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Butterfly, thank you for writing and Kidzzie thanks for reposting.  Your story or the way you talk about it is very powerful and relatable.  This part put into words my struggle in this life of reliving a trauma and trying to overcome daily.


"Another key was learning to feel feelings, to name them, to recognize anger at a lower level instead of just ignoring what my body was screaming. EF and triggers are a signal to me things have gone too far and I had to pay attention to emotions at lower levels. I had to learn to recognize anger. Maybe I even needed to learn to feel anger. Anger signals a violated boundary. Since I had never had boundaries before I had to learn what a broken boundary felt like and what anger at a broken boundary felt like and then how to respond to that anger. So after boundaries my next task was learning to feel and respond to anger at a low level, to be able to speak without freezing. Having boundaries attached to core values made them a part of me, they became internal, responding to boundaries became more of a natural response, very little thought required."

I hope to read more from you soon.

Hey Blueberry, I am glad you fought the fight to wake up. Dreams have been a challenge to me too. They become triggers and my whole day becomes rubbish. I am interested in hear about how you use a recovery journal. What you keep in or out and with what purpose. Do you have a system? Thanks for your time.

That was a very insightful reading. Thanks for that. With this I came to realize I need cooping mechanisms to deal with daily tasks in managing the house and the kids. Unfortunately, almost every step I take towards kids and household are EF's. This makes me angry, frustrated and overwhelmed by not only the tasks itself but also by the idea of nurturing my kids childhood. There is no model to follow. The situations common of childhood comes with so much baggage. I used to use children's programs (Caillou, Daniel the Tiger, Mr Rogers) to deal with the fact that I did not have a childhood myself, so I thought. Now I see I had one. As the kids grow older its becoming harder and harder to connect in a healthy way. Today for instance, my 4 year old difficulty to deal with a situation just stroke me. That picture of her standing there searching for an answer within, lonely, vulnerable and feeling at loss brought me right in, but instead of reaching out to her I just felt mad and frustrated. I have been asking myself how to overcome that. This EF article seem to have reopened a door of understanding. However, I would appreciate any other resources that could help me in such situations as I am thinking now to empathize with the kids and focus on them instead of my fears. Thanks in advance!

Thank you

Thank you!







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Hello Everyone, I just found out about this resource. I usually read through the FOG forum as currently I am married to a narcissist family. But my reality goes  far and beyond that and I have struggled to make my way out. I guess I am hoping that through here I will find space/voice and support. I also would like to thank you for reading and urge you to ask questions if my English isn't sounding so English to you. I regret to have to acknowledge the fogginess of my brain, specially at harder times making this task to communicate even more challenging. I will appreciate resources to read, see, or listen to. I have done therapy for many years. however, life with kids make the hundred sessions look much more. I need to work through a few feelings, and stuff, and I am stuck. For instance, why I can't control my thoughts or behavior anymore? Why, I have recurrent dreams with my abuser in which I am trying to interact with him in trivial situations that are never normal, even though one of my realizations is that during the several years in which I lived in his house (as a house keeper, kids companion/babysitter, and add more 10 job descriptions to it) being abused in different ways, I actually never spoke to him, he never spoke to me? Why almost 30 years later, I dream off him. I question myself if I will ever be able to trust anyone, to get close to anyone in a healthy way? Every time I have a good time within my new life and relationships his presence comes right in. My dreams wakes me up given the oddness or tragedy of it. Last night for example, amid confusion and lost ways, people left behind, objects forgotten, I arrive in a place that would be discovered to be a textile museum. He orders around to people bring a massive bed, and the bed falls down on the floor below. The corner where the bed is resembles my house. And the feeling, just remembering this bit brings me agony. My chest is tight, my neck is sore. I need always noise and a distraction to be able to do anything, even sleep. I am afraid, insecure, and I realize that my fear is that the pain I lived takes over me again. Although it already has. I have become more neglecting of my kids, which is what I do with friends. I have been asking myself where my ability to empathize has gone. Am I a narcissist myself? I am constantly gaslight(ed) by my husband. He has been challenging me in ways I can't hold myself together. Like I feel left out of certain things and alone in others. His passive aggressive criticism to my insecurities and indecisive behavior its what hurt the most. It hurts because I am causing my son to become anxious as I am too anxious working through the decision of a way taken and the time to get to our destination. Meanwhile, my husband thinks that belittling my behavior is the best answer to help my son. When I challenge that he says he did not do that, and we go down hill from there. in his opinion I am making it about his behavior. That because I told him if his concern is my son, irony and sarcasm wasn't the best approach. I did not want to my son to see his mom being treated like that. Off course I spoke out of another fear. They are 6, how are they going to treat me at 15?  My husband is the fun, the light, the warmth. I see him like that and I make a point to the kids see and have that too. Instead, my behavior seem to bring the worst of my dear husband. Because abuse in his house doesn't often include shouting. It is done quietly and cleverly fitting all social norms. Me? I fail in everything I do. The first one is keeping my mouth shot. I work hard for things and once I reach them I just drop the ball. I have contested all this theories of how risky/inferior/vulnerable or whatever else negative is there to talk about abuse survivors, but I am struggling to keep up myself. I am terrified I will fail my kids. I often think of leaving them. That they would be better off without a moody, bitter, and angry mother. I see them drifting. If if the price is to see them abused? I do try to teach them my snappiness and stormy behavior is not natural, appreciated or acceptable. I'm falling short. The days these dreams happen I get into an obsessive though of why, and how to get rid of it. I am exhausted. My 4 year old just avoids me and too copy some of the storm. My husband says that I am drowning my son's confidence. He is so sensitive and struggles to make friends. As me he takes things quite literally. Is it me? At times, I go right back there being a child never enough, never right, never heard, never mattering or smart enough. This last one because I can't get, enjoy therefore I can't understand a joke.  I used all my rage to graduate, to become a professional and I feel like I have nothing left to fight this. Enough already! I need to move on.  I did realized a long time ago I did not have to use that identity of a victim to survive anymore. I want to live, and the past 3 years I am adrift between madness and loss. I lost something I can't recover because I don't know what it is. Thinking of it maybe realizing I am still a victim. That won't go away. I meet my triggers daily and the loneliness is just too hard. I lay in bed with my husband he is there, I am cooking he is there... maybe that's why I can't coop with staying at home anymore. I am happier when in vacations and suddenly I perceive that that's it. In that context he is not there. Its just us. The 3 pregnancies were torture and for reasons that did not make sense for anyone else. The times I cried, inconsolable. The times I desperately asked to be heard. But that is another long story.  I just missed my widow to cook dinner before school pickup. Thanks for reading. Thanks for having this space.