Having a Boyfriend Has Helped My Somatic Healing A LOT
I recently started dating someone with whom I feel really close. I can really pour my heart into this person. And it's really changed my perspective on things. It's much easier for me to process emotional experiences.
I know it may seem obvious, but it was not obvious for me. I wanted to avoid relationships because I felt like they were constantly breaking me. Don't judge me, but I was getting into my man-hater phase before he completely broke it. I was scared of being hurt when I was already alone.
I put my guard down with a previous partner, and they completely wrecked it. I felt completely abandoned, but I gave in because the idea of someone not abandoning me was so tempting. I put my guard down. I had attached to him, and the world became more vivid before my mental health crashed again when he left me. But since I've started dating this sweet pea, I can actually process the past now. I couldn't even cry it out or process it because I felt so unsafe. I can process the pain of being abandoned in the past, as well as how abandoned I've felt in my life. I was actually trying really hard to process the past with the person, and it was very hard. I was trying to make myself feel safe, and nothing worked until I got into this great relationship.
Now I started dating someone I really feel cares about me, and I've been coming to terms with reality so much easier. I can really look at myself and realize I've been completely abandoned for so long. I always knew it logically, but it's like I can actually see it now in my feelings. I can feel it. I've never seen myself like this. I'm crying a lot and actually have the safety to cry. I couldn't cry before there was nothing I could do to not feel abandoned. Even though I was a safe place for myself, there's nothing you can do to not feel abandoned unless you want to make up people in your head. We all need a place to belong. And even though I've tried to cultivate a safe place within myself, I'm realizing there's a level of love and safety I could never give to myself.
I had a lot of maladaptive daydreaming, and I couldn't understand why. I think it was all a way to compensate for the fact that no one cared about me. So many of my dreams were about people being surprised by my pain or caring about my experiences or feelings. Since I've been processing because I feel safe, I notice a lot of vividness in my visual field. I actually feel loved and more attached. That safety is allowing me to see a lot of things about my reality. I can see myself a lot more clearly. I'm not in the state of, "Trauma made me stronger. It was worth it." Although I can absolutely acknowledge that it accelerated my maturity by a long shot, it's not my crutch to cope with the pain anymore and ignore it.
I couldn't turn off the numbing if I wanted to. My body didn't want to carry a pain that it knew wouldn't be satisfied. But with safety, I can defrost. And medications and solo healing could have never done this on their own. It's quite an expected but delightful turn in my mental health. And I'm feeling so much better.
CAUTION: I will say that I have already done a drastic amount of healing, so I am very turned off by bad partners. That is crucial for anyone reading this because I used to be attracted to horrible people, and it's better to be alone and in pain from loneliness than with an emotionally abusive partner because you can't have a healthy attachment. I don't want to encourage people to get into emotionally dangerous situations if they can't depend on themselves to avoid abusive relationships. Remember that emotional pain is just like physical violence. It registers in the body as pain, just like physical abuse, but kills you slowly over your entire lifetime. It accumulates and is very dangerous.