Running

@rav3n

1. friend is male

2. I picked it up not him

i went back and re-read your post, i don't know why my brain misread that SO BADLY!! SO SORRY! @avant-garde

how do you feel about the emotional deflecting, do you feel its impacting your relationships? do you notice yourself doing it often?

@rav3n it was amusing, so it's ok

there's so much to it... I only really notice me doing it at church, I only realised yesterday, so the first step is noticing that i'm doing it, not sure if I do it anywhere else. I hate to say it, but I do think it impacts my relationships, I think it's why I feel so alone when it comes to my church. Given that most of the abuse I've suffered has been at the hands of church leadership I'm not surprised I do it though.

I think this might help answer your questions

I’ve begun to realise certain things

Habits that I have

How I deflect from admitting emotion

Like emotions are all bad

I find that I’m quite robotic

And tell how I physically feel

That my emotions can be challenged

Invalidated or dismissed

But what if, just what if

I could set a challenge for myself

To check in on my emotions

Instead of letting them build up

What if I shared how I emotionally was

Instead of my physicality

Would I be less lonely?

Would I feel people care for me?

Can I afford to be vulnerable?

To share what I’m going through?

Can I let people in?

To an emotion or two?

Will they then challenge me?

Or tell me that it can’t be that bad?

Will they be dismissive?

Like a sentence never said?

Will they share their opinions?

About how I can feel better?

Or will they walk beside me

To help me overcome?

Will it be invalidating?

Will it be too hard?

Or will they actually be there?

Be the community I want?

To think it’s just a question

That I deflect and avoid

But what if I didn’t?

What if I’m heard?

To have that connection

By this one simple change

Not to deflect

Rather be brave

@avant-garde firstly - wow, that poem is amazing and also i related to it a lot... i think i emotionally deflect too!? anyways i'll reflect on that later tonight.

so you notice it mainly at church - do you feel like you don't really trust some of the people there atm? sometimes emotional deflection around certain people or places can be your instincts trying to protect you because you don't feel safe there/safe around them. it doesn't necessarily mean its bad/damaging in some cases, it could just be you not wanting to share your emotional feelings with them due to incompatibility? what do you think?

but if you do feel that you deflect with others outside of church too, then it might be like you mentioned in your poem - that fear of invalidation. it sounds like you do want to share you emotional wellness, but i do want to remind you that you have control over who you share that with. you don't owe it to everyone, it's absolutely your choice - is there certain people you've recently wanted to open up to emotionally but felt you deflected instead?

@rav3n

The walls kind of have ears at church and I don't trust a lot of people there, the older ones tend to gossip more than care...

There are people that I'm trying to let in but I find it hard in church settings because there are so many people and I often feel overwhelmed and just want to get out and it's not the space for deep and meaningful conversations as much as it is about idle chit chat and all the typical talk about kids and work and then there's me...

I open up in smaller gatherings like Bible Study and when catching up with people away from church, but when other people can walk up and interrupt at any point, I'm less likely to share stuff and what I'm going through.

There are some that I avoid being open with and yesterday I wanted to check in on someone and he and I have a good friendship, but the person he was talking to, well he's an emotionally invalidating and silver spooned jerk. So while the friend wanted to see how I was doing, the other kind of side railed the conversation...

honestly that makes a lot of sense @avant-garde i'd have my emotional defences up around the gossip and invalidating types too.

do you ever meet up with people from church, outside of church? do you feel comfy perhaps inviting a few that you feel like you could trust for coffee or something to practice opening up in an environment you feel safe?

that's nice you've got the Bible study space as well, but i can see how it might not feel totally safe if other people can come and interrupt it. especially if there's people like... i'll call him silver spoon jerk for now too... if people like silver spoon jerk is around then avoiding being emotionally vulnerable sounds like a defence mechanism. i guess you have a few options like 1. continue to avoid speaking about your emotional wellbeing to avoid being invalidated, 2. risk being invalidated but remind yourself that people like silver spoon jerk don't know you - and whatever comes out his mouth is irrelevant/powerless on you, they're just taking out their insecurities/hurt on you. there defs more options but those 2 are the main ones i reckon.

@avant-garde also apologies for taking a while to respond! we're a mod down this week so we might be a lil slower 😅

@rav3n the last time I did more than one on one I got a real verbal battering and so I try and avoid that. I am much better at one on one.

I'm meeting up with someone tomorrow from church that wants to get to know me and offer support so we'll see how that goes.

I lean towards option 1 but I want to develop option 2

@Ru-bee

*kicks wall*

Why do they have to screw with me so much!

Hey friend @avant-garde what's going on for you? Wanna talk about it?