Beth Ellen Virlee

fmr family law/crim defense lawyer & inner-city youth mentor | #traumarecovery | #codependencyrecovery | Francophile 🇫🇷 | profile 📸 Tony Stroh circa 1990

[Beth Ellen Virlee @megansocal]

@Elaa_ampe5 That’s not a healthy, functional person I would want to deal with anyway. I try to respond, not react, too. I can say, “I feel angry .. or hurt”without shouting about it (containment).

[Beth Ellen Virlee @megansocal]

Sorry the PD failed you. Not sure what jurisdiction you’re talking about, but there’s legally recognized marital rape & intimate partner rape in many (most) U.S. courts at least. Victims should consider going to the ER after rape — have a rape kit test. I say make the police report. Don’t give up before trying.

[Beth Ellen Virlee @megansocal]

@Patrickwebb Not just the CIA, but other entities/people too

[Beth Ellen Virlee @megansocal]

It depends on who I make myself feel disrespected by, and if I wanted to foster a healthy, intimate relationship with them. Family or close friend? If I don’t become vulnerable and tell them how I feel when they behave a certain way, it becomes a guessing game. I’m not furthering intimacy. Trying to control others is (unhealthy) codependency.

[Beth Ellen Virlee @megansocal]

@jerrymejh @skill_of_life 💯 I can be dysfunctional (toxic) myself if I don’t communicate my feelings when I believe a boundary’s been violated. Humans aren’t perfect. Shutting down and abandoning at every slight isn’t how a functional adult behaves. (Exceptions, of course)

[Beth Ellen Virlee @megansocal]

@quotesdaily100 Great list. Re #15: If I’m healed/recovering, I don’t look for “confirmation” from anyone. I’ll know I’m enough (and remind myself often). That’s all the confirmation I need. Praise from others is great, but it falls empty if I don’t believe it myself.

[Beth Ellen Virlee @megansocal]

@sunnkssdseraph A chronic people-pleaser may not even know who he/she is anymore — what many of his own thoughts, feelings, beliefs, etc really are. So that’s losing parts of his true, authentic self. Loss of self may have started at a very young age

[Beth Ellen Virlee @megansocal]

My understanding is that fierce independence can be a trauma response. An avoidant often didn’t learn growing up how healthy intimacy and *interdependence * with other functional people works.

And “your mood can affect theirs” sounds like possible codependency/boundary issues. Fear of enmeshment/engulfment can also be worked through with practicing boundaries — with self and others. See Pia Mellody writings.

[Headquarters @HQNewsNow]

.@ChefJoseAndres: I am a cook and I know there is no America without immigrants. There is no food at our table without immigrants. There is no farm without immigrants. There are no kitchens without immigrants.

[ALUTHEDON @Mbakaza4L]

Colombia bans 𝗰𝗵𝗶𝗜𝗱 𝗺𝗮𝗿𝗿𝗶𝗮𝗴𝗲𝘀.

MPs celebrated in Parliament after the bill was passed.

[Beth Ellen Virlee @megansocal]

This is excellent. Share with all women and girls

[The Figen @TheFigen_]

This should be taught to all girls.

[Beth Ellen Virlee @megansocal]

For the great majority, yes.

But in conservative circles, people sometimes formally address boys/young men as “master.” For ex., my grandfather used to address my young brother as “master” on envelopes when he sent him letters. That would have been in the mid 1970s. General point taken, though.

[Beth Ellen Virlee @megansocal]

@CultureExploreX Leavitt consistently, and knowingly, lies. She’s sharp, but she’s a propagandist through and through.

It kills me that she (and many other MAGA women) wears a cross pendant. It’s such an evil charade.

[Beth Ellen Virlee @megansocal]

I see codependency here. I suggest a re-frame. Instead of “he gave me …”, how about focusing on your behavior and choices that lead to you experiencing anxiety/depression >> therapy?

That way, he’s not the fall guy, and you can take responsibility.

He may have seemed like your “soulmate” at first, but were you maybe re-enacting childhood abandonment with him?

[Beth Ellen Virlee @megansocal]

@WealthChakraa @Solyricon 💯

[Beth Ellen Virlee @megansocal]

@anishmoonka This is absolutely fascinating. Thank you

[Terry Applegate @CharliesWhiskey]

In the spring of 1955, a 67-year-old grandmother from Ohio told her children she was going for a walk.

She didn’t say how far. She didn’t say why. She simply kissed them goodbye, packed a cloth bag with the barest essentials, and vanished into the Georgia wilderness.

Her name was Emma Rowena Gatewood — and she was about to do something no woman had ever done before.

For three decades, Emma had endured unspeakable violence in her Ohio farmhouse. Beatings that broke her ribs, blackened her eyes, and nearly broke her spirit. She had raised eleven children on that farm. She had finally escaped her husband in 1941, but the invisible scars ran deeper than any wound.

Then one quiet afternoon, she read an article in National Geographic about the Appalachian Trail — more than 2,000 miles of rugged paths stretching from Georgia to Maine. The writer made it sound peaceful. Achievable. Beautiful.

Emma thought: If men can walk it, so can I.

But she knew what would happen if she told anyone. Her children would worry. Friends would call her foolish. A grandmother, alone in the wilderness? Impossible. Dangerous. So she kept her plan silent as a prayer.

She sewed a simple denim bag and filled it with the absolute basics: a blanket, a plastic shower curtain, a first-aid kit, bouillon cubes. No tent. No sleeping bag. No proper hiking boots — just a pair of Keds sneakers and a cotton dress.

On May 3, 1955, she boarded a bus to Georgia and began walking north from Mount Oglethorpe. Alone.

The trail was nothing like the magazine promised. It was merciless. Roots caught her feet. Rocks sliced through her thin shoes. Rain turned the path to mud. Insects swarmed relentlessly. At night, she slept on bare ground in abandoned shelters, sometimes shivering too violently to rest.

She got lost. She fell, twisting her ankle so severely she could barely stand. Sitting on that rock, pain shooting through her leg, she wondered if this was where her journey would end. But after catching her breath, she wrapped her ankle tight and kept moving. Always moving.

Hikers who passed her didn’t know what to make of the small, gray-haired woman in a dress and sneakers, carrying a homemade sack. Some thought she was lost. Others assumed she was crazy. A few offered food or shelter. She thanked them graciously, then continued on.

When strangers asked why she was walking, she’d smile softly and say she wanted to see the country. But anyone who looked into her eyes could see something deeper burning there. This wasn’t recreation. This was reclamation. Every mile was a mile farther from the life that had tried to destroy her. Every step was proof she was still here, still strong, still capable of extraordinary things.

Weeks became months. Her feet bled. Her back ached. The sun burned her skin raw. But she never stopped.

On September 25, 1955, Emma Gatewood stood on the summit of Mount Katahdin in Maine. She had walked 2,168 miles in 146 days. She was the first woman to hike the entire Appalachian Trail alone in a single season.

When word spread, reporters flooded in. Newspapers nationwide ran her story. Overnight, she became “Grandma Gatewood,” a household name. Everyone wanted to know how a 67-year-old woman with no training and minimal gear had accomplished what seasoned hikers failed to do.

Emma smiled and said it wasn’t that complicated. She mentioned the trail needed better maintenance — too many rocks, not enough signs. She spoke as casually as if discussing her garden, not surviving one of America’s most grueling challenges.

But she wasn’t finished. In 1957, she walked the trail again. Then in 1964, at 76 years old, she became the first person ever — man or woman — to complete the Appalachian Trail three times. Each journey with almost nothing. Each journey proving that true strength doesn’t come from equipment or training. It comes from refusing to surrender.

[Power of Positivity @LIVEpositivity]

Heal the root so the tree is stable. 🌱💪

[ً @prinkasusa]

Over 400 women have been arrested since they overturned Roe v Wade... yet not a SINGLE man has been arrested for raping children with Epstein.

It’s never been about protecting children... wake up.