littleoc
MyPTSD Pro
I need some help. I think I took helpful advice from these forums and corrupted them with an abuser's voice that's still in my head.
I was texting a friend and he told me that he's noticed that I take responsibility for everything to an extreme degree, and it's affecting my relationships. I want to just type down what he said to me, but let me paraphrase:
We were talking about my mom. My mom had frustrated me by rushing me to do my own plans so that I would do something for her (which, unfortunately, indirectly caused me to miss out on the one thing I even left home for). I then told him it seemed odd that when he rushed me, it felt supportive, but when my mom did, I got upset. I assumed this had something to do with me.
He told me it was because my mom has a history of being abusive to me. I disagreed. Cue a one-hour semi-argument where I insisted my mom isn't abusive and he started pouring out examples of abusive behavior done in front of him, that I told him about, etc., until I finally said, "She's just dysfunctional, rude, irresponsible, and very disrespectful. She's not abusive, though. Abusive behavior doesn't make a person abusive."
He responded by telling me that that's literally what makes a person abusive (basically: "what? if there's an abusive behavior, that's literally abuse"), and then sent me a screenshot of me saying these exact type of words about a "friend" who was being extremely abusive (trying to force me to date her, long story short) a couple of months ago. He asked me a couple times to explain my logic.
I stopped arguing and began to listen.
I eventually realized that I was triggered -- there's a thing I have where I assume people calling my mom abusive are people who are abusive themselves, don't understand that she's ill, or are trying to get her into trouble. From court cases when I was 13 and 14 years old.
But after that was out of the way, I really listened to what he had to say, which is the main point of this post.
He told me I have a problem with taking too much responsibility. I will try to make everything sound like there was something I could have done to make things better, that I am just not taking enough responsibility. I am avoiding being the victim as much as I physically can.
I'll say, about my mom, "Well, if I communicated with her, that wouldn't have happened. Her actions are totally understandable." My friend's response to that was, "If you weren't afraid to communicate with her, you wouldn't go mute, and if she respected what you said, this wouldn't be a problem right now."
He also told me (this is not verbatim): "Regardless, our mom has done much worse stuff that just not protect you from an abuser (which is in itself a crime).
"It's just that the only time I hear you talking like the other person isn't abusing you and it's just something you need to fix about yourself to be a better person, is seemingly when you're trying to convince yourself that a person 'isn't that bad' and you just 'don't get along' so you can ... ??? have uncomplicated feelings and not be the victim? indulge that abusive voice in your head that says everything is your fault?? you seem to think that your problems with your mom would just magically be resolved if you just talked with her honestly, while you completely ignore the fact that being unable to speak to her safely with honesty is one of the biggest red flags.
"Maybe she WOULD be totally understanding and become a perfect mom if you could tell her things, but you've been trying for literal years"
I told him in response that I can only control my own actions, and that that made me responsible. He told me that while that's technically true, I'm in control of who's in my life as well. In practice, what I seem to be doing is giving people chance after chance while telling myself, "but maybe if I'm more clear/patient/understanding/kind/etc then they'll start treating me well :)"; in other words, I believe everything is my responsibility and I need to step up my game and do better in every scenario. If ANYTHING goes wrong, it's always my fault. It's always something I need to be doing to fix the situation.
So, now I'm confused. I know it might seem obvious to some of you, so please tell me what you see. I see around these forums all the time that we need to stop playing victim and step up our game, to avoid trauma in our future and break the cycle, so that's what I've been doing. I'm taking responsibility for my part in my trauma, but now I'm being told I've gone too far. I'm now taking responsibility for other people's actions and behavior as something I can work with (that is, a response to my own not-perfect behavior), because it's probably my own behavior triggering these responses in other people. I just need to talk clearer, confront people better, be more confident, let things slide more instead of get upset about them. What's the middle ground? Is there one? Am I still playing victim?
Ugh. I feel utterly pathetic writing this. I feel like the words I'm using aren't explaining the situation properly.
All I can think of is that that basically sums up my relationship with my abusive ex-girlfriend. My job was to make her happy. Same with my father. Same with a pedophile.
Thanks for any input, it's greatly appreciated.
(Disclaimer: the quotes from my friend are heavily modified to protect his right to private correspondence with me. They are in quotes only to signify that I'm paraphrasing what someone else said.)
I was texting a friend and he told me that he's noticed that I take responsibility for everything to an extreme degree, and it's affecting my relationships. I want to just type down what he said to me, but let me paraphrase:
We were talking about my mom. My mom had frustrated me by rushing me to do my own plans so that I would do something for her (which, unfortunately, indirectly caused me to miss out on the one thing I even left home for). I then told him it seemed odd that when he rushed me, it felt supportive, but when my mom did, I got upset. I assumed this had something to do with me.
He told me it was because my mom has a history of being abusive to me. I disagreed. Cue a one-hour semi-argument where I insisted my mom isn't abusive and he started pouring out examples of abusive behavior done in front of him, that I told him about, etc., until I finally said, "She's just dysfunctional, rude, irresponsible, and very disrespectful. She's not abusive, though. Abusive behavior doesn't make a person abusive."
He responded by telling me that that's literally what makes a person abusive (basically: "what? if there's an abusive behavior, that's literally abuse"), and then sent me a screenshot of me saying these exact type of words about a "friend" who was being extremely abusive (trying to force me to date her, long story short) a couple of months ago. He asked me a couple times to explain my logic.
I stopped arguing and began to listen.
I eventually realized that I was triggered -- there's a thing I have where I assume people calling my mom abusive are people who are abusive themselves, don't understand that she's ill, or are trying to get her into trouble. From court cases when I was 13 and 14 years old.
But after that was out of the way, I really listened to what he had to say, which is the main point of this post.
He told me I have a problem with taking too much responsibility. I will try to make everything sound like there was something I could have done to make things better, that I am just not taking enough responsibility. I am avoiding being the victim as much as I physically can.
I'll say, about my mom, "Well, if I communicated with her, that wouldn't have happened. Her actions are totally understandable." My friend's response to that was, "If you weren't afraid to communicate with her, you wouldn't go mute, and if she respected what you said, this wouldn't be a problem right now."
He also told me (this is not verbatim): "Regardless, our mom has done much worse stuff that just not protect you from an abuser (which is in itself a crime).
"It's just that the only time I hear you talking like the other person isn't abusing you and it's just something you need to fix about yourself to be a better person, is seemingly when you're trying to convince yourself that a person 'isn't that bad' and you just 'don't get along' so you can ... ??? have uncomplicated feelings and not be the victim? indulge that abusive voice in your head that says everything is your fault?? you seem to think that your problems with your mom would just magically be resolved if you just talked with her honestly, while you completely ignore the fact that being unable to speak to her safely with honesty is one of the biggest red flags.
"Maybe she WOULD be totally understanding and become a perfect mom if you could tell her things, but you've been trying for literal years"
I told him in response that I can only control my own actions, and that that made me responsible. He told me that while that's technically true, I'm in control of who's in my life as well. In practice, what I seem to be doing is giving people chance after chance while telling myself, "but maybe if I'm more clear/patient/understanding/kind/etc then they'll start treating me well :)"; in other words, I believe everything is my responsibility and I need to step up my game and do better in every scenario. If ANYTHING goes wrong, it's always my fault. It's always something I need to be doing to fix the situation.
So, now I'm confused. I know it might seem obvious to some of you, so please tell me what you see. I see around these forums all the time that we need to stop playing victim and step up our game, to avoid trauma in our future and break the cycle, so that's what I've been doing. I'm taking responsibility for my part in my trauma, but now I'm being told I've gone too far. I'm now taking responsibility for other people's actions and behavior as something I can work with (that is, a response to my own not-perfect behavior), because it's probably my own behavior triggering these responses in other people. I just need to talk clearer, confront people better, be more confident, let things slide more instead of get upset about them. What's the middle ground? Is there one? Am I still playing victim?
Ugh. I feel utterly pathetic writing this. I feel like the words I'm using aren't explaining the situation properly.
All I can think of is that that basically sums up my relationship with my abusive ex-girlfriend. My job was to make her happy. Same with my father. Same with a pedophile.
Thanks for any input, it's greatly appreciated.
(Disclaimer: the quotes from my friend are heavily modified to protect his right to private correspondence with me. They are in quotes only to signify that I'm paraphrasing what someone else said.)