What's Your Trauma?
Hi Beautiful One,
As I travel along the road to a better me, I have found new terms for what keeps me up at night. It's crazy to think that so much research has been done on the human mind that I can now understand and heal. Healing is such a hard road to travel. It's not just feeling better. That's what I thought going into this. I thought I would just find some source for my pains and then it would vanish into smoke. I thought one day I would just look in the mirror and feel better, but I was wrong. Healing goes deeper than cosmetics and it is an everyday fight. It's exhausting and I am already tired of doing it. I want a break you know?
I have been on a downward slope to my old habits, well at least last month I was. I started eating too much on my weekends (this includes ice cream). I started working out less and less. I practically gave up on homework. I am just so tired of the emotional rollercoaster that is the healing journey. It feels like there's no end to it. What I would give for one day of a clear mind and free heart. Oh, how I desire a day where I am just okay for the entire day. All of these survival tactics and habits that I have developed to endure abusive environments! To make matters worse, now I have to work to stop all of these habits! When does the relief come? When do I get to take that giant sigh that takes the weight off of my shoulders? Trauma has really stained my existence.
Yesterday, on my day off, I was able to see the beginning of a spiral! Such growth but I was meticulous to pay attention to the fact that I was spiraling and not that I recognized the spiral. I have so much I desire to accomplish in life. There's a list of things that I am attempting to do and when I don't put any effort to those things just to rest, I overthink! I begin to think I am lazy and that I'll never achieve. Well that thought process started to happen yesterday and I realized that's a trauma response! I remember being called "lazy" for sleeping in on the weekends. I remember nothing was ever good enough for my mom. I remember never feeling like I could relax and just enjoy the moment of laying around doing nothing.
I couldn't believe it! Yesterday in my head I was 12 years old again being called lazy mentally and my body was responding. My mind started to circle the drain into depressive thoughts of how I would never heal from these things. All I wanted was to binge eat ice cream and not workout. All I wanted was sex and alcohol to numb my mind! I wanted to spend money I didn't have to appease the hunger of my depressive thoughts. What's crazy is that I have learned that all of this is a version of self harm! Overeating, overspending, sex, and alcohol, all of these things were/are ways for me to control what I can't.
It has been 12 years since my mom kicked me out. 12 years since I have had to endure the emotional, mental, and physical abuse. It has been even longer since recieveing that treatment from my family. Here I am at 29 years old seeing my responses to certain things are trauma responses from unresolved traumatic experineces caused by loved ones. My overindependence, my control issues, my overeating, all responses to the pains of my past. I saw the start of this spiral and I answered it, but not how it wanted me to. I did what I think we all should do:
I called a friend
I set positive goals to combat my negative thoughts
I allowed the emotion to exist while not reacting to it
Listen, you've been through a lot and it has made you a strong human being, but it has stopped you from being loved. It has stopped you from being cared for. It has stopped you from living a full life. I can say this because I am typing this to myself right now. It is my job to give myself my best chance. The chance my parents never gave me, the chance my family wouldn't allow me to have, and the chance that my Grandmother believed I could have. It isn't fair to have to give ourselves this amount of emotional security, it isn't, not when it should have been given all along. But we cant focus on what should have been. This is the Free World. In our world we are all free to be who we truly are, passed the trauma of our past and the pain of our mistakes. We can break these generational attitudes and create from love. We can build a legacy that doesn't just look functional but is functional. Isn't that worth this journey? Isn't the future of your heart worth it?
Everything that you are healing from is going to manifest some of the deepest love and greatest affection you have ever been a part of. The trauma won't matter and your heart will heal. I know how tired you are. This fight isn't recognized by people because they can't see the emoitonal and mental toll it's taking, but you are not alone. I am here along this road to healing with you. We are not alone.
I want you to keep your head up, be encouraged, and know that you are loved. You are a member of the Free World: a world without shame, without fear, a world where being who YOU are is expected. Be patient with yourself because everything is a process. Remember life is a marathon not a sprint. You'll make it through this week!
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