The one-week experience helped shine a light on the shapes of how my childhood trauma is still expressing itself in my adult life on large and small subtle planes. Whereas before, the effects seemed foggy, vague, I came from the retreat with more awareness and clarity, and last week a big trauma vortex materialized upon my return home.
It is incredible how much pain can come up from a past trauma when triggered by a current situation... was trying to grapple with what happened in my past that creates such an "illogical" reaction right now.... feeling the pain of opening up vulnerably to someone and feeling abandoned by them, even if they're not really abandoning me at all.
The only thing I can surmise is that when I was 3, my father had a bad car accident and left the country with my mother to recover in a New York hospital for 4 to 6 months. When he returned his personality was different and he was a little bit out of it, very disconnected from me. This traumatic experience was never processed so it was never completed because as a three-year-old I didn't have any language and the wisdom of the day was to pretend like nothing happened and everything is normal, to "protect" us children from emotions related to upsetting events. So even though it was a very upsetting event for the adults in the family, their approach was to not talk about it and stuff emotions and not explain or empathize with the four children who were surely freaking out on many levels, or just shutting down.
I have no direct memory of my three year old's experience, but last week while bending over with grief and intense crying in the kitchen, I did start to connect somewhere deep inside to the desperation of annihilation that my small child actually experienced, and that awareness made me cry so much harder feeling empathy for the little one who was completely abandoned and was completely empty and meaningless without her parents. I connected to awareness that the wound was never treated by her trusted caregivers.
Certain relationships today trigger that trauma experience of losing contact with my father.... So when a capable attractive man shows a special interest in me, even as a friend, and we connect vulnerably, I get drawn in and when we part, it can be very upsetting/triggering the childhood pain again. The more vulnerably I share with that person, the more deep into the wound our connection penetrates, and so when the connection ends (we both traveled home and went back to our lives after the one week in the retreat in this iteration, there have been many!) it's like the wound has been re-opened, and pus is flowing and the pain body is totally awakened.
So how can I complete the cycle of my 3 year old self losing her Dad's attention so I can safely share with people without feeling attached or abandoned?
I proceeded through flight, then freeze then fight responses as I went in and out of the trauma vortex over the course of 2.5 days. Thoughts of dying, going into the hospital, being in a tribal community with 20 people holding me in love and being a lover-partner to this guy were all fantasies I had. Then I popped out of the deep level of pain to a functioning place of going to the store with my faculties and language intact without wanting to fall back into despair... I had to function to deliver a workshop in a few days.
I called in my closest women friends as loving resource. I also spoke to this wonderful man and I criticized him for something he did the week before, and it was the weirdest thing to watch myself go there, to this blaming, wounded place again with him. Days later, I was reeling with regret that I let my little wounded child get a hold of the steering wheel of the bus of my life... she was careening through the relationship, banging into his knees. He had a pain response, and withdrew a bit... but has not totally fled. In many past situations when my wounded child would complain or ask for more attention, the man would flee and I would lose the whole connection, exactly my biggest fear.
This is a cruel affliction... grasping to something I want to survive and feel worth being alive, and it evaporates when I get needy. And I am ready to hold it all and take a bigger ownership to heal it.
I realize now how much my little girl has taken the wheel in my relationships with men who tap into the wound as well as with friends and bosses... making them responsible to fulfill some of my needs.
And I can celebrate huge strides I have made in the last 10 years, not taking things so personally in relationships to friends and acquaintances, and creating better boundaries with men who were objects of my source of validation. I have maintained friendships with two of the men who triggered a trauma vortex for me in the last 9 years (but 4 or 5 others failed, being turned off by that child presence) and this feels like a success worth celebrating.
An area for me to focus on is my struggle with self-care and self-love... I struggle with doing nice joyful things for myself like making music, dancing, singing, creating art or poems... I used to do these things when I had steady jobs and rich social connections. I started a path of spiritual and personal growth, and while I have deepened into some close friendships, I have much less social contact not working, and not hanging out at so many events or hosting parties as I used to.
My ultimate goal is to be a full adult in this lifetime who takes care of her inner child(ren)... I think I have a 3 year old and a 10 year old in there that need love and attention.
So what to do now?
- attend to my own thoughts, feelings, and behavior.
- pay attention to what I want and need and I ask for support.
- take care of myself. I move my body and I connect to music.
- (AKA #resource)
- be in touch with what is going on right now, including how I feel about it.
- accept 100 percent responsibility for my own happiness, security, and needs.
- recognize and celebrate my strengths, while remaining humble about my weaknesses.
- consciously celebrate my power, my qualities, my unique lovable beauty
- get therapy with trauma healing counselors
While my wounded child can get a little passionate driving the careening bus, she is also happy to sit in the back seat and be cuddled with a safe loving blanket.
