Have you ever stopped for a moment to wonder how you developed the feelings you have about yourself? Usually we just go about our lives, overwhelmed by every moment to really stop and take stock of our thought processes. Some of us have a real disgust and self loathing toward ourselves, and while we can come up with a zillion reasons why we feel this way, we rarely question the logistics of it.
Being an empath sometimes can be overwhelming in itself. You don’t know if you are feeling your own stuff, the person sitting next to you, or someone fifteen states away. Again, we do little to process this, taking it on as our own. We have broad shoulders don’t we?
When you add these two things together, it becomes an interesting mess!
I was reading interesting information from Deepak Chopra‘s ‘Reinventing the Body, Resurrecting the Soul,’ and it’s funny that answers always appear when the questions are rattling around in my head. He was talking about the energies a fetus picks up from it’s mother in the womb, and how a lot of trauma actually begins in our lives there. Not just from difficult births, but from the circumstances surrounding our mothers at the time of their pregnancies. Their thoughts, their desires and so on. I had already had a recent awakening to so many things, but this brought even further clarification to a lot. Let me explain, and show you how this works, maybe you can find peace in your own life from such clarity.
For as long as I can remember I have always wanted to die. Even before the age of four years old. Now, that cannot be normal can it? For me, that was normal. I grew up around parents that were always angry. I watched my mom and my father fight constantly, hitting, and throwing things at each other. My mom left one marriage and moved in with one angry man after another. Well, there are two, but how do you word that? I remember being pretty nervous, always having stomach pain. Things in an angry household could be fine one minute, then without warning could explode into fists, belts and a barrage of words. My mother has always been the kind of woman to pull me closer with one hand, while kicking me in the gut to get away at the very same time. I have never known if I was coming or going, and this has infected so much of my life. And I say infected, because it’s like a disease that eats away at your spirit when you try time and time again to make your mother love you, and nothing you do is good enough.
I was always told that I was a mistake. My mom was 15 when she got pregnant, and she never missed an opportunity to let me know how much that pissed her off. It wasn’t until a recent visit with her that I finally realized just how deep seeded that truly was, and my eyes were opened, and my soul was freed. I however, carried this belief forward into life with me. It affected every relationship and interaction with every person I’ve ever had. I have had this belief that everyone hated me, it didn’t matter how nice they were to my face, they were lying. If your own mother cannot love you, no one can. And when you believe something about yourself, you often times end up behaving in ways that create situations in your life to project back to you that belief. So, people really didn’t like me. I was lonely, and angry, and bouncing from home to home, living with friend after friend, not able to lay down any roots, the more I hated myself, and the more it proved I was unlovable and unwanted. You see, when you are told that you were not wanted, planned for and were a mistake, you feel as though you do not have the right to be breathing. You take this on as your fault.
I was molested from 9 years old until I was 14. And while my step father and I are very close now, a lot of people do not understand the how’s and why’s of that relationship. That is a whole blog to itself, but I will at least say this, that it was because he eventually took responsibility for his actions, and did what he had to to get better. He does not set anyone else up, or himself for further victimization, and he always treats me with the utmost respect. I can say to him that something hurts me or bothers me and he really hears me. So my point in telling you this, is that this situation further proved to me how my existence was a mistake. From DHS workers involved dropping the ball, to a therapist not reporting the abuse because he was friends with my mother, to my own mother turning her back on me several times. When she read it in my journal she told me she thought I just enjoyed it and that was why I wrote about it, and then did not talk to me for the entire summer, while the abuse got worse. Sexually from him, and physically, mentally from her. I stopped talking, and I stopped telling after I was 9. What was the point? I didn’t deserve better treatment. If I did, someone would have intervened wouldn‘t they?
When it all came out at age 14, my step dad denied it at first, scared of jail time. My mom told me she didn’t know who to believe and that I was destroying the family she’d always wanted. I cannot imagine anyone wanting that family to be quite honest. The one thing I remember most about this time was how deeply sad I was, and how badly I wanted to die. I wished beyond all else that God would just take me from this earth so that my mom could be happy. I truly believed I was the root of all evil, and the world would be better off. I still at times fight those demons. But this has truly been a year of healing.
I have always been a very forgiving person. Back to being an empath, I’ve always been able to see the pain in the other person and see where they are coming from, and how they could get to whatever point they are at. I recently started questioning where I got that ability, since I most certainly did not learn that in my household. There was always jealousy, and judgement about my weight from her, and I turned that hatred against the attention my body got me. My body was my enemy, because it brought me so much pain. Now, my body, 100lbs heavier, is screaming at me to come back and to it, and love it the way it never has been.
A recent visit to my mom, left my soul deeply wounded at first. But truly her meltdown was probably the most freeing gift she could have given me. I almost cancelled my trip because I had been sick for a couple of weeks and it was just getting worse. But we’d seen each other only 3 times in the last 8 years. Something always happens, and usually I am to blame. This time however, wracking my brain trying to find a cause for her meltdown the only one I could find was that I was texting a friend that was going through a very hard break up, and keeping in touch with clients as well. I try very hard to be there always for my friends. I may not always succeed, but I try. It wasn’t interrupting us…or taking away my time from her… she was either driving or we were watching tv. But I was insensitive to her snide comments, that were obviously her attempts at letting me know it irritated her. Before I go into that, let me tell you about a very eye opening conversation that we had….
She was telling me about her nephew getting his girlfriend pregnant. She’s still in high school, and he’s graduated. Sound familiar? This entire conversation had my eyes wide, and the hairs on my neck at attention. I listened as she spoke about how their lives were ruined now. She said that the girlfriend, we’ll call her Mary for the fact I don’t know her name anyway… that Mary’s life was over, and she wouldn’t be able to go to school or do anything that she had wanted to do. And the conviction that she kept saying “Her life is OVER” with, was jaw dropping, as I was seeing her as that scared 15 year old girl, and realizing how frightened she was. Her and my grandmother had always had a strained relationship as well for many similar reasons. So I am sure she didn’t have any support and truly did feel as though her life was over. I saw in that very moment where all those feelings I had about myself came from. She truly did not want me, and blamed me for her life being over. How could I hate myself at birth when I had barely begun to live? It was her hatred of me! With her, she doesn’t ever take responsibility for her actions, or her words…. So I was left to carry the burden of her spreading her legs at the tender age of 15. I had this mad rush of adrenaline and I simply said to her, “ Many women in worse cases than Mary’s have had babies, and gone to school and pursued their dreams.” She just sort of paused for a moment, and I’m not sure she really heard what I was saying to her, and she said, “This is true.”
I was horribly frustrated at her internet dialup connection slowness, cell reception in timbuktwo, and finding out that my husband had spent the cash he had withdrawn, plus some cash in the account he wasn’t supposed to, and left me with $2.11. I was panicking at how to pay for my luggage since now the airlines have found yet something else to charge for. When she snapped at me for the third time, I could not take it anymore…and I asked her to please stop, that I was frustrated enough. I saw the flash in her eyes and I knew the moment she’d been waiting for had arrived. Then I said, “ You’ve been an ass this whole week biting my head off for nothing.” Truly… I could have gone without saying it… but I’ve held my tongue my entire life so that she could remain comfortable. When she called me every name in the book and then some, I could see that she hates me to the very depths of her soul, and in that very moment I realized that all this anger and hatred of myself that I’ve carried these almost 36 years was not mine at all, but hers. I can still feel my eyes bugging out of my head as I watched her tantrum… listening as she called me an idiot and said I was so immature, and lit up cigarette after cigarette blowing it in my face when she knows I am allergic to them simply because it was “her house”. I couldn’t pack my suitcase fast enough and get the hell out of there. That’s all I could think of, and I didn’t care if I had to walk all the way back to San Diego, I was out of there.
Since then my body has been going through a sort of detox process. The body is an amazing thing! My brain is swelling, and a comment from someone I never expected it from was really quite thought provoking. He said, “ Sounds like someone has been lodged in there and the infection is being worked out.” And since illness begins with our thoughts, and my thoughts were created as a result of all of this… it made complete sense! My brain is working all those negative thoughts out of my system! I’ve never had pneumonia before, and that was what I had when I went out there to see her, and am still getting over… this too makes sense, as my body was ready to process all of this out of my life so that I could finally let go and move on. An infection of the lungs has to do with deep sadness… and it is ready to be healed!
I realize that the tone of this blog may sound blaming, and that truly is not my intent. I do not think that my mother ever set out to believe that her life was ruined or be hurt and angry for her entire life. I certainly don’t think any of her actions were done purposely. I just wish that she could take a good look within, and learn how to say that she’s sorry. Maybe she never will be able to… who knows. It used to cut me to the core that she wouldn’t talk to me, and now I find it rather freeing. I do not have to worry about trying to measure up, or be who she thinks I should be. Or hear the judgment in her tone at whatever it is she doesn’t approve of this time. It’s only herself she is hurting with her silence this time. I wish above all else that she would be able to find the freedom from the voices that have held her captive all these years. The ones that have kept her angry. This is part of the empathic thing, as I can understand how she got to where she is… but only she can make the choice to stay there…. Or move on. I forgive her… but I will no longer play the role of the hated girl for her. I am far better than that. Despite what she may feel. What she feels…. Matters not to me anymore, as I no longer have to feel it for her. I choose not to.
So, I urge you to really take stock of the worst things you say to yourself repeatedly, and investigate where they truly come from. Maybe it’s not your mother… or a parent at all. Yours could stem from one particular moment in your life verses starting in the womb…. This is all for you to figure out. But I hope this has started you thinking and helps you to find your own peace. <3
Love this song....
Wynonna ~ I WILL BE
