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Feeling hopeless: How do you make boundaries and keep them?
Depression & Anxiety | Last Active: Nov 12 11:57pm | Replies (22)Comment receiving replies
@kb2014 Thank you so much!
I will check out the site you mentioned, and it sounds especially good as the source has experienced PTSD herself. In a way I wish more/everyone would or could reveal their mental/emotional/psychological/developmental burdens such that the stigma and hidden woes could be shared and carry less weight. However, I realize that that is not realistic in our current society, as compassion is or very much seems to be at a new low.
Your family dynamics sound amazingly familiar too! My sibling, the Golden Child, has suffered in her role, yet maintained it her entire life, not seeming to question it, but paying a severe mental and physical price for what she assumed was her lot in life. Only now, finally, has she been open to discussing it when I volunteered to participate in some of her remote therapy sessions in the interest of helping her put words to her life experience with our mother.
Our mother, for whom I have such conflicted feelings, but also hold dear (kind of crazy-making dynamic) is still chugging along at almost 95. Thank goodness her mental faculties have been good up until recently. But she still has no concept of the toll her codependent relationship with my sister has taken on my sister's life so unfairly, not to mention on my life, but my father, 10+ years deceased, had a more damaging effect on my psyche for my life. But he also helped me pursue my career goals that took me across the country many times, for decades, and so on. But distance didn't - back then - quiet the tumultuous voices in my head critiquing everything I did. They're still there - mainly in my mother's voice, but I continue to strive, with many outward successes, but ultimately dragged down by this fundamental developmental burden that I can't seem to "grow out of".
If you'd care to continue: how do you find any peace? how do you thrive? can you sustain the healthier ways to find joy, peace, happiness? does it burden your (search for) meaningful, or even pleasantly supportive, relationships?
Either way: Warm wishes on this journey.
Replies to "@kb2014 Thank you so much! I will check out the site you mentioned, and it sounds..."
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I relate completely to what you say There was trauma in my family that was never addressed just shoved under the rug.My mother's first cousin was molested by another male relative at a young age. My paternal aunt abused her 2 children who were adopted. My mother was the codependent trying to rescue. Did not work. My father was very hard on me too. He said to me in 2015 after surviving bacterial meningitis of my brain if I had known this before you would not be here. During my hospitalization for this I was coded. I was septic in.multi organ failure on a vent in a medically induced coma. My first husband- deceased in 2012- was an online porn addiction. My paternal grandfather had epilepsy. I am seizure free 10 + years after what happened to me. It is very hard sometimes to cope. Other people's decisions and behavior change and affect us yet we can be blamed. I have had a lot of therapy. I have an affirmation app with to affirmations about my husband and parents. I wrote their names birth date death date and then live to forgive. I look at it several times a day. My goal was to break the cycle of transgenerational trauma in my family..I still work on that goal daily. My father is still alive but his days are numbered. He was a harsh unhappy man. Our relationship is only by phone or email and it is toxic. I do believe the consequences of his actions caught up to him and he knows it. Same with my brother. I wish I had better news or insights for you. But perhaps my role and yours exceed a this pain.