learned something important from a BPD "friend"

[doubleAries]

Had an epiphany of sorts today and yesterday. About myself and how I trap my own self into dysfunctional crap. It feels pretty good to see myself making progress.

Here's a brief version of the back story... .20 some years ago, I spent the summer in Alaska working at a resort. Made a friend there (let's call her A). She was a little wild, slept with at least 20 guys that I knew of that summer, but I figured to each their own, not place to judge, etc. At the end of the summer, she confessed to me that she had a boyfriend back home (she lives in a different state from me, pretty far away) and she had come to Alaska to "sort things out" in her mind about their relationship. She definitely made it sound like it was a pretty casual relationship that was starting to get serious and she was a little scared and "sowing her oats" or whatever. OK--whatever.

Our friendship continued after we returned home to our respective states, and sometimes she would come to visit me. When she did, she would always find plenty of men to just jump right into bed with. This was a little disconcerting to me, but again--not my business. I asked her about the "boyfriend back home" and she said they worked it out and were staying together. hmmm... .ok, maybe an open relationship or something? Not my business. During all this time, she would call me and complain about lots of stuff, especially her sister. Even burned up a whole Christmas day once on the phone with her griping about her sister. No problem--if you can't talk to your friends, who can you talk to? I always figured when I needed a shoulder, she'd be there for me.

I went to visit her once when I was on a business trip near there (this was very far from my home state) and she made it very clear that she didn't want me there--wouldn't even let me come to her house at first. It was weird and I didn't understand what was going on. Lots of weird details, but suffice it to say it was just weird--I was part of some other compartment that she didn't want to "taint" her "other" life. She met me at some seedy bar and told me that she was worried I was going to spill the beans (paraphrasing here) about our time in Alaska, because actually, the "boyfriend back home" wasn't casual at all, but they were engaged to be married and the fiancé's father had committed suicide and she didn't want to deal with that, so she went to Alaska for the summer. Said she wasn't proud of what she'd done (except her behavior continued every time she came to visit me). So they were NOT in an open relationship and she didn't want him to know about any of this. I was not very comfortable with this, in fact I was horrified, but--well, "not my business" again (and all the other stuff we tell ourselves in order to continue to ignore red flags and surround ourselves with toxic crap)

Skip forward a few more years (to about 6 or 7 years ago). I was diagnosed with a serious life threatening disease. Was married to a bipolar guy who couldn't come up with any supportiveness or sympathy, and needed a friend to talk to--I was scared to death. Call my friend A up and tell her what's going on, and she listens quietly for a while, then very angrily tells me that I'm too needy and she just can't deal with all of my "negativity" and hangs up on me. WHOA! But being a good little co-dependent, I try to make up some excuses for her (that she isn't bothering to make up for herself) and ignore it; tell myself "well, we're still friends and that's just how she is, and maybe I am too needy or something, maybe I shouldn't be burdening anyone else with my whining about my life threatening disease, blah, blah, blah. So I continued to try be friends, minus my "negative whining". But she wouldn't answer or return my calls, letters, or emails. Just "disappeared" me into the dust bin. I was very hurt and angry about this for a long time. Not just at her, but at myself for not being able to discern friends from users. And it was easier to be mad when I wasn't busy making excuses for someone who doesn't bother doing it for themselves.

Now fast forward to yesterday. "A" sends me an IM on FaceBook. Sort of just chatty. I was guarded with her(have heard from her maybe 2 or 3 times in the past several years, like a text or something, just a hit and run type communication that she wouldn't even follow up on). So then she IM's this: "well.  I guess I think you think that I left you when you were sick.  It's not what you might think.  I just felt as if we disagreed on some stuff and I just felt we grew apart knowing how serious you were about issues I didn't care about".

OK, here's where we start getting to me and my epiphany.

I responded and told her that it had hurt my feelings. I also told her I appreciated her bringing it up instead of just pretending it never happened. I thanked her for her apology (OK now scroll back up there and look at what she said. Do you see an apology in there?) she replied back that it was more than just that we grew apart--it was that she needed to remove herself from all negativity (thereby putting it back on me) (hmmm... .wait, I do recall that just previous to my telling her I was very ill, she was emailing me about a crush that she had on some guy--she's been married to "the boyfriend back home" now for about 18 years--and what did I think she should do? Since I was finally asked, I told her it was not cool and that if she had problems with her husband she needed to resolve those first, either repair the problems or leave him, but that affairs only add to the problems. GEE--wonder if that's part of the "negativity" she was referring to? )

So my brain is finally starting to work at this point (HEY! In minutes/hours instead of months/years!) and I realize--wait a minute. I'm thanking her for apologizing when she did no such thing. Simply bringing it up isn't the same as apologizing. In fact, she's kind of laying this all back on me again. What's going on here? Why is she bothering with this? Why is she even contacting me?

Right--her and her husband (a narcissist M.D.) are having big problems (no way!) and she needs someone to talk to! Somehow ran out of other people to talk to    and is returning to the past to fish around and find someone to dump on. My first thought was to tell her to get f**ked. Then I thought "wait--I can't just keep hiding from this kind of crap. I need to learn to deal with it and practice boundaries". So I let her ramble. And lo and behold, she wants to complain about (among many other things) that her doctor husband keeps calling her a BPD. And the  's began to go off. OF COURSE she's a BPD! Of course! DUH! Just because he's a narcissist (I had finally met him a couple of times and it was incredibly obvious) doesn't mean she isn't a BPD. In fact, that's a pretty good match!

That's not the epiphany though. The epiphany was that I keep looking for some giant obvious reason there is a bulls eye on my forehead that makes me easy pickings for predator/user types. When actually, the devil is in the details. Like for example, reading an apology into something that was very clearly NOT an apology.

BPD's (or other PD's) aren't fiendishly clever manipulators that zero in on us and devilishly ensnare us in some magic way we can't figure out until it's too late. They, like everyone else, are just fishing. We are all fishing for people we can relate to. And biting on others hooks at the same time. It isn't personal. They just throw the line out and see who bites. If you don't bite, they move along and keep throwing the line out until they get a bite--just like we all do. Sure--the bait is kind of poisonous, so how is it that we decide to bite? For me, it's not a huge mistake I'm somehow overlooking. It's a smaller thing, done automatically. I'm biting that hook when I make up excuses for someone else's boorish behavior, when I take a crumb (like simply bringing up something) and turning it into a feast (like an apology). When I thank someone for apologizing when what they actually did was blame and insult me. That's where my disconnect is. Right there.

I told "A" she needs to find a good counselor and if hubby won't go then go by herself (heh-heh---sound just like Ann Landers. That's all she ever says!). She hasn't responded.

[Blimblam]

Lol. 

Yeah it's just like for myself I identify within myself that lonely child schema and it requires somone to not understand to complete it. Lol

It's like shame triggers that cause us to chase after something and struggle against it at the same time.  If you are ever hanging around a psychopath they will trigger that struggle in people around them for their amusement, they think it's funny most other people think it's funny too when it's not them.

[Grey Kitty]

*snerk* Some people don't change, "A" is apparently one of them. I'll bet she enjoyed Alaska--not because of the scenery, but because of the male-to-female ratio there!

You, on the other hand are changing. I recall you saying something about how pwBPD always seem to seek you out once. I suspect that this is starting to change.

It has to be hard to realize that a 20-year friendship has been completely one-sided, and not in your favor. (Even if there isn't enough there to really miss!)

[A Dad]

Wow... . that is a really powerful epiphany doubleAries.

After recovering from my BPD ordeal, I have also started to look at my relationships with people, and how I react to them in whole new light. Good job 

[doubleAries]

thanks, all.

In the past several years, I have lost a lot of friends. It is pretty obvious that the reason is because I am changing, I am learning better boundaries, I am becoming less co-dependent (less of a bottomless pit of support to offer with no needs of my own), and developing some self worth. At the same time, the mean little voice inside me (some of you may recall me referring to this as "mom's voice"--Pete Walker calls it the "inner critic" or "inner terrorist" whispers in my ear (OK, it rarely whispers--it usually yells) that I'm a weirdo and nobody likes me.

had a long talk with my T the other day about masks and such, and how if someone spends all their time developing their various masks instead of a self, then the mask becomes the face itself. That's all well and fine to understand about "A" (and frankly, I'm still not real clear on why she chose me to be the guardian of her promiscuity secrets) but it still comes down to my own interactions. Sometimes I fear that if these are the kind of people that are attracted to me, then I must be just like them. I even begin to convince myself of such. which is weird--I'm actually quite opposite, more of a frightened little prude, yet able to convince myself that I'm [in "mom's voice" words] a flaming slut. Yep--I put a profile up an a dating website--that proves it right there (forget the fact that I haven't even gone out on a date or talked to anyone on the phone as a result of the dating website).

Have a hard time with seeing my own identity, and separating it from others (and it goes both directions). Getting a lot better with that through grieving processes. Perhaps this is related in some way to making up excuses for others and reading apologies into insults (I would be sorry if I treated someone that way--so she must be, right?)

I have to laugh sometimes about the look on my T's face over the past 3 or so years, for all the times I come to my session, head hanging, feet shuffling, and announce I finally understand what my problem is and then proceed to let him know that I'm (whatever du jour). He told me once that at first he thought maybe I was a hypochondriac looking for a diagnosis or 5 or 9, but finally came to see that I just had some identity issues (at times unable to see myself clearly, at which point "mom's voice" loves to fill in the blanks!) and sincerely want to identify the problem in order to begin work on it. The problem is shame and programmed self hatred--during "emotional flashbacks", the amygdala "hijacks" the brain and starts spewing self hatred.

I am immensely frustrated by this. If I am thinking about... .whatever, baseball, say for example. And decide I don't want to think about that right now, I want to think about... .grape juice. no problem--I can switch to grape juice. OK, so if that's true, then why can't I just shut off "mom's voice"? (by the way, Grey Kitty, my T was alarmed and told me "mom's voice" is NOT the one I want to be having tea with! For the rest of you, no I'm not multiple personality disorder [though I could probably convince myself I am], I'm just identifying processes by giving them names).

So I trudge into counseling, most often convinced I am a BPD, but have even been convinced I am Schizotypal disorder, a sociopath, Dissociative Identity Disorder, even schizophrenic. Somehow, my T is always caught off guard by these announcements--they go something like this: OK, Bob--I finally understand what the problem is. I'm BPD. So what do I need to do to start dealing with it and start the road to recovery?" And he sits there stunned for a minute, looking to see if I'm pulling his leg or not, then (yet again) tells me "no, you're not. I would tell you if you were BPD (or schizophrenic, or whatever du jour). and you aren't. So let's get back to our shame work, shall we?"

I had a session with him yesterday afternoon. I told him this story about "A", and when I was done, and proudly told him about my epiphany, he said "there's another one you haven't mentioned yet". I searched my brain but couldn't find it. So he said "this would be one of the times that you decide that YOU are the BPD, not your friend "A" and you didn't do that this time." He's right. So I'll take that small victory too.  

[Blimblam]

I found Pete walkers book useful, especially how he makes all those things universal and not s laundry list of psychiatric labels.  What you describe with the labels I see A LOT on here but the labels as your T pointed out, shame.  It's like your creating this idea of "normal," or "healthy," then comparing yourself to that then attaching that shame to these psychiatric lablels to give you you some sort of constant in the void of your own pain. I see this as a sort of enmeshment with some inner parental figure.  That you need this other to trample all over your boundaries so you can attach those shameful feelings to something "tangible," like those labels you mentioned.

[doubleAries]

wow Blimblam! Perfect description!

I'm going to cut and paste that. That pretty much nails it on the head!

I have found Pete Walker's book very helpful as well. When I read through the criteria list for CPTSD (what my T says I most closely resemble but don't quite fit) There were many things that didn't fit. But some, like these, fit well:

difficulty identifying and expressing emotions and internal states

fragmented and disconnected autobiographical narrative

excessive shame

negative internal working models of self

There's a long list of things in the criteria list (and a certain number required for a diagnosis) and these are the only ones that apply. But man oh man do they apply. Especially the last 2.

And what Walker calls "the inner critic" for me is just absolutely intense. It is the reason I call it "mom's voice" instead of "inner critic". My mother is only technically considered a BPD--and only because Sadistic PD was removed from the DSM (that is the one that every single criteria fits her like a perfect glove). So this is a particularly nasty vicious inner voice. I wouldn't dream of talking to others the way I talk to myself. And sometimes, because of how incredibly vicious that voice is, others snarky insults are NOTHING in comparison, so I let it slide. Make up excuses for them. Turn their insults into apologies.

Same about outer reality--when I left home (actually my mom threw me out at 15), everyone else seemed so NICE--even the most dysfunctional predators. I probably would have made up excuses for a serial killer at that point, LOL.

I actually recall/have pinpointed when this internal shredding began. I was 11 years old and began performing OCD behaviors (no where near enough criteria for that diagnosis either). I knew nothing bad would happen if I didn't count every foot step in sets of 4 starting with my left foot, but I was compelled to do it anyway, and began to shred myself to pieces for doing it. I mean viciously, until I was in tears. For many, many years I assumed that agony was because of the OCD behaviors, until it finally occurred to me fairly recently that all that counting was annoying--not agonizing. The agony was about the horrific childhood I was living (DUH) and the counting was the controlled place to express some of the agony in measured amounts (because it was overwhelming). But this is when the inner terrorist ("mom's voice" made it's appearance as well.

Yes, I know it's my own voice now. But that doesn't mean it doesn't feel like a foreign invader. Because it does. I can't make it shut up. I can't make it stop. And it's a hypocrite too--my inner terrorist shreds and belittles me for having an inner terrorist.

The little voice everyone has that says "hmmm... .maybe you shouldn't do that. and here's why... ." for some of us, and certainly me, has become a voice that instead says "you stupid POS. What the heck are you doing? Who do you think you are?" and loses track of whatever the situation is and instead launches into a long litany of exaggerated shortcomings (some completely made up) in severe attack mode. It doesn't make me cry like it did back when I was 11 because I've gotten more used to it.

My T says it is a form of protection, but I completely do not understand that at all. How can I be protecting myself by attacking myself?   Still, I cannot make it stop. He says because it's programmed into my amygdala, and not a cortex function (OK, I understand that, but not how it could be construed as "protection" or defense) What I do know is it drives me absolutely nuts!  :'(

I know this is directly connected to my issue with the original topic ("epiphany" here--I call that kind of behavior co-dependency, but it's not really, even though it resembles it (for those who have read the Walker book, I am a "flight" type, not a "fawn" type, and fawns become co-dependent. Flight types lean more toward perfectionism and OCD). I make excuses for others or read kindness into injury as a weird way to try to appease the inner terrorist. Because who the %$#@ am I to judge anyone else? HUH? What a selfish, paranoid narcissist I am for not accepting others for who they are! What a #$%^&! You're lucky anyone even talks to you at all you $%^&! (meet "mom's voice". And note how it goes from "I" to "you", making it seem more like a foreign invader) Others behavior seems so mild in comparison, that I find myself grateful to them for "only" blaming me for their rudeness.

[Blimblam]

as you got close to the "secret life" of your friend with her partner you were split and encountered the abandonment depression. 

The criticisms of your inner crittic are a way to keep the "vulnerable child," enmeshed with it an avoid experiencing the abandonment depression. 

So while with the friend you felt safe in this role of validating other to her is a parallel to a dissasociated part of you that is not a part of the inner critic-vulnerable child enmesment. Your friendship with her was a way to access that part of you that you describe as dissacociated from her bad behaviors while observing them.

[Grey Kitty]

My T says it is a form of protection, but I completely do not understand that at all. How can I be protecting myself by attacking myself?   Still, I cannot make it stop. He says because it's programmed into my amygdala, and not a cortex function (OK, I understand that, but not how it could be construed as "protection" or defense) What I do know is it drives me absolutely nuts!  :'(  

I've got a take on it being protection. This is an example I heard from my meditation teacher. She told me that in her meditation practice, she had a really bad time with being sleepy while meditating. She says worse than anybody else she's ever seen, and she's been teaching students to meditate for 20-30 years now, so it must have been pretty bad. When she finally stopped dozing off/zoning out completely during her meditations, she found incredible amounts of anger.

In her case, the sleepyness protected her from experiencing the anger. She believes that she didn't yet have the tools to deal with the anger, so protecting herself until she was ready was a good thing for her. There were other emotions underneath the anger... .and the anger was protecting her from them... .until she was ready to deal with them!

So... .your inner critic beating up on yourself keeps you focused there, and doesn't let you go very deep into experiencing other emotions... .and given the anger that came up recently, and how badly various people in your life have treated you... .you can guess what sort of stuff is there.

BTW, I describe this protection process as if it is 100% accurate, and behaves in a linear fashion... .which it probably isn't.

[Blimblam]

Grey kitty that's a good example.  The tiredness is a dissacosiation.  When the self is felt as the vulnerable child vs the inner critic it is felt as two seperate parts but when felt as a whole its on a surface level and dissacosiated.  For a long time even now when I feel those dissociated parts o myself it manifests as spacuness, tiredness, confusion when on a surface level. Those symptoms are a lot like smoking weed and like smoking weed when I feel those things I want to sleep or eat to stuff the emotions back down. 

A lot of my earlier posts is me describing that process and I just stays with the uncomfortable feelings and eventually stopped struggling against the tiredness and followed it into sleep and would actually deal with those same emotions in semi lucid dreams. In the dreams it can be Delt with on a more symbolic level and is interactive. When awake the same feelings tend to attach to a narrative we falsely believe is real but is purely imaginary. 

[eeks]

My T says it is a form of protection, but I completely do not understand that at all. How can I be protecting myself by attacking myself?   Still, I cannot make it stop. He says because it's programmed into my amygdala, and not a cortex function (OK, I understand that, but not how it could be construed as "protection" or defense) What I do know is it drives me absolutely nuts!  :'(

I came up with the metaphor of the invisible fence, like the ones they have for dogs, that give them an electric shock if they go over it.  Inside the fence are all the "safe" traits, feelings and behaviours.  Outside the fence are all the traits, feelings and behaviours that were "unsafe" in your family of origin.  Unsafe because they got you punished, ignored, your parents repressed or shut down this energy, disapproval, any sort of withdrawal of love or attunement on the part of your caregivers.

Please keep in mind that to find what's really "unsafe" you may need to look at your parents' traumas and defenses, I say that because there are things that my therapist says were dangerous for my mother to experience in herself and therefore she reacted when she saw me even getting close to doing/feeling the same, and I think the evidence both in her history and my issues suggests this is a valid explanation.  And I never would have figured this out on my own, because I doubt my mother would ever consciously admit to it, because it was a defense against her own trauma, and she has a perfectly legitimate sounding explanation for why it's the correct and effective way to live life, that she is afraid to examine because that means she has to face her own pain.

And so emotions like anxiety and shame (or the sleepiness that Grey Kitty mentioned) or the very harsh inner critic are, to me, sort of like the "guardians at the gate" of the fence.  You asked how attacking yourself could be protecting yourself?  Well think of it this way.  You've got a lot of life energy in you, and in order to stop that it takes a pretty strong equal and opposite force.  The "mom's voice" is that strong force that pops up and stops you from doing, feeling or expressing something that would have been "dangerous" in your family of origin.  It has to be strong too because although it may not be the case now, from an instinctual perspective when you were a child it was literally a life-or-death matter.  (I don't know if this is just his speculation but after hearing Pete Walker mentioned a few times here I went to his website, where he says that it only takes a few seconds for an unattended child to be snatched by a predator, and I thought "oh yeah... .true... ."  

[doubleAries]

THANKS ALL!   This is totally helpful! Lots of food for thought here!

Starting to grasp what's going on here. Even starting to grasp what my T and the Pete Walker book keep reiterating over and over--that insights, while extremely valuable, can't replace the grieving work that has to happen.

By the way---"A" finally responded, and (how text book is this?) says she is staying in her marriage because a better alternative hasn't come along yet.  

Another idea I had about "mom's voice" being a form of protection is simply that in it's original form (healthy scenario with good enough parents) this "voice" would indeed be protective. That's it's purpose, and has simply gone berserk. Needs to be retrained.

I have been doing some of the grieving work required in this process. Not to the retraining part yet though. For years in therapy I tried to "get in touch" with those lost emotions from a childhood in hell. They just wouldn't come. Then in the past several months, they have started blasting out in a weird form of "themes"--one emotion at a time (I certainly haven't planned it that way!). A few months ago, it was all about shame. And I literally spent DAYS wallowing around on the floor in agony. I didn't realize another one was in the works. The more recent one was anger.

For some reason, I keep doing this in strangely public ways. Some of you know the shame meltdown I ended up vomiting up all over some guy I met on a dating website. Fabulous first impression! He's not real interested in talking to me anymore for some reason... .

The anger one was very recently, and it played out on FaceBook. I have hidden from my witch mother for 24 years (no contact at all) and finally decided maybe she should hide from me instead of me hiding from her. My older brother and I were very close growing up and are still pretty close. He was  delighted that I finally put up a facebook page, and kept talking about how empowering it is, but I knew from the get go that it was NOT going to go smoothly (I'm the scapegoat of the family, and my older brother is a "smoother over" guy). My mom was furious when I cut off contact with her years ago (who's going to take all the blame?) but quickly adapted to the situation and began telling other family members that she forgives me now (hoo, boy. that's a good one!) and wants to be "friends" with me but I'm just too crazy and mean. Of course, she never attempted to contact me and say any of this, because it was never about her and I being "friends", it was about divide and conquer, and her weak attempts to be seen as a victim (she's never been good at the waif thing, she's an out and out witch). So when she realized I had a FB page, she immediately blocked me (I had not made any contact attempts) and tried to get everyone else to as well. There was her chance to be "friends" LOL, and she showed everyone that she didn't really mean it!

OK, fine, who cares--I don't want to be "friends" with her anyway--not on FB or in person. But then she started slinking around behind my back trying to get other family members to initiate a psychiatric intervention on me (no, seriously!) Her "proof"? That I cut my hair into a Mohawk a couple years ago (still have it) and am "claiming" to be an atheist (we all grew up fundamentalist Baptist). No one blocked me, no one initiated a psychiatric intervention--which she didn't really want anyway, she just wanted to plant the ":)A is crazy" seed (she told my brother that my counselor "implanted" abuse lies in my head--as if he wasn't there and being abused when we were kids too  ) This "defiance" against her will (everyone was supposed to block me and shun me) started getting to her, so she decided to ramp things up a bit (and in our see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil family dynamic, apparently I was the only one who saw any of this coming). So when I would comment on family members posts, she would chime in with something snarky, knowing everyone but me could see her comments. But my nephew started telling me what she was saying. At first, I responded to her comments, to scare her into thinking maybe I could see them somehow. But then the anger meltdown began.

I created a post on my page (I knew she was spying on my page, and had actually played up to that a little bit--put the "understanding the borderline mother" and other similar books in my book section, publicly). the post was calling her out, telling her if she had something to say, she needed to come out of hiding and say it, otherwise, shut the F*** up. not surprisingly, my family members freaked out and my friends encouraged me. The post had dozens and dozens of comments, and became a public discussion about child abuse, and not hiding the secrets of the perpetrators, because the shame is theirs, not the "abusee's".

Family members kept telling me "what do you hope to accomplish with this?" and "she's not going to apologize, so why are you trying to get her to?" I myself was hard pressed for a little while to articulate what I hoped to accomplish, but finally was able to say "who said anything about apologies? I sure didn't! You think I don't know that? Why do you think I cut off contact with her? She isn't sorry for anything she did to her kids; in her mind, all her torture and sadism were absolutely justified and the blame lays with those of us she abused." When asked repeatedly what I hoped to accomplish and also told over and over "you need to let this go, it's hurting you still and letting her have power over you" I finally was able to say "guess what? THIS IS LETTING GO.  This is what it looks like! What you are really asking of me is to stop letting it go and continue swallowing it, ignoring it, pretending it doesn't matter! Well it DOES matter and I'm angry! Life isn't all about rainbows and candy canes--sometimes it is entirely appropriate to be angry! Like when my mother severely abuses me for 15 years, then sabotages my life for another 10 years after leaving home, and then has the nerve to call ME crazy and try to turn everyone against me just to protect her dirty little secrets! OK? ANGRY!"

It wasn't until I started posting specific things she had done to me as a kid that she reported me to FB and they removed my entire post. It felt like the witch had stolen my voice again. But I made another post announcing my upcoming book with the working title "daughter of the witch". When it got dozens of likes, the witch removed her page from FB and disappeared (temporarily, I'm sure). She won't answer anyone else's emails or phone calls. My "smoother over" brother is in a tizzy. Me? I feel a heckuva lot better. I'm a bit apprehensive too, because witches don't "go away"--they get even. In a spectacular way. But I have 2 powerful weapons against her, the 2 things she fears most--the truth, and the truth spoken aloud for all to hear.

Wonder what the next emotional theme meltdown will be?

I'd like to get them out of the way (yes, I know it's ongoing), because I really want to get to the part about retraining the inner terrorist voice. So it can start to become my "conscience" instead of a self shredding terrorist.