Will I ever be free to feel love, for me?

[woodsgnome]

Feeling has always been difficult for me. I recall being in groups and the leader would say in a guided meditation..."feel this in your body" and...I'd feel nothing...I was just numb, and my body matched my hollow inside self. Nothing.

Now emptiness is sometimes quite a desired trait, a goal of many who meditate, and they strive hard to be empty—so maybe this is a blessing. One could think that—but mine isn't that sort of empty; it's an injured empty that doesn't want to feel, for it brings up all the old fear/shame/aching hurt...in my case, the strongest is the fear that I can't love, don't deserve it, can't have it, not for me, too risky...ever, ever, ever. And the cycle turns over and over, no matter what some very sincere people have told me to the contrary.

In my very small social circle (outside of employment, I was very hermit-like), there was a lady who sensed my inner loneliness...until she died last year, she'd call me just to remind me, out of the blue, "We (her family and mutual friends) love you." She did this many times in her last years and I'd try and accept the sentiment, but the old sense of no, love isn't really for me, she's just saying that, would resurface no matter what. Always the freeze effect returns, and even after years of therapy and reading, some bodywork, etc—the numb feelings always settle in. The door just won't open, or if it does the fears obscure the view. What's weird now is,  most of the ones I know have died, and I've become more isolated than ever and I ask ...is it all gone?  Then the mind voice-over says: "Figures--you don't deserve love, anyway."

My vocational life often involved intense feelings--hospice work, teaching, always a social component despite my own hermit tendencies. I was absolutely adored by children and others I assisted with their lives, but in my own life I was still untouchable--love all around and none for me.

Okay...stuck in circles of unworthiness. Is there really a way through? Or perhaps there is no way, it's always/already here, and this confusion is the only reality? Or...please help me becomes my nightly mantra, and memories rush in, and my response relives the fear, agony, confusion, bitterness, helplessness, until I go numb, again, my only sure escape, not to feel. Numbness fills the void and I give up.  It's almost as if it's my natural state, like walking around in a block of ice that never melts.  Some writers suggest this is love too, just in disguise. I try to grasp this, want to feel it, and...numbness. Maybe the trying is, indeed, the obstacle. And so I wonder, and wander, in this awful search to feel.
 

[Widdiful Falling]

I understand how you feel. I feel the same way. I was doing a guided meditation the other night, and in it I was instructed to give love to someone, or something. I had no problem with that, but then I was instructed to feel love coming from it in return. Immediately, my defenses went up, and I couldn't accept the love back. I told myself I don't deserve it, that I will eventually harm the thing I love, and that I have to pay penance.

The meditation also said that whatever I was feeling at the moment, even if it wasn't what I was looking for, was exactly right, and to just sit with it for a while. I think that makes all the difference.

I lived like you seem to for a very long time. I was emotionally dead inside. Too much dissonance made me give up and push everything aside. It couldn't stay that way forever, though, and I would rage and sulk in episodes to release some of it. I couldn't feel until I decided to sit with the numbness, get comfortable with it, without judgment, and peer past it to see what lies beneath. It was ugly, and I felt like I was going insane, but I spent a few nights on it, and came out better for it.

What is your numbness trying to tell you? If you sit with it, and talk to it, what does it have to say? Try to feel the numbness in your body. Let it be, because it's okay. Whatever you feel is okay, because emotions aren't like actions. There is no wrong or right. So I think that you're right, it probably does have to do with your wanting to feel it, in some way.

[bee]

I know what you are saying. I've felt cut off from my feeling too. Have you heard of the Polyvagal theory (Stephen Porges), and how to use this theory to heal trauma (the work of Peter Levine)?

It's basically a theory that says our bodies are hardwired to react to trauma in a certain way. Social interaction parts of our brain and bodies get shut down to leave more room for threat awareness. Good because we are more likely to survive. Bad because we need the social interaction to help us calm down. For some (cPTSD) the social interaction parts needs help getting restarted.

I probably butchered that synopsis. Reading Peter Levine helped give me hope that I can overcome my lack of feeling.

Another note. I spent too much time in my childhood frozen in fear. This results in me freaking out every time I successfully meditated. It was successful because I accessed my feelings. It's just that forced sitting still brings on feelings of terror. Now I only try meditating while I am moving. Just wanted to caution that even standard meditation might need to be modified for those with cPTSD.

[Boatsetsailrose]

Thank you for sharing ...

May I ask what therapy you have had in the past - for me I too had yrs of therapy but now I am seeing child trauma therapy I am getting inherent changes and material to work with ..
' the ' you don't deserve love ' mind sounds like old programming - for me it's been about being able to come to a place where those thoughts have less power and I am starting to believe that I deserve everything that is on offer in a human experience -- self worth is so big for us and the mind plays its patterns of old to keep this shame/ not worthy stance going -- I have found CBt with a therapist who uses other styles also to offer a true holistic healing - ( she is a child trauma specialist
Fear is something I know only too well too - I also practice a spiritual way of life and a belief in a higher power this really gives me security to live aside from the fears and 'the fear'. Do y have any addictions ? As I know for me putting down what I use to numb has been an inherent part of my un thawing .
I have also had healing - energy healing - shamanic healing - shiatsu - group work expressive dance and many other things - they have all played a part in me unfreezing. ..
Everyone on this planet I believe deserves to live from love - experience that inside of them selves for them selves and for others and to be loved --
The head to heart journey -
It seems v good that you have all this awareness and know what u want - now how to get it is your next part --
For me it's been about many things to get to start to feel it and to accept I am worthy --
I too have lived reclusive and know the comfort and pain in this -
To learn to trust and feel safe coming out of that has taken small steps with the right support - I believe we can't do this stuff alone healing is through others be that a therapist a healer a friend people in general and then the time alone feels right --
I wish u all the best on your next phase in recovery

[DaisyMae]

it's an injured empty that doesn't want to feel, for it brings up all the old fear/shame/aching hurt...in my case, the strongest is the fear that I can't love, don't deserve it, can't have it, not for me, too risky...ever, ever, ever. And the cycle turns over and over, no matter what some very sincere people have told me to the contrary

Hi, I relate completely with what was said in Woodsgnome's post.  I am struggling right now and my counselor is on vacation (more like a sabbatical) for a month..... I have been working on trying to retrace the events of my childhood to put the pieces together to figure out how I ended up so emotionally numb and feeling that I don't deserve anything, and that I am not worthy of love. All I feel is shame, guilt, and emptiness.  I know I should feel anger and hurt towards the people that have abused me throughout my life.  But, I can't seem to overcome how my brain has been conditioned and I don't feel anything towards them at all.  I only feel anger and hatred for myself.  The anxiety over the last several days has been unbearable and I feel like I want to scream, kick, and cry - feel pressure from the back of my throat down to my chest.  Feelings like something pounding in there but it will not let go, or my mind will not let it go.  Right now, I am not even sure what emotion or emotions it is fighting to hold back.  Is this feeling normal in the path of self discovery and trying to re-parent yourself?  It is very painful at the moment as a result of the anxiety and pressure.  I have never self-harmed but now I can relate to why someone would to release the pain.  Scary for me to even think about and it is not fair that anyone has to go through that much pain and suffering in the journey to feel worth and compassion for one's self.

Is this a "normal" response during therapy, CBT / DBT, as you work through learning how to feel and express emotion and learn to regulate them?

[woodsgnome]

Thank you for sharing your feelings, DaisyMae. I hope they can cycle away somewhat from that numbness--I know that too well; some days, it seems like I'm walking around in a tight ball that squeezes ever tighter. And then it loosens, often without my even knowing why. The time from when I wrote the opener on this thread to now has been exactly that way--up/down/around/all over--numb, clear, awful, better.

You wondered, "Is this a "normal" response during therapy, CBT / DBT, as you work through learning how to feel and express emotion and learn to regulate them?"

Reluctantly, and sadly, it seems that way, doesn't it? Although I'm not sure what "normal" means anymore. For me, it's just life cycles recurring, but I guess they're oddly better that way--not cycling would mean being utterly trapped with no way out of the heaviness.

Staying with it takes another quality--patience. Living in a world not attuned to it, that too can seem totally frustrating, but it seems like part of the "normal" process of recovery.

I once thought that recovery would end in a steady state of euphoria--that I'd be past the bad times for good, etc. So cycles lead to patience and lead further to acceptance (which is NOT the same as resignation). But sometimes saying that makes me feel like 1)giving up or 2)getting mad. I used to consider the angry part to be a sign of failure. Now I feel it can be good, too; paradoxical as it seems. Recovery involves a lot of re-learning and finding surprising twists on what once seemed so rational.

In these moments, it seems like staying with it is the best way to get through the cycles I spoke of. I hope you can continue to find the way through, DaisyMae .

The writer Rainer Maria Rilke put it this way:
Let everything happen to you:
Beauty and terror.
Just keep going.
Nothing is final.

[DaisyMae]

Thank you for the advice & support Woodsgnome.  I am not sure what "normal" is anymore either.  I can relate to the cycles....  But I have been feeling the heaviness for a few weeks and it will not seem to let up this time.  The ball will not loosen up and I don't know why I can't clear the hurdle this time.  It is like my left and right brain are in an arm wrestle and neither one is giving even an inch.  I want to stop feeling and stop telling myself that it is all my fault, I am bad, I am worthless but the other side will not give in to, accept it, believe it that it is not and that I am not  worthless...  so I am feeling trapped in the heaviness. I need a break and to be set free for awhile soon.  I will practice patience as you suggest and stay with to work through this cycle.  I have memorized the Rilke saying, thank you for that...  it actually makes sense and I get it.  I will say this to myself to help calm me down and relieve the emotional pain so that I do not use the banned topic approach that is running through my head.  I have disassociated myself for so long from the feelings of anger and I am so numb to it, that I think I honestly do not know how anymore.  It hurts too much and takes too much energy to feel angry and I think that is the reason the heaviness has held on so long this time around.  It is like it is trying to break me in to submission.  Thank you again for your kindness and support.  I will do my best to find my way through. 

[woodsgnome]

Over my years of dealing with this, seemingly forever, I've tried about anything and everything to relieve the memories, the pain, etc. I tried endless meditation techniques, affirmations, visualizations, read psychology texts, funny stuff, serious takes, theories, mantras, etc, etc. Some of them kinda/sorta worked, sporadically. I just never hit on anything that felt totally right for me or that said "eureka, I'm in recovery". All I ever felt was the awful numbness, and that's my current stuck place. And lots of fear keeps me there, it seems. Another vicious cycle.

The only thing that ever panned out in my searching may seem strange or silly, and maybe it is—but the times when I stopped looking so hard for meaning were the most comfortable. The endless search for meaning only led to a bottomless pit. Strangely, when I gave that up, I found a smidgen of hope that, while it didn't produce the full recovery I coveted, at least it pointed to a road that was more peaceful. The mind's cobwebs were cleaned out by giving up the search for meaning in a  brutal past, and was replaced by an acceptance of peace in trying to create a more beautiful present.

By giving up the search, I DON'T MEAN giving in—this isn't about surrendering, none of that. I mean just easing off on the desperate search for the perfect way out, for finding any grand meaning to any of it. How can there be any useful meaning to something so awful? I can't say I trusted or even hoped as much as I just accepted that the abusive past had passed. It left me with some serious scars, and those I do have to deal with each and every day. So I guess I changed the focus somewhat from searching for answers to just finding what felt peaceful; then going on from there.

That all sounds rosy and nice, but acceptance has done little to ease my numbness, either. Yet. I desperately want to feel worthy of love, but go numb just thinking it too may have passed me by. Sad, and worse, it seems like it's become my normalcy. But I guess if I no longer try at all, that would only be giving my power back to my tormentors of long ago. It would confirm their attempts to shame and terrorize my soul into submission to their twisted desires. That I must never do. I need the strength for that, even as I struggle with the numbness. May your struggles lessen as you find the peace you're needing, as well.

                               

[arpy1]

this is a helpful thread. thanks for the opennesses.

i said to my T last week that i have given up looking for love (feeling that it proved a bit of an illusion as far as i am concerned)

and i guess i have only just recently realised how much i don't love myself. it's a bit of a revelation. 

with my background, self-love was a cardinal sin; i have no idea how to love myself! what shocks me is how much, how violently i seem to hate myself, but how unable i am to feel proper anger at the people who have perpetrated so much damage to my soul.

that seems to be a bit back to front, somehow. does anyone else feel like this?

[arpy1]

ditto, southbound, think i've got a way to go on the loving me thing. 

[Boatsetsailrose]

Learning that I have self hatred has been a revelation for me -
Turning on myself and beating myself up -
I didn't really know I did this - I can do this at every twist and turn if I allow it

So part of that self love for me is not allowing myself to do this
Allowing myself to be imperfect and goofing up

I am enough

And yes the taking care of self - daily
I work a 4 day week ( this was a great act in self care
Building a strong support system
Taking the time I need for me ' important

[arpy1]

thanks guys, this has been actually very helpful for me.

i woke up this morning thinking "here am i punishing myself for what other people have done to me". 

it's like, what happened was WRONG, so somebody should pay... but becos there is/was too much at stake, it mustn't be the people who did it, so by default the only person left that i have any power over is me, so i get all the anger and punishment i need to deal out. it's somehow been my fault for letting them do it, for not stopping them.

well, that was a revelation, and i told my T in session today and for the first time, i felt a bit angry at my ex and a couple of people in the cult too... and didn't justify them like i usually do.

progress, i think. T said it's right to be angry at them. that too is reassuring. i have spent too long being understanding and accommodating. not that i am going to try and contact any of 'em and have a go at them or anything, it's in my head the change needs to happen.
but maybe it is a start, eh? so thanks for this thread.