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Therapy worked


devils daughter

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Finally. I'm OK. Thank God for that, I guess. Part of being OK now is that I am not overwhelmed by guilt and shame. But there is some. Crazy people act crazy and “hurting people hurt people”. I didn’t kill myself 9 years ago when I thought that I was no good to myself or my adult children and not much good for anybody/anything else. But instead of being killed, long buried feelings and behaviors came spewing out in my struggle to “live”.

Hence I’m back to a theme I started writing here about a year ago – the need for more and better information about personality disorders and how to treat them. And another one: information for us on how to interact with people in our lives – or not interact with them – while we are in the process of changing internally.

There is a lot of intolerance these days for “ill” behavior. That’s understandable. There’s a lot of intolerance for throwing up in public, too. But the first time or two you throw up, you don’t know you’re going to do it. And even then, if you’re very ill you can’t stop it – you can only go to a safe place to do it.

My support group was one such place. My current therapist is another. But numerous other therapists and, in particular, one therapy group were NOT such places. Instead, I was shamed for being open – I didn’t know that in my openness others felt attacked or defensive. I had cut off the ability to feel that myself. Part of the dissociation or personality disorder.

Now I can feel it. That’s progress, for me. But I still don’t like the idea that I had to be a jerk to people I loved in order get to where I am today. Well, something in me “wanted” to hurt them I guess. I could usually shut off acting on anything like that -- because I knew that it was "bad". But I didn't really understand why it was "bad". Plus I really couldn't totally shut it off completely, anyway.

I know now that when I feel that way it’s because I want to communicate the pain that I’m in – horrible, unbearable, shut off pain. I (that shut-off part of me, at the time) wanted somebody who cared to “hear” it. Now “I” hear it – that pain is a part of the whole of me – and I can bear it because of the interaction I’ve had with my therapist, who could hear it, too.

10 years ago I believed it was possible for me to get OK – but it’s been horribly difficult. And although I’m the same person, I guess, I’m put together differently. So I’m not going to seem the same to many people who have known me for years. The relationships will/must be different. Well, most of the people I’ve known for years are out of my life now anyway. Ugh.

Here’s a wish: once it is known that people’s personalities CAN be transformed and the ways in which to help with that become better known, then the powers-that-be-can establish “sanctuaries” or retreat centers where we can work out our jerki-ness with professionals who understand and with other “disordered” people who are trying to do the same thing. To the extent that I made choices that “made” my personality “disordered” I did it when I was 3, 4, 5, 11, 13 years old or younger. It’s extraordinarily difficult and emotionally painful to go back and feel the feelings you couldn’t bear at the time so that you can be aware and make different choices today. Seems like the process could be made a lot easier. I certainly haven't wanted to be a jerk -- just some of me didn't care, sometimes. My guess is most people with personality disorders feel that way, too. Or would if they knew there was an effective way to get help.

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