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Here’s a question regarding anxiety issues in a family from Kari, a woman in her 20s.

I’ve been reading through your advice about breaking habits, low self-esteem, etc and am curious to hear your opinion of what I view as my main problem.  I also went back to my therapist today after a long hiatus and feel very positive about that.

Bit of back story: I have a loving little brother and an amazing, supportive father. Both have always been there for me regardless. Parents broke up when I was around age 12. My mother and I never really clicked. I felt there was a duplicity to her that, as a child, was frightening and although she has since admitted she had untreated depression, our relationship has never recovered. I do believe that her “double life” (i.e. living as a depressed person while in my company but putting on a happy face when required outside the home) has made it impossible for her to really be honest and happy. I’ve told her as much and am willing to work with her to restore what we can of our relationship.

To be honest, I really doubt the success of that. I have sympathy for what she has gone through but it seems like I’m always more willing to work than she is on her depression.

Now here’s my question. As I get older, I notice that I am developing my own fears, insecurities, anxieties about my relationships. I don’t know if this is a natural process of becoming self-aware or what. When one fear or insecurity crops up, I feel utterly helpless to stop the hellish snowball that is my reaction. I feel powerless to stop my outbursts. It manifests itself in neediness, whining, and anger towards my loved ones. I feel that it is a habit I’ve developed.The extreme outflow of irrational emotion feels manipulative. It’s like I’m giving them an ultimatum to either care 110% or get out.

I can see how it’s wrong in so many ways. Shortly after bursting, I feel ashamed and feel as if I’ve “learned my lesson” this time. Inevitably, the outburst is triggered again and I lose confidence that I’ll be able to ever understand it or deal with it. I am fairly certain that I’ve nailed down 80% of my problems (whether or not I have an idea of where they stem from). It’s the implementation of the solution that is escaping me.

Hi Kari,

First, thanks for entrusting me with your story.  It must be scary and overwhelming to have such strong emotions burst out and lose control of yourself.

I appreciate that you have written a very astute description of your problem.  You are very self-aware and insightful.  A lot of what you’ve written really gets at the heart of the matter, which is great.   It’s also good that you’re seeing a therapist — as you know, it’s that commitment to heal that makes the healing happen.

There are two things going on here, isn’t there?  One is your relationship with your mom, and the other is your overwhelming, uncontrollable anxieties.

Healing Your Relationship with a Parent

A mother is a huge presence in everybody’s life, and having an unresolved conflict there can mess up anyone’s mind.

I agree with your notion that if your mom herself isn’t committed to treating her depression, then she can’t be expected to really get better.  That doesn’t mean that she’ll never become committed, but until then, it’s unfortunately necessary to maintain a healthy distance.  There’s no need to cut off all communication with her or anything, but you may want to watch it so you’re not too close, especially while you’re working on your own problem.

Now, your mother not working on her healing doesn’t mean that you can’t heal your end.  We expect the world of our parents — rightfully so, they are our world when we are little — so when parents habitually fail to deliver, it builds up a lot of resentments.  It’ll help with your healing if you purge this emotional baggage with your mom.

My coach Tom Volkar taught me this excellent exercise in purging stuck negative emotions from a relationship.  It was originally created by John Gray. Here let me paraphrase it.

1. Write a letter to your mother.  Give yourself some private time and space and really write a letter that tells her exactly how you feel.  Include all anger, resentments, and disappointments and write how you wished she’d acted instead of what she did.
2. Then write a response from your mom’s point of view, and write it so that she’s saying exactly what you want to hear.  Make her apologize and ask for forgiveness, admitting all the faults she’d committed.

I myself have tried this exercise and it’s a wonderful way to heal a relationship wound.  Obviously, it won’t heal the relationship itself, but you will be able to accept the relationship for what it is, instead of feeling the conflict between what is and what you wished it could be. With a long and deep relationship like mother-child, you’ll probably have to do this more than once.  Do it every time you realize that you’re holding any grudge, anger or resentment.

Healing the Source of Your Anxiety

I’m sure that your therapist can explain the connection between your Mom and your problems, but since you wrote such an honest, truthful description, allow me to re-quote pieces that point to the root of the problem.

As I get older, I notice that I am developing my own fears, insecurities, anxieties about my relationships. I don’t know if this is a natural process of becoming self-aware or what.

It’s not a natural process, but it may mean that actually you are moving forward in your healing process.  Healing is a bit like digging out garbage that got buried instead of getting thrown out.  When you start digging them out, fears, conflicts and angers you weren’t aware of before can surface and momentarily you feel worse than you did before.  When you process this problem, then you’ll be ready to dig deeper to uncover more garbage (if there is any) that got buried deeper.

When one fear or insecurity crops up, I feel utterly helpless to stop the hellish snowball that is my reaction. I feel powerless to stop my outbursts. It manifests itself in neediness, whining, and anger towards my loved ones.

I can really see this firsthand since I’m now a parent of young children, but parents are the world to the kids.  They have no emotional guards or walls developed between themselves and their parents, so when parents have problems, they take the full brunt of its effect, and they are literally powerless to stop that.  They receive everything parents give with arms wide open — both love and hurt.  And it can be traumatic if it’s the latter.

When a person was hurt/traumatized earlier in life, when something reminds them of that experience, the reaction that comes out can be similar to the child of that age when you got originally hurt.  There may be an ungrown child stuck inside you — the one who was terrified of your mom — so when something triggers that fear, you react in a way a child does.  Your healing is to raise that little girl living inside you.

I feel that it is a habit I’ve developed.The extreme outflow of irrational emotion feels manipulative. It’s like I’m giving them an ultimatum to either care 110% or get out.

So imagine this: you were a precious little girl and your mom is really scaring you and hurting you with her duplicity, not because she doesn’t love you but she can’t help it.  Our pain has a way of oozing out in places where you feel safe, so little kids get victimized — because they are powerless to fight back — and the same thing happens between family and loved ones.  And you’re doing the same thing your mom did — directing your venom toward your loved ones, precisely because you trust them and feel safer with them.  This is why family members hurt each other — in the safest place, the ugliest parts are revealed.  It’s unfortunately a bit of vicious cycle, each one of us hurting the very ones that love us.

I can see how it’s wrong in so many ways. Shortly after bursting, I feel ashamed and feel as if I’ve “learned my lesson” this time. Inevitably, the outburst is triggered again and I lose confidence that I’ll be able to ever understand it or deal with it.

It sounds like you have a form of a temper, except it’s driven by fear and not anger.  The emotion is strong and you’ve developed a habit to act from it.

What you’re seeing is the symptom of an underlying problem and trying to suppress or control that behavior won’t work in healing the fundamental problem.  It’s like taking Tylenol to deal with your headache when that headache is caused by a brain tumor.  I’m not saying you can’t treat the symptom, especially if it’s affecting your relationships with your loved ones.  By that, I mean you learning how to control your behaviors in the face of your anxiety attack, instead of treating the root of the anxiety so you don’t have the attacks any more.  But know that even if you somehow manage to change your behavior or suppress your emotions so you won’t act on it, the problem will resurface in different ways, possibly in more severe manner.  I don’t mean to scare you, but I’m reading a book called Hands of Life by Julie Motz, an energy healer.  According to her, our body organs store various unresolved feelings, eventually developing serious illnesses.  I don’t know what you and your therapist discussed as your goals for the therapy, but if you’re working on modifying your behavior and not purging your fear, then keep in mind that that should be a temporary solution just to get your behavior under control so that you can focus on a deeper issue.

So what is the root of the problem?  Judging by what you wrote, I agree that you probably know what’s going on.  Unreliable mother -> unreliable love and acceptance -> irrational fear in relationships, demanding extreme “reliability” (really, an unconditional love), because you can’t stand another unreliable relationship that reminds you of the one that hurt you.  The bottom line probably lies in experiencing unconditional love and acceptance.  It’s a big task, though possible.

Implementations will naturally stem from knowing what the source is, but I will make several suggestions:

• Check out the guest post I did on the Positivity Blog: 5 Ways to Self-Produce Unconditional Love and Heal Yourself
• If you do need to urgently deal with your anxiety outbursts, you may want to explore cognitive behavioral therapy.
• Commit to working with your therapist (assuming you have a good, trusting relationship with him/her) on an on-going basis and heal yourself.  Keep in mind that you are the one who’s healing yourself, and the relationship between you and the therapist is the catalyst.  Be sure to work with a therapist you can count on to provide unconditional support and unfailing hope.
• Homeopathy.  This is our choice of healing art right now (I’ve been meaning to write an article about it).  I’m going to let the Society of Homeopaths from UK explain what it is — but it’s a form of holistic natural medicine that can deal with disharmony in your being, whether the symptoms are physical or psychic.  For a situation like yours, they use what they call constitutional remedy, designed to address the root of your problem.  If you can find an experienced homeopath, I think you have a good chance of having him/her prescribe an effective remedy, as you are very self-aware and can describe your problem well.
• Also, watch your exercise routine and eating habit.  Many people don’t realize that if you eat junk food too much, then you’re going to feel like junk.  Reduce sugar, caffeine, alcohol, nicotine, and processed foods — and replace them with whole foods, especially fish and vegetables cooked minimally if at all.  (My family eats traditional food)

I realize that the latter two may appear to deal more with your physical body than your mental issues, but at the root, they all have the same cause.  With a situation like you and your mom, it’s likely that the problem is deep-rooted, so approaching it from multiple angles is a good idea.

Kari, I’m afraid that with a situation like yours, there’s really no quick fix if you want to heal completely from the bottom up.  Many people settle for the quick and easy fixes that just deal with the surface problem, such as taking antidepressants.    But I also want you to know that if you decide to go after healing from bottom up, that is very possible.  And if that is the case, I really hope you look into homeopathy, as it has the potential to deal with the root of your problems in a most effective and efficient manner.  But good homeopaths aren’t exactly easy to find (bad ones won’t do anything for you, just as bad doctors can really screw you up.  At least homeopathy seldom has side effects) and regular therapy with a therapist you trust is still a very potent treatment, if time- and cost-intensive.

Above all, don’t lose hope — a story like yours isn’t exactly uncommon, and there is a cure if you’re willing to do the work to search for it and implement it diligently.  Best wishes to you!

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