It’s really difficult to deal with unmet childhood needs. Having the courage to dig through painful memories until you unnerve the ones which cover open wounds is a process that requires time, patience and commitment. It literally involves us looking for the things we are most afraid of and admitting to that thing how much you fear it. Only once you’ve admitted how much you wanted something you never got, can you honestly mourn it’s loss. See you don’t lose something you never got until you give up on the hope of ever getting it. It is a daunting process that hurts a lot, but the price to pay for not having the courage to face your demons is even higher still. When we refuse to let go of an unmet need, we are it’s slave. Subconsciously we are a slave and we will do whatever inappropriate behavior our unmet need suggests in order to attempt to meet it, but despite years of abuse and cycles of inexplicable depression and anxiety it will never be met. We will remain chained until we choose to confront and grief.

Sometimes you just need to see reality for what it is – reality. Fighting reality is exhausting and uses up resources that you could’ve used for figuring out how to move forward. Sometimes life grabs you by the collar and drags you back into the past tense. You can fight being dragged back, you can refuse to accept how far you’ve been dragged back or you can accept that you’ve dragged back by the collar and start walking. I am what I am. I’m not who I am not. It is what it is and it’s not what it’s not.https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/pieces-mind/201207/radical-acceptance

Note to self: I give you permission to rest and rest well. When you sleep tonight you can do so with a feeling of peace and contentment, because you have done well. Yes, you haven’t fixed the business yet, yes you were a bit slow at work today, yes there is more to be done, BUT you’ve worked like a tornado the whole weekend and the start of this week. Just remember what is important. Looking after yourself is number 1 because everything else depends on you being not just okay but being you. I love you and I want you to succeed. You deserve every ounce of happiness in this world. Stop being so hard on yourself. Prioritize. One step a time. Career first, then husband, then business. Okay? But first now rest. Please.

Inspiration for the day…

A garden, like a soul, needs to be tended to daily. Like a flower, “we need you to flourish, to live your best life.” This is another beautiful post from the fractured faith blog: https://wp.me/p8L73F-1cS

I’ve been thinking about why I’ve been so anxious and I think I feel like I am not doing anything well enough and I’m just messing up my life because I tell myself that I’m not good enough, that I need to work harder/ be better/ or else… The problem is the anxiety isn’t making doing what I have to do easier, it’s making it more difficult so this is not a helpful way of thinking. If I could find a way to encourage and comfort myself more and to feel more secure in myself I would be able to do better at this part of my life.I have a fear that if I am not so hard on myself, if I let go, if I decide to feel ‘okay’ everything will turn into a disaster and I will be disillusioned.I can understand that I might feel this way given what happened to me in my childhood, but what I must understand is that that wasn’t my fault. I was a child back then. It was my parents job to keep me safe and take care of me, but they didn’t. They weren’t constant, they weren’t reliable and they weren’t “there”. That was not my fault.I am no longer a child. I am an adult and my safety and well-being is my responsibility. I have proven time and time again that I am capable of doing this.That doesn’t mean I am perfect, but it does mean that whatever happens I will be able to take care of it.I am an amazing person with an exceptional life.I courageously followed the love of my life to the ends of the earth. I am the reason we are able to be together.I courageously started a small business after losing my job due to socio-economic problems in the country.I work really really hard and I deserve to take time off.I add value to the organizations I work for and with.I am skilled at finding, developing and mining opportunity.I am a good dog owner.I am a good wife.I am intelligent, loving and fair.

https://www.samuelthomasdavies.com/cognitive-distortions/

My feelings are valid. My struggle is real. When I just read now what I wrote yesterday I am filled with an abundance of compassion for myself.

This is progress. And I just want to say to yesterday that scared me so much “you’re past now and I totally survived you so suck it.”

Also to all the future days that will try to scare me into submission or oblivion “I know now that I’ve survived at least one of you. Don’t think I will forget it.”

My anxiety is through the roof and I find myself thinking… Well, what do I have to be so anxious about? Surely I am overreacting (a little judgy voice in my head points out).

But then, realistically speaking: I actually have A LOT going on. Other people always tell me “they don’t know how I do it.” Other people can see the muchness of what I deal with on a daily basis, but I can’t, because I’ve been taught by my internal parent to ignore my own emotions and limitations, which on the one hand has given me a CV that others would kill for and on the other hand has also almost gotten me killed.

If I try to think objectively about it I can actually see that it’s emerging as a strong theme in my life: this endless circus and balancing act of my life. I thrive on living on the edge, pushing myself to the limit, juggling the tasks of life like big colourful balls in the air whilst jumping through the hoops of other people’s expectations in a house that is on fire because I cope best in chaos. I am recreating, over and over again, as if by some invisible forceful hand of destiny, my own childhood nightmare; over and over and over again.

I’m not unhappy, just very very very anxious, to the point of breaking, all the time or that is what I tell myself. I still have difficulty defining and identifying all my emotions. I’m working on that.

On the outside it looks like I have it all: the management job at a reputable firm with a fair salary. 1 day a week off to run my own business. My own accounting firm. And now also perhaps a contract to teach and run an online course for an online university (teaching is one of my biggest passions). I am grateful for all of these opportunities and I work on all of them.

But why am I so anxious?

I guess I’m just a bit overwhelmed. Is that normal? Perhaps, I don’t really do normal well. Perhaps I’m afraid of failing. Perhaps I can feel the fuel in my tank running low, with no gas station in sight, and I am paralyzed with the fear of ending up with an empty tank and no results. After all, this isn’t all just a show, we need results. Real results that matter. Like financial security. “The accountant that couldn’t figure out financial security… ” an apt name for a children’s book about life lessons and how to not approach it.

I’m rambling, I know, but this is my therapeutic journal… I’m allowed to. After all, it’s not easy living life on the ledge.

People call me overly dramatic, oversensitive, over emotional, too much all the time and I am aware that I am being that right now. It’s one of the borderline traits. Instead of feeling sad I feel the kind of the despair that would be justified by the world ending, instead of feeling joy I feel the kind of elation one would feel (hopefully) on the day you marry the love of your life. I don’t know if I’m explaining myself well at all, but that is how it feels. There is no buffer. No skin. Just raw emotions doing combat with raw reality. And apparently it will always be there. Right now my goal is just to calm down enough for me to get some much needed sleep before my next 14 hour shift at my 3 different jobs.

Today I need to pause to recognize the fact that today was a good day. Don’t get me wrong it wasn’t all butterflies and sunshine. In fact it was a rainy day. I worked 10 hours, well excluding smoke breaks of which I took 2… I got up at 05:30 and got home at 18:00. My business probably won’t make a profit this month. My water and electric bill still isn’t paid. I haven’t figured it out yet. I’m not on holiday and I haven’t made my first million, but still… It was a good day.

I found joy in doing a good job on one of the tasks on my technical list for the day (the kind I’m usually good at). I found relief in finally finishing off one of the jobs that I spent way too many hours on doing (in accounting that means I didn’t do a good job). I found comfort in knowing that my husband loves me so much that he spent the last part of last night talking to me when he got home from the pub. It felt like we related. He even made me breakfast and left it in the microwave for this morning (he doesn’t get up as early as me). I found hope in the fact that my business partner took some initiative in making a difficult call to a client (one that I told him I am not making).

I wasn’t too anxious during the day today. I used 15 minutes of lunch to go to gym. The work colleague that went with me (lets call her Iron Woman shall we) comforted me by saying that “Sometimes you don’t have to do everything 100%, you just have to do everything 1% better and you’ll be fine”. She says I’m in a lucky position to be worrying about ” do I quit my job and focus on my business or do I quit my business and focus on my job or do I just keep juggling and praying that things stay in the air.” I also, by some miracle, decided to organize some of my clothes, providing me with easier access to warmer clothing now that the weather is turning into winter.

Somehow my circumstances today was still the same, but also completely different. I guess perspective really does make a difference. And perhaps having boundaries in place that caused me to not work the WHOLE weekend is a good thing. Also, it probably doesn’t hurt that I took the initiative to get my doctor to put me back onto 100mg sertraline a day.

Overall I feel happy, like today was a good day.