Anger is currently the biggest wound I've had to learn to detach from.
Today I was emotionally triggered by certain actions of my BPD ex with whom I practice No Contact, and I decided to log into the board to revisit some discussions and advice so that I could find a coping skill for the awful feelings that I was experiencing. This resulted in an epiphany that could drastically, positively change the course of my life, should I choose to keep doing the work and sorting out my problems.
I wrote down what I learned, just for myself, as a form of journaling. Originally I hadn't intended to put it here. But I'm going to post what I learned today, because maybe it will help someone else who is struggling with something similar. I'm not saying that everything I've written here is right for everyone, or even 100% right for me forever, but it's right for me today, and maybe some part of it will resonate with some of you in a helpful way.
I've been angry. It's been eating me alive. My health is suffering and my overall quality of life is suffering. Today I worked through a big part of the anger problem that I've developed as a result of formerly being partnered to a person with BPD.
When I was younger, I felt abandoned by my family. When I felt abandoned, I felt like I needed someone to help me, because I didn't know what to do to be safe. Because I felt unsafe, I felt afraid. In other words, I felt helpless. So abandonment, a feeling of helplessness, feeling unsafe and fear went hand in hand.
After my BPD ex and I broke up, she charmed people in all my social circles into becoming her friend. Pretty soon, I had very few friends to spend time with, because I felt like they were choosing her over me, and not understanding how abusive she was to me. I felt helpless against her charm and lies, I felt unsafe telling my friends anything about my personal life for fear that anything I said would feed into the lies that I feared she was telling about me, and I felt abandoned by my friends. To this day, when I discover that my ex has made friends with one of my friends, I immediately feel afraid that she will make them think poorly of me, and I feel afraid that my friend does not take my suffering seriously, which makes me feel as though I must defend myself, which manifests as anger. (I was badly bullied when I was young, and part of that bullying involved mobs spreading unkind untruths about me. And when I was younger, an adult caretaker frequently and openly practiced a form of abandonment by emotionally shutting me out when I displayed feelings, or by mocking my emotions, particularly if they were strong, deeply personal ones.) Abandonment, helplessness, feeling unsafe, and fear. Old wounds triggered by current events.
For most of my life, I've called my friends my family. Therefore, the ongoing situation with my friends heavily impacted old, unresolved wounds around family and abandonment.
Logic would suggest that this also means that my feelings around the situation with my friends being friends with my ex must be more traumatic for me than it would be for people who do not have an abandonment wound. Further logic suggests that understanding this will be key to understanding how my friends can be friends with my abuser. There was more here that was on the tip of my tongue, but my overwhelmed brain immediately lost it - which means that this is an important thing to think about.
I've been trying to work through the anger problem that I developed from when my friends "abandoned" me in favor of my ex, because it has been devouring my life. Today I finally understood that feeling abandoned and helpless made me feel unsafe, and that anger made me feel safe. Anger also made me feel like I was finally standing up for myself against my ex for the first time. I felt that if I stopped feeling angry, that I was cowed, and I didn't want to be cowed by anyone ever again. When I was still in the relationship, I needed to stand up for myself because I was in an unsafe, abusive situation, but I didn't - not to the extent that I wish I had. Therefore I was unsafe. Therefore in addition to using anger to feel safe in the face of an abandonment wound, I have been using anger to feel safe in the face of abuse - abuse which has its roots in a wound that I haven't discovered yet.
I've been using anger as a defense against the demons that make me feel unsafe. I had no healthy coping skills, so anger became my shield.
If I feel angry due to feeling unsafe, and if I feel unsafe due to being abandoned, and if part of a sense abandonment is feeling alone, then the resolution is to understand that I am not alone. The resolution also lies in knowing that I am safe. How can I know I am safe and not alone? Because I can take care of myself. I'm safe right here, right now, in this moment. I'm sitting still in a quiet spot that I chose to be in, safe. When I learn to trust myself, when I learn to view myself as capable (see that self esteem issue there that just came to light?) and forgive myself, even when I make mistakes, even if I make mistakes all day long, I'll feel safer. When I feel safe simply because I'm with myself, I won't feel abandoned, and I won't have the reflex to protect myself with anger.
I just took a first step, and found myself envisioning myself in one of the situations I was in when I was young that made me feel abandoned and afraid, and I envisioned myself as an adult, standing quietly with the young version of myself, keeping myself safe. Not alone.
When I heal my abandonment wounds by trusting myself and having better self esteem and self confidence, then I won't be eaten alive by anger and anxiety - i.e. fear - any more.
When my anger and anxiety are gone, my physical and emotional well being will improve, and that will affect every aspect of my overall quality of life.
I am very grateful for this board. Without it, without all of you, I would not be healing at the rate I am now. If you're curious, here's the discussion that was the catalyst for what I learned today:
https://bpdfamily.com/message_board/index.php?topic=226988
