Reveling in Shame and the Anxiety Disappears

Who’d have thought this would be true?

But it has been incredibly freeing to understand that my shame is understandable, of course I would feel it, and being ashamed of feeling ashamed is just plain unnecessary.

I had been feeling anxious off and on this past week and at least for now that anxiety has disappeared.

It had been a while since I had checked in with the various ages of myself to see what they were feeling or needing, but I did this over the weekend and it made a difference.  Since recognizing that of course I would feel ashamed for being so backward, awkward, unkid-like, and generally un-mothered, I have had memory flashes of what it used to feel like and have been able to identify for myself that what I felt at those times was shame.  I couldn’t acknowledge the shame then.  I couldn’t even say that there was something wrong.  So it means so much to me now to be able to name that feeling.  I remember not wanting to feel ashamed because I didn’t want to hurt my mom.  I knew things had been hard for her and I didn’t want to add to her troubles.  I didn’t want her to feel shame because I felt shame both about myself and her.  Goodness, what a mess that was.

And yet here I am today and I am calm in a really precious kind of way.  Precious perhaps because I’ve been so controlled by that shame and now I am not.