Generational Trauma doesn't need another Warrior; it needs a Rest

A lot of people ask me HOW to do "this." Whatever the energetic "this" is. And in full disclosure, I've been laid up asking God the same lately. And the answer I keep getting back is always the same.

I'll be up in the middle of the night, wall staring, settling in with my insomnia and appreciating the guilt-free-alone-time to process as my family sleeps. My guts hurts while my eyes reach out "God, how do I do this?"

"You already are. This is how."

"Insomnia? A nervous system on fire? Blood curdling inner screams that only my heart can hear?" I wonder. "This is how God?"

Yes. The answer has been true for years of my life. Self Care IS the HOW through the worst and best of times.

There's giggling children gathered in my front door. They're so loud. So excited.

I'm well slept enough this afternoon, to receive it.

Sometimes, when the neighbor girls come over my skin literally melts along with my face when they tear through my house like a giggle volcano with a confetti trail of fun I'll be cleaning up behind them that feels anything but fun in front of me. Them 7 in total. Me, questionably one.

But they're here and after one of my longest friends dad's funerals yesterday, I'm trying to embrace the "fun one" vibe and not "the warden," which is what I see a lot of male-female relationships in my own and my friends from ole's families carry forth. It could be simplified to this programming.

Men: are lazy, stupid slobs who need women to baby them and they should be babied because they really can't help it they're lazy stupid slobs. Basically, men are irresponsible which translates to...they're "allowed" to have fun ONLY because they're irresponsible. AND, their comfort is far more important than anyone else's and deserves extra attention.

Women: are overworked, under-appreciated multi-tasking CEO's who keep everything required to maintain a functional adult life, in order. Basically, they drink wine and cry in a together-sense of aloneness over their husbands alcoholism after a long, un-pleasured day.

And this somehow made them more...right.

Put into an image, it's men drinking beer around a football game while the women slave in the kitchen bitching about the men doing nothing, and a group of teenagers knock on the door uninvited when the men hold up their beers in a cheers and invite them in.

The women don't get the same biochemical hit of "Come on it and relax with us!" kind of collective feel. They get the adrenaline producing...'fuck, they came in, five more mouths to feed" vibe and it shows.

Men played. Women worked at on-the-ground, all-around-living, and we're supposed to feel privileged for their lot.

That was the script anyway.

Mentally speaking, I have released the grips these scripts have held over my lineage, but really that just means, I've finally played them out to their own exhaustion.

I have been the un-pleasured control freak martyr, unable to ask for what's needed, guilty for needing, resentful for it not being noticed, unable to just...speak the truth because I've been taught the Truth, is not my place.

So, I woke up from my afternoon nap. The girls are giggling and Chris is adulting. I feel safe, and gate-kept, and that I trust him to call all of the shots in the best interest of all of us, and rather than go down and attend to a situation I'd normally attend to...I sit to write. Gotta say, my nervous system feels much closer to "the fun one" here, than feeling obligated to attend to it.
Ya see, I always thought that "come on in and relax with us" vibe was reserved for men. That "the fun one" gets away with murder, while "the responsible one" is jailed after wrongful prosecution.

Vibrationally...this is what the male-female divide felt like.

Feel familiar?

When I truly settled into my relationship BEFORE I truly settled into myself; I took on "the responsible role," and it came with a lot of unwanted armor that felt necessary to be the house warden our system "needed." Without a partner, I'm SUPER good at being "the fun one" but like default programming magic, I'm magnetically polarized to the "women" role when I step into a partnership with a man. It's felt, and it shows.

After many years of teetering these patterns, COVID finally taught me we don't need a warden. And that if at any point the women in my family would've went upstairs to take an afternoon nap instead of dutifully show up to work but call it home, the men would eventually have went and fed themselves a shittier version of what you were making. Them bitching about having to get it themselves would be as irrelevant as the women bitching they demand it. Eventually, they'd eat.

IF the women dared...go take a nap.

Self care doesn't always look like ensuring you're getting enough sleep with a handy sleeping pill. It can sometimes look like waking up without resisting your own awakeness and sitting with yourself where your heart feels; in the dark.

Self care is putting down the dish, and going upstairs to journal when your threshold is being tugged at. It's keeping the therapist you love because you want to, not because you need to. It's paying yourself first. It's so many simple, allowing things that open us...not because we're overworked and exhausted from CEOing but because we CARE about our Self.

How do we break generational cycles? With self care.

How do we stop polarizing programming so our children don't inherit it? With self care.

How do we have fulfilling relationships with our partners? With self care.

How do we step more into vibing as "the fun guy" rather than the warden? With self care.

We as women, cannot expect our men to care for us as if we only deserve care if they give it. And, vice versa. We change the whole program when we take it.

Go take a nap when a nap calls. It could change more than just your day. It could change what your daughters and granddaughters believe about what it means to be a woman, (and what it means to receive a truly good man if you've got one).

Sweet dreams and all the ZZZ's

Stac

PS If you were raised in a codependent or narcissistic family and you struggle to love, trust or honor yourself, AND are attracted to my work, Earn Your Luck: A Field Guide for Living Beyond your Narcissistic Parent's Wildest Dreams...is calling. Pick up here.