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We do tend to ruminate (usually over the bad stuff), remembering & replaying every tiny detail. This is because one of the symptoms of ADHD is the inability to filter out just the important stuff, and ignore all the tiny details. This inability is also why we find driving to be so difficult. So much information, coming at us so fast!
We can get so caught up in ruminating over the past, feeling the slings & arrows as keenly as when they were first shot at us… And what good does it do us?
On the afternoon of New Year’s Eve, 1958, my mom’s fiance phoned her and said, he was sorry, but he was feeling really sick, so he’d have to cancel their date to go to a party. A few days later, she found out that he’d lied to her, and gone to that party with another girl. She felt so crushed and betrayed and furious, that she dumped him immediately. A few years later, she met and married my dad.
But, every New Year’s Eve, she ruminates over that *one* New Year’s Eve, and how her jerk of a fiance stood her up and lied to her. She never wants to go out, or do anything that might be fun, or might make her feel good, or might celebrate the occasion. No, she just wants to replay every cruel, painful detail of what happened to her, FIFTY-FOUR YEARS AGO. The jerk probably completely forgot about it, decades ago. Heck, he might even be dead by now. But, every New Year’s Eve, my mom lets him hurt her, all over again. It’s like those rituals that people who cut themselves follow…
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