new person

[ecomama]

Hi everyone
not sure what parts to disclose here, feeling very uneasy posting. I feel like a lot of people here, know that I'm socially isolated but feel it's safer this way. I have a lot of mixed feelings due to covid19; feeling freer or even happier that movements were restricted as I have had little choice but to live this way for a long time. Then I realised how odd this reaction is, opposite to what I was hearing at work. Simultaneously I felt huge grief for the world. I'm experiencing compassion fatigue from all of this.

my life has been wrought with trauma & grief, tremendous violence & loss. I desperately sought help from authorities to stop things over many decades. I have fought so hard through courts etc, I know it has cost me a lot of mental stability a lot of the time. At least my children and I are safe atm. Feeling safe is another thing entirely!

happiness eludes me. I strive for the happiness of my children. I don't know how to attain personal happiness, so have strived for contentment. I work hard physically but feel far more exhausted by my mind. flashbacks and memories often come back relentlessly in my waking hours and in my dreams. Working hard physically helps me sleep better 🙂

I used to be very sociable, quite athletic and had a large family. The abuse has taken its toll. My relationships were undermined by the abuser, so they are lost. My physical health was severely impacted by the abuse also. I have a counsellor but I was advised by a close friend who is studying psychology to seek a more intensive type of therapy. I have completed countless hours in therapy through books, online and in person over decades. My counsellor is very impressed by my persistence, resilience and recovery but I feel awful most of the time.

I have no relationships with extended family anymore which is very sad for me. I have basically given up trying since doors are constantly closed on that front.
Soon I plan to take leave from my work to support my children all struggling in their learning from home programs. I will have to take leave on far less pay, so this presents obvious issues to an already stretched financial situation.

I know there is no magic cure for all the issues I have at hand but I still have hope that things will improve and that I can feel happy one day. I pray there are answers within this forum for me.

Thanks for reading.

[Jstar49]

Hiya,

Ok, I haven't read all of whats been written on anger, so please excuse me if I'm repeating.

I got soooo angry last nite! And I think I handled it really well. It was the type of anger that makes me really feel like hitting someone (2 guesses as to who...)And I now know its all tied up with the oppressive controlling patronising patriachy and my dad and authority figures so....

But anyhow, I took off, got the dog and the car and some shoes and took off down the beach. And just let it all out! Howled and cried and got angry with the wind and the waves. It was such a lovely almost evening, with really high tides and murky surf, so almost no-one around, so I could let it out. For me it was a bit of a breakthru, becos I didn't stuff it down, I was able to say, "I'm really angry right now" and then get out of there, to work it thru on my own. Ok I mite have slammed the door a few times, but trust me, it was absolutely necessary! I also may have muttered a few flippin hecks or something similar.

I liked what Edith Egar (holocaust survivor) had to say, on Brene's podcast. Its ok to be angry. Be angry! But decide, how long to be angry for.

Also for me this was life changing: being angry with someone for doing the wrong thing is like punishing yourself for their mistake.

It really helps me to think on these things.

Last nite, I decided I wasn't going to continue being angry with H. He could be, if he wanted. I was going to let it go.

Old anger is so hard. I think it's because we haven't given ourselves permission to be angry at the time. I find it's good to be able to forgive myself for not being in a better, clearer space at the time. And also to recognise that I inherited some really unhealthy ways of relating to anger, my anger AND others anger.

Anger is scary! Unexpressed anger is scary, just not so clear.

My H is also scared of me expressing my anger. Thats a direct result of his past, and also the knowledge that it's not safe for him, esp as a guy, to really be angry. Complicated stuff.

I worked for two decades with my anger. Breaking plates, breathwork, getting in touch with it, heaps of stuff. And depression, of course.

It's only now that I feel I'm approaching something like a healthy relationship with anger. Which is pretty funny cos it doesn't mean I'm not angry, obviously! I think I was angrier than I've ever been last nite!

Whoa that was a huge long rant about anger!Sorry, maybe TMI!

Cheers,

J*

[ecomama]

Dearest Sleepy

Awww ofcourse I'd cheer you on!!!

It's the most wonderful feeling sinking your hands into the earth... working just to create new life... it was the most healing activity for me and took me on so many adventures truly!

There are so many analogies for life being a gardener.

A few rules of thumb would be you WILL fail!
All great gardeners have had countless "failures" that we turn into learning opportunities.

Another is that I think because of your personality and caring nature... you CAN kill plants with "too much love" lol... they actually need a little neglect too!

A great, apparently health giving, indoor plant is sansevieria.
Japanese (I think) studies have found ppl sleep more peacefully with one on their bedside table.

PLEASE join us.
Attending to the seasons and awaiting the joys of the next season is so closely aligned with life's experiences.
You're a blossoming flower so there's the alignment for you!

My garden is mostly in other people's gardens now lol!
The rains swept so much away.

It's all good. Nature does what nature does.
I was just reading this quote before I read your post "Do not get upset with people or situations, both are powerless without your reaction" Buddha.
RIGHT?? lolol rather true in some cases I'm sure.

I was rather anxious this morning in reaction to my kitchen ceiling noticeably caving in... but primarily p.son and all the things he told me last night.

Yes my darling precious boy is home.
He needs us so much right now. To say I'm concerned for him would be a major understatement.
Tonight he's out with his siblings at the soccer and had a relaxing day with lots of food!!

I'm buying him new shoes and some Winter clothes tomorrow.

Hopefully he'll spend alot of time at home over the school hols.

Thankyou for your post Sleepy, it was so beautiful to read your words.

Love EM

[ecomama]

Hey J*

You're very welcome to feel whatever you feel and let it out here - GO FOR IT.
No issues at all.

I needed to make a HUGE strong cup of tea for this reply lol.

I think anger is a completely normal emotion.

I understand that, for me at least, it's important to identify exactly WHAT I'm angry about.
Not just "BE angry all the time".

Then to check in with myself whether it's 'compounded' anger...(I don't think I have that any more - I believe I felt this alot in previous marriage, it was a test of my patience to Biblical proportions) like it's just another cupful of anger when my "anger cup" was already near full from previous events.

Esp if it was the SAME person and / or the SAME event or situation meaning NOTHING was gained at all by all my efforts LAST TIME. That's FRUSTRATION.
So add frustration to that equation.

Egads... I used to say "I'd rather watch the grass grow than do this again".

I'm really glad you liked the way you handled it last night! Kudos to YOU!

I'm not sure why you're afraid of your own anger??
It makes sense that you're not comfortable with it, from FOO issues though.

Driving to the beach, screaming and crying it out is very healthy in my books lol... let's hope I'm somewhat sane though! lol.

Better that option that stuffing it down, letting it fester.
Or drinking it.
Or depressing it.
Or whatever elsing it.

Did you THANK anger? Anger could be trying to tell you alot.
I need to ask myself a few questions when I have more energy lol.

What I don't like about intimate relationships is how easily the other person's same ole same ole words and actions can spur us to anger.

Psych friend said to me today about specific habits of BFs... "you know you can't really expect him to change".
IS that what I was doing??? ugh.... 'expecting him to change'?

OR was I expecting him to "grow"?
or "develop"?
or "learn"?
or "recover"?
or "work on his issues"?
or "seek MH help"?
= yep I was expecting him to change without realising it.

Me thinks my expectations were disguised and I'm not sure where to go with this except to ACCEPT and just do my own life, because it IS my own life.

What do you think J*?

Btw was that a trick comprehension question?
giving us 2 guesses, THEN giving us the answer with "(I) got angry with the wind and the waves".... I may have invoked a bit of the Walrus there!

Love always EM

[Croix]

Dear EM, Jstar49 and Sleepy~

I feel invoked, an unusual sensation.

I'd have to say anger for me is not a problem but is a two sided coin, and by and large that has helped me more than hindered.

I read of your difficulties, and it seems they are brought on by others. I do think others can change a bit if they are willing and want to ease your path. Any two person adversarial position on the other hand is a downward spiral. So I understand why you would like to control and manage your anger just in yourself, it seems your only option.

Jstar49: Railing at the elements sounds beneficial, they won't stop so hopefully your anger will subside and calmer perspective come to the fore. I use wind, rain and waves on a cliff in my mind as a retreat and balm..

I might get angry at another's action but I'm fortunate that for all but a very few in my life that anger has quickly faded and half the time is my lack of understanding or impatience.

For the very few where it has not subsided it has been (in my view) for just cause and they have been permanently written out of my life. An example - I went out with a 'friend' to help him in a distant place. I was contacted about an unexpected death in my household after I left and he refused to drop everything and take me home, money before people. There are others.

I've found it can be a most useful tool to motivate, as anger at callous or thoughtless management helped me beat the odds when invalided from the police, or at tobacco companies specifically catering to small boys (a packet containing 4 Woodbine cigarettes is in pocket money range) when quitting smoking.

So reading your words about your feelings makes me feel very fortunate.

Sleepy: green thumbs are mostly a myth. True there are great chefs, and great gardeners. However I'd think if you start with a modest aim and follow rules, the gardening equivalent of a cook book, you will succeed. The hard part may not be in getting things to grow, but planing an overall design for when they do. Difficult to visualize if plants are alien territory.

EM: you seem to be lapsing into 16th century English language - Egads, Me thinks - well, odds bodkins!

Croix

[ecomama]

Hey Croix!

Thankyou for your wise words!

lol yes quite a few of my children are studying and we're talking about Shakespeare at times... more my area than the Maths they do at this level! EGADS all right!

The thing I've used with ppl at times (thankfully not needed much lately!!) when I'm upset or angry, confused or just not sure where to go in a heated discussion is one of Brene Brown's great sentences she calls a magical sentence...

"when you do ____ the story I'm telling myself is ______"

I think this ONLY works in a relatively "safe" relationship.
In an abusive one this only gives the abuser MORE information about you that can be used as 'ammunition' against you... hope that makes sense?

Sometimes I wish Brene gave that 'disclaimer' on the side... because the basic 2 kinds of relationships for explaining this vey simply being
SAFE
or
ABUSIVE

are chasms apart.

Everyone needs money to a greater or lesser extent to survive.
But another red flag of an abusive person is their obsession with money, including your own resources... whatever they can get a hold of! theft etc.

I'm sorry your friend wasn't kind to you when the unexpected death in your household happened.

The lack of respect for us from others astounds me at times.

It's a kindness to ourselves and showing respect to ourselves also that helps us rid our lives of abusive people.

Invocation has a strange feeling hey Croix?
Ooops sorry bout that!

Love EM

[Guest_1643]

hi EM

wise point about some of this advice only being applicable to safe relationships

I was discussing with my therapist safe ways to express anger. Sometimes it's just unsafe.

Sharing those feelings wouldn't work for m with certain ppl because they would just make fun of my emotions and use it against me. We have to assum th person has an interest in how we feeel and can accept it - and toxic ppl don't.

I have the Edith Eger book "the choice" - but didn't know she also was a podcast guest.

sounds fun helping ur kids with shakespeare 🙂

[Jstar49]

Hi Em, Sleepy, Croix and Blue,

O yay! I'm feeling so released today! So glad I let go of that anger- altho I had to remind myself determinedly a few times lol...

I do feel scared by my own anger Em. I think because it has been so unpredictable. When I was a single mum and with PND, difficult co-parenting r/ship etc, didn't know or understand my triggers or how to be safe, keep myself and others safe, I could find myself picking up objects and hurling them thru windows with very little warning. It felt like an uncontrollable Beast! Now that I understand it and respect it more, incl it's purposes to protect and strengthen boundaries I have a better handle on it. Of course the foo family stuff, anger being used to intimidate, one way street, not allowed to be angry at all, made it harder for me to deal with my own anger as an adult.

Thanks Croix, love that point about anger being useful motivation- righteous anger methinks! lolol

Also I have a relationship where, altho it's not exactly 'safe' to express it, we have done some time and talk on the topic of anger, and it hasn't broken our relationship yet, so it feels a darned sight safer than any other r/ship to date. To be able to express feeling angry rather than act it out is, I believe, essential in any healthy r/ship.

Sleepy I totally get that thing of others using it against you. My dad would def try and do that. Has done. More ridicule and put downs. Because to him, expressing any emotion is weakness. He has no idea of the effect of his anger on us as kids. Or the accompanying lack of warmth.

My hope is that now, with my current clarity, if I was angry in the moment with something he said or did, that I could state it, clearly, and then get out! I don't want to carry it around with me anymore. Why should I have to hide my emotions and pretend that I don't feel, just because he has had to do that to survive? Maybe in time kindness too would become part of that exchange. Not sure I can do that yet tho.

I think expecting others to change as a result of us expressing our emotions is where it gets sticky. And of course, I'm guessing there is rarely a work situation where it's ok to be open about your emotions. I'm about to explore this territory tho. Start work tmw. Yikes!

I would like to end on a gentle note, but instead I am reminded of an eagle, soaring high above the smaller birds that would harass it. Except they can't fly as high.

Rise above!

Cheers,

J*

[ecomama]

Hey hey Sleepy!

I know right??

Tbh I'm seeing a huge, like HUGE gap of "deficit" in real and useful support for people who are trying to exit toxic relationships including us entering that numb, new and very scary world of leaving them...

no one truly understands how near impossible it is to leave unless they've experienced it all themselves.

This goes for partnerships, marriages, friendships, bosses, colleagues and family! Anyone.
Awful.

I mean even SEEING them as they are is a thang.

We get so fogged up with them.

Have you found Dr Eger's book helpful at all Sleepy?

I've always been entranced by survivors of the Holocaust... read so many books my mother had about it before I was 12yo... I think it was too much for my age tbh... then felt it my necessary obligation as a human being from 12yo onwards to watch any movies on it that came on TV... like "this is YOUR obligation - you cannot change the channel".

I think this all came from my great grandfather telling me stories of what he saw and experienced when he served in WWI. My first memory of a story of his was when I was 3yo. I was entranced then.

I ended up choosing every History subject I could thru High School and Uni lol....

I was preparing to Volunteer for The Shoah when I fell pregnant the first time.

Now my interests are NOW and for my own family but they've heard as much as I think they can cope with about it all.

Can't wait to hear how you found "The Choice", I bet it's DEEP.

Love and caring always
EMxxxx

[ecomama]

Hello J*... well methinks we are ALL PHOENIXES here.

We are.

Anger CAN motivate us for sure 100%!

Also realising that we ARE in control of our own emotions is really important.

Never ignoring them! NO!

I think they're there for us to ACKNOWLEDGE and pay attention to... then ask ourselves (if we don't already know lol) why would that make me feel so angry?

"Know thyself" such beautiful, powerful 2 words from the Bible.

I'm sorry you had PND and so many troubles back then. Hugs.
It's hard and that was HARD darned work.

So glad you did what you did on Friday night. Getting it ALL OUT there.

I think we need to put ppl in 2 camps... the safe ones and they are few!
Brene Brown talks about this without the word "safe"...

Then the "haters" she calls them... ppl hurling hurtful comments from the "cheap seats". I'd classify MOST people to be in the "cheap seats" when it comes to mental health, FOO issues, DV / FV even if it's just that they don't acknowledge stuff.... and anyone who's NOT dealing but instead being cruel, dismissive, hurtful towards us.

Sometimes, esp when my children make an offhand comment (like last night lol) and ppl at work say something that could potentially hurt me... I think "oh that's THEIR stuff" and by gosh it usually is!

My kids were all leaving last night and the last group to leave said "Yeah we better go home now because no one's here".... I chuckled to myself and thought "I guess I'm 'no one'" hmphhh. But then melted into a beautiful feeling that all the kids and grandkids just KNOW I'm here for them.. they take me for granted but in a beautiful way.
Mama's here.

I'm a Nana now and felt that same warm feeling about my own Nana, one in particular... she was just always there. Nice.

NB: I'm STILL buying my surfboard and wetsuit this year... so when Nana isn't home they can say "Oh Nana's gone surfing" lol!!! LOVE THAT.

SO EXCITING starting work TOMORROW J* YAY!!! 😂🤣🥰😍
I can't wait to hear how it all went when you have the energy to come back and tell us!

It's so great J*, I'm so proud of you.

Daring to walk into the Wilderness... remember we are ALL flanked right beside you every step of the way.

Phoenixes flying together... now that's an awesome sight! lol.

Love and caring always
EM

[ecomama]

Update: trying to work things out...

It was a HUGE weekend. P.son opened up SO MUCH to me, which was absolutely beautiful but ofcourse I had alot of anxiety over what he said in the FIRST conversation... then he had another one then ANOTHER one with me... it just kept pouring out of my little darling.

The caving in kitchen ceiling with issues from the roof was bubbling away in the ole anxiety pot all the while.

BF just frustrated me lol. So I skipped talking with him.

Some things p.son told me sent a red flag straight UP. Tbh what he said was terrifying if I gave it lots of thought. All I could do was act instinctively...
CLEARLY He needed a LOT more support than what he was getting.

We're all anxious about the situation for him now... so we're all reaching out alot more to him.
We'll all be so RELIEVED when he moves back home in about 6-7 months.
For now he's just coming up to stay more often.

I could tell he's so desperately lonely.
By the time he left LATE last night on the train, he had a skip in his step with his brand new shoes I bought him yesterday. He couldn't stop talking about them lol.
My poor baby, we've been through too much and he's not had the opportunity to put recovery time in. This will have to be our focus when he moves home.

Yvette wants to see a SA psych again.
I'm HAPPY she wants to but omg the palaver involved and none being available and even when there is... she dumps the idea.
Her new GP ordered bloods to be done last year which Yvette refused to do... then felt alot better then the come down again.

I had to talk with her about "committing" to this if she wants to go thru it all.
Uncomfortable convo but yeah.

I may have found a roofing firm to repair the roof... IDK yet... waiting for the number now.

This was a bit depressing since I was HOPING to get my teeth fixed this year and now this massive roof / ceiling issue.

Finding gratitude in all this is the only way forward.

Now as of last week, there are NO GPs here for us to be Bulk Billed. The last ones jumped on the train of charging.

So knowing the kids will all be home alot on the holidays starting at Easter (costing alot of money) AND all these other financial costs skyrocketing... I'm feeling the pressure for sure.

Everyone needs so much from me, including making our home safe... hmmm.

I'll get there lol... the fine weather is helping! The roof staying dry helps.

EMxxxx