Sometimes I feel like things are just swirling around me. Like there’s no place for it to land. Like there is always a judgement or agendas attached to it all. Or more like I’m combating that and working to debunk them all as they arise.
You may have heard me mention this before but something I am insanely proud of is the level of self awareness I have cultivated over the years. In that I’m able to acknowledge things so much quicker than ever before and It allows me to process through things almost in real time versus having the “aftermath”.
That’s why it caught me off guard when I found myself feeling puzzled by the level of trauma response I was experiencing recently. It was a couple of days after an attack and I was in that whole out-of-body-for-my-own-protection-state (that you know all too well if you’ve ever lived through abuse), trying to bring it back into my body and ground once again.
While actively understanding what was happening and why, along with listening to my body and giving it the space and nourishment needed to get back on solid ground I found my thoughts going to “why is this happening so intensely? What happened wasn’t THAT bad.”
I went on to ponder if the more aware I’ve gotten, the more sensitive I’ve gotten and was contemplating if that was really a thing I wanted to be… more sensitive to the effects of an abusive encounter.
At the end of the day, yes I do want to be more sensitive to it because I want to feel it and acknowledge it and process it in real time so nothing is pushed down, ignored, or rejected ….therefore stored in my cells later to manifest as more pain and discomfort or illness.
I have years of experience doing that and it’s been a LOT of work, work with a team of support people to move and start to lessen the pain. So yes, being more sensitive to hopefully avoid that, Yes I want more of that.
The thing that’s interesting about people who have been through trauma in their lives is usually in order to get to a place where you know it THIS well, where you can see the abuse for what it is IN the moments and almost float out of your body to process/shield from it, in order to be that intimate with it it seems that most have dealt with some pretty bad shit.
So the thought that led me to write this and share today was this..
>Isn’t it fucked up that when it’s not hands-on-you, when it’s not throwing things, when it’s not taking daggers for days kinda bad, then something inside of us feels like we shouldn’t have the trauma response at all? Like it’s irrational or out of proportion or dramatic of us to have that reaction because it wasn’t…..”that bad”?<
Wow.
That shit is real, y’all.
I know I’m not the only one who goes there and tries to play down things that we KNOW are not okay.
Or try to not allow the response we’re having to be what it is because we feel like it’s dramatic.
So I wanted to share this to tell you that there is no fucking rule to what your body processes as trauma.
There is no scale of what is “bad enough” to generate this feeling or the need to get your therapist on the phone immediately something happens or go lay in the grass hoping to come back down.
Listen to your body.
Listen to her reaction.
Listen to what she needs.
Our lives are far too short and our peace is far too precious for us to play something down simply because it feels like it wasn’t big enough to constitute help or extra attention to deal with.
No one, that’s who. And fuck anyone you tries to make you feel like you are being irrational or out of line. Chances are that person has never felt what you’re feeling, or at least hasn’t identified it for what it is.
You’re worth it.
And you should be very proud of knowing this of yourself.
Whoever this was meant for please hear me when I say, you are not alone and you are not an island♡