And What About You?

If you're anything like me, you probably have a particular gift. You can look at situations from every possible angle. You understand why people do what they do. You see their pain, their history and their good intentions. It makes you warm, loving and often incredibly diplomatic.

But when it comes to your own life, that same beautiful quality can sometimes get in your way.

Because I understand that you understand your mother. I understand that you understand where your father is coming from. I understand that you can put yourself in your partner's shoes.

But who understands you?

And I understand that you take care of your parents. That you work hard for your boss. That you're there for your partner and support him.

But who takes care of you?

And perhaps the more important question is:

Do you?

One of the hardest things I have ever had to learn was how to say what I was feeling. Not what someone else needed. Not what was convenient. Not what would keep the peace. But what was actually alive inside me.

But there was something that came before that.

Often, I wasn't even aware of what I was feeling or what I needed. My attention automatically went to the other person first. It was only much later that I realised I had already abandoned myself long before anyone else ever asked me to.

During my burnout, that thread finally became impossible to ignore.

Shortly before I collapsed, I was sitting at the Christmas dinner table with my family. I was singled out as the one with a problem, even though I had been sober for years and alcohol was flowing freely around the table. The only form of support I received was that, on the few occasions we saw each other, they would make sure there was a non-alcoholic drink in the house for me. Beyond that, no one really asked how I was actually doing.

IIn my relationship, we reached an impasse around the same time. My need for stability and safety collided with his need for freedom. What I didn’t understand at the time was just how deeply that situation affected my body. Looking back, I understand that I was experiencing an emotional flashback (PTSD) — something I didn’t even know I had at the time. I pushed my own feelings aside and focused instead on trying to understand what was happening between us, while all the while feeling incredibly alone, unsafe and abandoned.

At the same time, a very sad situation at work resulted in several additional responsibilities being handed to me. I told my manager that it was too much for me at that point, but his response was: “Ooooh Jacqui, you can do this. You’re going to do a really good job.” And that was that.

I was drowning, and no one saw it. Eventually, I literally collapsed. I couldn't breathe.

I had abandoned myself for years. Not once, or only when it came to major decisions, but dozens of times a day. Every time I swallowed my feelings. Every time I looked to the other person first. Every time I thought, It doesn't matter. Every time I kept working without taking a break, without eating lunch, without drinking anything and sometimes without even going to the bathroom.

Slowly, I had made myself so available that it had become almost taken for granted that I would always be there. I was increasingly seen less as a person with needs of my own and more as someone who could always be relied upon.

All that supporting. Always being nice. Staying polite. Adapting myself. Always being available. It hadn't served me, but ultimately, it hadn't served them or our relationships either.

And perhaps that was the most painful part: the voices from my past had slowly become my own voice.

No one needed to tell me anymore that I had to keep going. That someone else's preferences mattered more than mine. Or that my opinion didn't count and I would be better off staying quiet.

I was doing it to myself by then.

I had spent so long learning that my needs didn't matter that I had stopped listening to them too. I didn't ask for help until it was already far too late.

Until eventually, my body said:

“It matters to me.”

For me, true healing began when I finally started taking myself just as seriously as I took everyone around me. When I stopped only trying to understand why other people did what they did and began offering myself that same compassion.

I discovered that I could only truly feel what I needed once I made space for my grief, my anger and my mourning. Only when I stopped avoiding anything did I slowly begin to experience love for myself.

Recovery doesn't begin with taking even better care of other people or understanding them even more deeply.

It begins the day you finally take yourself just as seriously as everyone around you.

Because perhaps there has been someone waiting for your attention all along.

You.

❤️

Reflection

When will you finally be important enough to count too?