Feeling one’s feelings after abuse

I have not been writing too much lately, mostly because I am dealing with the final spurt in my therapy and things are getting tough. One thing about therapy that will always surprise you is, how much more you will feel in every next step. I thought that I had already worked through everything and yet there is another layer to unwrap and suddenly I feel even more pain.

Most people that have gone through some form of abuse dampen their feelings. There are different ways to escape and numb one’s feelings such as different addictions like alcohol, strategies such as creating an ideal scenario upon which one hopes to be okay such as becoming rich, finding the one etc.,  pushing oneself harder for perfection, sinking into the deep hole of depression etc. Yes, even depression in a way is a strategy to avoid one’s feelings because sometimes hopelessness and apathy feel easier than facing one’s inner demons.

The problem with damping one’s feelings is of course that if one tries so hard to escape negative feelings, one ends with a hindered capacity to feel positive feelings as well. I one’s dated a guy who had alcoholic father and he was extremely rational and controlled in his feelings. He was also incapable of knowing whether he loved someone or not. I think the problem was bigger than this though….I don’t think he was even fully able to feel love.

Taking the risk of feeling one’s feelings after abuse can be terrifying, because first one needs to go through all the pain and fear. It is far from an easy road and it takes ages. Will it even pay off? To be honest I don’t know, as I am still in the middle of the struggling period. This is something I can reflect on after this period.

You are just overthinking……I don’t think your childhood was that bad…

The way I see life is..there are people that are lucky enough to have inherited quite healthy patterns to manage in the world. They might not be the smartest, the most outshining..but they manage their life quite well and most importantly are happy with their life and who they are….And then there is this other side…which is people like me and probably also you that you read this post – people that did not somehow get self-esteem, social ques, confidence in life direction, healthy relationship behaviors etc. from their childhood.

Let me tell you it sucks. Why? Because first, you get told by people who have had a decent childhood that you are overthinking. You are clearly overanalysing your past and that is your main problem. This advice clearly comes from people that do not have to question their past, do not have to question the way they think and question how they form the relationships. Not to over-analyze in this case is the same kind of privilege as the usual class privilege in the societies. Basically what happens is that there are certain norms in the society and too bad if you don’t fill those. People who tell you that you are over thinking usually had a privilege to not have to think about those things because they fitted right in.

The second part is that essentially you keep fighting for years to achieve the normality that other people got by having a normal childhood. It feels unfair. Lets face it, at times it feels unfair to have to fight so hard for something that well…in the end is just considered to be normal and average…..And it is not about people with abusive childhood being out there for achievement, it is more like when you imagine your autist son to have their first words…it feels like a small miracle…This is the same that it feels for people that have had an abusive childhood to finally be able to say…I am not hurting on a daily basis.

Whereas autism and many other disorders are accepted, abusive childhood and the effects of it still seems to be a bit of a controversy. Kind of like horoscopes you know….I mean sure you can think you had a bad childhood, but you are probably just delusional…In my opinion this is something that effectively repeats the abuse, over and over again…Most people seem to be extremely reluctant to believe that you might have had a bad childhood.

My guess is that it is a bit like the class thingy. Noone wants to admit that they are successful because their mommy and daddy had connections and money. The same way no one wants to admit that they might be successful because their mommy and daddy were sane. This, however is a prejudice that people with abusive childhood struggle with constantly.

Taking care of other people’s emotions and ability to draw borders

This is a topic that I have written on over here several times. The issue is, I find myself taking a liking in someone and I was wondering what makes him so easy to be with. The answer that I came up with was that I feel like he spends equal time trying to take care of my emotions. He is easy to be with. That made me also think of my experiences from the past.

For instance, my ex would get regularly annoyed. His annoyance was even bigger because I could not always predict that he would be annoyed about something. One example – he would get annoyed when I talked with him for too long and he was tired. Instead of just simply communicating that he was tired and would like now to have some time off, he would get very annoyed that I did not notice this myself. If I was to sum up the problem – he was unable to draw a border there. So instead of taking responsibility for his inability to draw a border, he would get annoyed at me for crossing this border. What followed then would be me trying to calm him down, hence taking care of his emotions once again.

Another guy I was dating disappeared suddenly with words – there will be no more communication between me and you. Two months later the same guy reappeared, telling me that he was very upset that I was not trying to contact him after he had disappeared with these words. He also then told me the reason for his disappearance. Again, I was baffled by this idea that somehow, I owed to seek him up when he was upset about something, while he was completely unwilling to actually explain to me why he was upset. Instead, he found it completely justifiable expectation that I would seek him up and try to take care of his feelings of hurt and anger (btw. I had not done much wrong).

This pattern of trying to guess and take care of other people’s feelings seems to be the one that I learned with my mother. Namely she would regularly just threaten to throw me out or go into silent treatment or lash out with anger. There was never any fruitful discussion on why she would do these things nor was there ever an apology. Instead I ended up mortally afraid of these things happening, so I spent a lot of time trying to guess and predict her feelings and also take care of them.

What we have in all three cases are people that make their feelings your responsibility. Not only though…they also get upset when you either fail to take care or predict their emotions. This is a lot of responsibility to put on another person and I am slowly starting to understand why I would feel so tired in these relationships.

 

Imaginary relationships

Have you ever had a relationship that was playing out only in your head and not really transpiring in the reality? I mean if you have ever been a teenager, you probably know what I am talking about. But…the thing is, some of us take this habit with us to our thirties.

Boy have I made excuses for men that were unavailable in some way. This started with – he is just afraid of his feelings for me and ended with, maybe he does not know that I like him, I just need to show him more. Safe to say that no, mostly he was not afraid of his imaginary feelings towards me.

I define imaginary relationships as some kind of a union (could even be friends union) where you create this whole story about other person and their attachment to you. However, this attachment is actually never shown in reality. In reality you might spend months waiting, not knowing what he feels and not perhaps even meeting the guy.

I am a veteran in these kind of imaginary unions. I am not sure how common it is or how many people can relate to that. But, I get attached to people and I don’t let go. At the moment when every sound person thinks it is a good idea to walk away, I am dreaming of the bright future between us and thinking what I did wrong. Why am I doing it?

Well I think partially it is because I am afraid of risks. I am afraid of changes. I would rather hold on to something old…even the old pain, because at least I know what is going to happen. Being safely unhappy can be weirdly comforting.

I think the other reason is though unwillingness to deal with rejection and having misread someone. Probably the latter feels even more embarrassing for me. I like to think I am a good people reader and here I am – completely having misjudged someone’s feelings. Not only that, but I have spent additional months obsessing about someone that never really felt much for me. I mean how stupid is that? I would not want to even admit this to myself, not alone to someone else.

I think the last reason is connected to the previous one. Namely it is about how I would like to see myself and be seen. I would like to see myself as popular, as wanted, as desired. I would definitely not want to see myself as someone that is chasing guys, going out of my way to have someone like me….if I actually accepted that these ‘unions’ have been fully one sided, I would have to also face this needy part of me. I would have to come into terms with the fact that I am this person that is obsessing over people that don’t really want me. But what would that say about me?

 

Love – The ability to be yourself with another

Over the years I have valued various factors in men. I used to think it was extremely important that my immediate group of friends would approve of him for instance. There are other things which I have valued that came from questionable viewpoints.

Naturally as human beings we are different and hence prone to invest in different values. However, I do think there is something universal about love and what you might want to have from your forever lover. Namely, the ability to be yourself..

Let me explain. I have a tendency to try to mould myself into whatever I think the other one wants. This tendency has decreased significantly over the years, but the lack of my adaptability and me standing up for my values has led to numerous conflicts. Mostly I need to invest emotional energy as well as my analytical abilities to understand other people. Some people make very little sense…

The ability to be yourself with another is not only about their acceptance, although this is an important part. I have spent years with guys who always wanted to change me. By wanting to change me I don’t mean small things such as, could you wash your dishes immediately after eating; but I mean big things such as – why do you analyse people so much, I want you to change this. Please just change this part of your character and keep some others that might please me.

Of course such a view of personality is immature, but it is not only that. It is that we as individuals find it easier to be around some people. With some conversation never really takes off and with others you could spend hours talking. Just give an example.

But the picture is perfect if you find a person who puts you at ease in most situations. In my case that means I don’t have to adapt and I don’t have to spend dubious amounts of energy trying to figure out what they need and want at the moment. Instead, I can just relax into the knowing that I can quite naturally provide them with what they need. I will not have negative surprises where they come complaining that they have somehow suffered for months because I have neglected some need which they had, but never told me about.

Of course what I describe is an absolute ideal, but there are relationships that are close to this ideal. How do I know? Because I have once had a similar experience. Since things did not work out, much due to the circumstances which we were at this point in our lives I thought that maybe I imagined it. But no, I recently talked to him again and then I realized how much effort I was putting into my relationships inbetween. It was still so easy. I did not have some overly romantic ideas about him anymore, so it was just a friendly conversation, but man it was relaxing. I guess relaxing is the best word I can use here. I was just myself and it was enough on every level…he was just himself and it was also enough on every level. No one put in extra effort, everything just flew on the level which is pretty hard to imagine in an every day life.

So long story short, I have ever since revaluated my criteria on men and I want something where I could be myself and at the same time be at ease with another.

Choosing who you care about

I have had this ongoing experience which has led me disappointed in people. Namely it always felt like I cared more about them. How did it express itself? I was mainly putting in effort holding contact, I was trying to solve conflicts and I was obsessing about their disappearances. I basically went through leaps and bounds to sustain my relationships, and no, not only romantic ones.

I used to think that it was my fault for getting hurt too easily….having too high expectations….being too needy…having some trauma about constantly imagining that people do not care about me. Whereas all the above might be true, I am also waking up to the truth that on numerous occasions I have been right. I have indeed invested in people that had very little emotional investment in me or invested much less in me.

So I am realizing that you need to choose carefully who you let into your world and into your heart. My caring is in fact a resource which should not be thrown out carelessly. There could be multiple reasons why some people have chosen to treat me sub optimally. They might not be bad people, they might just have emotional issues, they might be too overwhelmed with their own lives to give something out, they might be out there using other people, they might not see particular value in me and having me in their life. These are all valid reasons and show the complexity of reasons behind why people decide to have little investment in their relationships with me. However, ultimately…the result is the same.

Couple of days ago I realized that it does not matter if someone is habitually unavailable or if they are unavailable with me. The result is the same. Unavailable relationship. If you choose to invest to people that have shown their unavailability towards you, you are in fact setting yourself up for heart break. Sure you can have relationships on multiple levels and a random acquaintance should not be expected to care deeply about you. However, if you have an ongoing feeling that someone you profess to care deeply about is dismissing you…well it is probably good to cut your losses.

Feeling your feelings versus being strong…

I feel that most of the Western culture is constantly telling us to be strong, to suck it up etc. Moreover, the family ties are weakening so are community ties, so we have fewer people to actually pull as up when we get down.

I think the whole ideology of being strong can be seriously harmful. I mean we can see the consequences of this with many men ‘who don’t cry’. The matter of the fact is that they are unable to cry because they have bottled up their feelings to the degree that crying would just threaten to unleash everything that has been hidden for decades.

In general, I think people that allow themselves to be weak live longer and happier lives. Let me clarify, by being weak I do not mean not being able to drive on your own, because you are too scared or feeling that going to the windy beach will make you ill instantly (real life examples), but I mean once in a while being able to admit that you don’t have your life together and that everything is too much to take.

I have had this feeling for two months now because a lot of bad things have happened. Similarly to the dominant ideology I at first tried to just suck it up, then I turned to my friends and then there was this emptiness….I remember this well from the time my mother got diagnosed with stage four cancer. You talk to your friends but then it all becomes quiet…your friends have accepted the fact that you are not doing well…they are at times trying to be supportive, but there is only so much they can do…so in the end you are all alone with your troubles again.

Now this might be the moment where you tell to yourself – why did I ever reach out, why did I ever even risk being weak? I mean nothing beneficial came out of it. I am worse now than in the beginning of this journey. And probably you are right, you are worse off. Namely because you opened this Pandora’s box called your feelings and no one, not even your friends, will be able to get you out of this one.

One might ask – why on earth would I then be open to any of this….well, to be blunt, life is going to be pretty meaningless once you have decided you don’t want to feel any feelings. Yes, you can have your rational mind carry you through life, but I have yet to see someone die for things they have rationally decided they should care about….

So here is the thing…feeling your feelings can suck….but there is usually the purpose as to why you feel these feelings. Even feelings that come after childhood abuse have a purpose…they are there to protect us. You can treat your feelings as your enemy and you can mute them, but in the end of the day it will also mean you mute all the positive feelings. You cannot cancel out negative feelings and live passionately, positively etc. This is what all ‘feel good, feel happy, live in the now’ philosophies have wrong – they make you feel as if there is something wrong with you if you feel pain, if you feel hurt etc. There is nothing wrong with it! It is part of normal human existence and I truly think you cannot choose to feel only one type of feelings.