Day 5 Journaling for 15-20 minutes

[Marla]

The event I choose was my moms first nervous breakdown when I was 12. As you can imagine I had a lot to write about, lots of fears, etc.

But they weren't the fears you would think. There was so much shame about it and her going to a mental hospital for a week, I wasn't told that. I was told she was very sick and in regular hospital.

I was afraid she was going to die, when I asked about her I was stone walled and told I wasn't allowed to talk to anyone about her.

I knew she had been acting weird, over reading the bible in a weird way and thinking god was talking to her, not the normal church way but for real. She also was drinking a lot of wine, and taking a lot of Valium but at the time I didn't know that.

All I knew was I was sent across town to stay with my moms friend and lots of whispering around me with no one telling me the truth for years.

It was about this time my fantasy life turned into numbing myself with long hours and hours of daydreams and invented invisible friend I would play tennis with as I hit the ball against the wall. I would talk for hours out loud with this friend. As I was not allowed to talk to anyone else.

How this affects me now is what I am currently in counseling about, mostly fear issues. I only go once a month in the summer as schedule is hard. I live in rural area and have to travel to larger city.

 

[Eric "Herbie" Watson]

I remember my mom would take me to my grandma's house to stay for several months at a time. I didn't know at the time it was because my mom was having nervous breakdowns. I learned later in life at the age of about 11 and up why she would take us over to my grandmas. She was always very fearful if I wanted to do anything outside in the yard " like play" she always thought I was going to get hurt or even killed if I played in the yard and lord forbid if I was to have a bicycle. I remember when I finally talked my mom into getting me one at the age of 14 and I wasn't allowed to ride it in the driveway. Someone might pull in and run over me, but riding a bicycle in the grass was very hard and almost impossible since we had high and thick grass in the country. I remember when my mom first caught me riding in the driveway and I thought she was going to have a heart attack, she told me how I was going to get hurt and and how I didn't care for her, this was after a long whopping with a big hickory and I was afraid to even get near the bike for about a year. I finally one day jumped on my bike, rebelled and took off down the rd and played cops and robbers for close to 8 hours till it got almost dark and I dreaded my return home. I knew it was going to be rough and I took my whopping as a soldier, it was a price to pay for having the time of my life on that one great bicycle ride playing the life of Punch Orello from chips in the california highway patrol.
To make this long story short I realize now my mother loved me so much and she was very much in fear that something bad was going to happen to her little boy, she was brought up this way as my grandma was the same way. My mom never had the knowledge we can get today on how to overcome anxiety and fear and be at peace in an un peaceful world, she always taught us to worry about the worst and I never really remember us not biting our nails and worrying about everything. She was just brought up in a family that taught her the best they knew and she passed that along to us.
I grew up and learned through great psychological teachers to be strong and expect the best, I was counseling marriage couples when I was just in my teens and also learning to be a great salesman and negotiator from the great Dale Carnegie courses.
My mom always supported me when I wanted to read and study and that was my favorite pass time. We became best friends as the years went by and I got to share some great wisdom with her as much as she got to share her great wisdom with me. I became a preacher at 29 and learned to think positive about all circumstances and she learned to be great at playing bingo. She would win several hundred dollars every time she went to play and as she showed me the numbers game I showed her the wisdom game, we got along great the last few years of her life and it's from those years that I have my best memories.
Life is beautiful, it was all in how I looked at it.
Your doing great Marla, Bless you.