Maladapted High Functioning Survivor

[movementforthebetter]

I'm finally writing an intro since I don't know where else to put this. Thought maybe someone else would be able to identify. It's pretty long!

In my life I have usually suffered in silence. My pain tended to seep out in self-destructive ways. But my self-destruction has always been "careful" and had limited impact on others. I've almost always imploded and only rarely exploded with my behaviour. All of it due to the abuse hat trick that started from the time I was born.

Implosion started in about grade 3 when I stopped doing homework. I also wouldn't practice piano. My parents were seperated & never sat with me to make sure I was doing these things. They fought all the times when they were together. I remember trying to practice when they were yelling. I hated it. And I didn't feel safe with anyone so I never talked about it to anyone. I just stopped doing the homework, stopped practising. Eventually quit piano lessons.  I was tested to see if I was gifted but came 2 points under. I don't know if teachers suspected what was really behind my lack of effort or not. I probably would have gone to higher level classes if I had been supported at home. I spent a few adult years angry that no one intervened but now I think even if anyon suspected anythung their hands may have been tied, especially since I couldn't talk about it. The only attention my mom tended to pay me was when she would pick at blemishes as I hit puberty. So that was a "life skill" she taught me. Also cooking so at least one thing was useful.

My comfort came from being alone with books or music. I spent a lot of time outside. I wrote lots of poetry. I also found comfort in food. Starting in junior high I would eat alone. I was also bullied at this time so it makes sense that I did these things to escape.

The lack of discipline continued until my first attempt at college, when I couldn't manage my depression any more. I flunked out in the second year, which was also the year I moved away from home. Up till then I had passed with high marks in courses that relied more on knowledge. My parents told me I would never make money which my skewed perception internalized as I will never succeed. Still I didn't know anything was seriously wrong with me because I hadn't had enough exposure to healthy families or people. I couldn't manage work, school, and pleasing my parents, but counselling and drs were for suicidal people, not me. I was fine, the world was wrong. 

After college I just worked and at work I had my first panic attack. I ended up going on medical leave and never went back. I went on welfare and had my first go at therapy (group therapy) and that had mixed results. I felt like I wanted to get on with living but hadn't actually been taught any skills. Just reccomended to read Feeling Good and use it as my guide. Eventually I went back to work but I wasn't better.

All of this is really glossing it over. There were deaths, relationship changes and other traumatic life events but it'll take to long to detail all of that. Life happened.

Off and on I went through periods of binge eating. I finally left a very complicated relationship with a partner who had multiple health problems. I had been his caregiver and it was eating me up and I was eating my feelings. I moved to my dad's for a few months, realised I had to teach myself discipline, and then moved out for good.

I got jobs and worked up to better jobs but I hated them all within a year. I know now it's because I had no coping skills. I was dating during this time and that was also a mess. I ended up getting into a relationship full of red flags I ignored and moving across the country. That was 9 years ago. Right away problems started.

My first boss here was like my uBPD/NM and it was the first time I was aware I was suicidal. I lost the job due to poor performance. I thought I just had to keep trying harder so I got better jobs and worked harder but still couldn't manage them. I had burried my awareness that I didn't want to live like this, burried it deep. I never told anyone about it until years later because I didn't want to end up in hospital. I had good, high-level jobs but I was so unsatisfied. Then my dad died and I had no emotional support. I was working while my partner went back to school for his dream job. I wanted him to focus on school. But I hated my work and wasn't happy in the relationship. I resented him. I turned to meditation and it helped a little. A couple years later I went back to school and graduated by force of will with honours. But I was depressed the whole time. I didn't feel supported in the way I needed to be. And I could never allow myself to relax.

My explosive behaviours have been cheating at times I had no emotional support and anger management issues that have gotten better over the years. Otherwise everything has been a swirling vortex of internal chaos that made me unreliable and irresponsible for many years. I drove people away or I left. Then I got better at fixing my messes but not myself. I made good friends but still couldn't figure out what I was missing.

So, after all of that here I am, in therapy and hoping I can salvage my life and still thrive in time to plan for retirement (maybe) and the inevitable caregiving my M will require. I've made it pretty far in life but don't have much to show for it. I've been high functioning enough to stay out of serious trouble, but maladapted enough to never be content in life for long. I'm working to change what I can.

[Kizzie]

Hi MMFTB and a warm welcome to OOTS     

I am  turning 60 in a couple of days and hope you will take some comfort when I say that it's never too late, it can and does get better, and it's worth the effort and time recovery takes, you're worth it. 

[movementforthebetter]

Thanks, Kizzie, I am so happy I found OOTF & OOTS. Literally life-changing and probably life-saving.

[Three Roses]

 

I'm sorry to hear about all you've gone through. Glad you're here, tho!

[Boatsetsailrose]

Hi movement for the better
When I read others story I can feel the exhaustion of it and then I remember my own story and the exhausting journey it has been. Like battling a heavy wind up hill - surviving yet ....
A deep sadness has arose in my this past yr at times - of 'how my life could have been ' what I could have been ' but then I remember this is my life and despite mental, emotional , spiritual and social difficulties I'm here ... ( I have wondered if I have had some kind of 'midlife crisis
Quote 'I've made it pretty far in life but don't have much to show for it '
Yes we have made it far and it may be not where 'I think I could be ' or 'how it could have looked ' but the growth does continue and the hope is good -
I came off anti dep this yr and had such a bad downturn - I'm more stable now ( back on them). During this time I found myself really soul searching and  surrendering it was quite an experience ...
We can thrive we are survivors ...
Starting from now we can reclaim more

Thank u for your thread I really identify

Today I have some time to myself - I am going to mediate , sleep maybe do a little art ... Just for today I let go of the 'fixing myself '
We are perfectly where we are we are perfectly enough ... The mind may say different
Today no fixing no binging no looking out - being with me and learning I can be kind to me

Best wishes

[Gentian]

I can really relate to this.  Thank you for sharing it.   Do you mind clarifying what you meant when you said that you now know your struggles with being miserable at jobs were due to having no coping skills?  Have you identified and/or learned any in particular that have helped? 

[I am a tree]

O my goodness! this sounds so similar to my life story too, wow. You are so brave to share it all.  I love that in all your choices you never choose to lash out and hurt others. That shows such strength of character.
I have just joined the site but I am sending you good vibes and hope you are able to laugh a bit everyday. Humour and art helps me otherwise I would explode.  xo

[Three Roses]

Hello and welcome, tree! We're glad you've found your way to us! Sounds like you're feeling the way most of us have - so relieved to find we are not alone in this.

[movementforthebetter]

Hi Gentian,
Part of what I was missing was knowledge. I didn't know about emotional flashbacks or dissociation, and that both of those things were what I was suffering every day at work. Further, I had no skills to cope with them. I have been working a lot over the last 6 months on grounding skills, assertiveness, and mindfulness and relaxation techniques. I've also been doing yoga off and on since January. All of those things have helped a lot. I was unemployed since January, though, and just a couple weeks ago got a job that I am much better suited to. I think that will help a lot, along with the work I've been doing on/for myself. Hope that helps.

[LaurelLeaves]

But my self-destruction has always been "careful" and had limited impact on others.

Yes,  I think I understand what you are saying about being "high functioning".  I was in the gifted class, and could slide by ok grades with very little effort.   SO NOBODY THOUGHT ANYTHING WAS WRONG. 

I had an addiction... but it was an addiction to fantasizing, so nobody knew.  You can't do your homework when you're off fantasizing. Now I'm 50 years old, and just being to deal with it.

I guess we have to plug away at getting better.

[White Eagle]

I wish you the very best in your hope to plan a good retirement and I also hope you will find work that gives you the joy and space you need to heal. I, too, am interested in this topic of coping skills. So often I wish I had someone to advise me what to do in a situation. Or to just explain a situation and check with someone to see if I am thinking about it correctly. I find that my hyper-vigilance is such an embedded personality trait at this point, I notice much more about situations than other people do and at times it seems like I live in a totally different reality than others do.

For example, recently I was volunteering with another person in putting on a fundraising garage sale. This other person happened to be adult child of alcoholic. Well, she began deftly stealing things from the sale and I was aware of it instantly, and continuously as we worked together. Funny, I just had the insight that she probably began this behavior around her mother, who was too inebriated to notice. Yet I have almost a psychic ability when it comes to picking up on intentions and furtive actions. I was really upset that she was sabotaging the fundraiser in this way but I didn't really know what to do about it in this small community where I live. And added to the complexity of the situation for me was my fear that kicks in when I feel emotional about something, that I will appear "crazy like my mother."