Our deepest wounds may last a life time.

Maybe there is nothing wrong with that at all.

“One day you're seventeen and planning for someday, and then quietly, without you ever really noticing, someday —” wait that’s not right.

If you know, you know ;)

But seriously, I notice the oldest pattern in my body rising lately.

If I take care of someone else’s needs, mine come second.

It also sounds a lot like…when I care about someone, there is no room for me. The most vulnerable person in the room needs me, so I don’t matter.

I taught myself these things in childhood, or I observed my environment and thought, since my mom could not take of herself at times, I would be the one to pick up the slack.

I felt if I took care of everything else around the house, I could control my mom’s emotions. If I left no dishes in the sink, mom would have a good day. If I did more, mom would be happy more.

And because my mom’s emotions usually ruled the emotional tone of the house, I learned to be quiet and keep to myself. I learned if those around me are okay, then I am okay. I learned to suppress my needs in the name of a greater cause.

You can imagine what sort of problems this caused me over the years. I find it laughable (a compassionate laugh) when I reflect on relationships of the past. I thought everyone needed saving, but everyone was actually just being themselves.

But I didn’t know how to find any sense of self if I wasn’t trying to make things better for someone else.

I still struggle with this, motherhood brought this pattern to another level.

Now, it is actually my job to take care of another person, because their survival depends on it. My son truly needs me. And while we have found a groove in the three years of his life, he needs me in a new way now as we navigate a diagnosis and shifts in how we all approach life as a family.

I find my old habits taking over. I lean hard into the task of caring for him, observing his behaviors, watching triggers, lessening demands. It is needed and I am struggling.

Because my body still believes if I have to take care of someone else, it means I do not matter.

My body is programmed to disassociate when I take care of another. My body and brain have wired themselves for survival.

Of course, they did. I couldn’t possibly understand as a child, I couldn’t make a different choice as a child. Children are wired to want to please their parents. I wanted more than anything to make my mom happy. I thought I could control myself and she would be better.

Life has taught me I can control nothing.

And yet, I forget my self when I try to be in relationship with other people.

I think it is why I pull away from connection. Even with my kid and my partner, or maybe especially with them. Connection at is most vulnerable and needed time equaled a loss of autonomy.

And while I didn’t start writing this to psychoanalyze myself, here we are.

I know why I do this clearly. But how do I change?

Being in relationship with the pattern I am observing (instead of viewing it from above, although awareness is the first step, always).

I have been half-heartedly trying for months to rewire this, to fix this, to push myself towards connection when I want to pull away.

Maybe, I need more professional help. Or maybe, this is a big pattern to unravel and I need a lot of evidence to shift this in my body.

I have been leaning into the ideas that the body takes time and the body is on time.

I don’t need to force myself to be different. I can acknowledge when this pattern arises and do something I know works for my sensitive nervous system, take small steps forward. I take small steps in the direction of connection. I do not go from zero to sixty. I go from zero to maybe one.

Five minutes of playing with my son. Not 15 minutes.

Asking my partner one more intentional question. Not 5 questions.

I loved learning other autistics have all or nothing thinking. When I know I need to shift something, I will come up with a fleshed out plan to get there. I give it my all and the plan will be deep, detailed, and demanding.

It never works. The plan is always too much for my nervous system to uphold. It becomes overwhelming and I shut down.

So, I take small steps in the direction of more. I take small steps in unwinding this pattern in my body.

I also try (try being the key word) to acknowledge what is happening in my body. What am I feeling and noticing as I try this new thing?

Usually a little bored, a little restless, and a little hungry (because when I am not, wait I think I need a snack).

One thinks changing a pattern feels good or uncomfortable, sometimes. Honestly, it usually just feels neither great nor terrible. So, we mistake the blah of something new with meaning we did it wrong or we should not do it. Or slowly edging our way forward is not needed.

But truly shifting something, I think its been a while since I was in therapy school, can feel underwhelming.

Usually, I feel like I am trying to do something that doesn’t quite fit, maybe because I am still trying to connect in neurotypical ways and not what feels genuine to me (lightbulb goes off).

Regardless safety can feel kind of blah. Small steps forward that ones nervous system can handle usually it doesn’t feel like much. Maybe a little edgy, but enough one can manage through the discomfort.

Change does not have to be dramatic. Sometimes it is really quiet. I am learning some changes build over time. And some change just takes time.

I tend to think when I unravel this pattern inside myself I will feel free, expanded, connection, and probably be radiating (I keep getting an image of floating with a yellow orb around me).

Its dramatic and unrealistic.

Because connection may always feel uncomfortable.

I may always put people before myself instinctively, forget myself, then come back home.

I am tired of thinking I can change myself in ways that imply I can erase my most formative years.

I know those years formed pieces of me. I know those pieces of me are good, kind, and compassionate even if though they were formed to help me survive. I think growing, healing, evolving is way more about being in relationship with the parts of ourselves than it is not having those parts of ourselves to begin with.

I am who I am.

And while I’ve grown, I am not sure I’ve changed fundamentally at my core.

I think I am okay with that.

If anything, I am becoming more me.

Because I lost buried her so long ago, it has taken a while to find her under all the shit I constructed to pretend I had a specific, palatable, acceptable self.

It was fake. It was to be safe. It was to look a certain way. It was to fit in.

But it wasn’t me. It was a construct.

I am not sure who is me (That is terribly ungrammatically correct, but you get it).

But I am sure as heck going to find out, after I get a snack.

Onwards,

Emma

Welcome to Being in Motherhood, I’m a writer, artist, and mother constantly redefining myself. I write about being human while navigating motherhood, neurodivergence and living a full creative life. I believe reflection and compassion can change the world, the way we see things, and how we be here.

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