Hi Yana

Thank you for sharing your experience. Beautifully said! I’m glad that you persisted despite the difficulties and managed to come through the other side. ❤️

It is unique because I have been in a similar situation too. I found it difficult to function with the amount of sorrow and pain stored inside me. I learned to accept it, but it didn’t stop the pain…

I have a potentially strange way of looking at these things. Because of the abuse I experienced growing up, I have habits of self-abuse. Because of the trauma, my emotions misfire and are amplified.

Sometimes, my feelings are there to make me suffer because of various false beliefs I’ve accumulated over the years. If I can prepare myself for the difficulties it won’t hurt as badly. There is a part of me that craves suffering because it was normal to me and what I grew up with. With the suffering there are no hopes to be dashed. There is nothing to break if I am already broken. I deserve for bad things to happen. In its own way, it is safe and predictable.

What isn’t safe and predictable is putting myself out there, taking risks and being open to new experiences. If I have hope, I could get hurt. I put myself through that too and the fear persists. What if I’m rejected? What if I’m hurt? This is hard and it hurts so much sometimes, but there are all of the good things that make it worth it.

Then being a parent came and it didn’t matter what happened to me anymore. I have to take care of this precious little boy. I have no room to wallow. I have to move on, because the alternative is ruining his life and that would make me miserable more than anything. Motivation.

It occurred to me recently. I have already been through the worst. So what is there to be afraid of? I have spent most of my life suffering. Haven’t I suffered enough? I deserve to move on.

Yes, I could be sad. But has anything really truly changed? I could sit in the feelings. Or I could enjoy the beautiful day and sit in the moment, connect to my body and watch the feelings change as they naturally do. I find that where I direct my attention is what I experience.

I learned that a lot of the grounding techniques for adults don’t work well for me. It turns out that for children they don’t recommend calming techniques when they’re upset. They recommend exciting ones. Action based songs. Happy, upbeat, physical. The adult version of this is singing and dancing. It has been helping me a lot to learn about taking care of children’s emotional development. It turns out that excitement and being upset use the same part of the nervous system.