Why Avoiding Your Feelings is Sometimes the Best Choice For Alienated Parents

You are listening to the Beyond the High Road podcast with Shelby Milford, episode number 135. Stay tuned. Welcome to Beyond the High Road, a podcast dedicated to healing your heart and life following the grief of alienation. I'm your host, Shelby Milford, a twice certified life coach specializing in post-traumatic growth. If you're experiencing the effects of alienation and you're ready to heal, then this show is my love letter to you. Stay tuned. Hey guys, what's happening? How's everybody doing today? Today we're going to be talking about avoidance, intentional avoidance, doing it on purpose. Um, actually, the ultimate goal of this episode is to help you to get to and maintain a sense of

balance and peace even in the chaos of alienation. as far as your emotional state goes. So, that's what I want to talk about. I don't want this to be about like healthy, unhealthy, doing it right or wrong, but more just like there are times when I think that choosing to avoid might be your best option. So, let's get into it. Okay. So I know that in the past that I have shared with you about how in my past I used lots of things to avoid and ignore and numb myself from the pain of alienation uh from the pain of abuse before that. Um I did not have the tools to process through. I didn't have the the knowledge the the self-awareness all the things. And so instead I thought that I couldn't

deal with it and so I would just ignore. That was basically my pattern. However, I did have a lot of halfbaked thoughts or ideas about how one person was supposed to deal with traumatic events, pain after loss or after abuse or what have you, you know. Um, and I think that most of those beliefs of course came from my parents, conflicting beliefs like between mom and dad and what was modeled to me. But then of course society were taught so many different ideas about what's right to do after goes down. You're supposed to follow this certain pathway, right? And everybody has a slightly different view of it. They were like rulesish to live by, but they all kind

of contradicted each other. One of the ideas that I had was that if I was feeling an emotion, whatever that emotion was, let's say I was sad. If I was feeling sad, I needed to show sad in the way that I spoke, the way that I walked, my body language, my facial expressions. sad needed to ooze from my pores because emotions and actions were one and the same. I thought if you're feeling a certain way, then you better be showing it. Then I also thought that two conflicting emotions aren't possible to be felt at the same time. Like you can't be happy when you're supposed to be mad or you're supposed to be grieving or the opposite. And if you are, if you show any signs of being happy while

you're grieving or while you're mad, then either you're being disingenuine or two-faced or something's going on. You're being dishonest in some way, right? That was the way that I was taught. I don't know where I picked that one up, but that's it. Probably my mom. And then the other one I was taught, and I know I probably got this from my dad, was that being strong equaled unaffected. Like being strong meant that I needed to not be affected. I was untouched and like stoic basically. That nothing bothered me. I was like a superhuman in a bubble. It's fine. I've got this. Let's just keep moving. Another one, this probably came from my dad too, is emotions. maybe the rest of

the world. Uh, emotions are not convenient and are to be avoided. Actually, now that I'm saying this out loud, that's probably from both. At least my emotions weren't convenient and were to be avoided. The message that I got, I know it probably wasn't intentional for either of my parents, was that my emotions were a problem, presented to be, yeah, inconvenient for my parents who wanted to keep doing what they were doing or not doing what they weren't doing. And then the last one is a person could actually be wrong for feeling a certain emotion. Like if I felt sad, this just happened to me yesterday and this is how this whole topic came up. I was with my dad and we got I won't get

into the all the details, but we got into a discussion and he basically told me that my emotions were wrong and that I was wrong and that my idea was wrong and he wanted to shut it down. He's like, "No, that's not right. you're not feeling right. It's not It doesn't make sense. And I luckily I mean I've done all the work that I have or else I probably would have blown a gasket. But I was fine because I knew I know what I'm who and what I'm working with. You know, it's okay. He just doesn't understand and that's fine, you know, for him. Maybe it's fine for him. I don't know. I don't love it about him, but it is who what it that's where he is. But it did remind me yesterday. Yeah, this is where

I developed this idea that I could be wrong for feeling an emotion that that's why I needed to keep my emotions within me and even within me I would shove them down because obviously I must be wrong for feeling it. So it must be you know it turned into a shame thing an unworthiness thing you know so because for me I could be wrong to feel an emotion and emotions weren't welcome being strong and unaffected was my mode of transportation for most of the time also because my mom and dad both used to always tell me as a kid like oh you're so strong and of course as you know we've talked about confirmation bias whatever we are being told or whatever we already believe, we will create more

evidence to support that because it works with that efficiency model inside of us, right? And so for me, people told me I was strong all the time and I was like, "Oh, I'm strong. I'm strong." So I created more evidence of how I was strong. That worked for me. But in my mind, strong meant I had to be unaffected. I had to numb myself or push away anything that overwhelmed me regarding the things that happened in my life. Well, come alienation, this of course proved to be very difficult because many things we can run from in uh teenage years and young adult, early adult years. But when it comes to our own children, the last thing most of us want to do is run from

them. And so it presented as a problem for me like how do I manage all of this overload of emotion? What do I do with this constant stress response that is just eating me alive, you know? And so for me, I did what was familiar and I numbed it away. I went and drank or I dated or I did all the things to keep my mind off of the impending doom, you know, because back in those days where I'm thinking right now, I still had my daughter most of those times there was just the threat of it coming on and I didn't know how to handle I thought if I thought about court or I thought about what they might do that I would crumble that I wouldn't know how to deal with it. And so instead, I would just go

drink and then of course then it numbed the prefrontal cortex and I was like, "Okay, everything's fine until the next day." I can definitely say for me that pattern clearly didn't work, right? And I've spoken with you guys about this probably ad nauseium about how my pattern was to go out and and ignore and deny and dance on bar tops. And that created a sense of escape for me for a very short period of time. And then of course it magnified everything and compounded all of the issues. So it was really a shitty way to deal with my problems. That kind of avoidance did not work for me. But I will say that there is uh a kind of avoidance that I think can be if you want to make it that super

healthy. There's something called the dual process model of bereavement of grief. Um, I kind of allude to it in the episode. I think I did a 50/50 episode giving equal airtime to your emotions, but I want to spell it out for you here today. Sometimes we do this naturally when it comes to our grief and don't even realize that this is what we're doing. But knowing now that there is a framework that you can follow and like that what you're already doing uh there's a method to the madness. It supports you. Anything that's going to support the actions that you're already taking or the actions that you want to take, knowing that there's a framework there already put in place for you can

can create a lot of safety and security for the way that you're moving through your grief. the grief of losing out on any amount of time with your kiddos that you expected to have with them. So the dual process model suggests well let me go back. the first ever I guess not maybe not first ever but the one that I remember model that people followed when it came to grief like the traditional sense of the word grief like if your partner or somebody in your family died was the uh Ross Susan Glubler Ross maybe she came up with the five stages of grief model that she developed anecdotally while working in a hospital with those who were dying. They were themselves

coming to terms with the fact that their lives would be ending. They were terminally ill patients. And so she came up with this five stages of grief model. So she had it was denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. And people for a long time I can remember like watching Oprah in my mom's sitting room back in the day like in ninth grade and her having maybe she had Kubler Ross on I'm not sure but them talking about the five stages of grief and it the way that it was marketed was that you go through these five stages and then you're done with grief and that's the way it is for everybody. Then people started realizing that they got to the acceptance part and they were

still like waiting like,"Well, what's next? Because I'm not through this grief. Grief keeps coming up for me. The sadness keeps coming up and what does this mean for me?" And the depression and the denial and the anger and all the things. It was coming more cyclical and people didn't understand. And then they started thinking they weren't healing in the way that this five stages outlines, right? And so it was just not as effective of a tool as originally thought. Now it does serve a purpose and it really normalized what grief is for a lot of people especially death grief around death right so it was a really useful model it's just not a comprehensive and fully helpful model so

the dual process model was developed by strobe and let me look it up shut s ch hut t their model proposes that grief is a dynamic process of oscillating between the lossoriented coping and restoration oriented coping. This means that individuals experiencing grief will move back and forth between confronting the loss and engaging in activities to rebuild their lives knowing that we're going through this ongoing ambiguous and also complicated sort of grief that we do along with the PTSD complex PTSD. It can feel not sustainable for so many of us, especially in the early days because the pain and the trauma response like it's proven that you're not our bodies cannot maintain staying in fight or

flight for too long of a period of time because our body would go into overload. So then it shifts into freeze. But that also proves to cause long-term health problems and what have you. Due to the intense emotions that are underneath the grief umbrella, it can feel not sustainable. It's like, I I can't take this anymore. I can't manage with all of these emotions. Too overwhelming for one person to take on and to feel all the time. Our bodies are not meant to just only process emotion, especially complex and deep heavy emotion like the ongoing time that we experience as alienated parents, right? knowing that our children are still alive and not being able to access them. It is a pain as you

guys know like no other. Our bodies are not meant to stay in that grief and grief only. The reason I love the intentional oscillation is because it gives you the 50/50. You're not only saying the lossoriented grief focused tasks where you allow the in more intense emotions to come into your life. That is needed. It's healthy, right? To be able to acknowledge and allow your emotions to come in. Also, what's needed is the distraction to start rebuilding to acknowledge the new roles that you might be taking on or want to take on, secretly want to take on. or maybe you're not there yet, but inching your way out to discovering who you are, who you might want to be. Those things are

equally important for your mental health, your emotional health, your physical health, right? The problem is when we get stuck in either one of these, which is when I will find parents who are feeling stuck in their life, like they feel like my life is meaningless or maybe they have no emotion, right? They've gotten to the point where nothing bothers them and they just feel like they're on lithium at all times when they're not. What I like about this model is it's switches in and out between the emotional processing and then the practical adaptation, which is exactly what our bodies need just to switch gears. And if you're ADHD, this is like music to your

ears, right? to not have to focus solely on your healing in a rigid super structured manner. You know, where the traditional models or like the old way of thinking is much less flexible, the dual process model is highly individualized, right? You are the boss of your walk through grief. There are no wrong moves. Another reason I love this model so much is because it takes the judgment and the pressure away from how you do your healing. Where I know for me, the way that I grew up, I thought that if somebody faced a challenge, whether it was like grief of some sort or a breakup or a substance abuse thing or whatever it was, denial and avoidance was considered like not good,

maladaptive. Which is why, by the way, speaking of this, why I never ever agreed with any of the 12step programs as far as like um like AA and NA and whatever is because when people would relapse, it was a bad thing. They were going down the dark path. And that actually can really really harm the person that's coming back and keep them from healing their lives because they think, "No, I have to start all over again." And what have you. Well, the same sort of thing with grief. If you feel like there's a process and you've gotten behind, it's going to feel that much more discouraging to get back on the path and back on the saddle again. You know what I'm saying? So, um I just

think that the traditional models did not offer the most compassionate way to look at your healing. Whereas this dual process model allows for and in fact encourages you to go through all of that to avoid to deny to in fact to avoid and deny is a healthy part of your grief. It takes all of your emotions and all of your thoughts everything that occurring for you as this is part of it. The dual process model is about taking necessary breaks from the intense emotions that you're experiencing as a result of being alienated from your children. We are already dealing with so much. You know, we have this ambiguous loss, this grief that we're feeling as a direct result of

not having access to our children in the way that we thought we would. Right? Many of us, if not all of us, are experiencing some degree of disenfranchised grief, right? This unsupported grief that we're holding for ourselves. And when we're not feeling supported, not only from our family, like from our children and from our spouse, the people that we thought would be closest to us, but now also maybe extended family. And then we're lacking the support like the rituals that other people have when they lose a loved one to either death or divorce or what have you. It's important to not carry the weight of the world on our shoulders, right? As we do when we're sitting in

grief. And so the reason the dual process model works is because it offers this compassionate and practical framework for you where we're not just sitting in those intense heavy emotions by ourselves. We can move from the emotions of loss, feeling the grief, the healthy acknowledgement of what's really going on for you, and then intentionally shifting over to restorative or actually just maintaining yourself and getting the bills paid and what have you. Okay, so your lossoriented tasks would be like your grief work and actively experiencing and expressing the pain, right? your sadness, your yearning for your kiddo, your anger, and all the other emotions that are associated with

the interruption of your memory making with your kiddo. The confrontation of emotions, acknowledging and working through the intense feelings such as shock, disbelief, guilt, regret, right? A lot of the the friction kind of emotions when we're in the lost oriented, we'll ruminate. And I know you guys can relate to this. We'll ruminate and look back and like should a could a would a counterfactual thinking about how we handled ourselves or how we could have done better or you know nipped it in the bud cut it off ahead of time like if I would have known I should have done this I should should have seen this you know that way that is a very natural part of grief I mean I have found this

to be true in all kinds of grief like with loss of other family members to death and what have you. That counterfactual thinking and wanting to go back to that reality is one of the most common denominators in my experience anyway. When we are in the rumination and living in the past, it's actually an avoidance behavior. But it is avoidance of the acceptance of the loss of your loss or of the interruption if you're still you know in going through the court case. But when we're in now and I know I talk about this a lot like you don't want to buffer away your feelings or distract yourself to the point where you're holding yourself back. However, too, there's a natural

balance when you are aware of, "Okay, I'm ruminating here and I'm wishing things would go back to how they were. I'm wishing that I would have known better." When you state it, like if you're the watcher of yourself, you have much more control over it as opposed to you being at the effect of it and just living in the past. There's one thing about you knowing that you're watching yourself living in the past and like, "Oh, this is what I'm doing. This is a natural part of grief. And then there's the part that the kind that can hold you back when you're doing it to run from the reality altogether. So naturally, of course, the next one that I have here on my notes is the acceptance of reality.

Just coming to terms with the fact that things have gone down the way they have thus far. Doesn't mean that that's going to continue, but the events that have taken place have happened. Right now, what are we working with? Also part of your lossoriented tasks. reminiscing and remembering, memorializing even like you're the memories. I've told you for a long time that I couldn't have photos up or reminders of my daughter for a while. It was just too much and too hard. That was me avoiding that and that's okay. And today I can mo for most things on most days anyway. I'm still going evolving for me and it isn't resolved if you will. So, I'm still going to have my good days and my bad

days, and that is okay. And that's what I do love about this model is is that it makes room for all of it. There are no phases. There are no steps. There is no order. The only order is you being aware and intentionally shifting yourself, oscillating from lossoriented to restoration oriented. Okay. So reminiscing and remembering, memorializing, included with that is talking about your kiddos. Some parents don't want to talk about their kids. They need to let that go for a little while and shut that down. It's okay that you do that. Give yourself the permission and the opportunity to do that. It's a natural part of it. For me, for a long time, my daughter's bedroom,

I did not go in there. I shut the door and I couldn't go in there. It was way too hard for me. Some parents will keep their room exactly how it is and they go and sit in there. That's a lossoriented task where they want to go sit on their bed or in their room somewhere and do the ritual of nighttime like look at the books that they used to read them and just have quiet time. That to them is therapeutic. For me, this one was a a no-go. In fact, it brought me straight into stress response and went into a shame cycle when I did it. I also back then when I still had access to her room, I didn't um have the tools that I have today. You know, I didn't understand how to process through the

emotion. Everybody is different. But just know that too, like being able to face those reminders, places, people, things, triggers can be very therapeutic. It's exposure therapy. So your restoration oriented tasks are managing your practical life changes, building new identity, your new identity or evolving your new identity and the roles that you play. Being open to evolving, engaging in new activities and new relationships, just just trying new things out, setting new goals, finding new meaning, and setting new expectations for your habit brain. being willing to experience discomfort, the discomfort of trying new things, attending to your self-care and

to your well-being. All of these for me I was very resistant to in the beginning. But when you take it little by little, one restorationoriented task maybe for just 5 minutes a day and then you shift over back over into lossoriented. I was wired to go to the lossoriented tasks. going to the restoration was a difficult thing for me. I had a hard time taking care of myself, learning to adapt and move forward in life. This was a no-go for me for years. And so, I get it if you're still there or sometimes that's where you you shy away from. Just know just keep giving yourself just 5 minutes a day, 10 minutes a day, 20 minutes, you know, little bits here and there. just

start drawing yourself away from the lossoriented tasks and shifting yourself into the restoration just a little bit at a time exposure therapy. Okay? And also the same is true for the opposite. If you're more into the restorationoriented tasks where you are wanting to produce and make money or clean or whatever it is for you, that's also fine. Just start directing yourself towards 5 minutes, 15 minutes a day of lossoriented tasks if you haven't done them yet. If you haven't done the processing yet, that's all this is. It's basically just balance. Just it's intentional switching between these two tasks, right? All of regular life is somewhere in between. But really when it

comes to what we've experienced, I think that regular life and restoration kind of go hand in hand because at least for me, I was not living regular life. I wasn't working. I wasn't showering. I wasn't going out in society at all. So those tasks when I did do them became restoration for me too. It was my rebuilding, you know. So there's the lossoriented tasks really you know the the feeling the focusing on the feeling and the acknowledgement of the emotions that you have around grief intentionally giving that space and time for you and then allowing yourself to then shift over into the restoration and the rest of life back and forth this way too. So many of parents that I talk to

are so worried that if they allow themselves to feel, then boom, that's it. Drive off a cliff. They're going to be in their emotions for years and years. The floodgates will open and that'll be it. But just as I described in the 50/50, like giving yourself equal air time. If you're thinking only bad thoughts and the worst case scenario, you're stuck in worry, then also give yourself an equal amount of time to be in the best case scenario. and how things could go amazingly for you, how they're already going perfectly for you. It's the same thing here. We're just shifting back and forth between them. No choice that you make is the wrong choice. It's the choice that you make

for you and it's how it was supposed to go, you know. But if you're noticing that you being primarily in the loss oriented or the restoration oriented, there's no variety for you. If you notice that it's holding you back, that's when it might be good to to then start developing some parameter. It's just a very mindful way to go about your healing. And it also gives you like I kind of alluded to or said in the beginning is it it helps you to to know that you're on the right track. Like I can spend time in this loss oriented. I know I know I have a plan. I know that I like a lot of times we'll make ourselves feel guilty for feeling the grief like this is a Wednesday. I'm supposed to be

getting stuff done. This happens so often. We'll be like, I don't have the time to be feeling this grief right now. I have things to do. I have bills to pay and I'm stuck feeling this. It's all okay, but just give yourself the parameters. You know what? It's okay that you're feeling this because if you now are causing yourself to feel guilty for feeling the loss, that's going to add like only complicate your feelings of grief in the moment. It's self-inflicted suffering that you're adding on top of the grief that you're already feeling and it wastes your time. So instead, you say, "Oh, okay. I did I today I focused a lot on my loss and now tomorrow I'm going to focus on the

restoration." instead of creating this guilt and shame around what you're already feeling because it's natural. So anyway, just recognizing and validating both sets of tasks can help to foster your own resilience and adaptation over time and help you to um feel reinforce that you're on the right track, that things are going beautifully and feel help you to feel in charge of your recovery or of your walk, your journey. Okay? So avoiding isn't always a bad thing. In fact, sometimes it's a healthy thing. It's like I've right now I've had I'm on overload and I'm going to intentionally set this down, this grief, this anger, this whatever, and I'm going to go focus over here. I'm

going to intentionally distract myself. Like I said, where it becomes a problem is if you're only in the distraction or if you're only in the the grief. It's too much for you to handle. Only just grief. Okay? So yes, we are working from a deficit if you are considering the traditional way that people deal with grief. Usually there's others that are there to support them and we don't always have that. So that's why it's so important for you to be that support group for yourself. Having all the frameworks and taking all of the information that you get and using it for you and not against you is definitely going to help you to feel more supported even if you are your

support team. No matter what you do, you are doing beautifully. So that's all I have for you. Have a lovely day. Take care. Thanks so much for listening today. If you like what you're hearing and you'd like to hear more, please make sure to click subscribe wherever you're listening or watching. Also, for byte-size clips and tips, be sure to find me on Tik Tok or Instagram. See you next week.