We are not safe

I was getting ready to write a new blog post probably about a week or so ago after I was inspired by my friend Michelle's blog post on her web site Find Your Balance - Why I'm Not Into Attachment Parenting. She spoke eloquently about how you think you are going to be a certain kind of parent, and then your child arrives, and you adjust to meet their and your needs together. Then the tragedy at Sandy Hook Elementary happened and I began to process what to take from the loss of 26 lives, 20 of them children just 6 and 7 years old. And somehow what I was going to write and what I am taking from this tragedy have come together. We are not safe. Tragedies on such a large and horrific scale as what happened at Sandy Hook remind us of this, as do the smaller tragedies - break ups, the loss of a loved one. Not that any one tragedy is less or more than another. All of them leave us with an unsettled feeling because our world, our existence as we know it individually and perhaps collectively is questioned. We feel unsafe because we are now exposed and raw and vulnerable. This is our natural state - the state a child is born into - but we've spent many years desensitizing ourselves to it and shutting down our ability to feel because we felt it kept us safe. We did this because at some point in our lives some event or perhaps a series of events was too traumatic for us to process so we shoved those emotions aside. We think of trauma to be an event as big as Sandy Hook. The fact is the trauma may not make sense to one person, may seem small or less than, but to the person who has experienced it it is big and has shaped who they are. The trauma has caused us to develop a certain way of living, a certain patterning in our lives - a dysfunctionality. We think its keeping us safe but it's not doing that at all. It's keeping us locked and shut down and unable to live and love fully. Do you ever notice though how many folks love a tragedy? I know people like that. I was one of them. The people who start every conversation with, guess who died? Or did you see such and such on the news? Or did you hear so and so has cancer? Yep, stage 4. Debbie downers I think they are called. I remember I would focus on such stories and used to watch so many shows about murder, crime, etc The First 48, Cold Case Files, etc. I used to tell myself it's just feeding the Jodie Foster in me, the girl who wanted to be a forensic psychologist (for like 20 min) but really it's feeding a dysfunction within me. I could watch episode after episode of this and I would just feed off of it wanting more. Perhaps you two have that show you get sucked into? I am not saying the getting sucked into is a bad thing if you know it's not making you feel depressed agitated or you are using it to avoid sitting with something. For me, these shows were a way to avoid emotions, to zone out in someone else's pain so I wouldn't have to feel my own. We are not safe. The irony is the acceptance of this will make us safe. We recognize we cannot protect our ego, nor our own story we are so attached to and we experience freedom. We are then free to be who we want to be, to let our mind relax because there is nothing to figure out, and we can just abide in the wonderful state of being. Of living. Of loving. We are not safe. We are raw and vulnerable. We are unprotected. There is no place that is safe - except out of the mind and into the heart, into the breath. We can't think our way there. I spent much of my life trying to make myself safe. This was my pattern. And I still see it coming out at times. It's been with me a long time. The fact is all that trying never made me feel safe. And life will throw curveballs into your face whether to you personally or in the world at large like Sandy Hook and remind you that yes, even YOU are not safe. My tendency when I would feel unsafe would be to do whatever I could immediately to feel safe. This would involve jumping from relationship to relationship usually, latching on to someone to feel secure. I was fairly promiscuous when I was younger so it wasn't always a relationship but sex. Sometimes just keeping myself so busy I was never just alone with my own thoughts. And for a time doing whatever I could to not be sober - smoking pot, drinking, doing drugs - experiencing life from an altered state. Also eating unhealthy - sweets and carbs to numb me and depress me further when vegetables in particularly and healthier foods triggered my metabolism and the churning of these stuck emotions. These last 4 or 5 months have been the longest I've spent alone, without a relationship, no sex - just me and my feelings and thoughts a lot of the time. None of my avoidances made me truly feel safe. None of it healed me or helped me to deal with the powerful emotions I was putting aside. So here I am a mother. Something about being a mother has made me finally accept that no, I am not safe. I will never be. I have this amazing child I love unconditionally - I don't even have to try, it just is there. Not that I had to try to love Josh when I was in a relationship with him but in many ways I realize I loved him safely - I wasn't completely vulnerable and honest in my thoughts, feelings as I have been with Julian. I don't want my patterns to be Julian's. I don't want dysfunction based around trauma that happened many years ago to be a part of my life now. I am no longer living that trauma. Julian as part of living in this world will I'm sure have his own trauma to sort out and if I've got mine sorted out I can be the mother he needs when he needs me. I've felt anger lately that I can't point toward a reason. It's an anger that's been there. I think it's a sign of a change and letting go that is happening as I recognize I'm not safe and let myself feel what I haven't felt. It's causing my relationships to shift. It's causing me to realize my own strength. Many of my friends and students ask about my blog, when am I writing again, and share that I have a gift. They say that I am stronger than I realize. I believe both of these things are true. This bad ass is becoming more bad ass! I've always said things but often without thinking, and from an emotionally ungrounded place. As I let myself feel what I need to feel, and I think finally because I am grounded in my emotions, where before I was not, I am going to have the confidence to speak what I have not spoken. And it may surprise people what they hear. There's some people in my life where this patterning has been playing out for some time now and that has to change. It's easier to say it on here than to say it in person. One thing I am becoming more comfortable speaking about is my role as a mother. I could easily tell you how hard it is, and complain about what I have to do, but instead I will tell you how it has made me strong and how I am doing the things I didn't think I'd be doing, but I'm a better parent for it. I thought I would wear my baby everywhere. Julian has been worn in the carrier a handful of times but not many. It's just easier and more natural to pick him up so I do that. I thought I'd never co sleep. We've been co sleeping since he was about 7 months. It's usually half the night in the crib half the night in the bed, but sometimes the full night in the bed with me. And some nights I would love the bed to myself but I'll admit I enjoy having him sleeping beside me and no I don't worry I am creating a habit I won't be able to break. I feed him whatever. Most days it's healthy but the other day he had some sugar cookie with m and ms in it and he loved it. I do not schedule him. We have somewhat of a routine but it's flexible and based on his cues - ie he's tired I try, for a nap, he doesn't go down, we do something else. Yes I've sat in the car if he fell asleep and waited to go into the grocery store so he could get a nap. I am still breastfeeding him on demand though it's less frequent these days and yes I still nurse him to sleep if that's what he wants. No I do not feel I am creating a kid who will never leave his mother's breast. I had thought I'd wean him at a year but to be honest, I don't know if that's when he'll be ready so again, I may be breastfeeding him longer than a year, he may stop next month. I am leaving it up to him and me. I have used TV to calm my kid down. It works when nothing else will. I have let him teethe on some things I know he shouldn't (like the ipod charger) but at that moment its what he really wants so be it. I haven't always told him consistently no with things but now he's definitely getting smarter so I do with the things I don't want him getting into. I am a parent who believes getting into things is a good way to explore though, so I let him make a huge mess with food. He wants to touch it all, mash it all, explore it all. I never gave him purees and offered him whatever he wanted that I was having from 7 months onward. I have had him around adults a lot, children too but he is very familiar with adults. I do not keep antibacterial wipes in my house, I wipe his snot on my shirt or take it off with my fingers sometimes, I take him to the store in clothes that may have dried quinoa or sweet potatoes on them, I have left him a locked running car sleeping while I run in to get coffee. I have very few parenting books in my house and if I do have them, I have probably not read them. We are not safe. So go on out there and drop your story, drop your patterning, drop your dysfunction and all the ways you've tried to protect and shield yourself from hurt and just say what you want to say, mean what you say you mean. Be honest. Be raw. Be vulnerable. Know every day you are not safe and see how it makes you life your life. And who knows, you may find that living with this knowledge has set you free. And here's an instant reminder folks - as I was posting this blog post I get a text from Josh in regards to me asking him to watch JJ so I can teach Thursday night. The text says Nice looking apartment would probably want us to move in Jan 1st. I text back, was that for *his girlfriends name* Answer yes, sorry mistext. I say so you two are moving in together and he says We are looking into it. Splitting rent. I call him up, I talk pretty honesty without getting too worked up telling him I want him to have a place for JJ and expressing my concerns to him as a friend about moving in so quickly and reminding him he finally has the opportunity to be on his own... in his own place... for the first time in his life. He lived in his parents house for a bit in between marriages but that was the house he grew up in. This could be HIS SPACE. I remember when I had my own.. in Rochester... 2002. One of the scariest thing I did in my life but best thing I ever did too. I had to ask... do you love her? He says I think I do. He's on his path, I'm on mine. Our son joins us. But I will tell you all... nothing is safe. Nothing. I'm a living testament to this. Everything I thought was safe in July is nowhere even freaking close to safe now. It hurts. I'm scared. I'm free. I trust all of this is for my highest and best and I'm living my way into it.