Mommy is Killing me.

[clarinetpath]

Thanks Jan, what did you do to help those foster children, when they had emotional problems inflicted by controlling parents? Remembering my own life, there are literally thousands of things I let my son do and have as much of as he wants. Like yesterday for example, it was a beautiful sunny day and we took him to get fancy home made ice cream at a local store. I asked if he had his fill, did he want a second or third helping? He said no! A child can only eat so much ice cream, no matter how good. Or steak, soup, cheese, pasta, chocolate, whatever.

Things like that I couldn't do, or could rarely get enough of. My son doesn't seem to care that much actually, never having experienced their absence or restriction. Interestingly, I outran him coming home, he was on his bicycle and fell far behind with his mother, screaming at me to wait. I figured he was on a bike, I was a runner...he could keep up if he wanted. He was so mad at that!

 

[Diana-M]

it is to your benefit to recondition yourself

@clarinetpath
Thank you for this post! I actually feel it’s a Godsend! Just what I needed to be reminded of. The link you added of ACE1’s suggestions for overcoming conditioning is priceless. And his admonition that you don’t have to assume you’re going backwards just because you’ve been triggered.

I agree; we all don’t have the luxury of isolating ourselves from stressful people; but as ACE1 points out, we can learn to weather them better. Personally, I think it’s good to get people out who are really destroying you—at least for awhile, if nothing else. Congrats on doing that! It takes guts.

I’m loving how my TMS journey is forcing me to learn ways to soothe my nerves. I’ve needed this all my life. It’s also teaching me to have clarity about what hurts and how to develop the backbone to protect myself. I don’t have to use flight as my only alternative—as I have all my life. I also don’t necessarily need to fight every time, either. There’s an in between. I can stand my ground, be honest, and make things happen that I need to happen. (Maybe this actually is fight?)

Case in point: last week my narcissist sister texted that she wanted to talk. Normally, I would feel I just should. Like I have to. Because telling her no would hurt her feelings. But talking to her chews me up alive. She kills me and is big fodder for my TMS. Well, for the first time I told her “no—that for the foreseeable future I don’t want to talk because I’m resting my nerves.” That’s it. Endo discussion. I’ve Never done that before. Protected my right to peace over what someone else wants. And I didn’t even feel guilty! That’s a TMS Journey victory!

It’s sad we have to “get rid of” people at all out of our lives. Especially those we love. Maybe with better boundary skills, some could stay. But ultimately—you have to ask yourself how sick someone is making you.

I really love this list you included! I’m going to put it to good use. https://www.tmswiki.org/forum/threads/key-to-healing.3577/ (Key to healing)

How does this relate back to the original post? Sarno says to tell the truth about what hurts.

 

[louaci]

When kids pass the survival level, they want to be seen and paid attention to and played with, and sometimes to an adult-maddening level especially when parents are overwhelmed by whatever triggers in adult lives these days. Back in the cavemen age, young children were cared for in groups with multiple adults and they played and were always watched by some adults. Modern parents have to be hunter/gatherer/caretaker etc. at the same time, no wonder they burn out.

 

[clarinetpath]

@clarinetpath
Thank you for this post! I actually feel it’s a Godsend! Just what I needed to be reminded of. The link you added of ACE1’s suggestions for overcoming conditioning is priceless. And his admonition that you don’t have to assume you’re going backwards just because you’ve been triggered.

I agree; we all don’t have the luxury of isolating ourselves from stressful people; but as ACE1 points out, we can learn to weather them better. Personally, I think it’s good to get people out who are really destroying you—at least for awhile, if nothing else. Congrats on doing that! It takes guts.

I’m loving how my TMS journey is forcing me to learn ways to soothe my nerves. I’ve needed this all my life. It’s also teaching me to have clarity about what hurts and how to develop the backbone to protect myself. I don’t have to use flight as my only alternative—as I have all my life. I also don’t necessarily need to fight every time, either. There’s an in between. I can stand my ground, be honest, and make things happen that I need to happen. (Maybe this actually is fight?)

Case in point: last week my narcissist sister texted that she wanted to talk. Normally, I would feel I just should. Like I have to. Because telling her no would hurt her feelings. But talking to her chews me up alive. She kills me and is big fodder for my TMS. Well, for the first time I told her “no—that for the foreseeable future I don’t want to talk because I’m resting my nerves.” That’s it. Endo discussion. I’ve Never done that before. Protected my right to peace over what someone else wants. And I didn’t even feel guilty! That’s a TMS Journey victory!

It’s sad we have to “get rid of” people at all out of our lives. Especially those we love. Maybe with better boundary skills, some could stay. But ultimately—you have to ask yourself how sick someone is making you.

I really love this list you included! I’m going to put it to good use. https://www.tmswiki.org/forum/threads/key-to-healing.3577/ (Key to healing)

How does this relate back to the original post? Sarno says to tell the truth about what hurts.

hi Diana,

You're welcome, I'm glad it's helpful. I went over this Ace score again interpreting it as Jan suggests. I get an 8. It's hard to believe, but then again I'm a lot like Baseball from what I can tell.

Among all humans alive, I personally believe that I'm one of the best at eliminating physical symptoms. No physical symptom troubles me, nor will it ever. Overall however, I can't claim to have figured out much about how to weather unpleasant people or situations, to calmly absorb the uncomfortable emotions they stir up. I mentioned in my other posts what I've done. I fought for 20 years, and won most of the time until I could not. That was my ego doing all that work, and it served well. Then I gave up a "promising" career full of shit, cut off my obnoxious family, etc. Another thing, when I get stirred up emotionally, I have dreams where I kill people, or suppress them in some way, like trying to drown a police officer. Don't worry, I wont do it in real life.

The best I've come up with is to simply eliminate disturbing people from my life. Shall I now go off to a retirement enclave, live alone, sit in the sun, read, post on the forum, and exercise the rest of my days? Be a father for 4-6 weeks per year. That wouldn't be the same as being huddled over inside, physically disabled by TMS. On the other hand, when I have done that lately for extended periods, like a month alone, no symptom bothers to make an appearance for even a moment. Not even anxiety. And my dreams turn peaceful. So take my posts on emotional aspects for what they're worth.

 

[Diana-M]

Clarinet,
You have an 8? (That’s messed up.) dang. Even worse than me. (Kidding!) you’re doing great against the odds. Good for you! I’m inspired by people like you.

No physical symptom troubles me, nor will it ever.

have dreams where I kill people, or suppress them in some way,

I do so envy people who can feel anger and then visualize violence. I honestly think it wards off TMS! I also think men tend to visualize violence more easily than women. I had my anger mechanism suppressed as a child—so that’s a real empty spot for me. (Starting to improve tho.)

a month alone, no symptom bothers to make an appearance for even a moment. Not even anxiety. And my dreams turn peaceful.

Hmmm this is something to consider. Very tempting. I was actually picturing it the other day.

 

[clarinetpath]

Try it sometime. Even just stay home alone for a week or two, don't talk to anyone or do anything but what you like. I don't know if I posted it on here before, but this is what happened when my major back and neck pain left, nearly 2 years ago now. It has never returned in any persistent way, and the relapses were a shadow of their former intensity, getting fewer and further between. I really was a book cure in a sense.

Anyway, all other family members were out of my house for 10 days. I read Healing Back Pain and Mindbody Prescription for the first time. I looked some stuff up in anatomy textbooks as I read. This guy Sarno, he was right all along, all these other medical practitioners either never bothered to look, or more likely they were too emotionally disturbed themselves. On page 1 of this thread, the poster said The group that received warmth and care were able to recover from an allergic reaction in 3 minutes, while the control recovered in 6 minutes, and the mean physician group recovered in 10 minutes. Note that the physician group had the longest recovery time. That's no accident. As my pain left reading Sarno that first time, I also admitted to myself that I did not want to sacrifice my existence for all these other people. I was not a family man. My life is much more than just living at my expense for others' benefit. Moreover, I wasn't bad for that. Who would want to live that way? It can't even rightly be called living. You know what you can get if you live like that for 50 years? Malignant melanoma. Carcinosarcoma. Fatal coronary artery dissection and thrombosis. The list goes on.

Somewhere later in When The Body Says No, Gabor Mate noted that nature's highest purpose seems to be autonomy rather than survival, something like that, a similar sentiment.

Another way of seeing this is how Dan Buglio described it in his book. He said that judgment of oneself is perceived as a self attack. It's perceived by the brain as dangerous, a potent symptom generator. So what are you judging yourself for? In what way are you betraying yourself?

 

[JanAtheCPA]

...interpreting it as Jan suggests. I get an 8.

Wow, @clarinetpath - that's a SIGNIFICANT difference!!!!
And, I have to credit our wise @Cactusflower for the suggestion to answer the questions from your childhood point of view.
I like to steer people to this thread about the ACEs quiz where I've tried to explain the purpose of the test and the significance of the score, including her recommendation (plus there was some interesting discussion): https://www.tmswiki.org/forum/threads/aces-quiz-online-printable-versions.27061 (ACEs "quiz" - online & printable versions)

what did you do to help those foster children, when they had emotional problems inflicted by controlling parents?

Just like with TMS, each individual is different! In the case of one 16-year old, it was as simple as not rejecting her when she did something a couple of weeks after arriving at our house, that caused us a relatively small amount of stress but landed her in a juvenile mental facility for three weeks. Her DSHS social worker said that we didn't have to "keep" her since it had been such a short time, and my response was that she'd already had too much rejection in her life (overseas adoption as a toddler, divorce of parents less than four years later at age 5, an adoptive father who loved her but married a total bitch who completely rejected her, and, most immediately, the complete inability of her adoptive mother to love her unless she behaved perfectly, which is where the ultra-controlling behvior came in)(impossible to maintain for a teenager with adoption and rejection issues, for crying out loud). And we were very laid back with our teens - we had pretty basic standards of behavior and they broke about half of them a lot of the time (staying at school during the day and not sneaking out at night were the two biggies) but none of this was unexpected and they made an effort to pretend to treat us with the bare minimum of respect, and most importantly we did not take any of it personally. Plus they all knew how to do their own laundry and they did actually appreciated being cooked for.

In a different case, it wasn't our kid, but her younger sister who was in a different foster home - and those parents were religious control freaks, to the point where they thought they could dictate what kind of music this younger sister could listen to when she visited our house - god only knows what her home life was like. We let our foster daughter listen to whatever she wanted, much of which, given that this was the 90s, was violent and misogynistic and of course full of foul language. We would tell her why we did not want to hear it, but she was quite naive at age 14 and would often ask us to listen to lyrics with her so we could tell her what they were about! She eventually gravitated away from what we thought of as the highly objectionable stuff. However, no surprise, the younger sister ended up with severe hospital-level anorexia by the time she was 15. Damn, we really despised those people.

Clinically speaking, it was really interesting, but also, of course, completely heartbreaking. Both of those sisters were pretty messed up, with bipolar in the family along with the fractured years of living on and off with their dysfunctional bipolar mother who had been self-medicating with alcohol since the 1960s (no SSRIs back then) and grandma was known to be a drinker. Our daughter (we were never sure about her sister) had fetal alcohol brain damage which wasn't diagnosed until we insisted on an evaluation. She'd been in and out of many foster and group homes up to age 14 - she is high-functioning and no one had spent enough one-on-one time with her to notice the anomolies, but we'd had training at the Casey Family Foundation which ran its own foster program. The running theme of kids and adults with FAS is rejection, in the form of "what's wrong with you?" because the high-functioning ones are quick to learn, but notoriously unable to retain knowledge and perform consistently. Due to the literal physical holes in their brains, they can't think on their feet and when forced to make quick judgement calls they have a 50/50 chance of getting it right because they're guessing. They are often promoted beyond their abilities, then when they fail in a situation requiring quick decisions, the inevitable question returns - "what's wrong with you?" Neither our kid nor her sister is a fully-functional adult, which sadly was entirely predictable.

I don't know the fates of several kids, but three of them are doing well - although their backgrounds and inherent abilities were not nearly as damaging. All of the kids are 40 and older, which I can't even believe.

Humans. Gah.

 

[louaci]

[/QUOTE]

"what's wrong with you?"
I don't know the fates of several kids, but three of them are doing well - although their backgrounds and inherent abilities were not nearly as damaging. All of the kids are 40 and older, which I can't even believe.

Humans. Gah.[/QUOTE]

These sound like big T and just awful what suffering adults could inflict upon kids.

What about the little t, i.e. for kids who are rejected of warmth and acceptance when their behavior triggers adult's rage or other strong emotions? They get yelled at, their privilege is taken away, or a timeout, or they sense adults' strong disapproval, they are shunned away etc. ? Or maybe that would be OK if the parents try to love the kids as unconditionally as they could when they know their true selves better? Would the kids thrive more if they are not exposed to the adults' rejections due to adults' difficulty in handling kids' negative emotions uncooperating etc.?

 

[clarinetpath]

Wow, @clarinetpath - that's a SIGNIFICANT difference!!!!
And, I have to credit our wise @Cactusflower for the suggestion to answer the questions from your childhood point of view.
I like to steer people to this thread about the ACEs quiz where I've tried to explain the purpose of the test and the significance of the score, including her recommendation (plus there was some interesting discussion): https://www.tmswiki.org/forum/threads/aces-quiz-online-printable-versions.27061 (ACEs "quiz" - online & printable versions)

Humans. Gah.

Thank you Jan, this was good of you. In the ACEs quiz you linked, there is an older questionnaire from 2015 that is worded slightly differently than the present one. The one I used to answer "8" is the 2022 version:

https://www.acesaware.org/wp-conten...for-Adults-Identified-English-rev.7.26.22.pdf

The 2015 version qualifies most of the questions with "often or very often." I only get a 6 on the old one, which was what I thought I answered before, a 5 or a 6. Even the ACE questionnaire, with criteria being expanded, could become a nocebo if allowed to define oneself. The nocebo is everywhere! It's like the changelings on Star Trek Deep Space 9.

 

[JanAtheCPA]

Even the ACE questionnaire, with criteria being expanded, could become a nocebo if allowed to define oneself.

Indeed. That's why I try to emphasize the importance of viewing the results as a starting point to identify issues for therapeutic intervention and/or self-examination rather than worrying about the actual score. Again, and as you've shown, the questions are highly subjective, and it really does depend on a combination of interpretation and viewpoint of the individual answering them.

 

[Diana-M]

Even the ACE questionnaire, with criteria being expanded, could become a nocebo if allowed to define oneself

Indeed. That's why I try to emphasize the importance of viewing the results as a starting point to identify issues for therapeutic intervention and/or self-examination rather than worrying about the actual score.

Jan and clarinet, I like what you guys are saying. I was getting hung up on thinking that there are people with such bad backgrounds (high ACE scores) that they can never get better— Or it will be harder for them to get better than others. (I was worried this was true about me.) But, this just simply isn’t true. And it also sets up a victim mentality, which doesn’t help anybody.

 

[Diana-M]

(this thread is getting so long. It’s hard to scroll to the bottom lol!) I had to give a follow up because this discussion did me so much good! I’ve probably had the best two days of my entire TMS journey, the last two days. (And I say this at the risk of my symptoms flaring because every time I’ve ever bragged about improvement, something always goes wrong soon, but oh well.) I think it’s worth celebrating that I feel better.

When I say improvement, I’m talking just a small amount of improvement physically but also a great amount of improvement emotionally. Believe it or not I like to follow most of the advice I get on this forum. I keep my mind open. The first thing I did was get the mind-body prescription by John Sarno, As highly recommended by @Baseball65 . I started reading on page 139 like he said and it has been a while since I’ve read a Sarno book. I have been getting lost in the weeds of the neuroplasticity camp (Which honestly I believe is still a good camp!) I started yelling at my brain a couple days ago- Yelling For it to stop. Yelling at it that I’m in charge. Yelling out loud. This worked once in the past and I thought it’s worth a try again. And it did help a little, For what it’s worth. Also, I did some even more honest journaling than I’ve ever done and some very grizzly truths came out. I let those all soak in to my conscious, rational brain. Maybe now my subconscious and my conscious are a little more on the same page. Sometimes you can’t do things right away about problems, but knowing about them is a big deal. And so I started saying these grizzly truths to myself out loud all day long. They mostly have to do with relationships with my family. What I feel about these relationships and how difficult they are for me. (I thank @clarinetpath for his discussion of facing true feelings —got me thinking.)

I’ve been in so much pain that I haven’t really been moving much at all for a long time. I just sit around and feel sorry for myself. Yesterday I exercised three times. I walked around my living room. I did some QiGong And some chair yoga. (But it’s hard chair yoga. It’s a program by Diamond Dallas Page called DDPY.) I slept so hard. I can’t even believe how hard I slept last night. I felt very, very cheerful yesterday and filled with hope. It was like I had my old life back even though I’m still TMS me right now. It was like I went through a psychological Door to the future —and the future is bright!

I also Picked up the book recommended earlier here by @sleepyjay — Disentangling from emotionally immature people by Lindsay Gibson. Thank you sleepyjay! Fantastic book! It really hit the spot for me and explained so much. I’m about halfway through it. I highly recommend it for anybody who struggles in tough relationships.

I’m going to write another post at some point about Sarno versus the new guys (Neuroplasticity camp). I do think it takes tough love. Yesterday I was tough with myself and that’s why I exercised so much and it’s also why I feel better today. I also was tough by yelling at my brain. My brain does respond to me yelling at it. But I also like all the things I’m learning about forgiveness and soothing myself And calming my life down from Dr. Hanscom And others. Right now I’m gonna weigh in that Both camps are good. And I think you can combine them. But I’ll continue this experiment and report back. everyone here is such a lifesaver! Thanks to all!

 

[HealingMe]

Tough love has its place. Soothing is important. A balance is needed.

 

[sleepyjay]

(this thread is getting so long. It’s hard to scroll to the bottom lol!) I had to give a follow up because this discussion did me so much good! I’ve probably had the best two days of my entire TMS journey, the last two days. (And I say this at the risk of my symptoms flaring because every time I’ve ever bragged about improvement, something always goes wrong soon, but oh well.) I think it’s worth celebrating that I feel better.

When I say improvement, I’m talking just a small amount of improvement physically but also a great amount of improvement emotionally. Believe it or not I like to follow most of the advice I get on this forum. I keep my mind open. The first thing I did was get the mind-body prescription by John Sarno, As highly recommended by @Baseball65 . I started reading on page 139 like he said and it has been a while since I’ve read a Sarno book. I have been getting lost in the weeds of the neuroplasticity camp (Which honestly I believe is still a good camp!) I started yelling at my brain a couple days ago- Yelling For it to stop. Yelling at it that I’m in charge. Yelling out loud. This worked once in the past and I thought it’s worth a try again. And it did help a little, For what it’s worth. Also, I did some even more honest journaling than I’ve ever done and some very grizzly truths came out. I let those all soak in to my conscious, rational brain. Maybe now my subconscious and my conscious are a little more on the same page. Sometimes you can’t do things right away about problems, but knowing about them is a big deal. And so I started saying these grizzly truths to myself out loud all day long. They mostly have to do with relationships with my family. What I feel about these relationships and how difficult they are for me. (I thank @clarinetpath for his discussion of facing true feelings —got me thinking.)

I’ve been in so much pain that I haven’t really been moving much at all for a long time. I just sit around and feel sorry for myself. Yesterday I exercised three times. I walked around my living room. I did some QiGong And some chair yoga. (But it’s hard chair yoga. It’s a program by Diamond Dallas Page called DDPY.) I slept so hard. I can’t even believe how hard I slept last night. I felt very, very cheerful yesterday and filled with hope. It was like I had my old life back even though I’m still TMS me right now. It was like I went through a psychological Door to the future —and the future is bright!

I also Picked up the book recommended earlier here by @sleepyjay — Disentangling from emotionally immature people by Lindsay Gibson. Thank you sleepyjay! Fantastic book! It really hit the spot for me and explained so much. I’m about halfway through it. I highly recommend it for anybody who struggles in tough relationships.

I’m going to write another post at some point about Sarno versus the new guys (Neuroplasticity camp). I do think it takes tough love. Yesterday I was tough with myself and that’s why I exercised so much and it’s also why I feel better today. I also was tough by yelling at my brain. My brain does respond to me yelling at it. But I also like all the things I’m learning about forgiveness and soothing myself And calming my life down from Dr. Hanscom And others. Right now I’m gonna weigh in that Both camps are good. And I think you can combine them. But I’ll continue this experiment and report back. everyone here is such a lifesaver! Thanks to all!

I'm really glad my hunch was right and the book is making a difference for you! It's been really eye opening for me, regarding how i tried to change myself to shape my relationship with my parents and how i'm entertaining their bad behaviour.
It really helped me accept the relationship as it is, since i really struggled with that cause it wasn't the kind i wanted, and how to deal with that.
I hope it can help you as much as it helped me!

 

[Diana-M]

I hope it can help you as much as it helped me!

It really is helping! I feel like I’ve been looking for these answers for years. Thank you, again!

 

[Ellen]

When I say improvement, I’m talking just a small amount of improvement physically but also a great amount of improvement emotionally.

So glad to hear of your success! Every time you notice improvement in the physical linked to improvement psychologically, you strengthen the notion that you have a mindbody disorder. This paves the way for more improvement.

 

[Diana-M]

So glad to hear of your success! Every time you notice improvement in the physical linked to improvement psychologically, you strengthen the notion that you have a mindbody disorder. This paves the way for more improvement.

Love this!