Are You Putting Out Fires or Breaking the Cycle?

And so if my voice sounds especially raspy or cracks today, or if I have to take a pause for a sneeze break, I apologize. But pollen is in full force. And while it is gorgeous in the Pacific Northwest in the spring, I do not enjoy pollen season as an allergy sufferer. On another note, a couple of things before we jump into the heart of the episode.

If you have signed up for my free workshop, Setting Boundaries with a Parent You Suspect has borderline or narcissistic personality disorder, but you have not taken it yet for whatever reason. Maybe you registered and you forgot. Maybe you registered and you never check your email. There could be a plethora of reasons why it got lost to the side. I want you to go back to confidentboundaries.com/slash workshop and sign up now. I don't want you to put that on the back burner.

I want to make sure you get in, get signed up, and take the workshop so that you can actually benefit from what I talk about in there. When you register, you're going to get two emails from me. One where I say, hi, you're registered. Yay, here's the button to go in and watch. And then you're going to get a second one that asks you to set up a password for my portal.

That's because I moved the workshop over to my portal to make it so much easier for you to watch it, whether you're on a phone or on your computer. And also, so I could send you my bonus boundaries cheat sheet automatically. I can do this in my portal. I can't do it as well through other platforms. Go in there, check it out, get my boundary scripts, and definitely circle back and let me know what you think after you check it out. A couple quick things.

So I've been working on an app for the Confident Boundaries membership. And I'm really excited because that's going to be launching really soon. And I will absolutely share more details about it when it launches. But our community is growing so fast over there.

And I am thrilled because it is really cool to watch people make connections with each other and share stories and read stories from other people within the Confident Boundaries membership and just finally feel seen and validated for the first time in their entire life. So if you're still thinking, if you're on the edge about that, don't hesitate to reach out to me. You can always shoot me an email at Tori T-O-R-I-E at confidentboundaries.com.

You can send me a DM at Tori at confidentboundaries on Instagram. And just let me know if you have a question, if you're wondering if that's really the right fit for you, just send me a message. Anyone who has messaged me can tell you that I always respond. If I missed it, it's because it like disappeared into some spam portal. But I always respond and I will always be honest. I tell people all the time, I don't think we're a great fit for working

together right now in this capacity because X, Y, and Z. I am not a car salesman. I don't do everything. I do a couple things and I do those couple things well. So I will always give you my honest opinion and I try to push you in the right direction if I don't feel like what I'm offering is the best fit for you. So please don't ever hesitate to reach out and just ask me. Okay, so today I want to talk about crises.

I'm sure you're very familiar with stressful crisis situations, given that you're listening to this podcast. I imagine that your life experience includes dealing with crises on probably varying levels. I know mine certainly does. And the interesting thing about that is when you grow up in a situation where there are all different types of crises, right?

There's an emotional crisis, there may be financial crisis, there's all of these crises because your emotional world, your family dynamic is just so chaotic and so dysfunctional. And so there's never a prolonged period of time that feels safe and peaceful. It's like this wave where things are really stressful and really tense. And then it's like, oh, I can breathe for a second.

Okay. I this is unnerving a bit that things feel at ease, but I'm just gonna try to not rock the boat and let this be as peaceful as it can be for as long as it can be. That's the abuse cycle, honeymoon period that I know I've mentioned on here before. It's that calm after the storm. And that keeps us from really diving in and doing the work that we need to do to completely break the cycle.

And what I mean by that is it's so common for people to reach out and seek help and support when they're in crisis. Because clearly that's a great time, right? I don't want to discourage anyone who feels like a crisis situation is happening right now from reaching out and getting support. Please do that if you are in crisis. But what I also want you to do is I don't want you to only reach out for help and support when a crisis is happening.

Because if that is what you're doing, you are getting some benefit. You are hopefully learning skills to help put out the fire. You're hopefully getting some compassion and empathy if you're going to therapy from your therapist while you're talking about really uncomfortable or stressful or scary things. There is benefit always from getting healthy support during a crisis.

But when that's the only time you go and access support, when that's the only time you do therapy, when that's the only time you really talk about, think about, journal about, dive into your complicated family dynamics, what's going to happen is you're going to continue to find yourself in this chaos cycle because that's part of the cycle. It's chaotic, it's stressful. And yes, that's still progress.

The fact that now you're reaching out for support when it's chaotic and stressful, that wasn't something that was probably available to you when you were growing up. That in and of itself is progress. However, if you stop doing the work once the fire has been put out, once the chaos has simmered, then you're

not actually doing the deeper work to break the cycle, to understand why you feel compelled to be a fixer. You aren't doing that deeper work that we can only do when we've taken a step back out of the crisis situation. That is so hard. And I am probably triggering so many people right now who are listening that are like, are you insane? I am dealing with a stressful situation so much of my life.

The fact that you want me to, in a moment of peace and calm, actually think about and talk about and dive deeper into my family dynamic makes you insane, Tori. That makes you crazy. Why on earth would I want to do that? And I know it's not that it doesn't feel great to think about having to confront something that is scary and stressful and painful and feel so out of our control. But it is so important that we do that too, because this is where we really do that work.

This is where we start making the connections with ourselves and our intuition. This is where we start learning how to trust ourselves again. This is how we start learning who we really are. This is how we start learning what we want in life. This is where we start really looking at big picture. What are the costs and benefits of me having the relationship I have now with my parents? What are the costs and benefits of me continuing on this cycle?

And the reason why we can only do this work when there's not a crisis is because in a crisis, you are in fight flighter freeze mode. There's something going on that demands your attention in the moment. And your alerts are up, your senses are spiked, you are hyper-vigilant, you're just trying to survive. That's the way we're built as humans.

And in order to do this deeper work, this self-actualization work, this personal growth work, this work around our own individuation, separating ourselves from this person that we were told we were, and really coming into who we actually are. The only way for us to do that work is when we feel some level of safety and comfort. All of that has to be done in an environment where you feel safe and validated and like people understand.

And it can't be done in an environment where you're being gaslit or shamed or scapegoated. It is so complicated healing from this type of relationship because there are those layers there. There is the crisis that is inevitably going to happen that hopefully will push you into getting support. There is the deeper work that needs to be done there, the self-reflection, the self-growth. There are so many aspects of healing. It's not something that unfortunately you can just rush through.

It's not something that you can just cross the finish line if you buckle down and go hard. It is a journey and it is a layered journey. But I know we all grew up in a black and white world. You don't have to put your life on hold in order to do that work. You're allowed to grow and figure this stuff out while you're living your life.

You don't have to take a leave of absence from work and focus on your healing journey 24-7 for six months or six years until you reach that finish line because that finish line is not there. Progress is imperfect. As we grow, as we get more life experience, our perspective on progress and growth may change. It is just one of those evolving things. It is really layered.

And I think that so often we really look at healing from a dysfunctional family dynamic in black and white terms. Like I'm either in it or I should be over it. I should be dumb with it. And as someone whose narcissistic parent passed away almost 15 years ago, and who still is on her own healing growth journey and has done almost two decades in personal therapy. It is a journey. It is. It's layered, it is complicated. And we really have to look at it through these were our formative years.

This was supposed to be a relationship with a securely attached adult in our lives. This was supposed to be a foundational relationship that taught us how to live as a human, that taught us how to feel safe, that taught us how to make healthy and good decisions. This person that traumatized us, this person that terrorizes us at times, this was supposed to be our safe person. And we grew up in an environment where that person was oftentimes the most harmful person in our lives.

And that is so complicated and so layered. And so my entire point of this week's podcast is to really push you to take a step back and just look at your healing journey from this perspective of what progress have I made thus far? I know that you are not starting at day one, even if it feels like you are. Even if you're like Tori, this is the first thing I've ever done is listening to this podcast. I've never done anything else.

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It takes so much work and awareness and so many of those moments where your gut tells you, I hate this, I don't want this for myself. All of those things are part of your growth journey. If you've been to therapy, that's part of your growth journey. If you have taken a step back to reevaluate what you want, if you've journaled, if you've talked, if you've reached out for support, if you've taken classes, if you have tried to increase your emotional intelligence, all of these things matter.

All of these things are important. All of these things are a part of your growth journey. And ideally, we continue our growth journey throughout our lives because that's what it is to be a cycle breaker. We're unfortunately the person in our family who, like everyone else, was severely traumatized, but we're the ones that decided this ends with me. Like I'm not doing this. I don't want this for my life. I don't want it for the people that I care about.

I don't want this to impact my friends, my partner, my career. I don't want this anymore.

And so I'm going to do what I need to do to make sure that I'm the healthiest version of myself. That's a lifetime journey, right? And sometimes it's shitty to be the cycle breaker in your family. A lot of the times it's shitty, especially when you're the scapegoat, which so many of us cycle breakers are, myself included. It is really hard and it takes a lot of work.

And so I want to just paint this picture, not to overwhelm you, not to make you think, oh my God, I've got to be in this like intense healing journey every day of my life for the rest of my life. Please don't take that away from this episode. That is not all what I'm saying. What I'm saying is you want to pace yourself. There are moments where you're going to be in crisis and need more intensive support. Of course, definitely access that.

There are moments when you are going to have more emotional capacity to do some deeper reflection and some deeper work. Do that then. There are moments where it's okay to take a mental vacation and say, I just need a breath. I'm going to take a pause from therapy for a couple of months. I'm going to circle back, but I need to just take a break and I just need to live my life. All of those things are healthy. All of those things are important. All of those things are valid.

And those are all things that are part of a real true healing journey. It would be impossible for you to have any life outside of healing if your focus 24-7 was on healing. And so really redefining this idea that there's this very clear beginning, middle, and end to your healing journey. And looking at it more, this is just a part of my story now. Part of my story is I'm learning about the dynamic that I grew up in.

Part of my story is I'm becoming more aware of what that means and how it's impacted me, and becoming more capable of reaching out for help and support. I'm becoming more confident in my ability to really reflect on this and ask myself what I want and what I need separate from what my parents have told me I want and I need. I am really tapping into myself and I am creating the life that I want for myself. And that is that's life. That's us. That's what it is to be a cycle breaker.

I think this is just my definition of a cycle breaker and what actual real

healing looks like. And I want that for you. I want it for all of us because it's so important. It helps everyone, society as a whole, when we all do our healing work. It is helpful when you go to the grocery store and something bad happens, and you know how to regulate your emotions because you went and sought that information. And so the checker at the grocery store doesn't have to be on the receiving end of like passive-aggressive conversations. This helps everyone for us to break the cycle.

It helps us, it helps the people we care about, and it helps a greater community that we interact and live in. And so I always am rooting for you. I know I end so many of my emails with, I'm cheering you on, I'm rooting for you, but it's because I genuinely mean it. I know that it's really hard. I know that it's complicated. I know you did not have a roadmap. That's being a cycle breaker. And that's also why I feel so passionate now about.

Sharing my own perspective, my own experience, my own thoughts regarding what it looks like actually to be healing from growing up in a toxic family dynamic, because I didn't have anyone to look at for that stuff either. And it's complicated. And this has been a journey trying to get here.

And I think that by sharing both clinically what I've learned and observed and personally what I have learned and observed, I am very hopeful that it can make this journey feel a little more accessible and a little less intimidating for you. Because I promise you, I mean it when I say that if I could learn how to do all of these things, if I could learn how to regulate my own emotions, if I could learn how to tolerate tough emotions, I could learn how to address conflict in a healthy way.

And if I could learn how to set and hold my boundaries, anyone out there who wants to do that, who really is willing to put in the effort and energy needed, I am confident you can do it too. It's not magic, it's not rocket science, but it is something that takes effort, energy, and clarity around what works and what doesn't, and why that is that certain things work and certain things don't. So I promise you, all is not lost. It is not hopeless. Keep going, reach out, keep doing the work.

Don't just do the work during crisis, keep going. I know that can feel really tempting and appealing. It is not the same thing as only doing the work during crisis if you're taking a pause from doing the work. Those are two different things, right? One is I'm only gonna confront this when there's a crisis going on. And the other is I'm taking a breath to just get out and live my life. And then I'm gonna circle back with more clarity and ease.

So with that said, have a great rest of your week, you guys, and I'll see you next week. Bye.