Reframing What I Want - Episode 19

It’s my last day, and I’m sitting with everything this stay has stirred up. I talk through the biggest lessons I’m taking home: choosing to look for the good instead of dwelling on what’s wrong, learning to say what I want instead of what I don’t want, and facing the hard truth that I can’t control how my husband or my kids respond to me. I share the moment that changed how I see my own people-pleasing, the text exchange with my husband that triggered old CPTSD patterns, and why I’m done pulling an empty bucket from a dry well.

#Katabasis #HealingJourney #CPTSD #Reframing #MarriageJourney #FamilyEstrangement #BoundariesMatter #SelfDiscovery #FaithAndHealing #InnerWork #KarriKennedy

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:16

So I'm sitting here at the within center at the front. There's real chairs up here that are indoor chairs that I'm sitting on in the corner of the house. And uh it's my last day here. Um I'm actually supposed to be leaving within, you know, the next hour or two, probably. It's been raining a lot, and so that kind of ugh, it's just kind of a humid, yakky rain from Texas that we don't like too much, but it's good for it's good for all the stuff that's trying to grow here, so that that's good. Um I've got a lot of mixed feelings and a lot of thoughts about a lot of things. It's way too much to put in here. Um after all is said and done, I have mixed reviews on you know different things here and there. Some things I absolutely loved, some things I didn't like. You know, it's like going to a restaurant. You might love one of the items, but not love ever, you know, every item, um, or whatever. Um I don't know if I'll ever be back here again or not. I think it's definitely going to change, or as they say, quote, shift more, evolve, whatever. It's going to be different for sure. I know that um because I've talked to people who have been here five years, a year ago, whatever, and they've seen the changes. Um, and some of that is is going to be something people want, and some of it is going to be different because you like what you had before, that type of thing. Um as far as the ketamine goes, I feel like um out of the five treatments I had, I definitely feel like there's a shift in my mind and my brain, and I'm thinking and processing things differently. I don't know how much I can attribute to ketamine or conversations or my own reading and my own dialogue. And, you know, I don't know that answer. I don't think anybody would ever actually be able to quantify that. Um they say that healing and and you know, going through this journey, um, you know, everybody's on their own path at their own time, and uh everybody learns, you know, at their own pace. And even though I wanted a meeting with God with a piece of paper on here's what you should do and here's how you should handle it, and and this is going on. Um I don't I I definitely did not see that, although I did see a lot of things that shocked me, or heard things, or learned things that, you know, were different from what I'm used to, and and have kind of expanded my mind in a in a little bit here and there. I've I've met a lot of wonderful, wonderful people and had a lot of really great um conversations, and I have like 15 phone numbers now in my phone. Um, and you know, I've been this morning, I had integration with Heather, and uh that was really wonderful. We really just talked about how it feels like I was like a rocket ship, and then the rocket ship has to go home, right? And when you go home, you want a soft, safe landing, and that's really what I want. So last night I was, you know, text well, yesterday morning I texted my husband, and he got to be five hours later, and then it was like too late for us to try to have a conversation or talk. So we said we would talk today. Um, I wanted him to say, Oh, this is a great idea. Let's go out to dinner or let's go to a hotel and let's have time and let's talk and let's make some space where we can communicate and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. However, my husband is an avoidant for the most part, and he didn't respond the way I wanted him to. He didn't say the things I wanted him to. And I know and realize that that is out of my control and out of my purview, right? Like I can't make him be, say, do, act, give, respond differently than he does. And I think I've hoped and wished and wanted until the cows come home wanting that. And unless he changes and he's willing to work with me and grow with me and develop and and care and do intensive counseling and you know, different things with me, it looks like I might end up getting a divorce. However, I don't want that. I want him to be on board and I want him to work with me, and I want, you know, to have those conversations. But at the end of the day, I realize that I can only make him do so much. You know, like if I push him, maybe I have a little bit of, you know, pull there, like, you know, push an actual response. Um, but no matter really what I say, what I do, what I whatever, it's up to him to to you know, give what he has back or not. And uh, so that's a a big topic with all of this is how much is in my power, how much is in my control, you know, what do I want to give of myself and and what am I willing to put up with? And um, where am I gonna say, no, this isn't right for me, this isn't comfortable for me. And I'm not just talking about with him, like I'm talking about in life, you know, and um a few things have happened, um, just well, lots happened, but a few things I would like to point out. Um, and I don't know if I've said this before. So if I have, once again, I don't listen to these and I don't pre-you know, like play on it, it's not unscripted, it's just me talking. Um, but one of the things that really happened here, and you would think it's really insignificant and not a big deal, but when you kind of pull back and you look at the situation from just the whole overview and the lens, what can I learn from that? What can I take from that situation, whatever, instead of just going about your life, do, do, do, do, do, you know. Um, I I see things a little bit differently. And one of the things is um I took Charles to go look at this house, and it was it was in the ghetto. I'm I I I could go all through everything, but it was just a really bad space. Um, the houses weren't nice. There was one house that had like five trucks in it, the grass was really high. It was just a bad situation. It was a bad vibe. He was looking to live at this place and rent a room with three other guys um who were not aligned with him. And uh I just felt really unsafe. I felt very concerned. Uh, I was not happy with the situation, and I kept telling him that. You know, I'm like drive, we were driving around the neighborhood, and I'm like, no, no, no, no. And I'm seeing all the negative. And somewhere in that, Charles goes, Look at the pretty flowers. And they weren't even real flowers, y'all. They weren't like somebody intentionally planted them. Um, they were like weeds that had grown up high, but he has a a perspective and a lens where he views the world and he tries to see the good in things. And so after that time and telling that story to multiple people, how this all went down, I realized that I want to be more like Charles in the fact that I want to be more positive, I want to see good things, I want to look for the good. I'm going to try to be intentional about that and everything. And adding on to that same story this morning when I did integration with Heather, one of the things she said is even just reframing the way I say things needs to change. And I am completely aware of that. How I go about that, I'm not really sure. Um, but I do I do want to voice in my head and in my my actual audio and in my conversations a more positive, um, because and I think it comes from a place of safety and frustration, right? Like you want things to be a certain way. So I think my brain has been saying what I don't want to be like, no, no, I don't want to get bitten by the tiger kind of mentality. Keep me safe, keep me protected, no, no, right. So when you see that something doesn't make you feel safe, it doesn't make you feel good, it doesn't, it doesn't bring you happiness, you say what you don't want, you know, like the lion coming to beat you. No, no. And our brains typically do that. But what we need to do instead of saying, I don't want this, I don't want that, I don't like this, I don't want like that, you know, whatever. We need to reframe it to just say, here's my example. So um we have white marble floors in my house. We've lived with these white marble floors for seven years. I despise the white marble floors. When we moved into the house, my I didn't want to. I cried and cried. I told my husband, I don't feel good about this. I like the house we're in. I don't think this is a good idea. He convinced me to sign the paperwork and move and believe that everything was going to be better. Okay. And to keep those floors, even though I said I didn't really like them in the beginning, I was like willing to put up with it for a year or two. It's been seven years, and for seven years, I've been basically saying the same thing. I don't like the way they look, I don't like cleaning them, I don't like walking on them. The story goes on, you know. Um, I just I'm not a fan of white marble floors that are from the 80s with holes, and so I've spent a lot of time and energy from myself and my my brain, my whatever, giving to that thought. I don't like these, I don't want these, I wish it was different. And now that I'm here and I've been doing this, my thought is I need to reframe not even how I just look at the stupid white floors. I need to say, okay, these are the floors that God has allowed me to have at this time in my life. I don't have to keep up with these white floors anymore. Literally, my youngest kid is 16. I could move out, I could divorce my husband. I don't have to stay with these white marble floors anymore. So there's that option. Um, I've asked my husband multiple times to put hardwoods over them or to get them cut up, and he has told me no repeatedly when we either don't have the money or we don't have the you know resources or we don't want to put it on, you know, card, whatever. And so I've just been trying to be okay with that, you know. So long suffering is the word that I was always okay with. Long suffering, it's okay. You sacrifice, you suffer, you're long suffering, and you know, everybody doesn't get what they want. And so I would make excuses and justifications for hey, this is my life, this is the scenario, this is a situation. No matter how much it sucks, no matter how wrong it is, no matter how I don't align with it, no matter how I don't want it, and I'm not just talking about the floors now, in general, I have just put up with it and not done anything except bitch and complain about it. And so now I'm looking at it and I'm going, okay, first of all, there's that. I do have I do have autonomy, I do have choices, I do have chance, but then also like reframing it instead of saying what I don't want, like the scary lions coming to eat me, I don't want it, I don't want it, I need to be saying and putting into my mind and into the universe and into my voice and into my conversations what I do want. I'm not getting all hippy-dippy trippy here and I'm manifesting it and like you know, all of that. But I do believe mindset is important and I believe that the Bible says, you know, take your thoughts captive. And if all I'm doing is bitching and complaining and arguing and whining about my circumstance and situation and not changing it or planning for it to change, then I'm not getting anywhere. So what I'm going to try to do is be more like Charles and try to see the positive things, whether I'm writing list or I'm whatever, grateful journals, whatever. We we've done that for school. It's not like I it's completely foreign to me, but we haven't been consistent and kept up with it. And I definitely have not tried to do, you know, 10 things per day that I'm grateful for. I mean, I got to six and one of them was beer on one day. Um, so maybe not today because I've got all this other stuff going on with figuring out what it looks like when I get home and you know, getting out of here and all of that. I think um I need to say what I want and I need to be positive. So I think I'm gonna write all this stuff down. I'm I'm thankful that I have this, but I'm also going to do something where I write down 10 things I'm grateful for every day, just to get in the habit and the practice of looking for the good things, like Charles looked for the flowers. And I'm also instead of it gonna say what I don't want, you know, I don't want this, I don't want that, say what I do want. So, like when I was back and forth texting with my husband, I'm like, okay, Mark, uh, here's my audio message. This is what I want, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And he did not respond the way I wanted him to. I wanted him to respond in this grand gesture and understanding and compassion and sensitivity and kindness and uh just hearing me. And instead, I felt unsafe. I felt unheard. I felt like it was very ambiguous, it was very avoidant. It was not what I wanted. And I get that I don't get to change him. He's got his own words and his own life and and all of that. But what I need to do is go, I got off and I couldn't even text him back. I started feeling like the CPTSD, the anger, the frustration, the stress bottling up in me last night. And I told Heather about it and we sat down, the counselor, um, a different Heather. And she's like, okay, you know, calm yourself. What's upsetting you? Why do you feel like this? And it's anxiousness. It's me feeling anxious, it's me feeling unsafe. It's me feeling like I'm gonna be walking on eggshells, it's me worried that I'm gonna say the wrong thing or do the wrong thing and get in trouble for it, you know, this just like very scared position that I feel like I'm in. And she's like, okay, yeah, yeah. So I didn't message him last night. I didn't message him this morning. And now that I'm thinking about it, it's like, I need to not say what I don't want, you know. I don't want you treating me that way. I don't want you running around the bushes here. I don't want you being ambiguous. I need to frame it with, I want this. I want, you know, and be specific. I want to feel safe, I want to feel heard, I want to feel cared for, I want actual dates, time, space, I want acknowledgement, you know, and seeing what that looks like. And so I did, I did message him and I did say, Are you leaving? Oh, okay, hold on just a second. No, I'll miss you. Thank you so much. I know I've got your number. I want pictures. Yes, I'll send you a number. Send me pictures, take care. Thank you. Okay, bye-bye. Yes, we will. Absolutely. Bye, Raina. Remy, hug Reina. Bye, Raina. Give me a hug. Oh, bye-bye, baby. Bye-bye. Okay, bye-bye. See you later. Have a good day. Um, so basically, I need to say what I want instead of saying what I don't. I need to be more positive. And I also need to think about what I'm okay with and what I'm not. Um, these are just some of the big lessons I'm taking today. I've got a lot more. I've got a lot more notes. But one of the other things is last night, um, Charles and I were about to sit down for our nightly tea. We we make sleepy time tea and we sit and we talk and we visit, and we've been doing this for a while. And it was our last night together. He's gone to Wimberley to work on a farm today, so I already said goodbye to him. Um, but we formed like a mother-son relationship, and he's coming to me for advice, and I'm talking to him about you know, goals, and aspirations, and thoughts, and opinions, and all that, and talking about just different things, and we've really formed this great relationship. Well, last night we were supposed to have tea, and basically, somebody was told they could spend the night here, just out of the blue. We had like one minute notice, one minute. The person came from the uh sanctuary up there into the space where we were making our tea, about to sit down and talk. And this random person who gets to space sleep here, um, got to stay here, which is fine. They can run the place however they want, that's fine. But the point was we met him. I gave him water, we gave him tea, I gave him a tour, I showed him where the towels are, like all the different things, right? Where his room is, all that. And I was a hostess. Number one, that's not my job here. I just, I just did it because that's what I do. I just, you know, kind of take control, take charge, try to be hospitable and help. And so I did what I'm used to doing, right? It's not my responsibility to do that. Nobody asked me to do that. It's just where I did it. So I'm definitely looking at what that looks like, you know, like what are the boundaries? What are the limits? What am I okay with? What should I not give of myself? I didn't need to do that. Uh, there's a lot of things I don't need to do, but I do them out of kindness, believing that, you know, I would treat others as I want to be treated. If I came into a house, you know, whatever. And I get that. But what ended up happening is this guy ended up sitting with us, having tea with us, then somebody else came down, and then they ended up having tea with us, and we ended up having a conversation about everything else that Charles and I didn't get to have that time. We didn't get to do our talk together. And I think if that was something important to me, which it was, I should have spoken up for myself. I should have said, it's really great to have you here. Here's your room, here's your stuff. I hope you understand, but we're about to sit down and have a private conversation because this is my last night here. And I I could have and I should have said that. But instead, I was so concerned about making everybody comfortable and doing what everybody else wanted slash needed. I put what my needs were on the back burner. And I'm just saying this has been an MO for my whole freaking life. I could give you example after example that I've been here for the last 16 days doing this shit, that it is extremely obvious and aware. I am so aware of it now. Like I get it. So I'm gonna wrap it up here soon because I'm doing a like a goodbye send away thing here in a little bit. But um number one, I'm going to try to be more positive and see the positive. Look for the flowers. Number two, I am going to try to reframe the words instead of saying, no, I don't want this, no, I don't want that. To I want this, I want that, you know, instead of saying, I don't want to be poor, say, I want money. I don't want these white, you know, floors, I want hardwoods, you know, like be very specific and say what I want and work towards those things instead of feeling like the victim, like I can't make things better. And I would hope that my family and other people in my life would also do the same, right? My kids are like, I don't want to talk to mom. Okay, fine. What do you want? Do you never want to talk to mom? Do you ever want to have a good relationship with me? Because if you ever do, you're gonna have to do something different than what you're doing. You know, like if I want to have a marriage for the next 30 years with this guy, he's gonna have to meet me somewhere. He's gonna have to level up. I'm not going to accept, you know, bottom of the barrel anymore. And that's another thing, last thing here, I think. Somebody said, if you keep going to the same well and putting the bucket down and trying to pull it up and it's empty, pull the bucket down and pull it up again and it's empty. If you keep trying to get something from somebody who either A can't give it to you, you know, whether it's my kids having graciousness and kindness and picking up a phone, they they're incapable right now. I don't know if they ever will be. I hope and pray that they will, but I can't make them be somebody who can have difficult conversations. I can't. That's on them. You know, I can hope, I can pray, I can wish, I can want, but at the end of the day, that's where the boundary is, the control is, right? Like I would hope and pray that someday I'll get to hold my grandkids and I'll get to see their faces and we'll all be in relationship again. I hope and want that, but I can't force anybody to do that. I can't, I can't have my daughter call me one day out of the blue and say, Mom, I love you, and I'm really sorry that, you know, this is where things have been for the last three and a half years, but I really want you to see your grandchild, you know, or your grandchildren. I I can't make the things I want to happen like that because that there's this level of control that I don't have, you know, I don't get to control everybody. And so. She's talking about that being the bucket, you know. I want to get this stuff from them. I want to get it from my husband. I want to get it from my kids. I want, you know, when I call upstairs for my kid and he doesn't come, and I call him four or five or six or seven times, and then I get so frustrated that he's not coming down. This doesn't happen very often, but let's just say a last time that happened, I just lost it. I just went into my room and started crying because I felt unseen, I felt unheard, I felt uncared for, I felt like nobody gave a shit. And that's just a sucky place to be. And so I can't make him be better than he is. I once again, I can hope, I can pray, I can encourage, I can wish, I can, you know, all the up to a certain point. But he's got his own self-autonomy and he's got to make his own choices, you know? And so I have to be okay with that cognitive dissonance between here's what I want on one side, I'm holding up my arm far from my body to the right, and then switching phone hands, now I'm holding up my left hand arm far from my body. So it's like what I want is on one side and what I'm getting is on the other. And I'm trying to make that come together in alignment somehow. And if I if if if if what I want is a relationship with my kids and my grandkids, then I've got to do my best within my power to reach out and say what I want. And if they still give me the middle finger or close the door or whatever, then I've got to be okay with that. And that is a big, big, big area of all of this is that I'm not okay with it. Like, legit. I am not okay with being treated like this. And how much more time and energy or years am I gonna sit around hoping that somebody will pick up the phone and give me the time of day? You know, like this is absurd, you know. Like, I've got to get on with my life. I cannot sit here going to an empty whale and wanting something from people who are not willing to give it to me. And it just, it's like, what do you call an idiot? Or what's the what do you what's the measure of being somebody who's crazy, basically? I don't know whose the quote is, but somebody who does the same thing over and over and over again, expecting different results. Why would I expect anything different if they're not gonna work on themselves, if they're not gonna have the prayer time, if they're not gonna have the Bible time, if they're not gonna have the hard conversations, if they're not gonna go to counseling, if they're, you know, I can only do what's in my power and my control. So even going home tonight and having these conversations, and and you know, either having or not having the conversations, I've gotta be okay with that. And that's a big, big thing to do, especially when you've been doing it for 32 years with the same guy. You know, I make justifications, I'm like, oh, well, he's tired, or oh, he's an avoidant, or oh, you know, he um has other things to do, or oh, he's you know, believing this or whatever. And I get that, but there comes a point where I have to be like, that's not working for me anymore. But instead of saying it's not working for me, say I want better. I want better, I want our relationship to be better, I want our communication to be better, I want our family to be better, I want to be better, I want you to want to be better. And if I can't, then I have to have some, you know, hard fast, okay. This is this isn't gonna work, you know, and and I've tried and I've tried and I've tried, but I I I can't make water come from an empty bucket, you know, in an empty well. And I I think that that is a huge, huge aspect to all of this. So wrapping it up, 10 things I'm gonna be positive about, reframing and saying what I want and need, thinking more about myself instead of always looking out for everybody else and saying what I want, you know, like not constantly being such a people pleaser. Not that pleasing people isn't good, but really kind of saying, well, hey, this is what I want. And like I did with the tea last night. I shouldn't have done that. And I've accepted other things here too that I really don't think I should have, or I should have stood up for myself a little bit more in this situation or that situation. So I need to stand up for myself. And I have to realize that this cognitive dissonance between what I hope, dream, fantasize, wish was gonna be true. At some point, I can't keep living like that. So I think those are my four big lessons. It's been almost 30 minutes. I think people are wondering where I am because I came out here and I was supposed to be somewhere else. So um I'm gonna go in. The sun's starting to come out. Maybe it'll kind of dry up all these puddles everywhere and get better. I'm going to be sad to leave this place for a lot of a lot of reasons. It's a beautiful area, it's beautiful grounds, um, wonderful people that I've met. Um, just the whole experience. I'm very grateful for it. I'm very, very thankful that I've had this time and I've met these people. And then I've had a chance to do the ketamine and have a chance to reframe and think things through. I don't know how many other parts of this podcast are going to be, if it's going to be where I have all these aha moments after I go home, which people say you do. Um, a lot of the time they they say that happens. You you leave and then you realize, oh, you're not saying or thinking things the way you were. And um not only are you changing, but everybody in your life kind of has to change with that too. But this is different, or that sounds different, or how are we gonna, you know, respond differently, or whatever. So I don't know if that's gonna happen a whole lot or not. We'll see. But um, I'll get back to you. This won't be the last one. I'll I'll wrap it up eventually. But um, it's yeah, I'm pr planning to be home and going from there. And so that's it. All right, we'll talk to y'all later. Bye.