Miswired Circuits/Things That Spark

NarcKiddo · October 26, 2023, 12:22:49 PM

Quote from: Bach on October 25, 2023, 09:10:48 PMIf I ever want to be happier and more comfortable with myself, I will have to get better at doing things I don't like to do that I like the results of.

You could well be right. You may also find, if you do some of these things you don't like, that you start appreciating the process. I am not suggesting that you will ever come to love it, but you might. I am thinking here of my own approach to exercise, which for a time when I started taking it seriously was a necessary evil and nothing else. I started to like aspects of it quite soon, which helped, but other aspects were a hideous grind. Yet I can honestly say that with time I have even found things to appreciate in the less pleasant aspects. Mostly because I like the results.

Bach · November 02, 2023, 04:27:58 PM

My Person is away on a work trip. He left on Tuesday and won't be back until the 9th, and I am not doing well alone in the house. It's pathetic how much trouble I have functioning when there's nobody around to see. I have enough trouble when there IS someone! I really just want to be a functional person living a decently productive life, but I think it might be too late. I don't think I can even blame my trauma. I think I'm just lazy and shouldn't even be here.

NarcKiddo · November 02, 2023, 06:50:59 PM

That is the trauma talking.

I'm sorry you are struggling.

Blueberry · November 03, 2023, 11:06:12 AM

The trauma is talking, your ICr is talking.

I'm glad to know you.

Armee · November 06, 2023, 01:52:46 PM

I agree with BB and NK. That is very much the trauma talking. I'm so sorry you feel like that now and so sad that little Bach felt that way so long ago. Those people damaged us all pretty good. We are all of us strong to still be here. You too, Bach.

sanmagic7 · November 14, 2023, 06:25:16 AM

Bach · November 14, 2023, 10:06:59 PM

Lately, instead of my intrusive voice saying "I want to die" or "I wish I was dead", it has been saying "Why didn't anybody love me?" Is this an improvement? It doesn't feel like one.

Armee · November 14, 2023, 10:43:21 PM

I think it is. Because that thought I want to die is there as a mask to cover up the deeper pain that is too hard to feel. But until we uncover it we can't heal. Congrats? Sorry? You can do it? Lol I don't know what to say. Hang in there? I definitely felt like it was an improvement when I could hear the message under the mask myself.

Chaos rains · November 15, 2023, 02:57:34 AM

Yeah, I think Armee's right. It sounds like that part of the healing that hurts more than the thing itself, but only for a while. Because healing, by definition, gets better.

{hugs} to you, Bach.

Blueberry · November 15, 2023, 07:02:06 AM

Bach, I can imagine that might not feel like an improvement but it sounds like a step forwards to me.

With questioning why nobody loved you, you're potentionally opening up to others, even if just another part of yourself or to us on here whereas if your intrusive voice is wishing for death that sounds to me as if it's more closed off. I don't know if that makes any sense.

I had an intrusive voice wishing for death for a long time. It has got better.

to you

NarcKiddo · November 15, 2023, 12:14:00 PM

I think it is a sign of hope rather than resignation. It may be the start of a path that is rocky but it seems like it leads up to life rather than down to the abyss.

The people who didn't love you? I'm guessing they may have had no genuine love to give to anyone.

Bach · November 15, 2023, 03:19:14 PM

Armer, Chaos Rains, Blueberry and NarcKiddo, thank you for this perspective. It makes a lot of sense. I think something in me must be fighting against any further healing because today the death-wishing voice is mostly back. I'm also having physical symptoms that I can't connect to any logical physical cause and this morning the thought popped into my mind that lately I have been functioning more-or-less normally even though I have been feeling emotionally AWFUL most of the time, almost totally unable to experience pleasure or feel joy and in the kind of disastrous mental state that usually significantly disables me. So maybe I am actually getting somewhere although now I am fearful that the "better" I get the worse I will FEEL and that is just not what I bargained for.

Hope67 · November 16, 2023, 03:51:27 PM

Hi Bach,
I am a little late in responding to what you wrote before about the two voices, but I agree with what the others said about it. I think it's progress for sure. But I also see that both voices are perspectives that are important and wish to be heard. Not sure if that makes sense. Anyway, wanted to send you a hug, if that's ok

Hope

Papa Coco · November 22, 2023, 06:45:08 PM

Bach

I too am sorry to come in late. But I agree with others, this sounds like a big step forward. The old comments, "I want to die" are statements spoken by you about you to you. But the newer words, "Why didn't anybody love me?" Are a question from you to the outside world about those who caused all this pain in the first place. You're putting the accountability onto those who need to own it. Most of us in our healing journeys have intellectualized the truth, that we are struggling because of unfair things that were done to us by others, but in our hearts, we still harbor a lot of ownership for our struggles. I think your new question is a sign that your heart is starting to understand what your head already intellectualized: That someone did this to you, and you are struggling to accept it so you can move on to the next level of healing.

I think it's a great step forward and out of the self-destructive announcements "I want to die" to the reaching out to the world asking, "why did they do this to me?" Healing can take a new foothold when our hearts start to soften and realize this was not our fault. NOT YOUR FAULT.

This hug is sent with deep love, my friend. I hope you can feel it.

If you can't, let me know and I'll send a thousand more until you can feel me with you in this struggle.

Bach · November 24, 2023, 05:59:16 PM

Hope and PapaCoco, thank you for the encouraging words and the hugs

I need that stuff.

On my mind today: About a month ago, my therapist told me she sees my difficulty in motivating myself to do absolutely anything without having to react against an antagonist as a self-regulation problem. For some reason, that sounds more like a solvable problem to me than however I was thinking about it before. Self-regulation is something that can be worked on and improved. I've been working for years on improving my ability to self-regulate emotionally, and rarely does a day go by that I don't notice and appreciate improvements I have made there. So if I can improve my emotional self-regulation, it stands to reason that I should also be able to improve my behavioural self-regulation.