@fern Mary Oliver's "Wild Geese" affected me profoundly when I first read it, and it remains a favourite since. I'm posting it here for anyone who has not read it before, or for those of us who love the reminder :)
Dead Link Removed
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I’ve had this too, but to be fair, it is very difficult to know how much is Cptsd, how much is TBI and post concussion syndrome, and then narcolepsy. Sometimes I can tell, but mostly I can’t either, so it’s difficult to give useful information. I have sympathy for drs who are truly trying their...
Complex Cptsd, by Pete Walker
When the Body Says No, by Gabor Mate
The Biology of Belief, by Bruce Lipton
The Brain that Changes Itself, and The Brain’s Way of Healing, by Norman Doige
Sacred Pathways, by Todd Murphy
Getting the Love You Want, by Harville Hendrix
Wired for Love, by Stan Tatkin...
That’s just hard. No way to make it something else. But you’ve been through and seen worse and you’re equipped to do this- whatever this is going to take. One day at a time, one hour at a time, one minute at a time- try to prevent overwhelm by focusing on one thing at a time. Have each other’s...
Wow! Congratulations on naming yourself! It’s very empowering and you deserve to have and enjoy all of your power.
I changed my first and second names also, 12 yrs ago. My parents deliberately chose my birth names to mock me. For real. They wanted a boy, and I am not one, so they took the name...
I don’t really know what normal is, and I neither seek it nor reject it. It’s as foreign to me as a language I don’t understand. And it’s simply not possible for me or my family anyway, so I don’t seek it any more than I seek to row our houseboat down a river, because we don’t live in a...
I’ve noticed that I feel the way you’ve described you feel, just tired of it and unsure if I can do any more things, right before a breakthrough. I’ve birthed five children, and during my natural birth labours, there came a telltale point where I- along with many women- said out loud, “I can’t...
@RussellSue, I don’t think you went on too long at all; thank you for sharing this. I didn’t realize how sibling relationships can be so weaponised until recently either. It’s a strange relief to know that abuse tactics aren’t so unique or varied that we can never find someone who relates. Not...
Thank you for this @ladee. 35 yrs is such a long time... wow. This was an intense 5 yrs but 35 yrs is a lot of shared life.
I think my extreme attunement abilities from silent but dangerous parents make it challenging to notice the danger in unspoken, increasing and changing rules that others...
This is all so sad. @RussellSue, I am in no position to give advice, so just my feelings on being the scapegoated defector in my family, possibly analogous to your sister.
My brother and I talk and my brother and our parents talk, but I don’t talk to our parents. So he feels stuck in the...
40 yrs of conditioning to explain what I say and do, right down to the details of my facial expressions or position of my fingers, went completely undetected by me until 3 yrs ago when I met a friend who says to me frequently, “You don’t have to explain that,” “You don’t owe them/me an...
[Long! Questions at the end if you want to skip the backstory but feel inclined to respond.]
Three yrs ago, I moved far away and went no-contact with a bunch of remnant relationships that were initiated and maintained by my abusive pd x-spouse (with several Co morbid psychiatric disorders)...