I really wanted to take Thursday off, but I had to work to make up for the sick day on Tuesday, so I toughed it out. I work from home and by the job, not the hour, so I was able to work in a 90-minute nap. I slept like the dead. I continued the inner dialogue of being loved and safe.
I was calmer on Thursday since I understood what was going on. I went back and forth slightly about whether my theory was right or not, but I chose not to question it for the following reasons:
- This answer came to me immediately after prayer, and I trust my faith. I had not remotely considered this possibility before that light bulb moment.
- This piece of the puzzle makes sense out of the last seven months of my life. Before that puzzle piece, nothing was making sense.
- After this realization, a large, wounded alter part emerged. I don’t think that is coincidence.
- The steps I am taking in reaction to this theory are resulting in healing, not further emotional damage.
Since there wasn’t much more I could do about priority #1 (that is going to take time and lots of self-love and acceptance), I moved on to priority #2 – accepting the reality that momster continues to be a threat. She is both mentally ill and of below average intelligence, so I have underestimated her – a mistake I will not make again.
The bottom line is that she knew the combination to the safe in my head to unleash the programming in this alter part. I can only see two explanations for this: either she was in on the programming when it was done to me as a child, or she is in current contact with ritual abusers who gave her the combination. (It is also possible that both are true.)
I am angry that momster is still trying to f@#$ with my head, and I will give her no further opportunity to do so. I will throw away any further letters that she sends me and tell a safe local friend about it. I am also cutting all contact with her and well as members of her side of the family. (I currently exchange Christmas cards with her sister and a couple of cousins on that side of the family.)
The good news is that this attack has removed the conflict that I have wrestled with for so long. Momster is not some innocent child abuse victim who is so broken she does not remember what she has done. She is not some wounded person that I am hurting by staying out of her life. She was a co-conspirator in trying to break me as a child, and she continues to use their tools to try to break me as an adult. I am 100% DONE with her, and it feels good to have the internal conflict resolved.
Photo credit: Hekatekris
Blooming Lotus 
What great insight and self awareness. It’s a weight off your shoulders when you start to place culpability where it’s due isn’t it. xx
Brava! That is a huge breakthrough, and I’m happy for you that you’ve been able to make it 🙂 sometimes we get stuck into believing (or simply wishing) things would have been different, and keep giving chance after chance to those who hurt us to keep hurting us, but accepting that they simply cannot love like a normal human being can…is a huge step into liberating ourselves from the emotional-slavery, the bondage that kept us from seeing how wonderful and worthy we really are.
A serious well done for all that you’ve achieved on this. What a horrible thing to have gone through for so many months.
Thinking here you are the important one – glad that you are taking care.
Our best,
Anns
Also so glad you are taking care of yourself and thankful for that moment of understanding and clarity for you, Faith. Perhaps this is a very real demostration of truth setting us free. But sometimes getting to the truth is excruciating.
You said one thing that has helped me in times when I think I’m imagining things or just plain crazy to think certain people could have done what parts of me have shown me. It’s point number 4. Healing is taking place. A fellow survivor told me once that I wouldn’t be healing and feeling less pain if I were making all the memories up in the first place. Even the littlest release from torment is, to me, a validation that the memories are real. For some reason that helps.
I am experiencing so much less torment than I had for most of my life, it has helped me accept both the past with its horror and me, as a valuable, real human being.
Again, I am so glad for these next steps you have taken. So hoping for the months ahead to be clearer. freer than ever.
Ruby
I relate sooo much to the letters. My mother had sent me one very apologetic letter in December and then recently sent one giving me advice. Both would seem innocent enough but there is always those hidden messages. And know my mother is saying whatever she can to get me to contact her, even that she is dying. I finally called her and confronted her about her behavior. She hung up on me.
I am like you, I will never allow her to try to infiltrate her garbage into my head. All hats off to you for taking this stand.
So are you going to revel the combination?
No she is not reveling the combination. This is all spiritual warfare. Don’t say things to mess w her head Michel its cruel ..faith you did the right thing.
Hey Rose.
No harm done calling me cruel. Don’t do it again without just cause.
Faith and I have a relationship that I am guessing is going on years. I know I am not powerful enough to mess with Fatih;s head even if I wanted to. There is no risk.
Even if I screw up I trust that Faith will let me know. She might just get loud. Smile
The reason I asked the question is with out the actual method used I can not really relate to what she is writing. She has in comments let me know where she is going with this so now I can follow. I expects when she does explain the way it worked more fully I can follow.
The reason I want to follow is to better understand what I call programming which seems to be different that Faith’s use of the the word. I can not know until I know the method.
It is like this at this time of year there is a flurry of activity across the board in the US. It is from the association of the summer ending and having to do to school. That is not programming. I thought it was a winter thing. It happens in areas they have not winter.
Journey on,
Michael
Hi, Michael.
I talk about it general terms in my Tuesday post. At the time I wrote this, I did not know what it was. I had a friend read the letter and walk me through the triggers in a safe way. The repeated theme was about mothers and children returning to each other, and intermixed within the letter were over 30 “trigger words” — words that my friend recognized as words that have the potential to trigger me, such as dog, kill, and pants. It also included two disturbing stories involving killing a calf and a man ripping the pants off a woman … really sick stuff.
~ Faith
Wow, Faith. Holy moly – was that the same letter you received that you felt ‘peaceful’ about? Those are extremely powerful – and one would expect – strongly offputting images for anyone. I doubt that one would have to be a RA survivor to feel extremely concerned about that. So, if this is the same letter you felt no danger signals about, that’s even more remarkable (and frankly, frightening).
I know from reading crime detection/body signal books that one of the tools pedophiles use to groom potential victims is to pair slightly dangerous – but thrilling – situations with pleasure AND with increased contact with the pedophile, because an adrenaline response strongly heightens learning at the neural level (and particularly at the level of the lizard brain). It starts small (one example was taking children on “don’t tell anyone” motorcycle rides where the thrill of physical danger and psychological secrecy was associated with physical contact with the abuser), and then escalates over time so that the sensations become fused and eventually the child is acculturized to danger enough that they don’t run/tell when the danger/pain aspect is increased and the pleasure decreased. I wonder if that might be an aspect of this letter – I can’t imagine a scenario where a person wouldn’t be frightened by receiving a letter with images like that unless you had already been primed in some way.
Or is there another dynamic at work here?
I know you’re going to post about this next week; I’m hoping you’ll consider (if you feel up to it) telling us how you felt (or what you thought) about reading those stories at the time, how feel about them now and, if it’s true that they elicited no alarm response at first, how you think that was possible.
My heavens but you are brave and courageous – and caring and generous to share this with your readers. Thank you.
There’s another thing that jumps out at me, Faith. About your descriptions of your momster as “below average intelligence”, and “mentally ill”.
A woman I know – I don’t necessarily consider her a friend because she’s got her life pretty barricaded and doesn’t let many people in, but nevertheless she’s someone I admire – described her mother in a very similar fashion. We were in a group together, so I got a fair bit of her back-story. I could tell right from the beginning that she was severely underestimating her mother, almost entirely due to what seemed to me to be a fiction: that her mother was “not very bright”. She herself is very intelligent; more importantly the things she told me about the way her mother hurt her didn’t sound like her mother wasn’t intelligent, more like she was using the appearance of being flightly to get away with it – most of her actions toward my friend were sophisticatedly cruel, but with the appearance of being unaware and bumbling. (Not to mention that her mother had been extremely violent to her as a child – resulting in serious injuries and hospitalizations.) But my friend made the decision that – even if she thought her mother was unintentionally doing this – it would be better for her to pull back from her. Of course, her mother then started pursuing. My friend finally confronted her, and her mother said something that was staggeringly cruel, and the mask was ripped off the misperception that this was all an unaware ‘accident’ on her mother’s part. And then her mother followed it up with yet ANOTHER action that was even more staggeringly cruel towards my friend.
My mother isn’t unintelligent, nor does she appear to be; however your post, and thinking about my friend’s situation, has me re-examining this. Even though my mother was very intelligent she too frequently couched her cruelty in this subtle, seemingly absent-minded, bumbling, ‘I’m not so bright so you’ll have to excuse me’ manner, that she wielded like a weapon – and a very effective weapon at that.
So I have a question: was your mother really all that unintelligent (after all she gave birth to two very bright daughters), or did her ‘lack of intelligence’ always lend itself to things somehow working out in her favour (in her mind, that is)? I’ve been reading a fair bit of criminology-related articles and blogs over the last couple of years to help me understand my mother – it’s helped me immensely (even though there is very little written or understood about female offender profiling). I’m thinking of the different profiles of killers: organized and disorganized. Disorganized killers either ‘aren’t too bright’ or are mentally ill (or enraged), and usually leave lots of clues that help apprehend them. Organized killers on the other hand plot and plan beforehand specifically to avoid apprehension. It’s generally accepted that if a killer plotted in a way specifically designed to avoid their apprehension they are not mentally ill – or at least not criminally insane. The judgement of stupidity rests partly on their success rate – unintelligent criminals usually are found out fairly quickly. If your mother’s actions resulted in her long-term public appraisal of being ‘flighty’ but not dangerous (or more likely ‘therefore not dangerous’), perhaps she’s not as unintelligent as you’d been led to believe?
As we speak my husband and I are trying to renew our mortgage; we’ve been working with a mortgage specialist who appeared to be nice, upfront and helpful, but all of a sudden when things got going started to look slightly ‘bumbling’ and ‘woops – you’ll have to excuse this’. But all of the ‘woops’ steps just seem to happen to be not in our favour. Now we’ve started to pay more attention and ask for verification at each step (including meeting with the branch manager); I’ve noticed the tone change; still more ‘bumbling’ but with a more aggressive tone. All the ‘mistakes’ still happening in his favour, however.
I’m thinking this is – perhaps – another trend/truth here that I hadn’t observed before, but will be sure to watch out for in future.
Birdfeeder,
i have noticed this same type of behavior. It is very much like the person who pretends to be poor when they are very wealthy.
There are so many different kinds of intelligence. It all depends on who is giving the test and measuring.
Back when sociology was trying to prove it was a science a study was done showing that criminals were below average intelligence. Another study was done and it was shown the low intelligence one get caught and don’t hire good attorney’s.
There is a term malingerer used to describe someone who fakes mental illness for gain. It typically is used only for those committing fraud. If you expand that to gaining an advantage it would include many people. It can be as simple as someone who just wants to be with someone and that person is a therapist. Some seem to use hospital stays to get our of working. I know some that go to a hospital and actually do work on a computer.
One thing about those that are dishonest is it does not start all at once. it builds. I am capable of this. If you pay me my the hour I will start to think I can bill for time in the pool if I am thinking about the job. That can be legit as I am a consultant. After a couple months I am stretching out the job as it is easier than doing fee work. I catch myself doing this and do not do it. I think that is the difference.
Kinda like triple billing starts with double billing.
Hi, birdfeeder.
My sister thinks momster plays up her lack of intelligence. Regardless of her “book smarts,” she is clearly manipulative.
~ Faith
Hey Faith,
Birdfeeder’s insights were very helpful to me, I now see it all over the place it is weird once you know about it there seems to be some sort of signal and the people stop trying to do it. I think it is much about not wanting to make a mistake and not want to falsely believe some one is speaking disingenuously. I think sometimes the person does not know they are doing it on some level. Maybe dissociating from it. They know the effect.
Wow~I could hear my daughters saying that to me. I feel like my hope of ever seeing them again is draining away from me and on the other hand if she is finding her path and healthy happy and loving than bless her heart and bless yours too. May love prevail~ I think we have to come to understanding, I know NOW I would have had a better life had I had the strength to say. Bye mom, you’ve done enough, when I was fourteen and just stayed in the girls home. BUT I wanted to be part of my family, so our relationship became this disgusting groveling on my part her whole life for her acceptance. No wonder everyone hated me. I discussed myself. So do what you feel you must do, but know that it will come back to you in the next generation. Always act out of LOVE.
I’ve been reading each installment of this event and waiting for the right moment to comment. I’m so shocked and horrified by what happened to you that I don’t know what to say.
I can say this: I am eternally grateful that you figured out what was really happening.
From the start I wanted to ask why you were still in touch with that woman but I didn’t want to come off bossy or insult her if that would be upsetting to you.
Today’s post has me beyond relieved!
I had to cut off all contact with my mother and it’s been over a year. Best decision I EVER made!
I’m so happy you’re safe and that you were able to draw the strength to fight that vicious programming!
Thanks, CimmarianInk. :0)
~ Faith
I am happy for you Faith, that you trusted your instincts and your prayer answer. I’m not sure why, but I have this feeling that you are going to feel a lot more liberated and easy with life having made this choice. One that you have struggled with for a long time…
Wishing all good things for you,
mia
I am agreeing with the majority here too where they are congratulating you on your insight for discontinuing. You owe it to yourself to seek better and more sound company. I would like to add one thing though. You might want to give your selves permission to instead of say forever disconnected that you still have a choice to always or never connect, OR connect if you want to make that choice further down. It should always be an option for you, obviously not the mother. I was following obvious manipulations in “Healings – 8-9-12 @ 8:28 AM” situation with her mother as well. I think you’ve both made great decisions, especially because they are yours, but I’d never want you to give up the part where it will ALWAYS be your choice to connect her or not.
Our best,
Anns
My mom says “I don’t remember that” when ‘I’ remember quite clearly. The most she has ‘admitted’ is “I may have been a bit too hard on you boys sometimes.”, which is totally under-exaggerated. I know she had her own rough past – but so did I! And largely, she gave it to me – 80% or more of the mental/physical/emotional/systematic/social – across the board abuse came from her. After all, ‘we’ were left in her hands – her oft insane hands (driven by a mind that was insane at times) – for years at a time while my dad marched off to war (to do some whoring and giving all the money he was supposed to send home to missionaries – while his family back home starved, and we wore rags a lot of the time.) 🙂 But she also mended our clothes, fed us and gave us attention; taught us a LOT about being independent – a lot of good things. Can still remember learning to tie my shoes under the table with her patient guidance. So she wasn’t “all bad”, either. We recognize that sort of thing.
That given, she is still into being a control freak, carries a gun (and will use it), still tries throwing a guilt trip or two – but we’ve learned and she’s learned: we’re “all growed up” (lol’ing, kids snickering behind our hands – not really! having fun in life is what it’s all about). But the thing is: she had a CHOICE in life whether to abuse or just discipline us in life. She knew she had been abused . . . (just musing) – and I know I would NEVER throw a tantrum at some children, not really, not like she does (or did – she still gets quite mad at them – and ruined her relationship with their granddaughter – as did my dad in some ways). And never with a knife and ‘things’. I’ll never forget her beating my brother when he was about 16 and he tried fighting back by grabbing the belt. She stopped, went, got her gun – aimed it at his head and cocked it – told him if he tried that again she’d take him down like a rabid animal – and went on to beating him again. I just sat in the kitchen chair and watched . . . bored. This kinda crap went on a lot of my life . . .
So I’m of mixed feelings buuuuttt . . . I try to forgive my mother. I don’t let her rages (and guilt trips) affect me any more. Or try to. I bow to the call of “family duty”, not love anymore. (This is to spare my brother long trips from Atlanta, over 150 miles away – whereas I live only 4.) I’ve found you can’t harbor hate & happiness in your heart at the same time, not really (or at least for me; I can’t be happy if I’m mad is what I’m saying). Hatred is a draining thing; happiness (or at least peace and contentment) another – a fueling one. So . . . we try to make peace with our mother inside our head while ignoring the one we have on the outside world, and not letting her get inside our head – even trying to help her on her outstanding rage issues! – but she’s too far gone, I suppose. Her mind is fading somewhat – sharp woman in more ways than one.
I hope you can … well, get things under control. If it means 100% avoidance, then that you should do. I know I avoid my parents, though I chose not to totally shut them off. But that’s my decision, not theirs, and is due to my ability to change my perceptions about their ‘stuff’ – and suddenly ‘take it easy’ when I feel I’m getting upset. Not 100% perfect, but we’re trying. LOL.