Continuing Aikido

I had a really hard time in class last time. We started practicing with staffs and I really wasn't prepared for it. I have a hard enough time knowing where one arm is in relation to the other without trying to figure out where a long stick is in relation to my body, too. So I had my first and likely not last break down in class where I started crying and chose to sit out.

Part of the reason is I didn't have as much mental endurance available because I hadn't gotten enough sleep and my shoulder was bothering me, I think. Then I was getting too warm because of the sun coming in the window on me, which always makes me uncomfortable/nauseated. Once the tears start I can't stop them, I can't see clearly, and I can't focus my mind. I tend to shut down. R-sensei offered to let me practice on just the first step by myself and work with me, but by that point I just couldn't keep going. Hell, I'm getting teary just typing about it and it's been a few days since it happened. I guess it was kind of like an anxiety attack with more self loathing, but not exactly. It's difficult to describe, but I imagine a lot of us have been there.

I sat down off to the side in a corner where I leave my stuff and thankfully I always keep tissues in my purse. Truth be told, it was a miracle I didn't go running out of the room and hide in the bathroom, so that's something, I suppose. S-sensei came over to me and asked offered to talk with or work with me, and I told her it was very hard for me to talk about. She nodded and let me be. Just trying to talk about things when this happens makes me cry more even if I want to talk about it, which in turn makes it even harder to talk about. I get in this negative feedback loop of feeling awful and breaking out of it is difficult. Just thinking about trying to explain things kept making me cry and every time I thought I had gotten a grip tears would start falling again. S-sensei came back again to check on me and let me know where she'd be if I wanted to talk, and eventually I was able to get up and walk to the restroom to change out of my gi.

Eventually I recovered enough to start talking without crying. I talked with R-sensei a bit but mostly I talked with S-sensei after class. They were wonderfully friendly and supportive. I told her how I'm very hard on myself and how one of the reasons I'm there is to try and work on that, and that I'm used to corrections being criticism/disapproval and that while rationally I know that isn't what's happening here it's difficult for me emotionally at times. I also told her about my very poor bodily coordination and spatial awareness, along with how when I get into that kind of state I tend to shut down. Basically, I summarized the issues I've mentioned here on my blog more so than I have to previously when I've mentioned them to my sensei. We talked about the class before last too, which I had felt very good after because I was starting to fall properly and was even able to start self correcting on some movements.

One of my sempai who attends classes on days I usually don't told me a few days earlier she'd started crying, too. It was kind of comforting to know people who have been doing this longer than me still have bad days like mine. Everybody was kind and no one got displeased with me for crying, unlike my NM and some teachers from elementary school. At any rate, I'm going to keep coming to class and keep working through all this baggage one step at a time.

Taking Love Away

I realized last night that I have internalized a particular behavior of my NM's. When she would be angry at me, when she would rage because I had done something wrong or bad, I would feel unloved and unloveable. She would take her love away from me at those times, her love was utterly conditional.

And now when I don't do as well as I think I should, or I make a mistake, I take my love away from myself. I stop loving myself in those moments. She taught me to hate myself. When I was a child I knew she was what made me hate myself, though I didn't have the words to really explain it. Some how along the way, I forgot this as I grew up and became an adult. Unknowingly I took ownership of her hatred for me at those times and made it my own.

I've mentioned this in comments before, but it's about time I posted it here. When I barely nine years old, I wrote this in my diary:

Dear Diary,
I'm going to kill myself cause of mom and dad! (I hate myself!)

That was it. I think my father simply got lumped in with my mom at that time because he was a parent, and I didn't realize back then that he had no idea just how awful it was for me. I actually have mostly good memories about my father. Anyway, I don't remember anything in particular that caused me to write that diary entry, all I know is it must have written it alone in my room, angry and/or crying, like I did all my diary entries. But it spells the truth so clearly.


When I read that page in my old diary now, I can see what it is really trying to say. "I hate myself because of my mom."

This song, "Sorry to Myself" by Alanis Morissette, is perhaps the story of myself, although the only person who has perhaps been crueler to me is my NM, but she's the one who taught me to abuse myself. I really have treated myself worse than I've treated anyone else though. I have more compassion for strangers than I do for myself usually. I need start being kinder to myself and loving myself no matter what. I really do owe myself the biggest apology.

For hearing all my doubts so selectively and
For continuing my numbing love endlessly.
For helping you, and myself not even considering
For beating myself up and over functioning.

To whom do I owe the biggest apology?
No one's been crueler than I've been to me.

For letting you decide if I indeed was desirable
For myself love being so embarrassingly conditional.
And for denying myself to somehow make us compatible
And for trying to fit a rectangle into a ball.
 
To whom do I owe the biggest apology?
No one's been crueler than I've been to me.

I'm sorry to myself.
My apologies begin here before everybody else.
I'm sorry to myself.
For treating me worse than I would anybody else.

For blaming myself for your unhappiness
For my impatience when I was perfect where I was.
Ignoring all the signs that I was not ready,
And expecting myself to be where you wanted me to be.

To whom do I owe the first apology?
No one's been crueler than I've been to me.

And I'm sorry to myself.
My apologies begin here before everybody else.
I'm sorry to myself.
For treating me worse than I would anybody else.

Well, I wonder which crime is the biggest?
Forgetting you or forgetting myself...
Had I heeded the wisdom of the latter,
I would've naturally loved the former.

For ignoring you: my highest voices.
For smiling when my strife was all too obvious.
For being so disassociated from my body,
And for not letting go when it would've been the kindest thing.

To whom do I owe the biggest apology?
No one's been crueler than I've been to me.

And
I'm sorry to myself.
My apologies begin here before everybody else
I'm sorry to myself.
For treating me worse than I would anybody else.
I'm sorry to myself.
My apologies begin here before everybody else
I'm sorry to myself.
For treating me worse than I would anybody else

A Good Cry

I've read a few books on the subject of horrible parenting. The well know Drama of the Gifted Child by Alice Miller, Toxic Parents by Susan Forward, and The Narcissistic Family: Diagnosis and Treatment by the Pressmans, which I highly recommend and you can read a review of here. Although written with therapists in mind, it's very informative and validating. In fact, it's the very kind of book I was thinking of writing until I discovered such a book was already written!

I mention this simply to illustrate my familiarity with the subject, beyond my personal experiences with my own NM and what was I was required to learn and study for my higher education. More importantly though, I bring this all up because one of the friends I mentioned in the post, A Validating Experience, who is also in the field of psychology, felt compelled to print and give me a copy of an article from the Wall Street Journal, entitled "Calling a Truce in Mother-Daughter Conflict" at an event where my E-sis was present despite knowing my preference for not discussing the matter at all in front of E-sis.

Fortunately my E-sis didn't see what was on the paper, so for all she knows it could have been recipe for the delicious dinner we had. Anyway, I am certain my friend meant well, but I was very uncomfortable receiving it and actually not interested in reading it because from the title alone gave me a bad feeling. You see, my NM and I have a kind of truce already; I have distanced myself from her and don't discuss sensitive personal things with her. We are capable of being quite civil and pleasant in each others' company.. What we are not capable of is having a close, intimate relationship because she cannot even begin to accept that my experiences and feelings are valid even if she doesn't like or agree with them. But the other night, after finally catching up on the blogs I read, I decided that since I was on the topic of NMs already to read the article before going to sleep.

Just to emphasize, this was a four page article from the Wall Street Journal of all places, written by a journalist who is in no way a member of any so called "helping professions" like therapists or psychologists, and who quotes only one or two people who are. Considering my friend's own higher education in the field of psychology and her knowledge of my personal and education background, and about the fact I have C-PTSD, I'm very surprised she thought this article would be useful or relevant in any way for me. I found it actually very invalidating of my experience, especially in light of the fact I had recently told my friend the entire story regarding my mother and me.

It was the end of the article that really did it for me, though. Where it lists "...ideas for how mothers and daughters can improve their relationship." - as if it were as simple as that little list makes it out to be! As if I hadn't already tried to "speak as an adult" to NM! Maybe for relationships where the mother is just irritating but genuinely cares for and loves her daughter, but definitely not for those where the mother was an abusive narcissist! I could rant on, but I would be neglecting the most important part, the true point, of this entry.

Right there in bed, with my DH next to me reading a book, I started tearing the article into pieces and bawling. Without a word he took me in his arms, and I did not refuse his comfort like I am prone to doing. Having been raised in an environment where I was taught I was not worthy of comfort and that it was wrong to feel anger, sorrow, or pain, I almost always push him away physically or emotionally when he first tries to reach out to me when I'm upset. Not only that, but crying often makes me feel more miserable than I already am, because I feel bad for crying, for troubling him with my tears, even though I know he is not like my mother. In fact, it's fairly recent development that I refrain from apologizing when I cry now.

But for the first time I can recall, perhaps for the first time in my entire life even, I didn't feel bad about crying and sobbing out my pain. Instead of making me feel worse, it actually felt good to be sobbing without any shame in front of another human being. I didn't even feel and have to suppress the usual urge to apologize for my sudden outburst. I didn't try to hide my face. And best of all, DH didn't ask me to explain what was wrong before offering me comfort, and I didn't feel like I had to explain immediately, either. I didn't feel like I had to try and justify my tears to anyone, even myself. Of course after I explained what set me off and he had already figured it had something to do with the article and my NM.

Unfortunately now I am left wondering how to politely ask my friend to refrain from giving me any more articles on my the subject.