By
southernfried01
Dr. Valerie has given me homework for the next couple of weeks. She requested that I write about something, anything, that was hard for me during the day, and to correlate a rational reason for the task being difficult. She suggested I share my thoughts with a loved one, because I am not alone in this. She made me repeat the phrase “I am not alone in this” about five times during our conversation earlier today. I immediately thought of J, and he may very well be the person I send this to later tonight. For my first homework assignment, I will write about apologizing.
I made apologies today to J and A for my behavior last night. My emotional reactions were inappropriate to the events, and although the way I felt was valid, my treatment of them was not fair. Regaining control of my outward reactions to inward triggers has been a challenge for me, for as long as I can remember. A side effect of not being able to regulate my emotions in a healthy way is that later, once I do feel more in control, I feel guilty and ashamed. And then starts the spiral.
The way I felt when A called me out on not knowing what a certain football term meant was reminiscent of how my ex would intimidate me into agreeing with him, even against my will, my better judgement, and verbal opposition. I’m sure she was completely correct, and I don’t doubt for a second that her intentions were innocent and coming from a place of wanting to help. It was the way she communicated the information that triggered unpleasant and frightening feelings of being belittled and controlled. I tried to keep my composure, but I didn’t last 3 minutes until my eyes were welled up and my breathing turned shallow. I escaped to the women’s restroom to avoid certain embarrassment and forced explanations.
A ended up needing to use the restroom about five minutes later (or maybe it was just an excuse to check on me because she’s a wonderful friend) and she asked if I was OK when she walked in. I decided that there was no getting out of this one without opening up to her, so I explained what was going on. Of course, she was supportive, apologetic, and she felt terrible even though she did not do anything wrong. Later, I felt guilty and ashamed that my emotional reaction had negatively affected my friend, and I became worrisome that our friendship would suffer. I needed to talk it through and organize my feelings, and J is the very first person I want to go to when I feel like I’m in a crisis. As it turns out, I managed to make the evening even worse.
With J, I sent a text that I regretted a very short time later. I was on an emotional roller coaster already, and when he implied that I was essentially over-reacting, quite frankly, it pissed me off, so I reacted. He had unknowingly invalidated my feelings, and instead of explaining further and helping him to understand where I was coming from so he could better help me, I shut him down and abruptly ended the conversation.
I sent a follow-up apology by text that was genuine, but I still felt as if the damage had been done and there was no going back. Then the shame and guilt kicked in. To top it off, his response did not offer forgiveness, which of course, I overanalyzed in my heightened emotional state, and I began to panic and experience feelings of potential abandonment that were irrational, but very real to me nonetheless.
Obviously, A and J aren’t going to end their relationships with me over what happened. They are strong people, they care about me and they value my presence in their lives. Still, the fear of losing them was real in my mind, and I felt it until they accepted my apology today.
I suppose that fear is the result of my ex emotionally abandoning me at the drop of a dime. Whenever I made a mistake, spoke to him in a way he didn’t approve of, did not want to sleep with him, or just generally displeased him, he would withhold communication by giving me the silent treatment and hiding my cell phone, refused to give me affection or touch me physically at all, denied money and took my debit card, took my car keys, and threatened to leave me and take my child and all of our money with him if I did not fix the error of my ways. These abandoning behaviors would last for days, until he was sure that I would comply.
Apologies were not accepted by him, and he never forgave me for anything. He believed that apologies were worthless and that I should do what is expected of me the first time, all the time. This is just an example of a tactic he used to control, intimidate and manipulate me, and so that I was dependent on him and him alone. I learned to avoid apologizing, because when I apologized, it displeased my ex, and that never turned out well for me.
A and J are nothing like my ex, but apologizing was still difficult today. I had to apologize to them in order to move forward, so I worked through the anxiety and awkwardness I felt, and of course they both forgave me and all is well.
.jpeg.9e51fc76d550cdc88a6cec4561b42281.thumb.jpeg.1eb0b75f29f7bbcafa89a17cb0f3ec4e.jpeg){kind=avatar}
By kindofokay
By Go Ask Alice
By iwishididnthaveanhedonia
By southernfried01
