People telling you how you feel

[Badmemories]

Kizzy wrote:
And we know it, we feel it in our bodies that we are being dismissed, put down, controlled.  My NPDM would just talk right over top of me as though I hadn't even spoken - I felt invisible and I would shut down. And eventually when I tried to talk to anyone about anything consequential, I froze.   I quite literally had to take back my voice in my adult years.

My Husband does this all the time to me! I actually noticed it about a year ago... he raises his voice and talks over me also! Now, I just let him talk... he is not interested in what I think or feel anyway!

[Kizzie]

When I did begin to finally find my voice (and that was quite  a struggle), I began to stop my M when she did that and tell her I wasn't finished. She would pout and look away and make it ever so apparent she wasn't really listening, but I didn't care - I was telling her it was not acceptable and that was good for me.

[schrödinger's cat]

My mother did that too. When I was a teenager, I found out that she's more likely to listen if I speak in a loud, deep voice and sound very sure of what I'm saying. (Less ilke a girl, more like a man.) It was only after being married for years that I found out that my natural voice is a lot higher than what I'd thought it was. I'd literally bent myself into a pretzel to get her to listen.

I've said farewell to my illusions that we'll ever have something like a good mother-daughter relationship. When I see mothers and daughters saunter through the city centre, chatting or having a coffee, I get sad - but that's not the old, numbing, deadening, stagnant sadness of being overlooked. It's just grief.

[Kizzie]

Me too Katz {{hugs}}

[schrödinger's cat]

Thanks, Kizzie. This kind of grief feels a lot better than numbness.

A few years ago, things just crossed a line. I realized that if I go on expecting closeness from her, nothing will ever come of it. She'll only ever feel pestered, and she'll react accordingly, and I'll get hurt. On and on and on, like a nut that's missing its bolt and is only ever turning in circles. So I thought: from now on, I'll just pretend she isn't my Mum, she's simply one of my elderly relatives. A great-aunt - someone who's vaguely benevolent, but not really interested in me, maybe even disapproving. But if it's a great-aunt, it doesn't matter. After that, when our interactions were unpleasant, I thought: great-aunt. Every time, it was like cutting myself with a sharp knife. A sharp pain that hurt a LOT, but on the whole, it was a lot better than our old misery. THAT kind of pain can heal. Numbness can't heal, at least mine can't. I was stuck like a fly in amber. It's better to make a painful break than draw out the agony.

Sorry for derailing the thread. To get back on track: my mother doesn't tell me how I feel - she tells me how I ought to feel.

[Butterfly]

Inner critic, didn't realize I had one until I heard the voice loud and clear the other day. Her voice was buried so deep it was barely a whisper. Now she is being banished using the same words as before, "you don't get to tell me how to feel"

Bmemories, uPDm used those words only a year ago just before OOTF and it felt so good to tell her she doesn't get tot tell me how to feel. In hindsight, it was part of my awakening journey.

[Badmemories]

@butterfly,

Bmemories, uPDm used those words only a year ago just before OOTF and it felt so good to tell her she doesn't get tot tell me how to feel. In hindsight, it was part of my awakening journey.