Scarleteen

Because my mother's consistently said it doesn't exist, and that I lie constantly. (The lying thing had flown over to other things.) And, it really, really fucks with me sometimes. I don't like it, and I really don't know how to keep the thought from recurring.

I'm sorry that feeling keeps cropping up. We may have touched on this before, but have you had any luck using affirmations or reminders (like, physical ones that you can look at and read) that you can look at when you need to counter what your mom is saying?

Sam W wrote:I'm sorry that feeling keeps cropping up. We may have touched on this before, but have you had any luck using affirmations or reminders (like, physical ones that you can look at and read) that you can look at when you need to counter what your mom is saying?

Yes, I have been using affirmations, but sometimes they don't work because the thought is too deeply dug in.

When someone tells you that your perspective or experience is invalid, it can be far too easy to believe them, especially when they are close to you. I'm really sorry that you're dealing with your mother saying that you lie constantly. This is advice that deals with trying to counteract the effects of that.

I have a few family members who will sometimes invalidate my experiences and tell me that I have no idea what I'm talking about, even when I'm talking about my own life, opinions, etc. What has really helped me to hold on to my own perspective in the face of that invalidation has been a) talking to friends and b) noting down my own experiences and observations if I feel a particular urge to do so. Because I'm a bit of an extrovert, I prefer to talk with friends about these things, but you might prefer the private blog or diary approach, and either could help if you need or want to vent when you are experiencing dysphoria. The reason I find this helpful is that I can use my past comments and reflections as a sort of "reality check" where I have a record of both objective events and subjective reactions to those events. So if someone tells me my experiences aren't real or I'm making things up, I have somewhere to refer to remind me of the reality of my experiences. This has been really useful for me when family members have said, "Oh, you don't really feel/do/care about X" or, "Y never happened" - I can check in with friends I talked to at the time, and they remind me of what I told them. I wonder whether that could be another tool in your toolkit, a different form of reminder, alongside your affirmations/reminders created explicitly for the purpose.