Couch 113 - Sofa, So Good

I love my Mac and iPad. The only issue I have is there are not very many cool computer games made for my Mac.

I like Blizzard's Diablo series..which is compatible with both PC and Mac.

I read that comedian Gracie Allen once ran for POTUS. She ran on the Suprise Party.

Therapy in a few hours.
Meanwhile, my brother is putting together a new push mower for me.


Plus, plus, plus....an organization similar to habitat for humanity fixed my droopy front porch. They will be back to clean and seal both decks, paint railings and weed around the outside of the house and flower beds.

Have you tried macgamestore.com? Pretty good selection, though it depends on what you like.

I love Gracie Allen. I'm pretty sure unaluna is her reincarnated. (That's a high compliment.)

I don't play many games on ipad, or macbook or pc. Words with friends or solitaire is about it for me and games.

I like Gracie Allen too. I listen to the Burns and Allen show in the car. Jack Benny is quite funny too. And Eve Arden.

Have you seen "Stage Door"? Late thirties, ensemble cast including Arden, Ginger Rogers, Katharine Hepburn, that Ann dancer woman whose last name I can't remember (Morgan?), and Lucille Ball before she was Lucy. Pretty funny in places.

I have a slew of old radio shows on CD, some of my favorites are The Big Show (Tallulah Bankhead hosts and there are all kinds of guests like Jimmy Durante, Groucho Marx, Ethel Merman...) and Dragnet from the 50's. And a bunch of others I don't recall at the moment as I haven't lisetened to them in awhile. Lots of mystery-type programs. Need to get them back out and listen to them again.

.............

Since the kids have returned from college, we have begun closing the bathroom door when we use it. Pup thinks this is a tragic development

Yes I have - I watch it when it comes on TMC. I find it an odd but interesting look at how they pictured women in groups. I love how in the movies at that time - the women are almost always in the most impossible clothes all the time.
I like the WWII propaganda films too. Such blatant manipulation.

Ann Miller

I have never been able to abide Groucho Marx. I can read transcripts and find it funny but listening to him makes me want to club something.

Mine too seem to think something super fun (possibly meat or cheese related) is going on without them and generally come crashing through the closed door. My inside doors don't latch easily and it is hard to shut them well enough to prevent visitors. To be fair to the dogs, the cat will push the door open too and look in before wandering off - just checking to make sure everything is okay in there.

I'm not sure if I want to make a separate thread about this, but has anyone felt like their problems aren't "good enough" to be in therapy, or even that whatever happened or didn't happen in childhood isn't a "good enough" reason to feel the way you do currently?

Ok, i will explain a bit more. I am diagnosed with chronic depression...been going on for about 13ish years (though I think maybe my T thinks I have been depressed longer than that...i am not sure about that), and have dipped down lower...and come back up to baseline for me, which is basically like living in a world of grey.

But...i have felt like this for so long, that it doesn't necessarily "bother" me...it feels normal, you know?

Sooooo...anyway, my T has recently brought up that my extreme prematurity (born at 24 weeks) was a major trauma and really effected my attachment process--i spent four months in the hospital, i don't think i was even allowed to be held until about a month after I was born. She said that because my attachment process was interrupted, I have a very deep sense that I can't trust anyone to really be there for me, and has affected my relationships. I do agree that I am very avoidant-fearful, and haven't even TRIED dating anyone in 13 years.

This is also complicated by my confusion on sexuality...which i do keep avoiding talking about.

ANYWAY, the point i am getting at, is it makes me VERY angry to think that all of my current issues are due to being stuck in the NICU for a few months after I was born? That feels completely lame. I know my T isn't judging me because I haven't been abused or had any tragic losses--I should be (and am, mostly) grateful i didn't experience those things! I think part of it might be that I can't connect to this infant who had a intense few months still cooking in the NICU. Obviously, I don't remember it.

Well..i've wandered off tangent.

I'm sorry you're feeling that way, velcro. I struggle too with feeling like I have to "justify" being in therapy...

t in a little over 2 hours and today we will almost assuredly be talking about my crazy-intense feeeelings from 2 weeks ago that I kept emailing about. I've worked through them, and perhaps need to just tell her that that's the important thing here, that I worked through them, and I need to just move on from here and not beat a dead horse. I don't think I'm going to get away with that, though. I think I really pushed her limit of patience...

You are not alone with these thoughts.

Extremely high! Difference is, people (mostly family but also others) just think im dumb, not clever

Velcro et al: so whats the difference between being left in the nicu and being at home with your caretaker ignoring you until you learn to stop crying? The effect is the same; "logic" doesnt factor into it. I think you can still learn to connect

To be a comedic genius one must be extra-intelligent.

I know exactly how you feel when you say that. I have felt that way plenty of times, just in a different situation. I have OCD, social phobia, and generalized anxiety disorder. I feel so stupid sometimes, especially how they started. Doesn't feel worth metioning. So you aren't alone in that. And I know what you mean by it feeling normal. And what your t says about you not forming attachments is quite plausible. Baby's form attachments very early on, even withing the first few minutes, and you not having that for 4 months could have very well caused some of your problems. I doubt that is all of the problem, but probably some of it.

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About being "good enough" for therapy - if I'm going to invest the time and money, I think pretty much anything is good enough to be in therapy for.

Velcro, I think there is research to suggest that being deprived of touch as a child, or having neglectful parents, alters one's brain in ways that affect attachment style. I don't see it as lame if you were in the NICU for that long.

I think i are!

Not just atachment style - all kinds of learning. All kinds of brain pruning doesnt get done. Then again, maybe thats why we see connections between things that other people dont. Nature provides. The one excluded may be the one to save the tribe. That was a Star Trek TNG episode. Jordy's visor provided the technology to save a utopian ie no physical defects society.

I know logic doesn't come into play, but that's all I have! Plus, don't you think 18 years of parenting sort of outweigh 4 months in the NICU? I told my T that while I don't remember much of my childhood, from what I do remember is that I never went to either of my parents when upset (this is me being older, after 10ish or so-don't remember much before then). She said that because my attachment was disrupted, I probably didn't think I could trust them, but that seems a bit outrageous that those sort of things can be cemented in the brain so early on.
I know, but I find it so hard to believe:

If you didnt go to your parents when you were upset, then you werent parented. I thought that parents kissing a boo-boo to make it all better was just a meme - like people didnt really do those things. But i think they do. I think they do show affection. Just not to me. Thats what non-attachment is like for me.

Yes, I have heard that that's something that actually happened for some people, as well - I would have believed it to be a myth. I can't recall anything like that ever happening. If I hurt myself I would shut up about it and preferrably hide away until it was gone. If I was bullied (which I sometimes was because I was a wet blanket) it was my problem and I was certainly not going to invoke a scolding by taking it to a parent! I was a horrible child.

There is a scene in a book (Swallowdale, Arthur Ransome), where a young girl has done something mildly naughty (from her perspective extremely naughty, from the perspective of an adult hysterically funny and not naughty at all) and tells her mother about it - and feels better afterwards! I think I may have mentioned it here on these boards before. It is such an unlikely scene and it makes me wonder.

Sorry. I talk too much. And my parents did nothing wrong at all - my childhood was perfect. As I say, I was horrid.

You don't talk too much, Crocus. And you weren't a horrible child because you didn't go to your parents when you had something bad happen. And bullying is a bad thing to happen. Parents can be really kind, and parents do things like kissing ouchies and things like that. Some don't. That doesn't mean they don't care. Some just show it in different ways. Then, some parents just aren't good parents. I'm glad your parents were good. But not talking to them doesn't make you bad. Just less trustful in people than another person who trusts too much. I feel like I'm rambling. Sorry.

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