I am obsessed. I cannot stop reading about therapy practices, trauma recovery, relationships and interrelational skills (is that a word?), and I’m starting talking about it in places where I used to be really quiet and nervous (where this subject is the topic of conversation). I’m back to reading about self-leadership and personal development, I’m actually beginning to create a space where I can make it the main topic of the content I am creating (like supporting socials for this blog). I really want to talk about games, but as I fully embrace this passion, I have to put that on the back burner.
Therapy for me has been a wild ride, and the more I dare to step into the process and explore my darker aspects of self — which are largely learned behaviors and twisted understandings of the world around me — the more I have learned to appreciate how my coach has helped me reframe a lot of my thought processes and emotional responses. I still get excited, I still worry and sometimes cry because I am fearful that I overstep or don’t step enough, but I’m learning to hear myself for who I am in the process of making decisions in such non-structured environments as socializing. It’s like every step in recovery was intentional toward healing, even when it felt like I was breaking my own legs in the process of walking through everything.
When you have a solid therapist (or coach), the sky is the limit, because trust is established (something I am poo at), and you form a bit of a bond with them. I know I talk about a lot of personal things, but the stuff here on my blog is just the surface — stuff runs deep. People get my feelings on the regular, but my thoughts aren’t as easily transferred to external expression. I’d wager that even my writing doesn’t share the fullness of what I am thinking about most of the time. People know how I feel, not what I think. But in therapy with the right person, thoughts tend to run freely. I really appreciate that. It’s inspired me to return to what I once studied as a hobby, and that’s leadership from a personal standpoint.
It’s also why I am starting to understand why certain people have affected me so much and in a positive way. There’s my problem of boundaries, which I feel are getting a lot better as I learn to trust my inner “no,” and one person specifically has provided the framework of such boundaries so that I can mirror that in my own life, there’s my friend who reinforced that I can’t be present for others if I’m messed up on the inside and encouraged me to address it and lose the shame and guilt of taking that time to do so, there’s my coach who entered into our patient/”doctor” relationship (i use doctor colloquially, she’s not a doctor) on a casual note so I didn’t feel the structure of feeling like I was limited to an hour in an office, and there’s a few more, but those are the big ones, lately. Like my friend who did everything but sponsor me as I navigated alcohol cravings, my two trainer friends at the gym who kept me consistent even if my eating habits haven’t been supporting my workouts, my sister, who gave me the first hug I’ve had in months…
…trauma made me feel like I’m alone or unwanted or unworthy. These folks have waded through that with me, even when I’d say that feeling out loud. (I also interject that I use the word “made” instead of “makes” — this is an active attempt at reframing my permanent mindset, though tomorrow it might be a makes situation, which can take a few hours to dissect and step out of. Keep it realistic, be mindful, but always strive for the optimum.)
But the summation of these folks and how each one has helped me navigate life as I mostly privately plunged out the sewage of my past has left me feeling inspired once again, and this time it’s not limerence, it’s direction and purpose. I believe with all my heart that my purpose is and always has been to write about healing and therapy and recovery, to address the difficult subjects of traumatic experiences, to talk about what we do for ourselves that help us grow in the direction of the radical self: self-love, self-care, self-sufficiency.
I used to believe that I had to be perfect in my own recovery to be able to speak on it, but I know now that this is not the case. I just need to be human. I need to be passionate. I need to have a reason. And my reason is because how amazing it feels to be okay for more than thirty minutes at a time, to wake up at any time of day, to do my routine, to make sure I am okay, and get myself dressed and caffeinated and get my morning walk in without being fearful that I’m taking myself away from others who may shame me for it, to have the power to choose what I am doing on any given day (work schedule aside), and to come home and choose whether I am going to stay up all night overthinking (which I am doing right this minute) or go to bed when my body says “hey I’m tired, let’s sleep.”
I’m crying right now, because it’s been a long time of feeling like I had no reason for being on this planet other than to waste its precious resources, and now I know why I am here. I’m crying because I feel good, and it hit me in my feels just now. I’m crying because I’m happy and I feel loved, and that happiness and love are not sourced from others, it’s sourced from me. That’s what therapy has done for me, and that’s what I want to share with others. I can’t be a therapist, but I can certainly share my passion for how to take care of yourself as you progress through life after the trauma.