Befriending Yourself

Hi friends! It feels like it's been forever since I've written. It's only been 3 weeks! Hoping to get back to every 2 weeks, but for now, I'm back today. 

I'm in a similar place as the last time I wrote, nothing has gone horribly wrong in the last like, month, which is so great. It might be a lack of horrible things happening, or a more confident and self-assured me. Probably a combination of the two. 

To jump right in, if I could tell you the thing I hate the most about myself, it would be the anxiety I get over relationships that then cause me to do things that can be off-putting to distance me further from those people unintentionally. I'm pretty sure I talk about this approximately every blog post. 

I've also realized that this method of "hating myself" for every time this happens, which is virtually every day, just shames me and makes me do it more. It doesn't change anything. 

I'm no psychiatrist, but I was reading about "internal family systems" from the book "The Body Keeps the Score," and I tried something that I used to think was ridiculously corny and would never help me. I'm sure a hundred people have told me to try this before, but the other day, I was ready to hear it, and I was ready to try. I was also desperate to make this all stop. It makes me miserable!

I can't stand being terrified that the most important people in my life are leaving every second of the day when I could've spent this whole time enjoying and feeling safe in the fact that abandonment was never even on the table. 

So, if I understand correctly, internal family systems is the idea that we have no bad parts. The idea is recognizing the different parts of us for what they are, thanking them for their service, and creating closure. If I understand incorrectly, well then, this helped anyway. 

The funny thing is I was almost more embarrassed to do it by myself for the first time, and so I did it for other people the first 3 days that I did it. 

Okay I need to stop stalling you're gonna hear me admit it one way or another!!!

I was in the car with my mom and I was telling her about what I was trying to do in my head. 

I said, 

"I basically need to have a conversation with my anxiety. It sounds weird but I'm just going to do it the way that I would just as an example, like this: 

Hi anxiety, I'm so glad you came today. Welcome. 

Thank you for all you have done to help protect me in the past.

Today, I don't need you to be here. You can now rest, or you can leave. 

You are welcome to stay, but my boundary is that you are not allowed to tell me that this is about my relationships with _____ and ______, or about my weight. You can stay, but you can not go there."

And WOW, has that helped. Even just typing it right now has brought me more easy breathing and peace. 

All I did was validate myself and validate my parts as not being bad, giving myself the freedom to let my feelings be there even if they're not pleasant so there's no shame that I can't just make it go away, and recognizing their true identity by setting a boundary. I told it "you can go here and here, but you can't go there." 

My therapist also commented about how I'm telling it that it can't play the wolf that dressed up like granny in Little Red Riding Hood. At the very least, no lying about what you are. You are a thought, not a truth. You are anxiety, not a truth about my relationships that are completely fine. Because when I was thinking about it, I was not having problems in my relationships. It's been trying to trick me all along. Or, trying to protect me from threats that no longer exist all along. 

Even the slightest change in language from "part of me is trying to hurt me," to "part of me was trying to protect me but I didn't need it to," helps me realize that I don't have bad parts, and validates my reality.

But HOW MUCH do we actually need validation and yet have so much fear of what happens when validating the things we are ashamed of? 

Literally alllllll the time. 

We don't want to recognize that we got to certain places for pure and genuine reasons because we are afraid of looking like we don't take responsibility, or afraid that if we give ourselves grace it will cause us to keep doing harmful things.

And yet, the point of grace is freedom to know that we are loved as we are, we CAN do anything we want to do, and we end up realizing that we are safe to make helpful decisions, we are safe to let go of our safety-making behaviors, our high-degrees of anxiety, etc. 

I realized how much I truly just need to sit there with every part of me that I want to shut down and thank it for what it's done, and tell it the same thing I told my anxiety. 

My anxiety is here for a reason. Trauma and ongoing threat is that reason. But that trauma is over, that threat is gone. There was a beginning, middle, and end to it. But my body hasn't accepted that yet. So, I had to have a conversation with my anxiety. 

My eating disorder is here for a reason. 

My battle with self harm is here for a reason.

But I don't need them anymore. 

But what kind of friend am I for trying to ghost them without talking to them first? (This is sarcastic, obviously they weren't the best friends, but truly, I used these behaviors for a reason. They served me for a time. I lacked external protection and used the internal resources I had at that point. Recognizing the part that told me to do these things to be safe, is insanely important. My trauma needs closure, and I need closure with the behaviors that resulted from it. We've been together for a long time, ending any long term relationship needs closure). 

This is really heavy stuff. Really heavy. And my behaviors don't just change overnight from trying to do this exercise. But I will tell you, when I talked to my anxiety like a friend, and told it where it can and can't go and that I won't tolerate lying, it died down. Because I validated myself, stood up for myself, self-assured myself, and told myself the truth. 

I could recognize that it was lying to me. Nothing is wrong with my relationships right now. It's my body and anxiety not realizing that the trauma is over.

Want to hear something that might blow your mind? Well, it blew my mind at least.

As I've mentioned before - as far as I am into recovery from anorexia nervosa, which is far considering where I started - I still have foods that make me fearful. I still have food rules. The number on the scale still makes me fearful (which is why I haven't seen it in probably 2 years). 

But it's not because I'm afraid of what I eat making me a bad person anymore (which is what I used to believe) or that a number on the scale would disqualify me from close relationships with others or from being a strong athlete, or EVEN a major one, the anxiety isn't even about thinking that my providers won't see me anymore if my weight is up higher than usual. 

My inner knowing, to the very core of me, knows that none of this is true. And I don't even believe any of it for a second. 

Truly, when I see a fear food at this point, the anxiety literally just comes from breaking the rules in my head. Breaking habit, breaking routine. Changing a pathway that is so thoroughly ingrained. The anxiety has nothing to do with a number or a rule at this point and everything to do with losing control of routine and what I'm used to. 

Making this distinction has helped me immensely. Because I can name my problem now, AND, I have more control over it. I know exactly what I need to tackle next, and I know that I'm safe to fix it. Because no matter what, the things that are important are staying the same. 

Maybe none of this makes sense to anyone reading it, but I'm telling you people friends it's all changing my life!!! 

On a sadder note, I'm about 97% sure I broke my foot again. 

I made a facebook post a couple months ago about how heartbreaking it is to work as hard as you can and put your whole heart into something, and then still fall short, and what a hopeless feeling that is. At that point it was about relationships, which, by the grace of God and humans, is completely fine now, which is a helpful perspective to have with me. In this situation, I'm really defeated. I've been fighting this eating disorder for years and years, I'm listening to my doctor's orders, cutting down my exercise more than I ever have, not running races in probably 2 years at this point, and it feels like there's nothing I can do. 

All I can say is for all you people hanging in there with me, let's keep hanging. I have no idea what's going to happen next, but I have a little bit of hope. 

Because I HAVE grown. Did you hear all of those things I said about my anxiety? Anyone who knows me knows what a paramount change it is for me to shift my anxiety away from my relationships even if it's just reducing it. I mean, my anxiety is still there, but it's not trying to jeopardize what's most important to me anymore, which is a miracle.

And you know what else? It's helping me not hate myself so much. Because I believe that all of my parts have become part of me for a reason, and in whatever way they did, they served me and kept me safe, and I don't need them anymore, but they never once made me bad. They may have hurt me, even if they hurt me more than they helped me, they didn't make me bad. They tried to protect me when I was out of other resources.

And you know what I've learned about God's grace, is this. When we are doing something that isn't helpful for us, let's say it's like idk, I'm gonna go with intentional weight loss via the method my eating disorder is asking for. God is there to hold space for us. 

She* is there saying, "I'm here Kyra. Go ahead, you can do anything you want to do. I'm not going anywhere. I will be here with you the whole time. Keep doing it, you are free to do so. Stop doing it, you are free to do so. I'm right here with you. I'll be here the whole time, no matter what." 

God isn't saying it as a challenge, like, "Do it, see what happens, see how horrible things happen," she isn't saying it with disappointment, and she isn't presenting any threats like "do this and I won't accept you anymore." She is merely holding space with love and grace, as she always was, and always will be. Like I was talking about before - freedom and unconditional safety allows us more space to realize what behaviors actually make us feel better so we can grow and learn and evolve into who we want to be. We need safety, not shame, not condemnation, but unconditional love and safety. When we realize we have that, we evolve. This was the whole point of God's message all along since Jesus came.

One more thing I've grown in that's given me hope? I'm not freaking out about having a probably broken foot yet. Because I've accepted that maybe running isn't my favorite sport right now anyway. If I can't run for another few weeks, then so be it. I'm into other things now anyway. I can kick a soccer ball with my right foot, I can swim, I can do other things, and I don't even have to miss running. It'll be there for me when I'm back, but right now, I don't need it. And, I'm safe. We'll see what's next - my doctors are away for this week so I'm going to take it easy and see if I can maybe get an x-ray while they're gone. But no panicking for this lady, not today. My anxiety isn't allowed in that room today. 

Right now my anxiety is allowed in the room where the US Soccer board meets and decides that they have been wrong all along and should finally stop pouring money into legal trials and lawyers to keep themselves from paying equally the women's and men's teams and JUST PAY THE WOMEN WHAT THEY DESERVE AND VALUE THEM. 

Sorry I had to throw that in there. I'm going to the game tomorrow and could not be more psyched. 

All my love to all of you. We are doing this together, okay? Never, ever alone. 

And I guess you can say, I’m becoming friends with myself today, maybe for the first time. With all of myself. “Hey Kyra, have you met Kyra? You may have started off on the wrong foot, but I think you 2 would be the best of friends. Let’s try again.”

*I used "She" instead of "He" as God's pronouns because God is too potent to be reduced to a gender, and as Glennon Doyle said, as long as "she" disrupts the status quo, I'm going to expand my perspective as God has all the good qualities. Maybe not tomorrow, but today.