Care Giving

Here's a funny to start things off...

Now, onto business. :)  I forgot to mention that the past posts where I’ve been talking about “the list” all topics I’ve covered have been under the category of: Care Giving.  I don’t have much to add from the rest of my day yesterday, but I do want to put that my husband has started noticing that I’m not the same I was two months ago.  I think I’ve been taking a slow ride back down my spiral.  Our therapist is hoping to be able to see us again in June… I can’t wait.  I feel like my old self and I hate it.  Onto the list.

Say other people make the codependents feel the way they do.

I don’t SAY that other people make me feel the way I do, but I know I depend on someone else’s opinion of myself before I can define my own opinion.  I also read really deep between the lines and come up with really stupid stuff.  I KNOW it’s stupid and not true, but I feel like it’s the truth because it seems logical and then I internalize the pain.  For an example, let’s talk about my birthday dinner for a moment.  I KNOW people just got busy and they didn’t mean to forget about my birthday.  I KNOW they all love me still and would feel horrible about missing it if I pointed it out.  But I FEEL like they all hate me, that they never really liked me, that they only ever come to stuff that isn’t directly related to me, and that I’m worthless and unimportant to them… that they wouldn’t even miss me if I was gone from the Earth.

Whoa.  Right?  :)  How’d I get from a missed birthday dinner to they’d never know if I left this life.  Welcome to my personal spiral.  Everything takes this path.  Someone didn’t invite me to lunch, no one wants to go to the movies with me, Jon plays video games… It’s so annoying.

By the same token though, if I think someone is taking the effort to make me special to them, I’m over-the-moon happy.  I feel secure, loved, wanted, needed, worth something, important, and beautiful.  I wish I could just feel this way all the time, whether others felt it or not.

Feel angry, victimized, unappreciated, and used.

Ha!  See above topic. ;)  Honestly, I don’t really feel angry or victimized.  I 100% feel unappreciated and used.  I hate when people take advantage of my giving nature.

Find other people become impatient or angry with them for all of the preceding characteristics.

This topic covers ALL the topics within Care Giving.  And I think out of everyone in my life, I cater to my dad and my mom and sisters get impatient or angry with me for doing so.  I know my sisters hate my peace-keeper mentality and my older sister especially gets so mad at me.  I went to visit her once.  We ended up getting into a fight over lunch.  Because she wanted one thing, my mom another, so I was trying to keep the peace.  

Well, I got the anger.  By the time we got to the zoo, she was flinging every swear word at me, I was silently crying behind my sunglasses, and we all had a horrible time.  At that time I was attempting to be friends with my sister.  As it turns out, that was my last attempt.  I finally washed my hands of everything.  For a while I even denied that I had sisters.  Now, I won’t seek them out, but if they want to talk to me, I’ll answer and converse.  I’m done being open to that hurt.

I think my mom gets mad because I won’t confront my dad.  I just let him have all this control, then I complain to her about it.  Lately she’s been making me confront him.  It’s not as bad as I make it in my head, but I still hate it and don’t want to do it.  Someday, I will be whole.

B