We Each have a Wound or Two …
I must be bad that you leave me alone so much
therefore I am alone
and therefore I will live detached
for fear that trying to attach brings back the aloneness again
in so many familiar ways from my childhood
Therefore it is better and more self-protective
and best to regulate my being and my emotions
by maintaining an alone stance …
be distant from people who could and probably would only hurt me again.
His wound …
I must be stupid or else you would pay attention to me, hear me,
and accept my ideas or suggestions
Her wound …
She has the wound of compulsively care-giving, co-dependency,
And comes across like preoccupied and anxiously attached.
Wounds dance especially in couple relationships and with the partner I love!
For I noticed that after the honey moon was over,
in the form of so many fights,
only proves that I cannot trust even my lover.
We each have a wound or two.
Wife shouts: “you have a lot of problems!!!!!
Husband defends: ” No! My shrink told me just one or two!!!!”
Wounds are …
attachment injuries
undifferentiation
childhood schemas
unfinished business
primary and secondary emotions
bio-emotional patterns
Wounds are perceptions or felt realities or felt memories and responses
They are born because of threats of separation, insecurity, un-safety
and other feelings / experiences of un-attachment
and loss and alone, and even death.
Wounds have emotional components .. but they are much more than emotions
Wound present in the form of fight of flight / freeze
We each contribute to the dance of wounds!
Wounds born in family of origin,
There are sibling revelry wounds;
Wounds can be ethnic or gender wounds.
We can differentiate childhood wounds from later life events wounds
like sexual or physical abuse, or depression.
But there will still be a deeper childhood wound….early development wound.
Wounds are my self-created identity, as I watched you watching me,
and what I thought you were thinking of me.
Wounds are the drivers … that move us in familiar ways:
wounds are very familiar, old habits,
almost like security blankets…
even if we cannot or dare not yet name and claim them.
The wounds of childhood dance in love relationships
the “there and then” dances in the “here and now”
a straight forward continuation in adulthood.
We are wired for love and survival and security:
We will fight for this right to live in love.
But we are probably wired a bit faultily,
Therefore, we can assess and discover wounds in my present couple relationships
OR
in my childhood family of origin beginnings.
Both work towards healing.
Either we name and claim them
Or else my partner will be naming them for me:
Wounds can be named…… like “not good enough”, “alone”, “bad”,
We each have our name for the wound…..
Our own feeling, our own familiarity
Our own wound word.
Each person’s wound is unique even if two people use the same wound word
Because we each lived the wounding times of childhood in our own way.
two siblings, with the same parents,
will have very different wounds
perhaps due to sibling rivalry
or that parents and parenting have changed over the years difference
Indeed, we need to NAME the wound … MY WOUND WORD …
in order to CLAIM the wound
and we need to CLAIM the wound
in order to TAME the wound
and thus find my own HEALING WORD
There is no need to spend too much energy of BLAMING others for my wound
we can even get angry at parents for our wound, for awhile
but we are all human in this life journey together
and our parents had their wounds from their family of origin …
and their parents before them, and … and …..
indeed, we need to see our parents as wounded people
who could not love us as we needed to be loved, and touched, and held secure.
Yes we need to look at our childhood
and ask stories of how I was when I was a baby, child, youth
and listen for the wound words and felt memories therein
My wound word is “alone because I am bad”
and my healing word is “I am good enough!”
Wounds are much more than emotions
we need courage, thoughtfulness and mindfulness,
sensate and touch re-wiring,
to look into the eyes of our attachment figures and see a new healing, if possible
or to look into ourselves and find a new healing word and sensation
or to look into the eyes of God and life and see the world in a different way
And then healing the wounds,
or is it repair
or resolution
or comforting and soothing
What do my wounds demand?
And what would bring thoughtfulness to this driving force.
Written By: Dr. Martin Rovers