Tedder's Blog, page 28

WWW | Wellness Word Wednesday | TRIUMPH

Have you ever considered yourself a winner? You should!

It was a great victory to make it out of childhood abuse. That acheivement should be celebrated.

By looking at ourselves *(YOU SEE YOU), we can find the treasures hidden in our lives — and we have many. By focusing on those that hurt us through hate, anger and despair, we only feel like losers.

Maybe I never will accomplish returning the murdered woman to her family, but I have accomplisehd a lot. Her story lives on with me — that is a triumphant feat.

I made it!

Can you see yourself triumphant?

Balancing Perfections

I’d love to know the percentage of people who have come through trauma who are raging perfectionists. I know I am. It’s been my longest and hardest habit to break.

I’ve derived so much of my confidence from being able to beat the odds, rise above, overcome obstacles that would decimate the average person.

I’ve built my sense of self on what I can accomplish and how far I can push myself. I get so much worth from taking everything to the next level. I seem to be allergic to doing anything normal. Being average has always frightened me. It’s part of why I used drugs – I didn’t want to be the ordinary, everyday depressed and anxious person. If I was going to suffer, I was going to suffer well. Make it an art form.

That’s hard to admit on some level. But it’s true. My outside struggle needed to match my interior pain. I never wanted to be a run-of-the-mill fuck-up. I wanted to mess my life up bigger and better than anyone I had met. And I did.

I don’t want to be average in anything I do. I think that is honestly my biggest fear in life.

Suffice it to say, I’m an extreme person. And on some level, I always will be. I’ve found much more productive ways to channel this aspect of my personality but I’d love to temper the more extreme bits. Be softer with myself and other people.

And then there’s parenting. My greatest responsibility and the ultimate way in which my perfectionism rears it’s ugly head. There’s the pressure we put on ourselves to be good parents, the high expectations we have of our kids, and the pressure we internalize from the societal image of a perfect parent. Then you add in childhood trauma – whew! Parenting is exhausting enough without this unnecessary bondage.

But I’m softest with my children. That’s how I learn what I want to be like. They are my guiding light. They’ve taught me all of my best lessons and I get so much strength, resilience and inspiration from raising them.

But I still strive so hard to be perfect for them. To be give everything that I did not get. The feeling is hard to describe. The stakes feel so high…like life and death. The thoughts of all that I need to do and learn and be haunts me until I close my eyes at night. All of the hard work and determination feels constantly threatened by my past, by my trauma, by all the horrible and disgusting mistakes of my family. I am haunted yet driven to protect them. It consumes me – I spend most of my time aiding myself in healing the broken parts, repairing the blind spots, meditating, praying, healing my nervous system, working on myself and my relationship with my husband, reading books, listening to podcasts, etc etc etc. It’s unending. It is NEVER enough. If I stop maybe my past will catch up with me and then consume them too… and that can never let that happen.

These are my fears of course. Rationally, I know that resting more, being less perfectionistic and gentle with myself is not going to result in their harm. But it’s a constant battle.

Thanks to prayer and daily mindfulness, I am becoming more aware of these perfectionistic thoughts as they arise. I’m getting better at recognizing them, but still baffled at the weight they carry and how they affect my well-being.

Research shows perfectionism can both aid and hinder us…and I believe that to be true in my own life. It had driven my to become the person I really truly love and respect today but I am still working hard to find that balance.

How had perfectionism showed up in your own healing journey?

B

Life’s Delicate Balance

I can have anger and not hate. I can love and not forgive. I can forgive and leave.

The older I get the more I realize that life is about balance. Coming thru such severe childhood trauma I often get stuck in an off-balance kind of place — everything is good or everything is bad. No in between. However, life is best lived in balance.

I find it hard to stay in the dance of joy. I look for struggle, unfortunately. It’s what I know best. I believe God wants me to change that outlook. Look towards my future and smile. I am learning to do that but I’ve not obtained that yet.

Striving towards the goal of unity within my own being is something that matters to me. I think I’ll find this by understanding balance better.

Balance means an even distribution of weight enabling someone or something to remain upright and steady. What a beautiful idea for life. This notion brings a steadiness.

Yes, I will be looking for balance in life. I think it’s a great goal.

Jewels, Gems & Gunpowder

I would love to hear from you! Sharing Saturday with you.

A Jewel: I wrote earlier this week about learning to throw caution to the wind and proving myself to be a risk taker. The jewel I’ll add to that is that I do use caution when taking risks. Both can work together. So, cauitously I do throw caution to the wind! Think about that for a minute.

A Gem: I am not a religious person. As a matter of fact, I despise religion. I am a follower of the Jesus as He is written about in the New Testament. That is my creed. I am affiliated with no religious organization. I simply write about my experience and how faith is the force that sets me apart.

Metaphorical Gunpowder: Sometimes waiting to see the plan as God has written it can feel like I’m on a crazy train. Everyone else seems to know where they’re going, what they’re doing, and what their future will look like. Not so for me. I leave room for God to write the script of my life. As crazy as that sounds, I don’t know what my future holds, but I know it’s good.

Please comment below by leaving your jewel, a gem or something you keep yourself free from with metaphorical gunpowder.

All love!

The Way Out

My story is one with a beginning, but no end. It is a story that continues to evolve and change. With each season that passes, a new me rises from the ashes of my past.

As I heal from trauma and unlearn the patterns that were handed down from generation to generation, another facet of who I was always meant to be emerges. Instead of stuffing my problems and hiding them through substance use, I confront them and adjust my behavior. I walk in forgiveness toward myself and those who harmed me, knowing that many people got here the same way I did – because someone showed us a way to live that was contrary to a life of wellness lived to its fullest.

I didn’t grow up with big dreams. I grew up wondering, “How can I get through this day in tact … mentally and physically.

In addition to the trauma I grew up with, I also learned something else from my parents. I learned that the only way to deal with life was to stuff it deep down and keep moving. The way you did this was simple – drugs and alcohol.

It was this hopelessness and the constant nightmares of my past that led me deeper into my addictions.

But I found a way out … through hope and prayer and therapy and employing the use of dozens of healing modalities.

I go out into my new world afraid and unfamiliar with the surroundings, but I push through the fear and forge ahead. I face my trauma and refuse to be victimized by it any longer.

I have been able to overcome and find healing. I want to keep going and take others with me.

I plan to take what I have learned and show others the way out.

B

F N’ F (Fear Not Friday)

On the discussion of fear — Do you fear throwing caution to the wind?

If I had learned earlier in my life to do something without worrying about the risk or negative results I could have ended a lot of suffering in my life.

What do I mean?

I stayed in a bad marriage for 17 years. Me and my children were treated with disdain and abused daily. If I had learned the art of not being so cautious and afraid of everything, I would have left that terrible man much earlier. But, I stayed. I stayed because I was too afraid of the risk of leaving.

I have learned to take a lot of risk now in my life — something I wish I had learned the art of a long time ago. Risk is not a bad thing. Conversely, caution certainly can be.

Do you risk enough?

Choose the adventure and risk!

Listening to Emotions

I love being a mother but sometimes it is so overstimulating to my already taxed nervous system.

During one of my writing exercises today, there was a prompt to think and then write about what it would feel like to witness your own children go through the traumas and tribulations of your own childhood. To journal on all the feelings it brings up.

It was hard. Excruciating at some points. To subject my children (even via imagination) to the kind of treatment I received as I child feels almost too much to bear. Too cruel – for everyone involved.

But it helped. The growing anxiety in me and the sense of impending doom was almost immediately quelled after this exercise.

I never felt like I had a sense of safety as a child. I place of retreat. A place where I could go to and be untouched.

Today, I know that I need to pay attention to my inner emotions but sometimes feel afraid that I will never have enough time to accomplish this.

My body is telling me so much on a basis… cying out. It has held so much sadness. It has felt the weight of bodies 3 times as big as me. It has witnessed more than one person should. It has withstood beatings and traumas and hurts both physically, sexually and emotionally.

But it is here.

Maybe not in one piece. But that’s ok. For now. And maybe always too. Only time will tell.

B

Resilience

We don’t often talk about the valor of being an abuse victim. But it’s an important silver lining that I think is good to remind ourselves of every once in a while.

We know that repeated exposure to trauma doesn’t actually make you stronger. But that doesn’t mean that we are left defenseless against what comes next.

Trauma doesn’t come with the assurance that it may not strike again but if we let it, it can help us foster the resiliency needed to get through it and the rest of life too. I would say that this is because those who’ve suffered have had more opportunity to develop their coping mechanisms more acutely.

Growth begins with healing from trauma—it is not a free pass to avoid suffering.

But we have the capacity to do far more than just heal. Given the right environment and mindset, we can change, using the trauma, the suffering and struggle that ensues, as an opportunity to reflect, to search for meaning in our lives, to ultimately become better versions of ourselves.

B

Is God Fair?

If I were sitting in an audience waiting for the play Life is Fair to begin, I’d most likely get up and walk out. Life isn’t fair. Is God?

I believe He is.

God didn’t hurt me, wicked people did. The Spirit of Religion was sent to kill, steal and destroy. Incest sits squarely in that realm.

When I married my first husband and he was just as evil, whose fault was that? Squarely, I’d say it was mine. Sure, all of my upbringing groomed me for bad, but I chose and I’ll own that.

Blaming doesn’t help anybody — least of all myself.

Isn’t the concept of fairness a moot point? If I hunt for it, will I find it. What if I don’t hunt for it and trust that God has my back?

There is one thing I am very sure of — what seems unfair in this life will be made right in eternity. That is not only my belief, it is where my hope springs from.

 On another day the angels came to present themselves before the Lord, and Satan also came with them to present himself before him. 2 And the Lord said to Satan, “Where have you come from?”

Job 2:1-2 (NIV)

Did you know that there are conversations happening all the time in the heavenly releam?

Satan answered the Lord, “From roaming throughout the earth, going back and forth on it.”

JOB 2:3 (NIV)

The God of angel armies is always by my side!

WWW | Wellness Words Wednesday | Denial vs. Emotions

The first weapon against abusive attacks when you are small is to find an area of your brain to place the bad — and, leave it there. While that is how God designed us to make it through those unsafe years, we have to change that pattern now to heal.

Denial leaves a thick impenetrable barrier between us and our emotions. Emotions were given to us for many reasons: to feel happiness, sadness, and everything in between; anger helps us know when there is a violation against our being and so on.

When you first begin to move out of denial and start living in your story, emotions are so raw and new they can feel exaggerated.

Feel them anyway!

Emotions are born to guide us. While we do not live a life dictated by our emotions, we certainly should use them.

Prodded on by hope I take each new day with fresh steps. Despair still rains a bit on me for the injustices I see in this world, but I do believe at the end of time God brings swift justice.