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Dr. Bob is Robert Hsiung, MD,
bob@dr-bob.orgShown: posts 1 to 17 of 17. This is the beginning of the thread.
Posted by LlurpsieNoodle on August 1, 2007, at 18:54:39
The good news is that I just got off the phone with my mom and I convinced her that I was eating my prepackaged meals (so apathetic that I signed up for food to be delivered to my door...) and that the house was all unpacked. no need to come visit in the next 2 weeks. really no need at all. I was even diplomatic enough to make her think that it was HER idea not to come.
So, my dad, in saying goodbye, says "you sound good, kid. We're really proud of you, and you know, I was probably abused a lot when I was a little kid too, but I always have happy memories and I try to stay happy too, so I know you'll be okay" With this cheerful tone of voice. and then "I love you"
utterly sickening. sick sick sick.
I don't want my dad to come visit me ever. mom, okay, but dad. no. it's just that dad can't be left alone for more than 24 hours because he's decrepit and brain damaged. so what then?
well, doesn't matter now, because they're not coming to visit me. I keep hoping that another hole in his brain will open up and swallow up whatever memory he has of me confronting him with child abuse. Maybe it will swallow up part of his midbrain this time too.
Posted by OzLand on August 1, 2007, at 22:44:26
In reply to Just got off the phone with parents ***trigger***, posted by LlurpsieNoodle on August 1, 2007, at 18:54:39
I so want to say more than I am up to right now, but suffice it to say that he's not going to change, your father. Nor is he likely to ever admit to anything.
When my brother died last summer, I could not even go back to deal with his body; my poor husband had to do it plus clean out his apartment. I had him cremated which I am vehemnently opposed to as I have family on my paternal grandmother's side who were Jewish and gassed and put in the ovens in WWII. So this left me a lot of guilt. And then I guess to redeam myself, I took his ashes to Minnesota and spread them in the woods near where my grandparents lived. You would not believe the "meaning" of all this and what transpired on that same path when I was eight years old and then the aftermath. My therapist almost fell out of his chair, and it was then I realized how much significance there was to what I did all the way around. Oh crap. He wasn't my only abuser.
When my brother died, he was the last of my immediate family. I am now an orphan. Both of my parents died unnatural deaths and due to botched medical procedures. Enough.
I should just go rent one of my favorite Bergman films; my therapist wanted to know which was my favorite so he could watch it. So of course I did not tell him. My favorites are very "dark" ones.
OzLand
P.S. I will answer your question about therapy over the weekend. I haven't forgotten. Guess my brain is no longer fried!!
Posted by B2chica on August 2, 2007, at 9:01:13
In reply to Just got off the phone with parents ***trigger***, posted by LlurpsieNoodle on August 1, 2007, at 18:54:39
{{{{{{Lurpsie}}}}}}
i can't even comment on your 'father's' response. yes..i'm literally speechless. i wouldn't even know how to comment on that response.but YOU get to choose who you see and when...you dont EVER have to see him again if you don't want to.
remember that!
and with your hug i gave you special barriers so that you feel extra protected today...
take care LN
b2c.
Posted by B2chica on August 2, 2007, at 10:15:17
In reply to Re: Just got off the phone with parents ***trigger*** » LlurpsieNoodle, posted by OzLand on August 1, 2007, at 22:44:26
> I should just go rent one of my favorite Bergman films; my therapist wanted to know which was my favorite so he could watch it. So of course I did not tell him. My favorites are very "dark" ones.
did you mean Ingrid Bergman or Ingmar Bergman??
Posted by LlurpsieNoodle on August 2, 2007, at 10:41:49
In reply to Re: Just got off the phone with parents ***trigger » OzLand, posted by B2chica on August 2, 2007, at 10:15:17
Oz, the symbolism of our everyday acts can take my breath away. Sometimes I don't realize what I've done and what it means until years afterwards, in these little flashes of... oh.
B2Chica, thanks for extra hug protection against the real world. you are awfully kind. I hope you know that I take hugs seriously. Sure, I do little friend hugs and stuff, but this topic deserves a real hug, so I thank you. It helps lots.
****
re. my dad never changing... See, that's the great mystery. He had a series of mini-strokes several years ago that left him physically incapacitated and severely cognitively impaired. His personality completely changed. He was meek as a lamb. Didn't lose his temper. Mild. Grateful. Tearful. Sweet to my mom, and acted nice to all concerned. Oblivious to pain, and to the consequences of his own brain damage.Fast forward 3 years, and he has regained much of his physical functioning (still requires caregiving), and most of his cognitive functioning, except for retrograde amnesia of a chunk of time from about 1999-2004.
Emotionally, he is regaining his manipulative tempermental angry nature. slowly it invades his heart with cruelty and meanness towards those who love him (does my mom love him?) and/or care for him. embittered he strikes out, and then occasionally he retreats back to his land of meekness and oblivion. I never know what to expect. When he says things like he said yesterday about how he was always happy and only has happy memories, I believe him. But to insinuate that our brains and childhoods are alike and therefore I should be oblivious and cheerful is outrageous and very hurtful.
and so I don't want to have anything to do with him, and my brother is getting wise to the fact that all is not well in Denmark. Trying to protect my mom, who has empowered herself by taking control of the household for the first time in her lifetime. But I'm no longer going to protect the secrets. I already told my aunts about the abuse, and all my close-extended family know about my mental illness. ill at ease
So, that's my truce with Dad- if he turns into an *sshole again, he may not expect for people to drop what their doing in their lives and take care of him 24/7 for months/years. They may just institutionalize him and see him when *they're* ready.
-Ll
Posted by Phillipa on August 2, 2007, at 11:46:49
In reply to Thank you guys. about my decrepit dad, posted by LlurpsieNoodle on August 2, 2007, at 10:41:49
Lurpsie tough situation for all involved. Love Phillipa. I know though you will do the right thing as time goes by.
Posted by OzLand on August 2, 2007, at 23:26:15
In reply to Thank you guys. about my decrepit dad, posted by LlurpsieNoodle on August 2, 2007, at 10:41:49
I completely understand, Llurpsie; my brother became a paranoid schizophrenic in later years and reigned terror on us in a different way. Wondered if I would live through the night or would I be shot and killed. So, it was double crap--csa and physical and mental abuse later. I hated him and I guess I still do and now also feels so guilty about it when he and my mother to a lesser but apparently significant extent are major players in my problems and demons of today. Both are dead now, and so it is difficult to hate them without feeling guilt. Stupid maybe, but it is what it is.
Now I guess I have all sorts of stuff for therapy tomorrow--my feelings of therapist inserting himself in me again wanting to know my favorite Ingmar Bergman film so the can watch it, and this whole issue of the hate and guilt re mother, brother, and I suppose father too who was physically and emotionally absent. Oh crap. Getting too morose now. Time to go to bed.
Oz
Posted by Sigismund on August 3, 2007, at 1:59:30
In reply to Re: Thank you guys. about my decrepit dad » LlurpsieNoodle, posted by OzLand on August 2, 2007, at 23:26:15
Excuse the interruption, but since he died the other day at the age of 89 and you mention him, I hope it's OK.
My favourite is Cries and Whispers, and I have a couple of favourite scenes I remember after more than 30 years. There is the self-mutilation one where she says 'It's all a tissue of lies'. And then there is the funeral prayer, which I take to be a grim form of Scandanavian humour.
Some people after strokes become nicer, depending on which part of the brain has been affected.
Posted by OzLand on August 3, 2007, at 22:40:00
In reply to Ingmar Bergamn, posted by Sigismund on August 3, 2007, at 1:59:30
Yes Cries and Whispers is one of my favorites as is Through the Glass Darkly. My analyst said he is going to watch Cries and Whispers this weekend so he can share something with me. I said, "sure, right; it's just to share. What do you think I am stupid; you want to know me better."
He laughed as of course this is the case and wanted to know why that made me uncomfortable. HAH; knowing me better than I know myself--scary and yet also a good thing as if he did not know me better than I know myself, well then how could he help. Told him this. UUOH; now I said more about me. So, first he will watch CRies and Whispers. Did not tell him anything about the use of the color red either. And then he is going to later watch Through the Glass Darkly. I also liked many of his films. I am of Swedish decent, and I know from his history that his mother and my mother and all the female relatives were a like. They can be very cold and use the silent treatment when you have misbehaved. I mean days to weeks of the silent treatment for an eight year old child is really hard to take.
Oz
Posted by Honore on August 4, 2007, at 11:44:58
In reply to Ingmar Bergamn, posted by Sigismund on August 3, 2007, at 1:59:30
I like Cries and Whispers a lot, but I worry about that.
I also love some of the other ones--Wild Strawberries (was that earlier?), the Seventh Seal-- and others whose names I don't even remember now-- I saw them so long ago--
by the way-- on another topic, do you remember the name of the Woody Allen movie where he runs over the dictator's nose? Where he wakes up in the future? I can't remember it and it's driving me wild.
Also, did anyone notice that Antonioni died at more of less the same time, at the age of 94? (A story on that : http://abc.net.au/news/stories/2007/08/03/1995660.htm?section=world) Did anyone here see Blow-Up?
Honore
Posted by OzLand on August 4, 2007, at 13:21:18
In reply to Re: Ingmar Bergman » Sigismund, posted by Honore on August 4, 2007, at 11:44:58
Oh darn; I lost my whole post. Honore, I think the Woody Allen film was "Sleeper."
No I did not know that Antonioni died. Yes I saw Blow Up a long time ago. I think with TV being as bad as it is and my still having some trouble with focusing to read and retain new information ala the ECT, maybe I will go out and try to rent some of the old classics that don't seem to be on TV at all.
We have Comcast where I am, and we have all the darn channels including HBO, Cinemax, Starz, Showtime, etc, and not a one has a Bergman film on. Maybe this coming week.
Yes I liked Wild Strawberries too. Cries and Whispers is not for the unstable so to speak, but then none of Bergman's dark films are. The red and all it's symbolic meanings is amazing to me. Plus the one sister's cutting experiences from when she was younger is just way too familiar, and since I don't do any of that stuff anymore, I wonder how I would handle it.
Through a Glass Darkly is one of the films I watched over and over again as I was getting sicker and sicker before I went into the hospital at Menninger's in the 80's. Because of that film and some other stuff I watched and read, I just felt like I was sinking further and further into the abyss of insanity and hell, and then I was not able to get myself out after a point. I really don't remember much about my first year in the hospital, and so having my records is interesting to say the least--also a bit embarassing. But no one judged me except me. I am getting off topic.
So, I just ask that anyone who sees this message to be careful about watching any of the darker Bergman films, and especially if unraveling in any way, then put off watching Through a Glass Darkly until you feel stronger and more stable.
OzLand
Posted by Sigismund on August 4, 2007, at 16:38:19
In reply to Re: Ingmar Bergman » Honore, posted by OzLand on August 4, 2007, at 13:21:18
Hello Honore
Yes, I saw Blow Up in 1968 or so.
For me Bergman was this impossible relief, like various other representations of the human condition (Macbeth, King Lear, The Waste Land, all of Eliot). I was all tears of gratitude. It's not for everyone though. My aunt said of Eliot, 'He's so gloomy'. I was completely outraged by this opinion. Another time I was rereading the end of Macbeth for no good reason, and was struck by how funny it was. I was telling someone else to look at it this way and she said not to worry, it was just me. Shakespeare is best read out aloud alone, like on those bushwalks you do as you say aloud
Let the great gods that keep this dreadful pudder o'er our heads find out their enemies now, tremble thou wretch that hast within thee undivulged crimes unwhipped of justice, hide thee, thou bloody hand thou perjurer and simular of virtue that art incestuous, caitiff to peaces shake that under covet and convenient seeming hath practised on mans life, close pent up guilts, rive your concealing continents, and cry these dreadful summoners grace.
You need to be careful in the Australian bush. Bergman is best seen with a friend. I need on of those for the 5 hours of Fanny and Alexander.
Posted by Honore on August 5, 2007, at 11:02:48
In reply to Re: Ingmar Bergman, posted by Sigismund on August 4, 2007, at 16:38:19
Ozland -- finally I can rest! Definitely Sleeper. I can't imagine how I forgot -- it's always been one of my favorite Woody Allen movies. Although I also like "Love and Death" and some of the Annie Hall movies, especially "Manhattan." For one thing I like the images of Manhattan (the city); they really are the best ones in movies.
One of the lines I love in those movies is about hating the country because it's so quiet. I used to connect totally with that--I found the woods really frightening because they're so quiet and there's no one for miles-- something one never experiences in the city, and which usually signifies some sort of danger. But the noise in the city lately has become so deafening and shrill that it's become oppressive.
I also have been pulled deeper into despair and violent self-questioning, to the point of being in a lot of emotional (and even physical danger)-- but mostly in danger in terms of suffering-- by novels and books, and movies mostly about insanity or suffering or the older, more theoretical books describing schizophrenia, that I read while very vulnerable. People rarely question or remember the psychic damage that certain types of books and movies can do-- that literature is not all spiritually uplifting but can be corrosive-- not in terms of morality, or anything like that-- but merely that one can be pulled into an artist's evocation of disorganized or deeply disturbed states. Their beauty and power create an even stronger lure or compulsion to reimmerse oneself in the very thing one most dreads, or is threatened by-- and yet these very same things can be the greatest works. Novels by Dostoevsky had that effect on me and I could rarely finish them. It could be why I turned to lighter types of literature and movies and plays, out of anxiety at reexperiencing those feelings.
I'd very much like to see some Bergman movies, although the more benign and depressive, rather than the scary ones.
There was an article in the NY Times yesterday, about Bergman and Antonioni's differing approaches to religious questions that you might find interesting. (http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/04/us/04beliefs.html?_r=1&oref=slogin)
Thanks again, Ozland, for helping me out.
Honore
Posted by Sigismund on August 5, 2007, at 15:55:21
In reply to Re: Ingmar Bergman, posted by Honore on August 5, 2007, at 11:02:48
I enjoyed Fanny and Alexander.
It struck me as being a very traditional fairy/childrens story.
Satan appears and is defeated. Good triumphs over evil.
He has a very good line on identity. Those are the bits I liked most.
Posted by OzLand on August 5, 2007, at 22:08:27
In reply to Re: Ingmar Bergman, posted by Honore on August 5, 2007, at 11:02:48
Glad I could remember; guess the ECT did not destroy my brain completely!!!
I tried to find some Bergman movies to rent this weekend. None to be found. So, maybe by next weekend I can find some to see all over again. Of course I have to challenge myself and watch one of the depressing ones and see if I can not get depressed. I am fairly certain I can. If I can listen to sex offenders talk about their offenses and read the police and medical reports and/or do the same with someone who has killed someone, even a child or infant without getting depressed about it or hating the person, then I guess I am doing better than I sometimes think. But then I can compartmentalize very well thank you very much. Actually, that is not always a bad thing. T thinks it shows ego strength. There I go with that term again.
Anyway, funny that Woody Allen is mentioned as someone who admired Bergman and who also used symbolism, etc. I used to like Woody Allen and his films and then stopped going to his films when I learned he is basically a pedophile. What a contradiction I am. Well it is what makes us human. Take care.
OzLand
Posted by B2chica on August 6, 2007, at 8:18:35
In reply to Re: Ingmar Bergman » Honore, posted by OzLand on August 5, 2007, at 22:08:27
>>..I used to like Woody Allen and his films and then stopped going to his films when I learned he is basically a pedophile....
whenever anyone asks me about a woody allen film they like i just tell them i've never been a fan, but infact i too used to like his stuff till all came out about him and his daughter.
cept for some reason i cant tell anyone that...i think i'm secretly afraid they'll jump to the conclusion that i've been abused...and i won't be able to lie and deny it.hmmm sounds like a post-secret postcard!
b2c.
Posted by Phillipa on August 6, 2007, at 20:18:59
In reply to Re: woody allen » OzLand, posted by B2chica on August 6, 2007, at 8:18:35
Yup remember Mia Farrow and Woody adopted a bunch of kids they lived in Ridgefield CT . I was living in CT then too. Did Woody move to NJ? Love Phillipa Mia is still there I think.
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