[GillyC]

Hi Benjamin...........I have been reading your book and found the comments on Projection very useful but not sure how I can perhaps apply them to my own situation.

I have just turned 50 ( have a son of 25) and have been married to the same person for almost 30 years - this is something I never thought I would achieve!I still feel so immature and need to restore the balance in my life as I get older!
I hope that by giving you a precis of my life situations, you might shed some of your expert light on what's wrong with me!

When I was quite young, my father left myself and my brother and mother, and supposedly went off with someone else . ( I have since found out that he suffered minor mental health problems ) My mother re-married and I acquired grown up step-brothers and sisters. My father also re-married and had 3 more children....this may or may not be relevant.

I could identify with the feelings you mentioned about your lost mother and not being allowed to discuss her, as this was how I was brought up...not to mention my father- he was a bad person, and I was to call my step father "Daddy". My step father was very strict and between both of them, I was told to behave properly,never let them down in front of others and never to discuss personal problems with them or outsiders and especially not my father on our infrequent access visits.

If I ever mentioned my father,I was told to remember my loyalty to the ones who brought me up, and as I grew up, I got to see my Father less and less. Even though I invited him to my wedding, he apparently never got the invite, but it wasn't me that posted them!
Sadly he died about 5 years ago,but I did get to see him after my son was born as I wanted them to know the grandparent relationship, and he also made sure that I got to know his other children so we wouldn't be strangers at his funeral (my own brother wasn't interested in having contact with his father and always took my mother's side of arguments we had.) We had a good relationship even though he became rather confused in later life, so at least I do have some good memories, photos and items to remember him by. He wasn't a saint, but I think I did love him and I can't help but think my life would have been very different if he had brought me up!

The next phase was when I was about 10 - I was away with my mother,step father and brother on holiday and I was sexually abused by a stranger in a lift - My brother had been helping him as lift attendant on the cliff edge, and he got me on my own and stopped the lift half way down - although I didn't understand what he was doing( I have since had counselling for this),I didn't like it , and later realised what he had done to me .I also felt I should never tell anyone so I just told my brother I had bumped my head and that's why I was crying when I got out of the lift.

I didn't think my family would believe me anyway so I kept it quiet until I was a late teenager and told a family friend...I don't know if they told my mother but she never said anything and probably put it down to my vivid imagination. I can see how this has affected my relationship with others, especially men, but now even though I have been married for so long,I still find myself wanting to be flirtatious with men - am I still trying to prove that I need a father figure in my life, and is that why I married a man who is a little older, and certainly looks older than me! Did I tease that man in to abusing me....was it my fault or was it that he was a predator of young girls anyway?

To bring this more in to the present - For the past 11 years I have been unable to have a relationship with my mother and step father( and also my brother) and they moved away,blaming me for the expense. I have never had a good relationship with them - as a child I was bullied, and handled very differently from my brother. They used emotional blackmail to control me even continuing this when I was an adult....telling me that no one would love me as I was so bad. ( My mother told me that my father had left because he watched me being born and it put him off her....I think that's perhaps why I wouldn't have more than one child . I suffered badly with PND afterwards and I can also remember having very vivid dreams of what happened in that lift when I was giving birth and vowed I would never go through that again!))

In my late teens I moved away to college for 3 years but had to live at home when I finished so I could save money until I got married, My "parents" still felt they should be running my life - telling me what to wear, who to have as friends, how to treat other people etc etc. . This went on even after I was married and became a mother myself. the controlling went on, and I used to suffer very badly with health problems, also feeling angry but guilty that I should treat my parents better...but having no-one but my husband to turn to.

It all came to a head one day when they started trying to do the same to my 13 yr old son and I got angry with them( which I was never allowed to do) and I told them we couldn't have a relationship and I asked for Time Out. I wrote them a long letter trying to explain that I couldn't handle the way I felt in their company and that it made me feel like a child again, and that now it seemed to be starting again with my son. I didn't point the finger as such,but merely stated how I felt when they spoke to me the way I did.

As time went on,I received a couple of letters from them telling me they couldn't believe what I had done to them and how badly I had treated them but I never replied. I began to suffer badly with several serious health problems and went on spending and debting sprees to mjake me feel better .( I have enjoyed the Spendaholics programmes and am now a member of Debtors Anonymous- paying off my massive credit card debts for a further 4 years, but thankfully not debting any more!)

To this day I have not seen them and we only exchange cards at Christmas and birthdays. Every year I long for that close family time when I see and hear others experiencing it, ( although i also know that life is not always that rosy!) but I know it can never be for me...I really don't want to have contact with them and then the guilt sets in that I should want to make thngs right.

Even though I often think I am incapable of loving anyone, I know that with other people, my relationships are good. I have some good friends of all ages, and sexes( my husband cannot understand that male and female can be just friends and this still causes conflict between us after all our years of being faithful to each other!)
I did and still do, have a bit of an issue with authority figures( bosses, church leaders, my husband! and other strong minded people etc ) and I wonder if this is where the projection comes in to play.

My husband has started to be more controlling than he ever was and I think I am seeing him as my mother and step father which is causing conflict in our relationship. He then becomes very insecure and is convinced I am goign to leave him for someone else - shouldn't it be me that thinks that? (His parents were married for over 50 years before they both died.)
I have had some help and support from people in my church, and have also studied some psychology at college, but this current phase in our relationship just seems to be constantly evolving where we just end up hurting each other and not really getting to the root of it all. I then think I would be happier just going and living on my own, even though I am committed to my marriage vows for better or for worse....and I don't want my son to have a broken family as I did even though he is a grown up himself. He says he wants to move abroad to live as he also doesn't want to get caught up in family stuff here so what have I done to him too?!

I had hoped to attend one of your seminars but I couldn't get the money together and justify what I was doing with it, and also didn't think I could cope with a long day out at the time. I will try again later in the year perhaps!
I just feel so immature and think that at 50 I should be grown up by now and able to handle family
dynamics as well as my own attitude to others- I tend to hide or withdraw if someone upsets me, and when I became ill and had to give up a job I loved,I went in to hiding and it took a long time to come back out again. I still retreat when I feel vulnerable.................does that all make sense? What's wrong with me??

[Benjamin Fry]

The answer is perhaps less than you think. Feeling childish is probably your effort at resolving your anger and resentment during your childhood. You need to feel like a child to access those feelings, which need to be released. Finding authority figures is a big help in that. The fact that you have a strong sense of commitment and a durable relationship means that you can use these feelings for catharsis rather than new destruction. Generally it sounds like you need to keep up the good work.

However you do have a pattern of withdrawal. I would challenge you to find a way to express yourself when you withdraw. Letters are a perfectly acceptable alternative to face to face confrontation. For example, could you send a copy of this post to your original family members? If not, then the reasons why not may be all that it currently "wrong with you".

[sunshinegirl]

I think it's a very common thing in our society that two people of opposite sex can't be just good friends. Even the term 'just good friends' is eyebrow raising. I identify completely with your wonderment, it's more a reflection on society than you, that both males and females think that there must be something going on, other than friendship.

I can understand completely why you retreat when challenged, when you feel hemmed in. The lack of control of a situation and the amazement that people don't understand you when you know how straight and down to earth you are.

Often most, the things others accuse us of are the things that they, the other person is doing themselves, or is aware that they may be capable of. It's not so much that they think you will have an affair, but that they are aware that it is something that could happen to either of you. Generally the person accused of this possible behaviour is the person who could never contemplate it. If a person doesnt trust themselves they sometimes reflect that onto another person, or people.

I don't think there is anything wrong with keeping the child within. As long as you are still responsible where you need to be.

I believe the older a person gets then the more they value there own freedoms, there are too many times when we have to accept other people's behaviour, with age comes the personal decision that we don't have to put up with things that we felt we had to when we were younger.

Sometimes accepting the way things are, the way people are and the dynamics of relationships, families and society, without losing yourself to it all, is not just a matter of survival, but a blessing.

Our past trials and tribulations make us all different, yet similar, stronger, yet cynical, the challenge is to forgive ourselves as easily as we forgive others.

Perhaps it's just time to put yourself first for a change.

[GillyC]

Hi again............Not sure what happend to my previous post...just got the reply quoted!
It's now been about 4 months since I last posted and I've taken on board much of what has been suggested about putting myself first and allowing the child within me to come out.

I've really enjoyed this new series of Spendaholics too, and as recovering debtor and credit card addict there have been some great insights in to why we allow this to happen to ourselves.

Unfortunately the possessiveness of my DH still continues and there have been some horrible situations in the past few weeks ( usually linked to his drinking habits and his denial that there is any problem - other than with me - typical addict behaviour!).

I have friends who tell me to move out and give him space to sort him self out - having grown up with a verbally and emotionally abusive family that I no longer have f2f contact with, I can see that it may be of use to put distance there.
However,I just feel this would make the situation worse and put responsibility on to our son, who , although old enough to handle it, shouldn't have to be party to the problem.

I am working on setting boundaries of what I will and will not accept, and trying to ignore the snide comments when I'm challenged about my alleged affairs ( which I can assure you are not remotely possible!)..........but I am also finding it hard that after over 30 years of being together , he is almost trying to keep me as a prisoner...having to ask permission if I want to use the car and go out - or offering to drive me, wait for me if I go anywhere, or wanting to know where I'm going and for how long, and then who I saw, what was said etc etc. He is self employed so is also at home with me most days!!

It's not as if I want to go clubbing....never have, and never will - but I do have girlie friends I like to meet with in the daytime, or -very rare - evenings, so I just cannot understand the treatment I am getting.
I don't know of any of our friends who treat their wives in this way - but he just laughs and says I don't know what I'm saying if I challenge this.
I understand he is feeling insecure but I cannot see how I can make that go away - surely it has to come from within? His posessive behaviour is driving me to want to leave!

I have MS/ME and am on IB so have limited income ( supplemented by some allowable and irregular extra work in a school) which is being used to pay off my debts , so going it alone is not a financial reality right now!
I would just love some outsider thoughts about how best to handle this possessiveness before it destroys me!

Thanks for reading!
GG

[Benjamin Fry]

Allow his feelings and reactions to be just that: his. You can have compassion with them, but that doesn't mean that you are responsible for changing them. You might be doing both of you a favour.