Face Your Feelings
What do you do when you’re asked to face your feelings you didn’t allow yourself to feel in the past? After doing it for a few days, I feel like I’m walking headlong into a dungeon.
The chaos left by living under abusive people is something that can’t be fully explained. After writing down a few experiences and why I pushed back the feelings, I realized the extreme sadness is back. I’m exhausted again.
I realize this is the main reason I don’t usually stick to doing these types of “assignments”. Because I don’t know how to handle the feelings, I get overwhelmed, then exhausted and, finally, I can’t fully function. I know I need to try to stick to it, but even when I have to stop the process, there usually is something accomplished. After only a few days into it this venture, I’ve discovered something of great value.
What I Always Wanted?
I have always wished I could be loved. I thought I wanted, more than anything, to be loved just for being me. The thing is, though, that I have always had people who loved me. I don’t think a man ever has, or probably ever will, but those who are in my life now do love me.
I also always thought that I wanted someone who would defend me. There were times when I literally dreamed about it happening. Because it rarely did, I was left feeling that all the horrible things said to me were true in at least some way. Because I pushed hard thoughts away, I worked through them in my dreams, and in them others defended me when someone attacked.
However, in the last few days, I’ve come to realize what I really wanted was for someone to protect me from the attacks even happening in the first place. Yes, having someone defending me would have been amazing and I’m sure the damage would not have been as profound. But, protecting someone from abuse by making clear it won’t be tolerated is an entirely different level of caring.
Protecting the One You Love
Defending vs. Protecting
This may not seem like anything major, but for me it really is. It proves to me there has been a shift in my thinking. I see it now and I’m sad that I wished for so long only for someone to defend me. I actually felt like that would be receiving more than I could ever imagine. But why would I ever think that was the best thing? For someone to defend me, someone would first have to be attacking me! At that point, the defense would be wonderful, but I would have had the abusive words spoken to me first. Those words would wound, hurt and add to all the comments made before. Why would my wish be to have abusive words said first and then the positive?
My wish is for so much more now. I want to surround myself with people who wouldn’t even consider coming after me or treating me horribly. I want to be someone who would not tolerate anyone around me to be mistreated and want those around me to feel the same about me.
Being asked to face your feelings isn’t all bad, even when it’s scary. Because of my doing so, there has been a shift in my thinking and there is a bit of freedom in it.
~ Joanna Lynn
