Mary Anns Journal

[Armee]

Oh Mary Ann. I'm so sorry. You didn't waffle on and it is ok to share here. Really really ok and important.

[Mary Ann]

Feels like things are just getting worse.
This recovery journal is turning into a backward step journal.
My best friend the 'older lady' was rushed into hospital with a suspected heart attack.
She's now at home, and was told it wasn't a heart attack, there's something else, but it's not clear, she doesn't know.... I think she's waiting for some test results. It's hard to know the full story, because she's been communicating by text, and she's also being careful about what she says, I can tell. She doesn't like to worry people. I don't want to annoy her by wading in and asking persistent questions, other than how she's feeling now, and can I bring her anything she needs....?
Earlier in the week, a fox maimed one of my chickens but left it alive.
It's just been a dreadful few weeks.
Last night I had the most severe Ef I've had in a long time. ..
I was crawling round the bed, almost screaming, I cried so much I almost vomited, and then I couldn't breathe....it lasted such a long time. I'd managed to be mostly ok during the day, but didn't want to engage with my kids/husband/anyone...couldn't think, just foggy and numb and sleepy stupid.
Then once I was in bed the storm broke.
Can't think, but foggy, numb and sleepy stupid....that's how I often felt as a kid.
This friend is the only person who it feels like cares for me....unconditionally.
The first person that ever has.,....I love her so much and I'm afraid to tell her.
She should be my Mum...I should have been born into that family.... Not mine.
A while ago, when I first started dealing with stuff.....I'd crave physical contact with her....I would have crawled on her knee if I could! She's not a huggy person, and I'm almost adverse to physical touch....but I wanted to magic myself small, and sit in her lap like a little kid...not that I would say this to her.
She's one of the few people who's seen me in huge distress and unable to speak because of the flashbacks.
She understands most of my story, has heard bits of it multiple times...
My son said, are you sad because she's ill...or sad for yourself?
Both. ...things won't be the same. I wish I could say 'Mum' to this person, just once, instead of having to give that word to the woman who abused all her children.
I read other peoples post...I never respond...I'm scared to, I have nothing to say...I don't want to get into trouble.
I'm just so very very sad.
I don't feel safe being at home....I never do....I'm going to go for a walk later.

[dollyvee]

Hi Mary Ann,

I'm sorry you're going through a difficult time with your friend's health. It's hard when we think about losing someone who means so much to us, even if they aren't exactly a mum. It sounds like she is a positive attachment for you and that is special.

dolly

[Hope67]

Hi Mary Ann,
I am so sorry to hear that your friend is having some health issues, and I hear how special and precious your relationship with her is.  You have been so honest and open about your feelings, and I think that's a really positive thing - your journal is hopefully somewhere where you can be true to your feelings.  Your friend is lucky to have someone who cares so much about her.  You mentioned unconditional love, and that is something really precious and rare.
Hope 

[Mary Ann]

Thank you Dolly and Hope for your kind words. It means a lot that other people hear.

[Mary Ann]

It's been a real hard week.
Today started rubbish but I went for a walk in the woods in the mud and I enjoyed it. The ground smelled rich and the birds were singing .

[Mary Ann]

Looking back I was an extremely timid, anxious little child.
There was nothing that didn't scare me, and it wasn't helped that my siblings were so much older, they were practically grown up by time I can remember.
It wasn't till I had kids myself that I realised how fragile they are, and how most people treat small children with care, but not my family.
My grown up sister used to tell me how she was stuck minding me from when I was a new baby.
She would tell me of the time when I wouldn't stop crying, and so her boyfriend at the time, grabbed me from the pram and shook me violently before throwing me back into the pram in disgust....I lay there quiet...then started to really cry! I was less than 6 weeks old, and could have been really hurt.
Instead of being horrified that a boyfriend would do such a thing, she went on to marry him!
She also used to tell me how they laughed when my pram rolled down a hill, hit a rock and turned over.
They found this hilarious till they saw I wasn't crying, I was lying there with the pram on top of me...wheels spinning! Again, this isn't funny. This same boyfriend dangled my two year old cousin over a railway bridge by the ankles!....
The same sister also dropped scalding hot food on my face as a new baby, and my parents both insisted she'd done it on purpose, though she always said she didn't, but who knows in my family?
My Mother shouldn't have been leaving me at a few weeks old anyway! And most 18year olds know enough not to shake a new baby, or let harm come to it, don't they?
This sister was left looking after me most of the time.
One of my earliest memories of her was of her calling me a horrible child. If I was naughty (presumably) I had to stand in a corner, facing the wall till she said I could come out.
This particular day, I was hysterical, crying and drooling, snot everywhere (so I must've been very young)
She kept asking if I was 'sorry for myself'....to which I wailed 'sorry.........'
This wasn't good enough for her....again and again she left, coming back and asking the same question...
and I kept crying sorry.
Finally I repeated her exact phrase 'I am feeling sorry for MYSELF'.....and then and only then, she let me out.
I'll never forget the look of disgust on her face.
My older brothers would play a game with me, where they dangled me by the neck, through the banisters from the top part of the stairs, their hand was round my neck and I clung onto their wrist with both my hands, legs kicking.
One of my older brothers drank a lot.
I was very scared to go to bed, I remember sitting anxiously at the top of the stairs, ears straining to hear what was going on. Even if the tv changed volume, or the door rattled, my heart would start banging with worry. Often the brother who drank would come home and there'd be shouting and huge rows.
One day, I was stood in the doorway watching my dad and my brother fighting, they were rolling on the kitchen floor and my brother tried to hit Dad over the head with the kettle. I remember crying to my Mother 'phone the police!' She didn't, they just carried on fighting.
She should have taken me into another room so I didn't have to see this.
My parents shouldn't have allowed my grown up brother to come home roaring drunk, not when it frightens a young child in the house, he was old enough to move out if he wanted to behave like that.
Mothers look after their own tiny babies if they're only weeks old, especially back in those days when they mostly stayed in the home, so why was I just passed around to people? It seems like noone in my family ever behaved normally, not with each other, and not towards children.
However odd and resentful towards me my sister was, she was still safer and more predictable than my Mother really. She was always either depressed in a way that meant angry, resentful and hostile to those around her....or overbearing, really intrusive towards me.
I don't know why I'm writing this here today. My family baffles me.
In a nice family, lots of grown up siblings can mean more love and attention, safe familiar people to occasionally babysit....but in my family it meant the opposite.
Two abusive mothers for the price of one....and worse! They resented anything each other did....and my sister especially had a point to prove, she didn't want to be stuck with me, hated her mother for it...but ultimately took it out on me. Grown siblings meant I wasn't just wrapped up in my parents dysfunction, I was at the mercy of theirs too.
So really, no wonder I was an extremely anxious child.
It spilled over into everything...

[paul72]

I'm sorry you went through so much..
I hope writing this down helped. Your writing always paints such a picture, and this was tough to read.
I wish you'd have had the kind of mother who looked after you. I wish so much for you.
I thought dealing with siblings as an adult was difficult enough...
Thank you for sharing... sending love and care your way today. 

[Mary Ann]

Thank you....writing does help.
For a time, my parents and I, and my grandmother who was very elderly, moved away and lived in a small coastal town. My big sister, who'd left and married, moved back in with us while her husband worked away.
At the age of eight, my favourite film in the whole world was Annie!
We'd recorded it off the tv, and I loved it, and wished I could sing and dance like they did on the film, but I couldn't....I was a very uncoordinated kid.
The next best thing though, was to own a gold locket....just like Annie had, with a tiny picture in it, but the trouble was I had no money.
My grown up sister came up with a brilliant idea. If I did jobs for her, she'd pay me and that way I could save up for my locket necklace.
So I peeled potatoes for a family of five, I cleaned shoes and did my sisters ironing, selected easy garments I couldn't ruin. I did these jobs for five pence a time, and even way back when I was eight it was no money at all, but she said take it or leave it, and to me it was better than nothing.
I remember feeling pleased with myself when she considered me good enough at ironing to do the trickier items for her, as well as the usual tops and jeans.
This wasn't a token gesture, the jobs had to be done properly, and slowly my jam jar filled with small change.
I loved to count my jam jar, and as I did I'd imagine buying the necklace and wearing it to school, hidden under my uniform like the best secret.
The plan was, when I'd accumulated enough money, my grown up sister would accompany me to the jewellery shop in the town and I'd choose my locket. (Obviously it wasn't going to be a real gold one with a jam jar of loose change! but I was exited)
   My Mother would see me busily doing the jobs for my sister, and she'd comment sourly to my Dad, they would shake their heads and tut, but they never said not to so I carried on working and counting.
One day, my sister was away from the house, and Mum said SHE would take me to the jewellery shop.
Had I been going on about it....or had I drawn her attention in some way? I don't remember.
However it came up...this was AWKWARD.
It had been my sisters scheme, and she was going to take me...but of course I couldn't say this and refuse my Mother! Mum was jealous of my sister, things were volatile, and I wasn't stupid!
I remember feeling a strange mixture of guilt and excitement as I walked into town with my Mum carrying the jingling jam jar of silver .
In the shop, my Mother chatted away animatedly to the owner while I looked in the display cabinets, and there was no way I had enough money,  the cheapest were a few pounds more than I'd saved.
The man then showed us some silver coloured necklaces with tiny dolphins on them.
He and Mum agreed that girls always like dolphins. The necklace was ok, but it was thin and flimsy, one of those pocket money items that kids can buy themselves.
I hated dolphins, and I desperately wanted a locket, like in the film.
Mum started being impatient, she was embarrassed I was wasting the shop keepers time, and she said irritably that if I didn't get something, then SHE wasn't going to bring me back another day.
If I'd been braver, I'd have said I'll wait! My sister was supposed to take me ANYWAY!
.....But.....this is me! I was scared of making her angry, so I got the little dolphin necklace even though I didn't want it, mum seemed happy enough and the crisis was averted.
    When my sister returned home that evening, Mum pointedly had me show her what I'd bought, and she looked at it, clearly wondering why I'd chosen that and gone without her.
Mum sort of implied that I'd wanted to go to the shop with HER, and she was looking at my sister in a gloating sort of way.
I tried to act pleased with my necklace, I tried to explain to my sister I'd not had enough money for a locket, but she glared at me, and curling her lip, she spat 'you just couldn't wait...could you!'
Was she annoyed I hadn't saved up more, or that I hadn't waited for her to take me? There'd been no way I could have refused my Mother!
She was angry with me, and she swept off to her room and wouldn't let me sleep with her that night , and she was frosty with me for a while after.
Mum looked at me, and said 'She's had you running round like a flipping SKIVVY for six months...for THAT!'
I never wore that necklace, it was so cheap and flimsy it got tangled in its little box.
Whenever stuff like this happened, I felt stupid, like I got everything wrong....it all added to my sense of being ashamed of myself, in a way I can't even describe.
   Last summer, I travelled to where I'd lived as a child. I stood outside my old house, and walked the woods and fields. One of my best friends came with me....and we stood on the shore and I threw that old necklace that I'd kept since the age of eight out into the sea!
I wish I could get rid of all the stuff and rubbish in my head as easily as that though.
I've written about this because it's a good example of how my Mother and sister were so at odds with each other. When I say it it doesn't sound like much, but over a whole childhood it really causes problems.
My Mother wasn't often around, and when she was she scared me, I felt uneasy in her company and she certainly never was concerned for me.
But though I loved my sister, she was irritated at me, I was always underfoot and she was embarrassed at everything I said or did.
Even my face....my Mother would bark at me not to 'smile like that....you look just like your sister',
And my sister would just say to stop 'smiling that stupid smile'
Luckily, there wasn't much to smile about in our house....so it was kept for visitors or the school picture!

[Mary Ann]

Feeling bad about my parenting when my kids were small.
My teenage daughter every now and then brings up something I'd said when she was little.
I've said something to make her feel bad, or made her do stuff when she really was unhappy about it.
She told me yesterday that when she was little, she struggled to fasten the top button of her coat, and one day I'd snapped at her for it....I'd said 'you can really...your just pretending you can't so we'll think your cute?'   I've no memories of this, and I don't get why I'd think she was trying to be cute.....
I did what I always do when she reminds me of times like this....I apologised....said I shouldn't have said that...and wasn't that a bad mother moment 😩.
I don't want to damage my children. I love my children.
The horrendous thing is....any time where I've said something, or implied something negative, or not made allowances for them being kids....well, it's how my family were with me. ..in a much lesser way obviously.
I'm terrified that I've behaved like both my dysfunctional 'Mothers.'
I struggle to look in the mirror because it's like I'm turning into them, but this thing is so built in to me, it seeps out...in my behaviour....or it must've done!
I've discussed my daughter with my T, and this worry, that they'll be damaged by me, same as I was.
She said there's a big difference. My daughter can TELL me that something I'd done had made her unhappy, she's not afraid to tell me how she feels, or that something I'd said was wrong.
It shows we've got a good relationship, she's not scared of me. And I don't ever deny my behaviour, I apologise, and say it was wrong of me. It's not like her whole childhood is blighted, it's some occasions where I've over reacted, or responded wrongly.
My parents denied anything they ever did or said was wrong. And I was much too scared to ever complain really. My family has never apologised for anything ever!
I've got a good relationship with my kids......we're comfortable with each other, there confident, we laugh a lot!
    But I've got that feeling again. I feel toxic, and I'm worried I'll damage the people around me.
Complex trauma is like an inherited disease for me, and I hope I've not passed too much of it along.
Or it's like I'm someone exposed to huge radiation...and now I can accidentally contaminate the people nearest me.
My T did reassure me like I said, but what if she's wrong?
I know we don't have to be the perfect parent....we just need to be good enough....
I don't know....the sun is shining, it's a lovely spring day, and I feel absolutely wretched.

[Armee]

I can relate a lot to this fear, MaryAnn. It can be crippling at times. But I believe your T. That your D feels safe telling you these things and that you empathize and apologize....those are proof you are not like your parents. All parents say dumb stuff to their kids. It's more about the overall context of the relationship. I know what I feels like to doubt that though and it's awful. 

[Mary Ann]

I felt things going downhill yesterday, and todays been pretty rubbish.
Nothing bad has happened today, but I'm just feeling really really sad. It's not as bad as while I was really in the midst of depression, it seems to be getting worse than it has been since I've been on medication.
The anxiety beast is also ramping up as well.
The difference is a while back I'd have been actually crying, and visibly distressed, but now it's all very much unseen. I can't stop sleeping though. I'm eating way too much. ..but then that's nothing new.
It took a lot for me to start with medication, and I just wish I felt a bit better than this, considering I've actually done it. I can't be bothered speaking to anyone, eye contact is going downhill as well...
Hopefully tomorrow will be a bit different.

[paul72]

Hi Mary Ann
I can relate so much about parts of how you are feeling.
I just started meds for the first time ever after fighting forever to not take them too.. and I feel like my symptoms have come back .. and I've only been able to cry now for about a week (I'm 6 weeks into an anti-depressant).. I can understand feeling like I may have spent my last 10 too, figuratively speaking.
It wasn't about control over my body and I can't begin to know that suffering (and I am so sorry you do!!!!!!!!!!!!). For me it was the fear of my mother being right about me being crazy.
Your sprained ankle analogy makes absolute perfect sense to me too. You aren't alone at least there
I was thinking about this after reading your entry earlier this morning.
Forgive me please... I am just brainstorming .. knowing it isn't just me having this effect from the pills.
Perhaps it isn't what we need.... but the fact that we did it to begin with was probably a great release for us because we did ask for them and we did take them. We took a chance for ourselves maybe and even if it came with a step backwards, making a step forward for ourselves has to be a good thing. Had to make us feel stronger, no? even if just temporarily? (this could be such backwards thinking I honestly don't know)
Maybe it's the wrong dosage.. mine is just what he wanted to start me on... i just felt it worked so have kept it at this low level.
Maybe it's just a part of what we need... this may be the answer I hope for most

Whatever it is, I hope you/we find out... and I hope you have some comfort knowing you aren't alone with this.
Thank you for sharing it.. it really helps. I hope you find joy in all sorts of places today.
I hope your EMDR comes quick and I hope you can replace that 10 spot in your purse
Sending lots of love your way

[Mary Ann]

I really appreciate your comments and kindness..
I looked at my last post, and felt such a lot of panic I've removed it.
I'm scared that I write too much, and someone could know who I am by the bits of my story. A bit of a conundrum when i desperately want to speak my story. It may be that the meds thing settles down.

[Armee]

I've done the same in the past too. I took down my response too just in case that also causes panic. I'm happy to write down anything here though again that was helpful to read.