#it does leave unhealed childhood trauma

[bearsfakedthemoonlanding]

I guess it’s time to talk about Linda

Linda is my grandmother. My mom’s mom. She’s the eldest of five children; her mother had her when she was twenty, and she had my mom when she was twenty, which is far too young to have a kid, if you ask me. I know she had a hard life-- a hard childhood before a hard adulthood. I know that she never wanted this. She’d wanted to join the navy instead of doing the husband and kid runaround, but she couldn’t bear disappointing and disobeying her parents, so she stayed. Married right out of high school. Had my mom. Had another one. 

My aunt died before she was even a full year old, and if you ask anyone in my family, that’s when things truly went to shit. She never recovered. Her and my grandpa divorced not long after, and my grandpa moved on. 

I wasn’t around for any of that, but my heart does break for the young woman my grandmother once was. She lived through hell. Followed the divorce and child loss with abusive boyfriends and heavy drug use and periods of homelessness and what I have to imagine was suitcases full of unhealed trauma. I wish that things had been easier for her. I wish that understanding her past was enough to get me over Our past, but I can’t sculpt my feelings entirely out of empathy. 

I don’t remember ever feeling safe around her, but I remember plenty of times feeling afraid of her. 

I was one of those kids who was nervous about everything, and when I was three became extremely nervous about goodbyes. Separation anxiety is totally developmentally appropriate at this age, but I remember what it felt like. I was certain for a while that any time I said goodbye to my parents might be the last time I ever saw them, and that sent me into a panic. Then, to try and cope with this, I came up with little rituals, and decided that Even If this goodbye was the last time I ever saw them, at least I could say goodbye and hug them and tell them I loved them before it happened. I wanted them to be certain of my love for them if they happened to die. 

This went on for a while. Any time I didn’t get a chance to do my ritual, I’d fall entirely to pieces.  I get how this was a hard thing to deal with. You need a lot of patience around small children, and the crying can get annoying. I remember Linda having very little patience for it, or for me in general. 

Once my mom was going out with her brother-- something she hardly ever did when I was young-- and she was leaving me with Linda. Going out at night was New, and as all kids know, the dark is more dangerous than the not-dark. I had a lot of trouble coping with this change in routine, with my mom going out somewhere dangerous with this strange tall man I didn’t know, leaving me alone with Linda. So I lost it. 

You know those grabber things old people use to reach things that are far away? I remember Linda standing over me, screaming, shaking one at me and threatening to beat me with it if I didn’t get a grip. 

I don’t remember if she did or not. Probably not. I can’t imagine my mom would have kept her cool if something like that happened. 

But there was a lot of that. A lot of explosive episodes in response to me crying, or laughing at the wrong time, or walking too loud, or playing in the wrong place, or being out of sight, or being in sight. It was hard to exist around Linda. 

Once when I was about four and too small to swim by myself, I was having one of my episodes because my father left for work and I hadn’t gotten to say goodbye.  I was out in the yard wandering around, contemplating what I was sure would be my dad’s death that afternoon, when Linda called me over. She was on the deck at the pool-- a simple above ground thing, four feet deep and taller than I was. She called me over, and I went, and she shoved me in. 

Took me a while to stop being afraid of swimming after that. 

It was hard to tell what would set Linda off, when I was a kid. “Tone” was always a big thing, and being gross or noisy or touching her things or not laughing at her jokes. She has real trouble when people don’t laugh at her jokes. I didn’t like being alone with her because I knew I would do something that made her mad. At the same time, she would play this game sometime where she would be extremely friendly, trying to play and be silly and shower me with affection. 

So smart. So clever. So pretty, so special. This child is a genius. 

That had always made my skin crawl, as young as I can remember. I never knew why. Always felt bad that I wasn’t appreciative. 

Sometimes she would pretend she was going to stab me. She’d be in the kitchen or on the porch chopping vegetables, and she’d turn to me with the knife, and I don’t remember what she would say but I remember being certain that she might actually do it. 

She would also hide in closets and jump out to scare me. I would scream and, when I was really young, cry. When I was older and had been taking martial arts classes, once I hit her on reflex when she did it. She was so mad. I thought she might never forgive me. 

Forgiveness was a big thing. 

Anytime an offense was made, I was forced to beg for forgiveness. An apology was never enough, and she would say she didn’t want to hear it. Would say all types of nasty things. Would sometimes go into the silent treatment. 

I didn’t mind the silent treatment, except it made my mom sad. I always ended up doing something to appease her. Writing lines, groveling, breaking down in tears to prove how truly sorry I was. It was a whole charade. I hated it. My parents never insisted on those things for themselves-- if we had any trouble, we would talk it out, and we would find a fix. I remember maybe five spankings at most in my childhood; my parents only had one of me, and were both near thirty when they did it, and they had more of a mind to have Conversations than just start swinging. 

Linda didn’t like conversations. She never liked anything I had to say, but boy would she get mad if I refused to talk.  She would go through these phases with things, where she’d want to go to a certain place and spend hours there days and days in a row for a couple months. The VFW bar, the department store at the mall, a flower shop, a thrift store. My mom would get into it, liked bonding with her mom, and I would get taken along. 

Kids have a hard time being bored in places anyways, but I remember times when we would go after school and stay till late evening, and I’d be so hungry I was nauseous from it.  Then, because of that, I would start getting nervous anytime we were out, because I MIGHT get nauseous, and that itself would make me nauseous anyways. It wouldn’t be too terrible if I was with my mom, because at least then I’d have someone to talk and play with, and she would take us home at a reasonable enough time. I hated being out with Linda all by ourselves. It’s hard being a kid and not having any control. 

When I was 10 or 11 there was an event, where I’d volunteered to go out with my mom and Linda. By this age I was being left home alone by myself not infrequently, which suited me just fine, but I missed my mom that evening. When my mom said she was actually going to go do something else and I would just go alone with Linda, I changed my mind, said I would rather stay home. 

Linda lost her entire mind. Screaming. Crying. I remember these terrible arguments when I was a child where she would demand “Why do you hate me!? What did I ever do to you!? Why does your daughter hate me? Why am I so terrible that my own granddaughter hates me??” 

I never answered her, though I wish I had. I wish I’d unleashed all of my prepubescent rage and told her the truth. I wish I’d bitten her. 

They left me at home, and I’d been so distraught that I’d made a banner out of that old printer paper that said “I’m sorry, I DO like you” and hung it on the wall. She accepted the apology. My mom was happy. My mom always just wanted to calm Linda down so we could all get along. 

Sometimes I was awful, of course. Everyone can be, and kids are learning to be people, so they definitely have their moments. The older I got, the more bitter I got, and the more resentful and disrespectful. Besides my own issues with Linda, there was a lot going on between her and my mom. 

They would get into these fights when I was a kid-- screaming, crying, suicide-threatening, throwing thing cage matches in the living room. Sometimes about something I’d done-- I’d committed some childish crime, and Linda had gone off, and my mom had stepped in. Anytime Linda tried to hit me, my mom would step in, and then they’d be off, and I knew in my childish mind that it was all my fault. 

They would get into screaming arguments, and sometimes my mom would storm off, and Linda would approach me almost too calmly and say “She shouldn’t get worked up like that. She has a bad heart. She’s going to have a heartattack and die.” And I knew that would be my fault, too. 

I stopped believing I deserved the blame as much sometime in middle school, but I remember an instance when I was eight. I don’t remember what happened the night before, but I was in the car with my dad on our way to church, and I told him I hated her. He said hate was a big feeling, and I agreed, but I knew it was true. He didn’t even try to talk me out of it. I think he hates her too, honestly. I would hate someone that tortured my wife like that. 

It was worse when she drank, which happened the most when work was stressful. Drunk Linda was meaner than sober Linda, and for a majority of my childhood Drunk Linda was the only Linda I knew. 

Once I accidentally flushed the toilet when she was in the shower, and when she came out of the bathroom wrapped in a towel, stringy dripping hair hanging over her face, she’d screamed and screamed that I was a demon, sent straight from hell, and the devil had me, and he’d sent me to torture her, and she hated me and I was a terrible, evil child. That one sits heavy with me, unlocks a tense, hot, flighty feeling every time I think about it. 

There were times she was happy though, too. Once when I was six she’d come home with a dozen pairs of children’s shoes that she’d impulsively bought that afternoon. My mom was upset, because she said my grandmother couldn’t afford it, and that Linda had some packrat tendencies and this was just more clutter. And I knew that I was supposed to be grateful. I kept a pair of the shoes; my mom returned all the others. I also knew that this weird shoe incident made my mom upset, and since the shoes were for Me, I knew this was kind of my fault. 

When I was in middle school something happened that I don’t remember, but I remember Linda gave me the silent treatment, and I decided to give it right back. Whatever had happened had been bad enough that my mom didn’t even try to stop me. It was one of the few moments of righteous indignation I got in my childhood; Linda actually apologizing to me. She tried to act like we were friends right after. It had made me want to scream. 

Linda also had some digestive issues that could get pretty bad, but the doctors said they were made worse with alcohol. She went on a pretty bad bender once when I was in middle school, and I remember the night she almost died. She collapsed in the bathroom and bled out and had to be carried out of the house by paramedics. She was in the hospital for weeks. I remember kind of hoping that this would be the end of it; it wasn’t. Sometimes on particularly strange nights she would go on and on that I was the one who saved her life, because I was the one who heard her fall and got my mom. 

She broke my door in elementary school. It had a lock on it, and she’d busted the door down. I didn’t put a new lock on it myself until the year I lived at home after college.  She threw a fit about that too. 

I wanted to kill myself in high school. I didn’t ever want to go through with it, because I knew it would break my mom’s heart, and I also knew that Linda was always threatening suicide, and I didn’t want to be anything like her.  Still, my mental health hit the absolute gutter my sophomore year of college, when my mom was similarly falling off the deep end, and Linda was getting meaner and meaner by the day. I ended up getting expelled from school, and Linda used to corner me in my bedroom at night and hiss that my parents no longer liked me, how could they? I was terrible. And that I was lucky they didn’t take a belt to me for all of this. That I would have deserved it. That I was lucky I was still alive. 

Even when she was being neutral instead of nasty, she wasn’t particularly pleasant. She didn’t like that I did martial arts, wanted me to do dance, was worried it would turn me into a dyke. Was always worried anything I did was too dangerous. Would take it personally any time I got hurt and go off on a guilt trip about how I was Trying to worry her to death, but not in a normal parent way. It was next level. Sometimes she threatened to kill herself. Sometimes she got black out drunk and said she had to, to deal with me. 

She did Karen shit at stores and restaurants that always drove me crazy, and she drove drunk a lot, and she was always so mean to my mom. I was in second or third grade when my mom started confiding in me, because my mom and I were very close, and I was a good listener who asked a lot of questions, and I was there to see all of there terrible fights while my dad was at work. She told me about her childhood abuse, about the homelessness, about the drugs, about how her mom would hurt her. Which made me hate Linda even more, and also instilled a good dose of fear of the woman. I knew what she was capable of, and I was always small and weak and sickly. I didn’t want to push my luck and have Linda really turn on me.

So I was my mom’s confidant, and sometimes I tried to be her protector, but I was also something that set Linda off constantly, which meant I was often the source of the terrible feelings my mom needed to vent about. It was a gross cycle, and wasn’t good for either of us. I wish my mom had had someone else to talk about. I wish she’d been mad enough to not let Linda live with us. I wish she’d been more hateful, like I am. Worse at forgiveness. 

Ever since a young age she would force me into showing Linda affection, to keep from hurting her feelings, because hurt feelings always meant either screaming or drinking or both. I hated it. I hate it now. I think I might stop getting bossed around like that. A 26 year old person shouldn’t have to hug anyone they don’t want to, but especially not their childhood abuser. 

In high school I started fighting back for a while. Screaming arguments. I’ve never screamed at anyone in my life except Linda, and I hate that I ever felt that desperate, cornered, and angry. I’m not a shouty type of person. I didn’t like myself during all of that. 

She would come into my room in the middle of the night to scream at me. She would go in during the evening and lay on the bed and refuse to move. She would get drunk and stumble into my room and collapse on the floor. 

Any efforts to get her to leave, pleads that I was tired, it was time for bed. Teen snappishness to “Get out of my room!” every so often. All of it was met with this demeanor shift that still haunts me. Like the life being drained from her face as her eyes hardened and her jaw clenched, the spat “Who the FUCK do you think you’re talking to!? I am your grandmother.” The way it truly looked like she might be ready to kill me. 

Sometimes I would slip out of the room and slam the door and let her scream through the whole house, locked out of my own bedroom at 2 in the morning. Sometimes I would crawl out the window. 

We got a dog when I was 11, right after I got a pretty serious head injury from playground nonsense, just some shit timing. He was a lovely dog, but an energetic puppy, and my family isn’t the best at training dogs. He did what puppies do-- chewed shit up, had accidents-- and it often sent Linda flying off the handle. Sometimes, calm and pleasant, she would tell me “You know, we only got this dog for you. It’s stressing everyone out. Maybe we should just return it.” 

She would say this was a joke. She thought it was just so funny and precious when I would volunteer that myself, when people were upset. Tearily say “We can take the dog back. We don’t have to keep him.” My parents never knew why on earth I would say that, worried I didn’t like the dog, and that would only make me feel even worse, because I worried they thought I was ungrateful. 

She would drive drunk with me in the car. As a high schooler I would have to pick her up drunk from the bar instead. She would pinch nasty bruises into my arm as a kid.  She criticized everything, or poured on lavish praise, and got upset when I didn’t accept it. 

When I was about twelve we were at the mall, and I was at the age that I was starting to worry about the other girls in my class liking boys, and trying to figure out what I was supposed to do about that. A chatted a bit with a boy, just some kid who was there with his mom. And when Linda came and took me away, she was spitting mad and told me to never do that again. That child was black. What the fuck was wrong with me. 

She was so mad when I would swear as an adult visiting home from college. She was even madder when I pointed out she was the one who taught me how to swear. 

It broke my mom’s heart when I came out as gay, and Linda didn’t let me forget it. She would remind me anytime we were alone. She would make comments openly about “faggots” and “the gays” and what God had to say about it and plenty of things about the AIDS crisis. But then, sometimes, when she was the right kind of drunk, she would tell me how she loved the gays, she had gay friends, it was disgusting but she thought they were so fun, those men. 

It’s therapeutic to write this, right now. She’s changed a bit as I’ve grown, got a bit less angry when she retired, which I get. Job stress can make a person miserable. She still has her moments, but she’s not as mean. She still drinks a lot, but it’s not as violent. Sometimes I’ll visit home and think she’s really changed, but before long there’s an explosion that has me feeling all of eight years old again, and rehardens my heart. I don’t know how to forgive her, and I don’t think I ever want to. 

She’s still terrible to my mom. She and my mom are tied together. My mom’s relationship to her isn’t something I’ll ever be able to understand, I don’t think, but that’s alright. It’s her mom. Moms are complicated. 

My mom tells me Linda is coming to my graduation for my master’s degree in a few weeks, and I’ve been tied in knots since she mentioned it. Seeing her at home is enough; I don’t want to see her here. She still introduces me to people as her granddaughter. Thinks this “whole thing I’m doing” is ridiculous. 

In February I casually mentioned my wife and she bit my head off, telling me not to talk about that shit in front of her. Later, in what wasn’t quite an apology, she told me “you know how I feel about those things. I just never want to think about any of that. Just don’t talk about it with me.” 

In a perfect world I would never talk to her about anything, but I’m not quite ready to break my mother’s heart like that. My mom said not too long ago that as long as she was still alive, Linda and I would just have to get along with each other. 

I wish she wouldn’t do that. I wish me hating my grandmother wasn’t my mother’s problem. I wish I didn’t, but I gave up imagining liking her nearly a decade and a half ago. Sometimes I worry I’m bad for feeling badly about this woman, but looking back and writing this has soothed that over. This rage is more than justifiable. I don’t think I’ll ever outgrow it, not while she’s still alive, at least. 

Whenever death comes for her, they’d better not ask me to write the fucking eulogy.

[the-courage-to-heal]

When you witness or experience something terrible, you may try not to think about it. To help you, your brain may call on one of its most creative and ingenious coping strategies to keep you going: dissociation.In the simplest terms, dissociation is a mental block between your awareness and parts of your world that feel too scary to know.

Dissociation happens to just about everybody at some time. It takes many different forms for different people. But for people with a complex trauma history, dissociation keeps the brain in survival mode. Nobody can endure a constant state of fear and still function well. You can’t get through life unscathed while always feeling frozen, worried or shut down by your greatest fears. Dissociation can function as protection, by keeping people unaware of the distress of being traumatized. That’s when it can eventually cause problems for people who have been hurt very badly, especially as children.

Children are especially likely to use dissociation to manage the inescapable pain of family problems that lead to complex, developmental and relational trauma. Such problems can include ongoing abuse, neglect or disorganized, avoidant or insecure attachment. Children must do something to endure experiences that make them feel unsafe. They cope by becoming disconnected to the memories, feelings and body sensations that are too much to bear. On the outside, they may look okay. But constant dissociation as a means of protection or survival for years then follows them into adult life, where it doesn’t work so well. As a coping mechanism, dissociation often interferes with the life a person wants to have, when the abuse is no longer ongoing in the present.

When dissociation blocks awareness of pain, it can also obscure the path to healing. So let’s take a close look at dissociation as a coping mechanism for trauma survivors. If we can safely see where it comes from, and how it evolves, we can also see what healing looks like.

What is Dissociation?

Dissociation is a state of disconnection from the here and now. When people are dissociating, they are less aware (or unaware) of their surroundings or inner sensations. Reduced awareness is one way to cope with triggers in the environment or from memories that would otherwise reawaken a sense of immediate danger. Triggers are reminders of unhealed trauma, and associated strong emotions such as panic and fear. Blocking awareness of sensations is a way to avoid possible triggers, which protects against the risk of becoming flooded by emotions like fear, anxiety and shame. Dissociation allows you to stop feeling. Dissociation can happen during an experience which is overwhelming and which you can’t escape (causing trauma), or later on when thinking about or being reminded of the trauma.

Dissociation is a coping mechanism allowing a person to function in daily life by continuing to avoid being overwhelmed by extremely stressful experiences, both in the past and present. Even if the threat has passed, your brain still says “danger.” Unprocessed, these fears may stop you from living the life you want or changing unhelpful behaviors as you grow. Some level of dissociation is normal; we all do it. For example, when we get to work and have to leave the personal concerns behind, we choose to put them out of mind for a while. But when dissociation is learned as a coping strategy – especially in childhood for survival purposes – it carries over into adulthood as an automatic response, not a choice.

Children with Trauma Are More Likely to Experience Dissociation

As a protective strategy for coping with trauma, dissociation can be one the most creative coping skills a trauma survivor perfects. It detaches awareness from one’s surroundings, body sensations and feelings. Children who experience complex trauma are especially likely to develop dissociation. It often co-occurs with the earliest incidents of recurrent trauma, since the only way to survive the horrific experiences emotionally is to not be there consciously. There are many possible conditions that cause dissociation. Therapists are aware and focus their understanding of dissociation in connection with the underlying trauma – what happened to you.

A few simple examples of risk factors for dissociation are:

• A disorganized attachment style. Trauma inflicted by abuse from a primary attachment figure, for elementary school age children, can lead to dissociative disorders for the child. When someone the child depends on for survival is also a source of physical, sexual, or emotional abuse, a protective response is to vacate being present in their body in order to survive the abuse, while preserving the needed family tie or even their life.

• An insecure attachment style. A child consciously develops behaviors or habits to dissociate, like using loud music, so they don’t hear frightening arguments between parents that terrify, for example. They may turn to video games or other distractions while dad paces the floor worried because mom is out drinking.

• Recurrent abuse or neglect that threatens a sense of safety and survival of any kind, by anyone!

• Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and Complex PTSD (C-PTSD). Dissociation to cope with events that cause PTSD or C-PTSD (developmental, relational ongoing trauma) can include out-of-body responses to trauma. A neurological response causes some trauma survivors to dissociate to a level where they look out at their bodies from another perspective. This can be looking down from above or looking at a part of their body that doesn’t appear to belong to them.

Dissociation occurs on a continuum, often impacted by how long or often one relies on it, whether the person has any other coping strategies, or whether other trusted helpers or a safe space is available. Helpers or places where the child feels secure can provide a way to safely be connected to feelings, sensations and body, despite the overwhelm elsewhere.

Childhood Dissociation Persists In Adulthood

As children with trauma get older, they may use self-harm, food, drugs, alcohol, or any other coping mechanism to maintain the disconnection from unhealed trauma. As therapists, we see these behaviors serving two functions for trauma survivors

As a dissociative mechanism or way to dissociate (for example, using alcohol or drugs to physically disconnect them from their thinking brain) As a way to sustain behaviors that keep them dissociated (I’m not connected to my body, so I can cut without pain, or I’m not connected to my body, so I don’t notice that I’m full and don’t need more food to consume). Ultimately, this coping strategy that was useful in childhood, in adulthood compromises abilities to trust, attach, socialize, and provide good self-care. These challenges follow trauma survivors throughout their life, if not attended to.

Recognizing Dissociation In Adults

Adults don’t just outgrow dissociation learned as a childhood coping skill. It likely becomes a go-to coping mechanism for maintaining life. Adults may not be aware of their ongoing state of dissociation, while words and actions like these tell a different story:

• Someone tells a therapist their most traumatic experiences without knowing or trusting them first and does so without emotion connected to the story; they are speaking from a dissociated place.

• Someone uses drugs, alcohol, cutting, food, pornography, or other forms of self-injurious behavior to continue to dissociate and not be present with their feelings.

• Someone disconnects from the here and now when they’re triggered by a certain situation or even a scent, such as cologne, and find themselves inside a flashback which feels very real.

• A veteran hears a noise that causes a flashback to a wartime event.

• Someone is arguing with their spouse, but when their spouse yells, they “check out.”

Dissociation is sometimes the best way a person can survive a terrifying ordeal in the moment, or chronic developmental trauma over many years. Yet it actually becomes a problem, a roadblock, in adult life. Dissociation interferes with forming secure relationships and connections. Dissociation can prevent you from developing these relationships or being present for them.

The reality is, in your adult life, you may actually be safer today learning to notice, reconnect and reintegrate the dissociated parts. Perhaps you are safe now and don’t need this coping mechanism to protect you anymore! Most times, an individual will show up in therapy for some other reason besides the use of “dissociation” or even trauma—they are there because they feel sad, or are drinking too much or fighting with their spouse. They can’t figure out why these issues persist, as they have a nice life now. As trauma-informed therapists, we can help people safely discover what issues are showing up due to their past history. We can help them discover and notice what made sense at the time given what was going on in their life that they had to survive. We can help people understand they are not “bad” and something is not wrong with them – their issues are based on the dissociative coping skills they learned in childhood to survive (which were very useful at the time, but not anymore)!

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[poetrih]

Dear Whoever,

I’ve randomly decided to start blogging my thoughts, feelings... ect. Poetry is normally my go to, but at this current time in my life, it’s not working out. Don’t get me wrong, it will always be my 1st love... I just want to say more... and not in a poetic manor. I also think there are a lot of other folks out here that can relate. Maybe. - So, why not sit still once or twice a week and just write... write whatever my heart feels. I could be talking to thousands of people or nobody at all, but who cares? 

Today, I want to talk about LOVE, and accountability. I know... I know, I let that same sigh out with a heavy ass eye-roll. I guess... I guess I just don’t understand at times. I LOVE love, but for the life of me I can’t seem to figure out why LOVE doesn’t love me. No...  don’t do that... don’t leave, please come back. This isn’t some depressing ass blog or a cry for help, I’m legit just spilling my thoughts. It might get sad, but I promise you there’s a silver lining. There’s always a silver lining. <3 

So, when I say “love doesn’t love me”, maybe I’m talking about the countless relationships (platonic & romantic) that didn’t work. But, I’ve learned something. I have learned that I, Alexandria has toxic ways. Now wait a damn minutes, you ain’t about to judge me, okay? I’m HEAR to say that everyone, including yourself has a little toxic in them. Just like that one saying “everyone can be a little crazy”. Now, you can be at a point in your life where you aren’t as toxic. & I greatly applaud you for that. I applaud you for growing, for healing & for understanding... cause well, that is the 1st step. Accountability. Not a lot of folks can admit when they are wrong, let alone admit when they are accountable. Trust me, I was one of them. It took me a good while before realizing - BITCH YOU REALLY NEED TO GET YOUR SHIT TOGETHER! 

It was a little over a year ago, when I first realized how toxic I can be. I was rolling around in the front yard of my ex’s place, tussling with her. All because she hurt me, because she cheated, because she lied & continued to fucking lie. & for the longest, I used that as an excuse to go off on her. I used it as an excuse to HURT her. I said mean things to her, things I didn’t mean & I watched my life spiral out of control. & you should NEVER allow somebody to have such an impact on how you react to things. 

We have got to start worrying about ourselves, and not others. What do I mean by this? Well, what John does... shouldn’t be any of my concern. I just need to make sure I’m doing my part and being a decent human being. I can’t blame John for being as ass, that’s him. We often blame everyone else. “Well, he cheated on me so-” so nothing. LOOK... we have got to get to a place where we cry, but we walk away. We accept & we heal. --- Our own thoughts is what causes us to react the way we do. & to be honest, it’s a lot of unhealed trauma as well. “But they didn’t have to treat me like that” - STOP! Sorry, just practicing for myself... you know, trying to knock those excuses that are not justified, out of my head. 

It’s time we really fall in love with ourselves. It’s time we HEAL from our childhood trauma. -- Hell, it’s time we heal from all trauma... cause baby, love is going to come & it’s going to be so fucking beautiful. Just trust the process. 

until next time...  LOVE & LIGHT

-Signed,  a strong black woman doing the work. <3

[mindynichole]

Okay...so it’s time to tackle Episode 10x18 and why it didn’t bother me that much.

Despite getting to watch TWD Season 10B early thanks to a forgotten AMC Premiere account, I waited an entire 24 hours before I watched 10x18 out of fear of the inevitable. 

And by now I’m sure you know exactly what I’m referring too.

However, after I did finally break down and watch it Friday evening, I was surprised that it didn’t bother me nearly as much as I thought it would. 

Some might say that’s just because of the tinfoil hat now firmly placed tightly around my head after the previous episode convinced me even more Beth Greene might just show up out of the blue one day soon to a TWD universe production near you. Okay, I’ll give you that! 

However, there are very logical reasons why I don’t feel the least bit threatened by this new woodland harlot, Leah, (I’m just joking, geesh) and I’m going to tell you what they are!

Before I begin, I want to make clear that while I’m not thrilled about the idea of Daryl being in a romantic relationship with anyone but Beth, I didn’t really even hate Leah but saw her instead as what I believe she was meant to be. On her own in another situation she probably would be a great character. However, when I have mentioned in the past that I liked this episode, I was mainly referring to the parts with Car*l. Not because I am petty and enjoyed the fight, but because I think these are conversations that Daryl and her need to be having. 

Nevertheless, here’s my take of 10X18. Consider yourself spoiler warned if you haven’t seen it yet.

Daryl was probably at the loneliest part of his life when Leah enters the picture.

Let’s take the time and set this scene a moment... 

At the point in the story when Leah first appears, Daryl has been wandering the woods for three freaking years looking for any sign of Rick’s body. 

While Daryl is away, everything he knows has changed and life has just continued to carry on without him for everyone else he loves. Rick and Carl are both long gone. Carol is busy being a wife and mother. Michonne has pretty much shut off Alexandria from everybody including Team family. Maggie left for parts unknown with Georgie and has taken little Hershel with her. 

Literally every single thing that Rick and Team Family ever tried to build during this apocalypse is shattered and everything the man has ever loved is gone. 

We also can’t forget that the person Daryl would have naturally clung to during this sad time happened to “die” before he ever stepped foot into Virgina. Therefore, Daryl is left with absolutely no one. It’s a damn miracle that he didn’t off himself and might have - had he not been so obsessed in finding Rick’s body.

Leah is Daryl’s exact mirror in female form. 

So he meets Leah after accidentally breaking into her cabin and almost immediately we can see she is literally like him looking into a mirror. Now, I’ve already read many people trying to compare her to Car*l and even Beth and while I do get what they are saying, I also disagree. This lady is no other than the female version of Daryl Dixon. He has surely found his exact match in her.

Here’s how we figure that out:

Leah is tough as nails but obviously has a heart because she doesn’t immediately kill Daryl for busting into her cabin and ultimately lets him go.

You come to find out she had abusive parents and a very shitty childhood just like Daryl.

You find out her life sucked until she found her group - who had given her not only hope but finally a real family.

Like Daryl, her life also greatly improved during the apocalypse.

It takes Leah a very long time to trust Daryl enough to even tell him her name.

You find out she had a son who was born very much like Judith was. Her “sister” died giving birth to him, causing her to raise him as her own.

Something horrible happens to the group (horde of walkers) and everyone else gets killed. She takes her son and runs to the cabin only to realize that he had been bitten and ultimately dies. 

It highly implied Leah blames herself for what happened to her family.

Like Daryl, at this point in the story Leah has lost everything she has ever loved, has sought refuge in the woods, and is completely alone.

Yet, in no way, shape, or form was Leah ever supposed to be a replacement for Beth. Instead, I believe she actually demonstrates why Bethyl worked so well.

While I’m okay with the character of Leah, she’s no Beth. Not even close. As I stated before, she is just like Daryl and that’s really the problem.

Because we need to understand the thing that made Bethyl work so well was their fundamentally different personalities fitting together like peanut butter and jelly - both perfectly fine on their own but together making the perfect combination. 

And TPTB spent a lot of time and effort back in the day showing us how much this was so.

While sometimes opposite people clash, we were shown that their different natures surprisingly completed each other very well. In other words, they were each other’s yin and yang. This was most obvious with Daryl helping Beth realize her own strength and Beth showing Daryl how to move forward. However, I could create an entire meta...and there are many that already exist out there...listing countless examples of how we saw them bringing the best out in each other. The combination of this along with their utmost (even sometimes brutal) honesty, shared history, and absolute trust in each other, created a foundation for a very healthy relationship.

In contrast, two people with nearly identical personalities and the same exact kind of unhealed trauma like Leah and Daryl, are usually not good life partners because they can hinder and get in the way of each other’s forward progress. 

While you can understand why these kinds of people gravitate together and form bonds over shared experience, resulting romantic relationships can often be rocky. Many times the shared trauma can result in both partners having the exact same kinds of problems with trust, communication, and reckless expression of feelings. There is nobody in the relationship to model different kinds of behaviors and ideas since both tend to have the same life experiences to draw upon. Instead, each serves to the other as a living testament to and as confirmation of why their negative thoughts and behaviors are correct. 

In other words, there is nobody there to throw the life preserver when both people are drowning. Nobody to even suggest to either partner a different way of doing things. 

Also, when the relationship’s foundation is based solely on shared trauma, the trauma itself can become the only thing holding the two partners together. 

This is why I never thought Daryl and Car*l would ever make good romantic partners. However, at least they have different types of personalities and kinds of trauma. Car*l is just...well Car*l - a force all on her own - and there’s nothing to suggest she ever experienced abuse in childhood. However, Leah being an exact carbon copy of Daryl gave that relationship even less of a chance.

And what I have just described seems to be exactly what we really do see happen between Daryl and Leah in Episode 10x18. I could list various examples but for time’s sake, I’m choosing not to because I am sure you can see it too - at least now that I’ve brought it up.

Just know I also believe this is why NR seemed to imply the relationship was not good in earlier preview shows.

Daryl flat out told Leah he didn’t know if he could choose her. 

As many others have already pointed out throughout the weekend, I believe the biggest difference between Daryl’s reaction to Leah and his reaction to Beth is the simple fact he really didn’t seem to  want to stay in that cabin with Leah forever. He doesn’t even seem all that upset about it either until he starts talking with Car*l later.

This drastically contrasts with the “Oh” scene with Beth. Hell, Daryl didn’t even care if the looney person who had been tending the funeral home and dressing up corpses came back! He wanted nothing more than to stay there and live happily ever after with her. There was no hesitation. 

I would go as far as to say Beth is the only person able to completely divert Daryl's attention away from the rest of his family - much like she did when he spotted the Grady car and began his pursuit. However, Beth would never even ask such a thing - because not only is it her family too - but also because Beth was much too unselfish to let Daryl make those kinds of choices.

So you might ask yourself why he changed his mind in the end and made him decide to go back to Leah?

I believe he makes this choice because of the conversation with Car*l. She basically tells him that everyone else has found their place and it is time for him to find his place too. It begins to slowly eat at Daryl how they have all moved on without him. It’s important to remember that by this time in the story, he’s pretty much done scouring the river for Rick. He’s already checked out that “one last place” he hadn’t been. So now he’s beginning to ponder Car*l’s words and wondering where his place is now? Where does he go from here? It’s logical to think maybe he’s supposed to be in those woods with Leah after all.

Daryl and Leah’s relationship doesn't seem to leave much of a lasting impression or effect on Daryl.

Don’t get me wrong, I believe Daryl most definitely cared about Leah. Yet, we can’t forget how we first found Daryl all those years later after the time jump in Episode 9X6.

If you remember right, Daryl still wasn’t doing all that great. His relationship with Leah apparently does absolutely nothing to change his outlook on anything. 

In comparison, we all know what just a few short weeks - perhaps a couple of months - in the woods with Beth Greene does to Daryl Dixon. It changes his character profoundly! 

Daryl might have went back to Leah at the time...BUT he made it crystal clear to C*rol that he knows where he belongs NOW. That’s what the entire fight between them was really about.

There is a line that Daryl spits out during his fight with Car*l that sums up exactly why he wasn’t able to give up everything and stay with Leah. He tells Car*l that he knows where his place is…and he’s referring to being with his family at Alexandria. He’s angry that she doesn’t seem to understand that it’s where her place is as well.

AK later points this line out on TTD as important too. In fact, she literally states that his relationship with Leah is purely in the past and they will not go there again. It is rare for a showrunner to flat out proclaim something like this. It means she felt it was important for the audience to understand that this was done.She also points out that the fight is really about how sick Daryl is of Carol running away every time things get extremely difficult.

I would go a step further and say that Daryl is probably projecting what he now realizes was going on with himself when he was wandering the woods and choosing to stay there with Leah all those years ago. He’s upset with himself for having done so and he’s upset with Car*l that she has yet to have come to the same conclusion.

Ps: Be on the lookout for another post - a part two of sorts - later this week detailing all the things I’m still tinkering in my mind about this episode! ;)

Until then, keep calm and Bethyl on! She’s coming soon...

[nic0lebcu]

should humans stop procreating?

“Again I looked, and I considered all the oppression taking place under the sun. I saw the tears of the oppressed, and they had no comforter; the power lay in the hands of their oppressors, and there was no comforter. So I admired the dead, who had already died, above the living, who are still alive. But better than both is he who has not yet existed, who has not seen the evil that is done under the sun. - Ecclesiastes 4:1”

Last week I discovered the term “anti-natalism”. As you may have been able to guess, anti-natalists are against natalism - giving birth, procreation, or otherwise the continuation of life on this planet. They believe birthing children into an inherently flawed world is ethically wrong..environmentally irresponsible, even.. and in a way I don’t blame them. The fact that a set of humans can assume the responsibility of creating and then birthing another human into the world without its consent, exposing it to a lifetime of danger and suffering doesn’t exactly seem fair to me. No one ever asks a child whether or not they want to be born. Their souls are brought to earth against their will and are then expected to just deal with the circumstances they’ve been given.

We are all fighting for our lives here, until our inevitable death.

Parents selfishly procreate with regard to only their own self-interest. Because, lets face it, even the most well-intentioned parents may be unknowingly nurturing serial killer, rapist, mass murderer, pedophilic sociopath spawn from within the womb. How a child perceives the world on its own and what it then does with this perception out in the world is always a mystery until AFTER the child is born. So having children is a risk…always a risk. 

Take Ted Bundy, for instance, who had a relatively normal childhood and even claimed to be treated very well by his parents. He would later grow up to be truly horrendous - kidnapping, raping, and murdering at least 30 women all before the age of 43. There are many others out there, just like Ted Bundy; and many more waiting to be born...

Every year, thousands of kids end up in foster care because their parents can’t take care of them. Thousands more go hungry and get sick. The fact that a child will be bullied and experience emotional abuse at some point is inevitable. And it’s all their parent’s fault. There are dangers in this world that no amount of sheltering will protect their children from; suffering is just a consequence of a child being born. What if we could spare any more lives from experiencing that same fate by just not having children?

We’ve been warned for years that the world is becoming overpopulated. Whether that’s true or not is consistently up for debate; but there’s no denying the human race’s impact on the earth has not always been a fruitful one. In fact, we are the ones destroying the world and each other while we’re at it. We are the very monsters that we assume only exist in works of fiction and fantasy. Yes, there is plenty of good we have done since being given the responsibility of populating the earth. But what if populating the earth is the very thing that is destroying us? This is the question that anti-natalism postulates and concludes that life is pointless and there’s no real reason to procreate. That life should end with us and it shouldn’t be an aspiration while living to continue it. The only real way to achieve world peace is to ultimately stop creating human beings. And it is when, and only when, humans cease to exist that world peace will truly be achieved. 

How’s that as food for thought?

Throughout my life this notion of anti-natalism and wishing I’d never been born has been a recurring theme. Unhealed trauma will do that to a person. I’ve had moments where I thought the wounds being inflicted upon me were intentional by some unseen force and that all of life was just a sick game where I was at the mercy of a sadistic god that hates me. 

Viewing the world through that type of lens, why would I want to bring more children here? What the earth really needs is to be destroyed, so pressing that red button right now would be doing all of us a favor. I would be lying if I said I didn’t have fantasies of being the one to smash it. I’m human; and at the core of every human is a shadow side with which we coexist.

So, why are people still having children? Are the ones having them oblivious to the fact that they’re contributing to world suffering? Or have they realized something anti-natalists haven’t?

As much as we’d like to, we can’t remove suffering from the world ourselves. Though we may try, it’s impossible. As much as we hate to accept it.. life is suffering, and perhaps people having babies have learned to accept something Buddha discovered along time ago.

“Life is suffering.”

There’s no escaping it.

But there are ways to cope.

For some, having children brings them the hope that they may be able to find a little joy in living…because life is short, and is suffering, but joy can be found in things as typical as having a child. For some, having children takes the focus off themselves and their own suffering and inspires them try and make life better for someone else. While still arguably a selfish act, it’s a good deed nonetheless. What can we do? We were given these bodies…are we not supposed to use them? We’ll never be able to control all the unpleasant experiences waiting to happen to our kids, but we can at least TRY to give them a good life and help guide them along with what we know. As with most things in life, we can only do our best… and isn’t that all God should be expecting of us anyway? We’re only human.

One of the core and founding components of the bible was that Jesus was born and gave hope to all humanity. Born of another human into a flesh and blood body made him a mortal being, susceptible to all the things we’re susceptible to. But yet, it was His destiny to become Jesus. And has since been the light and life-giving figure we know today. What if Jesus had never been born?

He was born, however, to save humans…aaand if there were no humans we wouldn’t need saving now would we?

But the fact of the matter is that there ARE humans. And there are some humans who are born to leave a legacy behind. 

There are two types of people: those that save and those that need saving…. maybe you’re one of them? And maybe, just maybe, that’s the purpose of being given life.

[padawanlost]

Anakin Skywalker & Slavery

Continuation of this post (a question by @ask-the-almighty-google)

Anakin, as a Jedi, had a unique approach to slavery. I’m aware this is a divisive topic with opinions ranging from “Anakin was worse than Jabba” to “Anakin did nothing wrong”. Instead of doing a “opinion piece” I decided it would be more constructive if we could look at the facts. My personal opinion will still be a part of this but today I’ll try to show more and talk less.

Anakin, as a child born in slavery, was deeply traumatize by his experiences and that certainly influenced how he look at it. His reactions to slavery were personal because it was something deeply personal to him. Anakin was wrong in not fighting for the clones but to expect Anakin to passionately the cause is unrealistic because he spend the previous 10 years old his life behind constantly criticized for that exact same behavior. He did want to save all slaves but the Jedi “beat” that dream of out him.

“Worried about helping Jabba? Don’t worry, everyone else is, too.” Anakin could never answer her. He tried not to think about it, but the thought was like a corris weevil, eating away at his resolve. The Jedi had never tried to rescue his mother or buy her out of slavery. Instead, they had taken him, given him this new life, but left her behind on Tatooine. He had just accepted it at the time, but now … now he knew how much power Jedi had, and all he could wonder is why she hadn’t been worth their time and trouble, too, if only to keep him happy. Not even Qui-Gon Jinn had cast a backward glance at Shmi Skywalker. As the months and years wore on, the question would not leave Anakin alone. He didn’t want to let resentment eat away at his fond memories of his old Master, but he couldn’t stop it sometimes. […]The Jedi Council had credits. Real wealth. Would it really have been beyond them to buy his mother out of slavery? Anakin accepted that some things had to be learned from the cradle. He was already full of attachment and emotion, too set in his ways of being a messy, ordinary human to adopt the aloof serenity—the unloving detachment, the arm’s-length and measured compassion—a Jedi needed. He did his best. Why wasn’t my mother worth saving? [The Clone Wars by Karen Traviss]

Why won’t they help me free my mother? It’s not fair! It’s not right! Countless times, Obi-Wan explained that every Jedi had to obey the directives of the Jedi Council, and could never use the Force for selfish purposes. He urged Anakin to consider how freeing one slave on Tatooine might lead to the deaths of others, as some slavers might prefer to destroy their “property” than release them from bondage. The Jedi also had to answer to the Galactic Senate, and for the time being, the Senate had little interest in anything that happened on Tatooine. Why do the Jedi have to answer to anybody? Anakin wondered. Despite Anakin’s desire to distance himself from the slave he had once been, he was unable, or unwilling, to shed the other aspects that had defined him on Tatooine. [Ryder Windham’s The Rise and Fall of Darth Vader]

This was a constant in Anakin’s years as a Jedi. every time he tried to bring up the subject he was told how wrong he was by these powerful and wise beings he so admired. Eventually he stopped asking. He buried his dreams.

When they'd met, Anakin had been a warm-hearted nine-year-old boy with an open nature. He was twelve and a half now, and the years had changed him. He had grown to be a boy who hid his heart. [Jude Watson’s Deceptions]

Slavery became a sore topic. Something he tried to hide at all costs. And, if possible, avoided thinking about at all costs.

Anakin regretted it as soon as he said it. He’d made it sound more as if he had some wild, dark past, and nothing was better guaranteed to keep Ahsoka asking questions than that. If he explained he’d been a Hutt’s slave, she’d dig away at it until all the bad stuff came out. It was hard enough telling Padmé, and she was his wife. [The Clone Wars by Karen Traviss]

I think he internalized and eventually blamed it all on himself. He admitted to himself he had a part in  it too and that guilty ate away at him.

When the war was over he’d go back to Tatooine and see. When the war was over he’d buy any child he found enslaved to Watto and find them a home where they might live and love in safety. Belonging to no one but themselves. I should have done it before now. Wasn’t that my other childhood dream? Become a Jedi and free the slaves. Instead I became a Jedi and let myself forget. Let them convince me that it’s not our job to remake the Republic. The Jedi were keepers of the peace, not legal enforcers. That was the Senate’s job. How many times had he been told that? He’d lost count. But the Senate was falling down on the job, wasn’t it? What was the use of having anti-slavery laws if the barves who broke them never paid for their crimes? It was enough to shake his hard-won and harder-kept faith. If scum like Watto and Jabba and the other Hutts kept on making their fat profits on the backs of living property—and if the Senate continued to turn a blind eye—how could anyone believe in the Republic? How could he? [Karen Miller’s Star Wars: Clone Wars Gambit: Stealth]

Anakin wasn’t sure how he’d react when he saw Watto again. Although his former master had been kinder than other slave owners, Anakin had always resented the fact that Watto refused to free his mother. Watto isn’t entirely to blame, Anakin mused, wondering just how hard Qui-Gon had tried to liberate Shmi. Slavery is allowed here, and Watto is just a businessman. [Ryder Windham’s The Rise and Fall of Darth Vader]

There are credits in slavery—and credits trump justice. Always have. Always will. And the Jedi? They didn’t want to get involved. Even Qui-Gon … So I guess it’s up to me. I failed my mother. I didn’t go back for her and she died. But when the war is over I’ll make good on my word. I’ll fight slavery wherever I find it … and there’ll be no mercy for those who steal lives. [Karen Miller’s Star Wars: Clone Wars Gambit: Stealth]

Jabba grew fat on the misery of beings like Anakin’s mother. He’d probably taken a percentage of the very transactions that had kept Shmi Skywalker in slavery. And still I have to save his son. Because we need his goodwill. His space lanes. The idea stuck in Anakin’s throat like a splintered nuna bone. The pain was palpable. [The Clone Wars by Karen Traviss]

He buried it so deep he became a Jedi. on the surface, he was very much a Jedi (not as dismissive of slavery as the detached Jedi but still unwilling to face the full reality of the situation). However, it still hurt him.

 Anakin wondered whether it was expedience, simple logic—both he and Kenobi spoke Huttese and were experienced in covert missions—or some exercise in character building. Yoda knew Anakin’s past, that he and his mother had been slaves of a Hutt. Jabba raked off a cut from the slave trade, too, so he was personally connected to Anakin’s boyhood misery, and even his mother’s ultimate fate. Callous didn’t begin to cover it. Anakin’s instinctive reaction would have been to tell Jabba that it was too bad and that people you loved got killed all the time. [The Clone Wars by Karen Traviss]

Again, he buried his feelings and thoughts because that’s what the Jedi taught him. when the Clone War begins, that’s what he does. He buries everything. It’s a result of his traumas and his jedi upbringing. But let me you, Anakin did care about the clones. No, he did not fight for his rights or recognized their status as slaves but this idea that Anakin didn’t care about the well being of his men is as fanon as fanon gets.

I know this is a contraction hard to grasp. I mean, how can’t some fail to notice someone is a slave, keep them enslaved and still care about their life and grief for them? sounds impossible, right? But it’s not. These kinds of contractions are what makes us humans, what makes great characters great. How can Obi-wan love Anakin and still cut of his limbs and leave him to burn? He is human. This is not a simple matter that can be summarized with a simple right or wrong answer.

It’s not darkness. I’m not dark. This isn’t anger— It was okay; they’d always told him so. He was fighting to save his men, and if he did terrible things out of compassion, out of love, then he wasn’t turning to the dark side. That was the Jedi way. For my mother. For my men. For Padmé. [The Clone Wars by Karen Traviss]

Impatience. Concern. Relief. Loneliness. Weariness. And grief, not yet healed. Such a muddle of emotions. Such a weight on [Anakin]’s shoulders. Months of brutal battle had left [Ahsoka] drained and nearly numb, but it was worse for Anakin. He was a Jedi general with countless lives entrusted to his care, and every life damaged or lost he counted as a personal failure. For other people he found forgiveness; for himself there was none. For himself there was only anger at not meeting his own exacting standards. [Karen Miller’s Star Wars: Clone Wars Gambit: Stealth]

Under [Anakin]’s careless confidence, she sensed a hint of that unhealed grief. The loss of greenies Vere and Ince during the Jan-Fathal mission … the loss of other Torrent Company clones since then … his pain was like a kiplin-burr, burrowed deep in his flesh. Anakin had a bad habit of nursing those wounds, and no matter what she said, tactfully, no matter what Master Kenobi said without any tact at all, nothing made a difference. He hurt for them, and always would. [Karen Miller’s Star Wars: Clone Wars Gambit: Stealth]

[Anakin] looked at Ahsoka. “Fine. You can go. But I want to be kept informed of Torrent Company’s status. Don’t make me chase you for updates, is that clear?” She managed to smile. “Yes, Master. Thank you.” “And Ahsoka …” He felt his heart thud. “Tell Rex—tell all of them—that anything less than a full recovery is unacceptable. Tell Rex I—” He had to stop. Obi-Wan was in earshot, and they were not supposed to care so much. [Karen Miller’s Star Wars: Clone Wars Gambit: Stealth]

 [Anakin] hit the cockpit canopy switch, fast. “Obi-Wan’s fine, more or less,” he told the anxious droid, firing their fighter’s thrusters. “Ahsoka’s pretty banged up, though. So are Rex and Coric. They’re on their way to Kaliida Shoals.” R2’s mournful whistle said everything Anakin couldn’t … or didn’t want to. [Karen Miller’s Star Wars: Clone Wars Gambit: Stealth]

Rex. Coric. Ahsoka. And fourteen dead pilots. Scores more dead and wounded ground troopers. Why can’t we stop this? Why can’t we catch Grievous? Dooku’s only one man. How can he defy the entire Jedi Order? Who is his Sith Master? Why can’t we find him? Day and night the questions ate at him. They ate at Obi-Wan, too, but somehow his former Master seemed able to live without knowing the answers. Or else he was just better at hiding his dismay. His fear. [Karen Miller’s Star Wars: Clone Wars Gambit: Stealth]

Anakin did ask himself questions but over 10 years of being told he was wrong does take a toll. And we need to remember Anakin was 19 years old kid pushed into a war by his superiors. A lack of self-analysis, a narrow view of the world and political nativity comes with the package. Anakin *is* concern about slavery but he is a flawed person with his own blind spots. It’s the famous cognitive dissonance we all know so well.

I’m not saying Anakin is right but deference is an important part of the character. Anakin cannot be the sort of person who is too aware of what’s going on around him or else he wouldn’t turn into Vader. He had to be written this way to explain why Vader exists. If Anakin had questioned the Republic’s slave army he wouldn’t have become the Vader knew from the OT. He had to be kind of guy who blinds follows his superiors even against his own self-interest.  

[leanne-welling]

Fear of abandonment; the belief that we are inherintly not good enough for anyone to choose us, and if anyone does they will soon realise their mistake and leave. . . The parenting we received in our early years taught us that love and attention are conditional. Our parents taught this through their absent or inconsistent responses to ourbexoressed needs. . . Often, this was due to their own limitations through their childhood experiences, poor mental health and other beleifs around what parenting "should" look like based on how they were parented. . . When, as children our needs were ignored, responded to with little care or mocked and made fun of, we quickly learned to displace our own needs for the sake of keeping people close to us. For example; If our screams were ignored or met with negativity, we stopped screaming as it didn't deliver the response we needed. We learned that to receive love meant to not be a burden, not to be needy, or problematic. . . We learned we are not accepted as broken and not deemed worthy of repair. As such we quickly adapt to ensure to keep ourselves as useful and beneficial to those we crave love from. . . Roles often taken up are: 👌The Perfectionist 🩹The Chronic Fixer 😁The Happy One 🆘The Family Caretaker or Counsellor 👍The Go-To Person . . Inorder to maintain these roles we tolerate high levels of abuse from those near to us because to not tolerate it would risk them leaving us. . . We attract those who would take advantage of this trait such as narcissistic partners and friends . . We appear to have it all together but will likely have quiet coping strategies such as binge eating comfort food, obsessive shopping and compulsive social media use. . . Unhealed childhood trauma manifests in adulthood in a variety of ways but all presentations include a reduction of self inorder to please others. The putting away of personal need inorder to not push others away with our perceived burdonsomeness. . . #trauma #traumarecovery #traumasurvivor #traumahealing #traumainformed #traumatherapist #traumatherapy #ptsdsurvivor #ptsd #cpsd #dtd #breakthecycle #anxietyrecovery #anxiety #anxietyrelief #anxiousparents #depression (at Sunbury, Victoria) https://www.instagram.com/p/CBaxHopBdyw/?igshid=1jqsaav69ytgw

[haigloel]

Adressing the toxicity

Okay, here’s the issue. I feel guilty for “ruining” our relationship and I need to address the whole situation to understand the underlying issues of it all. Her biggest issue with me was me not listening, here are the reasons why I did that what led me to it;

Adressing

Adressing her toxicity, verbal abuse and negative impact on my self-esteem since childhood,

https://www.joinonelove.org/learn/unhealthy-relationship-behaviors-series-belittling/https://greatist.com/live/dealing-with-a-toxic-person#4 https://www.healthscopemag.com/health-scope/toxic-relationships/ )

(Criticism, trivializing, condescension, insults, discounting, undermining)

We underwent the same traumas

I’m not her parent, I do not owe her shit

Her belittling probably reflects her inner monologue. Her inner anger. I mean she is mad all the time. 

Addressing the effects

I’ve been in survival mode trying to seek approval during this whole relationship - It started young, as we both underwent trauma, i went into survival mode, formed by conditioned beliefs. I was seeking approval from her while she was projecting trauma and inner wounds which led me to self-betrayal

I am doing this to protect my feelings and honor my emotional needs 

She doesn’t respect my boundaries, it reflects her character and he unawakening - Doesn’t mean anything of me, do not rely on her as a source of validation or approval since she is unawakened and toxic, look at her toxic tendencies and ask yourself why you want to trust that as someone you’d look up to. Ask yourself if you’d do the things she did to others? Would you trust her with your kids? 

She makes me feel like shit - Foul language, name-calling, belittling to minimize me, gaslighting, all of this reflects nothing of someone. She makes me second-guess myself, slowly chips away my self-esteem, 

Even if what she did was justifyable, I was wasn’t capable of asserting myself and showing up in my highest due to my unawakening and being in trauma state and survival mode - There’s a humane explanation behind it. I had lots of unresolved trauma from childhood that put me into survival mode and Ego protected me. Our parents did not equip us with with the love, guidance, stability, healthy emotional boundaries that I needed in order to stand up for myself at that time. That is something that needs to be understood. Including her.

Even if I was healed and I was able to stand up for myself and she changed - Why would I want to stay in a relationship with someone like that who thinks that it was okay to act like that in the first case? It just describe exactly the type of person she is - unhealed. I cannot engage with people like that, what I do is that I just leave, I have my own shit to deal with. It is not my responsibility to address her shit.

No positive impact in my life - It’s very minimal, the negatvity outweighs it all, I feel drained. Again - I do not want to surround myself with people like that who do not inspire me.

No positive role model - Her characteristics, personality traits does not reflect nothing of who I want to become like. She could have chosen to be nice, respectful, but she chose to project anger. I do not want to surround myself with those types of people. 

She does not cultivate growth that makes me a better person (which is what I value within a person to turn up in my life, I’d like someone who is supportive, positive, love). This gives me another example if what types of people I would not like to surround myself with. 

We are not on the same vibrational frequency - She is not far in her awakening, has unresolved trauma and is acting out her inner wounds and anger, I do not want to engage with those types of people. You can see that she is acting from her inner wound of not being heard and validated. Me not listening was a disruption in her system. She took it personal. I have my own trauma to deal with, cannot deal with hers.

I have my own emotional needs to meet - Her unmet need of being heard and listened is not mine to deal with, that stems from our parents, not me. I do not want to deal with someone who is negative when she expresses her concerns and issues, even if that comes from our parents. I have my own emotional needs to honor by setting boundaries.

The things that she does - I would NEVER do to a person

It doesn’t matter if I was able to address the issues AND pursue a healthy relationship, there’s a chance that I would still be steered by Paula and trying to seek her approval, I was in survival mode and trying to cultivate a relationship with her wouldn’t be able to work UNLESS she broke me off

I do not owe her a good relationship, It’s not my responsibility to tend to her needs - She thinks I owe her things but those are inner wounds from childhood traumas, you can see it. When I do not listen to her she gets sent into her own Ego state that’s acting from child wound and conditioned beliefs telling her that it means something about her when someone is not listening to her. (This person is not listening to me, I am not feeling heard and taken serious and validated for who I am, this is an attack, she owes me her ear and her attention to attend to my needs) Our parents denied our reality and dismissed our thoughts often. She thinks it means something about - the best part of this. Therefore it comes out as if I was responsible for that wound when I am not. I am just a reminder. 

She is making moves - She is moving too much that interferes with my sleep and need for rest and ease, this is disrespectful and she is not respecting my needs”

[makingtheunconsciousconscious]

the therapy which combines family systems theory, and socioecological theory to understand a person. family systems and epigenetics helps to understand how past traumas may have shaped a person and their view of the world. 

the traumas that we were put through as a child are that traumas that continue to repeat themselves in our relationships with others. we need to be able to heal our childhood traumas in order to not continue the perpetuation of trauma and abuse in our other relationships.

i see myself playing out the weaknessess of my parents in my relationships with others. my interversion and aversion to conversation from my father. my insecurity and paranoia from my mother. these traumas that i have seen, learned, and experienced in my home are affecting the way that i relate to my significant other. they affect the way that i treat my significant other, and they are refelcted in the way that i connect with others.

understanding, acknnowledging and seeing myself play out these unhealthy and toxic behaviors is one thing. understanding where they came from is another. and understanding how to kick them is another. i see myself doing these things, and I hate it. but it feels like such a visceral need. and if i don’t play it out, my anxiety builds and builds. and i see my unhealthy behaviors and wants surfacing, and i try to repress it, but it builds and builds, and i make the dumb choice- i act on it. i release it in the way that i know i shouldn’t. but how else can i release these anxieties and emotions without letting them play out?

will writing help? i don’t know maybe. i’ll try it. maybe art will help. i need to acknowledge it somehow. it’s bursting at the seams, but at the same time, if i write about it.. or if i speak about it... i guess.. that makes it feel more real. and i heard a kid say that about their trauma before too. and i didn’t understand, but now i do... writing about it makes it feel real. it brings it to life.. on paper.. here in front of me.. and to what extent am i simply making myself the victim?

to what extent am i making this into a mountain? i choose how much these things mean to me.. how much they affect me.. but why does it affect me so. what area of my heart and mind are plucked and pulled?! and how can i cut the strings so those chords can never be played again? how how how???

i just wish i was a therapist.. so that i could do my own therapy.. so that i could create my own therapy.. and help myself. i don’t want to rely on another person. i don’t want to spill my insides out to another person. i don’t want to leave my heart and my guts and my pains and my hurts on the table for another person to see. i can’t be vulnerable. i don’t want to be vulnerable. and i don’t want to put my issues on another person to shoulder. i want to deal with this on my own. i want to solve this on my own. i want to heal on my own without hurting anyone else.

i have hurt brandon more times than i can count because of my hurts and traumas. the wounds are still festering. and i don’t know how to heal them. i don’t know how to close them. and they’re not just my hurts. they’re my mother’s hurts. they’re my father’s hurts. they’re my ancestor’s hurts. i carry that pain with me too. and i need to release it. in order to keep the pain from carrying over to the next generation.

this is what needs to happen for everyone.

we need a complete jubilee.. we’re a world carrying the hurts and burdens of generations past. we’re living in a loving yet dysfunctional society which marginalizes so many.. the dysfunctions continue to build.. generation to generation...

we all came to heal, to grow.. to release the pains of the past.. and to create the solid foundations for the generations of the future, the generations to come. healing begins from within. i need to shine a light on that swamp. i need to bring it to the forefront of the light, and i need the light to heal it. heal it all. to grow flowers where it was once dark and murky. green grass. flourishing, lush trees and plants. love. 

turn the swamp into a pristine pond. with crystal clear waters that glitter in the sunlight. where fairies and animals venture and laugh. where there was once a swamp, there is now a brimming oasis of love and life. where the monsters transformed into woodland fairies... no longer neglected and unhealed.. but helpers and healers and keepers of the place that was once a swamp. 

an acceptance of the past. and an honoring of my history. but not letting it continue to affect me and my future. to transform and build into the beautiful utopia it was destined to be.

[drmariefeuer]

Stories vs Experience

 Stories vs Experience

I was recently at a dinner with some professional new age people, meaning people who make a living promoting new age type of skills and information. Sort of like being a pastor without needing to be accountable to anyone else except their “guides”, and since their guides are in their head, invisible, and only talk to the “gifted” person (no one else can hear them) there is no way to question what you hear from these folks. I personally like asking questions and like Leah Remini says in her expose on Scientology if people or an organization are offering information that proclaims to help people (or save the world), it should hold up to some questioning and in fact the process of question and answer should make the information stronger.  In the new age, typically the problem is often no one asks questions. It is not cool to question a so called spirit that talks to only one person. It is too embarrassing to question someone who appears more “advanced” than you because they hear a guide (so called) and you do not, etc. The second problem is that the answer is often “my guides told me so” and since only one person can hear the other’s “guide” there is no place to go from there.  Again, typically, one does not want to appear uncool or not spiritually advanced so there will be no questioning of the so called guide, or of the person claiming to hear this guide.  To make the situation more complex, Spirit is the world of the invisible, the world of perception, and faith is a practice of moving into the unknown with no evidence.

Back to the dinner. After drinking, people decided to do “readings”…. after drinking. Sorry, I do not go with that. And, Readings, for me, are not a party activity, it is a sacred encounter.  Some people like orgies, public sex, casual sex etc. Nothing wrong with those, it is all a choice. Some prefer only sacred sex, making love, tantra.  Another choice.  This was an opportunity.  Whenever I don’t “like” something I have two choices: leave, or stay and learn. I chose to stay. When I get with new agers, I put on my mosquito net. My mosquito net for new agers is I bring up Shadow Work because most new agers want to be the butterfly that brings the “good news”, the “healing”, the “sunshine” to someone else. That way they get the gratification of seeing the person “feel better” and they get showered with thanks, gratitude, and often more. There is a reason new agers call themselves light workers rather than say Spiritual Servants. Bring in the Shadow Work and here is what happens. You will be told a story that makes it all better. This is called a reading, a message from a guide (that you cannot hear), reframing, a prediction (a positive one of course) that “this “will all be over soon and you will marry the prince etc. Then, if you do not believe the story you will be told you are blocked and that is why bad things are happening to you. In other words, if you do not believe my story, you will be causing more bad things to happen to you. If you actually have the nerve to point this out, you will be told oh no, I am not judging, you are twisting my words, which makes no sense at all and typically confuses the person enough that they stop asking questions, or even talking.  Finally the (generally narcissistic) new ager will now revel you in a story from their life of how they got through some similar bad time and now all is a miracle, therefore since it happened to them, it is somehow proof that 1) they are right  2) it will happen to you.  This kind of faulty magical thinking is an earmark of a narcissistic personality, not a full blown personality disorder, but definitely a tendency.  Dig deeper, you will find these kinds of new agers have not done any work on their childhood issues or traumas, instead you will hear that they are walk-ins or extra terrestials etc. My year in Sedona, running a school, kept me around the town’s new agers who talked to the mother ship while each one was a food addict, a sexual abuse victim (not a survivor), co–dependant, etc. and other than their “broadcasts”, they were not having a good life. They were having a good time escaping, or compensating by losing themselves in new age stories while neglecting the work of this current life.

Understand that this is a short article meant to make a point. Therefore you are reading generalizations and material that is exaggerated (rarely but somewhat) to make a point, to make you want to learn more. If you think these short articles (I don’t like the label blog or some reason. It sounds like a swamp to me) “teach” you, you are wrong. They are simple arrows pointing to a direction of travel should you find the information relevant. The pursuit of more in-depth knowledge is then up to you, your efforts and your actions.  The new age loves to tell stories and give stories as knowledge, or wisdom when it is only information, and often not even valid information. Telling stories can be a tool to stimulate the attainment of wisdom, but, in this country stories are used more to prove one (or one’s ideas or information) is right, to try and motivate people (rather than teaching people to self-motivate).  Sufi teaching stories, Zen koans, vision stories of the Native Americans and other indigenous cultures, these are stories meant to send one into deep contemplation, to give you an experience that needs time to sink in and if you let it sink in, will shift you and your energy field through the experience of contemplation. So, to again get back to the new age dinner, share an experience that is not butterflies and rainbows and new age folks will jump all over you to “fix” you , push you into a “positive” outlook. And you will be told a story. If you do not believe the story, jump on their bandwagon, you will be told in so many words that you are cursing yourself with bad luck because you are not believer (in their bright and sunny story). Just like big Christian television shows filled with “stories” which then ask you to jump on their bandwagon (and give money). The only thing that has changed is it is now the use of the word “guides” instead of Jesus and instead of money  the narcissists seek only accolades (not a canny as the Christians that way). But it is still, stories, still someone else working hard to get you to believe his/her story. About you and your life, and beliefs and sometimes even emotions (you “shouldn’t” feel that way says your so-called unhealed healer…. you are creating bad karma…etc.)

Now what?  Stories can offer experience and they can motivate. Offering a person a teaching story, one that takes some thinking, some contemplation, some work, to shift yourself (!) to a different perspective, a learning by working through a challenge to your current thinking is one alternative. This also means, the person will not “get it” until they can handle the shift, on an energetic level. This also means, the new ager will not get accolades in the moment, or perhaps (gasp) ever. Teaching stories take time to sink in. Teaching stories take work, by the listener. You, as a seeker, have a choice. Study with people who make you work for your gains, or align with those who have great stories. Go to a new ager who will tell you about a past life where you and a friend were lovers (and how exactly does this information help you? It only makes you feel better and/or makes the new ager seem amazing), or do a regression to discover one of your past lives for yourself, and do the work to actually feel for yourself the importance of that life and that relationship at that time and the implications in this life. When you get an experience versus a story from a new ager, you thank Spirit for giving you what you can handle and the new ager will not get much in the way of applause or worship. When a Spirit Worker offers another an experience, the Spiritual Worker is only the facilitator of Spirit. There is little to no grandiosity in that role. When Spirit gives you what you need, rather than what you (your ego/left brain) desires there is typically less drama which many resent, as “drama” with no effort is “in” and drama with no effort  is what most people currently crave.

Seek out Spirit Workers who let you have your experiences, who offer you a ladder that you can use to climb out of a hole. Who offer you a hammer and nails so you can build a new reality for yourself, whose stories move you to think, contemplate and make new choices, those who help you on such a deep level that you don’t think to thank them until often years later if ever.  Be wary of those who seek to seduce you with wondrous stories of their new age “gifts”, stories of miracles in their life. Those miracles are theirs and will not rub off on you, nor are they proof they will happen to you.   Does this article irritate you?  So be it. For most people thinking, these days, is an irritation.  For many, they welcome the chance to think, contemplate, experience and learn.  I have always chosen Teachers that will let me learn, will not rescue me or do my thinking for me,  who motivate me with stories to continue to work and evolve, and do not motivate me with stories of  that “explain” how I should see, understand, believe or experience things (telling you a past life for example), and most of all, are there for me as I come out of the tunnel often dirty and tired but “new.”  Viable research on educational theory has shown that learning via experience is the most powerful and permanent kind of learning. Not movies, not stories, not reading. Those all have their place but there is a hierarchy of learning. Learning through experience is challenging. Life will present you with challenges and you will learn, like it or not. I prefer to be confronted by a Teacher, challenged by a Teacher who offers experiences for me to work through. And when I  emerge from each challenge, there is my Teacher (who often at times looked like the challenge when really it was all inside of me), smiling, embracing, celebrating with me acknowledging, profoundly acknowledging this part of the Journey I just accomplished by willingly taking on the work of this lifetime and by allowing the deep intimate connection of working with a Teacher guide me. Either way you will learn. You will learn, either way.  Choices.

Journey On

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