Wow. Yesterday and today I had so many moments of insight. I cannot believe how my mind is usually trying to kill me--and I'm only sort of joking. I cannot believe how aware I have become of how much I beat myself up. No wonder I have TMS. Who the hell can live with that much pressure and anguish?
And when it comes to my kids and my marriage, that's where it really kicks up. I literally can't do anything right or good. I've gone through periods of time where I just cry myself to sleep every night. Somehow being a perfect Mom would keep them safe. I think it was me I was trying to save though.
I also have Radical Self Acceptance on tape and listened to it while walking today. I've listened to it before, but I heard so much more today.
My back went out on Mother's Day. I've been thinking about this a lot. My own mother left when I was seven, but she was pretty removed and distant to me for a long time before that. And she didn't know I was being molested either, which had happened since I was an infant. I realized today that I really believed that one day she would come back to me. And when I needed her the most, she left again, by becoming incapacitated by back pain herself for two years. During that time my own kids turned the ages I was when she left. So I had been having huge historical reactions too. And my marriage was hitting the rocks. I had tried to be the perfect wife for so long, I was so so so angry at how checked out my husband had become. In essence I have literally been trying my whole life to heal my mom and teach her how to love me....and I've picked people who I try to do that to as well, in all my major relationships. When my back went out on Mother's Day, I walked into the house and laid down on the couch. I thought, well I guess I'm not weeding today. So I called her to wish her Happy Mother's Day....and she was lying in the exact same position with the exact same pain radiating down her right hip to her foot. By that evening I was in so much pain I went to the ER.
Because my back hurt, I had to ask for more help from my family around the house, and that led to months of just being furious all the time at how clueless my husband was to what I was feeling or what I needed. He only responded to my rages. Which were getting more and more frequent. Followed by guilt and despair as nothing changed and I saw how it affected my kids.
When my mother left, my Dad quickly remarried after a series of housekeepers. My stepmother was a monster who seduced him by portraying herself as a kind child expert. She beat us and terrorized us and kept our family in a continual obsession with housework and yardwork. So as I was working myself ragged trying to be the perfect Mom, wife, and keep the house and yard AND run my business, the perfect storm was brewing for horrible back pain.
I was able to admit to my husband this weekend that I hate chores around the house with a white hot passion, and I hated feeling bound to them for my self esteem. I was also enraged because I never really had a childhood, because of chores and living in an abusive household.
That was a bit more than I was planning to write.
Today's question to ponder is about physical activity. I have continued to do bikram yoga since my "injury" in the spring. But since learning about TMS I have made myself do a bunch of stuff I had slowly backed off of: wearing heels, going on long walks, cleaning house, and of course, the dreaded gardening, which is what I thought caused the injury in the first place. The thing is, I am not gardening like a mad woman anymore. I do a little bit, calmly. We have a big garden and the recovery for me is asking for help, not taking it all on and getting resentful. Yoga probably helps because it's hot in there but it's also where I do a lot of meditation, plus I just love it.
And when it comes to my kids and my marriage, that's where it really kicks up. I literally can't do anything right or good. I've gone through periods of time where I just cry myself to sleep every night. Somehow being a perfect Mom would keep them safe. I think it was me I was trying to save though.
I also have Radical Self Acceptance on tape and listened to it while walking today. I've listened to it before, but I heard so much more today.
My back went out on Mother's Day. I've been thinking about this a lot. My own mother left when I was seven, but she was pretty removed and distant to me for a long time before that. And she didn't know I was being molested either, which had happened since I was an infant. I realized today that I really believed that one day she would come back to me. And when I needed her the most, she left again, by becoming incapacitated by back pain herself for two years. During that time my own kids turned the ages I was when she left. So I had been having huge historical reactions too. And my marriage was hitting the rocks. I had tried to be the perfect wife for so long, I was so so so angry at how checked out my husband had become. In essence I have literally been trying my whole life to heal my mom and teach her how to love me....and I've picked people who I try to do that to as well, in all my major relationships. When my back went out on Mother's Day, I walked into the house and laid down on the couch. I thought, well I guess I'm not weeding today. So I called her to wish her Happy Mother's Day....and she was lying in the exact same position with the exact same pain radiating down her right hip to her foot. By that evening I was in so much pain I went to the ER.
Because my back hurt, I had to ask for more help from my family around the house, and that led to months of just being furious all the time at how clueless my husband was to what I was feeling or what I needed. He only responded to my rages. Which were getting more and more frequent. Followed by guilt and despair as nothing changed and I saw how it affected my kids.
When my mother left, my Dad quickly remarried after a series of housekeepers. My stepmother was a monster who seduced him by portraying herself as a kind child expert. She beat us and terrorized us and kept our family in a continual obsession with housework and yardwork. So as I was working myself ragged trying to be the perfect Mom, wife, and keep the house and yard AND run my business, the perfect storm was brewing for horrible back pain.
I was able to admit to my husband this weekend that I hate chores around the house with a white hot passion, and I hated feeling bound to them for my self esteem. I was also enraged because I never really had a childhood, because of chores and living in an abusive household.
That was a bit more than I was planning to write.
Today's question to ponder is about physical activity. I have continued to do bikram yoga since my "injury" in the spring. But since learning about TMS I have made myself do a bunch of stuff I had slowly backed off of: wearing heels, going on long walks, cleaning house, and of course, the dreaded gardening, which is what I thought caused the injury in the first place. The thing is, I am not gardening like a mad woman anymore. I do a little bit, calmly. We have a big garden and the recovery for me is asking for help, not taking it all on and getting resentful. Yoga probably helps because it's hot in there but it's also where I do a lot of meditation, plus I just love it.
