vulnerability

Abuse is Abuse

Sound Familiar? These are Big Red Flag StatementsSound familiar? So, this is my modified version of the Narcissists Prayer. I have re-evaluated my need to label others as addicts or narcissists.  In my attempt to recover, I found myself needing to know “but whyyyyy???”  And the singular answer of “because I suck” is no longer acceptable to me.  My upbringing taught me over decades of collective attitudes and actions, that any harsh treatment of me was either →imagined →fabricated, or →well earned.  And that is 100% deranged and untrue.  AND–It stands to reason that if I am willing to believe I can earn abuse or cause someone else to mistreat me, you know what else I believe…that another person may earn abuse or cause me to mistreat them.  

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Courage to Change

The Classic Fauxpology—CAUTION RED FLAG–Turn and walk away.

I get that my mother did the best she could…and STILL–what happened to me is not right or acceptable.  I know we differ in many ways, she and I,  one of the more pronounced ways, is that if and when I am struggling to understand and be present for either of my children, I count on friends, whom I call family, to stand in that gap, not to align with me against my sons.  My mother’s need to be right outweighed her need for connection with and protection of me.  She invited others to align with her, to shame or frighten me into something other…and I sure did become something other than what I was born to be in this world. Ashamed.  Angry.  Disconnected. Broken AF. (more…)

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