As I said last week, my goal is to write on a weekly basis… so here we are, eight days later. Hey, I’m improving, it wasn’t a month between posts. Go me. I have been giving it thought all week, trying to figure out what I will write about but really putting my fingers to the keyboard seems like the best way to go for now so here goes. I have worked hard this last week to stay on track and really work at getting things in line for this business. It’s nice having something positive to put my feelings into. That is how I got started with this business in the first place. Funny how things come around full circle. I am pretty excited for what is to come. I have worked hard both in this business and on myself these last few years, to really get to this place that I finally feel ready to take this all on. And I do feel ready. Of course I am way nervous, but I know I am capable of doing this. I finally have some confidence. I am a very skilled individual. I also have a lot of people standing behind me, believing in me. That really helps. This week has really been helpful in taking steps forward because I’ve been able to get my production process down and really finetune a lot of details. It’s a work in progress, and it’s coming together, One Step At A Time. Supporting people I care about has been a big part of this process as well. Knowing that sharing my Experience, Strength & Hope helps people I love and care for, makes all the difference. Knowing that people I care about are lacking the support they need in their lives in order to lead more fulfilling lives, is a big motivator for where this business is heading. When I started my recovery journey, I was on my own. I had a few friends that supported me, but I later realized how much I outgrew them because much of the support that was offered, was not healthy which was making matters worse. So I felt even more alone and just had a really hard time finding help. It wasn’t until I found my twelve step program a few years after working to get better, that I finally started to make progress. That really changed things for me because it gave me positive support and lots of tools. Which led to even more support and even more tools. Now I feel supported in many areas of my life, through friends, family, support groups and organizations. It makes all the difference. Knowing I am not alone. Knowing that I can make a phone call and reason things out with another person, helps me to get better and find solutions that work for me, that will help guide me toward positive change. Especially so if my support is healthy, coming from a place of love and selflessness. I strive to be that positive support for others, that I wish I had had when I started my journey. That’s also why this last few weeks have been so difficult for me. I am the one needing support, which means I have not been able to be there fully for people I really care about and I’m having to refill my cup in other, more simple ways. Thankfully everyone understands, but it doesn’t make me feel any better. Though I am blessed to have so many wonderful people who help encourage me and respect my need for healing, that’s pretty amazing. Because right now I am much more sensitive than normal, requiring even more care. One of the most important things that I have learned when it comes to supporting people, especially when it pulls on my heart strings, is to take extra good care of myself so that I can keep being there for people. And setting boundaries so that I am not giving too much of myself. That’s a lot of what I have had to do these last few weeks in order to get better. It’s hard though too because that means I can’t be there at times. Yesterday I wanted so badly to be there for a friend of mine but I just was not able. I am getting better, but the situation hit too close to home for me to be of any help. Instead I had to take extra care of myself and really reflect on my healing. You see, my dear friend made the decision to chase recovery, which meant she had to leave her best friend and partner behind because he is not yet ready to put in the work. I have been through that very same thing… more than once and in varying ways. Having to leave behind a loved one who we so badly want to help and want to have join our journey of recovery, is such a heartbreaking experience. Knowing our loved ones are in pain and there is nothing we can do about it except to take care of ourselves, that’s a hard choice for most to feel good about in the moment. And anyone who is capable of stepping back and letting their loved one figure it out for themselves, while working to be strong enough to be there for them, is such a strong being. To carry the weight of one’s own journey while staying strong for those we love, that is what unconditional love is all about. When I went through similar the first time, I was not healthy about how I chose to fight. I made matters worse. Much worse. I was not capable of detachment or forgiveness, and I had no tools. I just didn’t know any better. I didn’t know that my choices were unhealthy… to me it was normal behavior. Now I know much different. Now I know that we all have our own journey and finding things out for ourselves is how we learn and do better. Nothing I do can make someone do something I want them to, even if it’s for their own good. But I can share my Experience, Strength & Hope, take good care of myself, work my program and really put in the work to get better, showing others that recovery is possible. Because reality is, when someone is not ready, it’s likely they do not have the solutions that work for them and they have no idea where to even start. I get it. I mean really, how does someone do something different from what they know, when they don’t know what else to try because they don’t know it yet? We can’t. Instead we have an opportunity to lead by example and to build healthy support, showing those who are still suffering, that recovery is possible. The journey of recovery, no matter what it looks like or what a person may be in recovery from, it is a challenging and trying experience. You will be tested in ways that will make you want to give up. You will just want the pain to end, and you will beg for relief. You will wish that you were back to being naïve and unaware. And yet something inside you will tell you that you’re on the right path. You will somehow keep pushing forward, putting one foot in front of the other, not knowing where you got the strength. Things will start to become more clear over time, keeping you motivated to stay on track and make better decisions. You will gain phone numbers of people to call, willing to talk things through with you. You will gain Strength, Wisdom and Courage. I know in my heart, that is what my dear friend is doing. This is one of the hardest things she has ever done, but thankfully she has the support and tools to help her be successful in her journey. And now she gets the chance to show her loved one, what that looks like and that it is possible to find contentment, and even happiness, no matter the world around us. I hope that in sharing my story and creating the right message with these candles, I can help more people know that they too can find serenity. Stay tuned followers, the best has yet to come.
Tag: trauma recovery
Stepping out…
It’s been a while since I wrote. I’ve been going through a lot. I honestly don’t even know where to begin to share really, but the reality is, I have to just start putting my fingers to the keyboard and let things flow. Part of my mission is to be vulnerable and share my journey, in hopes to help other people and to support this mission of change. By sharing my recovery story, I hope to help educate and give people understanding about how our untreated trauma can affect all areas of our lives without even realizing it’s happening. The goal is to keep up on at least one blog post a week, a few short Facebook posts, and maybe some Instagram or TikTok… I haven’t decided yet. But maybe me putting it out there will help keep me accountable, we’ll see. I’m confident that it will all come together in time.
Anyways, so here’s the deal, I am officially capped out. I have nothing left to give. I am making a conscious decision to Keep It Simple… for now. By focusing on me, my recovery and this project, I will heal and get better, so that I am better able to be there for others the way I am meant to be. The thing is, with all the things I am going through, and some most recent happenings, if I don’t slow down, I may relapse. I feel the urge to go back to my old coping habits of anger and destruction. No, thank you. I would much rather choose a healthier path, so instead I am focusing on Gratitude, Trust, Vulnerability and Forgiveness. Four very important virtues that I am still trying to figure out. Part of my journey is to understand and actively practice them in all aspects of my life. In doing so, I will be a healthier version of me. It makes sense though, that anger and destruction are where I want to go back to… it’s what I have known all my life. Growing up in an alcoholic home came with a lot of poor coping habits of not handling our emotions in healthy ways… and we definitely didn’t talk about our feelings. There was no positive communication or addressing conflict in healthy ways. It didn’t exist. To no fault of anyone. They are just not skills any of us ever had. It’s something now that I work hard at every day to change in positive ways. Through the work in my program, I have found new ways of expressing myself. I write a lot about that piece of my journey in my earlier posts. I would encourage all of my readers to check out my other posts over the years. It’ll give you some perspective into who I am on a deeper level and you’re likely to find some helpful tools. Perspective is where I really started to open up.
Throughout my time in recovery, I have been working extra hard to overcome (and grow) from the affects of alcoholism in the home and relationships, domestic violence, childhood sexual abuse, work traumas, mental health issues, chronic pain, single-momhood, and so much more. Those top three things are what has really driven my behaviors for so many years, causing the highest level of trauma. Now that I’m in recovery, all I have ever known has changed. It’s all new, uncomfortable and yet feels good. Proof that we do recover. Which is funny because most people hear recovery, and they think recovery from drugs and alcohol. No one ever thinks about the fact that a person has to recover from years of childhood sexual abuse by a family member and the many years of poor coping that follows. And that’s because it goes untalked about and is misunderstood. Just like alcoholism in the home… the family disease that no one ever talks about. Just like domestic violence… it goes untalked about, unreported. Imagine having multiple of these things piling up over years and years, and how damaging it can be to someone’s self-worth, never actually working through it in healthy ways. Yeah, pretty bad right? That’s where I’ve been… until the last few years anyways. Back in January things were getting pretty heavy for me… and dark. Scary dark. I started having really unpleasant, suicidal thoughts. It was a pretty scary time, and honestly sometimes still can be. It’s a work in progress. At least now I know how to pick up the phone and reach out when I start making my way down the dark rabbit hole that does me no good to visit. I used to live there. I am so grateful I made a decision to get better. It’s been quite the journey. But for the first time in all my years of living in trauma, I now no longer go straight to not feeling good enough or feeling unworthy. At least now I give myself space to use the tools I’ve learned and really heal. It’s taken a lot of practice and hard work to get to a place I am able to do that first and foremost… now it is just second nature. It was so much harder to do when I was stuck feeling like I wasn’t enough. For too long I let my self-worth be measured by others. It makes sense though given the fact that safety was taken away from me when I was just a young girl, I grew up in a home where my voice did not matter, I was constantly told that I would never amount to anything, and throughout my lifetime I have been treated/assaulted in ways that made me feel completely insignificant. And when a person is low enough, they accept unacceptable behaviors, making them feel even worse over and over again. Oh the things that will be discussed in time. For now I will focus on why I am sharing all this with you today… Moving forward, I will be sharing details about things I have worked through in my recovery, which can be quite triggering for some, and healing for others. Throughout the year I have worked hard to cope through clusters of my trauma in EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization & Reprocessing) Therapy; it’s basically a fast track, reframing the trauma and mindset, to more positive thinking/self-talk, reducing the need for many years of talk therapy. So far I have worked through my long-term childhood sexual abuse by a family member, a prior relationship with an alcoholic, and a DV event where I was strangled. Those were all pretty intense traumas that I worked hard to stuff down for a lot of years because I didn’t have the skill to work through them in healthy ways. I did the best I could. I had slowly accepted those things happened to me and that I was getting better, but through the EMDR therapy, I have come out so much stronger and with a much higher level of awareness and growth in healthy ways. It’s a blessing really. I know I am getting better because those are things I am able to talk about now. Maybe not always with ease, but I can do it without the pain they once caused me. I still have quite a bit to work through, and I’ll share along the way if I am feeling up to it. As of a few weeks ago, I switched over to regular talk therapy while I work to navigate a recent traumatic event that caused a pretty significant trigger, which as you can probably imagine, has me at a place that I have no choice but to take care of me before I have a complete breakdown. Triggers are funny like that. While I’m trying to work through feeling my feelings with the traumatic event, it’s causing me more awareness in areas I was not expecting to have to face like this from another event that surfaced and intensifies what I’m going through. And there’s no going back now. I am going to embrace this opportunity for growth, but it is really, really uncomfortable. Which means I have to take extra good care of myself, so that I don’t fall back into that negative self-talk of “I am not good enough” or “I am unworthy”… “I am unlovable”… “I am pathetic”… the list goes on and on. Being there mentally is exhausting. Battling that negative self-talk, also exhausting. It gets even worse when unhealthy, toxic people try to project their negative stuff onto you, which they do because they are uncomfortable within themselves. However, my history of being a people pleaser who likes to carry everyone’s burdens, is a recipe for disaster for those types. I always lose. I sure am glad that I know more about boundaries and detachment now. I am blessed to have my lived experience and extensive toolbox, as they help me be the person I am today.
Thankfully I have great support and I have spent the last couple of weeks setting myself up with the right support people for what I need right now, and I am going to face what I am going through head-on. I sure am proud of my strength. Even when I want to give up, run away, or worse crosses my mind, I put one foot in front of the other and take One Step at a Time. I continue to show up… maybe not with bells on, but I show up and give all I’ve got. We are all survivors. We all only know what we know. It’s important to always be kind to ourselves. Give yourself space to understand who you are as a person. Making a decision to do better is where our power lives. Stay tuned followers, the best has yet to come.
Here is some helpful information about EMDR Therapy in case you are interested in how it works. https://www.emdr.com/what-is-emdr/