Why, yes, I do look like the shithead here, don't I?

[evile]

I blew up, I freaked out, I got mad, I'm the bad guy. It's all on me. Aren't I the unreasonable bitch? Aren't they just the innocent wounded parties having to deal with the sicko crazy woman. Poor poor little victims. Soooo mistweated and misunderstood. So sad.

What I find most interesting about interacting with emotional manipulators is how they can push past your bounaries til you blow up, then step back and play the oh so reasonable and noble hurt party. This is a game I do not play well. Especially not when I'm recovering from fricken emergency eye surgery.

Comments

More thoughts

[bramblekite.livejournal.com]

When you violate someone else's boundaries or hurt their feelings, the correct response is not "But I needed to violate your bounaries/hurt your feelings, FOR ME," and proceed to give a laundry list of excuses and justifications for why you did what you did.

A more correct response would be "I apologize for violating your boundaries. I am sorry for hurting you. You must be feeling very hurt and very uninterested in trusting me any more, and I understand that. How can I fix this? Or is this not fix-able? If it is fixable, what can I do in the future? What would you like me to do now to help you feel better?"


Some fucking acknowledgment of my feelings, not a laundry list of why you fucked me up and why you feel justified in doing so.

[emmainfiniti.livejournal.com]

Hugs.

[bramblekite.livejournal.com]

Thanks. This has gotten beyond tedious. I'm tired of hte aftershocks. I just wnat to be done.

[emmainfiniti.livejournal.com]

BTW -sorry I haven't been able to coordinate a lunch time yet. I have alternated between being stupidly busy or stupidly weepy for the last week.
I am hoping next week will look better.

[emmainfiniti.livejournal.com]

Oh, and I really like this:
"A more correct response would be "I apologize for violating your boundaries. I am sorry for hurting you. You must be feeling very hurt and very uninterested in trusting me any more, and I understand that. How can I fix this? Or is this not fix-able? If it is fixable, what can I do in the future? What would you like me to do now to help you feel better?""

I wonder if anyone has heard this before in real life?

[bramblekite.livejournal.com]

well, 'someone'is the Therapy Princess, so it seems to me that somewhere in her journey, some therapist or another should have taught her better ways to respond to people expressing hurt felings/anger. But who knows?

[made-of-paradox.livejournal.com]

Having the right kind of therapist makes a huge difference.

Maybe she doesn't have the right kind of therapist. And, if that's the case, there's nothing that any of us can do about it, except possibly hope that one day, she will.

[bramblekite.livejournal.com]

yup.

But I don't owe her anything, not explanation, not validation, no more of my emotional investment.

[made-of-paradox.livejournal.com]

OK.

Holler electronically if you need to vent about something else. :) I'll be here. Possibly with a delay, but I'll be here.

[bramblekite.livejournal.com]

And, more importantly, I just don't get the impression that anyone or anything is important to her, other than her own needs and feelings. She has not given me sign 1 that she is interested in relating to me as a feeling being with desires of my own.

I keep wanting to relate to her as if she's a person, and keep on trying to understand and be understood, and this is not a sane or rational approach for me. As with other Emotional Manippulators in my life, I get so caught up in Teh Unfairness and Teh Misunderstandingz and I want so very very much to reach a place of fairness and understanding that I keep on trying...when the other person is not in the LEAST bit interested in trying, and has given me more than one indication of that....this is a person who is invested in being the Helpless Victim. This is a person who wants what she wants and she will do whatever she can to manipulate people into doing and giving what she wants. This is not a person to be spoken or explained to, because understanding and mutual respect are not in her interests.

I've met this sort of person before and it always, always ended badly. Emotional investment must be finished with now. I am never going to get what I want from this person. She will never hear or respect me. It just makes me sad and angry and frustrated.

[bramblekite.livejournal.com]

I probably should not have been the one to tell her, but I went ahead and sent her email today, with the profanity edited out, with my sample apology as a better example of what to do next time someone calls her on violating a boundary and hurting feelings. Save that "reasons and rationalizations" for youf fucking therapist, cupcake.

Anyway...like I said, I should not have... I don't owe her anything, any more attempts at understanding, nothing. But...on the off chance that she was raised extremely poorly and was never taught to have consideration for the feelings of others or how to apologize, I went ahead and sent it.

bleh.

done. I just want to be done.

[made-of-paradox.livejournal.com]

*hug*

If the boundaries were described before they were violated, then doing that to someone in the midst of a health crisis? Ick. Just, ick.

And, well, someone in a crisis is going to have a shorter fuse, and anyone incapable of taking that into account doesn't deserve to be exchanging oxygen in the same atmosphere as you. (OK, that was gross (as in, large, not as in ewwwww) hyperbole. But I felt righteous when I was typing it.)

[bramblekite.livejournal.com]

Thanks for getting my back. I am working on creating this 'bubble of calm'...completely independent of what anyone else thinks of me or wants from me. I don't 'owe' anyone anything more than I've already said/given. It irks me to be misunderstood and mistreated after I feel I've tried VERY hard to be understood and explain how I prefer to be treated, but that's not their problem. If I say "don't poke me in the eye" and someone pokes me in the eye and proceeds to tell me WHY they poked me in the eye, I'm the dumbshit if I hang around for more poking.

No thanks.

[made-of-paradox.livejournal.com]

That sounds distressingly close to the sort of situation where I'd eventually be saying, "What part of NO didn't you understand? Was it the 'N' or the 'O'?"

I'm sorry about this shit. :(

[bramblekite.livejournal.com]

It will get better.

The important relationship here is not the one between me and the manipulator. The important relationship here is between me and Thax, and we both need to work on better, healthier ways to speak to one another and be understood by one another. We are commited to that.

At some point down the road perhaps I will be thankful to the emotional manipulator for breaking open this wound and allowing Thax and I to begin to heal it. I didn't create his shut down/avoidant tendencies. He didn't create my tendencies to tell myself that I'm worthless and my feelings and desires are invalid and stuff them away until I blow up in a giant mess of insecurity and anger and abandonment issues. We didn't make each other codependent, we just found each other this way and for a time our baggage was a really comfortable matched set. We can unlearn these things and do better by each other. I am commited to that. He is committed to that.

[made-of-paradox.livejournal.com]

I'm glad y'all are using this to help yourselves and each other, and not letting it ruin things.

And, "It will get better." Good for you to be stating this. :)

[bramblekite.livejournal.com]

Thanks for this.

*hugs*