Tag: healing journey

Yelly Writes

Rip the bandaid…then breathe!

Yelly

Peace is not the absence of pain — it is the presence of acceptance. — Unknown

The road to peace is never easy. It is difficult because you have to walk through it. It will need you to go through things, to see things you may not want to look at, to remember things you may have wanted to forget, to accept things that are difficult to sit with, to let go of a future that you wished for, planned for and desperately wanted but now no longer is part of your timeline.The road to peace is never easy. It is difficult because you have to walk through it. It will need you to go through things, to see things you may not want to look at, to remember things you may have wanted to forget, to accept things that are difficult to sit with, to let go of a future that you wished for, planned for and desperately wanted but now no longer is part of your timeline.

STOP — You need to stop the spiral. You need to pause. Maybe count. Maybe focus on breathing in and breathing out. Anything to stop running with your thoughts, anything to stop you keeping pace with your anxiety. You have to consciously tell yourself to stop.

LOOK — Look for the little moments of happiness. Look at where you are now instead of thinking about the past or worrying about the future. Staying in the now allows you to actually be present.

LISTEN — Listen to yourself in the present, not the one who keeps repeating recriminations or the one worrying about what might be. Your heart knows what you need in the now. You need to trust yourself. You need to listen to what you’re saying to yourself.

You need to actively choose to be in the peaceful present. You need to stop and be still.

@yellywelly

Yelly Writes

The blurred lines of grief

Yelly

Healing is not linear — and neither are boundaries. — Unknown

A few weeks after my return from my mother’s memorial service, I met up with a few friends. I thought it would be a good experience to be around people. But one person kept asking me what happened on my trip, how I was feeling, if I was okay now, and if I could move on now. Up until that point, I thought I would be okay being around people. I wasn’t. I wanted to scream at this person, and I wanted to run away and cry.

I didn’t, of course. I am thankful I bit my tongue and prayed for my tongue to stick to the roof of my mouth so I wouldn’t say anything I couldn’t take back. I knew this person did not have the capacity to understand the depth and heft of my grief, because they hadn’t experienced the death of a parent, and really, because we all deal with situations differently. They were approaching me and my experience in the way they would if they were in the same situation. I behaved differently around this person after that. I didn’t feel like we were occupying the same spaces anymore. I know I may have judged too harshly after that experience, but I had to step away. I was too hurt. I don’t think they realised that they had wounded me so deeply. At the time, I didn’t have the capacity to explain what I was going through (that’s on me completely), but I knew that if I had opened my mouth, I would be caustic and say things I couldn’t take back.

Grieving and healing are both processes that involve ebbs and flows, with twists and turns. I think boundaries are the same. They shift and stretch depending on a person’s growth and capacity

Everything is a work in progress.

Yelly Writes

No is a complete sentence

Yelly
@yellywelly

Over-explaining yourself is often a sign that you don’t yet believe you have the right to your own limits. — Unknown

I’ve been in so many situations where I’ve felt that I had to explain myself, whether I felt compelled to or whether I was made to, I’ve found myself defending my decisions. It has been an automatic response and I always thought it was because, growing up, I was being taught accountability. Because when asked, I (was made to believe) had to be able to explain myself, I had to be able to articulate my answers to why questions. I’ve always joked that I had an overdeveloped sense of responsibility and I know inside me there’s this little girl still deathly afraid of disappointing people.

As I’ve been going through this healing journey, I’m starting to learn that apart from the fight or flight response that humans have, trauma survivors have a freeze or fawn response. The trauma is something else to unpack entirely and I’m not laying blame on anyone. I know I need to deal with it eventually. But I don’t think that day is today. I do understand and recognise that I fawn more than I freeze. I think I understood early on in my life that I needed to be hyper-compliant and that I had to learn to how to quickly soothe and please other people to diffuse potentially volatile situations, avoid conflicts and be safe. Part of this was me explaining my decisions, justifying my actions and answering the why questions to appeal to reason. I somehow believed that it was my responsibility to do that.

Sometimes you don’t necessarily owe anyone else an explanation because it doesn’t matter if you have a perfectly good reason for your decisions. And, sometimes you don’t have to say anything more than no. No is sometimes the only thing you have to say because it’s a complete sentence. You don’t have to explain why your boundary is where it is. They won’t necessarily explain themselves to you. So let them set that boundary, and you can also act accordingly.