Lifting shame and desire for perfectionism through motherhood
holding my inner girl through the ring of fire
To people it would never occur that I strive for perfectionism, because I have a naturally expressing chill vibe. Deeply inside, ever since I was little, fucking up anything I like hurt a lot.
The wildest self defence mechanism for not fucking up was mostly shutting down, not doing anything I loved so I could stay safe. Literally there was a part of me that believed if I make a mistake, I will die. The hows and whens of these personal story of mine don’t matter that much. The interesting part is how it surfaced when I expected it the least, during the time where space for integrations were scarce, in postpartum.
Each daughter’s arrival initiated something internal. For example in Fauna’s case it was facing my fears, and entering my power. In Onka’s case it has been connecting with the deep maternal feminine energy and the existence of death. With Yuka it has been facing my wildest hidden hurts, pains and impotencies. She has been my invitation to see, where I never dared to look. To feel what I never imagined to feel. To see what I denied myself from seeing.
After she was born…
I thought my goal was to keep everything together, keep everyone satisfied and perform my best. It was my subconscious way of the best performance and getting the results I want. To my surprise it was doing the opposite of what I was expecting. It created eruptions of immense scales. The thing what I really dislike is not knowing what is going on in my mental world. I had to rest in the space of not knowing why the confusion, why the hardship, why the messyness, until I could let go of that coat of shame I put on as a little girl.
Facing my little girl and letting her know, that it’s okay to fuck up, it’s okay not to have it all figured out, not to know what tomorrows bring. That little girl really needed me to be there. hold her, and let her feel whatever emerged through the process. There was a part of me that really didn’t want to do it. It’s the little girl who was so affraid of the rejection, going through it over and over again that she developed these mechanisms not to ever feel that again. Shutting myself down from feeling this made me develop allergies so that my body could deal with the irritation from the feelings that wanted to be akcnowledged and seen.