James Ballantyne

Tag: Healing

  • The Long Road of Recovering.

    The Long Road of Recovering.

    Yesterday I wrote a piece about how it was 4 years since I picked up my first self help book, when I realised that the damaging effect of, and types of narcissistic behaviour that had dominated my life, that piece is here:

    My Healing started the day I realised the narcissism of my mother

    4 Year ago the same month was also my first session with a therapist, and even deciding to do therapy felt like a deep personal shift in loving myself

    The thing I realised to is that its been 4 years.

    If I’m honest with myself, I kind of knew that the process of recovering from the childhood experiences, the abusiveness of my principle care giver (to give a more technical term), it was going to take significant time. It’ll be one reason why it took me having to hit rock bottom, and also have safe emotional space to start to deal with it.

    Though part of me might have wanted a quick -fix, there was and is no such thing.

    4 years, and the road still continues.

    I wouldnt say that even at this point that ‘I have dealt’ with everything.

    Im just walking. Sometimes slowly. Sometimes sitting on a bench. Sometimes taking a risk and putting my feet in the water. Sometimes letting the metaphorical emotions, memories, dreams and moments be felt on my face, like the wind. Sometimes feel like I’m walking and getting lost or stuck, and in those moments there’s been many tools, and guides along the way, encouaragers and supporters. Revisits to therapy. Reminders of what I knew. Reminders even that in tiring and stressful moments, I’m likely to forget what I knew.

    I still need to remember to breathe. I mean Im not going to be able to walk very far without breathing. But even that basic thing, I can easily forget.

    I still need to remind myself not to avoid feeling feelings – like getting a stone in my shoe on a hike, feel, notice, and respond.

    I still need to remind myself of my own strength, and to be kind on myself – getting lost on a walk might be an adventure in disguise.

    I still need to remind myself to notice the beauty moments along the way. The equivalent of the wild flowers or tiny insects on walk

    as well as some of the larger moments, that seem like clouds shifting and light pouring in. Storms on a walk dont seem fun, but they can shift the air around. With no storms there’s no rainbow.

    I still need be reminded of the universe. The universe that speaks in the loud storm or the colourful rainbow, the tiny insect of the rumbling waters over the weir. To be reminded to listen, and to hear in that moment, to sense, to feel, to appreciate.

    Its a long road.

    Ive had times when I thought, ‘yeah’ I’m sorted now. But then I get the ‘opportunity’ to face something else, to notice something in my shadow, to sense grief, or realise where I had stopped listening. Complacency doesn’t seem to be appropriate on this walk.

    Its a long road and its one step at a time.

    Its a long road, but at least I can sense myself on the road.

    Im not just watching the road, or watching others on the road.

    But sensing that I am on the road. The long road of life

    That I am on.

    I am making it happen. I am walking. One slow step at a time.

    Life on the road.

    Lord I dont know where I’m going, but I am walking.

    One conscious present moment at time.

    The long road – the long road of life,

    The long road – of being conscious me in the moment of each step.

    Learning and Feeling along the way.

    Points of gratitude. Moments of the guiding Universe.

    Tools laid by others, picked up to aid me.

    Reminding myself that I cannot be rushed.

    Step by Step, Moment by Moment.

    Walking, not rushing the long road of recovering.

  • A Time to Heal

    Im reading the book ‘What Happened to You?’ Conversations on Trauma, Resilience and Healing, by Bruce Perry and Oprah Winfrey, at the moment, its a powerful conversation between them that includes stories of humanity, and the effects of trauma. Worth a read, and ill put a link to it in the resources page above.

    But this, for today is what I thought id share, on page 216, after Oprah shares a story of how a man who was exposed to childhood neglect then acted violently began to change whilst in prison.

    What would it look like if we asked -‘What happened to you’ rather than ‘Whats wrong with you’ – or had the attitude that wanted to listen…How would this change my life, and those around me?

    So… This:

  • EMDR and my Anxious Mind

    When I got triggered by something a few weeks ago I went into a bit of a spiral.

    Downwards.

    And I forgot.

    My mind went into overdrive

    The words, fears and punishments from my childhood got relived into my present.

    Thats what trauma, childhood trauma, any trauma feels like.

    Mind whirlwind.

    Anxiety.

    Thinking.

    Over thinking.

    And in the midst, I forgot.

    I forgot because I had got consumed.

    I forgot who I was, I became the frightened child, the frightened me, hiding and scared.

    I didn’t even realise I was doing it.

    I needed my fiancé to keep checking in and asking me.

    The Trigger.

    Did it matter what it was? No – but it was big one.

    I spiralled downwards for at least 5 days. But tried to keep going and pretending.

    During that time wrote a bit – publically

    And wrote a bit privately – a lot of emotions out, alot

    But I was still on edge. Even after beginning to realise myself in the present.

    Beginning to regroup and rebuild

    Telling myself, that I am safe, that I am enough, that I am stronger than I realise.

    I did a great job of telling others too, but I needed to hear myself.

    But ultimately, it wasn’t what I wrote, what I read

    The things I needed to know.

    I had to learn again, and again that I didnt have to suffer alone – and my lovely Christelle sat with me on times, affirmed that I was having a trauma reaction.

    Affirmed that what I was going through was trauma anxiety.

    Taking me back to the past, unable to rest in the moment

    Unsettled.

    I forgot and also I resisted, I resisted to do the very things that I knew would help

    So I did all the other things, like comfort eat, excessive cleaning, distractions.

    Part of me was anxious, so I listened to that part

    Part of me was also resistant to and didn’t want to get rid of the anxiety, it was loving the attention

    Two weeks of the swirl, back and forth, heart racing, forgetting to breathe.

    Forgetting my safety

    Forgetting the journey to this point

    Forgetting and being over taken by mymind racing

    Forgetting my power

    Forgetting myself

    Yet in the midst of last Thursday, in the afternoon, I somehow did something that I remembered.

    Yes I had began to regroup the preeceding few days. Get myself out of the swirl

    I remembered EMDR.

    Something my therapist taught me.

    Something I had barely needed or used for a long while.

    So I sat down

    Breathed

    Closed my eyes

    And for a few minutes listened to my breathing

    and tapped either side of my shoulder blades, first quickly, then slower.

    Breathing too.

    Why had I forgotten EMDR? In the midst of a severe trauma reaction, I forgot a lot.

    The part of me that wanted pain to remain dominant raced – Tolle calls this the Pain-Body -the ego.

    Anxiety induced forgetfulness

    And what happened.

    Since I did EMDR, my brain completely stopped the anxiety patterns. And it has done ever since.

    The descending of calm on me.

    Calm. Utter calm.

    A reordering of the neurones and programming, that no amount of writing, eating or other externals would have changed. Almost miraculous to be honest, and virtually instant.

    Incredible. Its as if my entire mind has shifted. To a new place. One that isn’t racing.

    I can breathe.

    Literally 5 minutes of EMDR. After 2 weeks of trauma responding. Panic and Anxiety.

    On one hand I could be annoyed I didnt do EMDR within a few days, on the other the trigger did give me the opportunity to work through some things- part of me that needed to heal.

    Maybe I need to have mental notes around my flat – remember the good practices. Remember EMDR, or Yoga, or other good trauma healing practices. Especially when in the midst im likely to forget.

    Recognising that recovery from a lifetime of abuse is seriously hard work, so im not beating myself up, but noting what trauma and anxiety does to the memory in the present, and how it created in me resistance to wanting to, and conscious memory of what I needed to do in response.

    How a trauma reaction caused me to forget – and highlight what I might need to do to remember in the future.

  • The Challenge of ‘Letting Go’

    The Challenge of ‘Letting Go’

    What does it mean to ‘let go’?

    What does letting go mean, when the damage has been so great – from people who are supposed to be anything but this?

    I thought I had let go of them, one time, but I was running away scared

    Ran away as far as I could – geographically and physically – but running scared of them

    Running away was all I thought I could do

    But

    Running away is pretending

    Running away wasnt wanting to face

    Running away when I couldn’t articulate it

    Running away was saying things like ‘I didnt have a bad childhood’

    Running away wasnt being true to the self I was

    Frightened James running away.

    Thats not letting go.

    ‘They did this to me’

    ‘Its their fault I’m like this’

    I cant change who I am and ill blame them

    Thats not letting go either

    Thats accepting that nothing can change

    And im just their continual victim

    Letting go, means not holding on

    Not holding on to the pain they caused

    or the excuse that I can give them

    Keeping the pain close

    Letting go, means letting that go

    Noting it, seeing it, feeling it, unescapable moments and reminders

    Opportunities to keep healing, not holding

    letting go – and letting go of the shame,

    The shame of things I needed to do to cope and survive

    The shame that I felt responsible for fixing them, soothing them

    The shame of not meeting their expectations

    Guilty by dissociation.

    The shame of being theirs. Their son.

    Identity shame.

    Letting go – means not holding on, means not running away, means releasing responsibility and giving it to someone else

    Letting go – and knowing that I am enough, I have a voice, I have needs and I am free

    Letting go – facing, accepting and making changes to protect myself

    Letting go – is that what forgiveness is? Forgiving myself for what I put myself through..because of them?

    Letting go – of their effects being my story

    Letting go – of having them take more power in my life and future

    Letting go – and being strong

    Letting go – of any myth of normal

    Letting go – expectations of pleasing or meeting their needs

    Letting go – and loving myself

    Letting go- and valuing myself

    Letting go – and releasing the pain

    Letting go – and making myself light again

    Letting go means being the sky and not on their cloud

    Letting go – to discover myself

    Letting go – to be the me I should have always been

    Letting go

    To breathe clean air

    To think clean thoughts

    To be in the present

    It’s time.

    Its time to not carry any longer.

    The inability or rather unwillingness of the human mind to let go of the past is beautifully illustrated in the story of two Zen monks, Tanzan and Ekido, who were walking along a country road that had become completely muddy after heavy rains. Near the village a young woman was trying to cross the road, but the mud was too deep it would have ruined the silk kimono she was wearing. Tanzan picked her up and carried her over to the other side.

    The monks walked on in silence. Five hours later, as they were approaching the lodging temp. Ekido couldn’t restrain himself any longer; ‘Why did you carry that girl across the road?, he asked ‘We monks aren’t supposed to do that’

    ‘I put the girl down hours ago, said Tarzan ‘ Are you still carrying her?’

    Eckhart Tolle, A New Earth
  • The challenge of saying No (today)

    The challenge of saying No (today)

    I had built it up over the weekend, tried to put it off, thought it, over thought it, woke up thinking about it, not been able to sleep thinking about if its the right decision was about to make.

    Then I realised that it wasnt that it was about the ‘right decision’

    It was about the fact that I had to say no to someone, someone who offered me some work

    I didnt want to do that thing, say No.

    I was also due to go and see some properties later today – but I realised that neither were going to be suitable – so that was another ‘No’ telephone call.

    I expected the work person to be annoyed, I expected them to say that I had inconvenienced them, I feared being made to feel guilty for saying No. Why?

    Because that’s what saying No meant every time when in an abusive relationship.

    Saying no – was responded to with anger or guilting – for not accommodating their needs

    How dare you say no to me!

    You’ve upset me and let me down

    You haven’t tried hard enough – this is your fault

    I dont like you when you say no

    You always do what you want

    and the rest…

    Theres no wonder why working through issues of conflict and saying No have been part of my healing and self aware story – Learning the power of No is here – the rest of my story is above in the links

    So I was building up to the phone call.

    Deep breath.

    Adrenaline going

    Lots of energy being spent…

    and…

    And it was ok.

    The person understood.

    The person was wished me well. The person was grateful that id been honest with them. The person realised that I needed more from them as an employer.

    The person I said no to – realised that my needs were important. Interesting that.

    Then I had to say no to some viewings – the estate agents, thanked me for calling and offered other properties and said ‘ thats ok James, there’ll be others more suitable’

    The Estate agent recognised my needs – as I said no to them too. Interesting that.

    What happens when you are emotionally damaging relationships with emotionally needy people – is that you are never ever seen, seen to have needs, or wants or desires – these all pale into insignificance, to the needs of the neediest. Yes is the only word to say to them, as otherwise it opens the door to the emotional rage from within. Eggshells again.

    I said No today and It was ok.

    I said No 3 times today – and it felt good.

    I even walked out of a car sales garage saying No and not feeling bad about it- I mean thats progress too!

    I didnt realise that people might actually be ok if I said no to them.

    I put my needs first.

    I eliminated things that weren’t the right thing for me.

    I chose myself.

    Also – because everything is just a tiny bit stressful at the moment, with job and flat all change situation – I forgot things I learned a while ago.

    Or worse – they started to attack.

    what will be their reaction, have you let people down again? and the rest…

    Today, I had a healthy reminder that it should be ok to say no. That No is about protecting, about deciding and about thinking about my needs.

    I had a reminder of the power of No.

    I had a reminder that I might be worth more than what was on offer – and that the other person could actually see that.

    I felt proud of myself that I had said no. I felt relieved too.

    Today was a bit of a life lesson, a reminder, of the energy required to muster up the power of No. – and doing it in the midst of tiring life situations…

    What if the No creates the space for the Yes to emerge? – well…maybe thats for another time…

  • Love will find a way

    Love will find a way

    To tell you something is wrong,

    With your heart.

    Love will find a way

    To show you what is hurting,

    With your heart.

    Love will find a way

    To break the barriers,

    Surrounding your heart.

    Love will find a way

    To keep persisting with you,

    From your heart.

    Love will find a way

    Of finding its voice,

    From your heart.

    Love will find a way

    To make you feel it,

    From your heart.

    Love will find a way

    To be found in the gap,

    Of your hurt.

    Love will find a way

    Of showing you,

    What love wasn’t.

    Love will find a way

    To show you fully,

    As you hurt.

    Love will find a way

    Of finding you,

    From your heart.

    Love will find a way

    A path to show you,

    If you listen – from your heart.

    Love will find a way

    To re build,

    That broken hurting heart

    Love will find a way

    That is slow, tender and warm,

    To mend and renew your heart.

    Love will find a way

    To find you,

    So you can be- from your heart.

    Love will find a way

    If you let it break,

    So you can be free.

    Love will find a way

    It’s time to follow its path.


  • When there is nothing, but relief

    I wonder – does ‘grief-guilt’ exist?

    Not the ‘I should have done this’ ‘ I could have prevented something happening’ kind of guilt – when there is grief – a bit like this

    But more, like , that feeling when you’re expected by other people to feel grief for the loss of something – and yet you have nothing?

    Like, that feeling when you’re meant to feel loss and pain – and you’d feel like you were pretending to feel anything close like that?

    Like, that feeling when you then feel guilty for ‘not’ feeling the way others might do about a situation, when actually that feeling of grief – is no where to be found?

    Grief-guilt.

    Guilt for not feeling grief – when somehow you’re supposed to feel grief – because the person who is talking to you would feel grief…

    Guilt for not being able to muster up any sense of emotional feeling – because, there is nothing.

    Grief-guilt – because Im meant to feel something?

    I know what grief feels like, feelings that overcome, that aching, of missing something and someone. Just shitty tears. Shitty tears that hurt.

    Love filled tears of loss, of someone I loved, and loved me back.

    Grief reserved for those for whom there is love.

    As I watched ‘The Boy called Christmas’, something was helpfully revealed to me

    Grief is the price we pay for love. And it is worth it, a thousand times over

    Matt Haig (A Boy Called Christmas, on Netflix now)

    It is.

    Grief is the price we pay for love.

    So – what happens when there wasn’t actually love?

    Grief may just be hard to find?

    ‘You’ll miss them when they’re gone’ Some people often say.

    If you’ve not walked the path of toxic, narcissist, psychopathic parents – who ‘look’ like ‘nice’ people to everyone else – you dont really know.

    And by the way – they haven’t died…

    But I have taken huge steps in the last 2 years to remove them from my life.

    And bring others into the collective space of seeing them for who they are, and have always been ..forever.

    And they have, and do.

    Which has been really hard work – and no doubt many of you have stopped reading what I write… its painful stuff, I’m sure.

    So I don’t feel grief for the loss of the relationship with my parents – even though im possibly meant to, because , I think Matt Haig nailed it – Grief is the price we pay for love.

    If there was a relationship in the first place – there would be something to grieve over.

    But its always been the way it always has been.

    There was no ‘way things were’ – so there was no ‘restoration’ or ‘reconciliation’ – fine ideals, and even manipulative standpoints – a broken relationship implies that there was actually something.

    I might grieve the person of myself who had to hide for decades under the shroud of trauma – though that person is feeling safe to play again, to live and love

    I might grieve the lost time

    I might grieve the love I didn’t have , especially when I see it in others – and know that its ok

    Or the Cards I couldn’t send

    But it’s ok not to feel that actual tear stained, shitty, painful grief for those who have abused us, the caregivers who were meant to do more. I think we need to say this. It’s ok.

    Save the grief for those we actually loved, and who loved us back in truth. Those who natured and protected us, for even glimpses in our lives.

    We have enough actual feelings to feel, to notice and accept – the grief for those who we have actually lost, loved ones – that forcing feelings (to avoid shame) doesnt feel right at all.

    So grief-guilt – can go its merry way and jump the hell off.

    Permission to not feel grief. Permission to tell the grief guilt to be dispelled.

    None of us need to force grief, or be forced to. It’ll happen if it happens.

    So what do I actually feel?

    I feel peace. I feel free. I feel safe. I feel big.

    Vindication is a hard fought battle.

    I might feel relief.

    Maybe ‘Grilief’ is a more appropriate word.

    The combination of grief and relief – if theres grief at all.

  • How walking helped to heal me

    Maybe each day you should just go for a walk

    Said my friend who I was staying with after leaving the family home in the midst of my breakdown.

    By myself? I thought?

    Without a purpose?

    Just a walk?

    Not just ‘walk the dog’ or walk to a place, or walk to get to something – just a walk?

    Yeah, just go for a walk, it might do you good

    And so I did.

    Virtually every day. The walks I had done before I had done with a dog, the walks I had done before were with headphones in, the walks I had done before had been for work reasons. Distraction. Functional. Escape.

    And at first it was well, a bit awkward. Just going for a walk.

    It was a walk through a small edge of city village, through tunnels and there was the cliffs and the sea.

    But I realised that I liked exploring, and so I did.

    Whilst in the midst of so many clouds, I walked.

    Clouds etched on my face, as below you can see. One of very few photos of me. So much pain on my face, looking back, I was a shadow, grey, hiding, pretending to be ok.

    This was me.

    My friend lived near the sea and the coast, and I started to look a bit closer and enjoy.

    Sometimes I used those walking moments to take photos, to phone friends, to try and work out what was going on in my life, to try and understand.

    Mind all over the place, busy, thinking, clinging on, trying to make sense of the clouds

    Sometimes in those days I wouldn’t be completely present to the space I was in, so I’m not going to say that it was a state of natural bliss as I walked along the north east coastline.

    But I walked

    in my own cloud at times. But I walked.

    Sometimes I walked miles

    Sometimes I walked miles to place where there was a coffee shop on the coast.

    Sometimes I walked in the rain

    I would try and find new routes

    New paths, for me

    Most of the time I preferred to walk in a circle

    Id go early in the morning and get up and see the sunrise

    Other times it would be the sunset

    There was a bench on the cliffs that I could sit on and watch the sea.

    Getting out, by myself.

    Beginning to enjoy my own company.

    Beginning, the glimpses of beginning to sense a change

    Seeing nature. Seeing things. Perspective shifting.

    Tiniest specs of change

    Im not going to sit here a few years later and say that nature was healing me, but I might say that it was the beginning of something.

    Fresh air…the opportunity to breathe, when friends on the phone were saying breath, my air was coastal and by the sea.

    I could slow down. With no pressure or expectation. I could explore, get lost in the caves.

    Enjoy coffee

    Take a book even.

    And just be.

    Sit on a pebble and watch the sea.

    Sit and look at the pebble.

    Watch as others walked with their dogs.

    Eat bramble.

    Throw a pebble into the sea.

    Getting hot, too many clothes, or cold with too little, trying to get back before it got dark

    Maybe even finding the pub on the way back, or the old bits of railway nearby, that evoked that childhood railway joy

    The pub with the railway name too, and pictures

    Talking to strangers in the pub. Talking to strangers with their dogs

    Me, walking.

    There was always something to find, something to see. An angle on life that I hadn’t noticed before.

    And I was noticing.

    Todays tide was different, the sea was different, the cloud colour was different. No two walks ever the same. the world is different, and so was I.

    I was enjoying what I saw, and it was healing to the wounded soul.

    I went almost every day.

    I was bruised, hurt, confused, and yet walking was doing something, nature was doing something, my eyes were doing something.

    Something was starting to awaken.

    The silence of the sky, the crash of the waves, they took me away. Took me to the present.

    A walk will do you good.

    It did. Its the same for all of us..isnt it?

    And now I still walk, we all did during lockdown, dont you remember.

    We walked and sometimes stopped to see, to feel, to notice, that the world was bigger, and more beautiful outside.

    And that we are all wondering like strangers on beach, trying to find our way home, but doing it outside not trapped inside.

    I still walk, and now I have a better camera. I still walk and sometimes notice, and still walk and forget to.

    I sometimes walk and forget to take myself along, as im elsewhere distracted by the noise of the world. That sometimes I have to be reminded to stop.

    And be me.

    And notice.

    Notice the colour, notice the sky, notice the flower, the bird in the air.

    Just see it for what it is.

    Walking in amongst the industrial landscape, beautiful rugged, panoramic Teeside, walking along the beach, walking with myself.

    Taking myself out for a walk.

    Not just going for a walk, but taking myself, me, out.

    Nature was healing me, and helping me to see.

    As I walked, as I saw, as I felt awe and gratitude for what I could see

    Snippiets of moments where my mind could stop.

    Now I look, and look intently, and the colour, the movement, the scene, watching the eyes of the birds or dragonflies move.

    A walk gives me chance to see the possibility of something that helps me see the work differently, gives me the possibility of stopping, and focussing on something, whether its the camera or the binoculars, to see the world in detail, the smallest detail of the wings of a dragonfly

    and be captivated in a moment.

    Go for a walk it will do you good

    I rarely return from a walk feeling less calm that when I started.

    Something has usually given me joy.

    Something in me often has shifted.

    Walking might be my body way of doing natural EMDR, the treatment my therapist showed me and helped me to do.

    Step by step.

    Heart beat.

    As I walk, dont think…feel.

    Feel and walk at the same time. Sense it, sense the feeling like im sensing the sky.

    Feel alive, feel bliss, feel me.

    Sometimes a walk is just a walk.

    Its when I take myself out for a walk

    that I start to notice me.

  • Avoiding emotions is like driving with brake stuck on.

    Now I’ve done therapy, I can deal with everything, all the emotions!

    So when they arrive I know exactly what to do

    Disappointment, Anger, grief, self depreciation, annoyance, frustration, tick them all off, I just sit, breathe, and let wash through me like a shower of life’s joys and gratitudes.

    Do I fuck.

    Actually, I’ll make myself busy, I’ll keep moving, tidy, wash, clean, check social media, walk a bit, check social media again, alot, get a drink, check social media again, tidy, eat, maybe go for a longer walk, Facebook distraction, water the plants, watch something else, say I’ll switch off the screen, then open it a minute later, write a cute healing phrase on twitter, when I’m talking to myself and honestly..trying not to do it myself..

    And that’s not just the things I have to do, essential tasks…like work or family stuff..

    That’s what I’ll actually do

    Until I realise

    That I’ve been ignoring, hiding, avoiding

    Life is one big distraction of avoiding us being our real selves. The emotion police.

    But after I did therapy I thought I would be emotionally competent, feeler, healed and deal with it

    Turns out, I just know what I could do, but still have to make the right choices for myself to actually do them.

    40 odd years of abuse survival avoidance habits die hard. Though they were needed, and to be thanked.

    The last thing I want to do is deal with myself, yet the rewards for doing so are so much that I wonder why I put it off.

    It’s like driving a car with a fixed on brake, the brakes can come off and it drives better without, but it’s easier to keep going brakes on and not bother stopping to get it unstuck.

    Maybe this is a good metaphor to explore more, a brake being stuck on, might not show up as a warning light on the dashboard, but its a nagging feeling that something isnt intuitively right. You may be able to drive without fixing it, or put the stereo on to not sense it, but its still there. Intuitively , gut, something is provoking to be dealt with.

    It’s only when I stop, do I start again. Every moment of silence to listen to my own heart is a space of healing.

    I know what I need to do, it just takes a while to do it sometimes.

    What are you avoiding? What am I?

  • 2 years of being able to breathe

    I realised this week that I’ve been able to breathe for 2 years now, these were the first two years I’d been able to breathe in my whole life

    I remember when I walked into the flat 25 months ago and being emotional in front of the estate agent. Realising that this was going to be my space, my space to look after, my space to look after myself in, my space , haven, calm

    My space, to make home. To light candles, listen to music, read, and enjoy life in my own pace.

    My space to determine boundaries of what I listen to, read or who I allow in

    My space to look forward to coming home to after leaving it

    My safe space

    I can breathe

    Stop and slow down

    41 years of emotionally abusive home space, with 2 in-between of working/living in houses with gap year teams, with me being the ‘responsible’ one

    2 years of being able to breathe

    2 years of being enough, 2 years of listening to my heart, 2 years of not having to revolve around the often crazy unpredictable needs of others, 2 years of being just me.

    2 years of healing from the 41 years previously

    2 years of starting to see

    Healing requires time, safety and connection, and in the process, self determination to make decisions, take control, for me about putting myself first, making decisions for my own good.

    It makes me stop and realise quite how unhealthy places are when breathing isn’t possible. When eggshells are the only floor covering and avoiding fighting or fawning conflict is the only reality. That’s not to mention lies and gaslighting, and trying to constantly work out who the crazy one is.

    It’s worth saying here, if you’re the one creating eggshells for others in your relationships, or family, through manipulation, control, bullying and neediness then maybe decide to give it up. You can change. Problem is, that you’re unlikely to read this. But…

    If you’re not breathing you’re not living, you’re just surviving. I was just surviving all my life. Ignoring every attempt of my heart to make itself known. Just surviving. Bouncing from one crisis to another. Fawning over the needy anger of toxicity.

    Breathing for 2 years, learning to be me. Realising who ‘me’ is.

    As I write I’m on holiday, camping in the rain, and up to now, my few holidays have been busy ones, climbing, walking, city breaks, and I’ve filled my days. Today I’ve tried to do what I am learning to do in my home. To stop and enjoy a ‘doing nothing’ day.

    Yes I’ve walked a short distance,but no rushing for trains , or climbing hills, just a short meander to the village a walk by the river and now just time reflecting on it as I write this, in a tent in the rain.

    In the past I realised that I struggle to slow down, in the last two years I’ve realised quite how much I’m able to slow down.

    Business was my ongoing distraction. Busy work, busy hobbies, busy. It’s no wonder that I’d wait to get ill during Christmas holidays only, when I had the time and my body relaxed. This was the pattern since childhood.

    Learning to slow down

    2 years of being in and feeling like being home.

    Safe

    Rest

    Breathe

    I’m sure I have more healing to do, as more layers are uncovered, as I listen more to my inner child, as I draw, write and play. But for now, a mark to note two years of being able to breathe, and feel new life, growth and change.

    Thank you to all friends and family alike in their support and encouragement to me in these last 2-3 years, and to Christelle whose healing, loving kindness is a joy