I just read these words written about the character of Lena in Australian novelist Alex Miller’s book The Path of Love.. It got me to thinking not only about myself by my living sister, and it made me realize that until we can care for and about ourselves nothing will change..
I believe we grow up learning to hurt and shame ourselves. We are not born with a ‘hole in the soul’ but we are born dependent.. As babies we are literally dependent upon the quality of care we receive and if that is not good and we go on to parent and do not address it, the wounds just get passed on.. Understanding this makes me feel those who judge those who have terminations of pregnancy are wrong and misguided on both an emotional and spiritual level. I have shared honestly in my blog that a big part of my story of emotional neglect and addiction involved 6 terminations of pregnancy.. It is not something I am happy about or proud of and I have shared one of the stories of the third one I had in Switzerland on the anniversary of my father’s death the year before in 1985. Last week I wrote about the first one but I did not have the courage to post it.. Part of my mind was saying that no one wanted to hear about it, the second that it was part of the past and needed to be let go of while another thought this is part of my addiction story and its honest to share it..Anyway I will probably post if after I put this out here today, 9th November. But I was sane enough at the time when I was still in full blown addiction to know that, for me, bringing a baby to term would be wrong as I lacked the capacity to truly know how to nurture a child.. I am still learning how to nurture my own vulnerable arrested parts.
What is becoming clearer to me now is the mothering wound I suffered from, that all members of our family suffered from.. We did not know how to really care for and love ourselves and sadly in my case I also learned to shame, judge and often be downright cruel to myself growing up. This is a deeply entrenched pattern I am only now really making any kind of head way turning around even with over 26 years of sobriety under my belt.
Today, for me, self care has to be a priority, as does self compassion.. Self compassion means I show empathy and understanding the parts of me that never got to form, to be accepted, to be nourished, to be affirmed, to be cared about and to be loved.. Its interesesting as I was listening to some talks by American therapist Jordan Petersen late last week and he spoke of the passage in the New Testament where Jesus says we are to love our neighbors as ourselves.. He mentioned this does not mean putting them first but that we can only show the love to others and compassion to others we are capable of showing to ourselves..
In this regard we should feel sorry for those with narcissistic wounding that lead them to be virulent shamers and critics of others.. they are showing by their attitude the way they are to themselves when the shades are drawn.. an older therapist of mine once said to me the more deeply wounded a person the stronger their defenses need to be.. So the most hardened person has to form that shell around their vulnerability and some will literally kill of the care others try to show them and ever dare to risk their vulnerability.. As a good friend once said to me when she sent me a little post card with the following words in the earlier days of my sobriety.
To appear strong
Is to hide behind a rickety scaffolding of denial
But to be vulnerable
Is to be invincible
Emerging From The Dark Night 