Wanting to be Understood.

[primrose]

I had an insight last night about my mother and my relationship with her. I've described before the dynamic I sometimes have with her that is very painful, this is it in brief:

I tell my mother something negative (I'm upset, scared, fearful etc)
My mother panics and tries to get rid of my feeling by re-framing it, often in quite a crazy way.
I feel angry and confused and withdraw.

Or:

I tell my mother something positive and ask her for help with it (I'm doing some teaching, have you any idea how to charge for a group rather than an individual session?)
My mother infers that I am doing something wrong by not knowing how to do the thing I'm asking her advice about. She asks me questions about what I'm doing that strongly suggest I'm a failure.
I feel angry and confused and withdraw.

The other thing that happens around communication that is connected to this dynamic is that my mother talks to me about people I don't know and have never met as if I know them very well. My siblings and I joke about her doing this because her conversation starts like this "Bill and I" and no one knows who Bill is, and if you say "Bill?" She glares and says "My hairdresser!" As if it's SO stupid for you to ask. This is amusing sometimes, but it shows how my mother is unable to really know what's in her mind and what isn't. Her feelings (she believes) are her children's feelings. She is so codependent that she doesn't understand her own mental separateness. In fact, she doesn't have a sense of separateness when it comes to some emotions, I think that's why when her children express negative feelings or ask for her help when she can't give it, she freaks out and behaves so strangely.

So what can I do about this and where does it leave me emotionally?

It's left me with a deep longing to be understood, a great deal of anger when I'm not understood, a strong sense of being alone with my feelings, and a tendency to try and be understood by people who aren't able to do it.

I think I began to understand this about myself through my POA. I wrote to him every day, and what I really did when I wrote to him, was expose my deepest feelings. I wanted most of all to be known. I obsessively wanted to let him know who I was. It was dressed up in seduction, but mostly the truth of it was "SEE ME". And for me, my withdrawal was so much about losing the possibility of being known. The terrible loneliness was about losing a connection where I felt I was understood, or at least, might be understood.

That desire to be known, I only realised last night, can never ever be met. I've hit yet another layer of it through women recently. I thought I'd worked through "The chase to be known" by a man, and in lots of ways I really have, but here it is again in a clearer form. This desire to be known is the wound from my mother, and also in some part my aunt who I loved very deeply as a little girl.

I had to give up chasing a man, I also have to give up being known by a woman. I just have to give it up. No one is ever going to understand me completely. It's not going to happen. I chased my father's love through my POA until in recovery I realised I was chasing a ghost and I'd never catch up, and I guess now I have to give up the chase to be understood by my mother through being understood by my female friends.

I suppose in 12 step there has been for me the hope that finally I would be understood, and in lots of ways recovery does provide community and understanding. But I realised last night, that if I've been wounded as a child where I wasn't understood, I can't escape that wound as an adult. I will feel misunderstood at some level WHEREVER I am. Even if I only socialise with brilliant, intelligent, sensitive giving people (like people here ) That lone wolf feeling will be triggered and I'll have to go through it.

And I have been going through those feelings the last few months. As my business took off in September I have felt so alone, and I've felt that with the ivf as well.

If I see this in the way that I saw my withdrawal I realise it will help. I had a LOT of abandonment to process in withdrawal. It was an extended period of grieving where I let the longing and the sadness overwhelm me (well I had no choice, it just did overwhelm me) and bit by bit I got through that glut of old feelings. Now I am feeling a whole other set of feelings. Fear (which is what happens in DA when you look at the money) and also this aloneness and pain about not being understood.

I hope that as I let myself go through this feeling, it will, bit by bit, be processed. Really, is it anyone's job to understand me fully? It isn't. As a child I needed my mother to understand me and she didn't, now I'm an adult and I don't NEED to be understood. As an adult it's my job to take care of myself and meet my own needs as best I can. That child part of me that is still so hurt that she wasn't understood is still getting hurt when other people are insensitive or misunderstand me, but that's okay. I understand myself and I can take steps to protect myself from people who won't understand me. And if I see this feeling as I saw the feeling of longing in withdrawal, I'll get through it.

Perhaps I can separate out for my child self what is the overwhelming feeling of frustration about my mother not understanding me, and what is the normal day to day selfishness of other people. That may help me protect myself from deeply self-absorbed people, and also tolerate general insensitivity from friends I usually get on with very well. I hope so!

[lotus]

Wow, I can really relate to that -- it made me realize a lot of things about myself. Thanks!

I wanted desperately to be known by my POA. I was aware of it at the time and thought "wow, this is kind of weird."

Reading your post made me realize that my mom tries to smooth over bad feelings to the point where I don't even share personal things with her anymore.

I've just realized too that I get upset with my husband when he doesn't understand me. If I don't feel like he gets my point of view it hurts a lot for some reason. This is silly because he is a separate human being so I shouldn't expect him to always understand, or maybe I'm just not explaining well enough.

[serenity]

Oh my goodness!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I have battled with inner demons for years about the way my mother talks constantly about people I don't know and have been so confussed as to why she isn't aware that its odd to share such detailed information about people that i may have only met a couple of times in my childhood or not at all.

'She is so codependent that she doesn't understand her own mental seperateness'- wow, i need to look more into this with my own mother.

[primrose]

Hey Lotus, I sometimes feel awful when I'm not understood. It depends who I'm talking to really. Sometimes I feel my heart will break if someone doesn't understand me, other times I don't care at all. I had such a fantasy with my POA that he would understand me, that I could throw all my feelings at him and he would absorb them for me. Now I see that having a mother who negated my feelings left me very vulnerable to a man who promised to take anything I gave him. I'm only just beginning to see this need to be understood for what it is, and how I need to give it up.

[g]

Great post Primrose. I can identify with everything you said about trying to get your poa to understand you.

I poured my heart out to my poa too and recounted my whole life to him in endless emails. I then laid myself at his feet to do with me as he pleased. My ramblings must have made him think I was insane from very early on but he insisted he didn't see things that way. He said he wasnt going anywhere and that he'd be there for me. That I should take my time and calm down. ( I know next to nothing about him)

I did run out of steam eventually thank goodness but considered myself totally worthless after I had confessed my whole pathetic life to him. I think I wanted him to rebuild me into someone he could consider worthy of him. I said I was putty in his hands to do with me as he pleased. And that was exactly how I felt and behaved.

I wanted to be perfect for him and did whatever he asked but my fear of rejection and abandonment just got worse and worse.

I started by writing romantic outpourings night after night. Writing my own fairytale based on nothing more than fantasy. And when he gave the slightest hint that he was not interested I'd change track and modify my persona to suit a script he found more stimulating.
I would do anything to try not to upset him. I would only talk about things that I knew wouldn't irritate him
Whatever he wanted I was willing to consider. Whatever his warped beliefs were, I was willing to make them my own.

I lost my sense of self and as a result couldn't have been more vulnerable than I appeared to him.
And the more I exposed my vulnerability, the more vulnerable I felt. I just kept digging that hole deeper and deeper for someone who could never give e the answers or support I was so desperately seeking. It was like drowning and clutching at straws and observing him standing over me and never reaching out to pull me to safety. Why wouldn't he help me??? Why couldn't he love me??? What the hell was wrong with me??? Why didn't he understand my moods and issues and act the way I wanted him to?

I wanted him to let me into his heart and his life and to share with me everything I was sharing with him. I wanted to be him and for him to be me.

That longing was soul destroying and noone would ever be able to fill that void in me.


Why I so desperately needed him to know me inside out almost brings a smile to my lips today. A slightly deranged smile perhaps, but still a smile and no longer that deadly longing that was sucking the life out of me.

I don't need anyone to understand me now. Except me. I never want to be that needy with anyone ever again. My contact was so intense and consuming that I actually dread the thought of ever being so totally open and honest about myself with anyone else for the rest of my life.

I'm with my h and living as a 'separate' human being. I used to tell him my every thought and share every single experience with him but don't do that any more. I used to be tormented by my conscience and felt the desperate need for my h to know everything that had happened. Only then would he know me and understand me again. But that is a two way street and that kind of intimacy isn't realistic for me. He doesn't tell me everything and never has but I only realised that quite recently. I need to start over with him. I'm seeing it as a clean slate I've wiped for myself and for him. We'll see how it goes.



I've been working hard for over a year and have got to know myself pretty well and I feel I am ready to let my adult run the show again. First therapy session today. Will write about that later. Maybe.
G

[g]

And yes my mother negated my feelings for a lifetime. Telling me I was over the top if I worried about exam results or told me I was kidding myself that my bf could possibly be interested in me.

She forced me to wear black when my brother died and told me she'd never let me go to university or allow me to learn to drive. She still tells me all my life choices were made because I was obsessed wit the idea of getting married and having kids from an early age. Maybe sex being so taboo in my home may have made me that way? Marriage woud be my only hope of real freedom. Pfffffttt.
I thought therapy hadn't got to me as I didn't shed a single tear this morning. But something is hgappening to me now.

My terapist told me that I have to stop thinking I've made mistakes in my life. I have to stop beating myself up. NOW.

Wish I could talk to someone just now.
G

[primrose]

G, it's so sad that your mother couldn't let you be YOU when you were growing up. I think in this last year you've done incredible work on yourself and can reap the benefits of that in terms of stronger boundaries and self-esteem, yippee! I hope you have a sense of self respect and healthy pride in yourself for doing what you've done. I find therapy has a way of percolating slowly sometimes! Things come up in dreams a couple of days after a session, and not crying in a session doesn't necessarily mean I'm not working on myself. I hope you develop a great relationship with your therapist, I'm happy for you that you've found someone you really like IRL.

Not being understood as a child is just horrible. I blanked out so much of my relationship with my mother that I am only now beginning to address this part of my experience. My husband said to me he thinks me seeing my aunt was the last straw for me with this stuff. He could be right. She was SO not on the same page as me and SO self absorbed that I think I have truly had enough of women who can't see past themselves.

My aunt spent most of her time with me going on and on about her sexual abuse and what it means. Okay, fine, she's been abused, it's horrendous, but HELLO I'm drugged to the nines with hormones and I'm about to go into hospital. Maybe, just maybe it would have been nice to keep the conversation a bit light? All she wanted from me was a witness. I've had it with being a witness. I see that the flipside of being DESPERATE for someone to know me is that I will act as a constant witness for other peoples' pain. That's the bargain. I give completely of my emotional self, I demand complete attention from others.

Okay, I also really don't do that in my life and have learnt to not give of myself fully in lots of ways, but this thing I have with needing to be understood, when it is triggered, it is very powerful. I will attend. I will listen. I will give complete attention. And then I am furious and want it myself, so I went looking for it from a man. Which makes perfect sense of my childhood: my mother used me as an ear, my father listened to me although he scared me because he desired me.

And here is another layer of it for me to process. Recovery for me just circles around the same issues going a little deeper each time.

[primrose]

Vee! I missed your post for some reason. It is crazy when people expect you to be privy to their mental landscape. Apparently it's a sign of narcissism, as well as a few other nasty things! That blurring of where a person ends and the other begins. My mother has never understood that her children are separate from her. It's why my emotions frighten her so much, she really takes what I feel personally. And writing about all of this stuff, I see I really do the same thing, although not in every area of my life. It's most intense around this thing of not being understood.

[primrose]

I'm angry again today, which is a bit crazy as really the best thing for me is to lie on my sofa, watch terrible tv and doze. But I'm angry, so I guess that's how it is! I'm angry with people (women) not understanding, angry that mothers lie to themselves so much about what damage they do to their children. I just watched an awful reality show where a mother was in complete denial about the damage she'd done to her son, and I had to turn it off. Wow, I'm just mad at all of that. I suppose having ivf would bring all of this up, I'd just rather I was serene at the moment, but I'm not. Oh well, I'm sure it'll make sense in time. Perhaps the anger is covering up fear because I am afraid I will be a bad mother. Usually I cover fear with anger.

[primrose]

It's helpful re-reading this post. The desire I have to be understood is very strong and it frustrates me when people don't get what I'm saying. I am still too attached to this need and I know it is because I haven't resolved the feelings I had as a child when my mother not only misunderstood me, she purposely confused me.

My friend who died last year gave me a good example of this. Her first marriage to an American broke up when her children were little and she and the children moved back to England. Her ex-husband, who had been abusive, showed no interest in his children. He hadn't wanted them and he didn't love them. My friend lied a lot to her children about their father through the years. She told them he loved them. She bought cards and pretended they were from him. When they were old enough to contact him, they were devastated to find out the lie. They'd built up a fantasy about their father and it was awful for them to discover the truth. My friend's son moved to The States to get to know his father and was very painfully rejected.

My friend felt very guilty about what she'd done. As a mother she hadn't been able to bare her children facing their father not wanting them, so she'd lied, but those lies made things worse in the end.

I can understand my friend very well, and I also understand my mother lying to me in lots of ways. When I went to my mother as a child and said "daddy hates us, he is always drunk and nasty" my mother didn't know any better than to tell me that he did love me and that I needed to not upset him and that it was my fault that the day was ruined "you've ruined the whole day". Better to put the onus on the child than to be honest and face coming out of painful denial about your husband's behaviour.

When I said to my mother "daddy doesn't love me" and she said "yes he does" I was left trying to make sense of "love" meaning getting drunk and raging and abusing people and everyone crying, and if you dared say anything about it, being told that the behaviour was your fault.

I guess if my feelings had just been heard, I wouldn't now have to do so much therapy and recovery where I piece together why, when I'm not understood, I freak out. Well, I don't always freak out, I've done a lot of work on this, but when it is triggered it is very intense.

When I told my mother her father was a pedophile, she forgave him and was furious with me. That is truly, sadly, INSANE, but it is quite common in families where there is abuse. The whistleblower is rejected, not the perpetrator. But how do I as an adult child of that kind of insanity, make sense of the world?

I was brought up by someone who was so damaged she couldn't face the truth. She had to lie to herself, so had no choice but to lie to her children.

My reality as a child wasn't just ignored, it had to be eradicated. My reality was dangerous to my mother.

And I feel a lot of compassion for my mother as I can see her pain was so horrific that she had to repress it in her children. She just could not look at her own childhood trauma, so sought to deny mine. but that's okay if you're two friends sitting together and one dismisses the other's feelings. That's okay. Painful maybe, or upsetting, but adults to adults can take that and deal with it. Children can't.

So I'm left with this trigger of fury and pain when I am lied to, dismissed or misunderstood, along with a strong over-acceptance and tolerance of lies because I spent my childhood listening to them.

I think the best thing for me is to pay very close attention to when I over-react and work back to the feeling.

Like what happened with me being angry with my mother over not telling me about my brother having a child. Actually, it's not up to her to tell me, it is my brother's decision when he let's people know.

But it triggers all the times my mother protected anyone else but me. Like the time my father threw an alcoholic fit in a restaurant and threw wine all over a friend of mine. The next day my mother called me furious with me, why? Because I'd taken my friend to the restaurant. Like the time I finally set a boundary with my father and told him he couldn't come to my flat drunk and call my flatmates c**ts. Again, my mother was furious that I would hurt my father's feelings by telling him he couldn't come in. All sorts of stuff like that.

Perhaps I also need to look more at how painful it was to not feel protected. Pff, so much stuff to process. Mind you, I need to also be proud of myself. I've done a lot of work on this, and I'm not nearly as angry or defensive as I was. I'm able to talk honestly to my mother and not be in constant irritation with her or resent her for not protecting me in the present.

I don't act out on those old feelings by getting revenge (being angry with her or withdrawing) and I don't internalised or ignore them. I can bare them now.

[g]

I'm sitting here with my mouth open having just read what you've written.

you are an AMAZING woman Primrose. hats off to you having had a childhood and parents like yours and coming out of it alive. Not only that, you have come out of it enlightened and a teacher for the rest of us. You are truly an INSPIRATION to me.

Love you to bits sweet girl
xxxxx

[primrose]

Very sweet of you hon! People survive all sorts of stuff and I don't really think my childhood was that exceptional. Sad that there's so much unhappiness for children. Think the more awareness people have about what harms children, the better really. Think you're a remarkable person too. Xx

[hiddenme]

Hello Primrose,

Your childhood sounds very difficult. Is your mother still playing the same role of denying and covering up the flaws, then being angry when you won't go along with it? Did your grandfather that you said was a pedophile possibly molest her or people she knew? There may be some even deeper truths she is keeping inside. She may be doing everything she can just to survive within herself.

For me it is best to completely avoid people that trigger me. I like to use e-mail, greeting cards etc so that I am in contact but on my terms. You don't even have to read their responses back, just know that you sent a card for each holiday and an occasional "hi, hope all is well" note. Then remove yourself.

When I absolutely had to personally be with difficult people I have pretended I was a robot (very distant, emotionally strong person who cannot be hurt) with only select programed responses that fit my boundaries. I can only do this because I have accepted that the situation cannot change and that it is beyond my ability to fix. So what they say really doesn't trigger me anymore. I do not record any of the hurtful things said to me, just let them flow out. I can sit there and be distracted by admiring my shiny armored chest and how great it is at blocking arrows. They cannot find or push my buttons because they are hidden inside (if they do find one I do not let them know). My programed responses are things like: I wish things were better for you, I'm sorry you feel that way, I'm glad that is going well for you. I never internally accept or take on blame, just nod and let them talk (but with limits). If they say something very disturbing, then its time to leave, quietly..."oh I just got an urgent call (silent ringer) and have to go".

I only have one person in my life (a sister) that I have to do this with. It has been over a year now and we are both more comfortable with this deliberate distance. I will not play the game where we end up not speaking or in tears. I have discovered that instead of being a robot, I am actually being an adult to her child.

[primrose]

Hi Hiddenme, sounds like a great defense! Glad it works so well for you. My childhood was no picnic, but then no addict ever had a happy childhood as far as I know. You know a tree by its fruit. It's not that difficult for me to relate to my parents these days, I've been working on boundaries for many years. When I'm triggered I use that information to heal my old pain. It's all useful information for healing in the end. I like your armour idea, that is what I did by being avoidant. It kept me safe in many wonderful ways. Defenses are great I think. And I take mine down only when I am strong enough.

[primrose]

I spoke to my mother today, not the best idea as I was thinking about IWS and what that means for me. Was a thoughtful day for me.

My mother is coming to see me next week. I guess she's in a difficult position. One child going to give her a much longed for grand-child. The other longing for a child and it hasn't happened. Finding that all out on the same day must have been a bit much.

So that's how it is for her. Complex. And it's painful for me. My mother is just not equipped for this kind of situation. She freaks out. She can't be there for me. Which is okay. It's okay, but still it hurts.

Really, I've spent a lot of time in my life accepting that I can't get what I would like. That I have to have other ways to meet my needs. It just hurts right now to not have support that is real support. A mother who could just listen and be present and not freak out because I'm triggering her own unfelt pain. Oh to have had someone who could be empathic but centred enough to not be overwhelmed by my feelings. But that wasn't the case. My mother was and is too neurotic and too unprocessed to be able to bare my reality.

Bad decision to talk to her today. Or maybe not. Maybe it's exactly where I need to be, just gutted that my mother is a child emotionally. She needs to be here trying to work the steps wittering on about her crap husband and have other people here guiding her away from all of that. How could I expect anything from someone who hadn't gone through withdrawal properly? I couldn't, and that is how it is with my mother.

She's just a love addict who has chosen not to embrace recovery, and as a result is a seriously crap mother. Which is fine FINE as I can mother myself today, but it's still crap actually.

I'm going to an IVF support group tomorrow. Am very glad about that. One of the things it says in the invite to the group is that often families and friends add to the stresses of IVF by being insensitive, and that rather than ease the process they can make it much worse. I can see that. My husband's mother has her own theories about why I'm not pregnant, and they are about as useful to me as putting a clove of garlic on my head. My mother is going down the angels and past lives route, also of no use to me and makes me cringe. I've lost count of the times people have told me to "just relax RELAX" or the helpful advice about how "so many people try for years and then split up with their partner and the next person they're with gets them pregnant really quickly". Some people just don't get it, and again, that's okay. BUT I'm fed up of being the understanding one, of detaching and accepting that people are where they are and being so understanding.

I'm childless. I might never have a child. It's incredibly horrendously enormously painful. No one can make it better. There is no perfect mother I can go to who can make it okay, there never was, and if I want mothering I have to find that within myself. And I got my AF today so that is why I've plummeted into this pain. I knew I wasn't pregnant, but it's always the same when I know for sure I'm not.