I never learned to regulate my nervous system. I don’t think most of us did. I was raised extremely codependent and didn’t even know what the concept of self trust meant. It wasn’t until last week, as I experienced my first real panic attack, and was on the floor seeing black and feeling like I couldn’t breathe, that I finally saw all of this come together. I’ve been reliant on someone else to regulate me, save me, fix me - for most of my life. For most of it, my mom was that person. It didn’t matter what happened, I could call her 20 times a day (yes, that happened weekly) and she would fix it. I would calm down and move on until the next thing came along and I needed her to do it all over again. What I saw over the last week is how much I have not trusted myself and how reliant I am on outside sources to fix me and my experience. I was on the floor as Conner sat next to me - he fully trusted me to navigate this. And yet I sat there, acting as if I had no way of getting through. I’m currently reading Passionate Marriage by David Schnarch and this morning he talked a lot about self regulation. If we can regulate ourselves and not outsource that to our partners, how much better could our marriages be? It’s not their job to parent us or save us or fix us. The fuckkkkkk. Then I went to therapy a few hours later, and my amazing therapist Genie helped me see how much I didn’t trust my own abilities to take care of myself. My inner child throws tantrums and panics and freaks out because she’s waiting to be saved. She hadn’t yet learned to be her own powerful hero... until today. I’m a badass in many ways. I can handle a lot. And Genie reminded me that we are multifaceted beings and that I can take on the world so bravely and also have an aspect of myself that is in fear and still very childish. So we talked to that part and welcomed her in to learn how to regulate ourselves together and tune into the trust we get to cultivate within. I didn’t realize how much pressure I was putting on my husband to literally be my everything until this week. I am so grateful for his willingness to speak up, not save me and trust me to handle myself. What a fucking gem of a man 💛