{"id":631,"date":"2010-07-30T14:59:09","date_gmt":"2010-07-30T14:59:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jennydeupree.com\/?p=631"},"modified":"2010-09-20T14:36:03","modified_gmt":"2010-09-20T18:36:03","slug":"more-on-denial","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jennydeupree.com\/?p=631","title":{"rendered":"More on Denial"},"content":{"rendered":"

One of the big problems with denial is you don\u2019t know you\u2019re in it.\u00a0 If you are ready to see the truth, when someone says \u201cdrinking problem,\u201d the light goes on immediately.\u00a0 If you\u2019re not ready, sometimes you don\u2019t even hear it.\u00a0 I once said \u201cI missed you\u201d to a man I was attracted to, and his next sentence made it clear that he hadn\u2019t heard me.\u00a0 For many years I\u2019ve heard or read the phrase \u201cThe wound was given in relationship, and it has to be healed in relationship,\u201d and I would think that made sense, but didn\u2019t feel anything.\u00a0 In December of 2008, Caryn said it to me and it struck with force.\u00a0 After the session I started feeling lonely in a way I never had before.\u00a0 I realized I had been in denial of my loneliness my whole life.\u00a0 Caryn encouraged me to ask for help.\u00a0 It was difficult because when I was growing up, if I asked my parents for help, they would make me wrong for asking.\u00a0 Because I was desperate, though overwhelmed with fear, I called some friends and asked if they would invite me for a meal and\/or walk the dog with me.\u00a0 I was blown away by their eagerness to help, and made sure that I saw a friend every day.
\nAnother time I found myself in denial happened at my family\u2019s summer house on the coast of Maine.\u00a0 My mother said something very cruel to me.\u00a0 Almost immediately afterward I wrote it in my journal.\u00a0 The next day I read my journal entry and found myself confused about whether it had really happened or not.\u00a0 I asked my sister and she said “O yes, Mother did say that\u201d and agreed that it was mean.\u00a0 I realized from that incident that this must have happened many times, her saying something nasty and me forgetting it immediately, which was why I was always so unprepared for her attacks.\u00a0 After this incident I started writing things down, and began to shield myself, and not give Mother a target.
\nSometimes breaking through denial was difficult.\u00a0 One time I was in a workshop, we were working in pairs, and my partner said something to me which I immediately started to deny.\u00a0 Then there came an odd discomfort in my body, so I stopped talking and looked \u2014 and saw that what she was saying was<\/em> true.\u00a0 I told her so and felt the discomfort melt in relief.\u00a0 But I saw how easy it would have been to stay in denial.\u00a0 Certainly the person I was talking to believed my defense, she didn\u2019t argue, and was surprised when I suddenly shifted.\u00a0 I wondered how often my mother came to places like that and refused to shift.\u00a0 I\u2019m very grateful for my commitment to truth which has carried me through many such obstacles.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

One of the big problems with denial is you don\u2019t know you\u2019re in it.\u00a0 If you are ready to see the truth, when someone says \u201cdrinking problem,\u201d the light goes on immediately.\u00a0 If you\u2019re not ready, sometimes you don\u2019t even … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-631","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jennydeupree.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/631","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jennydeupree.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jennydeupree.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jennydeupree.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jennydeupree.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=631"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/jennydeupree.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/631\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jennydeupree.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=631"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jennydeupree.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=631"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jennydeupree.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=631"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}