Jaeger

Kimmen, What wonderful news. I'm so thrilled to hear the progress you're family is making. Hearing about your daughter made my heart melt, what a beautiful experience that must have been. Those are the moments that make parenting such a joy. Thank you so much for making yourself available to your children.

I would get vertigo do to Meniere's disease that would last hours and was confined either to bed or on the bathroom floor. I couldn't walk so had to crawl to the restroom to puke because of motion sickness even though I wasn't moving. I felt I was crawling on the wall even though it was the floor. My whole perception was turned sideways. I also get what they call drop attacks. The bad ear would send a signal to my brain that I was falling when I wasn't, That caused me to instantly fall to the ground as my body tried to correct itself. The doctor ended up injecting gentamicin into my ear to kill the vestibular nerve so I wouldn't get vertigo and drop attacks. That killed all vestibular function in my left ear. After the first shot, It took me a couple of days after to be able to walk while my mind adjusted to only having one good ear. After that it took weeks to fully be steady on my feet. The vestibular system also stabilizes your vision while you walk or run so the horizon bounced up and down for me for months after the shots. I will say it's better to have no vestibuar function than a faulty one as eventually the brain adapts to the new norm. I also lost most of my hearing in that ear as well but that was nothing compared to lack of balance. At least for me.

I'm so sorry for the cruelty you experienced by these girls. I couldn't imagine the humiliation. Now I know that your "red in the face" isn't your run of the mill, boy meet girl awkwardness, as I assumed in my earlier post. Please forgive that assumption.

That is a normal physical reaction. It is your body language saying "I find you attractive" to the girl. If you take the time to look at the girl's face you might be surprised she is also red in the face and feeling awkward. That is her body language saying "I find you attractive too". At that point I don't think it matters what you say or how well your prepared speech is. 1. You will not remember it. 2. If you do remember it, it will not come out the way you planned it. You will feel like the biggest goof in the world but she will love you all the more for it. Then you will be like "wow, how did I get so lucky". That's step one, the next step will be dating her to find out if she shares your values and if she is able to negotiate. Opposites tend to attract (My wife is an introvert and I'm an extrovert for example), so learning to negotiate is the best skill to have if you want a successful relationship/marriage. Unfortunately that is not a skill being taught by most parents today so make sure she comes from an intact family where that skill was modeled for her. Not saying that children from broken families can't learn the skill only that it is a lot harder. If you parents or future in-laws are not good examples of negotiation then take some relationship classes or better yet find the old couple who has been married forever, like 40 years, and ask if they will mentor you. They will know all the tricks to staying happily married. I have a feeling the #1 rule for the husband is keep being the goof for your wife. I've only been married 19 years so I'm not there yet, Still working on it.

My mom had to earn that love and she did make amends. I agree parents need to pay restitution for any pain they cause. The more pain they cause the more restitution. For example, my ACE score is only 1 so maybe the pain wasn't that much to amend for. I would imagine the parent of someone with a much higher ACE score say 6 or 7 might never be able to amend for the pain they created. I'm sure it's possible but it would have to be some big time restitution. Bottom line is parents should love their children unconditionally and their children are not obliged to love them back. Even if the child's ACE score is 0 they are not obligated to love their parent. They most likely will but they aren't obligated.

Even if your dad was a model father and did everything right you would not owe him anything. It is the responsibility of parents to provide unconditional love as well as the physical needs (food, clothing, shelter ect...) to their children until they are adults and can provide for themselves. This is not a loan to be paid back at a latter time by the children, but a responsibility of the parents to provide. I would talk this over with a therapist. Mine has helped me tremendously concerning my mom who is 81 and is ailing fast. I now provide her help, not out of a sense of obligation, but because I love her and want to help her. Even when I feel so inadequate when I help her. My therapist is helping me with that as well. Helping an aging parent is very emotionally draining and if you are still processing childhood trauma I can only imagine it would be worse. A lot worse if the person you will care for is the one who inflicted the trauma.

Hi Kimmen, Your post really resonated with me. How to be a peaceful parent when dealing with a chronic Illness or injury? That is a question I have asked myself many times. I suffer from Meniere's Disease also called Meniere's Syndrome in some places in the world. While I don't suffer from chronic pain I do get vertigo from time to time and suffer from deafness in my left ear. I have been bedridden for days at a time do to disabling vertigo. I was diagnosed with Meniere's in 2008 and had surgery in 2010 to relieve fluid build up in the inner ear. That surgery failed and I ended up haveing to get gentamicin injections to deaden the vestibular nerve so I won't get vertigo or rather lessen the intensity of them. Well anyways from 2008-2013 I would get frequent vertigo and would be bedridden for days. The 4 of my 8 children who were either born at this time or where in their informative years all had tantrums similar to your kids. At the time I haven't heard about peaceful parenting and unfortunately I would yell and bluster and put them in timeout, holding the door shut so they couldn't leave their room. When I was feeling sick or working I wouldn't allow my children in my room. I would yell at them to leave. I was very irritable and would wallow in self pity and my children suffered from it. My wife suffered through it. We went through Marriage counseling in 2008. As the gentamicin injections begin to work and I got vertigo less and they also became less intense. I started to yearn to get out of the house and learn new things. I started listening to Stefan and learned about peaceful parenting. Why in no way consider myself an expert, here are some of the steps I took to change how I parent. I hope it will be of some benefit for you. 1. I acknowledged I was the one that needed to change. I was the reason my kids acted out. I was the reason my wife was withdrawing. I had to make the changes not them. I can not change my kids' or wife's behavior I can only change my own. 2. I apologized to my wife and children for my pass behavior. I told them my desire to change. 3. I sought professional help by hiring a therapist to help me gain self knowledge. 4. I accepted my wife and kids as they are and love them unconditionally. This is the big one. The tantrums diminished significantly once they feel you will love them no matter how they behave. It is alright for kids to show anger. How I used to react to their anger wasn't because of them but some unprocessed trauma from my childhood. A reaction to how my parents treated me when I had tantrums as a child. Which was exactly how I was treating my kids. I needed to learn how to show them a healthy way to share their anger. For me that is now coming right out and saying I feel angry and why. I try to put myself in their shoes and act how my inner child would want my parents to have acted. 5. I made myself approachable even when I'm not feeling well. I tell them how I'm feeling and invite them to sit or lay with me. They feel concern and want to be included in my illness. They want to understand why sometimes I'm playing with them other times I'm sick. Before becoming a peaceful parent I was very reclusive and hid in my room. While I'm not always physically available I make myself emotionally available. It was hard at first but overtime it became easier and easier. I like to think of it as an emotional muscle that I'm making more fit. 6. I look at life is a work in progress. I accept I will make mistakes and I will be fully responsible for the outcome of those mistakes. I will always strive to better myself and become more educated in how to be a better parent. I'm learning to look at failure as an opportunity to improve and not as an opportunity for self attack.

You are probably correct in assuming that. I have a bad habit of stating the obvious some time. I was triggered. See FreedomToon's video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MACnJi4GIGY I do agree Trump's supreme court nominees will be way better than what Hillary will choose. Hopefully he will have support of his fellow Republicans in the Senate. I'm not familiar with the show. However based on the your description it sounds like something I would enjoy. I saw that you PM me the link so I will give it a watch. I grew up in California. I lived in Hawaii 88-92 then move back to California late 92 but to late to register to vote. Moved to Utah in 94 then back to California in 2001 then Virginia in 2002 and Texas 2006. In Virginia and California(80's and 90's) I would consider them swing states. Virginia still is, California is not. I always felt like my vote mattered in those states. Utah, Texas and Hawaii I don't think it matters. Utah and Texas would go Republican and Hawaii Democrat. I guess what I was trying to convey was that as someone who is new to anarchism and lives in Texas, it is real easy for me not to vote and live by my principles as others would vote in the better candidate anyways. Same would be true if I lived in Hawaii as it wouldn't matter as others would vote in the candidate I don't want, So I wouldn't feel guilty for not voting. Now if I lived in Virginia and didn't vote I would feel guilty if Hillary won or very relieved if Trump did. I have been battling in my mind about voting for the last year or so and haven't firmly placed myself in any camp. I swing from "I'll vote in self defense", like I did in the primary's for Trump, to "I will never vote as it is immoral". At this point I think I'm somewhere in the middle. Voting is the use of force and should only be done in self defense. Self defense should only be used if I'm threaten. I don't feel threatened at this time. Even if I don't vote Hillary will never win Texas. Now if there was something else on the ballot like a vote on a raise on city properties taxes then I would feel threatened and justified in voting. Now the argument of about we own ourselves. I'm not so sure since we have a gun pointed at our heads and are required to hand over a portion of our income. So if not slaves then at least serfs. That is what makes me think of the quote by Frederick Douglass I posted above. Texas over all has been a good master so I can think about being free. While if I lived in Hawaii I would want to live in a red state. If I lived in Virginia the I would feel I had a chance to get a good master so then I can think about being free.

Taxation is theft not a contribution. Congress spends the stolen money not the President, and they seem quite content to go along with the globalist. I think the best we can get with a Trump presidency will be gridlock. I think we will see a lot of government shut downs again like we did in the 80's and 90's as there will be real opposition verses the controlled opposition we have now in congress. If Trump does get the presidency I only hope there is enough Republicans that will support him to stop the overturn of the any veto he will have to perform. He will have the ability to enforce the current immigration law and undo any executive orders signed by past presidents. I like Trump and think he will be a better master than Hillary but in the end I think I will be the best master for myself. I don't need or want a master. Now that being said I do live in a very "red" state and have the luxury of not voting for Trump who will win the electoral vote most handsomely here in Texas. If I lived in a swing state I would be mighty tempted to vote for Trump as a good master is better than a bad one.

As someone who had a good childhood this is a wealth of information. Thank's so much for sharing. I do find myself providing just sympathy or trying to down play someones abuse. For that I'm so sorry. I grew up in a house where a kid like Stefan would hang around for food and he always got it. That really hit home because I know my parents suspected the kid's parents of being abusive but never confronted them. I can see now that food and sympathy is not enough.

I have befriended dsayers and found him to be a wonderful person. He is committed to perusing self knowledge and improving himself. When I first contacted him I thought I was providing him help with the issues he was having at the time, and that perhaps he may be too needy. I was so wrong, he has reciprocated many times and I am a better person for knowing him. He has said I was "poisoning the well" a few times or being deterministic and so on. If I disagree with him, I tell him so, and that leads to further discussion. I think talking to him on the phone verses posting on the forum makes a big difference. He is not abrasive as his post makes him seem like, but in fact very caring and loving person. Does he have a few rough edges? Yes. They are the scars from his abuser. He has been talking about wanting to make more friends for months now and I'm so happy to see that he has taken steps to do so. If anybody wants to contact me just PM me. I'm always looking for friends myself.

ENFP-A CAMPAIGNER

Thanks for bumping this. I have looked at my process of gaining self-knowledge as waking up or becoming more aware. Now that I'm awake, when I notice that I'm making the same mistakes my parents did, I can stop it right then and there and fix it in the moment. Where as before I was oblivious to the fact I was even making a mistake let alone I was mirroring my parents. I have noticed that during therapy when I get to do re-parenting I always feel so very happy at the end. I feel like the old child me and I are very good friends and the new adult me get to give each other what we are missing. The child me gets the unconditional love I deserved as a child and the adult me get to feel what it's like to be young again, playful and so full of life. I imagine my older self fishing with my younger self and enjoying popsicles or ice cold sodas together. Now I need to be the best parent I can so when my kids become awake there are not nearly as many of my mistakes that they will need to work through.

I can think of another reason you have ancient Israelite ancestry. Roman slavery of the Jews after the fall of Jerusalem. They were scattered through out the Roman Empire. It could even be from before the fall of Jerusalem. She could have been a wife of a Roman soldier stationed in England and chose to stay after Roman rule. Who knows?

Very helpful advice thanks for posting. I hope you don't mind if I share on Facebook