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MoxieDoxie
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Default May 26, 2019 at 07:23 AM
  #1
So my therapist wants me to pay attention to the messages of my mother in my head but I just do not recognized them. Not like I hear her voice. I never remember her yelling at me that I was worthless or not good enough.

There is one running theme for me. That I do not have anything to offer anyone like in intellectual, skill or talent and all I have is my body. Now that I am older, menopausal and having problems being as lean and fit as I use to I feel worthless and do not want to be seen. My relationship with food is getting worse. I also feel I am not worthy of his care and kindness because I do not look a certain way. But that is not my mothers message.

I have until Friday to figure this out as that is when my session is.

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When a child’s emotional needs are not met and a child is repeatedly hurt and abused, this deeply and profoundly affects the child’s development. Wanting those unmet childhood needs in adulthood. Looking for safety, protection, being cherished and loved can often be normal unmet needs in childhood, and the survivor searches for these in other adults. This can be where survivors search for mother and father figures. Transference issues in counseling can occur and this is normal for childhood abuse survivors.
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Default May 26, 2019 at 07:57 AM
  #2
For me, the worst messages were not the spoken ones (and I did not experience emotional abuse and put downs in the way you describe) but what I learned I was supposed to do. The silencing that went on without anyone saying I couldn't talk about it or even acknowledge it to myself or act as if anything had happened at all. Someone I worked with once said, "I was taught not to flinch." I thought, me too.
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Default May 26, 2019 at 08:16 AM
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I could not ask for help as I could not describe what was actually the problem I need help for and I was so afraid of my mother. The fear kept me silent. I obviously asked for help as an adult by finally seeking therapy at at 45 but I still have problems asking for help for fear of retaliation, rejection. I think that is why I am always so reluctant to email my therapist or contact him when I am feeling like I need help. I fight a that part so bad it becomes an overwhelming emotion that I want to hurt myself. Anyway I do ask a little more than I did in the past.

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When a child’s emotional needs are not met and a child is repeatedly hurt and abused, this deeply and profoundly affects the child’s development. Wanting those unmet childhood needs in adulthood. Looking for safety, protection, being cherished and loved can often be normal unmet needs in childhood, and the survivor searches for these in other adults. This can be where survivors search for mother and father figures. Transference issues in counseling can occur and this is normal for childhood abuse survivors.
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Default May 26, 2019 at 08:16 AM
  #4
My parents were not abusive but I would have no idea what the therapist meant by that sort of thing.

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Default May 26, 2019 at 08:44 AM
  #5
For me, too, the messages weren't the spoken ones but what was in my feelings, how I responded, before those feelings got shut down, numbed out, or cut off. Rejection, disrespect -- those behaviors from parents or significant others resulted in me feeling things about myself that I still have trouble putting into words.

I understand about not asking for help, too. I didn't know, haven't known, exactly what to ask for help with, either, although I did go to therapy for "help" for years. That information was stuck in the shut off feelings, along with anger and sadness and etc.
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Default May 26, 2019 at 01:41 PM
  #6
I'm not sure what you are asking in this post as I'm not sure what your T is expecting by having you "pay attention to the messages of my mother". Like others have posted, the messages I identified were not spoken ones but more narratives that were created through many different "minor" comments and actions that occurred over my childhood that I combined to form an understanding/narrative of myself.

One narrative was that I was always fat. I don't know when this narrative became my narrative, I remember being in high school/college with it. I took out my baby book that had my weight/height recorded at different ages until I was 15, my memory of different things that gave me some perspective of potential weight at ages up to 20... and then my school pictures throughout my entire childhood to figure out a BMI at different points in my childhood only to come to find that it wasn't until I was 14 that I technically reached overweight per BMI charts and in 5th grade when I was put on my first diet, I was technically on the lower line of the BMI chart, headed towards underweight.

So where did this narrative come from and who's was it? Going into therapy, I had known that my mother considered herself fat as a child until middle school. Through discussions with my mother as I processed elements of my childhood in therapy, I found out that she'd restricted my eating from early childhood on for fears of me becoming fat.

My mother never told me I was fat... directly. More the usual comments of how I'd look cute if only I lost... or that doesn't look good on you at this weight. The bottom line is - this was never my narrative, it was my mother's. I'm pretty sure it wasn't a realistic view of hers either.

There is also some element of this narrative that if I lost the weight, I'd have friends and be happy. I was (am) a shy individual, an introvert. My mother is an extrovert. In her story of being overweight, she talked about losing the weight because something happened in middle school that made her sick to her stomach whenever she ate so she stopped eating, she lost the weight and got friends. I believe this element of my narrative came simply from my mother retelling her story as she saw it.

It seems to me that you know the narrative that is there or elements of it at least. Perhaps rather than trying to find an instance of when your mother might have said those words, it might be more about trying to find the little things (said, done, and not said or not done) that when added together you interpreted her statements and actions in such a way that built this narrative.
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MoxieDoxie
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Default May 26, 2019 at 04:01 PM
  #7
He said it wasn't actually messages I heard my mouth tell me or shout at me. I have feelings that are hard to put into words as well but. I was afraid to express how I felt for fear of her so as an adult I had a hard time naming what I feel and I would just explode into rage or just get suicidal or self harm over extreme feelings I do not understand internally. With my ex-T I remember us working on being able to tolerate my internal world. I am still not sure what I am going to bring into session on Friday.

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When a child’s emotional needs are not met and a child is repeatedly hurt and abused, this deeply and profoundly affects the child’s development. Wanting those unmet childhood needs in adulthood. Looking for safety, protection, being cherished and loved can often be normal unmet needs in childhood, and the survivor searches for these in other adults. This can be where survivors search for mother and father figures. Transference issues in counseling can occur and this is normal for childhood abuse survivors.
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