(no subject)

This started out as a response to another person's livejournal entry, but I started getting to wonder if I wanted to say it "for me", or if I wanted to say it "for her". Plus, I was already thinking "Hey... I might want to copy this to my own journal". So, here it is.

Right now, I'm not going to bother to re-write it, so it's still going to be in a second person style, as a response to something someone else said.

(begin original response)
This is a meander, and I don't know if there's useful information in it or not. It's stuff I want to say; I don't know if I want to say it for me, or for you, or for both of us. But...

There was a time when I was 'hungry'... I desperately wanted love, understanding, and approval.

If you told me this, I might have angrily denied it; I wasn't some needy basket case! But, I was *starving*.

Hah. I just remembered a scene from a war movie (or maybe a documentary) about how POWs were being interrogated, and probably kept very hungry... why waste valuable rations on prisoners? And one of them managed to answer a question in a way that satisfied the interrogators. (I can remember this part perfectly; he was asked how long it took to train a US soldier; he answered "weeks... months... years." ) They took him back to his cell, loudly proclaiming that they were going to bring him extra food.

And, now that I'm thinking of that, I'm absolutely furious to imagine it. To keep people hungry, starving, probably, and then to taunt them with the food they so desperately want *and NEED*, if only they'll betray their loyalties to their home countries.

Okay, there's a point to this... I'm getting to it, though it wouldn't surprise me if you've already got it.

I had a similar problem, where people being praised in public would make me feel hurt, or maybe angry, or even mean/nasty, inside. Funny thing is, if someone praised me too much, I'd refuse to accept it, kinda-like I'd be afraid to admit how much I wanted and needed it... I'd be afraid to admit how much control they had over me with this simple kindness. (Plus, if they simply did it *out* of kindness, and didn't mean something real by it, well... that just wouldn't be right. It'd be like eating wax fruit (assuming wax is completely indigestible - I'm not sure it is).)

Mild compliments were okay... but I was so hungry, and so afraid people would see how hungry I was, I wouldn't accept anything but a few skimpy appetizers, while starving.

Seeing someone else praised was like watching someone else being given food, when I was already starving. And I knew I was being unfair to feel badly, and I knew I'd refuse all but the skimpiest portions of 'food' myself, and I would pound on myself for being such an asshole, getting upset over honest praise to someone else, and for being such a baby, wanting everything for myself.

But... from an outside perspective, it was as painful as watching a prison guard loudly and proudly bring food to another prisoner, when I was starving myself, and couldn't get that food myself.

It wasn't anyone's fault; no one did *anything* wrong. Hell, in some cases, if the people bestowing praise had known how 'hungry' I was, they'd have been glad to 'feed' me, though perhaps privately. And, if the people being praised knew I was that starved, they might well have done something similar. But I couldn't ask, so they couldn't know.

No one *hurt* me... but I was hurting, badly.

Now, if a person does something, and I simultaneously feel hurt, it's very easy to put the two together, and say "That person hurt me", and to see what they're doing as a slam, or an attack.

I had a cat meowing once, and it was terrible and painful at the time (my brain was *very* jangly, and the meows were just the *worst* sound to make my brain even more jangly), and it felt like the *cat* was attacking me. It felt so *intentional*... but that's just a normal reaction. It doesn't really seem possible that something can hurt past a certain point and *not* be intentional.

So, there's no reason I should feel guilty over feeling that praise to one person was a slam on me. It's natural. Mind, the goal of healing should be that I could feel happy that another person is being praised, because my own hunger is sated... but *right then*, it was okay that I didn't have that. Healing proceeds at its own rate.

Anyway... in the end, it was all about the hunger, I think. I had to get the hunger under control before I could stop feeling so much pain at the sight of 'food'.

I wish I could put together a step by step "feeding program" that ended the hunger for me... but I don't know if I can. I'm trying to do so, though... seeing if I can put it in terms that the 'former me' would have understood.

(no subject)

This started out as a response to another person's livejournal entry, but I started getting to wonder if I wanted to say it "for me", or if I wanted to say it "for her". Plus, I was already thinking "Hey... I might want to copy this to my own journal". So, here it is.

Right now, I'm not going to bother to re-write it, so it's still going to be in a second person style, as a response to something someone else said.

(begin original response)
This is a meander, and I don't know if there's useful information in it or not. It's stuff I want to say; I don't know if I want to say it for me, or for you, or for both of us. But...

There was a time when I was 'hungry'... I desperately wanted love, understanding, and approval.

If you told me this, I might have angrily denied it; I wasn't some needy basket case! But, I was *starving*.

Hah. I just remembered a scene from a war movie (or maybe a documentary) about how POWs were being interrogated, and probably kept very hungry... why waste valuable rations on prisoners? And one of them managed to answer a question in a way that satisfied the interrogators. (I can remember this part perfectly; he was asked how long it took to train a US soldier; he answered "weeks... months... years." ) They took him back to his cell, loudly proclaiming that they were going to bring him extra food.

And, now that I'm thinking of that, I'm absolutely furious to imagine it. To keep people hungry, starving, probably, and then to taunt them with the food they so desperately want *and NEED*, if only they'll betray their loyalties to their home countries.

Okay, there's a point to this... I'm getting to it, though it wouldn't surprise me if you've already got it.

I had a similar problem, where people being praised in public would make me feel hurt, or maybe angry, or even mean/nasty, inside. Funny thing is, if someone praised me too much, I'd refuse to accept it, kinda-like I'd be afraid to admit how much I wanted and needed it... I'd be afraid to admit how much control they had over me with this simple kindness. (Plus, if they simply did it *out* of kindness, and didn't mean something real by it, well... that just wouldn't be right. It'd be like eating wax fruit (assuming wax is completely indigestible - I'm not sure it is).)

Mild compliments were okay... but I was so hungry, and so afraid people would see how hungry I was, I wouldn't accept anything but a few skimpy appetizers, while starving.

Seeing someone else praised was like watching someone else being given food, when I was already starving. And I knew I was being unfair to feel badly, and I knew I'd refuse all but the skimpiest portions of 'food' myself, and I would pound on myself for being such an asshole, getting upset over honest praise to someone else, and for being such a baby, wanting everything for myself.

But... from an outside perspective, it was as painful as watching a prison guard loudly and proudly bring food to another prisoner, when I was starving myself, and couldn't get that food myself.

It wasn't anyone's fault; no one did *anything* wrong. Hell, in some cases, if the people bestowing praise had known how 'hungry' I was, they'd have been glad to 'feed' me, though perhaps privately. And, if the people being praised knew I was that starved, they might well have done something similar. But I couldn't ask, so they couldn't know.

No one *hurt* me... but I was hurting, badly.

Now, if a person does something, and I simultaneously feel hurt, it's very easy to put the two together, and say "That person hurt me", and to see what they're doing as a slam, or an attack.

I had a cat meowing once, and it was terrible and painful at the time (my brain was *very* jangly, and the meows were just the *worst* sound to make my brain even more jangly), and it felt like the *cat* was attacking me. It felt so *intentional*... but that's just a normal reaction. It doesn't really seem possible that something can hurt past a certain point and *not* be intentional.

So, there's no reason I should feel guilty over feeling that praise to one person was a slam on me. It's natural. Mind, the goal of healing should be that I could feel happy that another person is being praised, because my own hunger is sated... but *right then*, it was okay that I didn't have that. Healing proceeds at its own rate.

Anyway... in the end, it was all about the hunger, I think. I had to get the hunger under control before I could stop feeling so much pain at the sight of 'food'.

I wish I could put together a step by step "feeding program" that ended the hunger for me... but I don't know if I can. I'm trying to do so, though... seeing if I can put it in terms that the 'former me' would have understood.