"In a land far far away, there was a huge black tree, and the spirit living there, was as vile as a hangry wolverine"

As a child I used to withdraw in my writing and drawing. I was good at it, I thought, despite the toxic comments my mother and brother would rain down on me whenever I finished some project. They accused me of living in a fantasy world, of not being able to live a normal life, of losing touch with what is real. I guess they were right, it just took me a couple more years to realise that what I was doing, was indeed escaping my life.

My stories, they were kind of a safe haven, a place where I could be me, and no one would judge me. My father loved it. He donated me his own typewriting machine, which I used until the S and the E no longer would do what they wanted to do. By that time, my father had bought a computer, an Atari, which I was allowed to use to write my stories.

My father was the one who had given me The Lord of the Rings when I was 12, because the books in the children's library were all read and returned. I needed new fuel for my ever expanding creative and highly imaginatively brain. And so dad borrowed The Lord of the Rings on his library card and handed it to me to read. It was not an option as such. He really thought I should read it. He loved reading himself, not the classical works in Flemish literature a Stijn Streuvels and Hendrik Conscience, but the science fiction of Tom Clancy and the fantasy of Roger Zelazny. 

Aside from the sketching art course he coaxed me on taking - against mother's will - handing me The Lord of the Rings was the best thing he ever did for me. Because after reading Tolkien, I was very much hooked and it was that book that drew me into creating the worlds I would use to flee in.

In the worlds I created, peopled with mages, dwarves, dragons, elves and whatnot, I could talk like I wanted, be who I wanted to be, decide whichever way to go, eat and buy and sleep on my terms. I could fall in love and the other person would love me back. I could have parents who cared - like the ones I invented as a ritual role-play before bed time, the parents who would come and save me. I was five or six when I first created them and I held on to that soothing ritual till I was about 12, when my brother caught me and made a fool of me. I never knew if he told my parents. In my stories I would have siblings who got my back and helped me deal with difficult situations. If I start a story with "In a land far far away, there was a huge black tree, and the spirit living there, was as vile as a hangry wolverine", I can choose if my hero will venture there or not. It is up to me to make it a horror story, Dean Koontz like, or a comical one in Terry Pratchett's style. I may add werecats, or green moons, or storms that rain flower petals. I am the one in control, and that means I can add to my Healing. 

✸ Aside from the sketching art course he coaxed me on taking - against mother's will - handing me The Lord of the Rings was the best thing he ever did for me. 

My drawing knew a similar course: Before the typewriter, I used to devour comic books and create my own comics, apart from drawing everything I liked or wanted to be or do, such as figure skating, ballet, princesses, green landscapes and huge suns shining. Faeries I drew most of all. I loved their beauty and their connection to nature and all creatures living there. I loved the idea of medicinal stones and herbs, and the weaving of spells to make things better. My faeries would be very cliché though, tall and slender, with wings and long dresses the way Walhalla strutted around in the Asterix and Obelix stories. When I started my own writing, I would add sketches to the story. Sometimes I would draw a scene merely to help me visualize it, so I could weave it into words. That, too, proved some kind of escape and a more direct one to be frank, because the sketch would draw me straight into the story, and I would sense my surroundings as if I was really there. I found, while writing Isangraille, the final part of my epic fantasy series Zerían's Curse, which was published in 2012, that this drawing out also put me on the path of Healing - the visualizing could detach me from the pain and the sadness, and help me focus on milder, lighter feelings that come with creating these scenes. (Because yes, despite my absurdly low self-esteem, I would feel proud of what I was able to do, even though it was pride wrapped in immense guilt.)

Up to this day, my creative mind has been saving me time and again from the feelings of despair that well up from the past. I am nowhere near the Healing end spot, but my Little Boat of Healing is getting me there. The time my laptop needs to actually get ready for writing, I fill with drawing little sketches of wisdom I would share with people in similar situations, i.e. dealing with trauma due to narcissistic abuse, and worsened by both toxic choices based on trauma and chronic illness. I weave in the wisdom I pick up from meditating, from Rumi, from Tara Brach, as well as the gentleness I receive from friends as Birgit and Ilse. The lovingkindness of good/best friends is an immeasurable necessity to rediscover your core, to re-see the golden and beautiful you that you have held imprisoned out of protective needs all those long years. And they are not to be taken lightly, because it truly takes special friends to keep supporting you, as trauma will pull you back in the trance of Fears and Darkness, for whatever reason. As I experience ever so often, I will get overwhelmed by grief and hold myself in trance, unable to step out of it. And even though these moments grow fewer as time passes, they do not lose their weight. Their heaviness is a huge burden on who I am trying to become - milder, kinder, more patient, less judgemental, and above all, more loving towards myself. I realize like no other the burden I pose to those few caring souls, willing to sacrifice their time and energy to help me see the light again, that fragile silver lining that, sometimes, I am too scared to see.

#gingerkittysketch
#littleboatofhealing

 

#blackkittysketch

The feeling of being a tremendous burden, that is absolutely trauma triggered, and that I am fighting every day. And I know I could not do this without the friends I came to know and re-know in these past few years. Of course, many left as well. Friends that were the loudest to yell they would stay forever and not be like those 'ignorants who are not willing to invest in you', as one of those put it. Trusting that not everyone is like this, proved to be the first important hurdle for me to take in re-connecting. Sketching my Black Kitty Sketch helped me a great deal, because those seemingly innocent and deeply recognisable illustrations proved to be a grateful medium to start discussions about friendship, caring, trauma and all those things that make us who we are today.

It is a great asset when you can add writing - if only a diary or a notebook for thoughts that linger - to the understanding and love that your friends give to you. Because your mind is in dire need for new pathways. New roads that lead to soft and kind destinations. And you deserve to be at peace. You deserve to have a mind that's bathing in light and warmth. It is also for that reason that I created the Black Kitty Sketch line, as well as the Ginger Kitty Sketch. Both are immerse deeply in a #littleboatofhealing vibe, each in their own way. But I feel they help me, even long after I created them, and so I am hesitantly convinced they may help others. Hesitantly, because I feel it is not my place to decide what helps another and what not. It's up to whatever you choose or feel you need. You are the one in charge for and of every aspect in your mental well-being. You just have to trust that deepest of the deep inside you, that spark of gold waiting to be re-discovered.

Dealing with trauma triggers - part 3

Healing from trauma is not easy. It is a daily struggle that can make you feel intensely alone and lonely. Because so few understand what you are going through. As with Fibromyalgia, and the sacrifices it forces you to make, only those who live(d) the same experience are able to grasp your reality, if only to some extent. 

It was my dear friend Birgit who first came up with the hashtag "little boat of healing", after I had mentioned it in one of my poems on Instagram. Since then I posted several very personal pictures on Instagram, and inevitably, I got judged for being too sensitive, too negative, too dark. I stepped away from social media then, wondering if I should continue. My primary goal for the posting was trying to help others in similar predicaments. I know I'm not the only one dealing with this kind of trauma. Instagram-friends acknowledged that, stating it is my account, and I decided what content comes on it. But after I threw myself into my pit of darkness, a response consciously triggered by my ex who is suddenly being the best dad ever and takes my son out to do all sorts of activities he knows I am unable to do, I stepped away again. I needed time to reflect on what is going on. Inside. My mind often feels too full to function correctly, I get lost in my own thinking. I now part of this is caused immense exhaustion of being wary all the time, of carrying the Fibromyalgia pain, of being at constant war with myself. I had just started a Ginger Kitty Sketch theme on #littleboatofhealing, raw sketches only, but I do feel the need to draw more elaborately, freely. Because as the posting I did on Instagram did help me find some order in chaos, so too does my drawing. To be able to put thoughts onto paper in the form of images that mean something to me as well as other people, is a great asset I am pretty proud of. And I do not pride myself on something easily. As a matter of fact, that is one of the side paths I know I need to walk, while trodding on that big path of healing.

✸ As Tara Brach asks in one of her guided RAIN meditations: What would happen if you did not talk to yourself like that? What would happen if you let those thoughts go, what kind of person would you be?

I am seeing more patterns of trauma response daily now. The way I try to compensate for my ex's erratic behaviour towards our child, so similar to how I tried compensating towards my mother for my brother's wickedness. The blaming myself after I fell into yet another trap of my ex's, the way I always blame myself after something went wrong, even if I had nothing to do with it. The shutting down completely when the Darkness arrives and the desire to cut loose every bond I still have, so similar to how I used to confine myself to my room, unable of any kindness towards myself or the world. The blaming of others for the way I feel, when in fact a lot of my misery is kept alive by myself. As Tara Brach asks in one of her guided RAIN meditations: What would happen if you did not talk to yourself like that? What would happen if you let those thoughts go, what kind of person would you be? I reflect on that a lot, both in my own RAIN meditations as throughout the day. I often think, regardless, I would be a much kinder and nicer person had the trauma never happened. If my mother had been able to muster up her own courage to seek healing of her own. Instead she turned my family against me and blamed me for being so miserable. Amongst the beatings and all the other psychological warfare, that is. But it would be easy to blame her, and it would not help me to step out of the trance of traumatic response, which is why I need to work on me.

✸ I had just started a Ginger Kitty Sketch theme on #littleboatofhealing, raw sketches only, but I do feel the need to draw more elaborately, freely. 

Ginger Kitty Sketch will surely help me. And I will, eventually, return on Instagram, but just not now. I really need to get myself back on the road to healing again, and that requires focus on myself. Not in a selfish way but in a kind and caring manner, so that my self can grow while healing from those cracks and dents caused by the past. I am not naive, I know I will never heal completely and the scars will ache and itch from time to time. But to be able to recognise the dynamics, to see the patterns, and to acknowledge my own responses to situations - without judging them and without judging me - is essential. Right now, this self of mine is far too fragile, too susceptible to what others think I should be doing. I lost my self for a long time, and now that I found it again, I will not risk losing that connection. I will still get into trance, I will make mistakes and get overwhelmed by the Fears and the Darkness. It is an inevitable truth. But with each day passing I am confident I will grow to see those experiences as opportunities to grow from. It is a long, winding road that will continue throughout the rest of my living days. But now I know, deep in my heart, that I will not have to walk it alone. 

Dealing with trauma triggers - part 2

It is a difficult thing, growing. Especially when you were brought up to believe you are worth less than a fly's crap on the wall. It also is difficult because of the flashbacks and the night terrors, and the overall need for being vigilant. To be wary all the time is exhausting. It likely caused my body to develop both colitis ulcerosa and Fibromyalgia. While the first chronic illness is well under control and poses no issue, except for the hospital meds drip every 8 weeks, the latter caused me to lose my job as a children's therapist. It robbed me of much more, socially and financially, as well as freedom and connectedness. And my EMDR therapist acknowledged the base of it is likely rooted in childhood trauma. Thank you so much, mother, and father, and brother, for so cunningly creating the opportunities for the Fears and the Darkness to move into my self.

My earliest trauma memory pinpointed at age 4, with my mother pinching my nose forcefully to have me eat cold and thickened in oatmeal porridge. I am wearing my beautiful red terry cloth apron, with a fir tree and a deer on it. And I only feel fear, a deep deep threat, when I think of that moment. At that time, my brother was. He was a terrible pain in the ass. He could be quite gentle, but had a streak to his character that was right down vicious and evil. In time, that streak grew to become his main character. My mother lost control over him as soon as he turned 4. And that must have triggered a lot of trauma in her own being - she herself was seriously abused during her own childhood, by seemingly everyone of her family, but most by her parents. 

✸ The Darkness was so suffocatingly strong, I could barely see where I ended and the Darkness began; I had turned into it. 

The Fears and the Darkness have ruled my life for as long as I can remember.
That is, until the divorce created a schism. 

Because that divorce symbolised me saying: I deserve better than to be treated this way. I did not deserve his narcissism poured over me every single day, my child did not either. I certainly did not deserve to live the rest of my days in fear of what would happen if *he* lost it. I have only a slight idea about what he is capable of, and I did not risk to wait to find out. 

This change in my normal proved essential for growth. As I mentioned, I went looking for help, in order to save myself. That can be understood quite literally. The Darkness was so suffocatingly strong, I could barely see where I ended and the Darkness began; I had turned into it. Being always short on funds, as I am disabled and financially dependant on the Government for welfare income, I had no money to get proper therapy, but also, I had ambiguous and even bad experience with four different therapists earlier (one I was appointed to by the Pain Clinic, 3 others were relationship counsellors who each sided with my ex and made me responsible for the health of our bond), so I did not want another classic therapist.

✸ It became clear that my trauma wanted out. Out of my system. Out of my mind.

I turned to a coach, for highly sensitive people (HSP). That step proved also major in me looking for alternative ways of healing. I went to see the coach only twice, and later also a couple of times with my child, who is HSP as well. It became clear that my trauma wanted out. Out of my system. Out of my mind. I looked for meditation apps, and re-invested in my yoga practice. Later I also contacted an EMDR therapist, to dig into the core of trauma - when covid-19 shut down life as we knew it, this therapy was helping me greatly and I even experienced alleviation of my Fibromyalgia pain, but it could not be continued, as EMDR demands safety in face-to-face contact. We scheduled a video conference but then she forgot to actually schedule it and I felt forgotten, and unimportant; trauma trigger, indeed. We were able to do the conference anyway, and I did mention how I felt, and why - she was a bit taken aback by it - but since then there has been silence, and I am afraid to reach out, fearing she does not have time for me; yes, trauma trigger again. I have no idea when I will have the courage to step out of that triggered thinking.

In the meantime, I focus on meditation and yoga, and I also dare to reach out to those special souls who have supported me for so long. That, too, is growing, if you ask me. Because with these friends, even though the Fear of Abandonment is still strong, I feel I can risk to be open. And with the RAIN meditation I am able to both acknowledge, allow and soothe the Fear.

Dealing with trauma triggers - part 1

Looking back on my life, my growing up to the person I am today feels like an entanglement of traumatic episodes, kept alive by attaching myself to similarly toxic persons as the one who started the primary narcissistic abuse. Those episodes, in addition, are not seldomly triggered by seemingly innocent events or confrontations, pushing me into the corner of defense and self-destructive talk, leading me time and again into a vicious cycle of hamster-wheel running. And I get tired of it, literally and figuratively speaking.

So, where to start in the attempt to get out of this trance, as Tara Brach calls these moments of being caught up in the emotional backlash, the limbic response to life?

For me, change subtly took off when I got divorced. Seemingly amiable in nature, this divorce was in fact mean and slick. It was a matter of conceding on my part, and loads of resistance on his. We had made a list of things we each liked to keep, equal in worth. It turned out, as I realised years later, that I had willingly given up a lot of stuff that was in my right to keep. He never mentioned that of course. He even got upset when I insisted on keeping the good steaming iron as my - weird - parents had given that to me as it is an easier and much lighter one than the old iron. There was a minor quarrel over books to keep; minor, because I soon gave in. I was reluctant to start bickering over that - books were stuff, not things I absolutely wanted to take with me. As far as I was concerned, I just wanted out, to be safe. And I wanted my child out too, for his safety. My ex was a very unpredictable force of darkness back then, and he was frightening me.bulging under frustration.

✸ I would talk myself right into my own pit of darkness, deep enough to be unable to see any flicker of light.

His darkness since then crept back under his skin, seeping through in carefully timed flashes, mingled in with neutral or even kind conversations, flipping the scales straight back into the turmoil of the marriage. Now that I am physically away, it feels easier to take those moments on, but only slightly so. At first, I fell into every single trap - he would say something he knew triggered me, and I was on it, head on, bulging under frustration, anger, self-resentment, blame and guilt. I would talk myself right into my own pit of darkness, deep enough to be unable to see any flicker of light. Two years after the divorce, things got so bad I realised I needed help. Right away. That decision saved my life.

This is the fourth year after fleeing the marriage, and I have been working on dealing with my childhood trauma which got enhanced by both the marriage and the toxic friends I mingled with. It is a strange thing, the way we look to attach to what we know to be normal. Not too long after my initial EMDR therapy sessions I recognised how I desperately try bonding to people who are similarly toxic as my mother and my ex are. It still is mind-blowingly baffling to me. I have put myself in emotionally destructive situations, just because they were familiar. As a result my responses were inevitably trauma triggered: I'd lose myself into blaming them, blaming me, shaming myself, resent myself and wanting to disappear because I was as useless as a pig's backside (as my mother used to snap at me; another favourite was that I was too stupid to dance for the devil). I'd shut down completely and attack the friends triggering me, posing myself as a miserable piece of shit that they maltreated consciously. no wonder I lost so many people back then. No wonder I started to think nobody loved me because see, they were always leaving me, sometimes after yet another trauma tantrum, or after they had used me for whatever healing they needed me and then lost interest. Both happened on a regular basis, I just kept blaming them and blaming me, and failed to see what was underneath it all. I call them the Fears and the Darkness. 

The ongoing struggle of healing

It was naive of me to think I finally had reached that part of my journey when I could lay my head and rest for a while. No, it's nothing dramatic going on, just a minor setback in my mind. It's something I need to get out, as part of the ongoing healing. But I am tired and a migraine now has taken over the normal fibromyalgia pain, and thinking is taking a tremendous effort. 

I'm not sure what caused this mental setback. It could have started when we got back from the pet store to buy supplies for the cats and birthday presents for Little Spottedleaf - she turns 1 on June 19. We both were very tired on the drive home; my boy suffering from a massive hay fever episode, and me from just using up too many spoons in too short a time. Back home I received a phone call that the water butt which I had ordered early March, had finally arrived. By then, the migraine was happily settling and I had difficulty concentrating and thinking, besides the total lack of energy, so no way I was going to crawl behind the wheel again. I asked my ex, since he lives close to the store keeping the water butt. When he arrived at my door, he was joyfully telling me about the virtual drink he would be attending when he got home. Normally he and his colleagues do this every Thursday in real life, but you know, corona. Instead of wishing him a happy time, I answered in a resentful tone, That's the joy of being able to work, right, get-togethers with co-workers; something that people forget about being chronically ill, I don't have that - and I added, silently to myself, I feel so very isolated. And useless, as a person, as a member of society. And then I felt guilty too, because I could not mute the resentment and be more friendly towards my ex, who, after all, had been so kind to get me that water butt.

It also could have started yesterday, on seeing a post of a magnificent artist I follow on Instagram. She only recently started experimenting with watercolour, and I was in awe of those wonderful pieces she created. I felt a pang of sadness, realising I would never be as good as she is. I am too amateuristic, too clumsy and trial&error still - and while I was thinking that, I knew I was being too hard on myself. Later that evening, I did Tara Brach's newly added meditation, Light RAIN in difficult times, and I cried the entire 9.5 minutes - because my difficult time was, yet again, me feeling inadequate and insufficient, falling short on so many aspects of being and accomplishing that I was drowning in quicksand again. 

And I was doing so well, I thought in-between my sadness and the nurturing part of the RAIN technique. I was doing so well, feeling light and capable, and managing boundaries and feeling proud of me. Yet, here I was, huddling in Peach's blanket, sniffling at the hot tears on my trembling hands, trying with an air of desperation to comfort the little girl inside me, mumbling that, YES, she was good enough and that I knew she tried the best she could - but the words felt hollow and I almost saw them fall around me, like fallen leaves in Autumn. 

It also might have started already last week, secretly, on realising that once again I would not be able to handle this month's finances. The ever-present frustration about my financial situation has been a heavy mental and emotional burden ever since I lost my job, so many years ago, but in the beginning it was buffered by my now ex's paycheck and the burden definitely less heavy than it is now. The divorce three years ago put me in much more delicate position, as I left with debts and even though my disability benefits have increased, my tax assessment did too, almost five times as much as I used to pay - or almost 1.5 month's worth of my benefits. Since I was not aware of that, I have been like driftwood on the sea of bills, debts and taxes ever since. If it weren't for the kindness and huge generosity of many people on Instagram, and one lovely woman in particular, I would have been with Social Services ages ago, and they would have managed all my money affairs and taken away my independency and perhaps also my cats and maybe the care of my child. For at that particular time, I even wasn't able to buy bread. I cannot express how deep the shame runs in me, of not being able to take care of my wallet, my bank account - to an outsider it may well seem money is leaking through my fingers, or to put it in my ex father-in-law: That I am a bottomless hole. Yes, I like to buy art supplies, and I did pay for some apps that give me pleasure. I do like to buy bird food if I can, to sustain the wild birds in my garden. And I do buy (expensive, for me) supplements to support my cats' health, as I know they work; and I do the same for myself since medication in itself is not enough - I have spent countless euros on supplements that I hoped would help, most of which did not but now I finally seem to have found the good ones.

But I have lived two years without buying anything for myself - no books, clothes, shoes. I mean, I really AM NOT leaking money through my fingers. Only this year I was able to buy some books for myself, and new bedding, thanks to the generous birthday gifts I received from two of my dearest friends. And thanks to some donations I got from my artwork I finally could buy birthday presents of my own for several other friends. I haven't been able to do so in ... like forever.

I know healing is a journey. I know it takes time, especially because of the severity and intensity of the trauma I endured as a child and long after in adulthood. I know. 

I know the stigma my mother engraved in my bones won't fully disappear. But I hate to hear her voice in my head once more - you are not worthy; you are unfit to deal with reality; you are unlovable; we never expected you to become a mother; you fail as a mother; you are too dumb to even dance before the devil; you have accomplished nothing worthwhile in your entire life; the books you wrote are stupid fairytales, nothing to be proud of; you should stop drawing those idiot sketches, stupid faeries, you live in a fantasy world; you are too sensitive, and weak; yes, I think you are pretty but I have to, because I am your mother. 

I try so hard not to listen. 

But I fear I fail at that too.

One day I will allow myself to believe there ARE people who love me

It was only last year, when I finally mustered up the courage to look for a new therapist, that I was able to really tackle the idea of my mother not only being narcissistic but also not having loved me, at all. That was a tough truth to take in, but in the end it was the step I needed to take to even begin my healing.

I have been posting a lot on Instagram about the start of this journey. Recently, I came across some really personal struggles and truths which stopped me from posting more. I still am not convinced I should continue posting, but I feel I can write about it in my blog. Few people read this still so chances are slim that I offend or hurt people. The last thing I want is trigger other people's traumatic pasts.

For the record, I went no contact with my family, now 2.5 years ago. In that regard it is fairly easy for me to deal with the echoes of the past, since they are physically a long distance away from me. Yet, reading "Will I ever be enough?" by Dr. Karyl McBride, I need to add that the mental separation is far from established. With my new therapist, I was working on that, through EMDR, but then covid-19 happened, and my therapy sessions were cancelled. The one video consult that we did, never had the power a real session has, and my therapist refuses to try on EMDR that way. It means that I am a bit left to my own devices, trying to keep my head above the dark deep of anxiety, where the mother monsters lurk. 

Lately, triggers reviving the trauma have been everywhere, popping up like daisies, buttercups, and clovers in an early Summer meadow. Instead of the careful responses which I had been practising while in therapy, I now find myself trauma responding: with fear, with blaming myself, with guilt, with shame, and a lot of self-destructive thoughts ("I'm not good enough", "I am not living up to expectations", "I am unlovable"). I often feel as if walking on quicksand, desperately trying to keep up life's pace - even in these corona times - and pretend I got everything under control, if only for the sake of my son. Trauma responding also means I am very purposefully shutting down, out of fear I am being a burden, keeping away from social media as much as possible, because I think no one wants me there anyway, and only staying in touch with a chosen few I have learned to trust. This, in short, is not good. 

One very striking passage in Dr. Karyl McBride's healing guide Will I ever be good enough? is:

Most damaging is that a narcissistic mother never approves of her daughter simply for being herself, which the daughter desperately needs in order to grow into a confident woman. A daughter who doesn’t receive validation from her earliest relationship with her mother learns that she has no significance in the world and her efforts have no effect. She tries her hardest to make a genuine connection with Mom, but fails, and thinks that the problem of rarely being able to please her mother lies within herself. This teaches the daughter that she is unworthy of love. The daughter’s notion of mother-daughter love is warped; she feels she must “earn” a close connection by seeing to Mom’s needs and constantly doing what it takes to please her. Clearly, this isn’t the same as feeling loved. Daughters of narcissistic mothers sense that their picture of love is distorted, but they don’t know what the real picture would look like. This early, learned equation of love—pleasing another with no return for herself—has far-reaching, negative effects on a daughter’s future romantic relationships

Because in these words I recognised my entire life, up to when I shut her out, and more, I recognised the same destructive pattern - the validation seeking, the forcing a connection, the desire to be part of someone's life - in all of my earlier friendships. Earlier as in 'before I came to realise the long-lasting impact of my mother's narcissism on every aspect of my life'. Needless to say I only could save a few of those friends, thanks to their understanding and patience, and - dare I say it? - love for me. Therapy now is helping me stripping all emotion off single traumatic events, and I complement that therapy with my own research on narcissistic mothers - such as the book by Dr. McBride, and also Mothers who can't love, by Dr. Susan Forward - and I listen to Tara Brach's podcasts on healing in presence, to investigate what is really alive in my heart. Both the reading and the podcasts are confronting me with unwanted flashbacks from the past, situations I really do not want to relive - and some come back to me in my dreams - but I apparently need to accept, to sit with, to finally release them as part of what has been, in order to move on. 

This afternoon I noted in my diary that the mere idea of someone missing me actually is completely idiotic. And this is what I need to un-learn. I need to finally accept there ARE people missing me, or sad that I am no longer in their lives. There ARE people happy to get a text message from me. And I am able - I AM ABLE - to make other people happy. And there actually are people who love me, for me. Which means that I am lovable, regardless of what she stated for all my life.

But it will be a long journey ere I will allow myself to truly believe that. From what I now know, this journey to healing will take many years, with quite the amount of setbacks and an unexpected amount of intensely joyous moments. Yet, when I reach that point, that milestone in my healing, I believe I will finally see myself for who I am. The one that was supposed to be destroyed but survived against the odds. 

 

Always The Fear

When I look at myself in the mirror, I always have to take a deep breath to look beyond the features that are so like my mother's. The eyes, the mouth, the bitterness that seeps from my skin. A bitterness that is not mine, but that I came to associate with her, as I did the resentfulness. And then the nausea comes. Swiftly followed by the sadness, the anger. And The Fear. Always The Fear. So I build my walls, high and vast, and I hope this time they will protect me from betrayal and abandonment.

Healing from trauma takes a lot of energy. It takes a lot of guts and time too. Patience and kindness with oneself. A huge help is a loving kindness network of people you can turn to if the journey to healing gets too much, people who understand and are willing to sit with you, people who do not judge or try to fix you, people who listen, who comfort just be being who they are.

Recently, I am going through an overwhelming streak of trauma responses: It seems everything turns into a trigger. And every trigger leads into a trauma response. I started out well enough, managing to keep the fear from running wild. In the not so distant past, I used to fall into blackness so intense I felt as if being swallowed whole, generalising what happened to everything and everyone I know. That way I shut myself off, building my walls so high I could barely see the light of day. Now the walls are there, but maybe only heart-high, and I try to refrain from generalising. It is scary. To allow room for light, for a mindset that is not totally doomed. But The Fear remains. The Fear that I will lose everything and everyone in the blink of an eye.

Living with trauma is intense. It is very hard to trust your instincts because you were taught to believe no one is to be trusted, yourself least of all. I was beaten severely to make sure I understood I was worth less than a speck of dust on her clothes. I learned to fear, not only her, but my own self - for the longest time I panicked when I had to make a decision. And I learned to distrust my father and my brother, as too often they sided with her, alienating me from my own family.

I doubted everything. Friendships most of all: I was always looking for confirmation that I was wanted, that I really belonged. I intensely believed I was only lovable if I complied with everything, and that resulted in me getting mixed up in some bad situations with men and also with friendships. But at that time, I somehow still confided in her and she used those confessions, that already were drowning me in shame and guilt, as evidence for her statements, that I indeed was unlovable, unworthy, sick in the mind, and attention-seeking. She actually sent me a letter once, telling me how I should live my life because clearly I made all the wrong decisions and I fretted far too much over stupid little things.

That legacy took the form of a dark fear looming over my every day. Sometimes it is just a greyish hue, others it is nightblack, but there are days that start off so gloomily that I brace myself as soon as I get up. The Fear intensifies when bonds get mixed up, especially with people I trust, and this huge red flag starts bleeding all over the place. As one of my close friends confirmed: "It's your intuition calling, and she is right!" -- and I have to agree: every time the red flag started bleeding in the past, and regardless of me addressing the issue to the friend, the relationship wilted. And because I refused to merely accept that, I started fighting against the process, desperately longing for a true bond to ... succeed. 

I know now, in a way, I have been seeking, unconsciously, for the acceptance, validation and love, not to mention acknowledgement and approval, that my mother never granted to me - and I looked for it in people who turned out to be, somehow, as equally toxic as she is.

In that regard, my path of healing is teaching me valuable lessons: I am more able to recognise toxic dynamics, even though I am still frozen with fear at times, and I still ignore some red flags, because I hope this time I am wrong.

It also points out, rather painfully, how I have been attaching myself, longing to fill the void in me, to people who themselves seemed to have been stuck and looked for their healing through me. That is a cycle I want to break -- I need to do my own healing, regardless what others want from me. And I need to keep trusting, because there are people who have my best interests at heart. They are the ones holding up the umbrella when I feel it's always raining on me. And I am deeply grateful for them, as they have to endure a lot of crap from me.

So. In a nutshell, building m is not a matter of not willing, but of daring. And it is not a matter of arrogance, but of self protection. 

Bad eggs

I had a really weird dream. It was not a nightmare as such, but it left a bitter taste and a sense of uneasiness throughout the entire day. My brother was in the dream and I woke with a lucid echo of his terrifying accusation about how I ruined his life.

It happened when we were out for dinner; my parents, my then boyfriend and I; for the very first time. There was no friction yet, my mother had me fooled she accepted the boyfriend and my father had put on his costume of important executive. While waiting for our orders to be served, my brother called me on my mobile phone, and he started screaming straight away, how I destroyed his entire future and how he would never be able to get a normal romantic relationship because of me. He referred to the best girl he ever had; and how she met me and we became close friends, and she broke up with him shortly after. The same happened with the second best girlfriend he ever had - one afternoon out with me, of shoe shopping, seemed to have ruined her affections for him. Because I introduced her to her own freedom of choice (instead of his bullying and manipulative behaviour).

From early on, my brother's behaviour resembled that of my narcissistic manipulative mother. Growing older, he got meaner and sneakier, and consciously trying to disrupt our family as well as me personally. He would make sure I took the full blow of my mother's rage; even when he was to blame. He lied and spied for her pretending to be on my side, while passing on any information of my thoughts and visions and whereabouts to her - so I could receive any punishment. It took me a terribly long time to realise that to some extent he was treating me worse than my mother did. When my father was admitted to hospital because of his leg going septic after a minor injury, my brother nearly forbade me to pay him a visit. He called me on my parents' landline; making sure I knew they were in on it, while at the same time my mother pretended she never knew anything of my brother's intention to keep me out. I did go, however, and I got soothed by my mother who swore my brother had no right to push me off like that/ Only later I learned she damned well knew and had agreed on it - but there, at the hospital, she smelled an opportunity to alienate him and me even more.
This became very obvious on my son's first birthday, on which he retreated to a corner with my mother; whispering to her the whole time, while my father stood watch; and my brother's unknown girlfriend and her two daughters sat silently on the sofa, only to leave after the etiquettishly one hour attendance.

Things never were normal in my family, but from that day on I realised there could only be one solution. I went no contact with my brother shortly after. I did the same with my parents five years later.

But my brother's accusations linger.
Especially because I recognise his anger in the careful ways my friends keep their other friends away from me. I never understood why, for instance, one girlfriend in the past would meet me one day at some place and meet another girlfriend at that same place two days later. Why not mix up, go together, wouldn't that be fun, since she talks of that other friend so often I already seem to know her my entire life?
"No, because she is so much different from you that it would not work."
Excuse me?
"I will not risk losing either friendship just because she might think you're a bad egg for coming between us."

Well, the same excuse was given to me by several other friends. Apart from birthday parties, I was not to know these other people about whom they gossipped or complained; or who they revered or felt sad for. And then I found out these others never knew a thing, or very little and most of it negative, about me.
Suddenly it wasn't about being different anymore:
It was not only about being a bad egg and friendship-wrecking.
Suddenly I was some sort of best kept secret.

Why?
Because like my brother so firmly believes, I would steal their friends? Because of the possibility these friends might like me? Because I am just me? Or because I indeed am a bad egg, incapable of keeping close friendships because I like to destroy?

I am still very confused about it. I keep pondering the possible answers - they are hurtling through my mind like leaves in a gale. I am fully aware of the fact that I may indeed have done bad things, I am human after all, a human who survived a lot of crap and still is paying a price for that.
After all, we are all bad in someone's story.
But we cannot all be bad in everyone's story. So I refuse to be the bad egg here because someone else is unwilling to face their own insecurities.