My Turning Point:
It feels so strange to sit quietly and feel that life is "good". On the outside, nothing has really changed. The problems, trials, obstacles and everything else that was there before is still there. The only thing that has changed is me, on the inside.
The biggest change is that I have stopped being so hard on myself. Focusing on what I do, not what I don't do. Who I am, not who I am not. Allowing myself to be human and forgiving myself when I screw up. Treating myself like I treat others, rather than something less.
I always knew deep down that I was my "own worst enemy", but I couldn't get a handle on what that meant in terms of dealing with emotion. Had to sort the "filters" and figure out whether the "self-talk or self-abuse" was really my own or the internalized messages of others. This is where I have spent so much of the past year focusing and it is really now starting to pay off.
It is really hard to stop and "think" about where your thoughts and emotions are coming from. Always started with "Is my response appropriate to the circumstances?". If not, why? A lot of those "why's" led me down some painful memory paths. Then I had to learn that to view the past, I had to look at it in the "light of today" and not judge myself for who I was then. I am different and much wiser, so the critical analysis of my prior behavior was being unfair to myself.
This has taken almost a year. Not an easy year and there is so much more personal growth to happen. But the difference is the hopefulness that I feel inside and the wonderment that each day can be even a little better than the day before. It is a feeling of empowerment, and not a feeling of loss of being overwhelmed that has accompanied me for most of my life. I don't need to "run" from myself, and just can learn to be and enjoy life. The internal peace is amazing sometimes. But it gives me a touchstone, and I know what it feels like to be balanced and how to get back there when I stray.
It is funny, but I saw my new P this week and will be working with a new T. I really couldn't benefit from therapy before, because my focus on "normal", "acceptance" and "validation" was all external. See it isn't what other's think that destroy us, it is what we believe about ourselves.
Still have a lot of work to do, but it is good work. Now for really sounding "loony"....I think getting the cancer diagnosis is the best thing that ever happened to me. It was such a wake up and it woke me up to wanting to live life at all the best levels, emotionally, intellectually, spiritually and physically. See, I don't think just one thing "breaks" with PTSD, I think a lot of things get broken. So focusing on the whole is where I am headed.
Thinking patterns can be changed, just practice, practice, practice. Focus on the good in your lives and not the "bad". Can't change the past, but the future can be a bright and wonderful thing!
