Always on high alert...a conditioned response?

[St. Adler]

I am new here, and in my welcome message I gave some background that lead to my current no contact situation. I will just briefly summarize here again.

I tried for years to escape my family of origin. I tried all possible avenues to salvage a relationship with them, but finally set some proper boundaries nearly five months ago. They did not take well to it, and I had to do it again. And since then, my extended family has been (consciously or unconsciously) doing the flying monkey act. I have had an aunt send me a message saying that she prays that God will lead me to go and see my parents as they are withering away. She has no idea of the dynamics of our relationship or the years I have spent trying to reconcile with my parents after the abuse suffered in their home.
I have just recently started to block people from contacting me that have proven to me that they don't have my best interests at heart, but I still feel exposed. Every time I check my phone, I am anxious about the possibility of getting a message that I wasn't expecting. I know I should expect backlash, but some days, just getting up and going to work are major accomplishments, and I just don't have it in me to deal with messages from people that touch on the topic of toxic family at all.

Since I have created some space for myself, I have recently also been able to start to deal with many of the abusive things I experienced in childhood, I have started to see how I have abandoned myself and my inner child, and now that I am starting to believe my inner child and listen to what she has to say, it has been extremely painful. I am in therapy at the moment, and I have very supportive friends and soul family, people who have become more family to me than my FOO ever was.

I feel a deep sense of loss from losing so many of my relationships with family members due to going no contact, but I know that what we had was at best not close to love, honesty and integrity...things I feel should form the core of relationships.

I feel like I want to just block all extended family from contacting me, but I worry about if someone should die...but if someone in my extended family dies, I still wouldn't attend funerals anyway. I guess these thoughts and feelings (mostly fears) come from childhood conditioning. I want to keep my younger and much more vulnerable inner self safe and at the same time become less reactive to messages that could possibly upset me. I would appreciate some support or input from anyone who has been through this already.

[notrightinthehead]

Your NC is only a recent development. Be patient and kind with yourself. It would be early to expect not to be triggered by anything that reminds you of your family. Quite the opposite: expect to be triggered and unbalanced by anything that brings back the memories of childhood abuse. Then go into your therapeutic state and soothe yourself. Listen to the painful memories that come flooding back, comfort yourself, tell yourself that you are safe now. And check the time it takes for you to return to a balanced, comfortable state. With time your recovery should be faster - instead of a week, only three days, then one, eventually a few hours....the shorter the time of recovery from being triggered, the more advanced your healing.

[St. Adler]

That is very helpful, thank you. Embracing the triggers, rather than trying to avoid them is a big part of the process. I try to deal with each trigger as they come, and have blocked people that I just believe are incapable of understanding or that have been on the attack emotionally. I guess I just also need to lean in more into trusting myself and doing what is right for me. Navigating this process is extremely hard!

[Maxtrem]

Hi, I'm sorry you feel lonely and unsupported by your sibblings. A lot of people in your situation feel like you, because it's easy for parents with a disorder to manipulate those around them to look like a victim, when the real victim is you.  The worst thing is that these people manipulate as they breathe, so they often succeed in turning others against us in order to maintain the FOG. Every time my mother uBPD doesn't immediately get what she wants from me she starts her smear campaign and says that everyone thinks and says like her. The worst part is that I am financially and professionally successful, so she thinks she has been a good mother to get me there. I want to congratulate you for succeeding:  "starting to believe my inner child and listen to what she has to say, it has been extremely painful". It's extremely difficult to do it, personally I'm still unable to do it, I just understood it in a rational and intellectual way. It would be one of the best way to heal (according to Alice Miller). Your journey is really impressive, I want to congratulate you for that. You understood from a rational point of view what was wrong and you found your true self. Personally, I'm still looking for my true self, but I think the false self has taken over for a long time.

Feeling on hight alert, a lot of people like us have been feeling all our lives, so it can take time to fade, especially since anxiety is a way our body has to tell us to stay away. My therapist also told me, there's almost no chance that our parents with a personality disorder will change, so it's up to us to force the change. And in that change, you have to choose yourself. You seem to have done that, and I congratulate you on it.

[treesgrowslowly]

Your post really brings me back to that time and how glad I was that phone numbers and emails could be blocked so that their intrusiveness could be blocked.

Always feeling on high alert is the pits. A tough part of the process that I remember well.

A couple of questions based on what I've learned about the period following NC:

Were you a caretaker to some of these folks? Did you help them with things in their lives? Sometimes the feeling of high alert is after leaving people who were dependent on us.

We can have anxiety that is tied to the way we played the role of caretaker for someone. Especially if our parents are PD. We were on high alert so early and so often as children of unhealthy parents that when we go NC we can feel quite a confusing type of loss.

Therapeutic support can help us as we recover from this.

Second food for thought. Are you feeling disoriented by being -finally- at a safe distance?

Wondering if we truly are safe can put us into high alert after leaving a stressful situation.

Going NC is a process and it got easier with time because the more I "blocked" people the more space I had and their ways couldn't get to me.

I put blocked in quotes because that is one way to look at it. What I see now is that Saying no to someone is because we're trying to say yes to ourselves. And in relationships with relatively healthy people, there is some understanding of that. As you are aware. The relationships in our FOC can handle us saying no and having boundaries. Our FOO lost that and we can't fix them. We can only fix our selves.

I learned over time to accept that I was born around people who are not healthy.  and we get to a point where we have to connect to therapy and a family of choice as you are doing. It was extremely hard I agree. It gets easier.

It got easier for me because I could look at my experiences with the FOO through a new lens the more my NC provided the space..I could review the times I spent with them, the people i wondered if i would attend their funerals or not, and recall how they behaved, and see with new eyes, the energy I had already given them.

It took me a while but I kept at it. I blocked them and blocked again when new numbers popped up. Your message reminded me of that process. I think you can trust yourself.

[St. Adler]

@treesgrowslowly - thanks so much for your input. I really appreciate it! I was the caretaker and mother for my mother. I took care of her emotionally and physically when she was ill. I feel like I mothered her a lot and that I was the only person who could see the abusiveness of my father towards her. In her own way, I find that her legacy in my current state is one of always expecting things to go wrong, never feeling safe, always being anxious. These ways of behaving were so deeply entrenched in her and I still worry about how she is coping with my non-contact, even though I know I should get out of their business and into mine, as I abandon myself when I worry about her.
I agree that therapy is such a huge support, and I am meeting up with my therapist on Friday.
I also find that with my family of choice I am very insecure sometimes, like I am not really sure if they want me in their lives, even though they have been the best support you can imagine. I also feel like I am too much for them sometimes, and I am wondering if this is a common theme on this forum between our people?
I also think that I am feeling disoriented because of the safe space that I finally have. Like everything is able to just crush over me like an avalanche now, because I am finally safe.

I am also going to adopt your viewpoint on blocking as a yes to myself and not a no to someone else, it feels more true and takes away some of the unnecessary guilt.
Thanks so much for views and thoughts once again!!

[Sweetbriar]

Hi St. Adler,

Thank you for sharing. Your experience is similar to mine, as I am fairly recent into no contact and battled quite a lot of questioning esp. last fall. I also began to feel afraid bc my elderly father would show up at my house uninvited. For months now, I've had the curtains closed and doors locked and I feel spooked when I walk around. It's not like he does anything violent, it's just I never want to be alone with him in my house because he says things that spin me.

I would say that I am often on high alert. It feels much like a past boyfriend I had to get a restraining order against. I was afraid to meet him on the street.

If people came forward and said to me, hey, i don't know what you went thru with your family, but i believe in you, that would be so helpful, but, well the outer world doesn't seem to support people who go against the grain.

I also feel, even in my friend group, not exactly FOC but good friends, I feel out of sorts. I think this is textbook C-PTSD - the part that drives survivors into isolation. I have a really hard time trusting.

I am very recent into this part of the process, so I can't say anything, except that I identify with your points and I wish us easier days ahead.

My goal is to reach a state of health and calm that I've never really known. I am going to continue to go to yoga, exercise and meditate. I am going to try to find other souls who understand, and read other people's experiences to help me when I get really foggy.

I wish you well.

[St. Adler]

Dear Sweetbriar,

So sorry for your experience, yet it does bring me some relief to hear you say..."Me too"...
I also have a hard time with what the outer world does and says, and I know deep down that it's just a reflection of my inner world, and that is the place where I need to give the approval and validation that I sometimes feel I desperately need.
I also feel out of sorts around people I choose to associate with and love. I am also starting to think it has something to do with the fact that I am learning to connect with myself still, and that maybe, when I can connect with myself more, I will be able to authentically connect and feel connected to others. It is in fact, mostly when I authentically connect that I feel out of sorts and like I want to isolate myself. And I do isolate myself. I cried when I spoke to a friend today, and as I was apologising for crying, I just got to a point where I said.."I am tired of apologising, I am not sorry for crying, this is where I am now, and I immediately felt relief and more connected to my friend. My friend also appreciated the authenticity of our conversation. I don't think we can control other people, but I do believe that the world becomes a friendlier place when we are friendly to ourselves.
You are doing great work by going to yoga and exercising and meditating. Good for you!!
For what it's worth, you are not alone, and feel free to share your emotions that you process for they really do matter and I believe in you. Hope you can believe that and just know that I also get foggy and we are not alone.
Thanks for taking the time to write to me, it means a lot

[treesgrowslowly]

Hi St Adler,

You are putting into words some of the key things I felt or sensed after I went NC.

The feeling of authenticity has been important to my recovery. What you wrote in your posts here is so familiar for me as well.

There are a lot of people in my life who dont understand my story AT ALL and it has taken years to understand that when I feel authentic, I don't want to deal with them even though they are "good people". For me the isolating myself so that I can work with myself has been key.

In reading this thread as a whole I can reflect on how being a caretaker and mother to our own mothers had this effect. For me, there were people in my life after I went NC who were not good for me to spend too much time around. They demanded a high level of tolerance from me for their immature behaviours and that made my own work so difficult so when I isolated I felt like I could express myself but around them I could not. This made recovery work extra difficult. Now that I see that I can understand what was going on there.

Even with well meaning people there are needs we have for solitude especially at different times when we are growing.

Thanks for what you've posted here.

Trees

[Adria]

That high alert feeling is very difficult.  I felt that way for many years after NC. I kept getting these phone calls of family updates from "well-meaning" aunts.  It would take me days to soothe myself after the calls.  I finally, changed my phone number. It was like careening off a cliff. Talk about feeling like the man on the moon, but I felt I had no choice.  I left things like that for a year until I could get my bearings.  Then gave it to an aunt.  Big mistake. She started the harassing calls all over again, and gave my number to other relatives that shouldn't have had it.  Some days, I feel like changing it again.

Do what you have to do to protect yourself.  It doesn't mean it has to stay that way forever. I did find that when they couldn't reach me, I could heal, and I did. But boy, oh boy, did it feel lonely.