Post by primrose on Jun 26, 2011 7:22:19 GMT -5
When I was a child my mother demanded that each morning after my father had been drinking, everyone had to behave nicely and pretend that what had happened the night before, hadn't happened.
My father might have a terrible hangover, he might still be drunk, but the family had to play happy families and pretend we were normal and were having a nice day and woe betide anyone who dared to suggest that what had happened the night before had frightened any of us.
The fear, the pain, the upset, the tiredness we felt after hearing my parents scream at each other all night, the violence we saw, all of that was not allowed to be discussed.
It's left me with a hatred of situations where people are afraid of telling the truth. I at once know how to lie and know how to enable addicts, but equally at some point I will rebel against that behaviour and throw bombs at the addicts and reveal everything about their behaviour.
It's also left me with an over-reaction to when people won't hear my sadness. My sadness was never heard as a child, so for a long time in therapy I just needed to have it affirmed. I AM SAD was what I needed to say. I AM HURT. I HAVE SUFFERED. I AM ANGRY. I AM NOT HAPPY.
This weekend my mother told me something that made me see yet again how unable she is to look at her own sadness. She has spent her life running away from pain. Probably she'll always do that. It's not a surprise to me that she absolutely could not allow her children to express their true feelings about her and about her husband's drinking. She spent her life pretending that things were okay, her denial was rock solid to protect her. If her children expressed pain her denial would have been challenged, and she couldn't afford that.
How important it was for her to pretend to be happy and to look to the positive, put a smile on her face and be cheerful and parade her perfect looking family.
I think in lots of symbolic ways I'm still trying to get people who are quite happy in denial to see the truth (well my version of the truth). I've still not completely let go of that sense of injustice I had as a little child that I knew what was really going on and nobody had the courage to listen to me. Everyone was frightened of the truth. I was alone with it, battling to be heard and NOBODY CARED. Actually, all they wanted was to shut me up and carry on as they had been all along.
I re-play that old script when I come across a group where there's a guru thing going on. Any sniff of BS from a guru in a group and I set about outing it. But my challenge is to not bother with those kind of groups in the first place. The compulsion I have to out an addict is a childhood wound. I need to let the guru groups alone. If they're happy in their little tight knot of dysfunction I need to let them be!
My sadness wasn't listened to as a child, I need to listen to it myself now. My need to tell the truth wasn't respected or admired, I need to respect it and admire it myself. I never gave up trying to show my parents the reality of their lives when I was a child. Now I have to let go of that completely and focus on the reality of my life. I just need to give all of that up. Let people live their lives as they want to.
If I'm triggered into that old behaviour, I need to stop and take a minute and not react.
My father might have a terrible hangover, he might still be drunk, but the family had to play happy families and pretend we were normal and were having a nice day and woe betide anyone who dared to suggest that what had happened the night before had frightened any of us.
The fear, the pain, the upset, the tiredness we felt after hearing my parents scream at each other all night, the violence we saw, all of that was not allowed to be discussed.
It's left me with a hatred of situations where people are afraid of telling the truth. I at once know how to lie and know how to enable addicts, but equally at some point I will rebel against that behaviour and throw bombs at the addicts and reveal everything about their behaviour.
It's also left me with an over-reaction to when people won't hear my sadness. My sadness was never heard as a child, so for a long time in therapy I just needed to have it affirmed. I AM SAD was what I needed to say. I AM HURT. I HAVE SUFFERED. I AM ANGRY. I AM NOT HAPPY.
This weekend my mother told me something that made me see yet again how unable she is to look at her own sadness. She has spent her life running away from pain. Probably she'll always do that. It's not a surprise to me that she absolutely could not allow her children to express their true feelings about her and about her husband's drinking. She spent her life pretending that things were okay, her denial was rock solid to protect her. If her children expressed pain her denial would have been challenged, and she couldn't afford that.
How important it was for her to pretend to be happy and to look to the positive, put a smile on her face and be cheerful and parade her perfect looking family.
I think in lots of symbolic ways I'm still trying to get people who are quite happy in denial to see the truth (well my version of the truth). I've still not completely let go of that sense of injustice I had as a little child that I knew what was really going on and nobody had the courage to listen to me. Everyone was frightened of the truth. I was alone with it, battling to be heard and NOBODY CARED. Actually, all they wanted was to shut me up and carry on as they had been all along.
I re-play that old script when I come across a group where there's a guru thing going on. Any sniff of BS from a guru in a group and I set about outing it. But my challenge is to not bother with those kind of groups in the first place. The compulsion I have to out an addict is a childhood wound. I need to let the guru groups alone. If they're happy in their little tight knot of dysfunction I need to let them be!
My sadness wasn't listened to as a child, I need to listen to it myself now. My need to tell the truth wasn't respected or admired, I need to respect it and admire it myself. I never gave up trying to show my parents the reality of their lives when I was a child. Now I have to let go of that completely and focus on the reality of my life. I just need to give all of that up. Let people live their lives as they want to.
If I'm triggered into that old behaviour, I need to stop and take a minute and not react.