My story – A journey of recovery
I am 67 years old, and I can honestly say I have now left my traumatic past behind. I was sexually and physically abused from the age of three until thirteen, by my father, grandfather and my dad’s best mate. At the age of 13 I became pregnant by my father; the baby died in pregnancy and was buried under the floorboards.
My father made me feel worthless, telling me I’m nothing and I never will be, treating me like a piece of meat, My mother was aware but did little to stop it happening. There were regular beatings, hunger and unending fear of my father and his temper.
I realise now spirit was working for me but back then, but I wasn’t aware of spirit until later. Somewhere inside of me wanted to heal and let go of the past, I’d had years of professional counselling, therapies and the like, read loads of self help books all with varying degrees of benefits.
The last couple of years I have been spending time looking inside myself for answers, and seeing that, what happened to me in my past wasn’t my fault and doesn’t need to continue to affect my future, I knew something had to change. Just after Christmas this year I was in a very dark place, I wasn’t happy with myself, my weight was creeping up dangerously, my arthritic knee was giving me significant pain, something had to change.
I asked spirit to help me and thought nothing more about it. The Middle of January arrived, I woke up one morning, and it was as if a light switched on inside of me, help had arrived ! All my memories came flooding back, the hurt , the terror, the pain, self loathing etc, I realise now I was shedding my past.
From that moment I became aware of the messages my body were sending to me, stop eating when your full, rest when you’re tired ect, I was seeing myself from a different perspective I had a different insight into me. I had always hated my body, it’s covered in scars from major surgery, suddenly I was seeing my body differently, I realized my body had supported me and kept me alive. I began writing a journal, finding joy in small things.
The biggest change was dropping a stone without trying, ive continued to nurture myself in many ways, as a result my weight has continued to fall away. Now I like me and my body.
It hasn’t been an easy process but then change never is, all my life there something inside of me kept me moving forward, to move from my painful past driving me to move forward and let go of anything that doesn’t serve me. Now I’m happy inside and out, I have a thirst for life, and enjoy every waking moment.
Underlying Causes of over or under eating:
There are many reasons why people become over weight or underweight, however some of the major causes stem from childhood, it is never the current moment. Somewhere inside of you your not happy, whether its negative programming from Parents, not feeling loved, not feeling good enough, feeling you have failed on some level, not knowing who you truly are and just pretending to be what society and family expect you to be.
Of course not everyone will have experienced the same trauma as myself, each person’s pain is different because we are all different and hurt on different levels, one persons pain is not better or worse than another.that doesn’t diminish your pain.
Conclusion: Healing begins with the urge to change, for some it will be too difficult to deal with their “stuff” in this lifetime which means they will have to live another life with all the pain again. Whatever your pain is you owe it to yourself not to carry it around the way I did. If I can heal from my trauma so can you.
Jean x