suddenly lost sense of self

[tea-the-artist]

i must have talked about this around the time i joined but this time i feel much more serious and much sadder.

very suddenly in the last 24 hours I've lost all sense of self. all of it. i dont even know if that's the right way to put it. i just don't feel like "myself" or rather the person i've been trying to present myself as.

at first it'd started with a small identity crisis a couple days ago that I was working through until yesterday. none of me is truly real or genuine. i was feeling gradually more accepting of the fact that trauma definitely shaped my personality. but it's beyond that now. now i just don't feel like i'm really anything. no genuine likes or interests that werent forced onto me or picked up from friends or other people I know.

it's like i'm a mirror, reflecting back the clothes, the room decor, the speech patterns and mannerisms. none of anything about "me" is true to me. the things that seemed to appeal to me aren't actually me, but that i took notes on things others liked and tried to fit them into my life.

i don't know what to do, but even if i was told, i would continue carrying doubt that it would be a genuine attempt. that i genuinely feel something about the self or the body that i'm in. it's like it's been a 24 year act. sure... many people around this time and even older may not know "who they are" but at least there is some kind of assurance there. something to support them and back up their claims.

i cant even give reason to the things i like or have taken interest in. everything came from a place of borrowing to seem like a good person. but now that i look at everything i own and think and feel, it's wrong and fake. theres no connection. i dont even know what a connection would feel like if it were a genuine one.

i just feel completely fake, and i dont even know if my feelings about this are fake too because i'm fake, or because i've never known how to be so sure of myself as a standalone person.

[radical]

Hi Tea,
I know what you mean.
It sounds a bit like the de-selfing problem, often learned in abusive family relationships, and first described by Harriet Lerner in 'the Dance of anger'.

[Manchesterford]

Tea - I hear you. But let me promise you something. You are in there somewhere and you are a valuable,  incredible human being who is precious beyond belief. Realising that you have lost sight of your self is the catalyst to start looking...  you are in there and you are wonderful.

[Wife#2]

Tea - HUGS - I agree with the other posters. You, the vital you that you haven't had a chance to meet yet, is in there and is worth getting to know.

When it comes to the borrowed things defining you and your likes/dislikes - that's common even outside of cPTSD. I personally believe that being the child of a narc also makes this more imperative to your survival. So, good job - you DID survive. You ARE surviving. Liking things because you saw others who liked them isn't necessarily a bad thing. Sometimes that's the exposure we needed to discover the things we now like.

Do I really like classical music, or did I feel that I should love it to be accepted into my FOO? A little of both. I don't like much classical music, but there are some I really just love listening to. Those pieces, when they play, make my heart feel and race and roar - or calm me down and help me be peaceful. I wouldn't have been exposed to classical music if my mother hadn't been a fan, but she was, so I was. Liking it now is part of ME. I have chosen it.

Jazz I listened to because Mom loved it. Country music I listened to because Dad loved it. Over time, I've found pieces and performers I like for my own reasons. But the exposure happened because of my parents. Saying that I like Jazz now isn't being fake. I don't like the same performers as my mother. I didn't reject them because she liked them. They just don't speak to me like they do her. That's ok.

So, after years of believing you loved flowers, you now realize that flowers - while pretty - aren't the center of who YOU are like they used to seem to be. OK. You've realized something about what TEA wants.

This may take time and a therapist is best suited to helping you sort all this out. So, be kind to you - whoever you decide you are. The disconnected feeling is natural - you're not sure WHO or WHAT to trust right now. Still, the essential you is in there - she really is. Through art or writing or flowers or talking or whatever method or methods you decide to help her find her voice, she will speak.

You have been working so hard for so long lately. Maybe this is the wall you need to sit by and rest for a while. Please, until you know which way to go and how to go that way - breathe. Breathe again. And please accept these hugs from me to you 

[tea-the-artist]

radical - i never heard that term before, but i looked into it and what i've found has resonated with me. very much part of the codepency problem i also have.

manchesterford - i really wish i felt the same. i feel that if we were to strip me of everything everyone's projected onto me or forced onto me, all of the abuse and neglect done onto me, there wouldn't be anything there. it's somehow a lot more insidious and deeper than i had thought coming into understanding complex trauma. down to the hindered, undeveloped sense of self and everything that that concept entails. it's like every move i make or consider making is not true, and at the very core of it, my decisions are based on making others happy or proud of me.

even taking on self care. my intentions and goal, even though, on the surface, it's that i would be working to take care of myself and care about myself and my needs, at the end of it, it's really to impress others. to be able to report back that i've been doing some good things for myself, but my concern is if other people are happy for me. down to every thing i've written here, in my journals and other posts. the decisions i make in my life. "will So and So be proud of me when i tell them i took a nap when i knew i was tired? when i'm prone to ignoring my body! will What's Their Name commend me for taking the day off and doing some relaxing painting? will they also be impressed with my paintings?"

that's just what i mean. there's no focus on me, because i just can't seem to remove everyone else from the picture. even if i were to move out, one of my goals this year, i am and would still be so much more concerned about making my friends proud of me. happy for me. but of course the question in the end is "but am i truly happy for myself?" and really i don't know the answer because my Self is not something i've ever really been concerned about in a "selfish" way. i really hope that makes sense.

wife#2 - i definitely know what you mean, but i think my examples above are kind of more what i meant. my interests being so focused on everyone else. "do flowers really make me happy? or is it something that when i comment on it, people are agreeing or are impressed?" i don't know what's really me, that really speaks to me. i looked all over my room the past couple days, even asked myself last night "what is it you really want to do?" multiple times sitting in silence, and came up with nothing in both situations.

even... in music, to use your example, is just so different for me. it's in a daydream sense, where in that sort of dream, i'm still pleasing someone else. performing for someone else. even if they're not real!! what even is that about...

i want to sit and try to take a break from it but is that really what i want, and will something come out of it for my own personal sake? or will i do it because i was suggested to? and because i want to return in a number of days with some results that may not even be true to me, just results to impress?

i thank you for the hugs and all of you for the supportive words.

[Wife#2]

Oh, how I wish I had answers or help to offer you! Just know we're here, expecting NOTHING from you at all. Not even a post. There are no other words. 

[bring em all in]

tea-the-artist

As I've read your posts this came to mind: "Is it possible that this is a transition period, like rebooting a computer to its original "factory" settings? Our brains are rewired by our traumatic experiences. Could this sense of being lost be a mourning for the person you thought you were and a fear that there is no "factory setting" to return to?

I'm not suggesting you be content to remain like this or not seek help, I'm just wondering if this interpretation of your experience might help as you make the transition/reboot.

[tea-the-artist]

thank you wife#2 i understand. still i know i'm not obligated to do much (i still feel a feeling of needing to do something that isn't just thinking of me, you know?)

bring em all in - i think... absolutely actually! i read it and i smirked, really i did. to think of myself as a computer, i've had to reset my old computer numerous times, truly mourning the lost art files i had created. brings me back but yes the analogy resonates with me.

i think i want to truly be all those things i mentioned, but am suddenly just aware that's not the case. i'm still of course getting dressed for work and speaking how i do, caring for my plants. but under an obligation still. if i don't, what have i got? what's the "factory setting" for me? if we're being literal, it's me at about age 2 or 3, before any thing i can remember.

i want to mention, during this past thanksgiving, my dad found a boatload of pictures from everyone's youth (though my parents later youth as adults) and when i saw pictures of myself, as a standing kid, maybe age 3 or 4, it weirded me out. in a second i thought "who even is that" not that i didn't know it was me, but that the girl just didn't resonate an emotional "hey that's me!" i didn't feel much connection, just a weird discomfort (also at the time, i deep in a "sadness about childhood" pit, so i was sad to see a child that was me, knowing the neglect i must have been going through at the time the photo was taken).

i do also want to say, as it's my last day of work for the week, i'm planning to go home and really dig through all of my things, my clothes, old journals. try everything on and read everything. look at everything i own. something in there has got to resonate with me, and if not... maybe i have to reboot somehow. maybe i  will take the basics (clothes for example) and stow away the rest somewhere out of sight so maybe i'm not tempted to people-please?

but yes bring em, that interpretation seems to be doing something for me. (though.... i'm worried about going in, again without the self-focused intent, ready to report back to everyone how things went, you know?)

[radical]

This made me smile because I did exactly that to my other computer yesterday.  If only our brains were as easy to reset.

I agree that this sounds like a positive, if painful, realisation and the beginning of change.

You aren't alone in experiencing this Tea.

We are with you as you navigate through it.
You're doing brilliantly

[Manchesterford]

Tea - it does entirely. These are layers,  painful ingrained layers piled on top of you and you can't quite see but I trust you are in there somewhere.  Because when you were a baby, before the trauma,  you were aware of your needs and you cried when they weren't met. It was that unconscious. It's still there. There is work to do but you will get there.

[tea-the-artist]

thanks everyone for standing by me it's tricky feeling like i don't need to rush, but also trying my best to figure out a genuine self.

manchesterford - i do agree, before the trauma i knew unconsciously how to have my needs realized and met. i think, i had realized a few weeks ago, that i have been afraid or almost reluctant to do any work towards self care and compassion because deep down, genuinely, i felt like i didn't deserve it? of course on a logical level i know all people incuding myself deserve to have a good and healthy amount of self compassion, but i emotionally didn't feel the same for myself. like it was a burden (on who? myself? the Self who needs it the most from myself?)

i know there's layers of feelings of undeservingness and hopelessness and a lot more self hurting/loathingness there that just seems so impossible, unrecognizable if my end goal is only focused on myself, and not making other people happy. i cant imagine tricking myself into becoming more compassionate towards myself under the guise of making everyone proud and feel happiness (in themselves) for me. haha would or could that even work?