Bone Deep

Bone Deep

My dear
something happened that floored you,
left you shattered into a thousand tiny pieces
around your aching bones
grown weary
from dancing around the truth.
Whirling stripping break
dancing until
 
you couldn’t see truth anymore.
 
Muscles skin cells becoming
something else
better evolved to survive this.
Thoughts rearranging themselves
From that’s bad
to I’m bad,
so it’s okay.
 
I’m just bad
So it’s okay
I’m just bad
So it’s okay

That badness you can handle,
though repent apology punishment.
You can be less bad
or you can at least just go away.
 
But the wrongness of that story
howls at you from your bones
 
until something floors you.
 
Suddenly there is nothing
but the aching howl
of what your bones know.
 
That someone took something from you
that was never theirs to take.
That you needed them
or at least you thought you needed them.
That you loved them
or at least you thought you loved them.

Something happened to you.
You are not bad.
You don’t need to dance so hard
or so fast.
 
Things look different from the floor.
The first floor.
The first story
you tumbled down to when
all the other stories crumbled.

Read the first story.
The one where
you are not bad,
you only came to believe you are bad
because something bad happened to you.

Then read the prequel.
The old one with pages yellowed and brittle
called You.
It’s set in the trees or the ocean or the mountaintop.
There’s a different kind of dance or music or art.
The faded words will show themselves to you
with patience trust time
if you just keep reading

Spoiler alert:

My dear
you are
and have always been
a delight.

Facing The Grief After Betrayal Trauma Comes Fully Into The Light

Coming fully into awareness of betrayal trauma and facing the grief is an enormous milestone toward living a life that is fully yours. If you are going through this right now, please know that you are in good company as countless others are in the same place, and countless others have been there.

You might feel okay sometimes, even relieved, and free. Other times, the grief may be overwhelming and feel like it will never get better. It will.

Awareness of betrayal trauma is sort of like being in a revolving door that is moving in slow motion.

While the relationship with the perpetrator is ongoing, you spend most of your time inside the building. Maybe you see the comfortable and glamorous hotel lobby and have a sense of familiarity and comfort with what is inside.

Every once in a while, you get a peek at the world outside. Maybe the perpetrator says something cruel that you have no way of making sense of other than the fact that they are capable of cruelty.

This is the first moment of grief as a betrayal trauma survivor, but the door often keeps turning until you forget that clearer vantage point and everything inside once again feel familiar and inviting.

If you are leaving or have left a relationship involving betrayal trauma, you have more than likely had countless moments of grief each time something was strong enough to break through your bond with the abusive person.

If you are reading this post, you have arrived at a place of being able to stand fully outside the building, walk down the street, notice that the hotel was dilapidated or maybe even just an illusion of a hotel on an empty lot.

If so, you are feeling a particular kind of grief unlike anything that comes from losing someone who was consistently kind, or non-abusive to you.

You are facing up to five kinds of grief as the betrayal trauma comes fully into the light:

1.     The grief of losing the person you thought you knew

The perpetrator of betrayal trauma, by definition, has betrayed your trust in a traumatic way. That means that once the betrayal trauma has come fully into the light, you are left to contend with the fact that much of your relationship, and this person, in hindsight, are not what they seemed.

2.     The grief of losing the person as they actually are

Perpetrators of betrayal trauma can sometimes be fun, interesting, passionate people. They are often people who are good at making things happen and getting things done. You may feel a sense of loss of the good parts of the person or the relationship.

If you are someone who has a high degree of empathy, which is common among betrayal trauma survivors, you may feel empathy for the part of the perpetrator that was wounded, and so learned to wound others. You may also be grieving from letting go of the desire to make the perpetrator happy, knowing that something may have hurt them early in their life.

3.     The grief of lost innocence

If you are fully recognizing betrayal trauma for the first time, this may be the first time you realize that people are sometimes capable of manipulative and often callous behavior. In addition to the grief of losing an important relationship, this is an existential grief that can turn the world on its head for the time being.

4.     The grief of realizing what you have been going through

Betrayal trauma is different from other traumas like a car accident or natural disaster that are immediately obvious traumas. Betrayal trauma, especially when it has gone on for a long time, occurs in a private and often secretive bubble without witnesses who can immediately come to your side and say, “Hey, I see things are not okay here. How can I support you?” You may feel waves of sadness for enduring so much for so long, and for telling yourself it was no big deal.

5.     The grief of losing friends, family members, and relationships with other people in your life who don’t believe you

Again, because betrayal trauma often occurs in private and doesn’t always leave scars, coming fully into awareness can sometimes mean walking away alone, or with one or two trusted people.

So now what?

The grief of betrayal trauma coming fully into the light can feel like the end of the world, and in a way, it is. It is the beginning of the end of a world in which you are not being treated with kindness, reliability, and care.

The most important question to ask yourself when grieving betrayal trauma is, “How can I be kind to myself today?”

A young pink trillium comes into the sunlight- The rain of grief brings the first signs of spring.

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This week's belonging reminder:

I always get to where I’m going by walking away from where I have been.

—Winnie the Pooh

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This week's practice suggestion:

If you are grieving a relationship involving betrayal trauma, that means you have already come a long, long way toward living a life of ease within yourself. At this point, it is tempting to doubt yourself, or second-guess yourself. This gives your mind something to do to try to bypass the grief, but it doesn’t work because the reality is that the relationship was harmful to you.

The most important thing to focus on right now is this question:

How can I be kind to myself right now?

Because grief looks so different for each person and even within each person depending on the day, it is important to sit with the question until you come up with one thing that feels kind to yourself right now. Here is a very small sample list to help give you some ideas, but there is no need to limit the answer to this list.

Ways to be kind to yourself on your own if you have space and privacy

-       Listen to an empowering song
-       Scream into your pillow
-       Walk in the forest
-       Listen to a sad song and feel your feelings
-       Watch a comforting show or movie
-       Read a comforting book
-       Take a bath and let the bathtub hold you
-       Lie down in the grass
-       Take a cold shower (if feeling very overwhelmed)
-       Do some journaling
-       Make art
-       Write a goodbye letter to the perpetrator (and don’t send it)
-       Make yourself a yummy meal or order yummy take-out
-       Take a nap
-       Find a guided meditation online on grief, or anger, or sadness, or longing, or whatever you are feeling

Ways to be kind to yourself involving others, when possible:

-       Talk to a trusted friend
-       Reach out to a therapist or support group
-       Spend time with a pet
-       Attend a meet-up and do something you enjoy in community
-       Reach out to your sponsor, if you have one
-       Connect with these domestic violence resources if you have any concern about your safety.

Ways to be kind to yourself when you do not have much space or privacy:

-       Put a small stone, or acorn in your pocket and remember something important to you every time you touch it. For example, it could remind you that you are worth treating with kindness.
-       Recite a line from a favorite poem or prayer to yourself
-       Breathe deeply into your belly
-       Pay attention to whichever of your 5 senses is the most pleasing to you. For example, look at the trees,
feel the breeze on your skin, or listen to the quiet, if possible
-       Hold your own hand

See if you can find things to add to this list that are uniquely about you and what feels kind to you. Whatever you choose, the purpose is to be kind to yourself, and not to fix yourself or your feelings. Your psyche, or soul, or spirit, or however you think of it, has been through trauma and loss. It takes time and a lot of kindness to heal.

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Want To Feel Secure Within Yourself? Here's Where To Begin.

Do you want to feel secure within yourself, but don’t know how?

There are probably two main forces in your life that have disconnected you from your ability to feel secure within yourself.

The first is the betrayal trauma you experienced. To survive being abused by someone you depended on, you had to quiet your inner voice and put the voice of the person who hurt you on loudspeaker. Betrayal trauma made it impossible for you to feel your feelings, know your needs and boundaries, and live your full life because of the physical and/or emotional consequences you would have faced for doing so.

The second force that has probably disconnected you from your ability to feel secure within yourself is society’s messages about certain types of bodies and minds (that is, white, able-bodied, straight, cis, male, middle-to-upper-class) being more important than other types of bodies and minds. If you have been marginalized in any way throughout your life, you have been shaped to believe that you don’t deserve to feel fully secure within yourself.

Even if you are at the top of the privilege ladder in every way, you have still been shaped by these messages to not be interested in things that are “too feminine,” to ignore when you are feeling pain and need rest, to refrain from close relationships with other men for fear of appearing gay, and so on. These conditions are obstacles to feeling secure within yourself.

The truth is that everyone, including you, deserves to feel secure within themselves. What’s more, by committing to the path of feeling secure within yourself you are joining a community of survivors walking the same trail so that it will be easier for more and more folks to follow in your footsteps.

You don’t need to have a personality transplant, go on a 10-day meditation retreat, or have a particular job or a particular relationship or a particular anything in order to feel secure within yourself. In fact, learning to feel secure within yourself is more about relaxing into your own body and mind than it is about developing anything new. It’s about re-connecting to your internal guidance, even if you had to disconnect from it from the time you were very young.

Your internal guidance always remains intact.

This post will take you through seven steps toward feeling secure within yourself. The first step is a short breathing exercise. The rest of the steps will work better if you do the breathing exercise first. The breathing exercise will help you to get calm and centered so that it will be easier to fully practice the next six steps.

Learning to feel secure within yourself takes time and practice. You can do it by following these steps:

1.     Breathe
2.     Remember your strengths
3.     Remember your thread and your pledge
4.   Consider the admission price (and accept it when you are ready)
5.     Note your needs and boundaries
6.     Become your own penpal
7.     Never give up on yourself

These steps make up a road map to feeling secure within yourself. This roadmap works if you follow it consistently over and over for as long as it takes. Let’s go through each of the steps one by one.

1.     Breathe.

Breathing is super important because your body is in a constant state of communication with your mind. When your body is tense it sends messages to your mind that something is wrong. Because of the betrayal trauma you have experienced, when something feels wrong, you are likely to feel shame and believe that you are bad (see previous posts for an explanation of how this works). The more at ease you are in your body, the easier it is to feel secure within yourself.

There are many different ways to connect with your breath. I like breathing slightly longer on the exhale than on the inhale because it engages your parasympathetic nervous system which is calming and soothing.

Let’s take three of these breaths together right now:

Inhaling a count of 1….2….3….4….and 5
Hold 1
Exhaling a count of 1….2….3….4….5…and 6

Inhaling a count of 1….2….3….4….and 5
Hold 1
Exhaling a count of 1….2….3….4….5…and 6

Inhaling a count of 1….2….3….4….and 5
Hold 1
Exhaling a count of 1….2….3….4….5…and 6

Great!

2.     Remember your strengths.

Betrayal trauma taught you to be hyper-focused on the things that could go wrong and to ignore signs that you have been learning and growing. Give yourself credit right now for at least one thing you have done already that helped you build a secure attachment with yourself.

Please give yourself credit for noticing your needs and/or boundaries whether or not you act on them. The more you notice them, the easier it will be to act on them in the future. You can also give yourself credit for ways you take care of your needs and boundaries that already come naturally to you, like eating when you are hungry or showering when you feel sweaty.

You can choose from the following areas to give yourself credit:

• Identifying a need that I had

  Examples: I noticed that I was thirsty while I was doing work. I noticed I needed rest at the end of a long day. I noticed I was sad and needed to talk to a friend. I noticed I was disappointed and needed encouragement. I noticed that I was feeling insecure and needed guidance. etc.

• Acting on a need I noticed and giving myself what I needed

  Examples: I got a glass of water and drank it when I was thirsty. I went to bed early at the end of a long day. I asked a friend to talk (or I did some journaling to myself, or I listened to a comforting podcast) when I was sad. I gave myself encouragement when I was feeling disappointed. I read this blog post when I was needing guidance.

• Identifying a boundary I had

  Examples: I noticed my body tensing up when talking to a certain friend. I noticed feeling a sense of dread when my neighbor asked me to watch their big dog for a whole month. I noticed feeling angry when a coworker made a racist comment. I noticed when I had had enough to drink. I noticed when my schedule was starting to feel overly full.

• Acting on a boundary by setting a limit or saying “no.”

  Examples: I declined an invitation to get lunch with a friend I consistently feel uneasy around. I told my neighbor that it doesn't work for me to watch their dog. I said, “That comment didn’t feel very good to me,” when my coworker said something racist. I only had one drink because I realized that was enough for me. I stopped adding new responsibilities when I noticed my schedule felt overly full.

• Not giving up on myself.

  Example: I am reading this post even though sometimes I don’t think I deserve to feel secure. I keep trying to take care of myself even when I get derailed for a while. I reminded myself that I have my own back.

3.     Remember your thread and your pledge.

Fill in the blanks with three things good things you think could happen if you became secure within yourself to create your thread:

I follow the thread of ________, __________, and _____________.

For example, if three things you would want to happen if you felt secure within yourself were:

 - I want to feel like I belong
- I want to know when to say “yes” and when to say “no”
- I want to trust myself

Your thread would look something like this:

I follow the thread of belonging, recognizing my “yeses and nos,” and self-trust.

Once you have written your thread, it’s time to commit to it. You can do so by saying the following pledge out loud:

I follow the thread of ________, __________, and _____________.

I pledge to commit to my thread, and to re-commit every time I catch myself doubting it, losing hope in it, or forgetting about it. I hold onto the thread even, and especially, when it feels like nothing is changing. I hold onto the thread even, and especially when, other people seem to want me to abandon it. I take the leap of faith and continue to trust my thread. I pledge to do this with as much kindness to myself as possible.

4.     Consider the admission price (and accept it when you are ready).

This is a tough one. Most of the time, healing betrayal trauma by building a secure attachment with yourself comes with some sort of admission price.

Sometimes the admission price is just the discomfort of trying something new. Sometimes the admission price is losing relationships with people in your life who don’t want you to choose yourself, or who, for whatever reason, are no longer a good fit for you once you have learned to listen to yourself.

The path of healing betrayal trauma comes with the beauty of discovering what really matters to you, what you really love, and what you really need; it also comes with the grief of saying goodbye to whatever can’t come with you on your path of healing.

5.     Note your needs and boundaries.

As often as you can, get into the habit of asking yourself, “What do I need right now?” and “Am I honoring my boundaries right now?”

Start a list of needs and boundaries that you start to notice on a regular basis. You may not know what you need or what your boundaries are at first, and that is okay. Just keep checking in and eventually it will become clear.

6.     Become your own penpal.

Becoming your own penpal is one way to build a secure attachment with yourself by writing letters to your future self to look back on as they progress along the path. We will come back to this practice at the end of this post.

7.     Never give up on yourself.

The path to feeling secure within yourself is winding and filled with obstacles big and small. I encourage you to take breaks and rest on your path, but always, always come back to it. You will find a whole world worth loving inside yourself, but only if you don’t give up.

To love a person is to learn the song in your heart and sing it to yourself when you have forgotten. Arne Gorborg

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This week's belonging reminder:

Healing may not be so much about getting better, as about letting go of everything that isn’t you - all of the expectations, all of the beliefs - and becoming who you are.

                                                                                            ― Rachel Naomi Remen

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This week's practice suggestion:

You are invited to become your own penpal this week.

Each day this week, write a brief note to your future self about your commitment to building a secure attachment with yourself. You can write about why you are choosing to commit to this path, about the obstacles you face, about your needs and boundaries, and about your fears and hopes.

Tell your future self what it is like for you to follow your thread every day. You and your future self may not be well-acquainted yet so take this as a chance to let your future self get to know you.

If you continue your self-penpal practice, you will have a treasure trove of letters to look back on in the future when you are struggling and need to be reminded what this is all about and how far you have come on the path to feeling secure within yourself. I recommend you date your letters and make them easily searchable for future reference.

With this exercise, you have a process you can repeat over and over to help you feel secure within yourself. You can use this exercise by itself, or you can go through all seven steps outlined above.

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For an assessment of your strengths and areas for growth in building a secure attachment with yourself, read my previous blog post called Home Base: Building a Secure Attachment with Yourself.

For the full exercise in identifying your thread and your pledge, see my post called Instructions on Not Giving Up.

Instructions on not giving up

As a betrayal trauma survivor, you’ve likely had the urge to give up on yourself many times.

You inherited this urge to give up on yourself from the betrayal trauma you experienced. It’s not your fault that you sometimes or often want to give up on yourself, but you do have the power to change it.

- How does betrayal trauma train you to give up on yourself?

Because the perpetrator of betrayal trauma is someone you needed or trusted, your subconscious mind kept your relationship with them intact by shutting down your own feelings, intuition, and/or needs. If you shut down your feelings, intuition, and/or needs over and over, eventually shutting yourself down becomes a habit. Without your feelings, intuition, and/or needs, life can be lonely, scary, and confusing, and it can make you believe that you need someone else to tell you how to live your life or it is impossible for you to be happy.

Building a secure attachment with yourself is about reconnecting to your feelings, intuition, and needs.

The best place to start is by making a commitment to never give up on yourself, no matter what.

- What does it mean to never give up on yourself?

To never give up on yourself means to commit to visiting yourself a little bit every day. It means to notice when you have abandoned yourself and to always come back to you. It means doing this over and over and over, until it becomes second nature.

When you first commit to building a secure attachment with yourself, it may feel like nothing is happening for a while. But if you stay the course and don’t give up, you will find a deep and lasting place of belonging inside you.

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This week's belonging reminder:

Instructions on Not Giving Up

More than the fuchsia funnels breaking out
of the crabapple tree, more than the neighbor’s
almost obscene display of cherry limbs shoving
their cotton candy-colored blossoms to the slate
sky of Spring rains, it’s the greening of the trees
that really gets to me. When all the shock of white
and taffy, the world’s baubles and trinkets, leave
the pavement strewn with the confetti of aftermath,
the leaves come. Patient, plodding, a green skin
growing over whatever winter did to us, a return
to the strange idea of continuous living despite
the mess of us, the hurt, the empty. Fine then,
I’ll take it, the tree seems to say, a new slick leaf
unfurling like a fist to an open palm, I’ll take it all.

- Ada Limón

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This week's practice suggestion:

Take a look at this list and write down the three things on the list that you most want for yourself. Don’t overthink it, just go with your initial gut feeling:

- I want to experience joy
- I want to feel like I belong
- I want to know when to say “yes” and when to say “no”
- I want to trust myself
- I want to know when to trust other people
- I want to do things I want to do without feeling guilty
- I want to experience pleasure
- I want to build connections with people who are good for me to be around
- I want more ease in my life
- I want to let go of worry about what other people think of me
- I want to know there is nothing wrong with me
- I want to live with my whole heart
- I want to speak up for myself
- I want to do what I feel is right, even when it is hard
- I want to take chances and move toward my dreams
- I want clarity about who I am and what my life is about
- I want to believe in myself
- I want to believe it when people say nice things to me
- I want to own my gifts
- I want to be my own best friend
- I want to express love more easily
- I want to feel love more easily
- I want to experience life as an adventure
- I want to become more playful
- I want to value my life
- I want to live a life that is uniquely mine
- I want to survive difficult situations without shutting down or collapsing
- I want to experience more wonder
- I want to feel held
- I want to feel understood
- I want to know I am loved
- I want to know my competence
- I want to know my strength
- I want to know how to relate to people who I don’t entirely trust
- I want to invite in healthy intimacy
- I want to let go of unhealthy attachments
- I want peace

Now imagine a thread that is made of these three intentions and that you can hold onto and follow no matter what.

Fill in the blanks to create your thread:

I follow the thread of ________, __________, and _____________.

For example, if the three things I want from the list are these three:

 - I want to feel like I belong
- I want to know when to say “yes” and when to say “no”
- I want to trust myself

My thread would look something like this:

I follow the thread of belonging, recognizing my “yeses and nos,” and self-trust.

Once you have written your thread, it’s time to commit to it. You can do so by saying the following pledge out loud:

I follow the thread of ________, __________, and _____________.

I pledge to commit to my thread, and to re-commit every time I catch myself doubting it, losing hope in it, or forgetting about it. I hold onto the thread even, and especially, when it feels like nothing is changing. I hold onto the thread even, and especially when, other people seem to want me to abandon it. I take the leap of faith and continue to trust my thread. I pledge to do this with as much kindness to myself as possible.

Read your thread and your pledge to yourself each day for the next week.

  
Until next time. :)

Home base: Building a secure attachment with yourself

You’ve likely heard of attachment styles. A bit less than 60% of adults tend toward secure attachment according to original research on attachment. The remaining 40% or so tend toward insecure attachment styles including anxious, avoidant, and fearful-avoidant (disorganized). I won’t delve into the various attachment styles here, as plenty has been written on the subject elsewhere (a thorough overview can be found here and you might want to check out the popular book, Attached.)

Whether or not you are familiar with attachment styles, how often have you thought about building a secure attachment with yourself?

Can you imagine:

-       A relationship with someone who does their best to learn what you need and give it to you as often as possible?

-       A relationship with someone who does their best to never cross your boundaries or make you feel unsafe in any way?

-       A relationship with someone who will always be there for you and who has your best interest at heart, even when you make a mistake?

Even if you don’t have a single relationship in your life that fits those criteria right now, as a lot of people don’t, you can become that person for you, and you can start anytime.

Often the idea of becoming your own secure attachment person can be upsetting for betrayal trauma survivors because it can feel like they have had to take care of themselves their whole life, and they just want someone else to do it for once. This is certainly understandable, and we all need caring, reciprocal relationships. It’s important to keep in mind though, that the more you learn to be your own home base/secure attachment person, the easier it will become to form the types of relationships that you long for with others.

Becoming your own home base/secure attachment person is not a replacement for intimacy with others, but is itself a part of being able to recognize, pursue, and contribute to healthy intimacy.

These little eggs will thrive as long as their needs and boundaries are consistently cared for and tended to. We humans are the same way!

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This week's belonging reminder:

Building a secure attachment with yourself is about learning what your tea and honey is and how to bring it to yourself.

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This week's practice suggestion:

How do you become your own secure attachment person? We will spend the next couple of weeks looking at this question.

Let’s start by getting a brief sense of your relationship with yourself as it is right now.

Please give yourself a rating using the following scale for each of the questions:

 0 --------------------1--------------------2--------------------3--------------------4

Not                  A little             Somewhat              Very much           Completely
at all                like me            like me                    like me                 like me
like me

1.     I usually know what I need

2.     I try to give myself what I need whenever possible

3.     I usually recognize my boundaries

4.     I try my best not to put myself in situations that cross my boundaries

5.     I try to be kind and caring with myself when I make a mistake

6.     I don’t give up on myself

The higher the score, the more secure your attachment with yourself is likely to be.

After tallying your score, take a look at which of these two combinations is the highest for you: 1+2, 3+4, or 5+6. If 1+2 is your highest score you have a strength in the area of taking care of your needs. If 3+4 is highest, you have a strength in the area of taking care of your boundaries. If 5+6 is the highest, you have a strength in the area of being there for yourself.

This week, focus on your strongest area (if it’s a tie, choose whichever one you want). Catch yourself when you are taking action in the area of your strength and give yourself credit for it. Focusing your attention on times when you are already practicing secure attachment with yourself strengthens your sense of yourself as a secure home base.

If all your scores were zero, that is also just fine. But go ahead and give yourself a “1” on number 6, “I don’t give up on myself” because you got all the way to the end of this post! Then look for other ways you don’t give up on yourself throughout the next week.

 
Until next time. :)

Let's talk about narcissistic abuse

Narcissistic abuse thrives in silence. We need to talk about it.

If you have experienced this type abuse but have never learned much about it, this post may be challenging to read. Although I do link to various resources at the end of the post, I recommend making sure you are reading this at a time when you have some space in your day to take care of yourself. If that time is not now, the post will be here for you to return to and read whenever you are ready.

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Not all betrayal trauma survivors have experienced narcissistic abuse. Betrayal trauma is often perpetrated by folks with anger management issues, or who act out when under the influence of drugs or alcohol, for example. These situations are not necessarily less harmful than narcissistic abuse, but narcissistic abuse follows a particular pattern that requires awareness in order to notice it, protect yourself from it, and reclaim yourself. This post may or may not apply to your experiences, but I hope that either way it provides you some information that will keep you from getting entangled in a dynamic with someone prone to perpetrating narcissistic abuse.

Educating yourself about narcissistic abuse helps you to gain clarity about where you end and someone who is causing you harm begins. It helps you to remove the bad feelings caused by the abuse from inside you so that you begin to see and feel that the bad feeling is not you, but rather information about something bad that is or has been happening in your life.

So, how do you recognize if you have experienced narcissistic abuse? Although there are common feelings that go along with living through narcissistic abuse including feelings of fear, obligation, guilt, shame, and dissociation or disconnection from yourself, the easiest way to determine whether someone is narcissistically abusing you, is to pay attention to what they are doing.

Much has been written about the typical pattern of a narcissistic abuser, which can be broken down into three phases. In phase one, the abuser comes on strong in the beginning, also known as idealizing you or lovebombing you. In this phase, the abuser is in contact with you all the time and starts to seemingly anticipate your needs and desires and fulfill them without you ever having asked for that. Lovebombing isn’t necessarily romantic in nature. Your boss could lovebomb you, for example, by saying things like, “I’ve never had an employee like you before,” or otherwise making you feel special or different from everyone else. If a new relationship, or a major change in a relationship feels too good to be true, you might want to make are you are not dealing with a lovebomber.

The second phase of narcissistic abuse is known as the devaluation phase. In this phase, some of the initial lovebombing may still be happening, but it is happening less often, and likely at strategic times when you are behaving in a way that pleases the person. For example, you may only receive some of the initial love and care in this phase after you clean the perpetrator’s house, give them money, or make them feel however they want to feel that day. Outside of the lovebombing, the perpetrator in this phase starts criticizing you perhaps subtly or perhaps downright callously. You likely start questioning yourself in this phase to try to figure out what you started doing to deserve the change in treatment (hint: it’s not you, it’s them). Meanwhile, because you are being rewarded with lovebombing when you behave the way the perpetrator wants you to behave, a dynamic in which they have power over your life is being established.

The third phase is known as the discard phase. At this point, the perpetrator has moved onto other targets or they have left because you caught onto the pattern and started standing up for yourself. This can be an extremely difficult and painful time because the perpetrator often abruptly disappears from your life as quickly as they entered it, leaving you reeling from the loss of a partner, best friend, family member, or work relationship that was really important to you even though it was so unhealthy.

The phases of narcissistic abuse often repeat themselves and there is even a term for when the abuser re-enters your life after a discard. It is called hoovering and it is named after a popular brand of vacuum cleaners. That is because when the narcissistic abuser reenters your life, it is so easy to get sucked away from yourself and into the abusive dynamic once again.

If you are not familiar with the dynamics of narcissistic abuse and are wondering whether this is something you have experienced or are currently experiencing, it can be overwhelming to consider what to do with this information. The good news is that there are all sorts of resources our there from meetup groups to books to YouTube videos.

Here are some recommended resources for further learning and healing:

Books:

Healing from Hidden Abuse by Shannon Thomas

Power: Surviving and Thriving after Narcissistic Abuse by Shahida Arabi

Out of the Fog: Moving from Confusion to Clarity After Narcissistic Abuse by Dana Morningstar

Homecoming: Overcome Fear and Trauma to Reclaim your Whole, Authentic Self by Dr. Thema Bryant

Podcasts:

Homecoming with Dr. Thema

Support Groups:

Search for Narcissistic Abuse support groups through Meetup.com, Psychology Today, or a simple Google search. There are groups all over the United States and the world. Keep searching until you find a group where you feel like you can be most at ease in yourself.

When choosing a group, make sure you attend to whether you feel like all your identities are affirmed. For example, if you identify at LGBTQ+, BIPOC, and/or disabled, make sure to ask the facilitator or organizer questions about their experiences supporting folks holding your identities. This is also important if you decide to work with a therapist to focus on healing narcissistic abuse

Your own path and your own light are always right there waiting for you.

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This week's belonging reminder:

In this podcast episode, Dr. Thema talks about coming home to yourself after narcissistic abuse.

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This week's practice suggestion:

Listen to the episode and choose one of the following areas of healing to focus on this week:

-       Self-forgiveness

-       Restoring your identity

-       Exploring your complicated feelings

-       Recognizing authentically kind relationships

-       Breaking the silence

-       Honoring your boundaries

-       Discovering what you enjoy

-       Learning to be proud of yourself

Find a way to just dip a toe into the practice the area you chose to focus on this week. For example, if you chose breaking the silence you might tell a trusted friend something like, “I haven’t always been treated well.” If you chose exploring your complicated feelings, you might breathe into your heart for a few breaths and then journal what feelings you notice for 5 minutes. If you chose honoring your boundaries you might wait an extra hour to respond to someone when your spidey sense is telling you that the interaction doesn’t feel good.

If you have not experienced narcissistic abuse, many of the above focus areas are relevant to healing all forms of betrayal trauma. Choose one that is relevant to you.

You are welcome to expand on your initial small practice, but start small. That way you can make sure not to push yourself faster or farther than you are ready for.

Until next time. :)

Interoceptive awareness: Your personal treasure map

You know that old cliché about how important it is to follow your internal compass? Have you ever wondered what the heck your internal compass feels like, how to recognize it, or whether you have one at all?

It is true that everyone has an internal compass, including you. If you struggle to find it or to trust it, you are not alone. Our culture conditions all of us away from following our internal compass from a very early age. The reason for that is that the internal compass lives in the body but we live in a culture that prioritizes the mind, brain, and thoughts over anything the body has to offer and treats the body as something for the mind to tame.

In addition to being socialized out of listening to your internal compass, betrayal trauma can make it a survival imperative to ignore your internal compass. Imagine what would happen if a young child listened to the racing heart and flow of blood to her core that said Run in the face of an abusive parents, for example. For betrayal trauma survivors, following the internal compass is often just not an option.

The good new is that there is a way back to your internal compass.

I recently had a pleasure of completing a 6-day training in a research-based therapy approach called Mindful Awareness in Body-Oriented Therapy (MABT) with its creator, Dr. Cynthia Price at the University of Washington. MABT has been shown to help with recovery from trauma, dissociation, substance abuse, and emotion regulation, through a superpower that we all possess and can get better at, called interoception.

Interoception is the ability to sense what is happening inside the body.

In addition to helping to heal the impacts of betrayal trauma, I think the coolest thing about interoception is that the more you practice interoceptive awareness, the more you gain access to a whole world of information that lives inside you and that was previously out of reach.

How is interoceptive awareness different from mindfulness?

You are much more likely to be familiar with the idea of practicing mindfulness that the idea of practicing interoceptive awareness. There is a lot of overlap between the two concepts, but they differ in a couple of important ways. First, mindfulness is not limited to awareness of sensations inside the body but could include awareness of things that you see, hear, smell, taste, or touch. Of course, there is a bodily component to things you experience with your five senses, but interoceptive awareness is more concerned with sensations in your inner body. Second, there is such an enormous explosion of mindfulness resources and practices out there, it is difficult to know to what degree they are guiding interoceptive awareness versus guiding something that is more based in thinking about your internal sensations as opposed to actually sensing them.

Thinking about internal sensations is very different from actually sensing them. In fact, betrayal trauma survivors often experience a lot of distress due to getting stuck in thought loops about their uncomfortable sensations.

MABT is like going to the interoceptive awareness gym where instead of strengthening your muscles, you are strengthening your ability to move your awareness into your body.

The world inside of you is just as complex and vibrant as the natural world around you.

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This week's belonging reminder:

Licensed social worker, Carly Woolard’s, poem about interoception gets at the heart of what interoception has to do with a sense of belonging:

YOU ARE HERE NOW
You are here
Now.
But How? you ask
You’ve been through hell and back,
countless panic attacks.
You hold your story
in the crook of your neck,
always gotta double-check
if you’re okay or in purgatory.
Disconnected from your body,
numbing the shame with another hot toddy.
Running the blame like, Why can’t I trust anybody?
But remember, you are here
Now.
Let us vow
to ourselves that we will allow
ourselves to reach for the sky
with a deep breath in and a deep breath out.
Untwist that spine
so we stand up like we love ourselves or something.
Wiggle your shoulders
like you are the beholder
of your own beautiful existence.
Take your story
and any resistance
from the crook of your neck
and let
yourself breathe in the morning and all it’s glory.
Scoop the earth
with your strong hands and spread your arms like wings.
Fly to safety- this is your rebirth.
So give yourself a bow
because you are here
Now

The very act of practicing interoception is an act of treating yourself like you belong in the world. As your interoceptive ability grows, you will also be better able to communicate your needs to safe others, set boundaries with unsafe others, and be able to really feel what belonging feels like in your body.

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This week's practice suggestion:

This week I invite you to practice building your interoceptive “muscle” using this practice I adapted from MABT as follows:

1. Start by taking three full, deep breaths, allowing the lungs to release completely on the exhale. This helps to prepare the body for the practice.

2. Now choose either your right or your left hand to focus on. The idea is to focus on a more neutral region of the body when you are getting familiar with interoception practice so that you can learn in a comfortable way. If your hands are not neutral for you, find a neutral spot like a foot, or perhaps the top or your head, or an elbow. Just choose one specific neutral area for the practice.

3. If possible, take your other hand and wrap it around the area you chose to focus on. If that is too difficult or not possible, find a towel or other prop you can use to wrap around the area.

4. Once the area your have chosen is wrapped/cradled/sandwiched, bring your attention to the sensation of the area inside the “wrap.”

5. If it feels right to you, let this area know you are going to be keeping it company for a few minutes.

6. If you can feel the sensations deep inside, start by feeling the sensation of the “wrap” touching the outside of the area. Then slowly guide your attention deeper inside the area.

7. Name what you notice in that area including sensations, colors, textures, or other qualities of the sensations. Examples are things like warm, pulsing, pulling, spreading, yellow, tingly. Just sense into the area within the wrap and name what you notice.

8. After a few minutes, let the area of your body know that you are going to start to transition away now. If it feels right, let it know you appreciate it for doing this practice today.

9. Take out a piece of paper, journal, or notebook and write down anything you noticed that you feel curious about or that has meaning for you. Only take a minute or two for this and if nothing comes up, that is fine too.

Do this at least three times this week.

Until next time. :)

Visit yourself every day.

Healing from betrayal trauma is a less like taking an Advil to knock out a headache and more like listening inward to learn what is causing the headache, realizing it is from dehydration, and starting a new habit of drinking water every day for the rest of your life.

When you commit to listening inward it may be more than just a headache that gets your attention. There are likely all sorts of uncomfortable feelings inside that you may have been avoiding for a long time without even realizing you were avoiding them. It can be overwhelming to pay attention to what is going on in your body all at once.

So how can you listen inward without blowing your fuses?

When it comes to healing betrayal trauma, don’t be afraid to start small.

The impact of daily visits to yourself will add up over time. The trick is to just keep visiting yourself. There is so much wisdom in your body. If you visit yourself a little every day you will learn to listen to it, you will come to see that you can trust it, and you will be able to give it what it needs in order to feel more at ease, like a glass of water for a dehydration headache.

I know it is scary to take these leaps of faith. As a trauma psychologist and someone who is on the healing journey myself, I promise your internal guidance will not lead you astray. That is not to say that you won’t make mistakes. Mistakes are a very important part of the healing process that teach you even more about yourself, your values, and how to listen inward in ways that work best for you. Mistakes are not a sign that you are on the wrong path but are part and parcel of the healing path, or any life well-lived for that matter. We will come back to talking about mistakes in future posts. For now, the focus it to start a habit of visiting yourself every day.

There is a whole world inside you that is no less worth visiting every day than this camellia I spotted on a morning walk.

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This week's belonging reminder:

One of my favorite podcasts is called The Best Advice Show with host Zak Rosen. Episodes are usually 5 minutes or less, so they often a great tool tool to help you visit yourself every day. In an episode from January of this year, Sadie Lune gives advice about breathing. The episode is titled, On Demand Breathing.

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This week's practice suggestion:

Listen to the On Demand Breathing episode of the Best Advice Show and take the advice. That is, breathe deeply every time you see or hear the word breath, breathe, or breathing in song, on television, on social media, in passing conversation, in the news, on this blog post, or anywhere else. If you go through a whole day without seeing or hearing the word breath, breathe, or breathing, breathe deeply once at night before bed.

Sometimes focusing on breath can be overwhelming at first as well for survivors of betrayal trauma. If this is the case for you, you can do the same practice with the word “see” or the word “listen.” Each time you read or hear one of these words, turn your attention to whatever you see or hear around you and hold your attention on something you see or hear for five seconds. If you don’t read or hear one of these words by the end of the day, turn your attention to something you see or hear for five seconds once at night before bed. Getting in touch with your senses is another way of visiting yourself every day.

You belong in the world, even when you feel lonely!

Feeling lonely is a normal part of life, and in fact, is becoming more and more common with the isolation of the pandemic and living in a digital age.

Betrayal trauma can make it hard to recognize when you feel lonely because loneliness is so often mixed with, or masked by feelings of shame. This could be for a lot of different reasons. You might have learned to pair loneliness with shame when a caregiver repeatedly gave you the silent treatment when they were upset. Or you may have connected loneliness with shame over time as you felt lonely in an abusive relationship and never talked about it with anyone.

Shame thrives in silence, so the more you have endured loneliness without talking to anyone or receiving love, the more your loneliness has likely turned to shame. Again, this doesn’t mean you don’t belong. It just means the needs of the loneliness haven’t been heard.

 What does loneliness feel like?

If you take a look at this emotion map created by researchers in Finland, you can see that emotions are connected to all sorts of different body states. Loneliness, like all emotions, feels a little different to everyone, but generally, it tends to live mostly in the heart area. It can feel like a heaviness and/or a burning sensation, which makes sense from a poetic perspective too, as loneliness is like a heart’s longing for connection.

Although we most often think of loneliness as a feeling of longing for connection with other people, feelings of loneliness may be just as comforted at times by connection with art, nature, poetry, music, spirituality, animals, or anything that speaks to your heart.

When connecting with other people is not an option in the moment, there are many many ways of remembering your belonging and comforting loneliness.

---

This week's belonging reminder:

I have never met a heavy heart that wasn’t a phone booth with a red cape inside.

- Andrea Gibson

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This week's practice suggestion:

One way to practice keeping your heart company when you feel lonely is by listening to familiar music. In fact, Recent research shows that listening to music may ease loneliness. You can use the same instructions the author used in the research study:

Please, choose music from your library that you would turn to when you are looking for comfort.

This can be pieces that feel like an understanding friend and that make you feel accepted and emotionally supported.

Allow yourself to connect with your emotions and feel comforted while tuning in with the music.

I would add that you may wish to put a hand or a hot water bottle on your heart as you listen, reminding your heart that you are here to keep it company. <3

How to Listen to Yourself

You may be surprised by what happens in your heart if you pay it regular visits. The heart is in a constant state of communication, always seeking a listener, always hoping that listener will be you.

Betrayal trauma can make it harder to hear what your heart wants and needs, but the good news is that you can always learn to speak your heart’s language. Like learning any new language, it just takes time and practice.

You may be in the habit of turning to others for guidance, putting other people’s needs and wants before your own, or even waiting for someone to come along and tell you how to spend your time instead of listening inward. This is another absolutely normal consequence of betrayal trauma in which you had to neglect your own wants and needs in order to appease the perpetrator. The earlier the betrayal trauma started, the harder it will be as an adult to know how to listen to yourself.

So, how do you learn to listen to yourself?

 The heart speaks, not in words, but in sensations.

 When you come across something that is right for you to move toward, you may feel one of more of these in you body, especially in your chest and/or belly:

-       Ease
-       Lightness
- Warmth
-   Softness
- Spark
- Fullness
- Expansiveness
- Spaciousness
- Uplift

These sensations may be barely noticeable at first, especially if your default is to have a lot of anxiousness or heaviness inside of you. At first, the sensations of rightness may be overshadowed by the more difficult sensations, but it doesn’t mean they aren’t there!

This week's belonging reminder:

There is a little spark inside of you waiting to be listened to over and over, until it is the first thing you hear every day. May it be inspired by the song This is Me!

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This week's practice suggestion:

Grab a journal and pen at the end of the day of at least one day this week. Pause and take three full, deep breaths, focusing on the sensation of the breath entering and leaving the belly. Next, reflect back on your day today. Were there any moments in which you felt any of the following things, no matter how subtle?:

-       Ease
-       Lightness
- Warmth
-   Softness
- Spark
- Fullness
- Expansiveness
- Spaciousness
- Uplift

Even if there was a moment when you think you may have felt any of these things, but you aren’t sure, write down what you were doing in that moment. What was going on around you? Were you inside or outside? Were you with others or by yourself? List anything you think may be connected with any of the feelings on the list for you.

Here is an example from my day so far:

- Having a morning cup of tea
- Watching the tram go by
- Seeing my cat’s floofy tail
- Sitting here writing to you

What’s on your list?

Psychological abuse is betrayal trauma

Many survivors of betrayal trauma are never physically touched by their abuser. Instead, the abuse comes in the form of silent treatments, name-calling, threats, boundary-crossings, and other ways of exerting power and control.

Psychological abuse affects survivors in ways that overlap with, but are also distinct from the harm caused by other forms of betrayal trauma. If you have been the victim of psychological abuse, here are some things that may be familiar to you:

• Intense and sometimes unrelenting self-doubt

• Not knowing what you need or want

• “Shame attacks” that may seem to come on for no reason

• Believing yourself to be broken, defective, or unlovable

• Confusion about what really matters to you

• Difficulty knowing who to trust and when to protect yourself

• Intense discomfort being in positions of leadership

• Fear of being alone

• Ruminating about whether you did something wrong

All of the common consequences of psychological abuse happen for the same reason: psychological abuse disconnects you from your core self. The good news is that your authentic self never goes away completely, and is waiting for you whenever you are ready to come home.

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This week's belonging reminder:

If you aren’t already familiar with Trauma Psychologist, Dancer, Poet, Minister, and Scholar, Dr. Thema Bryant, today is a good day to learn about her. Dr. Thema’s book for trauma survivors came out today!! It’s called Homecoming and it looks like an incredible guide and companion to help you guide yourself home to your core self that you were disconnected from by betrayal trauma. I’m ordering my copy right now!

Dr. Thema is the President-Elect of the American Psychological Association, which is very good news for the field of psychology!

She also has a wonderful podcast you can start listening to today.

You can heal from psychological abuse and betrayal trauma. It takes time, practice, and a relentless commitment to keep coming back to yourself over and over.

You are worth it. I promise.

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This week's practice suggestion:

For the next week, each time you catch yourself struggling with one of the things on the list at the top of this post, do the following:

1. Tell yourself, “I’m in trauma survival mode right now.”

2. Remind yourself, “Other people feel this too. I’m not alone.”

3. Tell your core self, “I look forward to getting to know you more and more, whenever you are ready.”

If you have time, I also recommend listening to Dr. Thema’s podcast or reading her book! If you find yourself in trauma mode, she likely has already recorded an episode specific to something you are struggling with!

More than meets the eye

Have you ever tried talking to someone about the anxiety, depression, or other things that you feel and it seems like they don’t quite get it?

Have you ever talked to a therapist about your experiences and it seems like they sort of understand the surface of what you are talking about, but don’t understand what’s going on for you underneath the tip of the iceberg?

A major reason you may feel misunderstood as a betrayal trauma survivor is that the uncomfortable feelings caused by betrayal trauma look a whole lot like other things that people struggle with. They also look a whole lot like other things that therapists get trained to treat in graduate school.

When talking to friends and family about your experiences, they may say things like, “Oh, I get it. I get anxious too when I have to meet new people,” or, “I get overwhelmed and shut down sometimes too,” or “I get depressed too.” These folks may even actually have a full-blown anxiety disorder or diagnosis of depression. Still, you might feel like you don’t belong during this type of conversation because your experiences just feel different somehow.

The fields of psychology and psychiatry, strongly influenced by funding sources, are responsible for deciding what is real and what will get attention when it comes to mental health, and this information gets filtered through the media to end up in general conversations.

In the therapy world, here are some diagnoses that may be given to someone with betrayal trauma because of how they match what’s happening on the surface:

Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD):

Folks with GAD get this diagnosis because they worry all the time about all sorts of different things.

Betrayal trauma survivors get this diagnosis because they worry a lot about a lot of different things, but there is a terror associated with the worry that is often overlooked by traditional therapy for GAD. Betrayal trauma survivors learn to anticipate all the possible things that could go wrong in order to avoid worse abuse (although it often doesn’t work). Your worry may feel life and death in a way that is different from GAD.

Social Anxiety Disorder:

Social anxiety disorder is when a person has anxiety about social situations that is either very upsetting to them or interferes with their day-to-day life.

Like with generalized anxiety, betrayal trauma survivors learn to anticipate other people’s every move for survival. Again, it is not fear of rejection alone that betrayal trauma survivors feel in social situation, but fear of annihilation. If your therapist were to talk about addressing your social anxiety without going deeper, it may not help you as much as you need, and you may end up feeling more strongly like you don’t belong in the world (you do!).

Major Depressive Disorder:

A therapy client would be diagnosed with Major Depressive Disorder is they feel depressed or down most of the day, nearly every day, for at least two weeks.

The way depression feels to a betrayal trauma survivor may be very similar to the way depression feels to someone who has not experienced betrayal trauma. However, a betrayal trauma survivor who is depressed may be depressed for different reasons. For example, you have a difficult time knowing what you might like, love, or need, because you didn’t get to learn these things about yourself growing up. It may feel terrifying or “not allowed” to pursue the things that would make you happy. Or your nervous system may be exhausted from constant hypervigilance.

Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD):

Although most folks given this diagnosis do have a trauma history, it is inaccurate to call the impact of betrayal trauma a personality disorder. BPD involves having a hard time soothing oneself, navigating relationships, and staying in the present moment.

Some of the things folks with BPD experience overlap with what betrayal trauma survivors experience, but betrayal trauma survivors do not have a personality disorder. If you have a hard time soothing yourself, managing relationships, and staying in the present moment, it is because those things were not learned or were punished growing up and/or they were punished by an abusive relationship in adulthood.

Post-traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD):

PTSD comes from a trauma that typically does not involve betrayal by someone you trusted or depended upon for survival. It involves some of the things betrayal trauma survivors experience, but it misses the core of what it’s like to live with betrayal trauma because there is nothing in the PTSD diagnosis about the terror and loneliness that come from relational trauma.

Complex PTSD is the closest, but it is not in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM) so it is rarely diagnosed. It is starting to get more attention. Keep an eye out for it.

Complex PTSD takes into account all of the symptoms of PTSD plus some of the struggles around self-soothing and navigating relationships that go along with betrayal trauma. It is not in the DSM, so it is less likely to be talked about in graduate school, which means your therapist may never mention it.

Feelings of non-belonging come not just from the trauma itself, but also from the lack of recognition of betrayal trauma and complex PTSD by the mental health field.

It’s not you, and you can trust yourself waaaaaaay waaaaaaaay waaaaaaaaaaaay more than you would think based on the silencing that comes from the mental health system.

By the way, racism and other forms of oppression can also lead to symptoms of complex PTSD.

I’ll say it again:

You can trust yourself.

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This week's belonging reminder:

Here’s a snail telling its truth!

How does it fit with today’s topic? Loosely! But it does include four elements I think are central to the healing of betrayal trauma: truth-telling, gentle humor, good boundaries, and genuine connection.

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This week's practice suggestion:

Do a little journaling about the messages you have learned about betrayal trauma and the impact of betrayal trauma. If you haven’t learned any messages about betrayal trauma, write about how you feel about the lack of messages.

How have these messages affected your sense of belonging in the world?

Bonus practice suggestion:

Look for messages about betrayal trauma (a near-cousin of complex trauma, so you can also look for that) that increase your sense of belonging.

Welcome back

Dear reader,

Well, now it has been two years since I have posted here. We have been through a global pandemic, experienced a major reckoning with the way society treats Black lives, another reckoning with the damage humans have caused to the Earth’s climate, and are now confronted with the kind of pain humans can cause by waging war.

The past couple of years have brought everyone to their knees on occasion. As a betrayal trauma survivor though, the past couple of years have likely affected you in particular ways that are distinct from folks who haven’t been through betrayal trauma.

You feel it all. You feel numb. You feel it all.

Because you are more likely to be wired for empathy, you feel all the stuff that directly impacts you and you also feel all the stuff that doesn’t directly impact you. At times you feel so much you want to explode. At other times you feel numb because your fuses are blown from feeling or because you are exhausted from all the grief, fear, and dread.

You feel extraordinary guilt and shame

You have a near-constant feeling that you aren’t personally doing enough to make things better. Maybe you shouldn’t have taken that shower today. Maybe you shouldn’t drive a car. Maybe you stood too close to that person in the grocery store even though you think you might have a tickle in your throat. Maybe you are speaking up too much and/or too little and taking the wrong kind of actions against racism. The breaks from the guilt and shame attacks may be few and far between. Paradoxically, the guilt and shame may be paralyzing and keep you from acting to make things better. You probably feel guilt and shame about being paralyzed too.

Old patterns may have reared their head

In the past two years you may have found yourself lashing out, withdrawing, using substances, staying up too late, forgetting to eat, or whatever old patterns you used to have that may have improved before the pandemic. You may think these patterns have re-emerged because something is wrong with you. They didn’t. They reemerged because of the exceptional stress you have been going through. Betrayal trauma habits can intensify during times of stress.

You have a nagging feeling that you need to be kind to yourself

As a betrayal trauma survivor, you have been conditioned to be mean, callous, sometimes downright cruel to yourself. At the same time, your high empathy tells you that we are all deeply interconnected, and that kindness to yourself is kindness to the world.  You might not know how to be kind to yourself, or you might be waiting for someone to give you permission to be kind to yourself. In any case, trust that nagging sense. It will lead you in the right direction.   

Why would I be kind to myself?

 Here are 10 reasons to get you started.

Be kind to yourself because you have been working so hard for so long.
Be kind to yourself because it will help you think more clearly.
Be kind to yourself because you have suffered enough.
Be kind to yourself because it can reduce physical pain.
Be kind to yourself because then you won’t be as lonely, even when you are alone.
Be kind to yourself because it will encourage others to be kind to themselves too.
Be kind to yourself because it will help you love others more fully.
Be kind to yourself because it is a skill that takes practice to get good at.
Be kind to yourself because it is a new adventure.
Be kind to yourself because it will help you stand stronger in what matters to you.

How do I be kind to myself?

Being kind to yourself means something different to everyone and discovering what it means to you is part of the adventure. That said, I think the trees have something to offer us all in the way of kindness.

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This week's belonging reminder:

When I am Among the Trees
By Mary Oliver

When I am among the trees,
especially the willows and the honey locust,
equally the beech, the oaks and the pines,
they give off such hints of gladness.
I would almost say that they save me, and daily.
I am so distant from the hope of myself,
in which I have goodness, and discernment,
and never hurry through the world
but walk slowly, and bow often.
Around me the trees stir in their leaves
and call out, “Stay awhile.”
The light flows from their branches.
And they call again, “It’s simple,” they say,
“and you too have come
into the world to do this, to go easy, to be filled
with light, and to shine.”

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This week's practice suggestion:

Each morning for the next 7 days, set a timer for 5 minutes and write without picking up the pen using the prompt, “What do I need today?” Come up with at least one thing you can do to try to give that to yourself and write it down too.

What are my superpowers?

Before we get to your superpowers, I need to address an oversight. In my last post, I used the term “betrayal trauma,” but I forgot to tell you what it means!

Dr. Jennifer J. Freyd, the creator of betrayal trauma theory, first described the term in the early 1990’s. Betrayal trauma occurs when a person, group of people, or institution that you depend upon violate that your trust in a big way. Dr. Freyd’s research with her colleagues (including me) over the past several decades has shown that people who experience betrayal trauma are more likely to forget about the abuse, or dissociate certain aspects of if from awareness compared with survivors of other types of trauma. The reason for this dissociation and amnesia is that the survivor can’t afford to lose the depended-upon relationship and so their brain comes up with ways of making the trauma go away without it actually going away.

If you have experienced betrayal trauma, I think you likely also have superpowers of a particular sort.

You likely have the ability to connect with the unseen.

I’m not talking about UFOs. I’m talking about the fact that in order to survive betrayal trauma, you needed to develop finely tuned empathy and intuition so that your system could know how to appease the person who was betraying you in order to maintain the relationship. So you may have the ability to feel what other people are feeling, even when they don’t tell you anything about what they are feeling.

I’m also talking about the likelihood that while you were in the relationship with the betrayer, you may have had to find a source of comfort or support inside your own imagination. As humans, we are wired to form attachments and to feel loved and cared for. When this safe care is not readily or consistently available from the world around us, some part of us will seek it out, even if only in imagination or dreams. You may have a particularly strong imagination, ability to be creative, active dreamlife, or ability to see connections and beauty that is harder for others to see.

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This week's belonging reminder:

Here is a research article from 2018 showing increased empathy in adults who have experienced childhood trauma.

If you are a betrayal trauma survivor, you may be a warm, empathic person who can easily sense into what others are feeling.

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This week's practice suggestion:

Take a look at these words again:

You have the ability to connect with the unseen.

What are your initial reactions to this idea? What do you feel in your gut when you read that sentence? Take a few moments to jot down your reactions by following these prompts:

- Recall a time when you strongly felt another person’s emotions.

- Recall a time when you were able to anticipate how to make another person feel seen, heard, or comfortable.

- Recall a time when you had a sense that something unspoken was happening and you later learned that you were correct about this feeling.

These questions represent one category of ways that chronic betrayal trauma tends to train survivors to be especially tuned into unspoken nonverbal cues from the surrounding people and environment. The training comes from having to anticipate the perpetrator’s moves in order to stay as safe as possible within an unsafe situation.

In addition to being able to sense the unseen within other people, your superpower also likely enables you to sense the unseen in other ways. Here are some writing prompts to get you in touch with how this has been present in your own life:

- Where do you go to in your mind for comfort when things are hard? Where did you go to in your mind when you were younger?

- Did you ever have any imaginary friends? If so, describe them.

- Did you ever feel that you were able to communicate with plants, trees, animals, or other non-human beings?

- Have you ever felt guided by dreams or synchronicities or signs in the world around you?

Betrayal trauma opens us up to the unseen because the seen is not reliable and some part of us knows that, even if not consciously. This superpower opens us up to the possibility of life that could be bigger and richer than what we have known so far.

Shame is a sign of your goodness

Shame is not a character flaw, but a sophisticated way of surviving betrayal trauma.

When a person is under threat from, for example, a stranger who is about to steal their wallet, or from an angry bear, the flight or flight response to threat is useful and perhaps life-saving. The person runs from the mugger, or gets real big and loud to make the bear go away (depending on the type of bear and the circumstances -this is not official bear survival advice!). But when the threat is coming from a parent or a partner or a best friend, the fight or flight response runs the risk of threatening the relationship. Enter shame (among other things like dissociation and confusion).

Shame minimizes threat to the relationship by causing the person feeling shame to become small, to take on all the badness so that the perpetrator goes unquestioned, and to sometimes put the person feeling shame into a sad, slumpy posture that could make the perpetrator feel more tender toward them.

But wait, how is this a sign of goodness?

Shame is a sign that you have a good nervous system and a good mind operating together to do the best they can to help you survive even the most difficult situations. As painful as shame is, sometimes it may be overwhelming to imagine losing the relationship, and so shame is a safer option until the idea of losing the relationship becomes bearable. In the case of childhood abuse, losing the relationship is a major survival risk, and so shame is a much safer option, at least until more independence is possible.

Does this mean I should be ashamed of myself?

Abso-frickin-lutely not!! The moment you start to respect your nervous system and mind, and respect that they have given you shame in order to survive and protect your relationships, my hope is that your shame will actually start to go away.

Am I still good if the shame goes away?

Yes yes yes! You are still good and also a lot more of life becomes available to you. There is more color, more sound, more belonging, more adventure, and more trust in healthy relationships, to name a few.

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This week's belonging reminder:

With his slumpy posture and self-deprecating attitude, Eeyore has always been a character who tends to embody shame for me. Here is a clip of Eeyore’s friends discovering his hidden magic.

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This week's practice suggestion:

This is a challenging one, so I urge you to practice it repeatedly. The next time you are feeling shame, look for its hidden magic. Do this for at least the next seven times you feel shame. Don’t give up until you have discovered something about shame’s magic or about how shame is a sign of your goodness.

Trauma-Informed Oregon

Survivors of interpersonal trauma often feel alone, disconnected, or alienated, not because they are, but because they have trouble recognizing and accessing feelings of connection. Some of the typical symptoms of complex trauma which are to withdraw and hide, and to focus attention inward rather than on the outside world, exaggerate the sense of disconnection.

In fact, there are opportunities for healthy connection all around! Sometimes, we just don’t know where to look. One such resource is Trauma-Informed Oregon. Trauma-Informed Oregon is a network of people in healthcare, educational, and all sorts of different organizations who are interested in making sure that services in Oregon are well-informed about interacting with survivors of trauma. Take a look at some of the cool work they have been doing by visiting their website.

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This week's belonging reminder:

I recently published a short blog post for Trauma-Informed Oregon. In this post, I discuss that a sign of healing is when survivor’s start naturally reaching for things that are supportive and caring for themselves when times are tough, rather than berating themselves. This does not come naturally at first, but instead, requires conscious effort and intention setting at first, until one day it becomes the default. Take a look at the post at Trauma-Informed Oregon for a little more information.

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This week's practice suggestion:

Create a “self-care kit” that you can begin turning to when you are feeling disappointed, confused, anxious, or sad. Self-care does not mean fluffy kittens and expensive wine. Self-care is those little idiosyncratic things that resonate with YOU and that make you feel more fully yourself. You won’t be able to figure out what things should go in your kit while you are very upset, so go ahead and make the kit at a time of relative calm. You can place actual items in the kit like a crossword puzzle or a picture of your niece, or you can put notes reminding you of activities that resonate with you such as “going for a run,” or “silly dance number 3.” Don’t place any limits on what goes into your kit. Remember, we need more YOU in the world!

Steadfast

Dear reader,

First, I want to apologize for the pretty large gaps in postings here. My intention had been to post something weekly and to be steadfast in reminding you about your belonging. This has been my first attempt at blogging in my life, and I am learning a thing or two. 

Gaps in connection can be hard. For survivors of interpersonal trauma, gaps in connection can sometimes feel devastating and even life threatening. Early caregivers may have alternated between periods of providing love and safety to periods of sudden, unpredictable anger, silent treatments, or physically disappearing. So, gaps in connection in adulthood sometimes bring up  the same feelings of terror, betrayal, abandonment, and aloneness in the world that were so devastating in childhood.

Have you ever had the experience of believing that someone really cares about you when you are in the room with them, and then during the gaps between visits you truly feel that you are completely Alone with a capital A? This is a very common experience for survivors of complex trauma, and a good reason to exercise your belonging muscle even, and maybe especially, in the gaps!

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This week's belonging reminder:

The thread of belonging is always there. When the people in your life are inconsistent, unpredictable, not healthy for you, or even just busy, you still belong in the world. Really knowing your belonging in the world will help you to ultimately walk toward healthier and healthier relationships and away from ones that are more harmful. I love this poem by William Stafford to help remember the thread of belonging that is always there even when we can't feel it. Thanks to someone in my neighborhood who made these colorful copies and put them in a little box outside their house for people to take. 

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This week's practice suggestion:

Paint or color your thread of belonging in the world. Use colors and shades of light and dark to portray not only your thread of belonging, but also all the things that may be obscuring it or making it hard to see or feel. As you are going about your day, tune into the colors, shapes, and textures of your thread. Use the pink thread in the image above as inspiration if you'd like. Don't worry if your thread is invisible for now. I promise, it is there. Don't give up on it.

Keep coming back.

Keep coming back.

Keep coming back.

You are loved.

You know what you know (but you don't know that you know what you know!)

When I was a graduate student there was an atmosphere of frenetic anxiety among my cohort when it came time to apply for pre-doctoral internship. The problem was that there were nowhere near enough internship slots for all of the students applying across the country and so there was a risk of not getting an internship and therefore not being able to graduate anytime soon.

I took a trip to the coast to escape the frenzy. As I was walking along the little row of shops there I was intrigued by a sign that read "sacred stone readings." I entered and met a woman named Violet who had a big velvet bag of stones. She asked me to focus on a question and select a few. I did so and she then asked me what my question was. I said, "Will I get a good internship?" Upon hearing this question, Violet put down the coffee mug she was holding, leaned forward, and looked me in the eyes with great intensity. She said, "Do you know what your problem is? Your problem is that you know what you know, but you don't know that you know what you know."

I don't think her statement had anything to do with the stones in the velvet bag, but it had a far greater impact on me that the rest of the reading. With her proclamation, she set me on a path of wondering about my untapped wisdom and what resources I might have that I don't even know I have. In times when I'm all caught up in self-criticism, Violet will interrupt me with her kind and dead-serious eyes asking, "Do you know what your problem is?" 

Complex trauma can put us into biological and emotional states that narrow our senses and make it difficult to wake up to the reality of our own wisdom. If we can practice living according to Violet's proclamation, the world of possibility can suddenly expand and life can, maybe, be a whole lot more fun.

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This week's belonging reminder:

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This week's practice suggestion:

-The next time you are caught up in worry, fear, anxiety, or panic, imagine a wise friend or mentor arrives out of the blue just when you need them. Imagine that they ask you to focus on your question. Tell them your question. Imagine that they put down their coffee mug, lean toward you, look you squarely and warmly in the eyes and say, "Do you know what your problem is? Your problem is that you know what you know, but you don't know that you know what you know?" Maybe even ask someone to you trust to say these words to you. Really take it in. Notice what happens.

What the animals can teach us

Non-human animals have a lot to teach us about belonging. I recall a story of a dog being accidentally locked outside overnight in the dead of winter. The dog spent the night hungry and shivering. The next morning, the dog's human opened the front door only to be surprised by her pet jumping up on her and licking her face, happy to see her. As the story went, the next night, the human accidentally locks her partner out of the house. When she opens the door the next morning, her partner is not so happy to see her. Unlike the dog, it also takes her partner over a year to trust her again. 

When it comes to healing from trauma, out animal friends can be great allies. When receiving a warm glance or a compliment from a friend feels scary or unpleasant, we might not be able to receive it or the sense of belonging that could have come with it. However, if we imagine a protective mama bear between us and the friend, we might be able to better receive the warmth because of the sense of protection that bear can provide. When we feel bogged down in shame, imagining the playfulness and lightness of the otter or the fox might provide a little respite. When we are dissociated and disconnected from our bodies, the groundedness or the turtle or the weightiness of the whale might be good allies. 

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This week's belonging reminder:

Here's a silly reminder from the New Yorker that animals don't judge in quite the same way that humans do!

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This week's practice suggestion:

-Without thinking about it too hard, what animal would it feel really good to encounter right now? List some of the qualities of this animal. Imagine yourself embodying those qualities. Stand like that animal stands, walk like that animal walks. What do you notice? Imagine your animal ally with you for the rest of the day and if you'd like to, jot down some notes at bedtime about what you noticed.

Coming home through grief

Sometimes things just hurt. Sometimes we can get stuck inside of our own individual hurts like a hamster inside of a wheel, trying ferociously to outrun or outsmart the pain. But sometimes things just hurt. If we can open our hearts to our own grief, we can open our hearts to the grief of the world and we can open our hearts to a depth of love we never knew to be possible. This doesn't and probably shouldn't happen all at once. Rather, we open our hearts to a chunk of grief, and then rest while our heart recovers and stretches to accommodate its new occupant. And, in fits and starts, we move forward with bigger hearts, a little more open to our own radiance and the radiance of the world.

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This week's belonging reminder:

The Well of Grief

Those who will not slip beneath
the still surface on the well of grief

turning downward through its black water
to the place we cannot breathe

will never know the source from which we drink,
the secret water, cold and clear,

nor find in the darkness glimmering
the small round coins
thrown by those who wished for something else.

            - David Whyte

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This week's practice suggestion:

- If it feels right for you, check in with your heart. While you are paying attention to your heart, hold your right hand in a fist. Notice whether your heart feels tight like your fist, or relaxed and open. If your heart feels tight, slowly and gently open your palm, simultaneously opening your heart. Place your open palm on your heart and remember that you belong.