An Update

I apologize for being away from here and from not visiting you all much. It has been a bit of a struggle as of late. Both the inner child and inner teen have been vying for my attention. I don't know what I could say is exclusively the inner child, it seems that the child's pain is a subset of the teen's pain.

I looked up 'inner teen' today as I had not really found much about such things. I found this which discusses how to make each inner child comfortable. I guess I had assumed that people only had one. I hadn't thought much about teens until I started my 'teenage rebellion' now. In some ways I feel like I have three, the last being my very late teens as I feel I have changed so much from then and yet I have a lot of pain and anger from that time.

That website discusses Hope's journey as a survivor and has advice about encountering and healing your inner children. She is not a medical professional, she is merely sharing what has helped her through her own struggle. I am glad that she wrote this as there seems to be a lot of ideas I never thought of. She also discusses other types of healing, such as meditation and dealing with triggers.

Another current event has been my reaction to the book 'Codependent No More'. I stopped reading it for now. I will definitely resume, I just have to do some more forgiving. I struggle a bit with self-hate and fully realizing how much codependent behavior I display made it a bit worse.

After a club meeting, I had a overflow of emotions in regards to not fitting in. It especially hurt as once upon a time I did feel like I fit in with those people, the first time I ever felt like I had a place. I have had those emotions since I was little, with family, school, and peers. I finally stopped my bike in the middle of a nearly empty parking lot, where no one would really pay attention, and cry it out. Not only did old feelings of not fitting in come out but soon I started thinking about everything that I blamed myself for. For not fitting in, for not making people happy, for not standing up for myself, for not fixing others, etc. I finally thought about forgiving myself for the past and for what I've become. It isn't all resolved, but I took my first step in really forgiving me.

I will continue on with that book and with other healing that I need to do. It's been suggested that I write down all that I hate about myself and explore that further. I think what I will do is list that out and then next to each one write about how I can improve or that it's in the past and I need to forgive and let go. You have all been so kind and supportive, I thank you all very much for that!