Emotionally Barbaric

Emotionally stunted people fail to learn to accept, process, or even tolerate a full range of emotion, leaving them emotionally primitive—limited only to recognizing pleasure and displeasure. “Me like” (waves club(friendliness, laughter, praise, flattery, gifts)). “Me no like” (pounds club(exclusion/shunning, withholding of information or communication, casually expressing diminishing things, gossiping and smearing, undermining). Important to acknowledge is the stone cold silence between the realizing of the displeasure and the standard generic REaction. And even though club pounding is undeniably displeasure, it is not uncommon to feel bewildered as to what has currently set off the club pounding. The consistent lesson seems to me: You’d best please me or else- this! I experienced a lot of the this. That way of living is too scary and stressful. My fear and stress cause more frightful silence and club pounding. Vicious cycle. My recovery allows me to remove myself, to choose a more virtuous cycle.

For decades now, I have worked toward feeling less– because that is what I was told was needed in order to be normal and welcome.  I was collectively admonished: THE problem was— that I felt too much.   The problem actually is that nobody was modeling or teaching me how to live life with full and complex feelings, of which I had many.

VERY IMPORTANT REMINDER: THE OPPOSITE OF SENSITIVITY IS NOT STRENGTH, BUT INSENSITIVITY.

To say that I have a lot of feelings is an understatement and the only expectation/requirement was that I mask and deny.  My consistent failure to do so, was judged as a willful and punishable breach. The shunning and berating left me with even more feeeeeeelings:  fear, shame, guilt, rage, despair–all intense, of course.

For decades, I lived far away and reported via hand-written letters that I was fine. This especially pleased my uncle and grandmother who served as the chief emotional police and demonstrated eagerness to always help my mother “gain control” over me. This was their loyalty to her. I kept physical distance and claimed to feel less fine.  My mother and sister also adopted roles as emotional police and I later married a man who is identical in this way. “Don’t make waves by directly expressing needs or feelings, but make difficulty for a person if they annoy, challenge, or inconvenience you.” This is what THE emotional police do.

I see now that feeling less (which often attempts to pose as strength and sophistication) and feeling better are not the same.  In my efforts to feel less, I have lost vitality— also known as— I suffer from depression.   

The Cavemen and the Happiness Police are no longer the bosses of me. Funny how Happiness Police and Higher Power have the same initials. I definitely have HP guiding my life and my recovery– diametrically opposing practices. One calls for drugs and alcohol to numb while the other relieves you with steps, principles, and fellowship– teaching how to feel and work through (rather than around) difficult feelings and people.

Healing is Excruciating

Because Sweet Greg did not flinch, pout, or punish me for declaring myself absolutely physically and emotionally unavailable for the weekend, I feel beyond humbled and blessed. There was no hint of guilt, shame, or fear intended to manipulate me into being, feeling, or offering what I simply could not.  What a gem of a huMAN—Strong, kind, humble, generous and trustworthy in ALL that he does. My Sweet Greg.

It is nothing short of a miracle to experience connection so pure. Another amazing thing is that I know better than to take his goodness personally. Sweet Greg is not these ways because of me or for only me. This is the way he moves through the world–unconditionally good.

To love and be loved in ways which feel wholesome and affirming is new and therefore challenging for me.  I look forward to getting better at it and wouldn’t it be nice if I could learn it all fast enough so that my sons might be spared some of the turmoil of my recovery. Grief and healing are messy, requiring time and work and a fuck-ton of solitude to rest.

My recovery continues to be a process rather than an event, which seems both exhausting and discouraging.  May I please just fucken learn it already– and be done? Nope. Like patience, it is a practice, calling for constant contrary action.  I guess that is why it is suggested that we do it one day at a time.

I will continue to work on myself. On days when my thoughts are less wholesome, I tend to prefer to work on others. hahaha– Laughing but not joking.

To Struggle Is Human

I struggled mightily, since my earliest days.  My formative experience strongly suggested my defectiveness as the cause, willfully imposing, as only an asshole would, on those whom I counted on to comfort and nurture and provide for me.  The list of things over which I struggle(d) is too great to begin.  Life was scary, confusing, and seemingly impossible. I was pierced by anxiety and depression from my deep knowing that I would struggle and that trouble and shame were guaranteed to follow.   What a mess.  My difficult feelings were appraised as “a lack of gratitude or a negative attitude”. If I were grateful, I would just be happy and the same as them.

My distorted and unwholesome understanding of struggle made me judgmental and harsh toward myself and others.  Often, when I saw another struggling, my trained instincts begged me to race to the rescue, mock it, call it out– but mostly to leverage it. It makes me ill to recall moments of bragging about my helping while underhandedly pointing out the issues of the struggler.  Ew!

As a naturally empathetic person mostly, I wanted to help.  But my urges and efforts to help were unhealthy—a manifestation of my desire to be needed and to not be the pathetic one, but the strong and able helper. So dirty. I believe the roots to most of my sadness and anger are are here: Feeling disconnected, persecuted, unprotected, unheard, insignificant, unwelcome, and unsafe. The MYTH of my unworthiness drove some very sick behaviors.

It is human to struggle.  It is woke AF to hold space and show up as a compassionate ally who may have nothing more to offer than a kind presence.  Sometimes, the broken me will emerge when I am run down or burned out and I will react unfavorably to someone’s “unnecessary and tiresome” needs.  I am pretty quick to catch myself and make immediate reparations.  Old habits die hard.  

In this home, we are breaking the cycles of shame, denial, addiction,  secrecy.  One day at a time.  We are growing and changing together. When we know better, we do better.

The 12 Steps teach us how to show up as allies, not heroes, punishers,  nor fixers- intent on taking charge —forcing an end. We learn to strive for understanding, compassion, and empathy.  Frequently, the icky helpers show up from a place of feeling elevated and they confuse pity for empathy. (In reality, we each struggle at times. Learning to accept struggle as a part of life allows us to offer and to receive wholesome support as an ally, something I first experienced within the fellowship–one which stresses HOW we are equals– because get this: not a one of us is more or less worthy than another.) The dynamic of the helpers and the helpless is a key contributor to the legacy of the alcoholic family cycle.

I do seek help when needed, but not from anyone possessing judgmental and entitled beliefs about what it means to help and be helped. I am very clear that I do not wish to have the support of anyone believing themselves to be in charge of rescue and fixing–as I no longer need or accept that definition of help. An authentic ally lacks interest in acknowledgement/praise for helping, as well as any expectation of something being owed to them.

There are actually such things as bad help and bad love. They make you feel worse, in an unnameable way. NOTE: If a person’s love or help leaves you feeling helpless and alone-ish, that is powerful information to be explored. (Plus—fuck that!)

Either Or

I never tire of this reading and continue hoping that it may become a more common practice– reaching for The Third Way– in times of conflict . Doing so requires courage, humility, transparency — willingness to say and listen to difficult things and then to reflect on wounded parts of our spirits which beg to be healed and allowed to mature. To choose this way may be impossible for people who need to believe themselves right, in charge, infallible. With them, we get to grieve the relationship and move on, as the Third Way must be mutually desired an sought.

I simply can not allow my boys to believe themselves limited to only these two options for addressing a circumstance in which a person has been harmful:

1- Pretend it did not affect you or even happen.

2- Retaliate (openly or passively)

We must reject the zero-sum mentality–one winner/one loser. Winning is for games and wars, not wholesome and sustainable relationships. I intend to model and create a better experience and a different example for my sweet sons. I still sometimes do the old shit I learned before recovery, though. I am aware and working on myself.

If you catch yourself begging someone for human decency, a response, time together, clarity, respect, come compassion, some kindness...

The Bare Minimum

Last week as I relished a much-needed break from being used, taken advantage of, I was able to feel a smidge of compassion for the BF(boys’ father).  Mercy and compassion are large parts of my spiritual striving and development.  They evade me utterly though, when in the midst of abuse which persists, and from which I cannot extricate or separate myself.  I read stories of people who forgive murderers, rapists, and molesters, once they are behind bars.  I get how it is possible to forgive and even empathize with the recovering, dead, or incarcerated– after the harmful behavior has been contained.  

I think back to our final Christmas with BF’s sisters.  Nobody spoke to us or acknowledged our baby of one year.  It was intense, like Amish shunning.  My husband would not agree to leave early.  He was unwilling to confront or challenge his sisters.   On the car ride home, crying, I declared that I would not submit our child to another family arrangement like that.  He later confronted his sisters and one responded that: “Your baby is not even one, and will not remember.”  Therefore admitting to the cold stonewalling of us and justifying how it was not harmful to the baby, yet.  The other sister stopped speaking to him, altogether.  All-because he attempted to have a boundary and a standard for himself.  How dare he–and of course this was my fault, my irreverent influence. 

The sisters eagerly embraced him when he crawled back to them three years later, at the onset of our divorce.  They welcomed him back to his place of compliance and submission in exchange for access to their children (his nieces and nephews) and their resource$.  

He is terrified of being on the other side of them.  I watched in pain as they excluded him from birthdays, graduations, and bat mitzvahs and consistently treated him as extra. But he was grateful to not be permanently banished as his father and other sister had been.  I observe and understand, even relate to that pain and fear.  

I had believed that he had wanted something better for himself and our children- until it became that clear he did not.  He wanted only to be like them…to also be in charge.  As if that is the only way to be in relationship. The controller(s) and the controlled.

I hope he will recover and experience wholesome and lasting peace and connection.    I cringe as he continues to paw at people of means, people who he is impressed by or whom he perceives as useful.  His struggle is saddening—but not nearly as much as what he chooses to do to our little family.  I recognize his pain and fear as tied directly to the controlling and mean behaviors—but I can find no compassion or mercy for him while he is actively involved in things which compromise us all.  He doesn’t recognize his behavior as harmful or problematic.  He has learned what he has lived and is unwilling to challenge or change that.

When he requested my help a few weeks ago, I reminded him, in detail, how he made life terribly difficult for us for so long and on purpose and that the urge to repay him is immense.  He responded right back with an irritated and entitled “So are you going to help me or not?”  

I hated myself for wasting words and energy and not saying NO, right off the bat – putting an immediate end to the exchange.  I suppose I hoped he would acknowledge some things so that I could say yes to him.  Foolish me.  The truth is– I want to work with him.  I have not found it possible to be in healthy partnership with someone who does not actively work for the best of our family.  I am officially, yes- it is official- healthy enough to no longer participate in my own abuse.

I am disrupting if not breaking this cycle. I wish BF wanted the same for himself and our children. I have not yet given up all hope for this. I just do not see his life working for him. Tonight, Favorite is throwing a belated birthday dinner for our older son with all the people and foods he loves. I really would do anything for BF to be at the table with US.

I will not change who Iam. I will not get angry with you. I won't seek revenge and be spiteful. I will be smart and change the role you play in my life.

I Will Change The Things I Can

Shame is confirmation of emotional and spiritual unwellness. I know of no other thing which will so swiftly turn a person to unkindness, dishonesty, and fraud: desperate to do and say anything to offload or escape the shame of feeling less than–to deny the unbearable sense of unworthiness.

Over the weekend, at a wrestling match with peers, my younger son said something diminishing about his brother to their group.  The comment was 100% intended to make big brother feel small and separate. It worked. This is a frightening pattern of behavior, which runs deep and wide through both sides of my sons’ families.

Big Brother’s reaction to feeling unsure and wrong footed, was to deny the thing which his brother reported.  Little Brother’s mocking and bonding with others, at BB’s expense were hurtful and harmful.  AND little brother, who is exceptional in his inherited lying and bullying skill sets, is eager to point out how Big Brother lied, while showing zero interest in self-reflection for his darkness part. Hopefully, this is nothing more than standard middle school insecurity / meanness, which he will outgrow.

We are breaking the generational curses of lying, bullying, alienating, and shaming.  Each of which are found to be linked to loneliness, disconnection, addiction. We will not UNknowingly default to these ways. We shall, together, look head on and regularly, into the reality of these issues.

I am grateful for discussions of how to manage ourselves in situations where someone is belittling.  We shall be intentional in our wellness: practicing kindness, honesty, humility, courage, boundaries, and offering generous space to those imposing anything other.  Becoming and staying well is a daily practice and process.

Take a moment to be thankful for the healing and humble people in this world who neither suffer from nor arouse shame. In their presence, we get to be and feel free. Choose freedom. Offer freedom. Unrecovered me needs to say; “Don’t be a shaming asshole. If you are a shamer, it is because you have shame. Heal that shit and quit offloading it. Grow TF up.”

Who Even Does That?

I am feeling agitated over how our new before and after school arrangement is no good for my sons.  It is the consequence of my decision to no longer inconvenience my self, in service to their father, who knowingly and repeatedly diminishes the peace of our family—simply because he can.  As if free-will is an achievement or a super power.  

The boys’ father (BF) likes to assert how it is his right to spend time with whomever he chooses.  I accept this as both true and fine.  Somehow, BF denies the toxicity of his relationship with my sister; conceived in a divisive scheme which hurts our entire family.  That affiliation is vile and unforgivably damaging to our children.  This alliance, between two individuals who have knowingly and repeatedly distressed my children and me, is unwholesome in all ways.  

My sons witness their father and his father(their grandpa) do exactly as my sister and my mother do/did.  I hope that their examples will serve as cautionary tales, more than models for how and why to relate, bond, and betray.  

I would rather go to my grave with my boys mutually and collectively hating on me– than them not speaking to one another.  They belong to each other…but they come from families who are committed to THIS.  Triangulation and smear campaigns— cheering for downfalls and struggles of any person daring to directly confront them with boundaries.

Who even does that? We are breaking that cycle.

Bold and Sensitive

This past Sunday, rather than attending the regular service, I sat in on the Middle School Group of girls at a new church, with a larger Youth Program than the church which we’ve been attending. The girls were precious: wholesome, courageous, and vulnerable, as they shared about belonging, and not belonging. Their innocence was grand and it literally made me weep. I cried for myself and for my boys and for all people whose innocence was neither protected nor prioritized –and whose faith in goodness was therefore compromised. I can not get back my innocence, but with spiritual recovery, I now live in faith and the by product of that is courage. Is it even possible to be courageous without faith?

I worry for my boys’ spiritual development. They receive heavy praise and incentives for looking good, receiving good grades and for athletic participation. The lies of perfectionism loom large – insisting that appearances are what matter most. I cannot be the only one in their worlds wanting them to value and choose honesty, kindness, and courage over the easier things.

I was deeply touched when my older son recently received something from somebody and he expressed, privately to me, that he did not want it. I told him that they were being generous, to which he responded, I don’t care about his generosity. I’d rather him to be kind to me, more than generous– and he did not want that thing-at all. While I treasure his depth of character, I recognize that evolving in this way, is risky, as my sons come from long lines of people who judge emotional sensitivity and vulnerability as weak and defective. Denial of Compensation for un-lovingness is managed through incongruously generous gestures. It is a total mindfuck to receive gifts or gestures from people whom you experience as uncaring and unkind.

Interestingly, my younger son DGAF if someone is unkind or hurtful, he will literally accept invitations to play and offerings from someone who has just betrayed and physically assaulted him. No joke. He would play basketball with his bully at school in fourth grade—because he likes b-ball. I cannot relate. What is also true about him is his inability to acknowledge difficult feelings, his or anyone else’s. He is enraged if asked what is wrong and will insist that it is nothing and that the question itself is what upset him. This is also true of my sister and his father. They act as if they believe that speaking of an issue, speaks it into existence.

I had warned my boys years ago to never ask their father or my sister unless they genuinely wished to cause problems. My younger son used to be sensitive and mindful of how others felt. I can not know if this shift came with age and coincided with my family drama or if it was the result.

I suspect that my older son’s spiritual development will separate him from those who are not ready and awake. But, I believe he is strong and it is worth it, to raise bold and sensitive humans. The right people are already ready and waiting. With much untreated mental unwellnes and addiction on both sides of their families, it seems that faith is a fine alternative. Grim determination and willfulness are dark and lonely ways of moving through the world. These are the cycles I may not break, but will gladly disrupt.

First Class

So odd to return to a campus in which I attended undergrad. Literally, it felt mostly unfamiliar, possibly because I am now in a different program of study and building.  OR perhaps because I was never fully mentally present while there, 30 years ago: lost, in a constant state of emotional confusion and pain, without any real sense of connection, purpose, or direction.  100% survival mode.  Boy am I grateful that there was not social media during that era.  I will count that as a miracle, fusho.  Yikes.  

I experienced the campus as much quieter than I recall:   with students either staring at screens or hooked up to ear buds.  AND– at the start of our lecture, we were asked to share our names and our pronouns.  Crazy.  The individual next to me responded:  “Everett, he,she,they, them, it doesn’t really matter”.  Wow. 

Another difference was my arriving in time to find parking, check the map, all by myself, and independently and fearlessly determine my route to class— with time to spare.  Whoa, who dat?

Class was fantastic. In a conference room, we were seated around a long table with comfy chairs. Seems as though everyone had degrees in philosophy already, so the language and content were a little foreign to me. After nearly three hours, I left with a bazillion questions, excited to learn, read, study, share, inquire, and present. My intent is to be on time and do my best and to see where this goes. Learning and expanding are my only goals. I had no idea the depth and vastness of the matter of ethicality. As soon as I sense even a basic level of understanding or an informed opinion, I will share.

Humility is not thinking less of yourself but thinking of yourself less.” -C.S. Lewis

Raising a Modern-Day Knight

I left our last wrestling match feeling discouraged by my boys’ attitudes and conduct, recognizing OUR need for guidance on how to be solid citizens, teammates, and contributors. I am not disturbed that they do not know what they could not know– but that their father and I have diverging values and desires for them.

I would like to raise humans who strive for humility and grace. I experience their father as preferring poise, grim determination, and force, which, to me, feels opposed.

So, inspired by my friend’s God-centered life, I reached out to acknowledge the grace and humility I observe in her son as he moves on and off the mat, unchanged by whether he loses or wins the match. I texted my praise and and need for counsel. Her Ben possesses a gentleness and strength that is common to those whom I experience as great humans.

OUR TEXTS:

Me: My boys attitudes about winning and losing are difficult for me to address.   I do not know how to help them. Your Ben is such a humble lil man.  Any wisdom?

S: Thank you Maggie!!! Danny tells our boys that men take ownership for themselves, where as boys blame others. Character is more important than winning and our reputations are very important. Proverbs 22:1 is a great Bible verse to talk about. Also, Danny shares from Robert Lewis’s Book Raising a Modern-Day Knight: A Father’s Role in Guiding His Son to Authentic Manhood .

Me: Oh. The father’s Role seems key. My boys’ father does not share the value of seeking, believing in or leaning on a God or power greater than himself.  I make no claims to having God, only to needing and seeking. This feels impossible with our differing values.

S: It’s ok you can still talk to them and have other men weigh in too.

I ordered the book last night (Why isn’t it here, yet?) and am reading as much as I can about Proverbs 22:1 so that I may learn and share its wisdom on character development. I have so much learning to do myself, and I cannot possibly learn(and unlearn) quickly enough to parent my children in these wholesome and often still unfamiliar ways. Also, I feel my efforts are strongly opposed and undermined by their father’s demand for reverence to him, as if he wants to be their God. Fortunately, Sweet Greg and Favorite’s husband are two consistent models of strong and gentle men, with whom they experience consistent positive connection.

I am stumbling all over this bible verse, trying to find a way to make it digestible (relevant) for my sons. I can do hard things, but not alone. Thank God, we have caring people whom we can count on for their wholesome support of our family and presence in our boys’ daily lives.