Not being present with SO or talking a lot about " the new explanation "

[Sasha2727]

I fall prey often to feeling compelled to share every thought I have with my gf. She is supportive for a time but then I know she gets engulfed with my constant OCD like need to explain everything. I never know that my researching was a compulsion until moving in with her. Most ppl who hide there phones hide them because they are talking to other ppl or looking at risky things .... I quickly put mine away because I don't want to be asked what I was googling this time. I can get fixed on some charecter trait and obbsesse about it. Spend entire days reading and taking quizzes. This is unhelpful and in general actually brings me shame... It puts things in my head and then I tend to project them onto others or inject them into myself. I have come to wonder if this isn't actually disassociating ? Like developing an obsession to block out the critic or the fear? It causes fights b/c if I could keep it to myself no problem but then I just have to go to someone for confirmation and that someone is her. it's like I have no ability to say yes I do this or yes this is real without someone to be my filter for me. It makes me ashamed. Like I need someone to control me or distract me from myself at all times.

[schrödinger's cat]

Do you think it could be a way for you to get a sense of control? I know that I got a bit obsessed with personality theories too, mainly MBTI and then Socionics. Looking back, I think it's because people around me were so erratic when I was a kid. There was never any telling whether you'd get emotionally abused or not. The same behaviour could get a normal-if-chilly response one day, and the next day you'd do the precise same thing and someone would emotionally abuse you for it. Seen this way, it's only reasonable that a part of me went: "RIGHT, now I'll research this". It's only healthy to want to find out more about a situation that keeps on harming us. After all, how else can we fix things? So at the core of it, this is still a very proactive response, one where you take charge of your own well-being and respond to a problem actively.

In my own case, the problem started with my assumption that I and I alone was to blame for my problems. I assumed that I was somewhat faulty and defective, so I had to find out more about faults and defects. And I assumed other people were simply being weird in a totally-normal-yet-to-me-unfamiliar way, so I researched what makes people tick. That's why I never got anywhere. It was like a nut missing its bolt - you can keep on turning it, but it never gets anywhere.

The missing puzzle piece for me was emotional abuse, childhood emotional neglect, CPTSD, and related issues. I'm now researching those things, and I spend a lot of time doing it, but at least now I get a sense that it's clearing things up, and that I'm making progress. And for the first time, something within me goes: "YES, that's IT, that's precisely what happened". It's like finding firm ground I can then build on.

This thing where you have to ask others for confirmation - I do that too, and I do it a lot. It's another effect of emotional abuse, in my case. My own experiences never mattered. I had a problem? It was minimized, trivialized, or just ignored, or I was even made to feel guilty and ashamed for having it. So whenever I now have a problem, I never think "oh, I have a problem". I think "oh, I'm being weak". It's simply what I was taught to believe. Like a kind of brainwashing. At times that even happens when I'm tired. I don't think: "oh, I'm tired." I think: "oh, I'm unable to muster enough willpower to keep on working".

Same goes for other areas - my opinions never mattered, my expertise never mattered, my feelings never mattered... so of COURSE I have this feeling that I need confirmation for the littlest things. How could it be different? This is part of having flashbacks, actually. I'm back in a world where I'm always at fault, always in error, no matter what I do, just by virtue of being me.

Thank goodness my husband is more than happy to help. We're having so many conversations that consist of me going: "...but maybe it wasn't so bad after all, maybe my family's okay, maybe it's just me...", and him going: "nah, it isn't, your family's just really really weird", and me going: "...oh, right, now I remember", and him going: "you're welcome". It took us a long time to get to this routine, though. I felt really silly and weak for years, like I was this weak and dependent person who couldn't or wouldn't think for herself. Understanding that my FOO put me through emotional abuse helped, though. I'm now thinking that emotional abuse does brainwash us a little bit. Hence my need to verify even the simplest things.

It's almost like in those therapy sessions were you act out a difficult situation. We're acting out my past, where I was made to feel like my own thoughts and feelings were always wrong. My husband gets to be the good guy, gallopping in on a white charger to be the voice of reason. (He rather enjoys that.) He's not solving the problem for me, he's providing moral support for the part of me that knows the truth but was systematically silenced and attacked until it atrophied from disuse. It's like training wheels on a bike. I do think there's progress, but it's sloooow. Of course it is. My emotional abuse went on for a really long time. This isn't about flicking a switch, it's about learning a skill I never got to learn, and it's about healing this old trauma of not being allowed to trust my own reality.

[Kizzie]

Hey Sasha - I was just wondering if asking for validation/confirmation is a new thing?  I ask because like Cat I get my H's opinion on things all the time.  I check things out with him or run things by him because I trust him. So if you are checking things out perhaps part of it is having someone you love and trust that you can run things by and get a bit of confirmation about what you're thinking or feeling.

I also find I am caught up in the researching because I want to know what this thing is that I've been struggling with for way too long, have found out finally just what it is and want to spend the time and energy on exploring.   If you do feel like you are distracting yourself or perhaps even dissociating though, it may be best to listen to that little voice and take a break every now and again.  And perhaps don't run everything by your GF and see if you can validate/confirm things for yourself so that you are building some trust in yourself.

[spryte]

Gah, I identify with this so much. For me, it's an extension of my intellectualizing defense mechanism. It doesn't help that I find psychology fascinating - but, I think I developed that fascination and passion because of my BPD mother. I remember very distinctly at a young age needing so badly to know WHY she was the way she was, WHY she treated me the way that she did. Subconsciously I'd already internalized that there was something wrong with ME but I didn't know that at the time.

So then, as I got older, not only was I looking for an explanation for what was wrong with her, but then I was also looking desperately for something, anything, to give me answers about myself - about what was wrong with me.

My problem is that I have a talent with this. I don't project onto other people...I'm usually right. I've had to learn how to keep that stuff to myself though. Unless they're paying me to give my opinions about their current emotional state, people don't generally react well to being told that they are co-dependent and have serious boundary setting issues which are why they keep getting hurt over and over again.

But, I am an information junky. I will absolutely spend all freaking day reading articles about personality, psychology, affects of abuse...on and on. Anything that has to do with interpersonal relationships...it gets seriously out of control. I'm not sure that anyone else in my life is aware of how much I do it, so I don't usually get called out on it. I did once, for researching health stuff...because I did the same thing a few years back with a bunch of health issues that I was having...which I also find fascinating, but after I talked to my then boyfriend about the 2578th thing that I found that "matched my symptoms" and spent way more money than we had on supplements, tests and other whatnots...he called me out saying that maybe the majority of my health symptoms were related to all my worrying and freaking out. (The jury is still out on that one)

I actually noticed that I would exhaust myself and overwhelm myself with information. It is most definitely an escape.

It's like the difference between "theory" and "practice". When I was in massage therapy school, we had "theory" classes, where we had to do book learning and take tests with paper and pencil. Then we had our "practical" classes, where we put the things that we'd learned in theory class to practical use, actually putting our hands on bodies.

Practical class was ALWAYS harder. I think my entire class that year was made up of intellectualizers because we were ALL the brainy, nerdy kids who studied for hours, wouldn't go out for drinks after class with any of the other classes and absolutely FREAKED when it came time for practicals. But, think about it it. When are you more vulnerable than when you're DOING something instead of just LEARNING about it? You could...gulp...make MISTAKES! You might get YELLED AT. You might get CRITICIZED. You might get OSTRACIZED for doing it wrong. - oh look...my childhood.

It's only been this last year that I've decided to take my life from theory to the practical. To stop using information as a distraction. And holy crap, I've made progress in leaps and bounds. Amazing what happens when we put all that information that we gather to actual use. 


Cat:
"Thank goodness my husband is more than happy to help. We're having so many conversations that consist of me going: "...but maybe it wasn't so bad after all, maybe my family's okay, maybe it's just me...", and him going: "nah, it isn't, your family's just really really weird", and me going: "...oh, right, now I remember", and him going: "you're welcome". It took us a long time to get to this routine, though. I felt really silly and weak for years, like I was this weak and dependent person who couldn't or wouldn't think for herself. Understanding that my FOO put me through emotional abuse helped, though. I'm now thinking that emotional abuse does brainwash us a little bit. Hence my need to verify even the simplest things."

Ug...that weakness thing. I have that too. First, it's really invaluable to have an outside person, whether it's a T or a partner, to be able to be that rational reflection for us and say, "That was not OK." So many of us, especially those of us with predominantly emotional abuse in our pasts grew up in families that taught us that we lived in Bizzaro World where pain=love and wrong=right. But then, on top of it, at least *I* was surrounded by adults who couldn't DO anything about the treatment that they knew I was receiving. They couldn't call CPS...what were they going to do? *, the one time they DID get called because of a bruise that a teacher saw, they didn't do anything and I paid for that sh*t for the next two years. But like...we're kids, so we don't know that there's nothing they can do, so all we see is this implicit acceptance of what's going on, further imbedding the idea that "it's not so bad".

And, for years, I tortured myself with...well, why was my reaction so much worse than other people's? I'm reading these recovery books, seeing much more horrific treatment than I got...why do I have all this lasting stuff...which was when I started delving into all the personality stuff, trying to decipher what made me so "sensitive".

Just the other day I was rationalizing..."Maybe she's not such a monster. She can be nice sometimes. Maybe...if I just get stronger, able to set strong boundaries with her then I can have a relationship with her and stop hurting her." (we are NC)

^^the momviruses on my hard drive are seriously dug in. I'm sure I don't need to point out all the faulty thinking in there, lol.

Thankfully...she helps me out occasionally by sending me sh*tty text messages like the one I got right after thinking that. And I am reminded...oh, no...she's crazy. It's not me. But, sometimes I still need those reminders.

[Kizzie]

Hey Sasha - just wanted to see how you're doing with spending your time immersed in all things CPTSD?  It is hard, and like you and Cat and Spryte - I too must know why and it keeps me in my head, in my heart not so much. 

Intellectualizing is not a bad first step though when you think about it imo, because we are bringing things out into the light and if it's in a way we can tolerate and get used to maybe that's a good thing. We might not feel "it" right away, but part of us is getting on board the whole recovery thing at least and that's a step forward. As long as we don't stay stuck there and move from our heads to our hearts I think we can give ourselves a pat on the back for moving forward at all.   (We need a pat smiley!)

PS - When my H's eyes glaze over I know I've been talking about CPTSD too much and that it's a good time to come here 

[Sasha2727]

Yesterday the most amazing thing happened I started going through this narrative in my head but it wasn't the normal " rehearsing conversation " it was like I finally understood what my family dynamics did to me on a deeper level and why I feel unsure and shaky. I felt JOY , I smiled for like 10 minutes driving home from work. It dawned on me then that I hadn't smiled due to just being alone in my car in probably a year or more. I think I let go of some repressed emotion! I felt lighter and happier also more present the rest of the night! It wasn't until recently I really understood that for me ruminating , rationalizing , rehearsing conversations , obessing in general are all methodes of emotion regulation or suppressing them perhaps. It serves as different things, sometimes I obbsesse to get away from abandoment fears, other times to avoid unpleasant feelings of failure and much to my own dismay even success. It gets crazy and feels like a non euphoric version of hypo mania. One thing I hope to let go of is the urge to " label " everything. I have to remind myself that grey area exsists and not everyone who projects , blame shifts , avoids , gets entitled has a PD. Although that's hard when you have always unknowingly gravitated toward that kind of thing. But the time it takes me to research does cause problems. It needs to be in check but it's so hard! It manufactures chaos and sometimes convinces me of untrue things!

One useful thing I think anyone could apply is this if you have trouble discerning your feelings from thoughts or musings be your own shrink! Ask outloud ( in private b/c the last thing we need is someone accusing us of a pd trait that we then would research lol) ask out loud " what am I feeling ?" Abd wait for an answer in your head! If the answer is mocking or shaming disregard it , and ask again " I'm asking my hug herself not the inner critic, what am I feeling right now?" Then if you get a " feeling word " ask " why " that's what set fourth my release yesterday!!!! It was so special! I finally admitted to myself that my mothers antics and favoritism of me where her way of punishing/distancing herself from my step father. I wasn't allowed to love him even though to this day he is the most consistant figure in my life

[Kizzie]

Hey Sasha - I didn't actually edit your post, I meant to hit "Quote" and hit "Modify" by mistake - sorry!

Yesterday the most amazing thing happened I started going through this narrative in my head but it wasn't the normal " rehearsing conversation " it was like I finally understood what my family dynamics did to me on a deeper level and why I feel unsure and shaky. I felt JOY , I smiled for like 10 minutes driving home from work. It dawned on me then that I hadn't smiled due to just being alone in my car in probably a year or more. I think I let go of some repressed emotion! I felt lighter and happier also more present the rest of the night!

Yay you, that's a lot of progress!