Withdrawals & Mood swings while rebooting

Try just to swalow it and go through it. If you have bad mood from reboot, it will go away in time.
You can´t be just harsh on your family, that isn´t right.

 

People will be people! Just as fire burns, which means we can't get cross with it for burning, we have to deal with people being people.

But the question, as you so correctly asked, is, "How?"

Here's how I do it. I don't know if this will work for you, but you can certainly try.

• When I get into a poor mood, I immediately remind me that this is my mood, not someone else's. So, I make a mental note not to take it out on someone else.
• When someone else annoys me, I remind me that, actually, they're not annoying me. Instead, I'm reacting in an annoyed way to them. After all, when I'm in a good mood, the same behaviour doesn't annoy me, so it's me, not them.
• When I feel in a bad mood with someone (it happens often), having reminded me that it's me, not them, I breathe. I cannot say enough how important this is. My ex-wife (a gaslighter) used to cause fights and drama. When I learned to breathe, I just stopped reacting, and she didn't know how to deal with it. I'll come back to breathing in a moment.

If your friend isn't leaving you alone, it's because she feels something wrong. She's probably looking for attention and validation. The other thing is that some people need to talk to process their problems, and cannot understand people (like you) who need time by themselves to process their problems. The fact that she keeps coming to you is in fact a compliment!

So, in your shoes, I would…

• Remind me that my mood is me, not her (as I already said)
• Breathe
• Sit and listen to her, without interruption, and without giving advice (unless she explicitly asks for it). (I won't explain why about the advice; but it's important.) Just listen and validate her feelings, no matter how crazy those feelings might seem to you.

If you do this, she will feel validated, and only then will she be able to listen to you when you say, "It's been lovely chatting with you. Now, sorry, I'm feeling really awful because of my addiction, so please could I have some time alone to process my thoughts?"

Back to breathing. Practice this in front of a mirror.

• Breathe with your stomach, not with your chest. This is called "diaphragmatic breathing" and it's how humans (and other mammals) naturally breathe, but because of stress we learn to breathe from our chest instead. Some people understand this easily, especially if you've learned singing, acting, martial arts, and certain other skills.
• Breathe out to empty your lungs. When you are as empty as you can get, try to expel more air by pushing in your stomach.
• Now, breathe in by pushing out your stomach. Pretend (imagine) that your stomach is in fact a balloon, so when you breathe in, it grows larger, and when you breathe out, it shrinks (pulls in).
• Your shoulders should not move up and down, even for a deep breath. They should remain relaxed and steady.
• Your chest should not expand and contract, unless you take a really deep breath, in which case your chest will expand only at the end to take in that last extra bit of air.

Practice this breathing always, whenever you remember. Breathing like this has effects on all areas of your life, and can calm you down, sometimes completely, when you feel stressed. (Wouldn't that help with your addiction?)

(BTW, you don't need to put all of your text in bold. It's a bit distracting and makes it more difficult to read when you don't have great eyesight like me.)

Good luck.

(Edited for clarification 2019/03/01)

 

Yes Yes Yes on all you say.

Your instructions on how to breath are fantastic. Just did it. I had forgotten how important it is to focus on stomach vs vs chest. Updating my general how-to sheet now with that .