OK TO FEEL

I shut down my feelings early on in my child hood. The sexual abuse from my older brother, the fear, neglect, shame, criticism, guilt I felt from both my parents, I quickly learned in my household not to express certain emotions. Except fear. That seemed to be the only feeling I did not shut off. My mum reeked from fear of the unknown. You saw it on her face. You heard it in her voice. My heart was very vulnerable and took on her irrational fears as well. Something I am battling daily now in my life to break free from.

My father was an absentee father. Present in body, but not emotionally. Playing outside all day as a tom-boy with my friends filled my empty void. Filled the lack of nurturing from both my parents.

The evenings I do not recall my father being around much. Both my parents were alcoholics and heavy Camel cigarette smokers. My mum supported us. My dad could not hold down a job. He became bored very easily and drank. When I came home from school I would always find my dad asleep with beer cans and porno magazines surrounding him. That was the reason for their major verbal arguments which eventually led to their divorce when I was 10 and splitting up our family. Then I had to deal with my mum remarrying within a couple of months and then me having to move away from familiarity with her to a new surrounding and living with a man who I have never met and having to be told to like him. My other brother remaining with my father and my oldest brother who was in Vietnam at the time having not only to deal with the war but his family breakup. Oh yeah! I shut down my feelings. I shut everything out. I was in emotional pain. I was in my own emotional fear. My whole life came to an abrupt halt at such a young age. To this day, I have been in a constant state of anxiety resulting in fear most of my life. When I wake up until I go to bed. My body really has never experienced relaxation.

Since in recovery I am discovering feelings. Most right now painful. But they are feelings nevertheless. When I am in the Spirit that is a total different feeling. A good one. I had to open myself up to feel in order to go through my pain.

And. . . . .

It's okay to have and feel our feelings - all of them.

Years into recovery, we may still be battling with ourselves about this issue. Of all the prohibitions we've lived with, this one is potentially the most damaging and the most long-lived.

Many of us needed to shut down the emotional part of ourselves to survive certain situations. We shut down the part of us that feels anger, sadness, fear, joy, and love. We may have turned off our sexual or sensual feelings too. Many of us lived in systems with people who refused to tolerate our emotions. We were shamed or reprimanded for expressing feelings, usually by people who were taught to repress their own.

But times have changed. It is okay now for us to acknowledge and accept our emotions. We don't need to allow our emotions to control us; neither do we need to allow our emotions to control us; neither do we need to rigidly repress our feelings. Our emotional center is a valuable part of us. It's connected to our physical well being, our thinking, and our spirituality.

Our feelings are also connected to that great gift, instinct. They enable us to give and receive love.

We are neither weak nor deficient for indulging in our feelings. It means we're becoming healthy and whole.

Today, I will allow myself to recognize and accept whatever feelings pass through me. Without shame, I will tune in to the emotional part of myself.

Hazelden Foundation.