bad.

[louie_ludwig]

My mother instilled in me the completely naturalized, immutable knowledge that i am Bad. She, as the absolute arbiter of good+evil in my formative years, had the ability to play upon this knowledge in various ways. But from an early point I can't identify, that knowledge was mine, and no longer just one of many messages I was receiving, full of the

Comments

[nervoustic]

i believe i would like to be more like you when i am grown up.

[louie_ludwig]

i would like to be more like you when i am grown up too.

[alsoname]

Last year I read an interesting book about hypochondria. I'm used to a word like "hypochondriac" being used as an insult, but one thing about the book I liked was the nonjudgmental attitude it seemed to take. I'm not saying you're a hypochondriac, it doesn't sound like you are, but some of what you wrote reminded me of things I read in the book about family dynamics surrounding illness and the caretaker/patient relationship, and what kind of effects this can have on people's development (including but not limited to the development of hypochondria). I wished it had delved further into that aspect, actually, because it was super-interesting.

I mean, I don't know if I have anything insightful to say, despite reading a book with information about family dynamics surrounding illness ...

[louie_ludwig]

what book is it? i'd be interested. i am definitely not a hypochondriac, though i think it would have been one highly understandable reaction to our mother! i went a different route.

[alsoname]

It was called Hypochondria: Woeful Imaginings, by Susan Baur. A pretty good book, some chapters more compelling (to me) than others, but it didn't delve as deeply into the things I was most interested in (like family dynamics). I'd love to find even more material on the subject, but this book was a good overview as I recall.

eerie similarities..

[trannygoat]

why do we never talk about this when we see each other? our kidhoods are kinda disturbingly similar. i'm working on this project for somatics right now where i have to write/talk about what 'shaped' me, and i made a big list of all the things that i was taught and reinforced from a very young age, and 'i am intrinsically bad' tops the list. if folks thought/think otherwise, it cuz i fooled/fool them by manipulation or they pity me and overlook my intrinsic badness or they are faking it.

gawd, the shit we carry. and the brilliant resilience that we have despite all the factors and people who did not want us to be brilliant or to survive.

love you lots.

Re: eerie similarities..

[louie_ludwig]

no shit. this is part of why i'm so interested in somatics too... i hope we get to spend more time together in the years to come, friend. and that your healing work is awesome for you. xoxo