rightkindofme
Diamond Member
I appreciate the sentiment. <3 I feel like a loser though. A party shouldn't be that hard.
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Control Over Myself
- Post starter Meadowsweet
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I appreciate the sentiment. <3 I feel like a loser though. A party shouldn't be that hard.
Mach123
VIP Member
I never control myself because I don't see the triggers coming. Or I control myself about as well as a cat that gets thrown into a cage with a dog. I always see it afterwards and I'm like "why couldn't I have been on guard for that?" or "why can't I be ready?" I'm always freaking out or saying something that really makes me come off like an ahole. It's murder and that's why I hide all the time. I mean it's not all bad you know but when I do stuff like that I beat myself up and of course the people I "offend/assault" don't want anything to do with me after so it makes the world smaller and smaller. I gave up saying I was sorry for stuff like that. I'm not trying to be a downer but that's how it is. Positive thinking and all that won't touch it because (I think) it comes out of the subconscious. The abused person is still in there you know and it all looks/feels like a violation to him/her so you get these reactions that are totally inappropriate.
Brat, I love that you use affirmations. I do this a lot. Something I find helpful is to also have a short version that invokes the longer version - for example "I can allow emotions and be safe. I am safe and strong." I can use the short version quickly and repeatedly if I feel anxiety rising or don't have the written one to hand. Repetition itself is soothing.
What is ACOA?
FZ, I understand what you're saying, and I think this is true when we're using rationalisations and trying to think our way through things.
I'd say that affirmations are a little different and they do work because they can reach the subconscious. They have to be done in a certain way for this - they need to be very short, simple, expressed positively (eg "I am safe" rather than "there is no danger") and in the present tense ("I am strong" rather than "I will be strong"). They also have to be done a lot, and along with other strategies, but my experience is that they do help to over-write the old programming from abusers. I find them powerful.
What is ACOA?
FZ, I understand what you're saying, and I think this is true when we're using rationalisations and trying to think our way through things.
I'd say that affirmations are a little different and they do work because they can reach the subconscious. They have to be done in a certain way for this - they need to be very short, simple, expressed positively (eg "I am safe" rather than "there is no danger") and in the present tense ("I am strong" rather than "I will be strong"). They also have to be done a lot, and along with other strategies, but my experience is that they do help to over-write the old programming from abusers. I find them powerful.
rightkindofme
Diamond Member
The fascinating thing is ACOA (Adult Children of Alcoholics) who become parents produce children who act like they grew up with alcoholics. Behavior training is such a complex and insidious beast.
I feel like behavioral training, control over yourself, what you think "having control over yourself" means are all things that are almost impossible to really understand. You live in the context you live in. We don't have perspective on ourselves. You don't understand how you exist in the larger pattern. You don't know how your behavior *should* look. There is no should. There isn't someone watching and deciding what is Right or Wrong for everyone.
I like to travel and talk to people in other countries. I find that many of the things that make me feel like a despicable, disgusting person are things people shrug about in other countries. I am a product of my environment. I feel shame about things that other people don't feel shame over.
Sometimes I wonder if my desire to control myself is just one more broken thing.
Hashi-- I haven't found that a daily affirmation effects my ability to control myself when someone does something inappropriate. Those reactions are far more ingrained in my subconscious. When I am in an environment where the social penalty for blowing up would be very high I freeze and do not respond in any way. When I am in an environment where the social penalty doesn't matter to me I react with screaming and violence. It is automatic and subconscious. In retrospect I can explain why I react the way I do when I do--in the moment I don't think about it.
I don't think telling myself that I am "strong" is going to change the way I react to threats.
I feel like behavioral training, control over yourself, what you think "having control over yourself" means are all things that are almost impossible to really understand. You live in the context you live in. We don't have perspective on ourselves. You don't understand how you exist in the larger pattern. You don't know how your behavior *should* look. There is no should. There isn't someone watching and deciding what is Right or Wrong for everyone.
I like to travel and talk to people in other countries. I find that many of the things that make me feel like a despicable, disgusting person are things people shrug about in other countries. I am a product of my environment. I feel shame about things that other people don't feel shame over.
Sometimes I wonder if my desire to control myself is just one more broken thing.
Hashi-- I haven't found that a daily affirmation effects my ability to control myself when someone does something inappropriate. Those reactions are far more ingrained in my subconscious. When I am in an environment where the social penalty for blowing up would be very high I freeze and do not respond in any way. When I am in an environment where the social penalty doesn't matter to me I react with screaming and violence. It is automatic and subconscious. In retrospect I can explain why I react the way I do when I do--in the moment I don't think about it.
I don't think telling myself that I am "strong" is going to change the way I react to threats.
The "I am strong" type wording that I (and brat) were talking about was directly related to the issue Meadowsweet raised - about how to safely allow emotions in order to process trauma - and as I said I think affirmations need to be used with other strategies too. Also, as I said they have to be done a lot. With me, it's more like "affirmations all day every day" rather than a daily affirmation.
I don't think that talking more generally about triggers, reacting to things people do etc, would be on topic. I do think affirmations can help with those things too, but the kind of wording and the additional strategies would be different to the ones being talked about for this topic. It would be a different discussion.
I don't think that talking more generally about triggers, reacting to things people do etc, would be on topic. I do think affirmations can help with those things too, but the kind of wording and the additional strategies would be different to the ones being talked about for this topic. It would be a different discussion.
righkindofme-I agree that ACOA's become parents and their children grow up as if raised in an alcoholic family. This is the typical situation, unless the ACOA make a real commitment to change. I had a daughter when I was 17 and was in an abusive marriage that I left when she was 6. All my sisters were older and their children older. I saw this happening in the absence of alcoholism. Rather than neglecting, there was doing things for kids that they should have been doing for themselves. I began learning about ACOA before having other children.
I went to counseling, read every book, did a ton of work. Basically, I threw out everything that I thought that I knew and re-learned. I came in real touch with my real feelings. I had a very safe environment and the benefit of the time to dedicate my life to this. I was determined to change the family cycle. I was very happy, healthy, and did not guess at normal. My whole life turned around from this work and I was so grateful. Then I had 2 more children. The changes were hard at first, but after awhile, they become very comfortable. My first does act like she grew up in an alcoholic family. My second two do not.
So all that counseling, individual and group, that was directed at ACOA, co-dependency, etc, and groups that members came from dysfunction, abuse and neglect was very helpful. It was the 80's and very popular and I still agree with the concepts. However, they did not address the abuse and neglect from a trauma standpoint. Early on, my therapist did say some symptoms were ptsd like. Looking back I can see where during those healthy years, there were a couple times triggers of trauma but extinguished pretty quickly.
It wasnt until my children were ready for college that things fell apart and the trauma came through. A divorce, an accident, in home assault. This led to full blown ptsd which I am told was always there but lying dorment. Childhood neglect and abuse led to choosing an abusive and addicted first husband. His drama led to a second husband that was unemotional but extremely stable and a good provider. Yet with growth, eventually one wants more from a marriage than safety and stability. When going out into the world, the trauma was unresolved and not processed adequately.
I think it is great to find anything that works, and if you try and it doesn't work, we just have to keep looking for something that does.
I went to counseling, read every book, did a ton of work. Basically, I threw out everything that I thought that I knew and re-learned. I came in real touch with my real feelings. I had a very safe environment and the benefit of the time to dedicate my life to this. I was determined to change the family cycle. I was very happy, healthy, and did not guess at normal. My whole life turned around from this work and I was so grateful. Then I had 2 more children. The changes were hard at first, but after awhile, they become very comfortable. My first does act like she grew up in an alcoholic family. My second two do not.
So all that counseling, individual and group, that was directed at ACOA, co-dependency, etc, and groups that members came from dysfunction, abuse and neglect was very helpful. It was the 80's and very popular and I still agree with the concepts. However, they did not address the abuse and neglect from a trauma standpoint. Early on, my therapist did say some symptoms were ptsd like. Looking back I can see where during those healthy years, there were a couple times triggers of trauma but extinguished pretty quickly.
It wasnt until my children were ready for college that things fell apart and the trauma came through. A divorce, an accident, in home assault. This led to full blown ptsd which I am told was always there but lying dorment. Childhood neglect and abuse led to choosing an abusive and addicted first husband. His drama led to a second husband that was unemotional but extremely stable and a good provider. Yet with growth, eventually one wants more from a marriage than safety and stability. When going out into the world, the trauma was unresolved and not processed adequately.
I think it is great to find anything that works, and if you try and it doesn't work, we just have to keep looking for something that does.
Shall come back and say more but was thinkinng about control in general. How people who are not running from things don't need it in this way. And how I think it leaks out in some way.
I have managed peoplle for most of my life, before I could not more recently. I am good at dealing with people and am fair and extremely controlled. I also alway workon developing peoples talents. And so it really shocked and surprised me when I realised that I intimadated and frightened many of them. I could not understand why as I am always reasonable and never trully raise my voice.
It was said that it is that exact quality that intimadtes. I am much less controlled now but I look back and I can actually see that there is an almost aggressive qualiity about it in some respects. It's also a little bit unhuman in a sense. I think people detect that there is something off.
I actually think there is an element of control that escapes. We are just trying to control ourselves anf our environment but somehow I think it affects those around us. There is power in it.
For me part of it is that I am very determinded. Once I latch onto something I am single minded. I have been discribed as frightening many times and bizaar as I have always found that I can see it now.
I have wondered if some of the work bullying was partly trying to poke a hole in my seemingly perfect and controlled exteria.
Hope it's not off topic Meadow. It seems you are looking at control on a wider level than trauma work and I do actually think they are all linked. I think I was phobic of emotions to an extent and that did not help.
Brat, I really love that quote and have copied it. Will say more later as am ob my phone.
I have managed peoplle for most of my life, before I could not more recently. I am good at dealing with people and am fair and extremely controlled. I also alway workon developing peoples talents. And so it really shocked and surprised me when I realised that I intimadated and frightened many of them. I could not understand why as I am always reasonable and never trully raise my voice.
It was said that it is that exact quality that intimadtes. I am much less controlled now but I look back and I can actually see that there is an almost aggressive qualiity about it in some respects. It's also a little bit unhuman in a sense. I think people detect that there is something off.
I actually think there is an element of control that escapes. We are just trying to control ourselves anf our environment but somehow I think it affects those around us. There is power in it.
For me part of it is that I am very determinded. Once I latch onto something I am single minded. I have been discribed as frightening many times and bizaar as I have always found that I can see it now.
I have wondered if some of the work bullying was partly trying to poke a hole in my seemingly perfect and controlled exteria.
Hope it's not off topic Meadow. It seems you are looking at control on a wider level than trauma work and I do actually think they are all linked. I think I was phobic of emotions to an extent and that did not help.
Brat, I really love that quote and have copied it. Will say more later as am ob my phone.
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Meadowsweet
Diamond Member
One affirmation technique I find helpful is "today I am grateful for _____". whatever is happening in my life, there's always something I can fill in that gap with. It can be like a lifebelt that keeps me from drowning, but sometimes it can take over and help me to stay in denial.
Abstract, I think that seemingly cold, unsociable, offish persona that controls by protecting the vulnerable child, that feels and trusts and needs people to care. Or the perfectionist persona that covers up the fear that anything less than perfect will attract severe consequences, are all part of trying to handle life with trauma.
Sadly it is a way of trying to control our own destiny, that tends to invite social harshness, as people don't know understand it and therefore make negative interpretations of it.
I did speak to my therapist about everything I've said here. She didn't have any answers (why would she), but she's aware of it, and it's something that I think we can work on slowly.
Abstract, I think that seemingly cold, unsociable, offish persona that controls by protecting the vulnerable child, that feels and trusts and needs people to care. Or the perfectionist persona that covers up the fear that anything less than perfect will attract severe consequences, are all part of trying to handle life with trauma.
Sadly it is a way of trying to control our own destiny, that tends to invite social harshness, as people don't know understand it and therefore make negative interpretations of it.
I did speak to my therapist about everything I've said here. She didn't have any answers (why would she), but she's aware of it, and it's something that I think we can work on slowly.
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