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Thank you guys, again, for responding. I'm feeling much more confident and relaxed about going through with this type of therapy. I feel reassured, and even a bit excited to try this out. I'm also glad to hear, Kaki, that a lot of the work can be done outside of the sessions. I was worried I wouldn't have enough time in them to sort through anything. While I don't think I will be able to afford doing one hour per week, (I think the best I can hope for is one hour per month) I'm very glad to know that I will still be able to do a lot of work on my own with guidance and advice from her when I can. @ Kevin Yeah that's what bothered me most about the IFS model, was the Self. At the very least, I'll be able to bring it up with her and maybe we can figure out my discomfort about it.

Kaylee, thank you so much for responding. Your post made me smile, genuinely. I didn't realize I had such a negative mindset towards the therapy itself, that the whole thing was so serious and depressing. I do have a lot of very serious issues to sort through, but that doesn't mean I have to approach it the same way. I have to admit, it does sound extremely hokey to me, and its my gut reaction towards it. Did you initially have reservations about it or did you just like it straight away? I'm curious if there's anything I can do to get rid of the uncomfortable feeling I get, and just dive in. I'm going to go look that book up now! @ Patrick You're absolutely right, I can have just as many bad IFS therapists as regular ones. It sounds so silly, but one of the reasons I need a therapist is I can't even express to them what I need/want. I'll work on figuring something out for that.

Thanks for responding Patrick, I forgot to mention that I'm only able to get counselling via Skype and that the only counselors I found offering their services through Skype were IFS therapists. I'm so hesitant about regular therapists as well due to previous bad experiences with them (though I know not all therapists could be like that). I felt that an IFS therapist might hold similar values to myself rather than calling my mother brave for being a single alcoholic parent, which had happened with one of my previous therapists. I am worried that I won't be able to discern if the therapist is the right fit for me within the first session, especially since I have such a difficult time expressing my thoughts and needs. I'm kind of curious if there is some sort of hybrid IFS model where spirituality doesn't play such a huge role?

I just wanted to reach out to anyone that has experience with IFS therapy. I recently contacted an IFS Therapist about starting some therapy with them, but I am skeptical of the approach. I am not spiritual in any sense, and find that I am uncomfortable with the process and ideas behind the therapy. I've only heard good things about it so far though so I thought I could give it a try. I have a very small income, so I'm extremely cautious about spending such a large amount of money on something that might not work for me. Has anyone gone through with IFS Therapy who is not spiritual, or perhaps that it made them initially uncomfortable? Were you able to successfully process your traumas? If I don't go with the IFS model, are there any other models that you might suggest as effective? The IFS model had me, right up until the true Self bit. The protectors, managers, and exiles all make sense, in a sort of "dumbed down" version of what's going on in my mind. Any advice or thoughts would be greatly appreciated!

Thank you all for your positive responses! I am excited about this, and it's so nice to not feel apprehensive about speaking to her any more. There's of course always going to be some anxiety and fear left just due to my past experiences with her and how she raised me, at least until I get enough positive reinforcement that she won't continue that same behavior. @dsayers I'm going to keep reminding myself what I want out of the relationship with her, to keep me on track and not just fall into old habits. I'm very determined, and I just hope that she's as determined. I'm sort of worried that she might have ulterior motives for doing this with me (she's getting old and may need someone to take care of her in a few years), but she also does have others like my sister to rely on for that. @MMX Thank you for your advice, I didn't even realize I was asking a question that a lot of people on here might not have an answer to! I'm very thankful for the support, and I'm definitely going to hold her to my own standards. @Kevin Even if I need to tell her what I want/need from her I want to make it clear and easy for her to understand me. Which includes me letting her know that I want her to initiate some of the talks as well. I'm hoping that she'll also open up to me instead of being the listener. I have a pretty hard time remembering everyone else doesn't live inside my brain and doesn't just automatically know or sense my needs. @miss_fasterEFT Thank you for posting the information, I appreciate any help offered. I do have to say, my automatic reactions to posts like those is initially discomfort and disapproval, especially when I see your post count and they are the only posts you have so far. I find I am more likely to check something out if recommended by someone that I've had at least a few interactions with first, and even then it's usually not something they are personally involved in. I may check the video out when I have time but I would definitely recommend that if you really are set on advertising your services, that you also spend some time actually interacting and speaking with others on the forum without the other agenda. I personally have no qualms about people advertising things they do or are passionate about, as long as it's not the only thing they're doing here, however helpful it may be. I'll definitely be posting updates again when I can, and I'm always up for a conversation!

Well, I just wanted to update this thread a bit as I've made some progress. I literally just got off skype with my mother and wanted to write some things down. The entire time I was explaining my emotions and thoughts to her she listened intently. She never used manipulation or guilt. While she didn't accept responsibility (blamed things on alcoholism) and didn't apologize to my expectations, she was patient and accepted the things I was saying. We had a very great conversation about trying to communicate more openly with each other and to continue to explore our feelings together. She let me know she wanted to do whatever she could for me and even if it was difficult she encouraged me to not let her get away with manipulative language or anything like that. I was so worried that the conversation would turn out differently, just from my nightmares every night where I am screaming to get her to understand and listen to me and she's ignoring me and laughing at me. I'm very relieved that I can at least attempt to begin a more open and honest conversation with her. While I don't expect anything miraculous, I'm glad to have someone else in my life who is willing to explore philosophy with me, and hopefully delve deeper into my past with. I feel very excited, however wary, as well as hopeful. It's been an emotional week, since last Wednesday's call set me to thinking deeply and having tough conversations with people. What do you think? Is it too soon to get excited? What are some things I might not have thought through that I should be careful about?

I actually don't have a temper, or at least not one that is triggered often. I do get easily defensive, but that usually just puts me in more of a "disagree with everything and be negative" sort of mood, though I'm learning to notice it and correct myself (as well as apologize to whomever I react that way with). I /can/ recall situations where my defensiveness led me to burst out with some very harsh words, but never shouting. The words are usually chosen with extreme precision for maximum damage. The situation in particular that I'm thinking of would be when my mother and sister decided to sit across the room from me (which, they often teamed up on me so it automatically put me on the defensive) to tell me all about what they thought was wrong with me and how I needed to change. I said some very hurtful things to both of them, which led my sister to spit out "I just hate you sometimes". Of course, this was back before I had learned any of the stuff I know now. It was while I was still struggling with depression, after I had quit university to move back in with my mother. I don't have those same impulses anymore, because I know how to deal with those situations better. As for the father figures I had growing up, briefly my sister's father who ignored his evil wife's torture upon us kids, and my grandmothers second husband (step grandfather) who hit us both abusively and also occasionally inappropriately on the butt. Those both were for very short periods of time, most of my time was spent with my mother, especially after the age of 10 after she stopped drinking. I feel like I don't go out of my way as much anymore for people, but I still consistently have that feeling of need, to be accepted and thought highly of by men. I don't trust my interactions with men as being honest and genuine anymore, until I can identify when I'm behaving this way.

@sagiquarius Thank you for taking the time to read and respond to my post. I'm so incredibly thankful that I was able to meet someone with a genuine interest in myself, and even more so for being such a wonderful moral influence. Neither of us are even close to perfect in how we treat others, or each other but it's so great to finally have someone to have open and honest conversations and be able to share and grow with. As for how things have been going lately, it's been a mixed basket really. I've decided to make contact with my family in the least amount possible, but I might as well be back living with my mother, since I have nightmares every night about her and my sister and the rest of my family. I haven't been journalling as much as I could be, but I've been trying to look up some information on therapists I could see through skype. @MMX2010 I'm going to need to search that podcast or call down, because just reading you paraphrase it made my heart ache. I want that, SO badly. The problem is I can never see my mother ever apologizing to that extent. She thrives on things being wrong with other people so she can offer her own personal advice and consolation. Someone that unhealthy would never be able to offer an apology of any sort of meaning or quality.

Yes, I definitely can relate to that 100%. I still do that now, trying to "do stuff" to show my value because I still struggle with understanding that I have value. Do you think this is from not having a father or father figure, or could there be some other factor as well?

I definitely can't speak to your experience as a man without a father, and I'm not sure how helpful an insight from a woman without a father will be but I'll try to give it a go. My mother made the decision to tell my father (who had been a one night stand) that she was pregnant, but she didn't want him to be around. I've never met him, and only learned his name and saw a picture of him after I was older than 18. Orientation-wise, this doesn't seem to have had any effect on me. I could have a relationship with a woman, but not a sexual one. The problem I've discovered is that it left me with the almost completely overwhelming need to please, impress and be accepted by all men. Any man. It's actually so bad that while reading through this thread I realized that it caused me to allow myself into a situation where I got repeatedly taken advantage of. I didn't say no, not only because of the threat of violence and death, but because in some twisted way I wanted to prove to him that I could handle it, that I wasn't like the other girls he had done it to. I'm very sorry that you had to grow up without a father in your life, I know that it's so damn important. I hope my post didn't sidetrack your discussion, I just felt the need to post my experience and thoughts that came to me while I was reading through. Please let me know your thoughts on how or if this relates to your experience at all, I'm curious to know. Do you feel the need to impress and gain acceptance from the men in your life as well?

Thank you again guys, I have a lot of things to write about now. I'll update this post if I come up with any more questions or things I may get stuck on. I really appreciate the help and kind words!

@Libertarian Prepper Yes, I think you're right about that. Not only can they not take full responsibility for their actions, but there's an attitude of "Look how well you turned out". It gets me every time, and my anger just starts bubbling up. Even if I say "not because of you, despite you" it doesn't change how they feel. When I'm doing terrible and I'm depressed, it's because of something I did or didn't do, or something that's wrong with me. If I'm doing well, have a solid job and a wonderful boyfriend then it had nothing to do with me, it was all thanks to my upbringing. @Mysterion Muffles I will definitely be continuing writing and journalling, and opening up as much as I can to those who I can trust. I really do feel extremely lucky I met a man that has such wonderful values. We met through work. Being one of the very few women in a QA Analyst position, a lot of the men working there were interested in the "cute" new female employee. We started talking around the time I joined a D&D campaign he was in that was run in the office and we just started chatting. He was so kind and patient even though I was awkward and so nervous around people. Even before meeting him, I was very open with what happened in the past if someone was curious, but he was the one that helped me realize that the things that happened were wrong. I spent my entire life up til then thinking those things just happened to everyone, or more often thought that it happened to me because I was a bad person. When I first told him some of my story, he cried, and I couldn't understand why at first. We talked about it, and I just felt so cared for, for once. I'm very glad that I got to discover these things, because I know if I didn't find a problem with how people treated me, how was I supposed to have a problem treating people that way? I think about my relationship with my mother and sister quite a bit. I think the reason I want to continue having a relationship with her comes in a few parts. First of all, she's had fibromyalgia since I can remember (a muscle disease) so she can't do much anymore. Despite how I was treated, I still care about her. Not love, of course because she'd need to have virtue for me to be able to love her. Just like I'd care about a stranger, I care about my mother. I know what feeling alone feels like, and I don't want anyone to have to feel like that. Another part, is that she is willing to talk about anything with me. We've been able to talk about her past and her mistakes and she's very open. I've talked about some of the things that happened in my childhood and how they affected me, and she's cried and apologized. I just feel like I can't keep bringing things like this up with her, because when do I stop? There's nothing she can do to change it or make it better, or even to make up for a small portion of it. Until I'm able to resolve these things, I've told her that I can't come visit and she was unbelieveably understanding and for once didn't try to guilt or manipulate, I was astounded. It kind of gave me hope that one day things could be repaired. I don't know if that's hoping too much. @dsayers That's how I discovered that what happened to me was completely awful. I had never though before "What if this happened to another child", and it seemed like an obvious thing to ask myself that I never had. What makes me angry is when I think about what could have been. If I had been raised in a loving, caring environment, how much happier and far ahead in life would I be? Instead of working minimum wage testing games, perhaps I could have been running my own company for QA. Instead of all these scars (both physical and emotional) maybe I could have found meaningful friendships. Because someone else was evil, I have to pay the consequences and put in the work to fix their damage. Aside from those personal wishes, what makes me angry is that the values I hold most important directly go against the way I was treated. I would never think of doing something like that to someone, and it makes me feel sick knowing that there are people who get direct enjoyment from it. Those are my thoughts anyway. Thank you guys so much for replying. I can't express how helpful your questions and insights have been so far. I really appreciate the time you took to read my story and reply. It's given me a lot to think and write about, and I think the conversation so far has really helped me understand a few things.

Thank you both for your kind words, I really appreciate them. I still have quite a bit of work to do, for sure. I'm thinking I'll try to keep writing and journaling. I've touched on some of these subjects with my mom since I started this journey, and she seems open to discussing them. She seems to be actually sorry, but I don't think she understands the extent of the damage and I have my doubts that she ever will. I wasn't taught how to process these things, so I'm not sure how to resolve my anger. Is it something I'll always feel, or is there some way to come to terms with what happened? I would like to continue to have a relationship with my mother and sister (not really interested at all in the other 'relationships' that were mentioned) but I feel like I can't until these feelings are resolved. I can't even spend a weekend there without becoming completely emotionally drained near the end of the second day. She can't change what happened in the past and unfortunately she's really not in a situation to be able to make it up to me now somehow.

Through listening to Stef's podcasts and call-in shows, I've learned (or rather, been re-educated) that anger is healthy and normal. Those who don't wish me to experience that anger are those who have likely hurt me and those who I should be angry at. I feel like I'm not even scratching the surface yet of all my issues, but I also don't feel like I can even resolve anything at this point. I've allowed myself to think back on my childhood, even my adulthood and experience the emotions properly, with my new perspective (perhaps not to a completely full extent yet). I've gotten angry, frustrated, and felt completely shattered. Now I'm left not knowing what to do. I don't feel like I can begin to express the damage that's been done, by so many people in my life. I'm not sure what the next step is. I'm still trying to find a therapist but a major setback is that there are just no quality ones near my location. I wouldn't care to go into much detail, as some of the situations and experiences are completely horrifying and embarrassing. I will provide some information to give context, though. I am the youngest (of myself and my sister) child of a single drug/alcohol abusing mother. Before she got clean there were even times where she'd go missing, leaving myself and my sister (I was in grade 1, she in grade 2) alone in a city we'd only just moved to. There were many attempts on her part to get clean, detox centers and the like. The downside to this is that we got placed with our grandparents, or my sister's father. Living with my sister's father, was literally hell. His wife despised us as we weren't her children (hell, I wasn't even related to her husband). We were hit with anything that seemed reasonable to her, for any reason. Belts, wooden spoons, hands, anything really. The physical abuse wasn't hidden from my sister's father, he seemed to approve of this 'punishment'. The torture was what she kept hidden for when he was away. She would set up situations that would cause us to do something she disapproved of so that she could dole out some creative disgusting torture. Pepper on the tongue, hold it til you cry. Ask for water after? You have to drink it until you vomit. Vomit? You need to clean it up yourself. Don't finish your dinner because you're full? Sit at the table until it's finished, with extra helpings. Don't finish your dinner in time? You don't get to eat. Complain you have a sore throat? Chloraseptic spray in the eyes 'accidentally'. My sister's father came home during that one, so she quickly gave me a cookie and explained I had moved while she was carefully trying to make my pain go away. Those are a few very small instances of her evil. With my grandparents, I usually "only" got sent to my room or hit in the face for crying too loudly. An occasional unwelcome slap on the butt by my grandfather (not as punishment) was also something that occurred too frequently. Finally by age 10 my mom became clean. From there it was a constant stream of her dating men, manipulating and ignoring us, and ridiculous punishments (with occasional spanking and more often screaming). When I was around 21 years old, while in university, I became completely undone. Depressed, anxious, suicidal and self-harming. I sought help after a while and was 'diagnosed' with bi-polar disorder, anxiety disorder, and possibly borderline personality disorder. (this was by the campus psychiatrist) I was prescribed several different pills, one after another when they didn't work. It completely wrecked me. After nothing working, having missed weeks of class along with exams, and cutting every hidden area on my body, I just left and moved back in with my mother. It became clear how my family thought of me as the problem child, the one who always messes up. There would be conversations where I sat on one side of the room while my sister and mother sat on the other, ganging up on me. I would lash out and say terrible things, and they would tell me how much I was hurting them and that they sometimes hated me. I somehow was able to get a job in a town an hour away. I moved out, started working, and eventually started dating an amazing man. He showed me for the first time in my life what empathy felt like, to be on the receiving end. When we got to know each other better, he introduced me to Stef's podcasts. Once I started, I had no choice but to keep going. I've barely even started, and it's been over a year now. I stopped taking medication for imaginary conditions, and instead took up philosophy and self-knowledge. It's not easy, and I struggle every day with continuing to learn and find out more. I avoid it more often than I'd like to admit, but I want to push forward. So here I am today. Pissed off. Broken. Now what?

What you've written seems contradictory to me. You only want to act in an excellent fashion with a handful of individuals who are high value, true to themselves, and act with integrity. To me, those people would behave morally with all people, not just a certain type of person. If you only behave morally with these select few, then you are not acting with integrity. By your rules they should treat you as you would treat those without morals, which would in turn make it so you would not want to choose them as your select few individuals. It's important to hold yourself to the same standards of the people you would like to have valuable interactions with. You can still behave in a well thought out way to not get preyed upon and still be moral. You can protect yourself and your rights without infringing on others. That is my take on it, from my beginner's perspective into morality. What do you think about it, or have I misinterpreted what you've written?