Re: Forgiveness and letting go of the anger

November 18, 2012

> **

>

> [...]

>

I guess my question is when does the hurt stop and forgiveness comes in or

> when or how do you deal with the anger.

>

[...]

> How do you prevent the crazy from getting into your head? (the ultimate

> question)

>

This is going to get long, so if you're on board, fasten your seat belt.

These are two different questions. I'll try to answer the second one

first because it's a little more straightforward.

The best way I know of to keep the crazy from getting into your head is to

know your own head as well as you can (so you can recognize when the crazy

is getting to you) and practicing effective mental self-defense techniques.

You can use the techniques of DBT (dialectical behavior therapy) to keep

from getting " infected " by the crazy of others around you, so you might

want to Google those and take a quick look. There are other methods out

there as well, but they all take knowledge and often practice for them to

work well, so be prepared to do some studying up.

But essentially there's no absolute way to keep other people from affecting

you unless you're a sociopath (and I'm definitely not recommending that as

a defense!) People influence the people around them without fail, in

larger and smaller ways, and emotions are particularly likely to jump from

one person to another (it's called " emotional contagion " , like it's a

disease.) The best way to deal with someone who has outsized and

out-of-control negative emotions is to simply avoid them as much as

possible to keep them from spreading around their misery. It's not always

possible to simply avoid them entirely (though if you can, it's the way to

go) but you should minimize contact with them. Don't fall into the trap of

thinking that you'll be able to " resist " or " keep control " or " not let her

get to you " -- normal human beings aren't built like that. We are built to

be affected by the other people around us, and usually that's a good thing

-- but if you spend the majority of your time with disordered people you

will be warped by them, so the best defense is just not to be around them.

If you MUST be around them, use the emotional control techniques of DBT (or

any other technique that works for you) to derail your natural mental and

physical responses to another person in visible distress. Deep abdominal

breathing, holding onto an ice cube, distracting yourself, using calm and

soothing imagery -- there are a lot of helpful techniques. Read up on them,

experiment with them, and when you find ones that work for you, use them.

Again, don't assume that just simple determination to " not let him/her get

to you " will be sufficient, as it probably won't. Remember that trained

therapists who work with BPDs regularly operate in teams because the stress

of working with a BPD is usually too much for a single therapist without

support to manage, so what makes you think you're going to come out

unscathed just via sheer willpower?

I know it sounds like a lot of unfair work to go to, just to protect

yourself from someone else's crazy, but it's self-defense for your mind and

spirit just like learning how to judge the safety of a physical situation

protects your physical body.

Now on to the second question which was asking about hurt, forgiveness, and

anger. There's some debate about these topics on the list and in the

mental health community at large. I'll tell you what I think is the way to

approach it, but others have other opinions.

First of all, the hurt only stops when you stop dealing with the person, or

when you develop sufficiently good mental/emotional self-defense techniques

to be able to ward off the psychological body blows they hand out. If

their behavior didn't hurt you, you wouldn't be a normal human (again,

you'd be a sociopath, and you don't want that.) I don't think you should

start hoping that you'll develop calluses on your feelings that makes it

easier over time -- my experience has been that the longer this behavior

goes on, the MORE painful it gets, not less. You get sensitized to it, not

deadened. Again, that's normal. To stop the pain, avoid the person

dishing it out, and if you must deal with them, learn and use whatever

mental/emotional self-soothing techniques work for you. Do NOT start

beating yourself up because you " let that person get to me again. " It's

not your fault; the other person is far more determined and ruthless --

usually out of desperation -- than you will ever be, so they will win if

you fight like this, because they will under no circumstances fight fair.

Anger is similar -- you're going to get angry. Anger is a signal from your

brain (and body) that says " Something is wrong here, something needs

attention. " Again, not " bad " -- normal. Again, the best way to defuse the

anger is to walk away from the person as much as possible. If you must

deal with the person, learn how to set limits and boundaries and enforce

them. At the first sign of abuse, get out. Knowing and utilizing your own

rights and power in these situations helps defuse anger because it reduces

the feeling of trapped helplessness that generates a lot of anger. The

best antidote to anger is knowing you have options and being willing to use

them.

Forgiveness is a sticky issue because it means different things to

different people, so I have to ask: what do you mean by forgiveness? For

some people, forgiveness implies that you are opening yourself back up to

trusting the other person again and allowing yourself to be vulnerable to

be hurt by them again. For people who can't stop being abusive, this kind

of forgiveness can be a deadly trap. If someone has proven to be

untrustworthy, you should NOT start trusting them again unless there is

solid evidence they have changed their ways -- that's stupid and

self-damaging.

For me, " forgiveness " is better expressed as " detachment " or " distance " , in

which the goal is not to resume trust with the abuser, but just to stop

focusing on the abuser and the abuse with such intense anger and confusion

that it starts to haunt your mind and your life. The goal is to disconnect

from the abuser so that the abuser's effects on your life are minimized and

then hopefully eliminated. As I said above, I think the best answer is to

start by getting the abuser out of your life so the abuse is not ongoing,

because obviously it's really hard -- probably impossible -- to keep an

abuser from having bad effects on you if they still have access to you and

are hurting you. Once the abuser is gone, the next step is to try some

self-examination to determine what kind of long-term damage being in the

abusive relationship has done to you and what, if anything, you need to do

to help your own recovery.

In a lot of cases time itself is the best and only healer needed, but if

you are having trouble letting go, then therapy or prayer or other methods

like meditation may help you. One other important step to take is to

determine if this is a pattern in your life -- if you keep finding yourself

entangled in abusive relationships without understanding why that keeps

happening to you. If that's going on, you will probably need some help to

figure out what about your approach is sending signals to predators that

you are, basically, a lame gazelle on the plains who is an easy target for

a quick dinner. It might not be your approach -- you might be just unlucky

-- but a lot of people who get trapped in abusive relationships wind up in

the because they are afraid to say no, to set limits, and to be assertive,

and an abusive personality sees that lack of limits and boundaries as an

open invitation to walk in and start doing whatever their please, because

they sense there will be few or no consequences.

As for achieving distance/detachment/disconnect, the best thing for me

personally has been to work very hard to remind myself (and it has taken a

LOT of reminding) that I not only do not have the POWER to control the

other person, but I do not have the RIGHT to do so either. If I am not

willing to attack back (and I'm not, because mutual assured destruction is

not my goal) then the only power I have over the other person is to say,

" Okay, I can't deal with you when you're like this, " and walk away. The

decision to change has to be theirs or it has no hope of sticking. As long

as you still have some hope or desire of " fixing " the other person or

" making it work " or whatever, you are still connected to them. The way to

disconnect is to let go of any hopes, dreams, and desires that are centered

on " If only he/she would stop that then things would be great, " or " If only

she/he understood how badly she/he is hurting me, surely he/she would be

willing to stop, " and similar " If only " statements. " If only " is wishful

thinking and doesn't do anything but set you up for disappointment time and

again.

I know that there's a lot of pop psychology self-help books (and thousands

of crappy motivational posters) out there saying " Never Give Up! " but in

fact that's bad advice. People who know when the situation is hopeless and

are willing and able to cut their losses live much better and healthier

lives. I will quote the immortal WC Fields here: " If at first you don't

succeed, try again. Then quit. No use being a damned fool about it. "

Remember that insanity is often defined as doing the exact same thing over

and over again hoping for a different outcome -- if this is the treadmill

you are on, you need to step off, even if that feels like quitting. It's

okay to give up if you've made every reasonable effort and gotten nowhere.

None of us is God.

So to sum up all of that: Remember that you can't control or cure the

other person. Focus on what you need to do for yourself -- achieve

distance, practice emotional self-defense, get support -- whatever it takes

to stay healthy. Don't beat yourself up for getting angry and hurt -- you

are human, and that's allowed. Don't feel pressured to " forgive " if

forgiveness means that you are expected to continue to endure abusive

behavior; focus on reducing the amount of mental and emotional energy you

have invested in the bad relationship, cutting the strings, and getting on

with creating and maintaining a healthy life for yourself.

Okay, I think that's enough. I hope somewhere in there is some information

or an idea or two that will help. I'm going to shut up now.

Best wishes,

Jen H.

November 18, 2012

Thanks for sharing your story. It sounds almost exactly the same as my

situation. My mother has BPD and she also tried to break my finance and I

apart with suicide attempts, fake stories etc etc. It has been very hard

for him to de-personalise this. We are getting married in a couple of weeks

and it all has to be done in secret without her or else I am sure it will

create headlines to the tune of 'mother poisons herself at daughter's

wedding' etc etc...

I have told my partner to not take everything personally. I still love my

mother very much and I have to keep reminding myself that in her twisted

way, she is doing all this because she loves me. I know it's hard to

understand but in her head, she genuinely thinks that by stopping our

wedding, she is 'saving' me from years of trauma and hurt (which is how she

feels about her own marriage). It doesn't make it any less hurtful, any

less annoying, any less 'OMG-my -mother-is-ruin-our-lives', but it helps a

tiny bit to step into her shoes and know that she can't stop being 'BP'

just as much as I can't help being 'normal'. But the whole ride has be

mitigation and management. Plan for the worse case scenario (i.e. potential

news headlines) and hope for the best...take it day by day.

Here is a question for you from someone who is just about to enter the

marriage world with a BP-mum. What sort of things should I expect once we

are married? I assume that the 'breaking us up' part will continue? Does

anyone have any advice to share?

> **

>

> Last night one of my best friends got engaged and it was the happiest

> moment for me because I know how hard dating has been for her and all of

> the challenges and struggles she's endured to get to this place. My husband

> and I went to her engagement party with all of hers and her finance family

> and friends and you could feel the joy in the room for them.

>

> While I was super excited my husband was saddened by the whole thing

> because as a child of a NADA who spousified him when we got engaged it was

> utter hell. She threatened to kill herself when we annouced to the family

> and our friends and our entire engagement period was overcome with lies

> that she made up about me to convince family members that I was this

> horrible person stealing her own son. That I beat him, that I threatened

> him, that I was pregnant and that was the only reason we were together, and

> on and on and on.

>

> This all happened this past January so it hasn't even been a year and

> we've been married for 6 months now and things have swung back and forth

> with his family. He's been setting boundaries enforcing them but this has

> been the first time that he's realized her mental illnesses and it's taking

> time to adjust accept therapy and so on.

>

> I guess my question is when does the hurt stop and forgiveness comes in or

> when or how do you deal with the anger.

>

> On such a happy occasion for people that we love, I don't want that to be

> surrounded by sadness because we couldn't have that happy family moment and

> I don't want to influence other parts of our lives together.

>

> How do you prevent the crazy from getting into your head? (the ultimate

> question)

>

November 19, 2012

Jen

I loved your response, definitely not a rant. I have long suspected that mental

states were contageous and that ideas were a little bit like viruses. Once you

learned something, it can be difficult to unlearn it. As a KO I found that there

are a lot of specters in my mindmap which are no native to me.

Andie

>

> > **

> >

> > [...]

> >

> I guess my question is when does the hurt stop and forgiveness comes in or

> > when or how do you deal with the anger.

> >

> [...]

>

> > How do you prevent the crazy from getting into your head? (the ultimate

> > question)

> >

>

> This is going to get long, so if you're on board, fasten your seat belt.

>

> These are two different questions. I'll try to answer the second one

> first because it's a little more straightforward.

>

> The best way I know of to keep the crazy from getting into your head is to

> know your own head as well as you can (so you can recognize when the crazy

> is getting to you) and practicing effective mental self-defense techniques.

> You can use the techniques of DBT (dialectical behavior therapy) to keep

> from getting " infected " by the crazy of others around you, so you might

> want to Google those and take a quick look. There are other methods out

> there as well, but they all take knowledge and often practice for them to

> work well, so be prepared to do some studying up.

>

> But essentially there's no absolute way to keep other people from affecting

> you unless you're a sociopath (and I'm definitely not recommending that as

> a defense!) People influence the people around them without fail, in

> larger and smaller ways, and emotions are particularly likely to jump from

> one person to another (it's called " emotional contagion " , like it's a

> disease.) The best way to deal with someone who has outsized and

> out-of-control negative emotions is to simply avoid them as much as

> possible to keep them from spreading around their misery. It's not always

> possible to simply avoid them entirely (though if you can, it's the way to

> go) but you should minimize contact with them. Don't fall into the trap of

> thinking that you'll be able to " resist " or " keep control " or " not let her

> get to you " -- normal human beings aren't built like that. We are built to

> be affected by the other people around us, and usually that's a good thing

> -- but if you spend the majority of your time with disordered people you

> will be warped by them, so the best defense is just not to be around them.

>

> If you MUST be around them, use the emotional control techniques of DBT (or

> any other technique that works for you) to derail your natural mental and

> physical responses to another person in visible distress. Deep abdominal

> breathing, holding onto an ice cube, distracting yourself, using calm and

> soothing imagery -- there are a lot of helpful techniques. Read up on them,

> experiment with them, and when you find ones that work for you, use them.

> Again, don't assume that just simple determination to " not let him/her get

> to you " will be sufficient, as it probably won't. Remember that trained

> therapists who work with BPDs regularly operate in teams because the stress

> of working with a BPD is usually too much for a single therapist without

> support to manage, so what makes you think you're going to come out

> unscathed just via sheer willpower?

>

> I know it sounds like a lot of unfair work to go to, just to protect

> yourself from someone else's crazy, but it's self-defense for your mind and

> spirit just like learning how to judge the safety of a physical situation

> protects your physical body.

>

> Now on to the second question which was asking about hurt, forgiveness, and

> anger. There's some debate about these topics on the list and in the

> mental health community at large. I'll tell you what I think is the way to

> approach it, but others have other opinions.

>

> First of all, the hurt only stops when you stop dealing with the person, or

> when you develop sufficiently good mental/emotional self-defense techniques

> to be able to ward off the psychological body blows they hand out. If

> their behavior didn't hurt you, you wouldn't be a normal human (again,

> you'd be a sociopath, and you don't want that.) I don't think you should

> start hoping that you'll develop calluses on your feelings that makes it

> easier over time -- my experience has been that the longer this behavior

> goes on, the MORE painful it gets, not less. You get sensitized to it, not

> deadened. Again, that's normal. To stop the pain, avoid the person

> dishing it out, and if you must deal with them, learn and use whatever

> mental/emotional self-soothing techniques work for you. Do NOT start

> beating yourself up because you " let that person get to me again. " It's

> not your fault; the other person is far more determined and ruthless --

> usually out of desperation -- than you will ever be, so they will win if

> you fight like this, because they will under no circumstances fight fair.

>

> Anger is similar -- you're going to get angry. Anger is a signal from your

> brain (and body) that says " Something is wrong here, something needs

> attention. " Again, not " bad " -- normal. Again, the best way to defuse the

> anger is to walk away from the person as much as possible. If you must

> deal with the person, learn how to set limits and boundaries and enforce

> them. At the first sign of abuse, get out. Knowing and utilizing your own

> rights and power in these situations helps defuse anger because it reduces

> the feeling of trapped helplessness that generates a lot of anger. The

> best antidote to anger is knowing you have options and being willing to use

> them.

>

> Forgiveness is a sticky issue because it means different things to

> different people, so I have to ask: what do you mean by forgiveness? For

> some people, forgiveness implies that you are opening yourself back up to

> trusting the other person again and allowing yourself to be vulnerable to

> be hurt by them again. For people who can't stop being abusive, this kind

> of forgiveness can be a deadly trap. If someone has proven to be

> untrustworthy, you should NOT start trusting them again unless there is

> solid evidence they have changed their ways -- that's stupid and

> self-damaging.

>

> For me, " forgiveness " is better expressed as " detachment " or " distance " , in

> which the goal is not to resume trust with the abuser, but just to stop

> focusing on the abuser and the abuse with such intense anger and confusion

> that it starts to haunt your mind and your life. The goal is to disconnect

> from the abuser so that the abuser's effects on your life are minimized and

> then hopefully eliminated. As I said above, I think the best answer is to

> start by getting the abuser out of your life so the abuse is not ongoing,

> because obviously it's really hard -- probably impossible -- to keep an

> abuser from having bad effects on you if they still have access to you and

> are hurting you. Once the abuser is gone, the next step is to try some

> self-examination to determine what kind of long-term damage being in the

> abusive relationship has done to you and what, if anything, you need to do

> to help your own recovery.

>

> In a lot of cases time itself is the best and only healer needed, but if

> you are having trouble letting go, then therapy or prayer or other methods

> like meditation may help you. One other important step to take is to

> determine if this is a pattern in your life -- if you keep finding yourself

> entangled in abusive relationships without understanding why that keeps

> happening to you. If that's going on, you will probably need some help to

> figure out what about your approach is sending signals to predators that

> you are, basically, a lame gazelle on the plains who is an easy target for

> a quick dinner. It might not be your approach -- you might be just unlucky

> -- but a lot of people who get trapped in abusive relationships wind up in

> the because they are afraid to say no, to set limits, and to be assertive,

> and an abusive personality sees that lack of limits and boundaries as an

> open invitation to walk in and start doing whatever their please, because

> they sense there will be few or no consequences.

>

> As for achieving distance/detachment/disconnect, the best thing for me

> personally has been to work very hard to remind myself (and it has taken a

> LOT of reminding) that I not only do not have the POWER to control the

> other person, but I do not have the RIGHT to do so either. If I am not

> willing to attack back (and I'm not, because mutual assured destruction is

> not my goal) then the only power I have over the other person is to say,

> " Okay, I can't deal with you when you're like this, " and walk away. The

> decision to change has to be theirs or it has no hope of sticking. As long

> as you still have some hope or desire of " fixing " the other person or

> " making it work " or whatever, you are still connected to them. The way to

> disconnect is to let go of any hopes, dreams, and desires that are centered

> on " If only he/she would stop that then things would be great, " or " If only

> she/he understood how badly she/he is hurting me, surely he/she would be

> willing to stop, " and similar " If only " statements. " If only " is wishful

> thinking and doesn't do anything but set you up for disappointment time and

> again.

>

> I know that there's a lot of pop psychology self-help books (and thousands

> of crappy motivational posters) out there saying " Never Give Up! " but in

> fact that's bad advice. People who know when the situation is hopeless and

> are willing and able to cut their losses live much better and healthier

> lives. I will quote the immortal WC Fields here: " If at first you don't

> succeed, try again. Then quit. No use being a damned fool about it. "

> Remember that insanity is often defined as doing the exact same thing over

> and over again hoping for a different outcome -- if this is the treadmill

> you are on, you need to step off, even if that feels like quitting. It's

> okay to give up if you've made every reasonable effort and gotten nowhere.

> None of us is God.

>

> So to sum up all of that: Remember that you can't control or cure the

> other person. Focus on what you need to do for yourself -- achieve

> distance, practice emotional self-defense, get support -- whatever it takes

> to stay healthy. Don't beat yourself up for getting angry and hurt -- you

> are human, and that's allowed. Don't feel pressured to " forgive " if

> forgiveness means that you are expected to continue to endure abusive

> behavior; focus on reducing the amount of mental and emotional energy you

> have invested in the bad relationship, cutting the strings, and getting on

> with creating and maintaining a healthy life for yourself.

>

> Okay, I think that's enough. I hope somewhere in there is some information

> or an idea or two that will help. I'm going to shut up now.

>

> Best wishes,

> Jen H.

>

November 19, 2012

On Mon, Nov 19, 2012 at 4:19 AM, nbody01@... nbody01@...>wrote:

>

> I loved your response, definitely not a rant. I have long suspected that

> mental states were contageous and that ideas were a little bit like

> viruses. Once you learned something, it can be difficult to unlearn it. As

> a KO I found that there are a lot of specters in my mindmap which are no

> native to me.

>

Thanks Andie, I'm glad you liked it. It wasn't intended as a rant -- it's

just that I'm longwinded in general and the questions that were asked were

not simple ones with answers that everyone agrees on, so I thought I should

put that warning out there.

" Emotional contagion " is a very real thing that has been studied a lot.

Wikipedia has a pretty good introduction to the topic at (

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emotional_contagion). If you think about it,

it's actually very useful in a dangerous situation: if three people go

running by you on the street screaming in terror, you don't just want to

keep calmly walking along while whistling, probably -- your chance of

escaping whatever is terrifying them is a lot better if you get terrified

too, pump up your body's adrenaline, and start running in the directly

they're running. If it turns out to be a false alarm, all you've done is

given yourself a good workout, but if the danger is real and you DON'T run,

you could end up dead. So it's a survival mechanism developed for good

reason, and it also makes group gatherings a lot more fun if, when everyone

else is happy and excited, you pick up on it and get happy and excited too.

Of course when there's someone disturbed and/or abusive who is screaming

and wailing at you for no reason whatsoever, it's really bad, because you

start feeling like you should also be screaming and wailing when there's

nothing to actually be upset about, and that kind of stress on your system

produces a lot of wear and tear if it happens regularly, as it does when

you have a Borderline in your life regularly.

So it's a real thing, and it's worth being aware of, because I've read

postings from KOs and others who associate with BPDs who seem to think they

should be able to just ignore the frenzied BPD and get on with their life,

and they kick themselves for not being " strong enough " to keep from getting

dragged into the drama, when human beings simply don't work that way.

-- Jen

November 19, 2012

Thank you for this post. I've always considered myself fairly

observant and well-read on health issues, but have been beating myself up on

how I could missed the severity of my mother's mental illness, and more

importantly how her behaviour has affected me and my husband and children. I

had thought we could " manage " her..when what really happened was we actually

got sucked into HER reality.

So disturbing and sad, but reading that article makes me feel less guilty

about it.

_____

From: WTOAdultChildren1

[mailto:WTOAdultChildren1 ] On Behalf Of Hawthorne

Sent: November-19-12 7:13 AM

To: WTOAdultChildren1

Subject: Re: Re: Forgiveness and letting go of the anger

On Mon, Nov 19, 2012 at 4:19 AM, nbody01@...

nbody01@...

>wrote: