Dear Lisa:

Correction, regarding the quote above. The correct quote is: “I am an artist who doesn’t draw and a writer who doesn’t write”- beautiful writing by a writer who does write, I say.

June 23,  you wrote: “Everything I grew up with though tells me not to (get help). I work no matter what. Injury…deal with it, weather, ice, snow, get through it, no bus fare…walk to work. It’s what I was taught at home… you either swim or you sink. I need help but I never learned how to accept help… No one in that family could get help. Their idea of strong was to go out and do it no matter what hurt you are dealing with. Favoured was acting like hurt didn’t affect you at all…”

As a child, you learned what you were taught. You were eager to be a good girl, to please and win approval, and so you were the best pupil you could be. You naturally took in what you learned as the truth and lived it best you could.

You were taught that feeling hurt is unacceptable, that you should ignore it, not mention it, act as if you are not hurt. You were taught that being strong means to not feel hurt or not to express hurt, that being strong meant to go out and DO, swim, stay afloat,  as if there no hurt. You were taught that to be strong means to not ask for help.

In reality, people do need help, a whole lot of help as children, and otherwise, we need help throughout our lives. Babies in nature need help, otherwise they will not survive. Children need help too. As aduts we need help as well because we are born to be social animals, to live in groups, like other social animals in nature. Living in a social group means helping and being helped. So not asking for help is incongruent with reality.

In reality, being strong is feeling hurt because we are born to feel hurt when we are hurt. It is in our nature. If feeling hurt means weakness, then everyone is weak. Being strong is noticing when we feel hurt and then taking effective action to operate more effectively and to protect ourselves from further hurt. It is the wrong teaching to ignore hurt because when you do, and then operate as if you are not hurt, you don’t learn and you don’t know what it is that is hurting you and you don’t learn how to operate more effectively and how to protect yourself from future hurt. Instead you keep “work(ing) no matter what. Injury…deal with it, weather, ice, snow, get through it, no bus fare…walk to work..”

It is similar to this: you twist your foot and it hurts a lot to walk. Congruent with reality would be to rest your foot, ice it, support it, elevate it so it can heal, use crutches… and gradually, walk just a little, increase over time, until full recovery. What you were taught is this- twisted your ankle? Don’t feel the pain and don’t talk about it, just keep walking like before, through the pain- you either walk or you fall, so walk! As a result of the latter teaching, your foot never heals. It keeps hurting and hurting.. and hurting.

There is more I can write, but I need your thoughts and feelings about what I wrote here so far, in this post.

anita