If I Go, There Will Be Trouble, And If I Stay It Will Be Double (Season 2)

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41:05

If I Go, There Will Be Trouble, And If I Stay It Will Be Double (Season 2)

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Once you realize that it was actually your parents' job to provide that love, to lift you up rather than bring you down — and that your narcissistic parent was incapable of providing those things — it can be actually be freeing. It’s like, “Wait a minute, I was actually incredible and amazing the whole time. I had so much to give, and I deserved so much better than what I got." On my healing journey, I created distance with my parents by giving up the delusion that they will someday change.

Meet your Teacher

Boulder, CO, USA

Meet your Teacher

Boulder, CO, USA

Transcript

Welcome. Thank you for tuning in to the Stuck Stops Here, Season 2, Episode 4. I'm LW Nolie and I'm here with Tami Atman and the title of this podcast is If I Go There Will Be Trouble and If I Stay It Will Be Double. Nothing ever comes when you're chasing. Nothing ever heals till you're facing. Too much time you made wasted. Wish I could rewind and erase it. Alright Tami, Take the wheel. Okay, Today's podcast. Low contact versus no contact with your narcissistic and or toxic parents. So on my healing journey, Very early into it, I realized quite clearly that my parents were supposed to lift me up, Not bring me down. And I realized that they were all incapable of doing those things. All three. All three of them. But that actually in a way made me feel better because immediately following that I started to realize that, Oh, I'm not so bad. I actually have good things to offer. I deserved better than what I got. How old were you when you realized that? 40s. Needless to say. Late 40s. 40 and up. Too goddamn late. So and what followed was like a mourning period for me. So, You know, All that hurt, Pain, Regret, Disappointment, And that was inflicted upon me. My whole life came pouring out and that was the grief that I had been burying for so long. That's good, Though. That's good. It was good. It's that's really the start of the healing process. Even though, You know, Figuring it out and healing from it is a long and quite painful road, It's worth it. And how can you recover if you don't heal from it? Like, How can you move forward? You have to heal. So when you wake up and realized, Oh, It's them, Not me. You create some distance and I created some distance by giving up the delusion that they will change. And I stopped feeling responsible for them and being responsible for their happiness was drilled into my soul. And getting rid of that responsibility and burden was huge. You start to see things more clearly. To me, It was like that dark cloud feeling like, You know, That I deserve better. Those clouds started to clear. That's great. So. And I my mother's narcissism, Controlling and criticism, My dad's physical abandonment, My stepdad's enabling. Having a. A spiritual or emotional time out from all of them early in my healing process. Contributed to my looking at things. More reasonably, Objectively and accurately by not having a lot of contact with them. Oh, Hence the low or no contact. Exactly. So and that's a very personal decision. I'm going to get more into that because there is no one right answer on this one. Everybody's choices is very different. Everyone's situations unique. Some people live far away, Which is easy. Some people live with them, Which not so easy. Some people are taking care of them because they're elderly. So they're that's why I'm providing tools and ideas and my own experience so that you have something to work with. So. One of the simpler concepts that I learned, Which shouldn't have taken me 40 years to learn, Is every time my parents got upset about something doesn't mean I did something wrong. It was them, Not you. Right. So when they got upset when I was two, Three, Four, Nine, 12, 20, 25, I assumed I had done something wrong and it was my job to fix it. When I start to reduce contact. There's an emotional separateness that sort of starts to infiltrate in a good way. And I start to experience life and myself. Separate from them without their toxic distractions. It was actually the first time I started to actually like being alone with myself. I noticed that, You know, This gives you a chance to think clearly and to breathe and to not be inundated with their emotional craziness. By having nothing to react to, You start to think a little more honestly, A little more deeply, You know, A lot more reflectively and more accepting of any pain and grief that rises to the surface as a result of that distance. So. You know. Our you know, It's all unconscious. Projecting the these negative experiences that you were raised with onto everybody else. So they were unconscious. They projected all their pain to me. I was unconscious and I projected all the pain to everyone else around me. And. Basically, When we are trapped. In the role of being a child that has to please their parents, It pollutes our entire adult lives and the only way to depollute or clean up that toxic waste. Is doing some form. Of detachment. That makes you decide what that level is. So one of the websites I'm going to link to is to marriage and family therapist Darlene Lancer. She actually wrote a book. I think she actually wrote more than one book on codependency. Her she's her books are fabulous. She's on Instagram. She's our website in the notes and she's absolutely worth checking out and reading. So what she says is if you detach and remove yourself from your narcissistic or toxic parents without doing your own work, You are not going to heal. Because you're still reacting and you're not learning authenticity. There is no inner peace without authenticity. It's like going to the gym and watching everybody do the treadmill. Excellent analogy. Thank you. Thank you once again. Thank you. You're a genius. So. Your true self won't surface if you take yourself out of the situation. Without doing your own internal growth. If you don't. Objectively place responsibility for the hurt where it belongs at. And I belongs all on your parents, Step parents, Guardians, Whatever it is. And. It will be easy for false guilt. To force you to let them back into your life. Now, I want to quote Darlene Lancer on this one. What's more important than initiating a break is learning how to be assertive and set limited boundaries. When parents are inappropriate, Controlling, Invasive or emotionally abusive and end quote. That's Darlene Lancer. Good quote. So, Yes, I highly recommend you guys check her out. So some couple of things to consider when you decide what's best for you. What are the costs to you when you allow your toxic parents to control you and manipulate you? Beginning in 2014, I asked myself. Am I going to live my life for my mother forever? Great question. Yeah. Somebody wants asked a similar question of me. Who are you living for? You are your mom. And I didn't understand it at the time. I think I was in my early 20s. I could have, You know, I could have read all these websites 10 years ago. And would you have said that's not me? No, It's not me. Or would you wouldn't have even had the ability to understand what it was saying. You know, What's I wish I this is a famous quote. I don't know if it's Buddha or Eckhart Tolle. I honestly don't remember. But it says when the pupil is ready, The teacher will appear. So for all of you experts that might know who said that quote, Let me know. I forgot. But when the pupil is ready, The teacher will appear. So the other thing you want to consider as you decide what's best for you is being on a productive healing journey to find your own voice. What are your boundaries? When you when you state your boundaries, What does it sound like to you? How do you want to say it? And what do you want to say? You know, Violation of boundaries is different for everybody. You know, My mother never showed up at a restaurant in front of my boyfriend telling me to change my shirt. But yet that's what happened to Lizzie. She, You know, Invaded my boundaries in a different way. So that's why you have to decide what boundaries you have to decide objectively. What boundaries work for you and how you want to set them. And you usually can tell, I think, When somebody does something that kind of makes the hair on the back of your neck stand up. That's probably that they probably invaded your boundaries. Yes, If you're getting angry, If you feel like suddenly like this physical reaction to what they just did. But if you're on a solid, Productive healing journey. You'll just say that's not acceptable and you won't let it happen. That's instead of lashing out. Right. That's setting the boundaries. Right. So the ride does get bumpy. There's always pushback and different mothers will push back in, You know, Very different ways. Some of it antagonistic, Some of it passive aggressive, Can be overt, Covert. So you need to be prepared for that pushback and how you're going to handle it. So some I got some of this advice from a Web site, Daughters Rising dot info. I'm going to put that in. So when you take the upper hand, You are flipping the dynamics of the relationship. And that's very important because when you were young, Mom held all the power. Now it's your turn. So whether you want to go no contact. Low contact or temporary break. If you can clearly communicate your needs and limits. Then she can decide her level of contact by her own actions and her own response. So you are now taking control of your life instead of hoping she'll change. And you don't have to carry the responsibility of whether you have a relationship or not. If you have kindly and articulately set your boundaries and she chooses to abandon the relationship or yell or scream or whatever multiple kinds of reactions she's going to have. That's her choice, Not yours. You've set the boundaries gently. You did it properly in your way. You spoke from I need instead of you should. Then it's her problem and it's in her lap. And also, If you've already started this journey and you know what's going on and you kind of understand the situation, You can observe her reaction objectively in a way and say, Whoa, You know, You can really see it for what it is. Yeah, The observe or his whoever the parent is. The observe don't absorb technique, Which was invented by Ross Rosenberg. I will put his Web site link into our notes. He has a fantastic book on codependency. Actually, He probably has more than one. The human magnet syndrome. And it's fantastic. I highly recommend everybody read it. So. The ultimate healthy goal is to let go of your expectations of your other people, Your parents and even yourself, Because all of them are probably unreasonable. You can't. I've never. Witnessed and I don't feel this way either that by saying they did the best they could. That's not that's a false way of accepting the way they treat you if you haven't healed the emotional wounds. So once you have, That's also not really giving them the responsibility for what they did. Amen. So it's like an excuse. You're making an excuse for them. Right. That positive thinking philosophy that everyone loves to talk about. Doesn't really become an authentic way of thinking until you have focused on your well-being first. So it's one of the steps later, Accepting that they did the best they could, But not initially. Initially, You kind of need to realize what they did. And that is pain and grief rising to the surface, Not marching over and saying, You did this, You did that. I blame you. This is what you know. That's you know, You can't tell a narcissist. You can't blame them for anything. They don't respond to criticism very well. So I want to do a quote by Meredith Miller. Her link is in the notes to the quotes is the characteristics of a cult are nearly the exact same as those of a family. We're the matriarch or patriarch is a narcissist psychopath sociopath or other manipulator end quote. So if you want to think about the severity of those unhealthy dynamics and the damage that they do. She equates it to a cult and we've all heard terrible stories about cults. It's almost like if you feel like you've been tiptoeing around your family and afraid of whatever repercussions just for you being you. Chances are good. You know, You're in a situation that's toxic. Absolutely. Once you you've been tiptoeing your your whole life and hyper vigilant threats and alerts and trying to control your environment so that you don't you don't get yelled at or blamed or criticized. It's just a chaotic way to live. Such a burden. It really is. So. Debbie Tudor is a licensed professional counselor and an author of It's Not You, It's them 30 days of hope and help for the adult children of narcissists talks about protected contact. And that's her creation. So this means that, You know. You're not alone with your narcissistic parent. And that's particularly effective if, You know, Like my mother, Wanting to appear charming in public, They won't be verbally or emotionally abusive in front of people. So if you're going to get together with a narcissistic parent, Do it in public, Not alone, Because they. So they care about what people think very much, Not what their kid thinks about them, But just outside strangers think about. I always say if my parents put as much energy into creating a loving environment that they did as impressing strangers, I wouldn't be here right now. So, Yes, They do care what people think. So, You know, Narcissists will abuse, You know, In the private phone cars and conversations if the two of you in the car. So you want to avoid those situations. And I like the term that she came up with, Protected contact. That is a good term. You know, She also uses the term civil connection, Which I think is fabulous. And what's your contact? What do you do right now? I am I use gray rock. Civil connection is another way to describe that. I just I like her phrase. I use gray rock. Gray rock is. Polite conversations, Light, Not a lot of emotional closeness. A lot of boundaries. But do you ever get the question like, Oh, You don't seem like yourself or you're not like you used to be? You've changed. You get those kinds of not really that so much as well. I haven't spoken to you in a month. And I just smile. I don't respond. And I ask a question about her job or something. I change the subject. I know that's for me. I know my mother could always tell when I was being distant, When I was trying to kind of break away from her codependency, She could always tell. She would say, Oh, You've changed. You're not you're not yourself. You're not the person I know. And which really pissed me off because I was changing, But I needed to write and she kept kind of lure me back into, You know, This codependent relationship. It was very hard to break away from. Right. And it's your mother and it's habitual and unconscious. So if you are doing productive healing work, Those kinds of questions won't bother you. Because it's them trying to get a reaction. How do you and trying to control you or manipulate you in some way, Shape or form or get something, You know, Whether a false kind of warmth or, You know, For narcissists, They like a negative reaction because they like, You know, The fact that they, Oh, I'm controlling you. You know, It's like the, You know, Puppet master. It's like a good thing to they like to make you feel guilty. True. And it's really up to you to control your reaction. To their reaction. So if you stay focused, If you've done proper healing work and internal growth and you stay focused, Then it won't and it takes time. That's true, Because I remember as I got older, When I finally did the work to heal, I was able to distance myself from those kinds of comments. And I didn't take it as personally. Right. Right. And I didn't feel bad about it. When you complete, Which is great, You know, A separation, Acceptance and had moved on, You know, Allow the grief to service surface and move on and develop boundaries. You can be next to but get apart from them at the same time. And that's where that solid sense of self forms because I'm setting boundaries. I'm not calling you names. I'm not being destructive. I'm not hurting your feelings. I'm doing what's best for me. If that doesn't happen to work for you. Okay. That's your problem. Not my problem. Very good growth. With that, We're going to take a short break. Listen to a song we just wrote called Find You. I know the less I feel out of the dark into the clear. Nothing I feel was ever really tired of being your next me. Steal the blame inside you. Heal the shame that finds you. Winds of change flow to me when I ask for the key. Time to let what's real find you. So push back when you implement civil contact or low contact or gray rock. The pushback I get my mom because she's deaf or hearing impaired. She's you know, Probably both. But is the body language. You know, She's big into body language. So she does a lot of, You know, Eye rolling, Staring, You know, Facial expressions. You know, I mean, She's almost like a torsioness at this point, You know, When she doesn't like what I'm doing. I'm like, Wow, You know, I want to give her a pair of handcuffs. She she if she can break out of them like Houdini. So she does a lot of that. And I don't react to it anymore. I used to, You know, You know, Just her looks and facial expressions and, You know, Body movements would send me into a, You know, Rage. Because I know what she's saying without saying it. Does she know that she's doing that? I'm sure she does. Yeah, She's manipulative. But then she'd hide behind the whole, You know, I'm, You know, Physically challenged thing. Right. So which was I would call it a another knife. You know, There's a carving knife and then there's the physical challenge knife. And, You know, I was always stabbed twice. I always say, Wow. So so she was more like a knife thrower than Houdini. Exactly. She probably should do that. I'm calling the Cirque de Soleil. She should be in the Cirque de Soleil. So. She could throw daggers at you without any daggers, Just with her eyes. Right. So, You know, The low contact has been described as, You know, Emergencies and holidays. That really depends on, You know, Your physical proximity to them. You know, I all of my parents live in another state. So, You know, Seeing them, You know, Three times a year is works for me. That's good. And it's healthy for me. So. But they didn't always. I mean, They lived closer. They didn't live the same. My mom and stepdad up until two years ago, Two and a half years ago, Lived in the same state. And I remember dreading that the one Sunday I had free, I'm like, I got to see them. I haven't seen them. I feel guilty. I know there was no they would never call me. But I know they were sitting there, You know, Tapping their feet by the phone, Waiting for me to initiate contact and make them feel important, Which I no longer do anymore. And they're still together. They're still putting up with each other. It's mind boggling, But in a selfish way. It's good for me because if he was not with her, She'd be my problem. Yeah. He's type of guy that could live by himself and never speak to another human and be OK. And that's not a compliment, In case you're wondering. So if you're going to do no contact, Everyone, Including me, Says you need to be in therapy with a qualified mental health professional, Because it takes a lot of courage to say I'm never speaking to you again. In our society who, You know, Worships parents even when they don't deserve it, Honor they mother and they father no matter what. So you can be a little bit culturally it's it's shunned. So you're alone in a lot of ways. After reading all the books that I've read, We are far from alone. But there's a lot of grief and guilt and shame and pain that comes with cutting them off. And that's why I would never tell you that you should or you shouldn't. But you need to be with a qualified therapist to do that. Plus, We're not licensed therapists or life coaches. Nope. We're just your friendly neighborhood neighborhood with neighborhoods. Now, Where we're spiritual pimps. I'm a spiritual pimps, Spiritual gangster. Yeah, I need to let's write a rap song because that would be so cool to watch 50 something going. You know, All right. Well, That's some heavy duty beatbox. Yeah, That was terrible, Wasn't it? I think I sounded like I was coughing. I think I have bronchitis. It sounds like you're sneezing. Bless you. Sneezing and coughing at the same time. So. Reducing or cutting off contact. Either way, It's you bring up guilt, Fear and shame, You know, Especially if they're getting older. Reframing the role of your parents. Can help with the guilt because their role is not to be. Your parents, They're incapable of it. So their role has always been to, You know, Marginalize you, Criticize you, Trivialize you, Manipulate you, Guilt you. So. Putting making, You know, Assigning that role in your head might reduce those feelings of guilt because they're not behaving like parents that behaving like children. Debbie Tudor elaborates saying that, You know, Your parents wanted the experience of having a child. You gave them that experience. And you have fulfilled that commitment. You're welcome. Yes, You don't owe them anything. You have your own life to live and they had their own life to live when they created you. So they need to behave in a way that's more appealing for you to keep them in your life. That's where the responsibility lies. So, But they don't they can't respond to that. They won't. They can't. But in your head, If you tell yourself that there's less guilt and shame and grief associated with that. And you're trying to once you've let it all come to the surface, All that disappointment and regret. Then it's time to look at them more objectively. I hope this is like an aha moment for some people listening that they're saying, What? I don't have to spend time with my shitty parents. That's right. You know, Like that's really a great freeing thing. I don't have to be with people I hate. You have choices, But there's no way to see that you have that choice if you don't have a voice. Yeah. And you only have a voice when you have started or in the middle of a productive healing journey. And you're changing the way your brain works. You know, We talked about the amygdala, We talked about hyper reactivity and unconscious. Poor coping strategies. Once you start peeling away all those layers of unhappiness. You won't be as volatile. And you will say, I don't need to expose myself to this. I can do things that make me happy. I can do things that make me feel good. I can be around people that bring me up and not bring me down, Regardless of whether they're blood related or not. Yes, You can do that. Yes, You can give yourself permission. That's right. You have to give yourself permission, But it all starts with where you're at on your healing journey. And if you're at the very early stages, There's still a lot of grief and pain there. So in terms of the level of contact you want to have with your toxic parents, Narcissistic mother, Whatever that is, That is up to you. But you should choose. I hate to say you should. It is better for you if you choose a path. That allows you. To experience internal growth and really getting to know, You know, Who you are. And that's one of the things that I've learned. I had chosen. The wrong professional path, Career path. And also a lot of bad decisions. How could you not have? Yeah, You know, You you had the wrong guidance. Everything I did was a reaction to something else. It was never authentic. And that's what you need to think about. Am I reacting? Or is this really authentic? Is this something that I want? You know, We talk about, You know, People pleasing and being a rescuer and playing the hero role, Which I did all those. And by doing that, That's actually a way of disconnecting from your true self, Who you really are and acknowledging the pain you're in. I'm going to rescue this person. Therefore, I'm great. I'm going to get this promotion. Therefore, I'm great. I'm going to, You know, Dispense this unsolicited advice to somebody who doesn't need it because I know best. And I know best if I know best and they listen to me that I'm great. When you say great, Like I know you're being sarcastic, But great in the eyes of your toxic parents. No, Great is I'm going to prove I'm going to I'm not in pain. I am not in pain. So if I help, If I am codependent and I'm people pleasing and I'm being a hero and fixing things for people, I am not connecting to the pain I'm in. It's a form of denial. It's a form of denial. Yes, It is a form of denial. And I did all that. Because everything is about being the best or the most. And it's not about being the best or the most. It's about being true and honest and real. So the whole the best and the most, You know, That's where all that, You know, Chaos comes in. And being alone with yourself and enjoying it definitely gives you a lot of clarity. I when you get focused on something that's healthy for you, Be it yoga, Meditation, Music, Art, Outdoors, Knitting, Which is not something I would ever do. I'd put myself in. I'd poke my eye out. I get carpal tunnel. Yeah, I'd be I'd be in the hospital so fast. My fingers hurt. I'd be in the hospital. Like, Why do you have needles in your eye? I was like, I was relaxing. Be in the hospital. So you gotta pick the meditative path and do things you enjoy. Exactly. Do things that speak to your soul. And sometimes when you grow up in in such a toxic environment, It's hard to know what you enjoy. You said yourself that you didn't realize how much you loved writing and, You know, Music and you know, There was a field there that you might have pursued had you not been so busy trying to prove yourself to your toxic parents and to yourself. You are absolutely right. And I was very clusterfucky. Now for me, I feel like I went into the field that I wanted. I'm doing the thing I love. But sometimes I think about it and I know my motivation was in a way to prove to my mother that I was going to do this because she she she loved the fact that I had talent, But she didn't really want me to go into the field of entertainment. She was afraid and she was probably afraid that it would take me away from her and I wanted and I didn't realize that and I wanted to prove to her that I could do it that I was strong and I wouldn't get sucked into whatever and whatever. And truth is I could do it, But I think had I not had that motivation, I probably might have taken a different path. Self-defeating rebellion. I did. We are not alone because we have, You know, We're talking about our, You know, Our careers and and you know, I would say, You know, Decisions that weren't good for me and you know, Some of that may not have been ideal for you. It's I think there are people who get addicted to drugs, Develop eating disorders, Crippling anxiety, Crippling depression, Multiple affairs, You know, Gambling addicts, All of that people pleasing. It's all under that same denial umbrella. We just chose different ways to do it. I'm not saying that. Okay, If you're a people pleaser versus, You know, A gambling addict, One's worse or better. I'm not saying that. What I'm saying is those are denial strategies, Poor coping strategies, Running away from grief and pain strategies, And it's avoiding the little voice saying that, You know, The life that you're living and the person that you're being is none of its true. None of its authentic. And when it's authentic, All those, You know, Monkey chatter. I like to say squirrels in traffic because it's it really captures how I used to operate. All of a sudden that goes away and that's where that inner peace and that productive silence. Not stonewalling, Right? Not that kind of silence, But it's a clarity. It's a clarity. Suddenly you can think straight and you realize that you can make decisions without like, Freaking yourself out. Like, Yeah, What feels right? It's nice to be able to recognize that. And the hard part, Which you know, I wish there was something I could do about the the long, The length of the process, But there isn't. You don't wake up on a Sunday and, You know, Understand everything that I now understand and Monday morning by 8, It's all fixed. Wouldn't that be cool? It would be nice. Magic elixir. Yes, But unfortunately it does not work that way. But I will tell you the time I've invested in learning it and continue because it's a practice. It's a journey. I'd notice I didn't say destination. I'm a recovery, You know, I'm a recovering destination addict. You can't undo like decades of damage overnight. Nope. Nope. And you know, It's unconscious. You know, Again, We talked about it was done it. You know, When you're a child and an infant, You're not listening to words. You're picking up vibes. You're looking at the eyes and the face and the body language because you're not having a discussion at nine months old that, Oh, My mother is hearing a parent or dad abandoned her. So I think I won't cry for a little bit. I don't care how much poo I'm sitting in. I'm not going to cry. It doesn't work that way at nine months. So what happens is you start to say, Okay, She can't. Instinctually you pick up on every nonverbal cue and you react to it at nine months, One year, Two years, Three years, And it becomes embedded into your soul. And it's a poison that takes a long time. You see how important parenting is? If only people knew. Yeah. If only people knew. I wish there was some sort of mandatory type parenting class that people had to take. It's you know what it is? It's therapy. You know, It's not even a parenting class. It's therapy. But unfortunately, There's a lot of bad therapists out there and a lot of good therapists. Right. It's true. And it's what happens is even if people get up that that incredible amount of courage and bravery to go and it's not working. They may not go back again, You know, So that's that's why on all on my website. There are a million resources. I shouldn't say that. There are several dozens of resources with a million ideas. That's what the stuck stops here. Com. Yeah, You go to those resources. There's life coaching programs. There's an endless amount of videos and these group programs are wonderful because everyone in them is in a similar position as you and every single one of them have free PDFs videos downloads affordable online coaching programs, And they're reputable. Wow. And it's like, You know, It's like, You know, You feel like you suddenly decide you want to get healthy. Let's say and you realize where what direction you've been heading and it could have been the wrong direction. And here you have an opportunity to fix to heal to, You know, Change some bad habits. It's the time is now fix it now. It's never too late. All right. Well that wraps up this episode of the stuck stops here. Episode 4 season 2 if I go there will be trouble and if I stay it will be double now now now now now. I believed everyone else could fly. Swallowed whole by what we deny all the dead monsters made us lose our way. I hate what I love. Anyway, We disappeared inside the bitter living under everybody's feet. I crashed my life over and over till I found a road. So sweet steal the blame inside you heal the shame and find you with a change go to me. When I ask for the key time to let what's real find you.