So my coach came over. It was unexpected and so very welcome. I’ve been crying like mad every since whatever it was inside of me snapped and triggered the nervous breakdown (since that’s basically what it is). I was so excited to have her over that I got all this energy very quickly, and used it to rapidly get the living room up to date in the way that I wanted it to look. Not spotless, but pretty damned close, all things considered.
But we talked about why I was sad. What triggered it, why it had me so far down in the dumps. Sure, it’s seasonal. Sure, it’s bipolar. But she wasn’t buying the notion that it was random. Of course “that” conversation comes up. Basically, my coach said this:
I have complex ptsd and am bipolar. We know this. Why this is important is because complex trauma and bipolar both generate massive difficulties with relationships. Everything is so disorganized, mentally, that even a morning and evening routine (like what I established with IPSRT in PHP) is a monumental task to follow through on, most of the time, because the lingering anguish from talking openly about quite literally everything that happened to me in my life with both coach and psych has me a bit preoccupied…as pain of any kind preoccupies a person after awhile.
It’s the same with relationships. In my case, I tend to approach relationships and connections from a point of view of “how can I make you happier today?” Because I see my own type of pain in others. Some folks receive a parenthetical, though. “How can I make you happier (with me) today?”
We dissected why some folks get the parenthetical — it’s because I’m so used to people who come into my life in some way, I decide they’re safe to unmask around, then they decide I’m too weird/too much/too off-putting, and then bail. Or treat me like an unsightly scratch on a wall (and put something prettier over me without removing me completely).
When you’re raised in an environment where joy is constantly being stripped from you through moving goalposts or general meanness, you grow into this mold where you feel obligated to give all of your joy to others once you deem them to be safe. Then you’re left with none of it for yourself, and become completely dependent on whether other people happen to show up on the daily. Unfortunately, this isn’t just with close relationships. It’s with literally anyone who my trauma self considers safe…you know, the mother wound finds a band-aid.
Which is why she pointed out how I went from alone and isolated, to living temporarily around people where I found shared joy, to the parenthetical happening. It’s part of a cycle that might have happened anyway, but this time, it was triggered by an event that reminded me directly of what I’d just left.
The parenthetical happens specifically when I decide someone is safe. I lose my joy once that happens. It’s why DBT skills don’t work as well. DBT teaches us to find our joy via mindfulness, distress tolerance, interpersonal effectiveness, and emotion regulation. The sneaky thief in the room is my past still showing up in the people that matter the most to me now, and my joy being given away entirely without anyone even noticing.
Instead of addressing it for what it is, people let it slip under the radar in the form of labels that didn’t fit the bill…at all. It’s not limerence because there’s no romantic interest. It’s not codependence because there is no shared dependence. As a matter of fact, besides a generic umbrella term that describes conflicting attachment styles, there’s no real word for it. Not that we need one, but we did take about 10 minutes going through all these labels and laughing at the absurdity that none of them fit.
Because nobody goes into therapy to heal the results of jacked up relationships with their either dead or estranged parents.
They go to therapy for jacked up relationships, and then find they must heal the results of the jacked up relationships with dead or estranged parents.
I’m a unique case because I’ve chosen not to involve myself in relationships due to the results of the jacked up relationships with my parents…and literally everyone else in my life up to the time that I fled that house two years ago.
Which is why my coach wants me to get back into community, especially with the addiction/alcoholism community, because I know so many people there already that actually want to see me and share that “non-parenthetical” joy. Because I already understand why a lot of people devolve into substance abuse. I already understand how to get out of it.
She believes the parenthetical will fade away eventually. But I have to invest in non-parenthetical first. Over time, the connection with Hero will return to its proper size and balance. How much time? No clue. Because somewhere in all this is still that mother wound that needs to be healed, and that’s going to take a bit.
I’m stubborn. I hang on for dear life, sometimes. But I can’t do that. It fucking sucks. I just know that I’ll take the time to finish healing, find my joy again, and turn around and they won’t be there anymore. It scares me. I told my coach this, and she said that this is what builds trust. Both trusting yourself to heal and trusting Hero to be there when you’re done…perhaps with a different pseudonym than Hero (haha…).
Of course I started crying again. I’m sensitive, what can I say. I just want things to be better. My coach told me not to take all the blame. I was trying to fix what has been repeatedly my fault my entire life. For me, it was only natural to rush to fix what was never broken to begin with.
For now, I gotta get back into community, find a place where I thrive, and learn to trust my instincts around people again. Focus my energy on making those routines stay in place, and even finding routines that work even better than what I’ve set up now. Everything and everyone takes a backseat to what works for me. I’ve no reason to be fearful.
In other news, I have the J word for the next post on the main site. I’ll work on that, soon. Also, my coach gives good hugs.