Powerless

Started by DaisyGirl77, June 20, 2021, 06:22:30 PM

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DaisyGirl77

I had a major puzzle piece click into place Thursday night & it took me until today to feel myself again.

Quick background:  My job requires a biometric screening every year.  This year they wanted us to give our waist circumference.  This was such a hard boundary that I took this way up to the national manager level because I saw no reason for this & the company we work with demanded it because "it's on the form & everything on the form must be filled out.  No exceptions."  Thursday was when I sat down & tried to figure out why this was so strong.  It was beyond "hell no, this is unreasonable" & into...??? world for me.  That's when I had my meltdown.  I realized that this powerful reaction was a trigger & I'd been living in that triggered state for two weeks (the length of time I spent escalating it) until kaboom.  It was tied to my parents restraining me while they were either spanking or beating me with a wooden spoon over my butt when they deemed me "bad".  Then, when I was already feeling shamed, ashamed, guilty, regretful, humiliated, & angry over it, I'd be told that "maybe next time you won't do it again."

This whole piece boiled down to this one word:  Powerless.

My entire childhood, I was powerless.  Mini Daisy fought SO HARD to get out of their grip in that above scenario & never could.  I felt trapped, too.  They kept secrets from me (important information re: family events that I never found out about until AFTER they had their fun day without me).  I had a voice but they never heard me no matter how much we fought or I yelled or innocently saying something then having my parents put words I never said or meant based on that in my mouth.  Powerless.

And now I know why I'm so quick to anger.  Why I'm so protective of my body as it is.  I know why I turned to food for comfort.  Why I have such a huge resistance (maybe a fear?) of working out.  I know why I have all these terrible coping mechanisms, & it's all because I felt powerless.

I just don't know how to feel powerful again with some of these things, or how to tame my anger so I'm not going from 0 to 100 in a half second.  But at least I have the beginnings of how to fix me now.
I lived with my dad's uPD mom for 3.5 years.  This is my story:  http://www.outofthefog.net/forum/index.php?topic=59780.0  (TW for abuse descriptions.)

"You are not required to set yourself on fire to keep others warm." - Anonymous

NC with uNM since December 2016.  VLC with uPDF.

notrightinthehead

I am so sorry.  My heart goes out to you.
It is so great that you realized that you have arrived in the adult world. You are strong now.  Very strong.  You might still feel powerless but it is like the adult elefant in the story - you only believe that the little chain can hold you - you have long outgrown it's power.
You might want to try this: Whenever that feeling of powerlessness rises within you think of that little girl you once were, visualize taking her in your arms, rocking her, comforting her, talk to her, tell her she will grow up strong. Tell her that she is not alone and that you are there to protect her. This helped me a lot. You are not alone in this.
I can't hate my way into loving myself.

1footouttadefog

I have two kids.  I probably only spanked them a couple or three times each.

I can remember trying to spank my youngest as a toddler and how she fought.  She was going to fight and fight and fight.  It was taking all I could do to get her across my lap and she was fighting with all her strength to keep my arms busy with holding her down.

I was mad and almost amused at the same time at the power she was displaying.  I realized that for whatever reason this was a compete and total deal breaker for her, It was offensive to her. I was violating her. 

I left her in her room and told her we would talk later.  I came back later and she was asleep she was zonked out and slept deeply for hours.

After that I was able to recognize that certain behaviors were a result of being over tired and I would send her to her room to lay down with no screen time allowed.

She would usually cry then fall asleep for awhile then be fine afterwards. We would talk about what had gone on before banishment and address changes she or I needed to make to adjust to her or our family needs or to make the household logistics work better.

I think identifying the feelings and memories that go along with the triggers is the beggining of processing them and eliminating or reducing the trigger.

I hope you can find yourself better soon in this regard.

I am angry about that level of biometric surveillance at your work place.  Yuck!!!


DaisyGirl77

I'm so sorry for the delay in responding.  Life interfered.

Not Right:  I've tried that several times but it doesn't seem to work very well.  Or maybe I need to keep doing it until I'm convinced of it.  IDK.  But thank you.

1 Foot:  Your daughter sounds a bit like me.  On behalf of your daughter, thank you for listening to her.  My parents never did & they minimized me to such a degree that I'm still working through the effects this had on me.
I lived with my dad's uPD mom for 3.5 years.  This is my story:  http://www.outofthefog.net/forum/index.php?topic=59780.0  (TW for abuse descriptions.)

"You are not required to set yourself on fire to keep others warm." - Anonymous

NC with uNM since December 2016.  VLC with uPDF.

1footouttadefog

My spouse at some point started going from 0 to100 on anger scale in a second. 

He now takes a medicine used for high blood pressure called Prazosin. It attenuates his adrenaline response so he does not walk around in flight or fright type of brain and body chemistry. Previously he was filtering everything through a "fight" filter. It also helps with his sleep and nightmares as a bonus.  Hypertension can be about more than high blood pressure it seems as he does not have  the high blood pressure part of hypertension accept when angry.

If your situation persists even after you are working on the past trauma issues perhaps you might explore potential physical health related aspects with your physician.  Many endocrine issues can also have similar or overlapping symptoms.

Take care of you, be strong.