Tentatively DARING to see change

[Kingfisher]

Hi all,
Yes, I start to dare to see some fragile, hesitant changes in the way I cope with this longstanding pain and grief in me. Actually, being able to call them 'pain' and 'grief' and to really FEEL them, is a change!
Most of my life I have been berating mysélf, blaming myself, hating myself, even, for the difficulties, the emotional upheaval I went through, again and again.
I notice I start to be drawn to emotionally more healthy people, start to connect with them, carefully, start to be more open, without SHAME.
This goes hand in hand with seeing others' abusive, disrespectful, crossing-boundaries-behaviours towards me and my ability to refuse to be treated that way any longer; to even END, non-angrily, socalled 'friendships'.
All this is very new to me and -THÚS- scary but underneath all doubt, there is a sense of trust. Trust in my own perceptions, trust to stay very close to myself and moreover to what I feel.
Having found this forum, reading, exchanging, feeling welcomed, validated, respected has meant and means só much to me and is closely connected to the changes I described above.

Thank you, all of you, for being out there, for your courage, wisdom and honesty. Be well,

Kingfisher

[Not Alone]

 

[woodsgnome]

  Here's hoping the change towards feelings brings you into a whole new world of self-care and compassion. Sometime the 'self' part is the hardest, I've found. But I'm realizing the tendency to always blame and belittle myself stems from a very abusive past that was more about others than it was myself.

Of course, it's kind of a double-edged sword -- one desperately seeks help but it's also extremely lonely. It's so good to see you've finally started finding your own way forward. It's truly like entering a new world. A bit scary sometimes, but there are ways to keep noticing how all those pent-up feelings may still be around, but their influence is fading.

Sometimes the openings seems to move further out of reach again, but sticking with learning the new self-compassionate way keeps one advancing on the healing path.ew feelings keep us on the healing path. Here's hoping for the emergence of even better feelings as you move forward.

Something I've noticed on my own journey is that once I started opening to feelings, I'd get stuck on old ones I didn't really want. I decided they weren't going away, so I studied and my T helped me to not ignore them entirely, as they had a tendency to re-group and find their way back in. This seemed counter-intuitive at first, letting even some bad feelings mingle with the new more positive ones. But slowly I've noticed that, with work, even these negative vibes can start to shrink; some I hardly notice anymore.

[Kingfisher]

Ah, woodsgnome, thank you for responding! (I take you to be a lover of etymology too... respond-response-responsible... wonderful, isn't it?)

Self-care and -compassion IS a whole new world, frighteningly new even, moreover since this world, this territory has felt forbidden to enter, all of my life.
O yes, this deeply ingrained self-contempt, self-belittling, self-hate, due to a very VERY abusive past. Abuse at the hands of the (two) 'adults' who would/should have provided safety, belonging, warmth, cherishing, comfort, validation, guidance, to name just a few... All of it was thoroughly absent.

Being the father of a seven-year-old wonderful boy-child, makes what I have had to endure, what was done to me, what I was 'put through' all the more incomprehensible. The cruelty of it, the mercilessness, the utter remorseless of it.
I can't help to sometimes imagine what it would do to my son when I would treat him, 'if only for a week', the way I was treated for decades on end. It would
destroy; just imagining it sends shivers down my spine.

Opening up to our feelings, yes. Are there 'bad' feelings, as such? Can we learn to acknowledge and contain them all? Pain and grief and sadness and anger, are they to be suppressed and avoided or to be acknowledged and really gone into (without 'going under', of course).

Your presence in writing on this forum means a lot to me, I want you to know that, thank you for it!
We'll move forward, I'm sure. 'Slowly, as fast as they could' is a booktitle which suddenly springs to mind 🙂

Kingfisher