This week, we need to come at the problem of abuse recovery from the opposite end of the question.  Instead of what looking at what wounded you, I feel we need to look at what makes you special. But before we get underway, a caveat.

Just in case that, doubting nasty little voice in your head was going to kick in and say, “Yeah right! If I’m so special, how come people who are meant to love me treat me that way?” Whoa!!!

You need to remind yourself that toxic people earned their toxic “stripes” by behaving in toxic way.   Deliberate and consistently vile behavior towards a person who loves you definitely qualifies these people as toxic.  That is just the fact.  It has NOTHING to do with your worth.

And so back to you – or, more precisely, if you will bear with me for a moment, back to me. 

Making a bad week better

This week, I did NOT have a great week.  I woke up in the middle of the night to discover that my lovely partner was seriously unwell. I’ll spare you the details but it was definitely a very tight call whether or not to call the emergency services right away. The only things in the frame were all in the life-threatening league. (Happily, my partner is much better now.)

Needless to say, the morning after the trauma before, I did not feel too great.  I was catapulted back into that old CPTSD mode, panicky, with a brain like mush, no energy – really just what nobody needed. My lovely partner, on the other hand, was his usual, sweet-tempered self.

At that point, I received a message from a lovely client who is going through a desperately bad time.  Given the state of my brain, I replied saying that I felt deeply for her and I hoped she would forgive me if I could not really articulate much more than that. I explained why as briefly as I could.

Within minutes, her reply arrived.  She could not have been more sympathetic and supportive.

The gift of caring

My lovely client had her own hellish crisis to face. She really did not need to hear about mine.  And yet she was able to see beyond her own pain and respond in a heart-warming way to mine. At that moment, she gave me the best gift of all – the gift of her caring.

That is what makes her, and all survivors of the trauma of abuse, so special –their  profoundly caring nature. There is a generosity of heart about survivors that never ceases to touch me.

Sure, there are issues with being so caring.  We have all had problems with caring too much about horribly wrong people.  Plus, you may have had your moments of rage and fury against the world – or maybe that’s just me!! However, your commitment to caring deeply about the wellbeing of others is, I believe, your lifeline.

I cannot convey how much my client’s kind words touched me in a dark moment.  She, of course, slipped into, “Oh, it was nothing mode.” Because that is what we do.  We dismiss our great qualities as “nothing really”.

Since they are natural to us, and we don’t value ourselves, it is SO easy not to value what we bring to the world.

So, this week, I would ask you to trust me on this.

What make you special

Your good, generous heart makes you special – and precious.

That good heart will not necessarily show you how to heal your brokenness.  However, it is the reason why you will heal.

Those of us with Good Heart  Syndrome have an issue – we have been led to believe that we are obliged to give that good heart to anyone who wants a piece of it.  No matter what they want it for.  Regardless of whether they will treasure or trash it.

Now, that is an unfortunate misunderstanding of how relationships work.

Actually, it is an unfortunate misunderstanding of how your relationship with yourself, also, is meant to work.

True self-care

The people who taught you to be a good, caring person never taught you that you needed to include yourself in that circle of caring. They certainly did not teach you that the first person to whom you owe a debt of care is yourself.

Care for yourself does not mean retail therapy, healthy eating  (and drinking) and gym visits – although all of these things have their place.

If you were faced with a loved one in deep distress, you would not show care for them by lecturing them, first and foremost, about their diet, gym membership and indulging themselves in retail therapy.  Or, at least, you wouldn’t do it until you had taken all the time they needed to listen empathically to them and validate them.

True self-care requires  you to listen – with empathy – to yourself and validate your own feelings.  Self-care also requires that you do that rather more than once. Just as you would with a friend.

You’re special

You are special. But you were never going to be special – for more than a brief, lovebombing interlude – to a narcissistic abuser.  Narcissists don’t value special people.  Rather they hate theme and seek to bring them down. That is just the way they work.

The time has come for you to stop paying Narcissists the attention they simply do not deserve.  You’re special.  The people who told you that you are not, were working to their own toxic agenda.  You’re special but you don’t have the power to change the way toxic people work. Don’t engage with toxic people’s toxic agenda. No good will ever come of it.