My struggle with feeling inwardly supported.

My health has been a huge worry since my denture broke last week. Eating has been challenging and the fear of moving is back, despite this I just made Jasper and I do a good walk around the neighborhood, and I took my shoes off to walk on some soft grass. I cannot tell you how much better that made me feel. They say that walking barefoot is good for inflammation.

I have been noticing that lately as these fears of ageing and losing mobility become strong that I am ever more appreciative of the gifts of life, of music, of flowers, of good friends, of those who care enough to want to help or know how I am and looking back I see how much I have given in my life, even when it was hard to do sometimes. There are also times I held back, times I did not want to interact much and that became a pattern coming out of old hurts.

I found this post on some symptoms we have been narcissistically abused in our lives from Cynthia Bailey Rug recently. It resonated with me.

https://cynthiabaileyrug.wordpress.com/2023/02/10/signs-someone-is-being-or-has-been-abused/

It is only natural we want to hide away if we have been hurt.. Its only natural we must protect ourselves and our hearts. It is a challenge to open our hearts to old hurts, lingering fears and resentments but I was encouraged yesterday reading a piece of writing from Louise Hay. It speaks of the need to connect to our hearts, especially as we age and wish to keep our heart in good health. I understood doing the practice she recommends of holding my hand on my heart and speaking to it that a lot of insight came. I felt the hurts my family caused, and how often that hurt felt insurmountable to me or made me lash out even at myself or break things. Around my home certain parts of furniture with glass in them have been shattered by me throwing something due to being hurt, angry or in pain. I see it’s a sad thing I lashed out but at the same time it was probably necessary. This coming at a time I had to repress stuff due to not feeling safe or in touch or able to deal in a healthy way with my anger, something I need to accept comes out of never learning and being shamed for legitimate feelings.

I the past that hurt could and did poison me at times or make me want to shut down and its natural I needed to be wary of others.. As I write this I recall how Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh speaks alot about the need for us to treat ourselves tenderly in our hurt, anger or rage.. If a small child is hurting surely we should comfort that child and make the child feel safer, because a lot of the time anger comes out of hurt and fear about boundary violations, most often the fear of having been or feeling we may be overwhelmed as sensitives. Our empathy is a gift but sometimes it can feel like a curse when it makes us feel so much. And there are times we need to be soothing and soothed, not to pour more combustible fuel on an already high burning fire that may if we allow it have the capacity to burn everything to ash.

Anyway these are some after dinner musings tonight. I am still working on knowing where my boundaries lay. On not over giving. Lately my body suffered again my giving too much, and only after the fact do I see it. Sometimes it seems I keep making the same mistake or learning the same lesson over and over. But all the time when I do help others, I know the desire comes out of care and love as well as a life of not truly knowing what it was to feel inwardly supported.