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Though I never blamed my parents outright for their mis-attunement to my childhood needs, in therapy I let myself hold them accountable. I could acknowledge that they did the best they knew how to do and allow that it hadn’t felt like enough. As an adult, I felt compassion and grief over the amount of fear and anxiety I experienced as a
child. It felt like the opposite
of the shame I’d carried for ...
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As a lifelong pleaser, it was scary and infuriating when members of the group were upset with or disappointed by me.
“Only someone who really cares about you and trusts you would bother to tell you they feel hurt by you,”
sessions.
more dating practice would help me discern which men I actually enjoyed being with instead of simply being interested in whether or not they liked me, which I’d learned is a typical drive of children of trauma.
“Feelings are not facts,”
that the sensations were messages written by a scared child who couldn’t and shouldn’t control the behavior of an adult.
Titrated appropriately, anger can be a tool of truth and action.
“Bud, you just got some bad news. Your body is trying to put it in the deep freeze so you don’t have to feel it. It’s okay, but I want you to try not to let the sadness become a block of ice.” Daniel
talked her through how the hippocampus, the part of the brain that codes memory, malfunctions in times of extreme stress. Memory
formation happens but is fractured.
Some details are coded with extra weight, while others are lost as ...
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knew a high pain tolerance is often found in trauma survivors,
Overreaction is also a trauma response
She’d explained that the brain sends adrenaline, like a security detail racing across the body, determined to create an energetic cushion of protection from the impending trauma.
Complex trauma can develop when a person who has experienced past trauma lingers again in fear without support or relief.
Compound trauma can occur when more than one overwhelmingly bad thing happens in a short span of time.
“This Day We Say Grateful: A Sending Blessing” by Jan Richardson,
On this day, let us say this is simply the way love moves in its ceaseless spiraling, turning us toward one another, then sending us into what waits for us with arms open wide to us
in welcome and in hope.
O hear us as this day we say grace; this day
we say grateful; this day we say blessing; this day we release you in God’s keeping and hold you in gladness and love.
STUG—subsequent temporary upsurge of grief.
Therese Rando, STUG is a grief term I’ve always liked that reminds us that grief comes out of nowhere, obliterates, then passes.
Movement shifted the intensity of trauma while allowing the brain to rewire some experiences.
“Trauma causes the amygdala to enlarge and choke off signals that would normally travel up and across the rest of the brain. The blockage impacts mood, sleep, hunger, concentration, memory, and even decision-making.” I nodded. I knew this description by heart. “When we describe someone as traumatized, we mean the brain is ringing like a gong from a hard piece of information it took in. It may be months, even years, before the brain can even itself out again. The amygdala means well, but it can really screw you over.”
PTSD checklist
“but women and people with good memories are more susceptible to PTSD.
“Feelings are not facts.”
“Needs do not make you a liability, Meghan. Just human.”
I’d kept my relationship circle large and loose, forgetting that the purpose of friendship was to feel connected, not indebted.
I’d created based on offering to others—some way to help, hoping to be thought of or considered in return.
“So you would have stayed sick rather than disappoint or displease her?”
“So, what would happen if you stopped helping others?”
“Can you let go of the idea that you are only worthy of love once you have given something first?”
“You are not a failure because you need support—just human.” I
“Your job isn’t to figure out how to need the least amount possible, remember?”
“It’s also not your job to figure out how much help is available or who will give it to you. ‘Help’ is a complete sentence.”
“Your life is an extraordinary gift. May you live according to your own compass and inspire others with the goodness of what you find and create.”
I began to understand that we never stop needing our parents and that we can be parented in ways we don’t expect even after they die.
Holding fear in one hand and hope in the other,
