Hey Alison! Actually, it was very therapuetic (spelling?) for me to type all that out. I even read it the next day and felt better getting it out. It certainly doesn't portray everything that I felt when I was a child, but it helped to get it out all the same. There were some good times but that usually revolved around my dad. He was the glue that kept us together. Still is I think. I'm feeling kind of anxious because we're going over to their house tonight for a bar-b-q. Here I am an adult and out of that mess and I still get anxious being around her. I do think it's important for your kids to know that life isn't perfect and that sometimes you aren't 100% or even 50% on top of things. I think that being real is very important, otherwise they grow up and get out into the real world with very unrealistic ideas about the world and then they wind up not being able to handle anything because.... life is tough. Plain and simple. BUT I seriously believe that as long as you give them tons and tons of love and reassurance that whatever you're going through is not their fault and that it will be ok, it should be easier for them. Kids need to know that there are hard times but it's not the end of the world. Throw in as many good times as you possibly can. Even just sitting with them and coloring and talking about nothing or digging in the dirt together is a good time. It doesn't have to be going to the movies or taking vacations. Any kind of parent / child bonding is more important than you can imagine. They grow up so fast - Don't miss it. I definitely think you can have enough good times to help through the rough times. Yes, I do feel better as times goes by. I still have hard days - like today. But, since working on the Panic Program offered here, it's not as often and when I do have bad days, they're not as bad as they used to be. My boys are exactly 18 months apart. I'm really glad they were born so close though because ever since my second was born, they've been really good friends. They have their moments - but they will always have that bond. Maybe I just got lucky. They are seriously fabulous kids and I am so honored to be their mom! It's a tough job, you never know if you're doing right by them. I wouldn't trade it fo

vickers4, thanks for sharing. I know what it's like to rehash painful memories from your past. It hurts but at the same time feels freeing. I don't know if you feel the same but when you get it out it seems like it's out in the light, and not a dark secret. And when read it or hear yourself, I think "Yep, that's happened, there's no secrets or shame and I'm stronger for have going through that". That's what goes through my mind anyways. It hurts when your mom/dad doesn€™t act how you think they should. It€™s no fun when you have to be the parent for your own parent. There€™s definite feeling of loss when mother isn€™t there for you or emotionally stable. My mom drinks too much at times, can be very emotionally demanding and is scared to death of everything in the entire world and thinks I should be too. When you have a parent like this you don€™t have normal discussions. I don€™t discuss anything concerning my health, the kids health, West Nile, floods, whatever the issues in the news are. I know how you feel wanting to be a different mom. Not having a parent you can talk to is a horrible thing and I never want to be that for my kids. When you have children growing up and anxiety that you want to stop having it feels like this rush against time. Can I imprint enough good times on them to make up for the not so good ones. My kids are still young and I keep my episodes as low key as I can. My episodes usually are: thinking i have some horrible disease, researching it on the internet, being very emotional and on edge till I get to the doctor, going to the doctor, then I get over it eventually. Do you find yourself getting better as time goes by? Two boys a year apart!- sound very busy!

Hey Alison - sorry it took me so long to answer your questions. Busy, busy, busy.... I have two boys. One is 14 and the other will be 13 next week. It will be official. I will no longer have 'little guys' but will have teenagers. It's so sad that time flies so fast! :( Anyways, to answer your question.... My mom was and still is a panicky person. Everything was major! Everything was a big deal! Whenever you went to her with a problem, she would always get this look of horror in her face, so we learned not to go to her with problems. If she wasn't giving us that response, it was the response of don't bother me. We always had to watch what we said to her because she took EVERYTHING personal and as a personal insult and would fly off the handle and go into a rage. Usually ending up with her beating the **** out of one of my sisters and then her leaving the house until my dad would make one of us go find her. She would usually be hiding somewhere in the yard. Very immature. This was daily on different levels of intensity. But, it was always in the air. She did not handle anything well. So, we were always walking on eggshells around her never knowing what would set her off. She was always throwing things, breaking things (including windows)and yelling about how everything is always wrong and the world was against her, etc... She still has this problem although she's taking meds for it now. Not as bad, but it's still there. We learned not to trust or depend on her as kids and so none of us really do even today. I've been trying to get her to get on this website so she can help herself and find some peace but she is so deep in the comfort zone that she has known for so long, that she lies to herself and tells me, "oh, I'm fine, I have the meds and that's cured me" - while she's white knuckling the steering wheel, leaning forward with her shoulders up to her ears. A couple years ago my family was helping me move and someone did something and my mom took it completely personal and ran to the van and plugged her ears and started crying and humming really loud so she couldn't hear anyone talking to her. Just like a two year old picking a tantrum would do. I've been married for 14 years and haven't seen her this far into it for a long time a

Thanks for your encouraging words. As a very new member to this board, I still can't believe there are a whole lot of people like me. I have felt so very alone till now. My husband comes from a great family and has his head on perfectly straight. I couldn't even begin to explain the thoughts in my head to him. Thanks for your feedback! Take care.

I too can relate. My mother was extremely uptight and anxious, and peppered me with warnings and horror stories about death and disfigurement. I think this has been passed down for many generations, because my grandmother who was generally a nice lady, routinely made me cry because I wasn't good enough or careful enough at specific tasks as a child. While I don't believe that I was sexually abused, my mother led me to believe I was for many years, because she kept asking me questions like "did he ever touch you, are you sure he never touched you" after she left my father, and made comments like "I always knew there was something wrong the way he would walk around in his underwear when you were little" etc. As a child and young adult, I struggled with and fought these thoughts, alternating between thinking my father molested me and despising my mother for making me think it. I don't want to compare this to your experiences of abuse, I just thought I could relate on a certain level. I have a good idea of the things we should avoid telling or burdening our kids with, as I too think often of how I must be sure not to pass this on to my kids the way my mom did to me. I've never really told anyone all the things my mother used to say to me, because I think they are embarrasing. But, here goes: don't strain on the toilet because you're cousin so-and-so died instantly from a blod clot in his brain when he did that; don't inhale a pea because it will sprout into your brain; don't sit on boy's laps because you will give them an erection (ok, this can happen, but hardly an appropriate thing to say to a teenaged girl!); if you don't dry between your toes after your bath you will grow fungus and mushrooms between them; etc etc etc. Those are the extreme examples - it's not hard for me to avoid saying those kinds of things. But I do have to avoid the more subtle comments and actions - hovering is a bad one - making sure they don't spill, don't fall, don't make a mess (I remind myself daily to let my 2 year old BE a 2 year old, messes and all) but sometimes I slip. I also am way too hard on my 12 year old step-son. He is so different from me. To me he is careless - to him he is carefree. And shouldn't he be? I was raised with so many rules of conduct and order,

I totally understand about the allergy as I have fatal food allergies. There is a book on amazon called Helping Your Anxious Child

I think that those of us with anxiety problems risk passing it on to our children. I had a great mom. Of course, she wasn't perfect but I am very grateful to have her. I truly think that she helped me with my anxieties as best she could. She's always been very supportive though she herself has trouble understanding anxiety. She is a very together person who doesn't worry about much. (She was very ill with a viral type infection a few weeks ago. She was put on some medication that gave her a panic attack. She told me how much more she understands now.) The funny thing is that 3 of her 4 daughters have anxiety problems (wait, actually 2 of us deal with anxiety. One of my sisters deals more with depression with a little anxiety thrown in there.) Anyway, my son shows signs of anxiety. Since I have problems, you would think I would be able to help him but sometimes I'm not sure what to do to help him. I do try to be careful of not being overprotective or stressing out about every little thing. My daughter has food allergies and I have to be careful not to overreact to things. The hard part is she has more dr's appts. Not my strength. When she has to have blood drawn, my hubby has to take her. I try to do it in a way that doesn't show my son my fear. (I do not do needles well.) Anyway, I think I'm rambling. I do agree that we as parents can effect our children with their anxieties. Although we may not be able to prevent our children from developing anxieties, we can hopefully help them learn to cope with them at an earlier age then we did. Enough rambling from me.

thanks for your response. How old are your children? I have a 7 and 4 year old. There seems to be a differnent set of panic problems for every stage of their life. From running to the doctor for everything when they are babies to trying to teach them about the world when they are older without freaking them out! If you don't mind me asking what sort of things did your mom do in terms of panicky thoughts and guilt trips? I constantly fear that I am this person to my children. There's a line between protecting them and panicing them. And I myself get confused. Again thank you for your response. I've never known anyone in my life that could understand both the complex worlds of abuse and anxiety.

Wow - I so relate!! I too was sexually abused as a child by a neighborhood friend. I too had a panic stricken mother. She used anger and physical outrage as her outlet. She didn't physically abuse me but she did a couple of my sisters. But.... it wasn't just the physical, it was also the verbal. Her panicky thoughts and her guilt trips really triggered a lot of panic for me while growing up and again after I had children. I do not accept child molestation in any way, shape or form!!! But, I have forgiven this guy for what he did to me for years. I am having a very hard time forgiving my mother for what she did to us as children. She is on medication now and is trying to be better. I understand why she did the things she did and I know that I have to use that experience as a valuable lesson in how I raise my kids because I desperately want to break the chain with me and not let it go down to them, but I am still struggling with getting over the things my sisters and I went through as children. She was abused as a child verbally, physically and sexually as well. So, I do understand why she is the way she is. I know from personal experience that this gets passed on to your kids - not by chemicals, but by the way they learn from us. It is my purpose in life to make sure my kids don't grow up with this. I hope and pray that all you parents out there are doing the same. I know it's hard but they are worth it!

As a child who was sexually abused by a neighbour and as someone who had a mother that was very anxious and obssessed over every scratch, frostbite, and cut. The more damaging events to me were my mother. Three years of couselling, some crying, and prayer got me through and healed me of the sexual abuse, well actually rape to be exact. This effort pales in comparison to the work I've done to untwist every twisted thought about disease and death. I work hard undoing all the years of programming of my brain from my anxious mother. So my advice to you parents- watch yourself very carefully around your children. Do not sentence them to your sentence, protect them from yourself. Know that even though you love them and would die for them that the odd light you portray events to them adds one building block after another to a wall of anixety and panic that you know for yourselves is very hard to break down. I myself have 2 children and struggle with this constantly- ie. "Do I take them to the doctor to have their mole checked one more time or just leave it?" Please note I am by knows means downgrading sexual abuse- I first hand know of the hell and real nightmares. I just wanted to share this with everyone from my perspective in terms of how damaging a anxiety ridden parent is (I have one and been one). Don't ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, give up!