Posted by shar on September 18, 2000, at 14:25:34
In reply to Re: Marriage Anxiety, posted by roo on September 14, 2000, at 12:23:44
It seems like your analysis of the situation is right on. The trauma you experienced at a young age, when you were literally helpless to take care of yourself, can indeed make trust a major issue later on.
Usually, the coping strategies developed at that time will stay around unless we work to replace them with something else. I think the goal would be for you to learn to mother yourself, something I'm working on.
That means you can look inside yourself as a whole person for guidance (not some kind of "everything I do is OK" kind of love). You can grow your own internal mother who will provide you with the help and guidance you need to accept yourself and live your life and be ok with differences you have with other people.
If you had had a nurturing childhood in those early years, you would already be able to do that. Since you didn't, you may want to work on it.
The problem with getting nurtured from without, or getting a sense of "I'm ok" from outside yourself, is that when the nurturer leaves, so does your sense of "I'm ok" or "I'm lovable." It's wonderful to have someone to take care of you at times, but I would encourage you to look inside and find yourself, and hold on to yourself, and don't become a pretzel (change) so that your external nurturers won't leave.
I also encourage you to get the tape "Warming the Stone Child" by Pinkola-Estes. It has a Jungian approach to abandonment in childhood, and I think every child who was left helpless to fend for themselves should hear it. There are many, many wonderful examples in the tape, and had me going, "oh, yeah" so "that's what that behavior is about." Plus, it's hopeful.
Once you get out of your head (analyzing the situation) you can start feeling, and that's where the work usually is. My therapist encourages me to express anger, fear, etc. that I feel toward her (and love too). She may not like it, and we may have rough times, and I may feel afraid...but I know she won't abandon me and we will follow through on these things. If she doesn't like something I say, the work is not to make her like it, but to realize she can have her own response to what I said or did, and still love me, and not abandon me. And I can stand by what I said or did, because it was "the real me" and know she dislikes something I did, or know that she knows I'm angry at her, and I'm still safe. She doesn't want me to change or give up my feelings, she sure isn't going to change or give up her feelings, and we will still have an ongoing, caring relationship.
Well, this is way too long!!! Best of luck to you and your internal mother.
Shar
>
> Cynthia,
>
> Thanks for your reply :-) Yes, I'm seeing a therapist,
> but we don't seem to be making a whole lot of progress
> on the issue. Of course these things take time, and
> I'm not the world's most patient person. She thinks
> it might be related to my not liking to need people.
> Fear of "neediness".
> My _possible_ ptss trauma--not sure if it would qualify
> for that or not, but between the ages of 2 and 4
> I was in a religious commune where I was pretty
> neglected (physically and emotionally) and didn't
> get to be around my parents very much. The biggest
> part of the trauma came from going to a month long
> camp (when I was 3) away from family and really
> physically neglected (remember sleeping in a urine and
> feces saturated sleeping bag, outhouses with shit and
> flies everyplace, covered in infected bug bites,
> pink eye, etc.).
> Someone told me today that if a trauma of some sort
> happens at that particular age--when you need a lot
> of nurturance, but also your beginning to develop
> your independent identity, it might result in either
> becoming really "needy" or overcompensating by being
> overly independent and being really afraid of being
> "needy". I think I'm the latter of those two.
> I'm not sure where I'm going with all this, but
> I do know that this man was extremely nurturing and
> he almost felt to me like the mother I always wanted
> but never had...I came to really depend on his comforting
> qualities. Maybe I'm scared I'd turn into a helpless
> baby again, and go back to that awful place, I don't
> know.
> I just hate to think I have to lose the best man I've
> ever known b/c of this anxiety. Or maybe I'm overanalying
> everything and he's just not the right guy...
> I don't feel like I can trust myself on this one.
poster:shar
thread:546
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/social/20000813/msgs/565.html