Saturday, March 30, 2024

Being true to high sensitivity

I was told I was too weak 
and born with high sensitivity which for my overwhelmed mother just Latin and Greek

I was not certified that I was a HSP, a highly sensitive person, in my infancy
For my mother it was a curse a day and a challenge on another relating to me, as I grew on a lack for feeling joyful life potency

It was all my fault I felt as the sounds, smells, crowd, moods and vibes made me withdraw in deep, unspoken fears
But all these were home to my mother as she grew up with her brothers and after losing my father came back home to them with sadness and tears

She wore victimhood as her attire and hiding behind her saree pallu(edge of the saree) made me one too
And disguised her insecurities by making me the cause of her emotional pain, her biting criticism on my sensitivities coming at me out of the blue

It was my fault and which became my stress to be good enough for her
While gulping down medicines, numbing my feelings and repressing my emotions was just my space and then became a vacuum as it stared back as my daily mirror

She never saw what I saw as she 'settled' into accepting that I cannot be 'fixed'
As I felt increasingly that being born after my father's death posthumously made me unlucky and jinxed.

I kept looking for reassurance outside of me that I was okay and 'normal' despite my high sensitivities
And was afraid to confront my mother for making this unhealthy conditioning which was a block on my creative abilities

She denied even as I confessed how another's unhealthy projections can damage one's mental strength and growth as a person
But she merely said a dismissive sorry to end the talk and I just felt angry and my numbness worsen

End Note/My takeaway: I learnt that my feelings which I had abandoned by not being there for it when it needed attention to be heard and validated needs to be reparented and nurtured and regulated, and not allow for it to become lifeless because we can never bring back people who die as it's the end of their destined time, but feelings can always come back to life if you allow yourself to be alive to it as they speak and share.



Monday, March 11, 2024

Undoing emotional abuse

 Emotional abuse cannot be mentally made sense of; it helps though to understand the pattern of the abuser's thought process and also that of the victim in giving in to the abuse. The mistake that the victim makes is to believe that coping up with emotional abuse and NOT expressing it out aloud and seeking support from others is the way it's meant to be - just be an emotional sponge and take in negative energy of the abuser (whoever it be) and try to be good enough each time and after every time post the traumatic phases of going through with it just so that the victim can fit in in the good books of the abuser. 

The trust as it seems to be so blindly placed in the other than in oneself forms the root of all forms of weakness, be it in the mind or in the body. To render oneself powerless and feel like life is out of one's control is the most damage that the victim can out of ignorance of its long term consequence on one's mental health still continue to participate in until they choose to otherwise.

To become detached from the ruminating memories that keeps the trauma alive in the body in some form or the other makes it then a priority to work on. Detachment by force is not key but letting go slowly and gradually by stepping into the new space of awareness and an authentic new birthing of the person that manifests in the rewiring/reprogramming process is the act of walking towards self love and without guilt, fear, self doubt makes it worth it.

The truth to remember is I have not inherited trauma and not a cause for another's trauma as it's made out to be (Generational trauma) but to step into this knowing. Although some deep seated sadness can be logicalized away and understood better by the labeling and validation of the abuser's back story, but it does not take away from the fact that emotional abuse has indeed happened. My mother has been reactive, narcissistic, cold, entitled and exaggerating and has crowded over all my fears by cornering and isolating me in the process of staging her emotional insecurities by projecting them on me through criticism and lack of reaching out to me over and over as if grappled by selective amnesia and self pity that she can conveniently bring on as protection for her behavior towards me and simply emotionally neglecting me in the process. It's as if my feelings never counted for her and I had to be extremely loyal for all the material things she bought and gave me and the umpteen times that she reminded me of my father's passing and months later my being born under difficult labor circumstances. It's just a numbing reiteration from her end that I owe her everything about me and that she made my creation unique and the way it was.

It's all about her and I was all about her and that's my emotional abuse in short. 

To feel like I am a separate person outside of all this feels truly refreshing. And so how to reframe my story of repression, numbing, anxiety, depression and invalidation from a new lens is my growing into this new space now. It will take time but at least I won't feel stuck and expect answers from outside because it's my blessed life and it needs truths and nurturing self care from time to time as it's already work in progress...