[Woman_Healing]

I have parents who are seen as enormously good members of society...helpful and giving. In reality, my mother has inwardly turned agner which manifests itself in anxiety, control, and withholding. My father is too weak to leave her or stand up to her and never protected us kids. I felt I wasn't worth enough because of the withholding.

As soon as I was old enough, I was handed the role of scapegoat. I was the golden child, strong, loving, smart, talented, beautiful - so I was chosen for this role. Thinking I deserved it and was "bad", I have always done things to perpetuate my staying in that role. Failed in school, became and alcoholic and drug addict, even got major disease. Thus, I became the scapegoat for my mother's whole side of the family who are all sick like her. For years I put up with brilliantly subtle, passive-aggressive, abusive comments which were meant to cut deep. They'd watch me struggle to trust myself or speak up which I never did and they could feel superior in comparison. This plays out in all my other relationships as an adult - people see I won't speak up and they treat me badly/abusively.

When I got sober my feelings cropped up and I became so emotionally ill that I stopped sleeping at night and have had to depend on my parents for financial support. I have drag myself around exhausted for years. This continues to give my mother a way to control and the whole cycle has remained. I can't get out. I get sicker and sicker.

I did hard work on myself for 3 years straight and started healing. I wasn't sleeping yet but had tools to change these dynamices. Unfortunately, just as I was feeling better, I didn't put up boundaries with a man who has a history of violence and I had a brief relationship with him. He misrepresented himself to me and I happily settled for less because I wasn't healed enough still. I ended it quickly but my fear, trauma, and abandonment issues cropped up and I kept pulling him back in. His rage surfaced, he knew I didn't really want him, and he began to punish me. Threats, intimidation, destroyed my reputation by making public the things I had trusted him with, exaggerated facts to make me look worthless, and this pumped up his ego. The last time a woman rejected him he murdered a weak, innocent bystander and what I got was a psychological form of that murder - a thousand times more painful than physical. The intention has been to completely destroy any self-esteem I had worked for. I found myself in a very new and different scapegoat role. He and his family and friends are locals of the community I lived in and I'm not, so everyone jumped in, blame-shifting, feeling superiorly united.

I wish my father was willing to stand up for me, it would have made a difference, he's a powerful man in society. He lent no support and asked no questions about whether I was OK, etc...I know...I'm an adult. I have struggled for a whole year now. I moved away (funny - the scapegoat is always cast out, right?) and now I'm sicker than ever because I'm dealing with rage from 2 separate situations. I know my part. I know where I went wrong. But I can't heal, it's just too much. I'm hardly sleeping at all even with meds. I think I have PTSD as my dreams are awful. I can't even settle down enough to nap. I have a terrific therapist but it's not enough. I'm in a spiritual program of recovery and that is I believe where most of my answers are. Prayer and helping others helps but I sure wish I could sleep. I need relief. Mostly, I stay in all day and punish myself down with cigarettes and try to keep my moods even with coffee. I am absolutely wiped out and exhausted. I believe I will die from cancer within a year or two if I don't get some relief. What can I do?

[madisgram]

i could so identify with your thread. too long to go into but it's amazing how many things we have in common and our experiences in life. i was in intense therapy the first five years i started. it took time to heal and i still have triggers sometimes that set off the irrational thoughts in my mind. it sounds like we've both found a support system that helps too. i'm 21 years sober in AA and the journey has certainly been worth it cause i learned that i am a worthwhile person. and you are too!!! i encourage you to keep at this in therapy and your support group. it's important we shed the negative self image and replace it with true thoughts about ourselves. my T called it replacing bad tapes with realistic ones. i'm sure you have good friends. you might want to do what i did and make your own-new-family with encircling yourself with ppl that care about you and value you for being really who you are. my new family is wonderful friends. i have limited contact with my real family and have never regretted it. hope you find some help in my post.

[Woman_Healing]

Thank you. The main problem here is that I'm so sick that I can't sleep so I can't show up for friendships or relationships or committments of any kind. I'm wiped out and so full of fear when exhausted that I can't even shower or get to the store for food. I feel completely stuck and dependent on my parents, who just can't hear me. I probably need to pack my things and go to a shelter where I can start over on my own - it's all I can afford or think to do. Today I want to kill myself because I don't see a way out.

[madisgram]

can you do some brisk excercise like even taking a long walk? it will relax your tension before trying to sleep. i have the sleep prob too when i'm upset. or perhaps reading a good book before bed. you may not get results at first but keep trying. you are having ruminating intrusive thoughts i think. i call it my mind not being able to shut off for sleeping. i hope you can get past this prob. do u still see a T?

[Woman_Healing]

I can try harder at everything, I suppose. I have had a terrible time getting a therapist with my medicare so finally my father agreed to pay for one, but my mother controlled that too so it's down to twice a month.

[Woman_Healing]

The bottom line is, no walk or book is going to fix this situation. I need to speak up for myself, with both my parents and these other people. that's what my inner voice ahs told me for a long time now. It's either that, or I need to put myself out of my misery.

[mgran]

Hi Woman Healing... I'm so sorry you've got all these issues... I wish there was some way you could get out of that toxic environment. I know that giving you advice won't help, because you already know what you need to do, you just don't have the energy to do it. I knew what I needed to do for months last year, but couldn't do it till the psychiatrist got a short term team organised to help me. What I would have done without the short term intervention team, I don't know. Are there no patient advocacy groups near where you live? If you can't organise it yourself, perhaps your father might... though I understand he's also oppressed by the whole family system.

Keep coming to this website though, there are online group therapies organised in chat. I've already been helped by one such group, and I've not been here terribly long. There's always someone who wants to help you.

Remember that you did start to recover, before that disastrous relationship knocked you back. You have it in you to go forward again, but with more wisdom, perhaps, as to some of the pitfalls.

Look after yourself.

[Woman_Healing]

Thank you so much. You're right. I know what I need to do but don't have the energy. I will look into where I can find such a short-term intervention team or patient advocacy group, although I'm not quite sure what that is or whether it's offered here. I can ask my therapist.

[mgran]

Let us know what the therapist says... here's hoping it's good news.