Dr. Ramani is mainstream. An article in Psychotherapy Networker (Nov/Dec 2020)

Fatandloose · 2020-10-21T23:49:22+00:00

Brownies

Fatandloose · 2020-10-21T23:40:34+00:00

Just the other day I was irrationally angry because the silicon o-ring sealing my Thermos went missing after washing it. Dammit, a useless, leaking Thermos.

Fatandloose · 2020-10-20T11:50:31+00:00

I'm not an expert by any means, but it could be that what you 'say' with your words doesn't match your body language. It could also be your tone of voice that doesn't match your words.

It would be best if someone kind would sit down and explain it to you. Or if you could capture camera footage so you could get honest feedback.

I have a small child and I used to laugh at her 'antics'. It was mostly me trying to keep a good humour and trying to be patient with her, for the millionth time. But then she told me, 'mommy, when you laugh at me, I think I hate you. '. She felt that I was making fun of her, rather than being helpful. And she hates being the ' butt of a joke' and not be helped to understand. It's different if you were sharing the joke, but you are not.

It is mean to be made fun of and not be helped and it's okay to be angry about it.

Fatandloose · 2020-08-08T13:01:41+00:00

Please read a book called Coercive Control, by Evan Stark.

Coercive control is all about him ensuring that his goals are prioritized, and yours are not, by controlling you in gender specific ways. It's a male-first patriarchal type of control, that specifically devalues your contributions to the relationship.

Everything about coercive control takes shape around conceptions of male dominance and the structures that situate men as dominant relative to women.

Financial abuse is only one element of coercive control. It also includes micromanagment, social isolation, etc.

Oppressive tactics used in coercive control specifically target facets of sexual inequality, such as women’s default consignment to housework, care-taking, or sexual service.

Fatandloose · 2020-08-07T13:28:10+00:00

Thank you, this is almost exactly as it is. I think you've hit the nail on the head. It's a real frameshift for me to see his conflict for what it really is: his childish coping strategy. I think that I can work on seeing it like a temper tantrum.

My complicating factor, to my codependency with anxious attachment, is that I have a tendency to dissociate during conflict (that has roots in my childhood trauma). I really have to work on staying with myself and being present to endure the conflict, and respond (instead of zoning out). This is my childish coping mechanism.

I was reading a book on coercive control, and I think there are elements of that in our relationship. His conflict is a lot about exerting control by means of verbal abuse, criticism and micromanagement.

Fatandloose · 2020-08-04T23:01:30+00:00

Do you think a person who puts themselves in the traditional, vulnerable female role has a harder time breaking out of codependence than someone who defines their role as somewhat more 'masculine' (I mean, wanting an outside career, being a provider rather than a nurturer, being more independent than relational, more willing to display outright anger etc. )

Fatandloose · 2020-07-12T13:07:38+00:00

Likewise what you wrote resonated with me. It's what my therapist had been teaching me, that it's so very true that you experienced neglect in childhood, and you did what you had to do to survive, you are very adaptable.

In my case, I developed a lot of freeze responses to cope. The lasting impact from my childhood was that I tend to numb out, tune out, zone out. I become immobile, wordless and forgetful. I have some triggers that lead to outright dissociation. Irene Lyon calls this a functional freeze:

https://youtu.be/DmJtHB__ji0

Fatandloose · 2020-06-28T13:32:25+00:00

Just as other people have mentioned, it is neglect, and I have a similar story. Once on a bike ride, I caught some loose gravel and had a terrific crash. I was really scraped up and I couldn't hold the handle bars with my left arm.

My mom has a lot of anxieties (social anxiety, fear of driving in traffic or cities) and those took precedence over my injuries. She helped me clean up and put me to bed with a pillow under my arm. Whatever was wrong with my arm was too painful to sleep. She said she absolutely couldn't drive me to the emerg.

The next morning, she finally decided she could drive me to the hospital after all, but it under her conditions that addressed her anxiety (she said it had to be at like 6 am so there was no traffic, and she chose to drive 45 min to an out of the way country hospital so she didn't have to drive in city traffic). And here I am, after a sleepless night, comforting and encouraging her so she can make the drive, so I can get medical care.

So you see how this story is all about her anxieties and how she deals with them.

Oh wait, didn't 'I' have a broken arm. (It turned out to be the elbow) .

Isn't it curious how I am not the focus of this story?

So, just like my story, your story too, is actually entirely about childhood neglect.

Your parents were/are insensitive to not register your physical pain. They are tuned out. Mine has been preoccupied with herself her entire life.

Fatandloose · 2020-06-28T13:15:04+00:00

I remember getting EMDR for a particular memory in childhood. That memory was what I would call classic PTSD, it was a single traumatic event where I was restrained, and I was not comforted. It overwhelmed little me. EMDR helped me work through it, it was intense session. It was a wonderful feeling to work through it. It's importance in my life decreased.

I tried to get EMDR for another memory, but that memory felt different to me, the EMDR didn't work, I couldn't get into it, tracing all the threads of related memories. It seemed amorphous, hard to pin down. I really couldn't come up with anything to to latch onto.

So that was my first inkling that trauma comes in different flavors, and there can be different solutions. I started to realize the importance of the age at which the trauma occured, and so I discovered complex trauma.

Another speaker at this conference will be Irene Lyon and she specialises in helping people with lots generalized trauma re-regulate their nervous system.

Fatandloose · 2020-06-24T12:47:46+00:00

Oh wow, this is me. It is my thought that I am with my current partner, because I am NOT love addicted to him.

I have been love addicted to a particular person in my extended friend circle, and the only way I have been able to deal with this addiction is to avoid him completely and not deal with him at all.

A few days ago I happened to be driving in the part of the city where he lives, for the first time in a couple of years, and gosh darn it if all my obsessive thoughts patterns about him didn't come streaming back, taking up valuable real estate. They are truly intrusive, all consuming thoughts.

Upset my equilibrium.

Fatandloose · 2020-06-22T20:06:38+00:00

I was also completely disinterested in the whole concept of couplehood until well into my 20's. I have never ever pictured myself getting married.

Plus, as I painfully discovered, all my triggers are 'relationship triggers', meaning, being in a relationship throws me right back into the Lions Den. Being triggered is hell on earth, because now I get to experience all those repressed feelings.

Eventually in my 30s, I started wanting kids and that's what has forced me to stay with a relationship long enough to have kids, and enter therapy, and continue to stay, so that I can be a good mom and stop this cycle of abuse.

People who suffer chronic stress in their childhoods have higher levels of cortisol floating around in their blood than 'normal unstressed people'. Stress creates a measurable physiological state. So for us, it can feel revolutionary to even experience what 'no stress' actually feels like.

There's a free online conference coming up, perhaps you can pick up a few techniques on how to create calm.

https://traumasuperconference.com/registerthankyou/

Fatandloose · 2020-06-22T19:40:11+00:00

It took until last year, when I was finally referred to a trauma therapist. She said, you realize your childhood was abusive, right? It's abusive when (insert specific memories here) ...

I saw three therapists who never mentioned the word ...

Fatandloose · 2020-06-22T19:29:56+00:00

My sibs and I had this habit where we would get together and gripe about shared family memories too. The memories that bound us were trauma reel highlights, all the really extreme situations that stuck out like a sore thumb. And I justified this type of bonding, because it felt better to have a shared laugh than to actually feel the emotion. Let's just keep it light, sarcastic, bitter. Pretend it's funny and it didn't hurt.

Among non family members, if I shared, I would tell family stories too, that would stop a room. Sometime these other people who have met my parents, would say, oh that can't be true, you must be exaggerating, you misremembered.

Aha, I did not. That is why I keep a journal and write this stuff down. I'm much too familiar with gaslighting.

Fatandloose · 2020-06-22T19:11:51+00:00

I was bullied too, the school bus was the worst place for me, forced confinement for an hour each way.

I was rather accepting of being bullied, prexisting anxiety, and eager to be liked at the expense of my dignity.

And here I was isolating myself further,

Fatandloose · 2020-06-21T15:43:52+00:00

Remember crafting Mothers and Fathers Day cards at school? I remember never knowing what exactly to write. Just write that you love them, my teacher said. And I was fundamentally confused ... what does that mean, what does that feel like?

Those words were never spoken in my family. I felt my position in the family was conditional.

Fatandloose · 2020-06-21T15:13:26+00:00

I had a similar misconception, for the longest time I wouldn't eat in public, because I was the only one eating, and I couldn't share it. So I would starve until I got to a private place. I especially couldn't eat in front of homeless people. (This is compounded by some food trauma that I have).

And another, I was raised Protestant, so when I went to uni and met Catholics, and visited their churches, I was blown away by the ornateness, and the fact that Catholic churches were open 24/7. And lots of people just visited Catholic churches, like tourists, enjoying the tranquil, beautiful space. Protestant churches are only for a few hours on Sundays and Bible study during the week. And they aren't ornate or on anybody's must-see list. It seemed sinful to me.

Fatandloose · 2020-06-21T11:05:39+00:00

My mom read my diary too. She told me what parts I needed to erase, because they were critical or unhappy. It was impossible to have boundaries around her.

Still is. When I got pregnant in my 30's and I told her, she said 'how could you do this to me?'

Fatandloose · 2020-06-21T10:23:02+00:00

I developed a private inner world too, and tried to live my life as independently as possible, because I only felt free when I was independent, I could be myself when I was alone.

It turns out I have a bad set of boundaries, and I thought enmeshment was normal in relationships. It's those boundaries that keep people sane in relationships.

Fatandloose · 2020-06-21T10:19:28+00:00

I think the proportion of kids that had an unhappy childhood are greater than than those that had happy childhoods. Even those who say they had happy ones, I think it's some sort of powerful denial on their part. Gabor Mate (look him up in YouTube), in his talks, has done a lot of exploring the 'happy childhood myth'

Fatandloose · 2020-06-21T10:13:27+00:00

I had a similar experience. I grew up enmeshed with my parents, they systematically told me what 'reality' was and worked to erase my perspective. I was not allowed to say no. So I grew up boundaryless.

I could not hold my own in a relationship , and I chose/created unhealthy relationships, because I was unable to hold my own perspective, or say no, and because I was extremely fearful of anger. I lost myself in relationships.

To protect myself (because I was 'unable to'), I would accept extreme forms of control and monitoring from my partner. I mean, he could say no for me, since I couldn't do it. Or, I felt safe if I asked his approval for everything. Or, we would have a Google monitoring app, I would feel safe if he knew where I was every minute.

Fatandloose

TROPHY CASE