Feeling Safe

[Bees Are Awesome]

We had some severe thunderstorms roll through yesterday afternoon and evening. My 3 year old was scared of the thunder and didn't want to go to sleep at bedtime. I sat with him for a little bit and tried to explain that thunder is just a loud noise and won't hurt him. I talked him into trying to sleep and he said he wanted to "snuggle my hand" (basically hugging my arm like one would do with a teddy bear). Once he did that he fell right asleep.

It took something so little and effortless to make him feel safe. I tried to think back to find any memories of me feeling safe like that. I realized that I haven't ever really felt totally safe. Even now the only place I feel safe is in my house (and sometimes it can feel unsafe too when the intrusive thoughts are bad). Even with people, there are a very few people who I feel safe around. My T says I am needy for safety.

So...Do you feel safe? In what way? If not, do you know what it would take to make you feel safe?

I know it is kind of a broad topic. I am really interested in how others feel safe or get safe and what/how/why. Maybe something will work like that for me.

 

[Meadowsweet]

No, I can't think of any time that I feel safe. It's not that I feel in danger every second of every day, it's more that my mind is in a constant state of acknowledgement, that anything could happen in the next moment. So I can't take safety for granted or relax into a false sense of security.

That's probably more realistic (bad things do happen), but the problem comes of course, when something in life creates seeming reason to make the possibility that something bad is about to happen even greater. Whereas somebody else's sense of impending doom might go from 1 to 3, mine would go from 5 - 10.

I can curb to an extent by talking myself down (that is watching my thinking and challenging it) and by practising techniques that help bring down anxiety. But it takes me down to my base level, and that never feels completely safe, it just feels liveable with.

 

[jaccat]

No, it's something I struggle with. The only place I ever get anywhere near to feeling safe is in my room and I've worked to make that a safe place. Even then it doesn't always work. It depends on what frame of mind I'm in, what time of day it is, where my cat is in the house...

 

[Recovery4Me]

So...Do you feel safe? In what way? If not, do you know what it would take to make you feel safe?

I work on it through surveying & securing my surroundings. I do loving kindness meditations which include "May I feel safe and protected." mantras. I carry music and meditation guidance downloads on my smart phone with me. I work on building a safe place within me to ground through visualizations or breathing techniques. I use self-affirmations. As well I have protection devices and have learned self defense.

However, one of the main keys for me was to separate the past traumas from the present situation and learn to trust in my self to be capable to maintain a reasonable amount of factors to contribute to my survival, thriving and handle situations should they arise.

Great thread.:tup:

 

[Deleted member 1860]

I think that safety is something that oftentimes comes as a byproduct of healing as opposed to something that is sought out directly.....that is, as we heal, we gain a feeling of safety instead of saying "if I get XYZ, I will feel/do feel safe". At least that's been my experience.

Don't get me wrong. I've stayed away from certain people and environments because I know that they are UN-safe. But, I have also had an overall feeling of being unsafe, even when I am in my own home and in no danger whatsoever. I've been able to finally feel safe in safe situations as my healing progressed. And I still feel unsafe in unsafe situations, but that's completely normal.

 

[Friday]

Safety is a feeling, not a reality. Where I feel it? When the people I love best are in touching distance, line of sight. Regardless of what else is going on. If I know they're alive, I've got eyes on? Then right now, for that moment, safe as houses.

 

[Biz]

I talk abt this w my meditation/reiki teacher a lot. She says that there's a point when you learn to ground yourself that anything is okay/safe, even something that seems to be inherently not. I haven't decided if I believe her yet. It's a cool idea though. She told me that when my inner little kid feels safe, I will.

I rarely feel safe. When I started doing trauma work abt a year ago, I became aware of how frequently I'm triggered esp. around others (like the grocery store is a hard place). I am trying to decide if it's worsened, if my new awareness makes it seem worse, or if my choice to rarely be in public is abt personal preference as an introvert. It affects where and how frequently I see friends because I won't go out anywhere except restaurants. Almost everywhere feels unsafe, even my apartment when my roommate is home.

That said, some places I can take a full breath and relax. My safe places are anywhere I'm alone and lock myself in, reiki sometimes, and the woods esp. deep in the backcountry when backpacking.

 

[The Albatross]

Mostly now, I feel safe. It took me a long time to get here. I did it with goal/challenges and decided that I could override the problematic past experiences by creating new ones until I felt a sense of confidence in my ability to assess my surroundings and take appropriate actions accordingly.

 

[Go Hungry]

Aargh, that's a hard one, as feeling safe is more of a perception rather than an objective thing. I feel varying degrees of safety in different places. I feel mostly safe at work I suppose, but there is always the alertness for people whispering, as I always assume that they are talking about me. Same thing when someone laughs in public. It's just a habit that I can't seem to get over. I have to deal with it by reminding myself that I'm not the center of things, that people are filled with other thoughts that have nothing to do with me.

I'd say the only places I feel really safe is with some family members and friends, or by myself in my room. Though I'm also kind of afraid of myself, so that only goes so far. *shrug*