Indifference - Emotional abuse - Not enough

It has been raining here a lot and this does dampen my spirit even if I pretend that it doesn't. I have to admit diving into my old pictures has stirred some feeling up. Not really sad feelings but some feelings of dissatisfaction with where my life is now.  People have families and I feel like I don't. I do have a family but one that really never thinks too much about me.

I found out they went to the beach for vacation last week.  My sister told me a number of people she tried to get to meet them there for a visit. I wasn't on that list. I use to meet them there every year until I got divorced and then they stopped inviting me. They use to come to my house every year for Thanksgiving until I got divorce and then they never came to visit again until last year.

I found some pictures of those Thanksgivings and how we cooked for sometimes as many as 30 for the day. One year I got the great idea of having everyone dress as pilgrims. We had a about six kids in the group and they loved it. Back in those days I wanted everything to be perfect because I was unhappy. I was always thinking of ways to improve the situation and make things better for other people. 

This feeling that I am not wanted has plagued me since childhood. To make up for that I always take the position of making sure everyone else felt welcome and that there every need was met. This can sometimes attract those who like to sit back and be taken care of without appreciation. 

Indifference is a sneaky form of abuse that causes so much pain. There isn't any specific incidence or words that can describe exactly what happen. No argument or slamming of doors no verbal ridicule. It just makes you feel invisible. Like my sixteenth birthday when no one remembered. 

I feel like I have been invisible most of my life. Especially to my family and in my intimate relationships. In my professional life I was a success because a few people recognized my contribution and promoted me over and over. Even when I lost my corporate job it was because I made it look easy. Quietly managing a huge department where nothing went wrong. It wasn't until I left that they realized they had no idea the scope of the work. My ex-boss made amends by getting me a consultant job paying twice as much as my old job.

I was taught by my mother that it isn't right to toot your own horn. The meek shall inherent the earth and God can see the good you are doing and that is enough payment. When I was a child I was always starving for some kind of validation from my mother. If I cleaned my room and brought her there to see it the reply would be "well it is your room and you should want to keep it clean."

I heard "never enough" she was saying "there is always room for improvement" the ideas are both true and I get it now. I have heard my sister do the same things to her kids. Pointing out how they could do better instead of "good job" or giving solutions instead of just saying "you are going to figure this out - you are smart it just takes time." 

In my early marriage I picked someone who believed in me. Even reading the letters from him he said encouraging things to me. Of course the amends letter he admitted manipulating me by using the doubts I had about myself as ways to hurt me. He was smart enough to know exactly what he was doing.

What I do with the indifference is I take it for a long long time and then I walk away. First emotionally once I am gone emotionally it forces the other person to move on. On the dark side I feel used and unappreciated to the point I am dead inside. I withdraw my contribution to the relationship.  I let them leave me because it is what I am comfortable doing. 

In the past ten years I have made the decision to get out of situations that are no longer good for me. First leaving the small shop I worked for and owned part of. I also left a few long time friendships because they felt one sided and what once felt like enough for me suddenly wasn't. 

I don't want those indifferent relationships anymore and I feel happier just being on my own. I feel less resentful and I don't feel like I am waiting around for something to change. I am a committed person to anything I do and I am looking for the same commitment to me from the other side. 

I am going to work through my feelings with my sister. She was raised with the same indifference that I was and it wouldn't occur to her that I would even want to meet them at the beach. She has done the same thing as I have training people to not appreciate her contribution being in a marriage where only one person's wants or needs are important. Working in the background waiting for her rewards in heaven. 

I feel better after getting this out and seeing that the way I feel has a past.  I can see that none of this is happening today except in my own head. I am free to make the best of today and the sun is actually shining at this moment. What could be better? 

Not wanting something more - freedom

I have been a little apprehensive about writing here because the traffic was coming from an unsavory source.  It appears to have been corrected.

I have returned to my happy self after my trip to see my family.  I hadn't wanted to admit to myself that it was the trip and what I felt while I was there that was making me sad. The girl in me imagined that if I could be a part of my family would make me feel complete.  This is what I have been looking for in every relationship I have had since my mother died. 

I first married someone who was overly protective of me.  Someone that would literally fight for me if I needed them to no one had ever done that for me. Since my dad never even verbally stood up for me after my mother died this was really appealing. I ended up with a raging maniac in the end who wanted to control me every minute. I moved on to the duplicate of dad a relief that felt so familiar and the relationship did help me work through all the indifference I felt with my dad.

The point is that I have always felt something was missing.  I had moments where I felt safe and secure and loved but inevitably history repeated itself and I was left. Rejected just like that girl who left home at sixteen. They wanted me there for my cleaning and babysitting skills because I was reliable as a support staff. This also has been repeated in all of my relationships.

Getting back to the visit with my sister.  I felt invisible there or worse like just another person to manage around all the drama.  When you are given instructions about what not to say or ask about. I just stayed silent most of the time.  I enjoyed having one lunch with my sister just the two of us. We talked about life and her kids.  We are similar in many ways which always surprises us both.

I think what I have been looking for is a rare thing.  I want to feel like I matter to someone when most of the time people are so wrapped up in their own life that they can't even see you most less appreciate you. The next thing I ask myself is "do I appreciate other people?" probably not as much as I should.  My own life circumstances has made me pretty self absorbed and autonomous.

When I lost the idea of who I was 10 years ago I almost didn't recover.  I never imagined that I could be happy just being myself and not wanting something more from someone. A maturity that I didn't think was possible. Today I feel that a kind of freedom that is hard to explain.

My recent sadness was from realizing that what I want cannot be found with my family or anyone else.  I have been mourning that loss since I got back. I am happy again because I can see that I don't have to keeping trying so hard to make myself a part them. Their indifference to me has nothing to do with me or whether I am worthy of their love.  They are just wrapped up in their own story.

I have decided to stop thinking that I will spend my twilight years with my family and make other plans.  I have also decided that I will make less visits and maybe get my sister to meet me somewhere for a long weekend.  She is growing too and realizing her kids want to manage their lives without her input. She is accepting that she has done her job and they have to find their own way.

I have been working on my house and very busy at work the two things I do love.  I am wrapping up my oil painting class something that makes me feel more balance.  I feel good just being me and not wanting something more. Enjoying each day as it comes.

ADD - Mother - Blood in the water

Because  I have been ADD all my life I forever had an endless list in my head of things I wanted to do. I hardly ever get tired and don't spend much time basking in my successes.  I move on to the next thing pretty quickly.

When I was a manager my team had serious deadlines to meet at the end of each month it was stressful but invigorating and when we met the goal we all clapped and danced around for about two seconds.  I would then start thinking about next month or the next minute.

I didn't get it that everyone wanted to take a moment a celebrate and they felt I did not appreciate their efforts but I did.  It just isn't in me to linger very long doing anything.  This has made me a success professionally but personally the only people I attract is the ones that are happy to just sit back and let me take care of everything physically and emotionally.  I  was mostly too busy to notice but when I started feel used or invisible I withdrew.

Every relationship felt one sided I ask you how you are doing and what is going on in your life and you ask me nothing. This has taught me to be self sufficent emotionally.  Instead of giving into the kid inside of me that drug my mother to my room to show her how clean it looked hoping to get some positive response.  She did make nice remarks but there was always one thing not quite right. I got the idea that I was not enough.  I would need to focus harder next time to please her.

I do that now I focus on what I didn't do right instead of all the good things I have done.  This made  me a perfect match for my addicted partners.  In my experience it was this doubt I had about myself that let them control me.  I say they can smell blood in the water and because my relationships were so intimate and isolated they had the upper hand. It was my own insecurities that made me give away my power.

I don't pick supportive people maybe because it feels so foreign to me. I am use to feeling on my own but it isn't healthy.  When I went to see my childhood friend and she was so kind and generous with me it really felt wonderful.  When I got back it was my birthday and my friends here didn't even mention it.  Is this the kind of friends I want?

It really hurt. I am withdrawing and preparing for something new. Mentally I feel good I have given up carbs and my mind is very clear.  As far as the mother story I am sure she was trying to help me strive for excellence.  Ironically my step mother was 10 times the cleaning perfectionist when someone else was doing it.  re-enforcing the idea that I am not good enough.

I have spent the last 20 years figuring out how I got here emotionally.  I now want to spend the next twenty enjoying being here and appreciating my contributions to this world.  I have done my best and it has to be good enough for me and that is all.

Taking an inventory - Seeing things as they are and not as I wish them to be.

I am in a quiet place these days feeling inspired about my life. For the first time in a long time I am not pushing something back or closing my eyes to what is instead of what I want I would like to be. Taking a objective look at the past and seeing if there is anything I would like to address.

I guess that is what the new year is really for taking inventory.  This isn't an easy task and must be done with patience and compassion.  I have been thinking about one particular issue related to my own indifference to people that probably loved me at some point but with my continuous indifference have moved away emotionally.  This happened while I was in survival mode and had nothing to offer.

I have to say that none of the these people were emotional givers but I always maintained the relationships from my side.  I accepted where they were and was content to be the one who reached out and kept these relationships going. While I was down I decided it was "every man for him or her self".  I was at my most selfish and wanted someone to reach out to me I didn't have the energy to do the reaching.

I have been better for a awhile now but haven't made any effort to do any mending at this point. Distancing myself from the emotions of others is easy for me. It has felt freeing to me not be with people that have been stuck in the same place for a long time.  It doesn't escape me that I was that same person stuck in the same place for a long time.

I have become the "indifference" I have talked about in my own family. I do want to help people when they are stuck in their own repetitive dream but you can't really do that for someone else. People do come to me and tell me their problems and I tell them about my own experience but that is all.  I don't want to be the emotional dumping ground I was in the past. I felt their pain in way that was too draining for me.

I know now that pain is self created by the thoughts our mind is constantly feeding us. Life can be ugly but the pain comes from thinking that I can control this ugliness.  Getting lost in finding a solution instead of accepting what is and letting the situation heal itself. I had to do this when I was at my lowest I had to just stop and say "this is my life this is who I have become" immediately my life got better. The lack of struggle open the door for divine healing instead of my own limited abilities.

This inventory of myself is on going. I didn't do any of what I did intentionally or to hurt anyone I just had to withdrawn and face the truths I had about myself. Cash in all the good things and bad things I believed I was and decide who am I really? None of the things on the list were really tangible just ideas the best one and the worst ones residing in my head.

It seemed crazy to me that I had built my whole existence on these ideas about myself. My mind is strong and some of the ideas I had about myself were harsh and hard to let go of.  Today I focus mostly on the next thing and if the idea of taking an inventory comes up I look at it for awhile and decide whether it warrants any action.

I can be honest with myself now.  I am no longer trying to hide anything from myself.  Taking an inventory can be simple and the point is not to label myself as a "bad person" but to accept who I was at the time and to forgive myself.  I can then consider what amends if any that needs to be made to the anyone else involved.

It is nice to let go of the suffering for today and just live with what is right in front of me.

Life - Making changes

This week my friend whose mother passed away called to let me know her father died last weekend. This was basically a month to the day her mother died. She of course was in shock.

He was not exactly father of the year leaving her mother for his secretary when we were kids. He and his new wife of 40 something years were mainly focused on making money. They had a big house in Hilton Head and as my friend learned this week ignored both sides of the family equally. My friend always assumed he was spending time with the other grand kids and not with her kids.

During her mother's funeral he made the comment that he wasn't mentioned during the service. Her brother told him that when his time came they would talk about him. No one could have predicted it would be so soon.

How strange life is and how you never what you will be dealing with next. My friends her mother never really got over be left by her dad. She had a full life but made a decision to never marry again. My friend said these last years she started talking more about him and how her life could have been different if her dad hadn't left.

My friend loved her dad despite his indifference to her and her own family.  She spoke to him a couple of times his last few days.  She was able to tell him she loved him. Because he lived out of town the last time she saw him was at her mother's funeral.

Even though his life seemed enviable from her mothers perspective they had their problems. They were isolated and his wife has had severe dementia for many years. Since they alienated their family they were alone and he had to drive himself to the emergency room. He died of double pneumonia aggravated by double prescribed cholesterol drugs.

You never know just how things will go or who will be there for you in the end.  My like feels pretty empty these days but I am making changes.   I feel good and ready to do something different with my personal life. I want my life to be fuller and in the end I want to feel content with the choices I have made.  

Happy Birthday - A new me

I have written several posts that didn't make the cut. I feel like I have been winding down my life. It started in July and bled over into August and now here were are in September.

I attribute this slump to the ending of something.  I think it is a crash of sorts from the ending of my training period on the job. I am no longer in crisis everything feels too normal and dull.  Living in crisis makes the days, weeks and months fly by with little time to live life deliberately. No time to ask yourself  "Is this what I want to be doing?"

I realize this has been my problem all my life. The tragedy early in my life started me living in a crisis mode and this felt normal to me. Braving every storm and when there was no storm I created one.  I would poke around at any ember until a fire broke out. I surrounded myself with people that carried matches in their back pockets. This has been my life and now that I have found peace I it feels unsettling.

Now my mind is unhappy with this and is bored and trying to create something anything to bring back the thrill that living in crisis gave me all those years. I have been getting over something as long as I can remember and now that I am finally over my past I feel unsure how to do it. Can I live my life without crisis?

Today is my birthday and naturally a time of reflection. I have felt the past few weeks like I don't matter to many people and that my life hasn't really made much of a difference.  I blame only myself. I have been so lost in my own mind that I have made a lot of mistakes that can't be undone. My pain has made me selfish and I have been trapped in my mind for a lifetime.

Today I was surprised by the number of birthday wishes I received mostly from my co-workers and friends outside the program.  I had the birthday song sang to me three times over the phone. This did lift my spirits.

My friends from the program are more like me and not too generous with there well wishing. I know it is a mirror for me. I was always this way I use to be more giving to the people in my life that were suppose to love me.  I know now I was hoping they would show any evidence that they loved me in return but it never happened.

I had a void that needed filling and this was one way I tried to fill it.  I wanted to be important to the people that were important to me. Their indifference just reinforced the truth I had in my heart that I wasn't important to them or anyone. I have continued this practice by indifferent to the people and family in my own life whom I claim to love.  I can change this.

Every day I have a chance to decide again who I want to be. I can begin again today and decide to give in a loving and mature way without looking for something in return. I don't have to be the hurt child waiting to feel loved by another. I can love first without hesitation.

Today I can start again and be be generous with my love without the fear of being rejected.  Happy birthday to me.

Fathers - Saying what needs to be said - It is never too late

I wanted to write about my dad today. He has been on my mind this week before I even realized it was Father's Day this weekend.  He has been gone over ten years and even before that we had a distant relationship.

He wasn't a bad man his only real crime against me was his indifference to my existence. I let this indifference label me and have spent a lifetime trying to feel like I meant something to someone. With my intimate relationships I tend to pick people that also ultimately treat me with indifference.  I see now that I have repeated this practice many times even sometimes with my friends.  I pick people that are there one day and gone the next.

Until now I have taken these departures as personal against me. It definitely seems personal.. They move on to a new life with someone else and you are left to deal with it.

What I have realized is that, because of my dad, I attract this kind of person. They are not evil or mean in fact all of them have been generous and kind up until the moment they disappear. They all have one thing in common and that is that they don't like to share their true feelings. They avoid emotion at any cost.

I think in any healthy relationship you have to have regular discussions about feelings. No two people are happy all the time with everything. My only regret in life so far is that I didn't have the opportunity to at least talk through things before I got to the " I want this person instead of you" point.

It all started with my dad. When I left at 16 my dad chose my stepmother over me. It was the same as all the relationships that followed. " I want this person so much I am willing to sacrifice our relationship."

My point is it you can really hurt someone with indifference. It may feel less messy for you to just pretend that life goes on but for the other person there is not closure. I always blamed myself for people leaving me. I was not good enough in some way. I just wanted a simple explanation which of course doesn't exist.

My ex-husband did send me a letter just before he married the his new love. He made amends in that letter which I have kept all these years. He said he had blamed me for what was really wrong with him. I can't tell you how healing that letter was for me. It wasn't all my fault after all.

I wanted something like this from my dad but it never happened. I did have lunch with him a few years before he died and I ask him why he let me go. He said "every one's gotta to do what they gotta do." I realized that day that that was best I was going to get.  There was no hope that real feelings would suddenly come bubbling to the top. That was it take it or leave it.

I stopped blaming him then for not being enough for me. I have stopped blaming people for hurting me because now I know it isn't intentional. It isn't about me it is about what works better for them. I use to consider this disloyal but now I know it is just part of life and people trying to find happiness.

These are old stories but I thought they might help someone out there that is holding back from saying what needs to be said. Nothing unsaid really goes away even if you leave someone behind. It is never to late to say you didn't mean to hurt someone you once loved.

I loved my dad and he loved me. I am sure he is happy up there with my mother if you believe in up there. Happy Father's Day daddy.

Whats love got to do with it? - 4th step

Saturday I made food for a friend as a kind of a birthday dinner. I made shrimp and then I made roasted corn and black bean soup with fresh avocado and cilantro added just before serving.

It felt pretty surreal there in the kitchen cooking. I was thinking I don't know that I have ever made shrimp in this house.

My life of cooking seems so far away like I lost some part of me a long time ago. I remember the zen feeling cooking always gave me. The focus involved in chopping and preparing food for the people I loved and I thought loved me. I am not so sure about the second part anymore. I think I created some loving family with my ex's family that only existed in my mind.

During dinner the topic of love came up. The birthday girl is 73 and fell in love for the first time three years ago. It is over for various reasons and he recently moved away to live with his kids. We thought that was sad to have to wait until your 73 to find love. I guess that is better than never finding love at all.

Driving home I was thinking about falling in love. I stopped at a beach access where I use to meet someone who I thought I was in love with. They were not available emotionally or otherwise so I had to let it go. A moment in time caught up in admiration that only new attraction offers.

I had just been jilted and the idea of by-passing the grief process was very appealing. I knew what grief was about and was hoping I was going to be spared. It doesn't work that way grief has to be dealt with now or later, your choice.

I sat there by the sea and watched droves of young people headed out to the water. It was dark and I was content to just sit there and think about love and lust.

I went home and decided to write about my own experiences with love and lust. A kind of chronological 4th step.

Leaving home at 16 I was pretty free to do what I wanted with whomever I wanted. I did marry at 21 but definitely had my share of love and or so called love before then.

I was lost and the indifference my family had towards me sent me looking for love in all the wrong places. I was never reckless because I was a control freak but I did attract people that were as needy I was. Two holes don't make a whole.

When I met my husband I was emotionally exhausted. I chose him with my head not my heart I even ask him to marry me. I remember thinking he was nice why couldn't I love someone that was nice to me. I did fall in love with him because he never stop believing in me. He accepted me the way I was and when I finally was able to trust him I was in love.

He was enthusiastic and put his heart into everything until the alcoholism progressed. He became mean and used what he knew about me to hurt and control me. I thought it was something I had done. We do our best even if it isn't good enough.

The writing was a good exercise. I saw where I hurt people with my own indifference and how I really didn't know what love was and maybe I still don't. I believe I have loved and been loved even it it didn't work out. It all seems clearer now since I have been able to shed the painful suit of armor I once carried.

The only thing that brought up emotion was the person I use to meet at the beach. I was very sick and desperate and we were both looking for a quick escape. It has been four years and it is clear now that I escaped nothing.

I am looking forward to love in the future. It will be different because I already love myself and won't need someone to fill the hole for me. The person will be as emotionally well as I that is always the case.

picture from soul-sides.com

More of the same

Last night a group of us went to a local rehab center to do a meeting. We have been doing this as service work for about a year it has been rewarding for the most part but it can also be a little oppressive. The attendees have to come to this meeting in order to visit with their loved one on Saturday. So it is one step below a new comers meeting in that they don't come voluntarily so hostility or worse indifference is what we are faced with.

Generally they are either so sad they are beyond believing anything can help or are superior to the situation and think they have it all under control. By the time I got in the program I was a broken person and really just listened until I felt better. The superior me had been broken by the drinking and I had lost everything and that is what it took to get me to listen. It was devastation that brought to the place I am today and I am grateful.

I was superior for many years and I didn't have compassion for people that had problems they couldn't handle. I had problems and I managed to suck it up and get on with my life. Now I know that what I did was bury the pain so deep that I didn't have to face it. Without emotion I lived life like the walking dead. I didn't feel anything happiness or pain no feelings at all. When the devastation of addiction came into my life I had to face all the pain I had pushed down. It was terrifying at first when the tears came to the surface I thought it would never stop but it did eventually. Through the steps I was able to have compassion first for myself and then extend that to others.

I feel lucky that I found the steps and the road to a spiritual awakening. It isn't easy to be fully conscious all the time. Facing emotions good or bad can still be uncomfortable at times but now it is more scary to feel nothing. I look at the people in those rooms and hope they can find the freedom I have found through the steps. Their journey is different from mine and I don't know what their Higher Power has in store for them I wish them well.