About how it is to be without playing some kind of part. Kind, warm shopper. Compassionate professional.

I think we have all learned roles from our upbringing.

I am seeing my sadness and vulnerability now as a glass half full, not empty.

I see that I revealed myself so very little in my life.

Being our true selves takes courage.

I am proud of myself to have finally made myself vulnerable to being loved. M covers me up so tightly when he leaves in the morning, like I am a mummy. I do not wake up when he wraps me but feel so toasty. And when I awake and see my mummy self, I feel glad.

M sounds very nice and caring, to wrap you up tight like that. How wonderful for you both Copa.

If I try harder, they will love me more, and treat me better.

I know this feeling. If I only did this, or did that....looked this way. Such a lonely feeling to never be good enough.

And so today, feeling sad, (not Feeling Sad), I feel grateful. I wonder who I will be now that I am more real.

The possibilities are endless Copa. The world is your oyster!