In which my psyche is commonplace
Big epiphany on where my horror of feeling or expressing anger, ever, comes from. This morning at eight am. BEST TIME FOR A PSYCHOLOGICAL EPIPHANY, RIGHT?
I have these nightly dreams, I think I've mentioned, where I'm back in my parents' house, wondering WHY I'm back and how I got there and why I don't leave again.
In the one I had last night, my mom was in the driveway going after one of the cats with a vacuum cleaner. A game! Vacuum the cat.* So the cat was getting all upset, and I yelled at her to stop and she wouldn't, and she kept not stopping and then some of the cat's fur and tail actually got ripped off by the vacuum (look, it was a dream) and I said, "That's really enough, STOP!" and she went inside and I like, tended to the cat's fucked up tail for a minute.
When I came in, she was in her room with her door closed and she wouldn't come out.. And I knew it was one of those times again, where I had gotten upset with her for a completely valid reason, but she was going to brood and get upset with me for getting upset, and tell me that I hated her and tell my sister and my father that I hated her, and it was going to all get slanted like I was the complete asshole for being upset at all, ever, and I was going to have to apologize and tell her I loved her and act like I had been completely unreasonable to be upset, or else she wouldn't talk to me for days except to look darkly at me and sporadically accuse me of hating her.
My mom vacuuming a cat is completely ridiculous, but the situation following it was something that played out many, many times while growing up.
I was reviewing it, after I'd woken up, and thinking, "That's so typical and unfair! Here I am angry for a legitimate reason, but I have to be the one to turn around as quickly as possible and apologize for being angry and ultimately make the case that it was MY problem for getting angry in the first place, and plead to be forgiven for feeling that way."
"...Goddammit!"
That's exactly my problem with anger. That's WHAT HAPPENS in the rare event that I get angry. It lasts for no more than a few hours--if that--and then I turn around and blame myself for feeling angry, and ultimatley decide that the whole thing was my fault. Then I go back to the person I was angry with and I apologize. WHY DOES THAT, TOO, come back to my mother? HOW DROLL AND STUPID CAN MY PSYCHE GET? Can I just have ONE issue that did not come out of my relationship with my mom--and can I be over ANY of them, now that I'm 25 and have been leading my life without her interference for years?
*It is only fair to say that my mother has never actually vacuumed any animals in real life. Or anything like that.
I have these nightly dreams, I think I've mentioned, where I'm back in my parents' house, wondering WHY I'm back and how I got there and why I don't leave again.
In the one I had last night, my mom was in the driveway going after one of the cats with a vacuum cleaner. A game! Vacuum the cat.* So the cat was getting all upset, and I yelled at her to stop and she wouldn't, and she kept not stopping and then some of the cat's fur and tail actually got ripped off by the vacuum (look, it was a dream) and I said, "That's really enough, STOP!" and she went inside and I like, tended to the cat's fucked up tail for a minute.
When I came in, she was in her room with her door closed and she wouldn't come out.. And I knew it was one of those times again, where I had gotten upset with her for a completely valid reason, but she was going to brood and get upset with me for getting upset, and tell me that I hated her and tell my sister and my father that I hated her, and it was going to all get slanted like I was the complete asshole for being upset at all, ever, and I was going to have to apologize and tell her I loved her and act like I had been completely unreasonable to be upset, or else she wouldn't talk to me for days except to look darkly at me and sporadically accuse me of hating her.
My mom vacuuming a cat is completely ridiculous, but the situation following it was something that played out many, many times while growing up.
I was reviewing it, after I'd woken up, and thinking, "That's so typical and unfair! Here I am angry for a legitimate reason, but I have to be the one to turn around as quickly as possible and apologize for being angry and ultimately make the case that it was MY problem for getting angry in the first place, and plead to be forgiven for feeling that way."
"...Goddammit!"
That's exactly my problem with anger. That's WHAT HAPPENS in the rare event that I get angry. It lasts for no more than a few hours--if that--and then I turn around and blame myself for feeling angry, and ultimatley decide that the whole thing was my fault. Then I go back to the person I was angry with and I apologize. WHY DOES THAT, TOO, come back to my mother? HOW DROLL AND STUPID CAN MY PSYCHE GET? Can I just have ONE issue that did not come out of my relationship with my mom--and can I be over ANY of them, now that I'm 25 and have been leading my life without her interference for years?
*It is only fair to say that my mother has never actually vacuumed any animals in real life. Or anything like that.