Story at-a-glance
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Hello 😉
I was born and lived for 25 years in a family where my mother had Borderline Personality Disorder. I am pretty sure she had experienced generational trauma as well. My dad was quite an enigma in all this. His ignorance and silent acceptance of what was happening at home is intriguing. What might have happened to him in his past to deal with it this way? Or rather, not to deal with the reality?
You can read about my experience living with a Borderline parent on my blog under the title “Living with a Borderline parent”.
My Story -- for those who don't like reading long texts 😉
Hi. I'm Marta 😃. I have a beautiful collie girl, Joy, that is 12 years old now. People say that she's very “mammig”, which more or less means that she's tied to my apron strings 🤣. Of her own choice! 😉. If she's “mammig” then I am “collieg” - very tied to her apron strings 😍.
Long story short, after trying 3 psychologists, I almost gave up on myself. Looking for ways to heal my past, I stumbled across a type of therapy that actually was helping me. Wanting to help myself better, I took courses to be able to work with myself in between the sessions. During the courses, I saw how passionate I was about helping others. I just felt my heart getting warm ❤️. I've decided to use my experience in overcoming my childhood trauma, working with myself and how challenging it can be, to help others who have been through similar situations. I became an EFT Practitioner.
I have decided to work with adult children of parents with Borderline Personality Disorder, persons who have difficulties setting boundaries, have experienced sexual assault and/or harassment, bullying, unhappy relationships and difficulties building one, loneliness, isolation and feeling of not belonging, not feeling worthy of love, trying to fix and heal others, seeing to others needs at their own expense… There are so many things that are a consequence of living with a BPD parent. And I lived through all the mentioned here.
I work online in English, Swedish, and Polish.
I have made my first website ever, www.loveyourlifeagain.com, and I am very proud of. Some love it, others say it's too much text 😆. I see it in a way that I apparently have a lot to say 😆. As Ted Hargrave said, “If it's worth doing it, it's worth doing it right”.
If you know anyone who's looking for support, please let them know how to find me. You can also check out Who I aim to work with and My areas of expertise.
My Story -- for those who feel like digging in 📖
I grew up in a home full of violence, aggression, anger, sarcasm, and humiliation. You name it, I’ve experienced it. I saw my mum behaving in ways that even the scariest Stephen King novel or film seems like a comedy. I did not experience love from my parents, or a sense of safety or security. I experienced imbalance in emotions and behaviour. My every day felt like walking on a minefield — hidden, ticking bombs… I’d never know when my mum would suddenly explode, yell and hit me, humiliate and call me names.
I learned to FEEL the atmosphere, read others’ facial expressions, assess the situation for any possible danger. I was so good at those things that I don’t understand why I wasn’t hired by the CIA or Kingsman.
My childhood was extremely difficult, but for me, it was normal. What was not normal for me was seeing a daughter and her mother going shopping together and having fun, having an interesting and fun conversation, sharing some deep thoughts and experiences. I didn’t have to share those with my mum. She just took my diary and read all about it herself. Then, she’d come sad to me, saying I hurt her feelings when I wrote I hated her for hitting me.
Many of those things made me who I am today. I am full of compassion and understanding. I have an open mind and I am tolerant. I don’t judge others. I am kind and gentle towards others — you never know what kind of demons others have to fight in their lives. I can see the subtle changes in others’ behaviour, hear the delicate change in the tone. That little movement of the eyelid, or a short stop in breathing. I can see in others’ eyes how their emotions start changing before they are even visible in their faces… I don’t go yelling at people in the street because I have lived through trauma, and that makes me entitled to take my anger out on others.
I could have become many negative things, a prostitute, a drug addict, an alcoholic etc. But I CHOOSE not to be that. Why? I didn't give up on myself. I didn't resign. I was hurting for 25 years living with my parents, and I do not wish my worst enemy, that kind of emotional pain I was put through. I can relate with others’ pain and negative experiences, most of them, not all. Maybe it’s a good thing? How much negativity and pain can one person take, huh? 😉
I suffered horrendously, especially emotionally, when I was a child. When I was around 15-16, I went to my first psychologist. It was one from a child care institution, where a psychologist was for free for young people. The woman listened to me for 15 min and decided I was spoiled. She told me to get a job and move out. I left devastated…
I was alone with my pain for another 25 years, strongly believing that I was the problem. That was what the psychologist made me feel, that was what she said. After 25 years of feeling empty in my chest, I don’t know how many toxic relationships later, one sexually abusive and extremely excruciating, I decided to seek help again.
I reached out to a psychologist, as I noticed that my relationships were devastating me. I wanted to know what was happening. That psychologist, I call him “Notebook man”, was looking constantly into his notebook. No eye contact. After 10 sessions, I was told that it was nothing more to work on and… to check a book “Stop walking on eggshells” as my mum might have had a Borderline Personality Disorder. And that was it. I was left with it myself.
After two or three years more, I reached out to another psychologist. It was a woman, and this time I wanted to talk about my mother and how my childhood looked like. After three sessions of her “Oh no…!” and sighing, she said it was terrible what I was telling her, and she was not able to help me. It was too much for her. At least she was honest.
So three psychologists… And all three failed me…
"There were serious consequences in my life stemming from that toxic environment my family created. Sexual assaults, toxic relationships, self-sabotage, feeling of not belonging and feeling different, a sense of unworthiness, financial difficulties and suicidal thoughts."
“The map is not the territory”
I did some yoga for a while, some meditation. It was supposed to be good for me. It didn’t make things worse, but it didn’t heal me. I got more flexible and my mind got softer on me, but I kept repeating the negative patterns that had haunted me since my childhood. I love yoga, and I am reading what chakras are and their role in our lives. However, it did not help me to deal with my emotional and physical reactions I developed during my life with my parents.
It did not help me to see what I didn’t see. You see (🤣), as a child you learn things by observing them. Up to 7 years old, a child just absorbs everything like a sponge, all the patterns of how things are done: how parents talk to each other, how their romantic relationship looks, what the social rules are at home, in the family… all that happens around them. And that is it - children learn only what they have contact with. We pass on to them our beliefs, our fear, our way of talking, seeing the world, solving conflicts… you name it.
So imagine this now: I grew up in a home that was full of sarcasm, aggression, physical violence, emotional manipulation. I saw my dad ignoring me for the sake of wellbeing of my mum. I saw my mum humiliating my dad, and my dad still showing her love, commitment, and submissiveness. That is what I saw… I saw I was ignored, never hugged, never said “I love you” to, but all those things were given to my mum by my dad. I didn’t know there was something else. I DIDN’T KNOW WHAT I DIDN’T KNOW. How was I supposed to know that I didn’t know? That it was possible to do things the other way? I didn’t know how a man who loved me looked like. I didn’t know how a man or a woman who loved me looked at me, how their eyes and faces looked when they looked at me with love.
I had a map, but I didn’t know that there was a whole territory beyond the map.
So, it was yoga, it was Reiki, it was breathing. All those things helped me a bit, but they only touched the surface of my skin. I wanted to touch my mind and my body, my heart and all the wounded places. EFT and NLP not only touched my deepest depth, but also helped me to see what I didn’t know I could see.
I was going through a terrible moment in my life. I was bullied at work by one of my colleagues. She bullied many people in the department. She bullied away from the department two of my colleagues, that I know of. The time came, to target me. I didn’t get any help from my manager. What’s more. I didn’t get any help from the HR department. Apparently, my “I feel bullied” didn’t matter, as the person who bullied me denied it… But the HR did know about the two persons, who left out department due to the behaviour of that one woman. The common words I heard were, “There’s nothing to do about it. That’s the way it is. You have to work on yourself.”
I was discriminated. I was told I wouldn’t get my summer holidays I asked for, as… I didn’t have children… My manager (it was actually two different managers — women), a woman, said to me, another woman, that I possibly was not getting my holidays due to the lack of offspring. Mums were prioritised, non-mum… well, were not.
I was notoriously picked on due to my choice of diet, how I lived my life. That I was single, that I reduced my sugar intake, that I didn’t drink, how difficult it was to be a single dog owner, how time-consuming it was to have a dog, take care of it… I felt I was going under. There was a year or two in my life that I can’t even remember… As if I was on some autopilot… Unaware of the world around me. I didn’t “talk” to my dog. We stopped playing, training. There were just boring walks, that felt like a punishment to me… I just cannot imagine, how she dealt with it…
I stumbled upon EFT when my Joy was sick. I stayed at home with her. I thought it was a snake bite as the blood was rushing through two small holes in her thigh. It was an infection. I cried so much, as I was scared I would lose her. When she was sleeping exhausted after an operation, I saw an energy medicine course from Hay House. A mix of different subjects: Eden Energy, Reiki, Breathing, Chakras, EFT.
I tried Eden Energy on Joy and myself. Then I discovered EFT. I started with some guided meditation using EFT. Some general YouTube videos. And although it didn’t heal me, as EFT does its magic when applied to very specific situations, memories, emotions, physical reactions, it did make me calmer. It made it easier to access myself and my heart again. My first self-tapping was on love to Joy. Every day, I’d tap, thinking how I loved her and what she meant to me. After two weeks, Joy started sleeping in my bed. And she does it to this day… She comes in the morning, or in the evening, and snuggles into me, putting her head and the whole weight on my chest, face and… Nose. I simply can’t breathe 😂.
I looked up an EFT Practitioner. Andy Bryce, EFT Master. We started working together. I tapped. I tapped every day. Sometimes 20 min, sometimes 1 hour. Sometimes when I was out on a walk with Joy. Sometimes when I was at home. In the morning before work. In the afternoon. In the evening. I made time to tap. I prioritised it. It was important for me to feel good and be happy. I wanted to feel good and be happy. I wanted to have the connection with my dog that I lost. I wanted to get over my past, change the negative influence it had on me, and to have a happy and fulfilling relationship.
I have lived through my horrible childhood and toxic relationship. I lived through the bullying and discrimination. And I am telling you that IT IS POSSIBLE TO HEAL, but YOU have to want it. No one else will do it for you.
It’s not easy to face your past. It’s scary… mostly because we judge ourselves and are ashamed of what we did and should have done but didn’t do it… We are the harshest judge of ourselves. The journey start with not as much what happened to us and who did it to us, but how we feel about ourselves from back then.
My Journey towards becoming a therapist
I decided to do the EFT and NLP therapist courses for myself, to help myself. I saw how it helped me. I would like to use the knowledge of the methods like EFT and NLP to help others.
I wish to use my life experience, there I had contact with constant violence, aggression, abuse, manipulation, and God knows what else, and the ability to listen to those things without being overwhelmed, to help others. The thought of helping others to deal with their negative experiences warms my heart.
I know how difficult it is to go through life unhappy, repeating the negative patterns that you were taught in your childhood, NOT EVEN BEING AWARE OF IT.
I know how others just don't have the capacity to listen to things similar to those that happened to me.
I know how lonely it is to be with it, feeling that there's no help.
I know how difficult it is to become aware that something is not OK. That maybe one or two unsuccessful relationships is OK, but 5… or 6… and that one there… the most horrible one… If it’s repeating, and the constant is me (you), but everything around is variable (men/women, people, places, countries, work), and a negative thing keeps repeating — we have a negative pattern somewhere…
Maybe you, like me, have been told all your childhood and life that “It’s you, not me”, leaving you feeling guilty of all the misery of the world?
I am trying to find my way to let others know I am here. I don't post videos of myself crying when doing physical exercises. I have done many exercises in my life, and none of them even touched my trauma 🤔.
I don't want to have videos telling others how to THEORETICALLY deal with negative experiences from their childhood, or psychologically analyse abused people's psyche. When I was that person with trauma, those videos only made me feel sad. I felt I was helpless. Not only were my problems pointed out to me, and how damaged I was, but I was left with that information alone, to myself.
I have lived through things that you might relate to. I lived through them and I have healed from some of them -- maybe many, or maybe just enough, or maybe it's just the tip of the iceberg I touched. I don't know how deep the holes are that my parents made in me. Sometimes, I get tired of finding yet another one. But most of the time I am determined to dig in. It gets easier with each time. EFT calms me down when I think or talk about those wounds. No psychologist was able to achieve that. And I have tried three different ones.
I am very much aware that I was severely damaged by my parents and family, but I am alive. And this is my expertise I want to share with others — it is possible to heal from your childhood nightmares, and EFT helps enormously with it. Not only with that... There were serious consequences in my life stemming from that toxic environment my family created. Sexual assaults, toxic relationships, self-sabotage, feelings of not belonging and feeling different, a sense of unworthiness, financial difficulties and suicidal thoughts... the list is long. Some points I've already crossed out. Others are still on the list. I wonder what else is there that I don't know about? 😉
If you’re willing, have a look at my website and get to know me. Read how EFT and I could try to be there for you.
My Experience with the traditional therapy
I sought help with so-called traditional therapy, psychologists. I have worked with 3 psychologists and 1 welfare officer and I met with:
Ignorance and unconcern, inability to connect and tune into me, making me feel that their notebook was more interesting than me, as they kept staring at it instead of looking at me. Interruptions during sessions, such as answering text messages from other clients and fixing prescriptions. Looking at me as if they felt pity for me. Gasping and making comments “Oh My God…”, “I feel sorry for you” and “I cannot help you, this is too difficult” using tone that seemed close to tears.
“You are spoiled” -- that what the first psychologist said to a 15-year-old me, when I talked about how it was living with my mum, who had Borderline Personality Disorder.
Every week, I'd enter a traumatic feeling, that would cause my body to shake, asking myself questions “Why?”, trying to understand myself and my actions. I'd be left alone to deal with it and calm myself down on my own after the session. I wasn't taught any methods on how to work on issues myself between the sessions or how to deal with a minor, stressful, and/or irritating situation.
Working with those psychologists made me wonder:
“Have they every experienced and lived through a trauma, and… Have they ever done any healing of it???” You know, people who tell you what's wrong with you and what you should do, but they don't follow their own guidance?
I started looking for other options, less “psychologist” more “therapist”. I stopped watching YouTubers telling me what was wrong with me, and started looking for people who were engaged into helping me to heal my past.
I see people being given pills for deeply suppressed anger or grief, instead of helping them to heal it.
