• silverwhisper said on Mar 07, 2007....

  your friend made a very, very astute observation, if you ask me.
  
  i sometimes have issues w/ guilt myself, so i understand where you're coming from. but you need to remember that by keeping it all within, you do these people a disservice. they need the benefit of your honest reaction in order both to understand you as well as understand how what they're saying affects you. hoping for change in their perceptions if you do nothing to alter their perceptions is merely insanity: repeating the same behavior and expecting different results, wouldn't you say?
  
  ed

• MissMimi said on Mar 07, 2007....

  Alyss, I don't have anything brilliant to bring to this discussion, but I can offer understanding.  I don't know why women have such a hard time with guilt.  But we do.  I try to imagine a time when I would feel the lightness of being guilt-free, and I can't. 

  I won't tell you you shouldn't feel guilty because you already know that.  I hope in time, you'll learn to put your happiness higher on your priority list.  Children are amazingly resilient, and benefit greatly from a parent who is strong and emotionally healthy.

  I wish you had more a more supportive family.  Just remember, it's not their life.  It's yours.  If you make the waves, they'll have no choice but to swim. 

  Alyss said:  I am feeling increasingly lighter, more liberated and in control and beneath my bouts of panic I am even feeling vaguely relaxed about it all.

  You can do it.
  

• beyondtheveil said on Mar 07, 2007....

  alyss- I agree with Ed that you need to let these people know how you feel. It sounds like you have never been supported and with your feelings out on the table, you might get just that, at least from someone.
   
  Do you have friends for face to face support? There seemed to be one from your first sentence.

• Alyss said on Mar 07, 2007....

  That friend of mine is pretty astute. ;-)
  
  Hmm as for letting them know how I think I am getting better at it but I really don't think my mum could handle it over the phone. She reacts badly to that kind of conversation over the phone. In fact the most recent conversation was in response to my having told her about the solicitor the day before and the conversation was cut short (neither her fault or mine) so she'd had a day to stew on it.
  
  I was talking with my counsellor earlier this week and she reminded me that it just the beginning of a new path, being truthful about my feelings and not hiding from myself, and that there would be occasions when I regress as well as move forward. I suppose that this is an example of what she means.
  
  beyond, I have a couple of ftf friends who now know which helps but truthfully I get most support from my online friends. And for them I am very grateful.
  
  mimi, thank you. A good friend told me I was looking more relaxed that they'd seen me in years at the weekend so I suppose that is an indicator of progress.
  

• silverwhisper said on Mar 07, 2007....

  alyss: honestly, if she has trouble w/ it, i say tough. her hurt is nothing compared to yours. strip away her illusions, and i say do it completely. she's being selfish by denying the validity of the reactions of the person who's in the gorrammed relationship, alyss. that's incredibly unfair to you, and not the response of a caring mother, if you ask me.
  
  ed

• polarheart said on Mar 07, 2007....

  Dear Alyss, it grates me when people try to put other people guilt trips.  No one is above reproach and we should not judge lest we be judged.  I am sorry that your mother is not more supportive of you. 
   
  {{{{Hugs}}}} Polar

• Zayda said on Mar 07, 2007....

  Alyss quoth:
  
  
  For as long as I can remember I have automatically taken the blame and accepted guilt even when it hasn't been my fault. Even when I have done nothing to cause the situation or if events leading up to it are wholly out of my control. Not only that but I have been known to let others divert their deserved guilt onto me and I have just accepted it as my lot.
  
  
  I read these words and instantly recognized that it could very well have been me writing them.  It's like looking at a mirror of my own words/thoughts.
  
  Thanks for posting this, Alyss.
  
  ((hugs))
  

• CreativeWoman said on Mar 07, 2007....

  Alyss,
  I agree with Zayda.  I could have written those words as well. I do hear a little hope in your post, too.  I hope that each coming day brings you more strength.
  
  Btw, congratulations on the job!
  
  CW
  

• yani said on Mar 07, 2007....

  I am sorry that you feel this way, guilt is the hardest thing to face, especially when you are all alone. It keeps on knawing at your insides, but please remind yourself that whatever decision your are doing right now is actually long overdue. You've been living for others for so long, it's about time you live for yourself. This may sound a little selfish, but so what? In the end, if you continue living unhappily, everyone else will be affected. This transition in your life is the hardest but I know things will be better, sooner or later. Isn't it getting lighter now? Go on....... live..... for you............ :)

• lioneljay said on Mar 08, 2007....

  Alyss, I like what you heard your counsellor say. That makes a great deal of sense to me. I married into a family of endurers - the women all take a large chunk of their self image from a sense of enduring their lot in life. And, since I represent a fair portion of my wife's "lot in life," you can see how that can put me into an awkward frame of mind. I suspect that this mindset of hers (theirs, as it goes back at least two generations) is a relic of times past when women's lives were much harder and much more subject to the whims of the men that they married. But not so today.
  
  You'll do yourself a great good by continuing the progress that you've begun.
  

• satyr said on Mar 08, 2007....

  Alyss, sometimes we have to walk through the woods to get to the meadow.  I wish nothing but the best for you.
   
  {{{{{HUG}}}}}

• EvilTwin said on Mar 08, 2007....

  [Hugs] Alyss...  I just can't seem to find the right words to say right now. 
   
  I know what you are feeling, and I too am wrestling with my own guilt (but that is beside the point right now).  I do hope there will be a time when you won't feel any guilt.  It is your life to live, you know...
   
  All my love, dearest.  I am here for you...
   
   

• CamDaMan20 said on Mar 11, 2007....

  Glad you had the reserve to make the decision, now show the resolve to carry your life forward without shame or guilt, rather with the pride of living.....once again.

• Alyss said on Mar 13, 2007....

  Wow, I've not been around here for a couple of days and wasn't expecting all these comments!
  
  Thank you everyone. I am trying and with each day I can feel myself inching further toward that freedom of expression.
  
  SW she doesn't mean it to be uncaring she's just never really understood. I know she loves me but is still the mum wanting to control what I do and decisions I make.
  
   I'm not sure that I ever said but many years ago I had broken up with a boyfriend who I cared about very deeply because I thought I ought to try to work things out with DH who was begging for another chance (only he wasn't DH) then he & I had split due to his lack of commitment some time before.
  
  What I didn't know at the time, and didn't find out until after DH and I were married, was that my boyfriend had been ringing repeatedly as he wanted to fight for me, persuade me to consider him, but unfortunately just never rang when I was there to answer the phone and my Mum chose not to tell me despite his asking her to ask me to call him...
  

• silverwhisper said on Mar 13, 2007....

  i'm sure she doesn't mean it to be uncaring, but some actions have meaning entirely independent of their emotional context.
  
  ed

• Alyss said on Mar 13, 2007....

  True. Sadly very true.

• cjeannette said on Mar 26, 2009....

  I found this old blog while doing a search on "living w/ guilt". I'm a psychotherapist and I believe that coming to terms w/ having strong, difficult feelings is an important part of maturing and claiming ones own life. I don't define these as negative feelings because sometimes it is rationally right to feel guilt, hatred, anger at one's mother for making her comfort come first which is what initiate the guilt in the first place ... So, thanks into this window on guilt and different people's attitudes about it. The necessity of bearing it if we are to get where we're going and going ahead anyway is quite a feat. I'll have to say I was distressed that a couple of people, unknowingly I'm sure, we're adding another layer of guilt by telling you you shouldn't feel guilty, etc. Claire Jeannette Berkeley, CA

Comment on "Living With Guilt"

Currently tagged	guilt relationships love strength Pride more on guilt (Click to add tags below)
Tag this post	(Separate tags using commas, for example: New York, dating, vegetarian)
Your comment
	Comment Anonymously