Tag: #theemotionalalchemist

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No Matter What

No Matter What by Calum Scott

This song was in my head this morning. Seemingly out of no where I kept singing it. So I decided to watch the video. So many tears. This kid was me on the playground. But instead of a parent guiding me I grew up amidst psychological warfare that I tried to fix for everyone. I tried to hold all their pain and mine. I was comforting until I could no longer take that burden anymore and cut the cords and attached to something else.

A husband. I needed a father not a husband. But I didn’t know that and perhaps he didn’t either. Young and naive we embarked on a journey. Seven Saint Bernard puppies and two adults in the back of a Ryder truck with all our belongings for Moses Lake Washington.

I was so dissociated I hardly remember myself in that time. Impulsive, brazen, curious, warm without any good reason to be. I remember that I just acted, I didn’t feel in the moment. I felt later when I could think about things. I created a sense of busy that had me never think about all the pain I was in.

I set to making a life. I looked at others and tried to piece together what mine should look like. I wanted the family pictures on the wall and that feeling of security that never existed inside or outside of me. That’s what I was searching for and love seemed the only way to create that.

So I kept trying for love, which kept leading me to shame. How can you be proud when you’re getting a divorce and hurting your children? I never got to be proud. I got more shame.

I put on a strong front to try and protect myself, but inside was an ocean of shame.

Unlike Calum I never got the I love you no matter what moments. By the time I came out it was another situation to internalize negativity about myself. Divorce the one thing I set out not to do. And hurting someone I loved, everything I stood against. And hurting my kids unthinkable. From that moment on I became cast in my own story as a bad mother, and something awful.

Therapists, friends, loved ones would try to ease this burden at times, but I shackled myself under my own burdens. Punishment.

I’ll never forget when I finally told him. I had tried so many indirect ways to try and keep my security, but finally I couldn’t keep it under wraps anymore. I told his family too. I wanted them to still love me no matter what. And I think they tried really hard which would be against the typical family system laws of protection. I didn’t love me, so I pushed them away in shame.

No matter what is never a condition I had or created for myself. I am working on that now for myself and my kids. Unconditional love from the inside not seeking from the outside.

I didn’t realize until now how much shame I have harbored underneath this tough exuberant exterior for being gay. Because mine was intermingled with hurting people when I was supposed to be a responsible married adult.

I was a scared child. I am more often than I would care to be a scared child. It feels embarrassing and terrifying to be aware of that, and yet that’s the only thing that can help me create something different.

All my relationships after were always going to fail, because I had no relationship to and with myself. None. I rejected her.

And this latest period of my life forced me to learn to have a relationship with myself so I could determine my boundaries from a place of love and protection, not merely a state of emergent need.

Dear Christina,

I vow to love you from this moment forward no matter what. Only to allow good actions into our lives. To have your back and always pick you first for my team, even when you make mistakes. I will love you fiercely. The no matter what parent you didn’t have.

Always,

C

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I Celebrate Myself…..

Sophie at approximately 6 months old. She’s heavy now. I didn’t move because the cuddles were too sweet. Why can’t human love be as easy as dog love?

The thing about love and I, is that I tried to make it and mold it and choose it the rest of the way I did my life. With intention and actions, but done by me.

I didn’t allow it to unfold organically ever. And if you had seen the beginning of my life you’d understand. Natural and organic for me, didn’t turn out so well.

I applied all the things I knew how to do to survive to love as well. I never trusted it. I didn’t have any faith. Maybe that’s what this process has become about.

Actually let me craft this better. I didn’t ever wait and allow someone…

Ok I see. I’m always trying to make myself responsible. I always was responsible. I had to be. I’ve never not been. And in this time now I’m responsible for and to me. It feels surprisingly good.

To know that I’ve put down my exhausting tasks and going to replace that with faith. That love will show up a fully formed thing and it will be safe and interested in me for nothing other than who I am. When it comes that will be what it looks like. Not for material or status gain, or for a perceived lack of other options. Scarcity.

For the pure enjoyment of the occasion. I celebrate myself. Stop this day and night with me….

Song of Myself Walt Whitman

The sun isn’t up yet on a Sunday. There are so many possibilities in this day. So many hours that can be filled by simply just being and noticing. One breath in and one breath out.

I’m noticing my kids a lot lately. How long had I been holding my breath waiting for something terrible to happen like that would change the level of pain felt if it did.

How long has life been a blur of longing and trying. What have I looked like to them? They just missed me while I was figuring myself out. Wanting more of me, not less, even as they pushed me away.

They are the only ones allowed to send me confusing messages about love.

They are trying to figure out their paths and separate from me some but still feel my warmth on them as they walk about the world. I’ve been lost to me and them, and it has cost a lot.

I have a migraine brewing, must be the pressure of the impending snow, or it’s Crohns Disease. My stomach is red hot coals this morning. 🙁 This is why I don’t drink. See still trying to blame myself, when it’s always been the stress.

Victoria came in and kissed my head last night while I was sleeping and my heart melted. We are figuring it out. It brings tears to my eyes just thinking about it, that single act of loving.

They are more able to be loving and open and warm than I ever was. It always made me feel defective when it came to them. The way I sometimes freeze up when emotions are too overwhelming. It’s only when I’m caught in shame.

When I don’t think I’ll be safe or good enough. I was never that. Life was that for me. And that made me start to cry. The words bring the emotions, and the emotions create the will to write the words.

This won’t help with the headache and the nausea.

My children are magnificent. They keep trying to better themselves. All three of them. I just hope their pursuit with that will not be as rabid and desperate as mine. That it can be relaxing and filled with peace. I guess that is my next task to model for them. It has felt impossible. RE-wiring. A break and rebuild.

My bed is so comfortable and my new bedroom color is lovely. It’s been a slow transformation. Who would have thought, and I am finally able to recognize while I wasn’t even looking….

I’ve been slowly transforming too.

That is a warm thought. I never thought I could find comfort outside the safety of another human until I was left so unsafe as an adult. A situation I never thought I would put myself in.

Love is always a risk worth taking. I have no regrets. Life is not meant to be lived fearfully and I stand behind my philosophy. I needed to be forced into recognizing myself as I am and not as I had crafted myself to be.

As it turns out this is even better than my representative. Read Love Warrior. We all have our path.

That was exhausting.

This is peace.

The only thing I’ll allow the rest of my life. Allowing. And I’ll leave creating for writing and not for love until love shows up for me without me doing anything. Natural.

Let the problem wear itself out. Rather than wearing myself out. Who knew that was an option.

Ok my coffee is beckoning and I’m going to need to take a migraine pill. My morning pages and my novel await.

Perhaps my unfolding as a poet and writer will happen right here… in live format. I mean it already has, but the consistency I was yearning to be.

Always,

C

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Peanut Butter Whisky and Grief

The way I work. This woman’s work. A great song. Featured on the movie She’s Having a Baby. Of course it is. A movie I can’t bring myself to watch these days.

When it comes to writers I get curious about one for various reasons. Recently a meme featuring Joan Didion stated that she had already left behind a couple of people she used to be, and I liked that. So of course on my next outing, one where I needed something to occupy my time, my mind… anything to feel some life in my veins, I would set out to find her.

So I went to Barnes and Nobles and left with virtually every book by her that existed. I have tamed my habits somewhat and I purchased the main one I was after (having no idea why at the time other than the title sounded fabulous), The Year of Magical Thinking. And the rest on Amazon, because cheaper. Though I prefer an independent book store any day. I also came away with a journal, the kind Elizabeth Gilbert favors, in a delightful color we shall call melba peach. Its uniqueness attracted me.

When you’re in pain you rarely think you just kind of do. Walking through my pain haze, wandering half in and half out of my body, I gathered up these items.

I had no idea at the time this book would be not only incredibly enjoyable, but also have a lot to say to me right now. I’m only around the 50th page, but the book begins with her husbands sudden and unexpected death, while their only child was on life support at a nearby hospital.

What strikes me so far about the book, is the happiness of the marriage. The couple were both writers, and anything these days that talks of a union between two people that is filled with mutual interest and affection makes my insides melt with longing. This isn’t new though, it’s old really. The longing that is.

Anyway the book as it turns out goes quite in depth about grief and never have I felt as seen as I do right now, and a book is offering me that. There’s talk of scientific looks at people grieving and what their bodies and minds undergo.

The kind of grief that gets support. I am in the kind of grief that doesn’t, the kind that is not only my fault in so many ways, but perhaps worse. Or that is how I was treating myself for a long time. I’ve since forgiven her. I didn’t have much of a choice I have barely been able to breathe as it is. Shame on top wasn’t an option.

How can one simultaneously be shown their capacity for love and loss all in the same short time span and live to tell the tale? I’ll keep you posted.

I am completely enrapt in this book. The first thing I have been able to concentrate on in as long as I can remember. The book also has very validating aspects for that. Thank goodness.

Thank goodness for writers who have the courage to put words to experiences so we may also find ourselves there.

I’m noticing now I’m a much different writer at night than I am in the morning. One could say I’m even split into two separate selves. My morning self and my night one.

My morning self is enthusiastic (generally) and bright. Frothing with ideas and piss and vinegar. Ready for the tasks at hand. I go full force into the day. I almost know no other way.

My night self is so worn down from all my endeavor and enthusiasm that she is a wispy creature in desperate need of comfort. Emotional, raw, wanting a resting space. Food, drink, soft and fuzzy blankets. Someone to run their fingers through my hair.

My night self rarely writes. But here we are, on a whole new path. Both morning and night self are cold lately, a kind of cold that cannot be warmed. So cold it hurts and the only way to help it is a long warm bath, or lots of movement. Only one of those is readily available in this weather. Joan Didion talks about the kind of cold that is because your body isn’t working properly when consumed with grief. I never would have thought about this without these words.

Today after my usual five back to back clients, I got some food and relaxed with my girls a little. We watched a couple episodes of A Million Little Things. I cracked open on a hard cider. I’ll have one a few times a week. I like to sip it slowly from a fancy glass so I can feel more sophisticated than I actually am.

Sometimes I drink from the can and sometimes a glass. All times I’m the same human. I just like to try lots of different things.

The teens went bowling, Chip made his weekly visit a surprise this time, as it’s usually on Sunday. He brought a bottle of peanut butter whisky. I had seen it “advertised” on an old acquaintance of a good friends page. It was featured next to their new baby’s bottle. Mom and son drinks. A baby boy, a thrilled gay couple are the parents. Funny I knew the mom only a little through someone years before. We were all children then. Though I was the only child I knew that had children.

An outsider. Alien.

Anyway much like following my instincts to a writer and this very book I needed… I explored the drink as well. It turned out not to be a disappointment. What’s even nicer is that Chip brought it for me, and a dear friend had a glass or two with me in the evening. It eased the loneliness some. It was a nice visit.

I made myself some dinner. Marinated chicken breasts with olive oil and balsamic, adobo, a little fresh dill, some garlic salt, and made a salad. Cooking for one. Strange. It was relaxing though.

Both the dogs are sleepy, and so am I relaxed from a good days work and all the things I’m able to provide myself after.

The kids will be home from bowling soon, the house will be filled with sounds again. I enjoy both my quiet life and my loud one.

I guess I just wanted to practice the art of capturing a still life as I know it right now.

I’m going to continue reading this book for now. Saturday’s into Sunday’s are my favorite, the possibilities are endless, and the time seems to stretch for miles. Something I’m not used to. It has always felt like it’s running out, and now it’s standing still.

And I’m still breathing…..

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Shame is an Ocean I’m Battling

Sometimes the only thing I have is my voice (my writing). Things have been so hard lately. For a lot of it I haven’t even been able to get glimpses it will ever be better. No glimmers in sight.

I also have music, Pink in particular, my barber, my therapist, my work that I love immensely, my friends, my kids, my health though that’s sometimes questionable but for the most part, and food and shelter.

The way I survived my childhood was to get away from it, and the way I did that was through my connections with people, and my tenacity and ability to get a job in five minutes or less of being in an establishment.

I made a family naively, quickly. I will never regret that. My sadness is that I didn’t have a situation that cultivated any safety or investment for me to know who I was and what I wanted beyond survival.

I wanted to be a mother because I didn’t have one. I needed a father not a husband at nineteen years old.

Why didn’t anyone see that? Why didn’t I? I was just expected to function like anyone else did, and damnit if I wasn’t going to try.

I was like a giant enthusiastic puppy about life. They couldn’t take that. But it got translated into a single focus, belonging anywhere and loving as hard as I could so I could feel safe. So my nervous system could calm down. I didn’t even know why it wasn’t.

I didn’t know what complex PTSD was, hyper vigilance, etc. I remember my ex husband would get upset with me or tease me that I couldn’t remember how to get somewhere. I couldn’t focus. Even when I started going to college I’d read the same line over and over and walked around in a blur. My friend Abby as I mentioned, she was kind to me anyway.

She was never unkind. Not mocking or teasing. That energy. Backhanded compliments, or criticism. I pick up on them at the most subtle levels. And now when I look back…. at what I endured on a daily basis and no one put it together.

I dedicate my life to connecting the dots for others. It’s what I do.

My whole life changed when I began taking foster parent classes last October or so, and that was just one of the many changes that occurred. I realized at that moment when I watched the graphic videos of kids in abusive situations that I was watching my my life. Wanting to be the foster parent, I ended up the child. I felt sweaty and like I would vomit, and I knew during those classes that I had held this at bay my whole life.

I rushed into relationships because that was the only place it all stopped. The way I felt safe (er). My nervous system was calmed by safe people to be around. And that was love to me.

Safety was love, and love was safety.

Until it wasn’t……

Demi Lovato. Warrior (Music always talks to me while I’m writing, this just came on)

It took one of the safest relationships I had ever had to unlock enough of my security to get into my next abusive one. Why?! There really is some kind of sense that if we have struggled we deserve this or that. And based on my experience it doesn’t work that way.

If you are self-love deficient (see the work of Ross Rosenberg and the Human Magnet Syndrome), then you can avoid pathological loneliness by attracting unconsciously the very type of situation that feels most like home.

I am struggling with shame. I’m a mental health counselor. How could I end up in an abusive relationship? Someone abusing the unconditional regard I gave them. A shared experience leading me to believe we would be one another’s safe space when it was anything but.

The effects are immense. My childhood trauma in my face with a vengeance while doing EMDR, and trying to hold it all together.

Now I am a mess of trust triggers and health symptoms and my children bare the brunt.

I was always going to need to heal these things if I was ever going to move forward on my path. One of the most devastating parts is the acceptance of the story as I actually experienced it. I was perfect for also wanting it to be a certain way, and creating that in my mind over trusting myself and actual reality.

The good news is that will never happen again. The bad news is the trauma I am wading through every day. And whatever toll it is taking on my body that already has Crohns Disease.

https://www.healthline.com/health/chronic-illness/childhood-trauma-connected-chronic-illness

I tried to hold my trauma at bay by feeling this alone pairing up with another person with a good heart. I tried to keep myself safe, and I didn’t know that’s what I was doing. It’s conscious now because I can see the blind spots. It wasn’t before.

I have complex PTSD and I intend to speak about it as I move forward. As all of this happened and layers of shamed piled on while very few actually knew what I was experiencing. I hardly knew.

There is always so much beneath the surface. Look! That’s all I can say is look. Ask! Educate yourself and be brave enough to understand. If you see the light in someone’s eyes go out, you have no idea how instrumental you could be if you’re kind and you don’t make assumptions or judge.

I’m in so much pain right now. A shadow of myself. The misunderstandings almost killed me. The shame. An ocean of shame I’ve been drowning in. I look forward to this.

For those that have seen me and loved me in small ways and big this past year, who believe more in me than the things society defines us by. The ones who see my heart and always have. You have saved my life so many more times than you know.

You have stitched together a patch work quilt I huddle under right now for warmth. All those that reach out, the people who see me.

Thank you….

Resources

Complex PTSD

Pete Walker From Surviving to Thriving

The Body Keeps the Score

The Human Magnet Syndrome

Alice Walker The Drama of the Gifted Child

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Respectfully, Abby

My bath feels life giving this morning. I need rest. My wheels finally have stopped spinning and I just want to read novels and breathe.

This morning two primary topics are on my mind. Angels on the earth (my friend family), and societal expectations/ our expectations of mothers.

It’s no secret to anyone by now I have been going through a difficult time for about, well in total we will say three years, but that also had many healing moments and ups as well as downs. But it culminated last December and hasn’t stopped. I was always able to get it to stop before, but how I remedied things became part of my own prison I didn’t even know I was in.

I had the key the whole time, but didn’t know it.

So after a particularly difficult few days, therapy with my daughters, and feeling beat up in only the way tiny mirrors of your own design can reflect; I hit another breaking point.

The best thing that ever came out of my entire masters degree is my friend Abby. Abby is the very definition of loyal when it comes to a friend and she has stuck by my crazy butt even after I didn’t always respect her well. I hurt her once (or twice even) and I’ll never forget. Over the years she always reaches out occasionally. I haven’t responded much, completely caught up in the whirlwinds of my own insanity.

My favorite memories of Abby include: our laughter during classes. She was impeccably organized and I was a Tasmanian devil who couldn’t keep a straight thought. She was (and apparently still is) my compass. Quite literally I’d ask her every single day where our class was. Abby’s dog Princeton who was a rag doll of a baby and made the kids laugh. Our favorite movie was Bridesmaids and we watched it several times and quoted it more times than I can count. She held my hand all throughout grad school.

Abby is brave in that soft and gentle way, but also not afraid to kick a little ass. She texted me yesterday morning that she had a dream about me in which a lot of people we coming in and out of my house (a party) perhaps and that she beat someone up to protect me. That’s the very short version.

I couldn’t help but get emotional, I was already raw, at this concept of being protected. I got upset a few weeks ago at my therapist, it was the peak of something that had been brewing for not protecting me, and a lot of the pain I’m in right now with figuring out boundaries and myself is the result of a lack of any protection in childhood.

The night before last I had a rough therapy session with my daughters and the morning after even worse. And there she was. I felt too vulnerable and almost cancelled our scheduled meeting time just before I was crying and having a breakdown.

I took the call anyway. I am so grateful I did. It was what I needed and so many things I needed to be reminded of, and this person, this gift in my life. How does she see me all these years later? I made that lasting of an impression.!? I never see myself like that which is the entire core of the things I’ve been struggling with.

All these years later and hardly any contact and this woman, who in many ways shares similar wounds, saved my life. It’s not dramatic. She did. She chose to see me and stay connected to me enough to have a dream that matched things happening in my life, to reach out, and spend her time reminding me what I need to see and hear.

If that doesn’t show you we are all connected and have a purpose in one another’s lives that is so vital to our path. I don’t know what does. At the exact moment I needed to feel less alone in my struggle and hear exactly those things, there she was. I cannot hold onto a story of suffering more than the gratitude at what I am given. It’s not possible.

She shared with me her mother had similar struggles with a situation and that she regrets to this day how she treated her, and reminded me that with the passage of time things will become more clear to anyone who is judging or criticizing, and that the things I’m doing are building blocks and I just can’t feel better right now, but that doesn’t mean that anything is as terrible as the feelings associated from these growing pains.

Oh my god the pain is searing. And I always think I can’t take anymore, but then the light comes. Et Lux in tenebris lucet. The light always comes.

This of course does the actual situation little justice for the relief. I napped after our talk, a dead dead rest and reset and was able to complete my five evening sessions when I didn’t think I would be able to.

Abby always signs her correspondence “respectfully” and when she does you can see and read the sincerity. Someone who makes you feel safe, which is typically the product of that person dwelling in a lack of safety for a very long time. In my experience. And one of the very best parts about her is her sense of humor. She told me there are very few things that can’t be fixed by doing funny squats throughout the living room while expressing whatever it is you need. Her kids are very lucky to have a mom like her.

I’m working on finding my humor outside anyone else. To be able to make light of the dark, rather than just try to find a glimmer of it anywhere. Which is where grief leaves us. I’m not sure mine will include squats my trainer can attest to my lack of agility in this department lol! Maybe shoulder openers :p

Also I shall submit for your amusement something she sent me last week that I cannot watch without laughing. Especially if you’re a therapist or anyone really.

Stop It!

I sent it to some of my clients that it was appropriate for and told them this was my new approach. They laughed. I guess I use more humor than once again I’m able to view myself as. Dark and serious.

My god I need the light right now, and in my life it always shows up. Just not always in the ways I’m looking for.

So I guess societies expectations of mothers will have to wait because this became a longer post than I imagined. What I will say about that for now as I’ve gone through hell and been lost to myself is for a good period of time my kids expressed their missing me as why am I not doing my “motherly” duties. It’s been a parent should, a parent should, a parent should, as I’ve been fighting for my life in every imaginable way. And I finally broke and the essence of that is mother’s are not super human beings we need help during certain times in our lives as well, and Should not be shamed for it.

I will not be shamed for the things that I’ve needed to heal in myself. I love my children fiercely but if I can’t pick myself up off the floor to make dinner, there’s probably a serious problem and it needs addressing. I’m full of wounds right now. And I’m going to need to heal. My only expectations is that you cultivate a certain amount of understanding and gratitude for all I am and have done rather than constantly throwing at me how I’m not meeting the mark.

This a product of whence I came. The martyrdom of the unhealthy mother who then resents her children. Well guys I won’t resent you, so instead you’ll get me standing up for what I need, and you’ll get the opportunity to be resilient as well. I recently revisited my roots on Little Women, the new version. I could never understand the character Jo before. I was always Amy, desiring only to love and be loved, nothing more.

I now understand our (women) history so much better and identify more with Jo. Many lives within one life. Also the sisterhood between women caring for one another when things are hard brings me back to my dear friend. Which makes me warm.

I watch the Greatest Showman lately as well when I’m lonely. It reminds me both of how I have risen and also why to remain humble. The best of both worlds.

Respectfully,

Christina

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Trauma and shame

It’s Sunday! And as you know Sundays are for blogging.

My daughters are seventeen, seventeen?! Where did those years go? They are beautiful beyond my wildest imagination and lately I’ve been able to travel back through my memories. Prior to this I never could really. I was traveling forward at the speed of light. Now I am glimpsing, staring out over the horizon.

We went to The Melting Pot yesterday. My little family plus a boyfriend (not mine obviously) and a friend. Each girl had a plus one. It was such a lovely time. I was present and the kids were happy, and that in and of itself is amazing. It felt good. They enjoyed everything so much. Just pure joy.

There was as always a couple of empty seats at the table, that should have been filled. Holes in my heart. I thought about it a lot as I always do, how the little one would delight in playing at dinner. But it didn’t steal my presence any longer. Nothing is worth that, no amount of pleasure or pain, to lose yourself and your luster for life. Not an option.

This morning I read a post on the complex ptsd group on Facebook. Someone wrote about how they shiver and shake in social situations and wondered if anyone else gets like this. I was so strong and resilient I had no idea what I was experiencing all of those years was complex ptsd. All of those physical ailments, intrusive thoughts, fear of dying, and complete terror ridden thoughts nearly constantly. Feeling like I didn’t belong, wasn’t good enough, and then betrayed by my own body. And not one single person put that together. The link.

Truly the world was just fine with letting me be strong and captivating as long as I could maintain it but god forbid I struggled. I got teased and truly just internalized that I had a problem. Absolutely brutal. All the while gratefully helping anyone I came across because I was just thankful to be alive and safe-er than I had been.

No one saw. I was such a good little soldier. And now I am going to spend some time honoring my journey and my story. I’m not sure what that will look like, but I know as the chaos calms I am organizing my thoughts better (at all) and so that helps me to know I’m on the right path.

There was something going on with me that I didn’t have the language for.

The only language I had was shame. Some people deal with this in ways that make them look even more efficient and attractive, but underneath the surface something very different exists. As I let myself be congruent with what I was feeling I lost a lot. Anyone who would judge me or take it personally, and everyone who couldn’t see the pain that was inside.

I think now and wonder how no one ever bothered to connect the dots before.

You think I’m just this island and doing fine? You think my physical symptoms, my sweating, racing heart, tingling limbs, trips to the emergency room, being spaced out and not able to focus that those were on purpose. Why didn’t anyone see? It always became my fault. Always judged for it. What’s wrong with YOU. And I better get this under control I thought or no one will ever love me.

If I couldn’t concentrate on what you were saying or even driving somewhere didn’t you ever wonder why? Beyond I didn’t care?!

Why can’t you focus, why can’t you remember how to drive places you’ve been there many times, why can’t you just be more quiet and need less attention, why can’t you suck it up, why must you have so much pain that you packaged away as to not bother the world with it?! Why do you need so much attention, any attention. Can’t you just manage that. As it turns out I could for most of my life.

Well I’m about to get loud.

It’s never been productive trying to have to shout to someone to get them to understand, to stay, to see. I always wanted to stay, but you were always going to need to see me too, and act like it by showing up.

And you…..I don’t want your promises of grandeur when you know damn well you won’t even answer my call unless you’re out of the house. Disgusting. I never deserved that.

I never deserved a lot of things. One being a paranoid delusional mother who was volatile and selfish and empty in her eyes. Or a cold womanizing father, predatory, who was only willing to have a relationship with me later in life if I had no questions and no emotions. Neither ever became a parent to me. They could have. They had a choice.

Everything is always a choice.

I never deserved that the safest place to land was with a martyr victim quietly co-dependent grandmother, and a harsh authoritarian grandfather, that at least was a little less dangerous and cruel with me. The real danger was his daughters jealousy at that. I was not supposed to receive anything they never did, after all I was not supposed to be born.

They would be nice when lonely or wanting something from me, while simultaneously telling me all their woes about everything and how much better I had it. Then when angry they would lash out say horrible things to me, physically chase me, or ignore and stonewall me. Getting any kind of attention that was pleasant was like a game of chess. I became the perfect player. My wits needed to be sharp to get the most out of that life, and I sure as hell tried.

He could even be warm sometimes. There were moments they both had genuine affection for me, and while completely burdened with the mentally ill children they created, those good church farers pulled themselves up by their boot straps and raised this granddaughter. Raised seems a generous term.

What I didn’t know was after getting out

alive how scattered my brain would be. How confusing it would be to be able to determine what was safe and what wasn’t. There was nothing about knowing who I was or my dreams. It was a game of survival.

A hunger games without the flashy costumes and weapons. It was mind war fare. It makes me skin crawl talking or thinking about it, that’s why I rarely do.

When I finally did go to college I was plagued by anxiety, and I didn’t even know it was that. That too more evidence I wasn’t normal and I was bad and wrong. Never once all that time did I realize I had illness I never asked for. That I was a victim not acting like one.

No one put it together. No one. No one except me now.

So you saw me functioning right ?! Trying to make a life with everything I ever studied to try and make that happen. But do you know most of my life I felt pain and fear and gave out love anyway. I gave it anyway so no one would have to feel like I was.

I have tried my best with what I was given. I’ve tried to keep the damage I was inflicted with off of anyone who comes into contact with me, and at bay. But I never knew I was allowed to claim my whole story and heal. And by god I fucking will.

I’ve had to crawl out of more shame than you can ever imagine and just talking about it is almost impossible. I took the responsibility for my whole healing on all by myself and I was trying to keep anyone from having to be uncomfortable. I wanted to make all the discomfort around me stop. I comforted all of them. I rubbed my moms back, listened to her pain constantly, even as she lashed out on me constantly. I spent time with my aunt I tried to be good and when I couldn’t I shamed myself. I was bad and wrong and not enough. And I carried all of this into the next steps of my life, all the while looking enthusiastic.

A pretty….. lost….. person.

So when you see me staring out in space maybe just maybe I am dealing with these memories. Not lacking presence or wanting to be connected. I wanted those things more than you can ever imagine.

To have them and to be them…..

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Scattered attachment

I’ve busied myself my whole life and now it seems all the pain that was buried unearthed itself all at once. Primal terror. I am reading Attached by Amir Levine and Rachel Heller. It like its predecessors, Conscious Uncoupling, and so many others reaffirms that everything I have been going through is easily explained by evolutionary theory, and not some personal deficiency.

I remember when I was interested in Bowlby, the pioneering researcher on attachment, before I even took a college class. I had articles printed by him as a young thing before schooling was ever a glimmer in my eye.

It helps me to not shame myself now, as I’m going through one of the hardest patches I have ever had and am tasked with giving myself grace.

For I am and have been in so much pain and for the most part unless you’ve gotten really close or seen my patterns you wouldn’t have any idea. I have always tried to carry it alone, anything else has felt like I’m feeling sorry for myself, asking for too much, grandiose to want to be seen, embarrassing, shameful, and a whole host of other things.

My mind is so scattered all the time I can barely breathe, and no I can’t tell a story any longer that I have caused this or that it’s even plain old ordinary adhd. That’s bullshit. My abuse was immense and intense and I have shielded everyone from it by becoming my own rescuer and trying to bring others along with me.

But sooner or later that river of hurt was always going to rise up. Now my question is what do I do with it? Raft it? That would be appropriate as I remember my adventurous teen self on the Rogue River. I wondered often how I went from being so adventurous to later being so anxious, and the answer is very simple. I had nothing to lose at that time, and no connection or value to myself.

It wouldn’t have mattered if I lived or died. That painful thought haunted me and through me into a 4 year long battle with my own body as I struggled and feared death. That was the first step in my awakening I suppose. Becoming aware enough of myself to realize if I died or got married or any of it I didn’t feel like one person would be there supporting me.

So of course I clambered to be loved and chosen and belong in a family as quickly as possible. What kind of expectations have I had for myself that I could shame myself for that.

I was supposed to have developed into an adult and it is assumed I’d be able to securely attach. Why wouldn’t I? Because you have never seen what is beneath the surface. I love hard to try and heal it. That’s what I do. I stay open and trying no matter how many mistakes to try and heal it the right way, rather than merely exist.

I deserve to thrive not to just exist, but if you had any idea the amount of work it takes for me to have understood love and connection more than merely studying it, but to actually feel it and stay.

My expectations when there are any always seem too much, when in reality they are below the bare minimum. Someone willing to see, to try at least to understand, and be willing to keep doing the work.

I only leave when there is no attempt to understand made for me. If I am expected to do all the work alone, that’s a place I’m too familiar with and something I don’t want. I want to work with someone, nothing more and nothing less.

The first break was due to sexuality and that nearly killed me before counseling. Being divorced was unthinkable. And I tried everything and I mean everything for it to be different. I felt horrible.

The next break was because I kept trying to patch the holes fast so the ship didn’t sink. There were three kids on that ship, sinking was not an option.

The next break was an accumulation of grief so great I cannot even begin to explain to you, and the pregnancy failures/losses were only a piece of it. The unmet needs were immense. But the needs of my children at face value seemed to be met and I prioritized that in ways that no one may ever understand.

I was not seen or heard. And I don’t think marriage was ever able to mean to me what I wanted to believe it did. I didn’t really know what it meant beyond survival. You choose a safe and good person and you try and make it work is what I felt was realistic. Fearing all the time my wanting and needing and very dreams were too much.

So that’s what I did. I had a dream. My dream was to have a fulfilling and safe partnership, and to be able to have a baby in the sexuality that felt like home, while my kids were still young enough to appreciate that, before beginning a second life. Perhaps I thought we would feel more like a family.

I wanted to be a family, as a lesbian woman, have a healthy partnership, and be invested in that dream with courage and enthusiasm. That is my dream.

I want to be seen and understood and asked about things too. How I feel, what I want, what I need, and what my life has been like for me.

What do we do when we can’t get what we want? Well I can only answer for me. I became it. I became interested in peoples stories their whole story beneath the surface. I still wanted that for me.

To be seen and noticed and appreciated not for what I do or provide, but for the whole story of who I am.

And I will concede it’s possible that maybe even as that was happening I couldn’t even see or feel it because I was moving too quickly.

My brain is in pain. It hurts to be this scattered. It’s harmful to me. So for now I will try and understand this pain and find ways to relieve it so I can carve the dreams I deserve and want and stay the course I choose, and do that from a place that’s using my knowing.

Right now just please hold me in your thoughts because I am in pain.

Always

C

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Gentle and Fierce

My mind is fierce yet I am determined to keep my heart gentle. My experiences were fierce and I’ve been determined my whole life to stay soft. It’s a constant battle.

My grief is not gentle, it is fierce.

I become fierce in groundlessness.

Fiercely overwhelmed.

Everything is overwhelming right now, and I wasn’t supposed to be doing any of this alone.

I’m allowed to not want to be and I was allowed to try for love in all the ways I did with all the needs I had.

My life and myself evolving too quickly to keep up. Many disjointed parts out of alignment. Sometimes I feel like a bag of broken glass. My second to last energy healing she spoke about seeing shards of glass and beautiful light and something about them coming together and a friend recently spoke about a kaleidoscope and mosaics have been coming up for me.

When I look out over even this past year I have an extraordinary life.

I always set out for that and I have one.

I have deep and enduring friendships that mean the world to me. Some new and some old, but all of them incredibly meaningful. I look at all the pictures of my tears, roads I have walked, my smiles, excursions, moments with my kids, this home. It’s a full life surrounded by love.

From within and without.

Perspective is a soothing balm to the open wounds all throughout me right now. Attachment fractures that feel like fault lines that can erupt at any moment. It feels terrible to be so acutely aware of this. The pain is unbearable at times. Almost all the time right now with glimpses of peace.

I just went through an intense period of “seeing red” I call it, threat everywhere, the intrusive thoughts get so loud I can’t hear any security. This will all be taken from you in a thousand horrible ways, bad things will happen, you are the bad thing, you had no business being born, you tarnished the family reputation, fix your mother, go soothe her, be quieter good little girls play with their paper dolls in the corner, children are meant to be seen and not heard. Why are you so….., let’s play the quiet game, all of ways you are inadequate. These weren’t complexes these were my actual beginnings. So much threat.

I work hard to calm these thoughts, and I fill my life with the opposite as one means of doing so. Pursuits that are worthwhile, but when there is no relaxation of the kind I need, those struggle too.

I am adjusting slowly but surely. It’s hard to collect my thoughts right now. That’s the worst thing. My nervous system is in overdrive all the time and I’m looking to connect to the things that used to calm it, and unfortunately these days that makes it worse.

Alone is a trigger for me I am finding.

I am capable of being alone. I’ve been very alone in so many ways. I’m allowed to not be I cry out. But I made this choice and here I am.

I don’t want to be figuring out the reorganization of my home alone. I never wanted that. That was not the plan. But these are the consequences of my choices. So I’ll take the hits, they feel like they just keep coming. I can’t breathe.

My grief is not calm and gentle it is fierce.

Being back at this place again. It’s like the ground hog day from hell. That movie is kind of appropriate actually. He’s an asshole until he gets it. His day repeats over and over until he becomes a different person and appreciates everything differently, and then the cycle is finally over. Intelligent writer there.

Something broke open last week, I hit a wall of awareness, or rather it hit me in the face during a therapy session with my daughters. I don’t want to be this snarling and snapping thing, it’s not natural for me, and nothing, and I mean nothing is worth losing yourself.

I have felt unworthy most of my life to connect with my children, so scared I would harm them, that I busied myself doing everything I could do well to keep them safe in so many ways. I didn’t even want them to see I didn’t know how to connect.

And as I wade daily through the stories of others the struggle became normalized. I recognized my own humanity in everyone else’s and reattached to myself in a slow painful process.

I remember my first energy healing. I could hardly be touched. I laid on that table struggling to be vulnerable and just breathe when so much rose up in my body. It was so defended. I remember her saying she couldn’t go anywhere near my heart, that it was too guarded and my mind was swarming like a hive. It’s so painful. If you had any idea what the moments of calm and gentle mean.

So that’s exactly what I’m attempting to become, with myself, and with my children. I hold on for dear life. Hold my breath and clench everything to survive. Then I spend all my time trying to undo that, to deal with the effects. The migraines, the pain, and the only thing soothing is safe adult presence preferably in the form of nurturing and attentive partnering with a good balance of give and take. I’ve long known this is the secret to a happy life. We are meant to be connected, and it certainly is for me. It feels a cruel joke the vulnerabilities that lie within in me with regard to that. The ones I’ve had to painfully uncover layer by layer, so I could be known to myself.

And now I’m supposed to like what I see and believe anyone else could ? The tasks asked of me seem impossible most days.

Am I a samurai sword ? Being beaten into submission so I can be what?! A weapon of truth? I’d rather be a beacon of light, peace, and warmth. How can one so fierce also be that ?

It’s all too much sometimes.

A screenshot from long ago stands out in my mind, it was our relationship can be unnecessarily intense at times. This coming from a person who held all the cards and the control and had me dangling on a wire. And you have the nerve to assess or speak about my behavior in the midst of deception and manipulation. How dare you make me the problem when I showed up and you didn’t. When I show up without excuses no matter the pain and cost to me.

Also that she would ask what I was doing, anxious about my whereabouts more than how I was doing. Yuck.

I’ve been shamed for the impact of my trauma in a variety of ways my entire life, and most people truly didn’t know what they were doing. They saw behavior as behavior and couldn’t or wouldn’t look deep. Looking deeper has become my life’s work.

Will anyone ever look deeper into me and stay ?

And will I stop trying to do that in the wrong situations and choose the healthy ones?

Stay tuned

Ps my last energy healing my heart was open and she put her hand over it awhile.

My heart was open.

My heart is open. That’s why it’s so painful.

It’s happening in my therapy sessions and I’m reconnecting with my kids and friends and appreciating differently. Don’t let the intense emotional moments shared fool you, it is happening. My first energy healing she had put her hands under my back and I recoiled and tensed but she didn’t stop, I thought she would, I worried about her having to feel all that pain. I didn’t want her to. My body screamed don’t hold me, but she stayed, and I softened, and my grief poured out of me, down the sides of that table, and back into the earth to be recycled. That day was a beginning in many ways. I sobbed and I thought she would say it was too intense or let’s stop, that I would be shamed again, that it would be too much, that I was too much.

What is too much is what I have endured in my life the danger and the loneliness and what legacy that has left me with to clean up.

It’s still extraordinary…..

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Feral children Feral Parents

Have I really operated like a scared animal most of my life, much less felt like one. Wow. I sit here and think about that. What it feels like to be scared. Like really think about it, the sensations, and what your mind tells you. The toll it takes on your body.

I am listening to Esther Perel podcasts of actual couples therapy sessions Esther Perel relationship podcast

And it’s making me think. What stood out to me in this one is how she made the couple aware they each operated from their own internal worlds for 20 years deeply affecting the quality of their marriage. Imagine misunderstanding someone for 20 years! They each operated from their own world view, fears, etc, but they did not deeply listen to the other.

Both feeling rejected and shameful from things that weren’t actually what the other meant. When they felt unworthy the ended up making the other feel that way from frustration of not knowing what they wanted or needed, or not allowing themselves that.

I have been thinking about what I’m meant to share. It always seems like it’s all been done, and everyone does is better. Imposter syndrome at its finest. That’s what happens every time. Usually when I listen to another therapist work I hear everything I must be doing wrong, or polar opposite I think wow I’d do that differently. My ego is often in full protective mode and that blocks out learning and trying for something. I like to think of myself as not like this, that’s probably why I’m so good at pointing it out in others.

My own arrogance disgusts me sometimes and facing it down in the mirror is not easy. Particularly when it comes to connecting with my children. With their experiences rather than my parent ego blocking being able to see life how they do. We are doing therapy together and it’s unbelievable. To see myself, the therapist gently confront, to feel that burning shame after when I realize how wrong I am doing things. God it hurts.

Trying to redirect to if you’re willing and trying you are ahead of the game, it’s those who avoid that that create harm for generations. So I sit in the burn.

I sit in the shame of how hard I clamp down and hold on tightly to the only thing I have ever been able to, my resolve. My strength. It’s the only home I’ve ever known.

I realize this morning what an unrealistic view of love I have and how painted by my trauma that portrait is and I am humbled. Unrealistic expectations of others, myself, and my children. I keep trying to get them to understand my experience, when I am not understanding theirs. Because it’s too scary in there. I could be my mom. It’s terror. Terror. And so I shut down completely and the only thing they are able to translate that as, is that I must not love them.

Which couldn’t be further from the truth. There’s a line in the movie Riding in Cars With Boys that always stopped me in my tracks. A young selfish mom, makes sense right 😉 who’s sons very existence seems to vex her and he knows it. The kids are playing and Drew Barrymore says to Britney Murphy, “we love our kids but like do we really love them or do we just have to love them.” And Britney responds that “she thinks sometimes we love them so much that if we felt it all at once it would kill us”, so we don’t always realize or can’t always be in that feeling.

Like how do you switch from protecting and providing to loving and nurturing. I clamped tightly to a role and held on for dear life I think. Nothing fluid or gentle, because my life was not those things.

I got very intense at one point last session with them, feeling attacked for everything and why don’t they trust me, I’m mom , don’t they know how hard I’ve worked, and the clinician gently said something along the lines of maybe it’s because of something like this. And I burned with shame and pain. And then later the hot wet tears of release and I’ve been thinking about it ever since.

And all the other people who have called me intense. All the fucking shame, the finger pointing, and so few have ever been curious and interested enough to stay to know why I get like that. I want people to know. And I don’t want people to know, and I’m locked in here.

It’s a cage.

Feeling like some kind of reject that doesn’t know which emotional response to choose out of the jukebox at which time. I turn my head in shame, and the tears come down.

Hurt people hurt people and I don’t want to hurt anymore or hurt them. Burning pathological loneliness. How do I make them understand I don’t know how? That I freeze. And when they don’t know how I just push them forward because that’s all I’ve ever done in my life.

Frozen and thawing. Frozen and thawing. The seasons of my life. This perhaps the most difficult which means the most fruitful.

I cried a lot while writing this, and I thought of her, how similar our wounds are and how they separate us from receiving any relief, and how does it have to be that way…. too much relief and you don’t grow, too little and you don’t either. There has to be something in between numbing and ecstasy. A grey area. Realistic and one step at a time.

For now I’m just practicing this with myself…..

Always

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Lina and the sunglasses

Fun fact the site of my first blog post ever written, at Safari kaffeine, next to the Jeep dealership. I was getting an oil change on my brand new Jeep Wrangler. What a naive pup I was then.

So this morning I didn’t even plan to leave the house. I’ve been under the weather and not wanting to be on for the world. However my mouth had other plans, and I needed a temporary crown affixed more permanently in my mouth.

Since I was already out I reluctantly decided to journey to the mall to replace my sunglasses. Tail tucked between my legs with the damaged pair in tow. Our new lovely baby Sophie, the five month old German shorthair pointer, had managed to snag them off the counter the other day. This is why we can’t have nice things, and why I kick myself for getting lazy about keeping them in the case. Lesson learned, but probably not for long.

Old habits die hard.

Anyway so I’m standing outside Sunglass hut in the mall it’s just before 10:30 and I’m guessing ok well I could wait til 11 if I have to. So I set to writing, listening to music, and walking back and forth. Trying to kill many birds with all the stones.

Side note: the black bean soup at Crave in Ansonia Connecticut is to die for, as is everything else here. I’m meeting my son for lunch now that he’s a full adult now, I have to schedule weekly lunches if I want to see him. Oh my God this soup is an experience. Heaven. The Cuban sandwich and shrimp Caesar salad is other worldly.

So I get lost in my mind and 11 rolls around and still nobody, and I’m thinking of making a Facebook rant with my mood as annoyed, and don’t they want to make some money. When a woman approaches me and completely disrupts my thought reverie, I hadn’t even noticed her.

My first thought is I’m about to make a snarky comment even if she is the long awaited employee. She asks what I’m there for and I’m still kind of dazed. I said I need new sunglasses and she says she can’t help. I follow her and am thinking what? And she says there’s a sunglass hut inside Macy’s. Being not a mall goer, I did not know this. She also mentioned it I have a Macy’s card (I do) that I get a discount.

I wonder how in the world this woman spotted me or even realized it’s interesting, not often does someone come find you to fix your problem. Wow.

She was very nice and informed me that since I had the old ones if she sends them back I can get a new pair for 1/2 off. I had already been wanting to get a new pair of wayfarers I’d had my eye on, but also I’m so used to thin wire frames now I wasn’t sure. She also shared my sensitivity for selection to do with weight on top of my ears and knew exactly how to help.

The woman ends up being so entirely nice helped me find the perfect size for my face, and even called over another employee to confirm the difference between two. I have always considered the shiny black wayfarers because they look so nice on people when I see them. They make a statement.

So when I asked her between the tortoise shell matte amber lens and those she said, essentially that the black look good on anyone so of course they look nice on me, however she would go with the others because they match my complexion and are more uniquely me.

I loved her answer, her outlook, her tenacity as only I would literally walked the mall finding my commission outside the store lol, her attention and kindness. This was also super random because I didn’t even have make up on. I’m not a big make up wearer anyway but I literally only planned to hop out and get my tooth put back in.

The ladies at the dentist office and I laughed and they told me again what a nice patient I was, which was easy since I was busy blogging anyway. And then the good interaction with the mysterious sales woman who found me and was perfect.

The other day when I found my sunglasses to be ruined I was having not such a good day and it was an overwhelming thing.

Today I get to balance it out with one less thing on my plate.

The woman and I of course exchanged information (after realizing we live down the street from one another) because I can always tell when something happens for reason, you can feel a prickle on your skin. But today she felt like my personal angel and a reminder of things working out.

This whole thing reminds me of a dear friend of mine Chip. Someone who likes to write me emails about random acts or things he notices and is always a gentleman and always considerate of other people. He is someone I greatly admire.

I ended up telling my girls if they go down today they can get themselves a pair each for early birthday as it’s buy one get one, and be helped by the lovely Lina. Which resulted in my sharing with them some history about why I am so particular about my glasses and what that means. They are getting to know me a little at a time, as I am, and it’s a whole new world.

Always

Ps. Old me would have beaten herself relentlessly about the ruined glasses and felt the world was ending, and also would have been covered in a layer of terror at going to that dentist much less having to go back. This me is cheerful and makes an adventure and/or a lesson out of everything and is able to appreciate that about herself.