Day 10 Maria's case

[mk.maria]

Think of a person in your life from whom you hide your emotions.

This would be my entire family (relatives). The only person I can now show my true emotions to - is my partner, however it doesn't always work well. Sometimes he can't handle my emotions well, maybe because I express them in a negative or harmful to him way.. and then I feel even worse than before sharing (but that's rather an exception).

As I remember myself I've been a person, who holds everything inside, especially feelings and emotions that make me look weak. I don't know exactly why and how, but I developed an alter ego during living at my family home until I turned 19. Maybe because my personality wasn't fitting into the norms and standards of the family, and I sensed it. No matter how bad I felt and whatever pain I underwent, I didn't share it with my mom, dad or sisters. Have to say, that they are wonderful, loving people. I actually quite often felt that I didn't deserve this family. From a young childhood I remember few episodes, where I was neglected and not understood by my parents - maybe this is when it started and I closed up. When I was about 8, I got a large and sever burn on my leg. I hid it for 2 hours from my mom until it was unbearable, I just didn't want to upset her, thought that I strong enough to handle it myself. This ended at a hospital, the burn was so big.

At 19 years old I moved to another country, I was very inspired, opened myself up to the world, was uncovering my personality even for myself. Until 4 years after when I got dumped by my boyfriend, who was my first love. Then I moved to another city, closed up my true personality again, and tried to develop a new personality that would fit into new surroundings and company of people.


What is preventing you from telling this person how you feel?
Now I feel that I don't want to share with my family, just don't have a need.. I think that initially the fear of pain from being neglected or hurt again is what made me closed up my emotional world inside myself. Also a fear of looking weak. That one person that I have now (my partner) is enough for me to share what I have inside. But maybe it's a trap I don't know.. because who knows what will happen if I lose this person too.. But I'm a totally closed person now.

 

[Adam Coloretti (coach)]

As I remember myself I've been a person, who holds everything inside, especially feelings and emotions that make me look weak. I don't know exactly why and how, but I developed an alter ego during living at my family home until I turned 19. Maybe because my personality wasn't fitting into the norms and standards of the family, and I sensed it. No matter how bad I felt and whatever pain I underwent, I didn't share it with my mom, dad or sisters. Have to say, that they are wonderful, loving people. I actually quite often felt that I didn't deserve this family. From a young childhood I remember few episodes, where I was neglected and not understood by my parents - maybe this is when it started and I closed up. When I was about 8, I got a large and sever burn on my leg. I hid it for 2 hours from my mom until it was unbearable, I just didn't want to upset her, thought that I strong enough to handle it myself. This ended at a hospital, the burn was so big.

Hi Maria, I know you didn't ask but I thought a comment on this might help.

I think that there's a risk of underselling what you went through (that was my first thought when I read this), and that's often because we don't think that two things can be true. I'm not questioning that your family are loving people, but it was your parent's responsibility (and theirs alone) to make you feel loved and accepted for who you were as a child - you didn't deserve to be neglected and you shouldn't have had to suppress yourself to fit the "norms" of the family. Feeling like you had to hide a severe burn on your leg is proof enough that your parents made mistakes when it came to making you feel safe (it's never the child's fault).

I think that's where people get stuck, because much like the thought process of a child (which makes sense as this is when these feelings developed), we operate in black and white thinking. If we feel like our family are good people then that means they didn't make mistakes and don't have responsibility for what happened to us in the past. That's not true and both can be true. You can still love them whilst validating your own experience and appreciating that they were at fault, and that's even more important because (due to the black and white thinking) a part of you has probably been blaming yourself all this time. Much like you were protecting your mum when you didn't tell her about the burn, you're likely in some ways protecting her now by possibly minimising what you've been through - it's actually a great analogy and metaphor because the protection of her in the past hurt you physically (by not treating the burn sooner), whilst here it's likely hurting you emotionally (emotionally burning you and not treating it, letting it fester).

Hopefully that helps