I am getting a larger view of my life now after all of these years of introspection and therapy.. being pulled up short by my brother’s ability to stymie my life with regards to my inheritance at times makes me angry and resentful and at other times ashamed.. Yes Mum left me this money but what did I do to earn it, so maybe I dont have the right to be upset.. However, when I talk this over with my therapist she reminds me how much I suffered in my family and how enmeshed I was and how I do deserve at least to be cared for in this ways.
That truth is often I beat myself up… I wish at times I made different choices.. my sister in law told me after my husband left I should run as far away from my Mum and family as I could, but at that point I had not bonded truly with them ever and there was a gaping hole there I had tried to fill with addictions and then in pursuit of relationships..
When I met my husband, six month before finally getting sober in 1993, I do not think I knew what it took for a good relationship and I had so many developmental holes inside of me.. towards the end when he told me I was killing his spirit it hurt so much. I could not move forward and back to the UK with him to leave family and I look back now and see that going back may not have solved my deeper need for individuation either.. as it was when I tried to go back a year after he left me and build a new life there, I had that massive head injury which still affects my teeth and digestion. I opted for a sinus operation two years after moving back to my home town because I wasn’t addressing my frustration and complex feelings including grief around my family…. A year later after several hospitalisations in the psyche ward my second sister spoke cruel words behind my back to her and my sister’s sons and that shocked me, I had the feeling she didn’t like or understand me much for a very long time, was so caught up in her on point of view and was labelling me as the ‘bad’ and wilful child… However, I have learned, that she was the one that tried to encourage Mum to go to Sydney and be with me when I needed a termination of pregnancy for medical reasons to a man who was so emotionally unavailable. Luckily when I had that breakdown a few years before getting sober I had my god parents to move in with.. honestly without them I may be dead of suicide by now.
Anyway slowly I am trying to lay these ghosts to rest… I could not expect the world to understand why and how I was so deeply haunted or traumatised, I don’t carry the external scars for the head trauma though both legs are severely scared from the first crash and I wear denture now and am missing 5 teeth…. .. It’s been enough just to feel I have a right to exist as me, let alone have my true feelings.. Mum would collapse in the face of righteous anger and I have seen my two sisters thrown into collapse or fawn responses or negated when they tried to confront the family system, that valued economics and emotional distance over closeness, empathy, true feeling and warmth.
Today I was up early exercising to fight my way out of recent resentments.. Japser and I just got out for two nice long walks and outings to the lake beaches around us and it occurred to me to write a post on creating our lives after trauma..(in the midst of making a healthy lunch of roast carrot and pumpkin wraps.)
Yesterday Rayne of Journey Towards Healing shared a link to the following article on her blog…
https://www.anniewrightpsychotherapy.com/the-gifts-of-coming-from-a-trauma-background/
it addresses the ‘gifts’ of coming from a trauma background and I found it so useful…. I believe there does come a point in working through our trauma that we deepen in our lives and emotional intelligence, trauma therapist Peter Levine says that trauma opens us to the spiritual side of life. In having to face the dark side of life, other people, ourselves and human nature we become seers and adventurers or indeed even ‘shamans’ of a kinds.. Being exiled or scapegoated or suffering from and having to heal and understand the multi-levels of trauma and addiction as well as emotional distancing we have the challenging task of learning how to champion ourselves amidst so much misunderstanding or further forms of invalidation abuse. I read a very interesting perspective on this kind of recovery in the 12 step book Drop the Rock yesterday in which one of the people quoted how recovery involves an uncovery, discovery and discarding process. What we most have to discard includes shame based conditioning and projections from a damaged family, collective or culture.
Also as trauma or neglect and abuse survivors we must always remember if trauma fragments us and our reality as it does, then we can make a piece of unique art with the fragments.. Piecing ourselves back together is a work of epic proportions and along the way we find our way back to the lost soul as well as those people who understand us and have lived through similar challenges….we get opportunities to grieve and find joy, we see the laughter and the tears and learn not to reject either on the path to wholeness..
Creating my own happy life after trauma involves a multi disciplinary approach. These are some of the things I use to enhance recovery:
Blogging, journalling, reading and writing and poetry.
Watching movies to tap into hope, fun or deeper emotions like anger or sadness.
Talking issues through with a therapist or like minded souls.
Creating and preparing nutritious food.
Listening to music to help me process, dive deep or uplift my spirit.
Walks in nature and by water to ground myself in life.
Sitting in sunlight.
Connecting to my higher power, angels, spirits or guides through reading or meditation or channelling.
Lying with my dog and tuning into his breath and heartbeat while calming and synchronising my own.
Inner child work.
Dancing.
All of us have our unique blend of things that we can find to tap into to enrich our lives.. Most importantly too is finding the value of POSITIVE HEALING CONNECTIONS in our lives with those who VALIDATE AND UNDERSTAND US IN ALL DIMENSIONS..Such a thing may sound a big ask and in time we learn who is safe and not safe, as we learn not to take on negative projections or deep seated fears or psychic defences of others, We can also find our inner loving mother and father or god parents…angels, fairies, ancestors… all these imaginative forms of connection can help and sustain us… in those moments when we feel most deserted by the empathic failures of wounded human beings.
Emerging From The Dark Night 