What is the difference between denial and being unaware

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Hello,  I have been struggling with this lately.  So many times I feel like how can it be denial if I am not aware?  To me denial is being aware of something but consciously dismissing it.  How can I deny something if I am not aware?  It just doesn't make any sense.  I remember an Aunt, on my father's side, who used to appear to be in a constant state of denial.  You could see it in her face.  It was like that lights are on but nobody is home.  She was an intelligent person though if you talked to her.  I have read our subconscious is always at work.

Can anyone shed light on the difference? 

Maybe I am in denial of being in denial?   

Tsultan

[Tsultan]

Hello,  I have been struggling with this lately.  So many times I feel like how can it be denial if I am not aware?  To me denial is being aware of something but consciously dismissing it.  How can I deny something if I am not aware?  It just doesn't make any sense.  I remember an Aunt, on my father's side, who used to appear to be in a constant state of denial.  You could see it in her face.  It was like that lights are on but nobody is home.  She was an intelligent person though if you talked to her.  I have read our subconscious is always at work.

Can anyone shed light on the difference? 

Maybe I am in denial of being in denial?   

Tsultan

[Mutt]

Hi Tsultan

To me denial is being aware of something but consciously dismissing it.  How can I deny something if I am not aware?

Different members will be at different stages of grieving - one stage is denial the board is designed to do self work which in turn eventually raises your level of awareness some more than others. You can read posts on this board where members are in the denial stage without them knowing that they are in that grieving stage - aware or not aware. Some people can tell.

Let's take an alcoholic for example that is in denial that he/she has a problem I would think that at some point the thought about having a drinking problem would come to mind and the thought would be pushed away because he's not ready or willing to accept that he/she has a problem. There would have to be some level of awareness to be able to acknowledge that you have a problem but maybe some people are completely oblivious to the fact that they have a problem.

What made you think about this?

[Tsultan]

Hi Mutt,  Thanks for responding.  When I am in a meeting for recovery from growing up in a home affected by Alcoholism I hear members say they were in denial about the drinking that was going on in the home either by their spouse or their parents. For me personally, I always knew my father had a drinking problem. 

I think a good example for me personally would be my mother's drinking.  She spent a lot of energy roping me into monitoring my father's drinking habits and trying to control it when I was a kid.  She would ask me to check the mark she made on the bottle to see how much whiskey he drank,  she would coerce me into talking to him about his drinking hoping that maybe this time he will listen and thinking maybe I had the power to influence him.  This went on for years. 

I have been going to meetings for over 30 years and I was not aware that my mother possibly had a drinking problem too until only about 10 years ago.  As a matter of fact, it was her behavior that brought a lot of shame onto me as a kid growing up.  She would pass out in front of my friends during an organizational meeting for one of my hobbies.  She volunteered to be a chaperone for that same organization for one our trips to Kentucky to the see the International Arabian horse show.  What an opportunity!  Every night as a chaperone she would go to the balcony and drink a 6 pack or more of beer.  Half way through the trip the head chaperone confronted her because one of the girls in my room must have reported her.  She was asked to leave and give up her chaperone responsibility because of her drinking.  I was about 14 at the time.  I was given the choice to stay or leave.  I chose to drive back home to NY with her and I was the navigator.  On the upside, I became very good a reading maps.   

So was me not being aware of my mother's drinking denial or was this simply not being aware?  I think some of it was the fact that she may have distracted me knowingly or unknowingly her drinking behavior by focusing on my Dad's drinking. 

There are other examples in my life too.  Such as my exH's mask that he wore outside of the home.  I just never saw the connection that he put on this mask until someone mentioned in a meeting that her H was a different person at home than he was in public. The light bulb went on for me at that moment and I made the connection to my exH too.  People couldn't believe he was the "other guy".

If I were to describe what it was I would say either I was very nieve or I just didn't catch that behavior because I don't think like that.  I am not sure about it being denial.  I would say more like a lack of awareness and I am continually becoming more and more aware of stuff all the time. 

So this is what made me think about denial vs awareness.  But I want to be sure about it. 

Thanks for listening.

Tsultan

[Mutt]

I'm sorry that you had to go through that as a kid it has to be hard to be put into a position like that, I would think that the loyalty that you have with both parents would have to be strained. It's not a situation that a parent should put their child through.

So was me not being aware of my mother's drinking denial or was this simply not being aware?

I think that it was because you were an adolescent you were being asked to do things that most of your peers didn't have to do, they probably had different problems at home or a small fraction if any had to monitor the other parents habits.

It sounds like your mom was passive aggressive instead of facing your dad she was going around it with you, she should have thought about your needs and how her actions affect you. To a degree you were seen as object to fulfill her desire with your dad.

Maybe she was in denial, I've always thought that people that struggle with substance abuse are struggling with pain or trying to cope with the pain by using something to numb it, maybe they're not aware of the core reason why they drink. Like attracts like, your parents were probably both struggling with their own issues that they didn't know how to cope with, your mom was probably really stressed with chaperoning maybe she didn't know how to act around your peers or the people that were in charge of your party, maybe she felt a lot of shame and didn't feel worthy and coped with it by drinking.

I'm not making excuses for her behavior with how she treated you all I'm saying is that it's invalidating when someone just sums up someone's addiction by saying that they're a druggie or a drunk it's labeling something without peeling back the layers and looking at the reason why someone behaves the way that they do.

What was your mom's childhood like if you don't mind that I ask?

[I Am Redeemed]

Speaking as someone who has struggled with addiction, I can tell you that for me, I was fully aware that I had a problem and that my behavior was not normal. The denial was thinking that I could sustain my addiction, and that I could not ever face life with healthy coping skills.

I think the difference between being in denial and being unaware is that with denial, there is a certain awareness but it is pushed away and, well, denied. It involves rationalizing and justifying in order to come to an acceptable comfort level of what one can believe as one's reality. Changing one's belief system to something less comfortable is met with opposition, and the denial is a defense mechanism.
Being unaware usually means that one is not opposed to a different perspective or acceptance of reality when facts are presented that are fairly solid, it just may be that the reality hasn't "clicked" yet.

Hope that makes sense,

Redeemed

[Tsultan]

Hi Redeemed,  Thanks for responding. Everything you said is how I interpret the difference between denial and unawareness.  I'm trying to get in touch with any denial that I may have had in the past so this is why I am thinking about it lately.  In regards the reality of my r/s with my xBPDbf there was denial on my part.  I knew deep down it would not work, but I hung onto hope because I did not want to face the reality of the situation.  He always left the r/s and I pursued him after he left.  I don't know if I would call my mother an alcoholic, only she can decide that for herself but I do know she drank alcoholically.  She often drank on weekends on the porch growing up and then would want to get affectionate.  It was repulsive to me.  Her breath smelled of alcohol and she slurred her words.  On my sister's wedding night we had to bail her out of jail because she got a DWI.  My sisters wedding!  She got angry at something and drove off in the car.  She tried pulling that at my 2nd wedding but I ignored her antics.  I had a few years of recovery under my belt.  I wasn't going to let her spoil my wedding.

Hi Mutt,  My mother's childhood was rough.  There is a lot of crazy on her side of the family.  She told me her father would lock her in the closet. He was physically abusive but she never got specific.  I never met my grandfather.  That is a strange concept to me that I never met him.  My late Aunt on my mother's side was an alcoholic who was in recovery, my late uncle on mom's side was a problem drinker and he was also abusive to animals. He held my head under water when I was a kid. I never went near the man after that - again!  And everyone knew about it too.  My other aunt on mom's side I was told had a temper and one night she took off in the car and hit a tree head on and she died in the accident.  She had another brother who was put into an institution because he was a special needs child, and her other brother seemed most normal but lived far enough away that I never got to know him but she said he drank too. 

Since coming to this site and becoming aware, I think it's possible my mom was somewhere on the BPD spectrum.  She sought attention, she was impulsive, she raged a lot, slammed cupboards, she presented herself in public as a completely different person,  she had deep shame and I know she had a deep sense that she was stupid. When she got drunk she called herself stupid.  My mother definitely had narcissistic traits.  I was an object to be used.  She would have me massage her feet and brush her hair for hours.  It is no wonder I am such a caretaker to this day.  My 1/2 sister has been Dx w/BPD.  If this is part genetic and part environmental I can understand my 1/2 sister's predisposition to the disorder.

This was my model during childhood.  I carry a lot of shame about who my mother is.  I am trying my best to work through that.  Even though my father drank and eventually his alcoholism would kill him, I had way more respect for him than I did my mother.

Great question Mutt,  It made me think of some things a process more. Thanks for listening, 

Tsultan