Genesis - Afterglow (Lyrics)

How does low self esteem manifest itself?

Answered by Dushka Zapata via quora.com:

I am unable to recognize my own worth and can only perceive it through what others say. This creates a self-perpetuating need for external validation.

I avoid conflict, because any form of disagreement threatens my fundamental architecture.

I never set a boundary as I feel that doing so risks my relationships.

I don’t respect the boundaries of others because I experience them as a form of rejection.

I am so anxious and wrapped up in how I come across that there is less room for empathy.

I judge others - a symptom that I’m not happy with myself.

I don’t trust anyone. Trust is hard to establish with others if I don’t trust myself.

I cannot regulate my own emotions.

I cannot communicate my own emotions.

I don’t know how to ask for what I want. I am not even sure what that is.

I struggle with two feelings that disguise themselves as coming from others but really come from how I see me: envy and jealousy.

I crave intimacy but am afraid of it.

I want to be vulnerable but it feels too dangerous.

I don’t like being alone but also often feel lonely in the company of others.

Low self esteem is like wearing tinted glasses. It colors everything, because we are the place from where we see the world.

Trait Twelve

"We are dependent personalities who are terrified of abandonment and will do anything to hold on to a relationship in order not to experience painful abandonment feelings which we received from living with sick people who were never there emotionally for us."

Many of us wish we did not perpetuate certain family disease traditions like abandonment, but we do so anyway. We may have abandoned someone on purpose as an outlet for our anger, or as a form of retribution. No matter what the reason, we are now in recovery to break the cycle of this multi-generational family disease the best we can.

The idea of not abandoning others may feel like a foreign concept. Maybe we just don't know how to stay, how to feel safe long enough to be intimate. It can feel terrifying to get close to others.

Being with fellow travelers in this program is a first step in practicing what it's like to tolerate intimacy. It's also where we can learn to communicate, resolve problems and forgive in ways we were never taught. We perform a real act of courage when we do things differently in recovery.

We can practice; we can do it. This is our living amends - a gift to ourselves and others in recovery, and perhaps to our families as well.

On this day I will practice new, trusting behavior with my ACA friends. I will continue to learn healthier ways of communicating that will keep me from leaving others for the wrong reasons.

Promise Four

"Our ability to share intimacy will grow inside us."

One casualty of our dysfunctional families was our ability to share intimacy. In our oftentimes dangerous families, intimacy led to vulnerability, which became an open invitation to be hurt and hurt again. We learned to protect ourselves by shutting down our natural need for intimacy. Our false self took charge to protect us from the harrowing pain of a multitude of unmet needs.

As we engage in the process of recovery, we begin to feel comfortable, learning to express our needs. We may need to be discerning in deciding with whom to share our most treasured hurts, but share them we must, if we are to regain our ability to share intimately.

The process of recovery requires us to become our own loving parent, relieving from duty our most ardent defender, our critical inner parent. Only then will our Inner Child begin to feel and express all the hurt inside.

As we grow comfortable with the uncomfortable absence of our critical inner parent, we build trust that our loving parent will guide us in knowing when and where to share intimately. Our internal intimacy translates into outward intimacy, and we are made whole once again.

On this day I will help my Inner Child feel safe so that my freedom to share intimacy can grow. I will practice sharing intimately with others I have learned to trust.

Relationship Anorexia

Adult children learn a lot of things growing up in a dysfunctional home. Unfortunately, one of the primary things we learned was not to trust. We learned to place a wall around us for protection from pain.

This wall follows us into adulthood and shadows all of our relationships with acquaintances, friends, co-workers, and most importantly, our intimate relationship with a partner/spouse. We find that, unlike our family of origin, a healthy relationship calls for a degree of trust, something so foreign to us that our safety feels threatened.

When given the choice to let down our guard and allow someone to breach our protective wall, some of us choose to either prevent or end a relationship. We fear failure but sabotage our own success.

As we get emotionally stronger in our recovery program, we start removing the bricks from our wall, knowing that now we can accept what life brings us with the love and support we have for ourselves, as well as from our Higher Power and fellow travelers.

Detecting a Fake Smile

Family Roles

"Survival roles tend to have a hardy life and remain fixed in our personalities long after we have left our unhealthy homes…. There is the 40-year-old sister, living out the lost child role by avoiding holiday meals and rarely calling home."

Roles adopted to survive our childhood experiences are our default positions in life, unless we become conscious of the underlying causes.

Before recovery, we may have avoided our families because we were overwhelmed with fear, anger, sadness, ambivalence, or mistrust. Not participating in the false cheerfulness of holidays was one way of protecting ourselves.

As we make progress using the tools of the program, we may continue to stay away from our families, but now it's because we realize the interaction is not healthy. We may hope for a time when we are able to care for our Inner Child well enough to re-establish contact. And if we do so, it will be with the full knowledge of what we may or may not get in return when we no longer play the role that makes our families comfortable.

Recovery is a process that ebbs and flows like the waves on the sands of our life. We can delight in the awakening of our spirit that can bring us joy every day.

On this day I will keep track of my changing family role as a way of noting my progress on this positively exciting spiritual journey I am on.

Hypervigilance

"Most ACA members have some form of PTSD, which is often expressed in our hypervigilance of our surroundings or our acute monitoring of comments or actions of others. This behavior is a carry-over from growing up on guard much of the time." In recovery, many of us become very aware of how we feel strong emotional and physical triggers by certain things and we don't always know why. Through our discovery process, we find the underlying trauma that causes this state of hypervigilance. The strong, deep emotions that surface may overwhelm us like a raging sea. To soothe ourselves, we learn to lie under warm blankets, drink hot tea, and take long baths. We activate our inner loving parent, doing whatever it takes to honor our hurt Inner Child. Our motto has become, "I will take care of me first!" We dialogue with the wounded parts of ourselves that need love. At first, our Inner Child may seem to scream with rage, "Where were you all these years? How do I know you won't abandon me like everyone else?" But we have the courage to listen to this wounded part, no matter what the cost. We let go of abusive relationships and rearrange our lives to give ourselves more space for healing. We know we are worth it. On this day I put myself first. When I am in a PTSD tunnel, I will not minimize it to look good for others while I am suffering inside.

Family Portrait circa '95