“I feel terribly guilty,” she says.

“Why?”

“I’m mad at my father.”

“So?”

“He be furious if he knew.”

She’s reminding me that control addicts (a.k.a. codependents) are cursed.

They’re cursed by the inability to distinguish their feelings from the reactions of other people to those feelings.

This is a common result of growing up in families — alcoholic, abusive or otherwise dysfunctional — where feelings were not tolerated, much less encouraged.

Thus this young woman can’t experience angry thoughts about dad without immediately scaring herself by imagining his reaction if he knew.

She feels anxious and guilty about feeling.

This is the curse of confusing inside with outside, also known as blurred boundaries — not knowing just where you end and others begin.

It’s a terrible way to live.

It not only keeps you scared of other people, it turns you against yourself — makes you fear the currents of your own emotional life.

Instead of something to respect and listen to, feelings come to seem like a dangerous vulnerability.

And since, being human, you can’t stop feeling, you almost never feel safe.

What to do?

Recovery for such people requires

(a) finding a safe place (like a therapeutic relationship or support group), and then

(b) slowly, bravely training themselves to express feelings to people who won’t punish them.

This is called a corrective emotional experience.

It’s no picnic.

It’s scary.

And must be repeated many many times.

But those with the courage and the patience to do this work often discover that they can uncurse themselves.

May I have your attention, please?

We’ll be starting our descent in a few minutes. 

And before we land the captain has asked that I brief you new flyers on the indigenous culture of Planet Control.  

Those of you who’ve heard this before can go on with your reading. 

I assume each of you has some familiarity with Planet Control, or you wouldn’t be on this flight to begin with. 

But just to clarify:  The basic rules of social intercourse here are,

1. Always conceal what you’re really thinking.

2. Always conceal what you’re really feeling.

3. Always conceal what you really want.

4. Always pay close attention to what those around you are thinking, feeling and wanting.

5. If you aren’t sure, try to read their minds.

6. If you can’t read their minds, blame yourself for being selfish.

7. If you notice symptoms of emotional distress — like anxiety, depression or the urge to abuse substances — relax.  These are perfectly normal reactions to the culture of Planet Control.  They won’t go away over time; they may actually worsen.  But you get used to it.

If all that seems too much to remember, following one simple rule should suffice:

Do not be yourself.  It may bother someone. 

We hope these tips make your stay on Planet Control safer and more pleasant.

Thanks for your attention.

And thanks for flying Codependent Airways.

Of all the pathologies to which control addiction can lead, family violence is one of the more grotesque.  This post came to me as twenty-year old notebook pages scribbled by someone going through one of the darker days of her life.  Worth reading, by men and women.  I thank the writer for her courage in sharing it.

x

Protection

I keep thinking I don’t belong here.

When I first got here at 9:00 AM there was only one other person.  The woman at the window talked to me in a loud harsh-sounding voice.  Especially loud.  She asked me why I was here through the hole in the window that keeps her separated from the angry and sad people on the other side.  Her voice was so loud it seemed to echo. 

Why are you here?

I am here for an order of protection I tell her in a soft embarrassed voice.

Against who?

My spouse.

The worst part had been said, and I was told to sit and fill out a petition.

A petition that would order someone — someone who had at one time vowed to love and cherish me  for the rest of my life – to stop hurting me.  So much that it left bruises.

I don’t belong here, I keep thinking.

Later I sat in front of a probation officer.  Attached to her desk were two signs with the same message: Do not move the chair closer to this desk.

The probation officer looked tired.  It was only 9:15 AM.

I told her about the incidents.  I told her about the strong hands around my throat, and how it still hurts in several places there.  I told her about the hands that grabbed my wrists.  I showed her the bruise on my left wrist.  It’s brown in color.  I showed her the small bruise on my right wrist.  It’s purplish.  I told her what happened when my face hit the rug of the living room, how it still hurts on the inside of my gums, how my head felt like it had been shattered, jolted for a long time afterward.  I told her my shoulder hurts, and I wasn’t sure of the other injuries, because sometimes it takes a while for the bruises to appear.

Then I was told to sit until my petition was typed.  It could take an hour, maybe two.  Maybe more.

I take a seat in the lobby.  It’s crowded now.  There are a few children.  Some of the people are speaking angrily.  Some of them are arguing about child support.  Too much.  Too little. 

Every now and then someone comes to the door that leads to the rooms where you tell about your bruises and other kinds of hurts and injustices.  She or he calls out a name.  The people come and go.

There is a very large colorful wall poster that contains artwork about family violence.  These are drawings by children who have watched people in their families hurt other people in their families. 

Like my daughter. 

Like my son.

There are drawings of a hand holding a belt and a face that looks frightened.  An arm held up to take the blow.  It’s instinctive.  There is a large tear on the frightened face.

Do I belong here?

Fifteen years, I told the probation officer.  I have been taking these bruises for fifteen years.

She looks up at me, but she does not show any emotion.  She tells me to talk to a women’s group. 

Then she says, Fifteen years is a long time.

I nod. 

I feel very very small, and very very stupid.

What is wrong with me?

Then I think — later in the lobby, where a little dark-faced, sad-eyed boy watches me intently — I have never really had a time in my life when I haven’t been abused.

I can do one of two things:  I can fight back, like I am today, or I can accept this fact of my life and just keep surviving the best that I can, and then die.

Last night I thought to myself it’s time to disconnect the life support systems here. 

Let this sinking ship fall beneath the surface of the waves and hit bottom. 

It takes so much effort to keep this ship afloat, and even at that it’s barely above the surface.

I’m barely breathing, and I’m alone.

Later I’m in Part 10 of the court.  I’m waiting for a judge to listen to my problem and decide whether I should be protected.

It’s another life support system.

I’m very tired, and I’m numb.

I can’t feel anything, so I don’t know if this is the right thing to do or not.

There are so many people here with attorneys in suits.  They are talking about transactions.  They are talking about child support and custody of children.  Some of these children are here.  One of these people is crying.  Her attorney is here. 

I am alone.

I am used to this.

Who would sit here with me?

I am not important enough.

I have not reached out.

My therapist offered to come here, but I did not want her to because I know how much it would take from her day.

It is too much to ask.

I am used to being alone with my fears and my hurts and my oh so very very much confusion.

People are pacing.  People are running after children.  People are talking to the people they are with.  Some people are just sitting, not talking, not moving, only thinking very deeply.

I wait for my name.

I am not sure if I belong here, but I cannot get out of my mind the look on my son’s face that night.

He was so frightened, like the children in the family violence poster.

I can’t stop thinking of that pain, that look on his face.

That is why I am here.

~ Susan Perretti 

A guy visits a farmer.  

“Want to meet the smartest mule in the world?” the farmer asks.

“Sure,” says the guy.

So the farmer takes him to the barnyard and shows him a mule.

“What’s two plus two?” the farmer asks.

The mule stares back at him.

“I said, what’s two plus two?” shouts the farmer.

The mule stares.

The farmer picks up a rake handle and smacks the mule between the eyes.

The mule blinks, then stamps his foot: one, two, three, four.

“Great,” the guy says.  “Smart mule.  But why’d you hit him with the rake handle?”  

“Oh,” says the farmer, “that was to get his attention.”

Control addicts are like all addicts.

Who are just like that mule.

They must get hit over the head before they can start recovering.

An addict’s rake handle is called “hitting bottom.”  Bottom being that point where the pain of their addiction becomes larger than their fear of giving it up.

Control addicts need this no less than alcoholics and drug addicts.

They need that pain.

Without it, they won’t pay attention.

So don’t waste your time trying to convince them to stop their controlling.

And — please — never protect them from its consequences.

They need those consequences.

They need that pain.

And unless and until they feel it…

They’re just another mule in the barnyard.

x

Don’t know?

Don’t worry.

You will,

after you read

x

Coming soon to this space.

x

Be honest, now.

x

If you are,

you’ll probably realize

how much

you need to read

Coming soon to this space.

.

x

Not sure what

you’re trying to control?

Uh oh.

Not good.

Be sure to read

Coming soon to this space.

.

Maybe you’re picking

the wrong fights.

.

Learn how to pick

the right ones.

.

Read:

Coming soon to this space.

We’re walking.

Loki lunges after every car that passes.

“What would you do if you caught one?” I ask.

He doesn’t answer.

But his silence gives me a chance to think about how people are like dogs.

The car we chase, of course, is control.

Ever wonder what would happen if we caught the car?

I know of two interesting possibilities.

One is the sedated, carefully emotionless dystopia of The Giver (2014), now available on DVD.  (Can’t catch the movie?  Read the book. It’s even better.)

Another is Wall-E’s (2008) depiction of a fat, comfort-soaked future where robots do all the work and humans have nothing to do but develop morbid obesity.

What these two visions share is a recognition of humanity’s craving for comfort, aversion to pain, and how disastrous it would be if we ever managed to gratify both totally.

Life would change fundamentally, they agree.  And it wouldn’t be pretty.

It wouldn’t even be life.

Seventy-six years ago Aldous Huxley took the same view in Brave New World (1939).  That novel describes a world where war, aging, illness, hunger and anxiety have been largely eradicated, and features this dialogue between two characters called the Controller and the Savage:

Controller:  We prefer to do things comfortably.

Savage:  But I don’t want comfort.  I want God, I want poetry, I want real danger, I want freedom, I want goodness.  I want sin.

Controller:  In fact, you’re claiming the right to be unhappy.

Savage:  All right then, I’m claiming the right to be unhappy.

Controller:  Not to mention the right to grow old and ugly and impotent; the right to have syphilis and cancer; the right to have too little to eat; the right to be lousy; the right to live in constant apprehension of what may happen tomorrow; the right to catch typhoid; the right to be tortured by unspeakable pains of every kind.

Savage:  I claim them all.

My point here is simple.

Like all animals, we’re wired to seek pleasure and avoid pain.

But we’re the only animals able to exert control over the world into which we are born.

In many ways, this is a good and useful thing.

But given our tendency to overcontrol reality…

God help us if we ever catch that car.

x

x

First session of the new year.

She looks haggard.

I ask how her holidays went.

“Awful,” she says.  “My demented inlaws visited.  Which started my husband drinking.  Which started us fighting.  Which scared the crap out of the kids.

“Now I can’t stand the marriage and can’t stop thinking about leaving it.  Can’t sleep or eat.  Can’t stop crying at work.  Can’t stop worrying or feeling scared.”

“Jesus,” I say.  “How can I help?”

She looks at me.  “Get me out of here.”

We exchange sad smiles.

“Or at least,” she says, “teach me how to survive a shitstorm.”

“Okay,” I say.  “Leave the room.”

“Huh?”

“You have two rooms in your house,” I say.  “Your mind and your body.  Right now you’re trapped in your mind.  Stay there and you’ll go crazy.  You need to drop down a floor.”

“How?”

“Whatever works for you.  Walk.  Go to the gym.  Take a yoga class.  Dance.  Take a bath.  I used to lie on a hard floor and focus on trying to get comfortable.  Anything that moves your attention from thinking to feeling.”

“And then?”

“Then listen.  Your body will tell you what you need first.  It’s telling you now, but you’re too scared to listen.”

“What I need,” she repeats.

“Sure.  There’s stuff you can solve right now and stuff you can’t.  Can’t fix your husband or his family.  But you can take better care of yourself, get rest and food and exercise.  And that will help you feel better and give you strength to figure out the other stuff.”

“Still not sure how,” she frowns.

“Start now.  Take a breath.  Move your attention to your body.  What do you notice?”

She breathes and listens.

“My heart hurts,” she says.

“What’s it feel like?”

“Like being squeezed by a big hand.”

“And what’s your body need?”

She breathes again.  And starts to cry.

She cries for ten minutes.

I pass her a box of tissues and wait.

Finally she stops and looks at me.  I raise my eyebrows to ask how she is.

“Better,” she smiles.

As I was saying, control addiction behaves paradoxically.

The Second Paradox is:

.

This is an interpersonal version of the First Paradox (“The more control you need, the less control you have”).

And what does it look like in action?

Consider:

Heather wants to marry Ian, who’s scared of commitment.  So she pressures him to propose. This scares him, so he backs away. This scares her, so she steps up the pressure (“Why won’t you marry me?”).  Which makes him back away further and faster. And so on.

*

“He never talks to me,” Janet complains about Kenny, who grew up in a family where no one talked about anything.  The more she begs him to talk, the more anxious and inadequate Kenny feels.  The more anxious and inadequate he feels, the more silent he becomes.  Which angers Janet, which makes her beg harder.  And so on.

*

Liz, a people pleaser, gets anxious when Mark is unhappy. So she knocks herself out putting his feelings, needs and preferences ahead of her own.  Mark – who enjoys this – finds he can keep Liz motivated by remaining unhappy.  The unhappier he becomes, the harder she tries.  The harder she tries, the unhappier he becomes.  And so on.

*

Nancy: “If you didn’t drink, I wouldn’t nag you.”   Oscar: “If you didn’t nag me, I wouldn’t drink.”  Rinse and repeat.

*

Patty and Ron both grew up in families that didn’t acknowledge or respect feelings.  Hungry for emotional validation, they now seek it from each other.  Unfortunately each takes the position, “I’ll validate you after you validate me.”  Since neither validates first, no one gets validated.  Ever.  So their childhood deprivation continues.  Indefinitely.

See the pattern?

This paradox grows out of two facts of human nature:  Everyone wants control, and no one wants to be controlled by others.

That’s what is being played out above.  Each of these ten partners tries desperately (if unconsciously) to transform the other into the partner they want.  And each resists transformation as hard as they can.

Even people who seem to comply with their partner’s (or parent’s) demands are doing it out of a need to control the other’s behavior.

This creates not love, not intimacy, not healthy connection, but monkeyship — relationship bent out of shape by control issues.  

Some of this goes on in all our relationships.  At some point we all turn monkeyish.  We all try to make our partner into the person we want them to be.

It has little to do with how much we love that partner. 

It has everything to do with how much control we think we need to feel safe.　

And it continues until we learn alternatives to monkeyish behavior.

x

paradox: a seemingly true statement or group of statements that lead to a contradiction or a situation which seems to defy logic or intuition. ~ Wikipedia

 x

Control addiction is hard to escape because it behaves paradoxically.

I.e., not as you’d expect.

So far I’ve noticed three paradoxes that confuse the hell out of people and keep them addicted.

Here’s the First Paradox:

Needing control has a sort of boomerang effect.  The harder you try to get more of it, the more you end up feeling controlled.

You feel controlled by, surprise, your need for control.

And this happens with weird regularity.

Still, it’s easy to overlook if you’re not looking for it.  So I thought some stories might help illustrate this stubbornly reliable principle.

The actors in each of these (except the last) are heavily disguised, but all the events are based in fact.

Annie’s depressed because she’s overweight.  So she eats cookies to make the depression go away.  Which makes her more overweight.  Which makes her more depressed.  Which makes her eat more cookies.  The more control you need, the less you have.

*

Barry’s wife drinks.  This panics Barry, so he does everything he can think of to stop her.  He reasons, begs, nags, yells, makes nasty comments, threatens divorce, hides her wine, pours it down the toilet.  Stressed by Barry’s behavior, his wife drinks more. The more control you need, the less you have.

*

Carol’s daughter fails Math and lies about it.  This enrages Carol, who can’t stand to be lied to.  So she confiscates her daughter’s cell phone and warns her of worse punishments if she lies again.  This scares her daughter, who starts keeping more secrets and lying about more stuff.   Which leads to more punishments.  Which lead to more fear and more lies.  The more control you need, the less you have.

*

Dennis is an anxious man whose last wife cheated on him.  Now he worries his new wife might do the same.  So he carefully monitors her comings and goings, and makes sure he knows where she is and who she’s with.  Then listens in on her phone calls.  Then intercepts and examines her cell phone records.  Then starts following her on errands.  As a result of all this his anxiety soars to panic-attack levels, and his wife finds a boyfriend with whom she can relax.  The more control you need, the less you have.

*

Eve’s boyfriend is abusive.  He doesn’t hit her, but yells and criticizes and threatens her constantly.  Friends beg Eve to dump him, but she’s scared that will make him angrier.  So she does her best to pacify and appease him.  Since the boyfriend likes this result, he continues to yell, criticize and threaten.  Then one day he hits her.  The more control you need, the less you have.

*

Fred and Ginger are married.  It’s the second marriage for each, and each brings to it a history of disappointed relationships.  Both want the marriage to work and are scared that it won’t, which makes them hypersensitive to any and all relationship problems.  They monitor each other closely for signs of dissatisfaction or anger.  They repeatedly seek reassurance that their partner still loves them.  They discuss their problems constantly.  All this leaves them chronically uneasy in each other’s presence.  The distance between them grows, which increases their uneasiness.   They begin to bicker, then to fight.  When they finally come to me for couples counseling the marriage is, in Fred’s words, “Circling the drain.”   The more control you need, the less you have.

*

Steve’s dog runs away from home.  Steve chases him across front lawns and through backyards, up and down streets.  Panting and bracing himself for his first heart attack, Steve suddenly remembers the First Paradox.  He stops running.  He sits down in the street.  The dog glances back at him over his shoulder.  Steve flops over sideways.  Closes his eyes.  Waits.  Hears nails clicking on pavement.   Feels a long tongue flick his nose.  Reaches out and grabs the dog’s collar.  The more control…

Oh, you know.