Subtle Abuse With Not So Subtle Results (Season 4)

This is The Stuck Stops Here.

Your source for humor,

Healing,

And honesty.

I'm LW Noly.

I am Tami Reseda-Atman.

Let's go!

Shipwrecked,

Lost at sea Crashed hard,

Found my free No brews or cuts that bleed It ain't love and it ain't free This much I know is true Only way out for us is through It ain't love and it ain't free A war we fight but cannot see This is Season 4 Episode 7.

Subtle abuse with not so subtle results.

So today's podcast is delving deep into emotional abuse.

Which is a way to control another person by using emotions to criticize,

Embarrass,

Shame,

Blame,

Or otherwise manipulate another person.

In general,

A relationship is emotionally abusive when there is a consistent pattern of abusive words and bullying behaviors that wear down a person's self-esteem and undermine their mental health.

Children often lack the perspective to be able to identify the abusive elements in their relationship with their parents.

And it's only in adulthood that they're more able to detect them.

I detect them in the form of aha moments.

So I have a quote here by Astrid Aluda.

I really hope I said it right.

It goes like this.

The scars you can't see are the hardest to heal.

So I'm going to list emotional abuse behaviors that I suffered.

And they're very common.

And unfortunately too many of us end up having a lot of anxiety and depression because of it.

So here's the list.

I'm going to listen to see which ones I can relate to.

Yeah.

And you better listen.

I'll know if you're not.

All right.

Here we go.

Ignoring and withholding attention and affection,

Including the silent treatment.

My parents were big on that.

I think that was their favorite go to.

Disapproving,

Dismissing,

Contemptuous and condescending looks,

Comments,

Behavior.

Threats of abandonment,

Physical and or emotional.

Invalidation,

Inability or refusal to acknowledge the child's feelings or experience.

Covertly or overtly making a child feel in the way and unwanted.

My parents blamed me for their problems and circumstances.

They blamed everybody but themselves.

Projecting their pain and disappointment onto me.

Encouraging and almost demanding for me to be overly dependent on them.

My dependence on them was a source of self worth for them.

And that was pretty tragic for me too.

Intentionally undermining my ability to take care of myself.

So you lose your ability to trust your instincts.

Another reason why I made so many poor decisions as an adult.

Negative comparisons to siblings or peers.

That creates a pretty solid foundation of deficiency.

And chronically feeling like I wasn't good enough.

Expressions of disgust that emphasize and reinforce rejection.

Constant erratic switching from either engulfing me or ignoring me.

Being intrusive or indifferent.

And all of that would change depending on their moods.

So it was very chaotic and very erratic.

And it's so common we accept it as normal.

So the psychologist Carrie Disney writes in the Guardian.

Children from emotionally abusive homes often learn that emotions are dangerous.

I quote,

In a good enough upbringing we learn that feelings can be managed.

They may be scary but they can be thought through.

Again,

Good enough upbringing.

In emotionally abusive upbringings,

Children are faced both by the overwhelming and problematic emotions of others.

And it reinforces that intangible feeling that their own feelings and thoughts don't matter.

So they don't develop the ability to recognize or deal with emotions as they arise.

Which would be normal.

So if you're scared of failing a test,

That scared turns into debilitating fear.

Instead of just passing through like a change in the weather.

And that's just a very simple explanation.

But the bottom line is all the emotional abuse behaviors that I listed.

And I suffered from their spirit crushing and soul destroying.

And no matter what form it comes in,

The consequences of this rejection plagues us.

And it plagues families for generations.

Both by inheriting that and passing it on.

And it ends up showing up in many forms.

So the consequences of these emotional abusive behaviors can show up in perfectionism.

Overachieving.

Addictions.

Drugs,

Alcohol,

Gambling,

Busyness.

We underestimate how powerful busyness addiction is.

People pleasing and codependency.

Alcoholism,

Anxiety and depression.

Sleep disorders,

Eating disorders.

Self sabotaging and destructive behaviors.

I had pretty much every single one of those.

The addiction to perfection and busyness was one that plagued me quite a bit.

As did anxiety and depression.

So unhealed adult victims of childhood emotional abuse have impaired instincts.

Damaged self esteem.

And they are stuck in survival mode.

Because we have spent our lives being hyper vigilant,

Hyper sensitive.

Defensive.

Walking on egg shells.

And therefore spiritually,

Mentally and emotionally beaten down.

The only way to break this very well entrenched toxic cycle is to wake up and kick start the healing process.

So one of the first things to do is figuring out why your parents did what they did.

It's not easy.

It's hard because you sort of have to relive the experience.

But it's crucial in distancing yourself from the pain of their limitations.

You can only come to understand your pain when you learn to understand theirs.

I didn't say forgive.

I didn't say keep taking crap.

Just understanding the pain and the emotional abuse that they suffered.

It's just one step.

One step in the process.

The primary reason that parents emotionally abuse their children is it makes them feel more powerful,

More confident and in control.

It is an illusion.

And for many of us,

Our parents were our first bully.

But if you think about it,

Who was their bully?

You're not born a bully.

It's something you're taught.

So who bullied them and why?

That's a great point.

And as I read more,

I read constantly on this topic.

It's part of my healing process.

And acquiring knowledge for me is I feel very similar when alcoholics get that coin.

A sign of accomplishment of distancing yourself from addiction.

Every time I read something new and learn something new,

It's my own proverbial spiritual coin of accomplishment.

That's great.

I think it's like when you have these realizations,

Even though they're very painful,

You feel better knowing the truth.

Why?

Understanding why is a very important step in healing and in living an authentic life.

But that first step,

Like anything else,

You have to admit you have a problem.

Once you understand the source of that problem,

You feel less like a problem.

You feel less damaged,

Like you're this destroyed toy that needs to be fixed.

No,

You've misunderstood yourself.

With very good reason.

When you are raised by emotionally abusive parents,

Every aspect of love,

Affection,

And validation is actually a transaction.

It's not unconditional.

It's performance-based.

So we run around like trained circus animals and wonder why we're so unhappy.

So one of the first steps in dealing with abusive parents is understanding why they are the way they are.

And then acknowledging the fact that you are the only one who can heal yourself.

So you are playing a huge role in your own misery as well as in your own recovery.

When parents were bullied by their parents,

They will never be fully present.

And they never can be.

And you cannot fix that.

You cannot change them.

You will not get them to see that they are disturbed.

And even if they were to even get to that point,

That,

Oh,

Yeah,

I am disturbed,

It doesn't change anything.

You can't go back and relive the childhood and become the adult you wanted to be.

Still,

Forgiving them,

Not excusing them,

For the damages they've done.

It's a way of giving yourself permission to move on and let go of their limitations that causes you so much pain.

It keeps you staying angry with them,

Keeps you crippled,

Fear-based,

And trapped.

And that's what's causing a lot of your misery.

Once you say,

They did the best they could,

I can't change that,

But I know I can do better.

You're going to feel a big sense of relief.

You have to set boundaries.

If they're still alive.

And by setting boundaries,

You sort of reclaim your sense of self by moving away from the role that you've always played with them.

Whether it's a parentified role,

A caretaker role,

A mini-me role.

Codependent.

All of it,

Codependent.

You may have been the scapegoat,

You may have been the golden child,

You may have been the mascot.

There's the lost child,

There's many roles we have played.

And once you understand the role you've played,

You'll start playing them.

Because you'll recognize where they end and you begin.

It's not easy.

It's a long-term relationship management issue where you have to monitor it.

Like an addiction.

But that monitoring becomes habitual,

And then their dysfunction and their bullying won't rule your life anymore.

Because you've acquired new tools and new skills to distance yourself from it.

And then you can recognize when they're doing it and maybe take an objective view and say,

Oh,

I see they're doing it again.

Suddenly,

Instead of getting emotional and being triggered by it,

You can just step out of yourself and become aware of it.

Absolutely.

Triggers are a sign that there's something that needs to heal.

So if you find yourself,

You know,

Viscerally reacting,

You need to look at what are you reacting to.

So when we come back,

I have some suggestions to start your healing path that worked for me.

Awesome.

We'll be right back.

Swallowed hold,

So much we missed,

Riding straight into the abyss.

Bigger than the fear we run,

On the edge with everyone.

This much I know is true,

Only way out for us is through.

It ain't love and it ain't free,

A war we fight but cannot see.

And we're back.

Charlie Chaplin has a great quote.

He said that we think too much and feel too little.

Which I think is fantastic as we think about the healing process,

As we,

When you grow up with toxic parents,

You study your surroundings for threats.

That is what you're conditioned to do.

You are,

You feel responsible for keeping the family system in place.

No matter what kind of personality disorders your parents have.

You know,

Narcissistic is the one that I've talked a lot about,

But there are other ones.

And you played a role.

And you played a role that kept you from really understanding the real you.

And you failed to develop any kind of healthy emotional regulation.

So if you are an adult with anxiety,

Depression,

And various addictions,

Chances are the root is in the relationship you have with your parents as well as the one that you have with yourself.

So some suggestions that worked for me.

And there's so many different roads to take.

I'm going to suggest just a few.

The first one is identification,

Recognition,

And acceptance.

Being able to put a name or a label to what your parents are suffering from is critical.

Because you can't fix what you don't know.

So if your parents were abandoned,

Mistreated,

Devalued,

Endured any kind of abuse,

They are not going to heal from that.

They've made that choice in the fact that you are here listening to this.

So identification and recognition,

You depersonalize the experience.

So labeling,

Naming it,

Is definitely a good step in feeling less pain associated with their abuse.

Accepting that they cannot fix themselves.

They're not interested in that.

They only want to keep you the same.

Whatever the toxic family system that they've inherited and have chosen to be addicted to,

You'll have a role in maintaining that.

Accept that you don't want that role and you don't have to do it.

And just because they want you to doesn't mean it's the right thing to do.

Understand the role that you're playing in your own misery.

Are you repeating these patterns with other people?

What kind of conversations do you have with yourself?

Are you an overachiever?

Are you a workaholic?

Are you addicted to material things to fill that empty space?

Food issues,

Any kind,

Under eating,

Overeating,

Doesn't matter.

It's,

Again,

Trying to fill an emptiness that was put there by generational patterns.

That's so interesting about repeating those patterns with other people.

It's one thing to be in your own home with the family you grew up with,

But then when you go out into the world and you repeat those patterns with people who don't really know you or who are learning to know you,

It's very interesting.

I recognize that in myself from years ago.

Yeah,

You've done some incredible work,

As a lot of people listening have.

I'll use,

Again,

My most familiar codependency.

This people-pleasing role,

It's an automatic,

Instinctual pattern that we have.

If you're used to surveying your surroundings,

Finding a way to keep the peace,

Solving a problem before it's a problem,

Which you were taught before you were three,

You're going to do that in adult life.

So you don't walk into a professional situation,

A social situation,

With a healthy mindset.

You walk in assuming that somebody's going to come after you in some way,

Shape,

Or form,

And that this situation is a threat before you've even stepped foot through the door,

Whether it's a terrible boss,

A backstabbing coworker,

A friend's party.

Somebody decided to plan the party and didn't include you in the planning,

And you start to freak out because you feel unimportant.

Again,

These are all little daily experiences that we misinterpret because we were trained to misinterpret them.

It's so frustrating for me to think about things like this and feel like I wasn't prepared for the world socially.

Oh,

Frustrated?

I drop F-bombs daily sometimes when I think about how unprepared I was.

It so angers me that I was not prepared for the world.

I'm trying not to do that with my kids.

I want them to be prepared for the world and for people and not to have these dysfunctional behaviors.

Right.

When we teach our children that the only thing we can control is our reaction to the chaos around us,

Assuming that 50% of everybody we meet suffered emotional abuse,

They're battling their own demons.

So if whatever we're experiencing,

All we can control is our reaction to it.

Honestly,

Things are going to go the way they're supposed to as long as you don't try to force it and control it.

Now,

I tried to force and control everything because I was craving certainty,

Which again goes back to being hypervigilant and defensive.

You try to control the environment where nobody can tear you down because that's what you're used to.

Again,

It's easier to teach a kid that at five than for us to unlearn it in your 40s and 50s.

As you start to depersonalize your experience with your parents,

There's going to be some guilt and it's going to be uncomfortable because they've made you feel less than if you don't accommodate their every toddler-like emotional whim.

That's what they taught you to do before you were three.

They taught you that you are responsible for their happiness and you're their punching bag,

Nonphysical because that's been my experience,

Nonphysical punching bag,

Verbal punching bag,

Shall we say.

So when you start playing that role,

You're threatening them.

They're going to make you feel guilty.

That's a discomfort that's beyond okay to live with,

Way better than climbing back into the caves they put you in.

So accept the guilt and live with that discomfort.

It's a good one.

Yeah.

It's better than having severe pain.

It's discomfort.

I like the way you put it.

It's okay.

It's discomfort.

It's like having a paper cut.

It's like cold rain.

It comes in,

Leaves,

Sun comes out again.

So another thing that every expert,

Every book,

Every video,

Every article,

Journal,

Journal,

Journal.

When you write,

You take the chaos that's inside of you and you bring it outside of you.

Picture you're taking the bags off your back,

The bricks off your shoulder.

It's not stupid.

It's not silly.

It works.

Stop trying to please them and don't try to change them.

You will never please them.

You will never change them.

Tell yourself that every day you can only control their efforts to control you.

When you deny their ability to control you and they make you feel guilty,

They're not going to change.

Ignore.

Deal with the guilt.

Don't try to please them.

Don't try to change them.

That's a good one.

Keep reading and learning.

Don't give up.

Educate yourself about the specifics of emotional child abuse.

It's everywhere.

There's so much free information out there.

The more you know,

The better you heal.

Eliminate the word should from your vocabulary.

If you find yourself saying it,

Replacing it with want and find out what the should is coming from.

You should do this because why?

You know what the reasons you are shoulding yourself will definitely help take all that pressure off of a performance based life.

Nobody wants to be a circus animal.

Be patient and compassionate with yourself.

Yes,

I told you every day I mutter these quiet F bombs.

That's OK.

It passes.

It's quiet.

I read something and I move on.

Surround yourself with people who lift you up and who inspire you.

Misery loves company is definitely a very true statement.

If you surround yourself with people who like being a victim,

Like wallowing in the victim mentality.

They're going to drag you down.

They're not bad people.

They're not wrong.

They're just at a different place.

That will lead to my last one.

You may lose friends and family members as a result of this very important and very healthy change.

Distance and you define what that distance is,

But distance is definitely a huge step in the healing process,

Because you can't continue to subject yourself to emotional abuse and not get sucked back in.

Again,

I'd like to equate that.

It's like having a drink when you really shouldn't.

And I'm only comparing it to a drink of alcohol so they you know,

You can understand that that is an addiction to.

Being a.

Verbal punching bag for your parent while being their parent.

Being responsible for how they feel.

Is toxic and you've got to put some distance between them and you.

So and that will cause some very adverse reactions.

Somebody wants to kick you out of their life because of that.

Let them go.

You have friends that don't like the fact the way you're changing.

You know,

I talk to people all the time who used to go to lunch or go to dinner with people who are in the same situation.

All they did was complain.

Once you stop complaining and start fixing,

You don't want to be around people complain anymore.

It's true.

So you got to let that all go.

When you create the distance,

You can start thinking clearly.

You know,

You get away from all that toxic behavior and you can really start looking at things objectively and and thinking clearly.

It's definitely very difficult to do.

Oh,

It's you have to decide what's harder,

Staying where you're at or getting to a better place.

Both are hard.

But what's your end game?

What's your end goal?

My goal was to be I could no longer live the way I was living.

I had reached a point where I had no choice.

Right.

Me,

Too.

I actually also created some distance years ago,

And I remember I went home after a little time from creating the distance.

And,

You know,

I was able to to be a little more objective and see things a little more clearly.

But,

You know,

My mother didn't change.

So when I went home,

She was the same.

No,

When they never will.

You know,

I'm I'm I'm.

I'm visiting family next week.

I'm doing it for my children because a lot of there's often these toxic parents are actually able to have pleasant.

I use pleasant.

I wouldn't say close or intimate or anything like that,

But pleasant relationships with their grandchildren.

And that's what it is pleasant.

You know,

If my kids are different people than I was,

They were raised by different people.

So to deprive them of a pleasant relationship is not really fair to them.

So and they will try.

They will do they will they will scowl.

We'll have the silent treatment.

I'll probably brag about my stepbrother.

Blah,

Blah,

Blah,

Blah,

Gossip,

Whatever it is.

Whatever the child is,

Stuff that they're going to do.

I'll just sit there.

Pull out my tool kit and saying this is not my problem.

This is not my circus.

It's not my trained monkeys.

That's good.

You're in a better place.

Yes,

But it was.

I have to.

Unfortunately,

I have to reinforce.

It's not easy,

But it is worth it.

Yeah.

Well,

What do you do for what about people whose parents aren't alive anymore?

How do they come to terms with the stuff that we're talking about?

Well,

They don't have to worry about.

Putting some distance is already there.

Put extra effort into understanding.

Why they did what they did and put some effort into making sure.

You don't do the same as them and that you're not repeating any patterns.

There are millions of articles on how to make peace with toxic parents after they've passed.

Because you think that if they were alive and you could yell at them and talk to them about it,

It would actually make you feel better.

Most of the time,

That won't work.

But I think you envision that it would.

So honestly,

Google's my fifth favorite person in the world.

I should say non-person in the world.

You can find in a story.

I've read thousands.

Story after story after story.

The parents punishing their children for disengaging.

And then when you're healing and you don't play their games,

They ostracize you.

They will do that.

And yes,

You will experience that if they're still alive.

They will do that.

But you're and you're going to feel responsible.

Because we are believed to we are taught by Hallmark that family is everything.

And honor thy mother and father.

So I really want I want to come up with a greeting card line that says,

It's okay that your parents sucked.

That would be hilarious.

You're still awesome.

How's that for a greeting card?

I'm going to write that.

I got to run.

That's a good one.

I got to go start creating.

Nice.

Awesome.

Yeah.

Go work on those reading cards.

That's hilarious.

It's okay that your parents sucked.

What's the second part?

You turned out.

You're still awesome.

That's a great takeaway from today's podcast.

Yeah.

So that's that's I think that's all I got in my notes today.

I think it's great.

So I'll report back after the toxic family visit.

Oh,

My God.

Good luck.

Yes.

Well,

Actually,

I don't think I'm going to need luck.

I used to need luck.

You just need that greeting card.

It's okay that your parents suck.

You're still awesome.

And I perfected what I call the silent shrug.

Shrug it off.

Oh,

Boy.

Quietly.

That's not a do silent shrug.

I think my shoulder shrug.

Yeah,

I think my shoulders might be permanently embedded into my ears when I come back from the shrugging.

But at least I won't get sucked in.

That's right.

That's right.

And we'll be back next time with another fantastic podcast on the Stuck Stops Here.

Goodbye.

Have a great day.

You have been listening to the Stuck Stops Here.

We are not licensed therapists.

We are not life coaches.

We are not certified in anything.

Nothing.

I just want to be a resource for those beginning or on their healing journey.