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Reinventing ourselves after an abusive or difficult childhood.
"If you are not where you want to be, do not quit, instead reinvent yourself and change your habits".
Eric Thomas
All children have the right to be free from harm and grow up in circumstances where they are safe, guided and supported to achieve the best they can possible be, sadly this is not always the case for many reasons.
When we find ourselves as an adult with all the ripples and waves of an abusive or difficult childhood playing out, it’s difficult to think of ourselves as anything other than a victim, a survivor, different from our peers or even damaged or broken.
This is the effects of carrying the symptoms of trauma and anxiety around with us for years and years which we can see in patterns of our feelings, thoughts and behaviours.
Set up in childhood to help us survive our environment we still use these patterns because they worked and they're all we know; they make up our comfort zone too, even when mainly negative they still bring us comfort because they’re familiar. Yet as an adult most of these patterns are of no use to us and are often detrimental to our relationships and ourselves.
In my experience the only thing that is broken, however is the record we keep playing in our minds and keep putting into actions subconsciously. Which continue to validate and affirm them on a loop, keeping the patterns going on and on and on, to negative effects and consequences. Really when we think about it, we are being directed by a child, our inner child, teen or both who carries all the hurt and pain, a sobering thought eh!
But how do we go about reinventing ourselves when we are sat in
a void of despair?
How do we start to begin walking out of our dark despair? What do we do when we know we are in psychologically and emotional distress but don’t know where to begin?
If this is you or you want to support a loved one who is distressed you might find the following helpful.
Step one - Breath
This step sounds obvious because breathing is automatic, but trauma and deep emotional distress creates chaos, and our breathing can often mirror the chaos, we’re experienced. We often forget to breath in a consistent way because our brain has gone on automatic pilot, that is shut off our prefrontal cortex, it’s like the WiFi to our brain has been turned off, it feels like a switch has been flipped.
Once flipped this stops us breathing deeply, thinking clearly and a whole lot of other things. The prefrontal cortex is the part of our brain responsible for executive functions such as working memory, expression, regulating emotions, impulse control and focusing for example. So it’s important it is switched back on, kept on and working efficiently.
How do we get the prefrontal cortex switched back on?
If we take back control of our breathing by taking slow deep breaths, this helps to calm the brains fear centre the amygdala and helps the prefrontal cortex to be reactivated and take back control.
Try sitting or laying down and take a deep slow breath in to the count of five and slowly out again for the count of five, repeating for a series of 5 slow deep breaths then breath normally for 10 breaths and repeat the 5 deep slow breathing. Repeat as many times as is comfortable throughout your day.
Breathing evenly and rhythmically also helps our mind to be more alert, which in turn helps us to think better and not have that foggy brain sensation. More importantly gets our prefrontal cortex back online to support our healing.
We can also
Give and receive hugs if you feel comfortable with trusted others, if we don't we can always hug a cushion, a cuddly toy or even cat cuddles and strokes work in the same way. Start creating a daily routine, play word games, puzzles and practicing mindfulness such as focusing by noticing our environments, reading, writing our thoughts, feeling and experiencing down to offload to calming our mind.
Trying to get 7-8 hours continuous sleep, eating a balanced diet and physical exercise is also constructive to our brain's health.
In short taking care of our basic needs and taking care of ourselves daily, reinvesting in our self is the way to go to a better healthier all round feel good factor.
Step two – Acknowledge
Be honest with yourself, trauma creates inconsistencies and secrets. Try not to treat yourself with the same old behaviours but start something new and stick to it one step at a time. Acknowledge and accept what happened to you, ‘happened’ full stop. You’re not wrong, acknowledge the experiences and accept they did happen.
Accept it’s not wrong to feel how you feel here and now. Notice how you behave, are you consistent or unpredictable? Do you have good routines in your day? Are you organised and get things done or are you filling every minute with chores or work to avoid your thoughts and keeping the cycle of confusion and fatigue going?
Or are you the opposite, so far in a void that you are not getting anything done at all and life seems hard and laboured? If so accept and acknowledge this is where you are, accepting that this will and can change with choice and a little effort.
There’s a difference between secrets which are very powerful, often destructive and detrimental which is opposite to having a private self part. Which builds our self-respect, that sense we are competent, capable and can do what we choose to do. Rather than giving our power away to some unknown force.
Acknowledge through being honest with yourself, which helps build positive thoughts about yourself and courage to be autonomous i.e. self-directing. Remember you have the choice what you do from here on in, who and what you tell another person.
Step three – Permission
Trauma creates rules, commands and controls, these may not be obvious here and now but direct our daily living through our subconscious drivers. We may need to give ourselves permission to feel what we feel, hear what we hear, think what we think and say what we say in this here and now.
A very useful tool is affirmations which are positive statements we can use to counterbalance all the negative chatter in our minds that keep us stuck. They sound like, it’s OK to be me, just as I am here and now, I am growing every day, I am safe, I am taking one step at a time, or I give myself permission to ........ Affirmations are easy to use, to repeat, you can build a plethora of them unique to you and use them throughout your day. Pop them onto post-it-notes and put them in places you can see around your home to remind you to say them,
We do not have to follow the old rules or instructions someone else instilled in us, we can create our own, but for now these are perhaps all we know. So give yourself permission to be OK with them, here and now, for now, later when we have more energy, when our prefrontal cortex is back online and can think more clearly, we can explore, challenge and change what we choose to change.
When we are able to think and do differently, we will, so affirm to yourself I am getting stronger every day, validate your strength and courage for holding this stuff this long and give yourself permission to be, do, change and choose at your pace in your own time.
Step Four - Make a deal with yourself
This is an important step because until we make a deal with ourselves, we may just keep going round in circles, if we don’t know what we want or have a goal to reach for. Make affirmations and affirm I am worthy of happiness, I am valuable, I have a unique place in the world and the world has a place in me, I can be well, I can stay well.
These affirmations can form the basis for you moving forwards by thinking about them as something to strengthen in the immediate time of days. Convince yourself you can do and you can achieve, become your own best friend. As your best friend would support you, support yourself to start moving forwards, make a deal with yourself to see how far you can go to get well.
Making a deal with yourself is easier than it sounds, for example in the beginning make a deal to focus on your breathing for today, then evaluate how its gone. Tomorrow the deal can be, I will focus on my breathing and add to this by making a deal to take care of yourself by getting out of bed at least one hour earlier than you have been getting up, shower and dress, this might be enough to achieve to start with if your fatigued. Day three might look like, I will maintain the focus on my breathing, get up 1 hour earlier, shower, dress and add something like read a page in a self-help book to regain focus. Do what you can when you can, at your own pace and in your own time.
Another useful tool is to keep a written account of what you’ve achieved, this will help you to see your process as you progress and be a daily aid memoir to check on, if you feel your not progressing. Recognising your progress is really important in the beginning so you can start to build your self-esteem and confidence in what you are doing. This will keep you motivated to maintain your new behaviours and as you get stronger, healthier and moving forward you will be looking for the next deal you can make with yourself.
Summary
In the beginning the task is to reactivate the prefrontal cortex, the strategies of breathing, acknowledging, permission, accepting and making a deal with yourself. to start walking forwards. All help get the prefrontal cortex back up and running, because if it’s not online we don’t have much choice in much of anything. Start slowly find what feels good and comfortable for you.
We often look to the big things to get us out of a difficult place, but healing starts in the details and the first steps, small steps all add up to a bigger picture. We need to start somewhere, and the above suggestions will help you to start moving forwards. Take things at your personal pace and don’t be rushed into doing anything to soon or to quickly, think one step at a time and all of a sudden you will realise you have moved and motivation is returning.
Depending where you are in your journey some of this may feel overwhelming, enlist someone who you trust to support you to get going, who can validate and affirm your courage, strength and choices or engage with a professional to support your healing journey.
If you feel you need professional support or would like to explore any of the above further contact me here
I offer a free 30 mins video call so we can meet before our first session. Contact me at email: pendulumofpeace8@gmail.com text or Whatsapp message to 07867938630 and lets connect and realise your fullest potentials.
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