Labels

One thing I have a difficulty adjusting to is being labeled.

I don’t like labels.

So when I learned about CPTSD (complex post traumatic stress disorder), my gut reaction was to snub it.

Yet, I couldn’t.

I matched every symptom listed.

What?!

I’ve not been traumatized!

How is this possible?

It took me some time to really get to the bottom of this.

In the meantime, I didn’t want to identify with CPTSD.

At all.

Nope.

Not me.

I’m on the personal development path.

I’m always working on bettering myself.

Yet, glaring me in the face were all these self-sabotaging characteristics.

And would you believe?

They were identified with CPTSD.

Ugh.

So, I started to work on them, one at a time.

Check them off my get-better list.

It’s slow.

It’s progressing, though.

And I found the reason why.

As a little girl, I adored my mom (biological).

She was my super hero and I absorbed everything from her, including her emotional dysfunction.

You see, she was traumatized as a young girl by a male family member, along with her two younger sisters.

She had a lot to deal with, abject poverty growing up, doing her school work when she could (university was her dream), and living with an awful secret.

She was an overcomer in every sense of the word.

She eventually met my dad, got married and they settled in another city.

She was going to protect her children.

She did.

They did together.

***

When I realized the source of the CPTSD and addressed it, I also realized that

I am allowed to accept myself for who I am, not what I can do for others.

I learned to let go of the false image that tried to prove herself as a superwoman.

I discovered what it meant to be me, with all my quirks, faults, shortcomings, and creative potential.

Discovering CPTSD was a good thing, but it didn’t mean I had to stay there for the rest of my life.

My goal is to become more Messiah-like.