Why are you lost?

 I truly feel sorry for my inner child for having made her get stuck on "shoulds," "should nots," as expected from us children by the elders in an emotionally chaotic joint family comprising 20 or more members. 

My inner child learnt earlier on that in order to survive in this family I have to comply with the unspoken laws, rigid and controlling behaviours of my uncles and somehow keep proving to my mother that all the money, time, and energy is worth it on me as she kept criticizing me for every migraine attack which started right from my childhood and as early as when I was 6 years or so.

My heart and mind feels heavy as I look back at the confusion that I suppressed myself down with and looked up at my mother, my uncles and aunts, and cousins for some sense of understanding, acceptance, genuine support but all that I had gotten was sympathy, criticism, body shaming, and insensitive remarks and comments on my health. I really don't know how I managed to navigate through all this and still stayed alive and going forward with the next day and the next.

I am bad at so many things I admit like goal setting, decision making, self discipline, and creating boundaries but all that I didn't realize, release, process, regulate and clearly speak out to ask for help which in all have made me an alien to my own mind and feelings, emotions, highs and lows, and so much more. It's like I habituated myself to self neglect so much so that I didn't realize I had insulated myself from living fully well connected and true to my life, my inner world.

All the stagnation that it created is a lot of undoing to release and sweeps my feet off the floor sometimes in overwhelm and deep sadness. I am truly sorry to my inner child for not allowing her to grow up with these experiences and staying stagnant with confusion, overwhelm, anxiety, and stubbornness.

So much so that I had lost all or any joy for living. What's there in it to be hopeful, joyful about? Is it possible for me to be feeling joy while living with my body? It's God's creation, all of it and all of us in our own ways, but to refrain from stagnation in confusion and releasing fears, or whatever that I am feeling from time to time is an important takeaway for me. 

I am lost and at least I know why.