Turning Off Emotion: it's what I'm good at

There is no grace, no redemption, no hope in this post.  If you are having a bad time of it right now then this isn't what you should be reading.



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Sadness

Regret

Hollow

emotion and tears well up...I flatten them down and refuse to feel

and then nothingness

 

 

Maybe there is a chance that things will change for the better someday, but I can't see it right now.  Truthfully, I don't want to see it either.  I'm out of hope and my pain meter is maxed out.  I just want a way for it all to stop.  I only know one way to stop it and to stay alive, nothing else has worked long term.

Everything I do is on my list. My secret “how to live life so no one knows you aren't really here” list. I haven't used that list for two years now. For two years, plus another four months if I count my inadvertent thawing, I have been waking up to my own emotions, feelings and pain. Lots of pain. I've dealt with it and had much needed help doing so. I spent several weeks feeling and a few being suicidal. I think I was in that dark place again for about five weeks . I thought it would be a long time, maybe 3-5 years before I would cycle back around to being that bad off again. I was wrong.

I got to the point I could be in church and the triggers and dissociation didn't necessarily happen every service and when they did it was manageable. It took the better part of two years to get to that place. Even then there were plenty of days where I didn't function well and was checked out and not able to do the mom thing.

NO. MORE.

I'm done.

I'm done working so hard to be okay and honestly thinking that this time it will work. This time, because the message is so different and I'm believed and and and... There is just no fixing me. Not a real fix, not real healing, no truly getting past the PTSD and dissociation and the failure of being a good mom, who is truly and always here for my kids. I can't give them these two years back or all the other years where I was trying to find help, but I can give them a well programmed mom who does the right things at the right times(with just a little bit of lag). This I can do. This is what I'm good at. I've done this my whole life except for those times when I longed for something more, something real and for the experience of having real emotions besides anger.

I've done the emotion thing now for the last year or so and it's just not worth it. I've experienced the good emotions in what I think are genuine feelings. It was amazing to feel, really feel happiness and to laugh spontaneously without thinking about it and cuing myself to laugh. As great as all that was I can't keep those good emotions without also keeping myself open to their opposites. The price is too high and I can't keep paying it.

Tears are turned off

feelings are being dampened

I'm starting to look ok again.

 

The true test will be when we tell the boys and we send them away.  Until then, I practice for the big day.  The day when I rip my heart to shreds and pretend it doesn't hurt.

Themed Blogging Days

Thinking about ways of being more intentional with this blog and I'm going to try themed blogging days.  Something like:
Marvelous Monday, Mad Monday or Morbid Monday or maybe just to be a little more "normal" I'll do Monday Munchies.
Truthful Tuesday, Tuesday Triggers, Troubled Tuesday, or Torturous Tuesdays: a walk down memory lane
Wednesday Wonders, Wordless Wednesday(I like pictures and occasionally I take a good one)
Theology Thursday (I could probably write on this, pose questions, post about the crappy "answers" I've received over the years)
Fearful Friday or Fabulous Friday (That's really polar opposites, maybe I'll just skip Fridays)
Searching Saturdays (open ended theme that can work for a lot of things, even normal living life stuff)

How can I love my unloveable child?

What does unconditional love look like when the "performance" is so wretched?

How do I make a distinction between accepting him but not accepting the behavior?

I have a hard time with living like I know that God loves me even when I mess up. I most often live like I have to earn God's favor by my actions. Underneath what I "know" is what I actually believe at my core. I know that God loves me by his choice, but really believe that my actions determine whether He "likes" me.

That's the way I parent too. I love my kids but don't like all of them. I choose to love them, but their actions determine if I actually "like" them at any given time.

Do I have to like my kids in order to truly love them?
How do I love a child who is so awful without seeming to either reward or ignore his behavior?
How can I demonstrate love to my child even while disliking him.

Guess what yesterdays sermon was about.
Yep, one of the points dealt with our relationship to God as Father. I've been chewing on it ever since. Three of my kids are great and teachable and want to do right; but one is not. (Read that as understatement of the year) I would be insufferably proud of my parenting skills if I didn't have the one. I've learned that I don't know it all. I've learned that I don't even understand my relationship with God as my Father. I am still bound up with legalism in my parenting. I don't know how or even if I should do things differently. Is is okay to be legalistic in parenting? Should kids have to earn approval by their actions? Do I tie up my approval of what my kids do, with who they are? I think I do, but should I?

My "one" is not allowed back at church unless Hubby is there. How do I explain that to him? For now I'm not. He doesn't even know. I told him he can go with Grandpa on Sundays and mow the grass etc. to pay back the mirror he broke off his car(a genuine accident, not rage)

How does that fit in with God's love and acceptance of us in spite of what we do? The "one's" acceptance at church is based on his actions. That's the way life is. But shouldn't the church reflect how God relates to us instead of how the world relates? This brings up the idea of covenant children. Since Hubby and I are christians where does that leave our children? Are we to view them as part of the covenant and treat them as such? At what point do we concede the point that perhaps a particular child is not included and should be treated as an unbeliever?

I wish I understood more. I just come up with more questions.

Mother's Day is hard to take.

Mothers Day can be such a rough day. Fill in the blank as to why. This is the first year I didn't have to hint to my husband about having the kids do something. We did talk this week about how awful it has always been for me. On the one hand it holds painful reminders of the past, but on the other hand it exists for me in the present in a good way as the mother, not the child.

I get tired of telling my husband things that really matter in life, and then he forgets. He has never remembered Mother's Day until this year. I buy his mom's cards and tell him to sign it. The last few years I've told him to buy his own card for his mom. So he forgets things I tell him, like how much I hate Mother's Day and why. Today he remembered.

We're going to this new church, which I really love, but it scares me spitless to meet so many new people and not know where I fit in. I did a lot better today and didn't walk as many laps to the restroom and back so I'd look like I was doing something or going somewhere. When we walked in the moms were handed a colorfully wrapped card, and I thought that was very nice. I also thought that would be it but it was a shortlived relief. I think it was near the end of the singing time that they had all the mothers stand. I stood along with the rest and he just talked and talked (it probably wasn't really that long; just felt like it) and then everyone clapped. I sat down, the rest of the moms stayed standing and the clapping went on and on. Once I sat down my husband put his arm around me and kept patting my shoulder to the point of it being overdone. What can I say? This is the year he finally got how rough Mother's Day is for me. I wonder if he'll remember next year.

Why I'm Not Sweet

I don't usually yell, but I get intense. I can't be sweet. I'm only sweet when I'm am extremely angry or scared. ie "Yes, Mommy Dearest" with Joan Crawford.

My sister and I were at my aunts house for Thanksgiving or Christmas one year and all the family was there. "Mommy Dearest" was on TV. I'd seen it before and knew what I thought, but didn't dare say anything. My sister was about 8 or 9 and she was my mom's darling. Well, everyone was in the living room talking and kinda watching the movie. After a while my sister turns around to my mom and says, "Mommy, she's just like you." My mom was so ticked, my aunt tried to get details and everyone else was aghast that the cute one would say such a thing. Great peace-maker and keeper of the status quo that I was, it was up to me to save the situation and deny the likeness when questioned about it. I said it was the hair that reminded her of mom, not how she acted. What a lie I told.

I started a story when I was five and kept it going until I was twelve years old. In my story I imagined myself in a Robin Hood kind of role and rescuing all who needed help. Somehow I just knew even when they said they didn't need me, that they really did. I think I had telepathy for the scared ones, but when I was younger I didn't know the word. In my stories they always thanked me for saving them and for not listening when they said they didn't need me. I wished I had my own Robin Hood type character to rescue me. Like the characters in my story I was too afraid to answer truthfully that I needed help. I would say one thing with my mouth while screaming in my mind what I was too afraid to whisper out loud. Where was my rescuer? Why couldn't he hear me? The noise in my head was deafening.

I'm Not Sweet

I like to read blogs. I especially enjoy the really feminine ones that sound so sweet and really with it concerning managing their household, raising children and being a help meet for their husband. Every once in a while I think that maybe I would be a better wife and Christian if I implemented some of those things I learn from those type of blogs or websites. So I turn it on and crank out the sweetness and perfect dinners and the kids always in bed on time, and the house looks good--even closets. I become very supportive and appreciative of my husband.

I do all this and I scare him. He wonders what's wrong with me, have I been watching Martha Stewart again?--he outlawed that about 2 years into our marraige;)-- in general he misses me. He misses the soapboxes I get on, and just me. I'm not sweet. I say it like it is. I have an opinion on almost everything, but when he "puts his foot down" I'm fine(usually) and follow what he decides. When he puts his foot down, he stands up, lifts his knee up high in the air and brings his foot down and says "I'm putting my foot down". Wonderful man that he is; he knows I need a definite answer in a non-threatening way. We both can laugh at the caricature of what we were taught in our early years of marriage.

Some part of me wants to be like those sweet women I know in real life and the ones whose blogs I read. I'm sure if I just did one, new for me, thing like keeping up with the laundry I wouldn't scare him. How is always having clean socks and underwear scary?:) What really scares him is when I agree with him too readily. I think we have a good balance of discussion and submission. I usually know when to concede even when I don't agree. I'm usually right on things we disagree on and he usually sees it eventually. We agree on most things and, depending on what it is, love to dig in and discuss(not the fundi word for argue/fight) what we don't agree on up one side and down the other. Well, I'm not going to be like the sweet, soft-spoken ones any time soon 'cause I'm just not sweet. I'm me.