Pick Up the Pen
Believe in your own inner awesomeness
Pick Up the Pen
After trauma or abuse, one of the most painful aspects can be the feeling of powerlessness over your own life. You may grieve for the parts of your life that were written (or erased) for you by others. But it's never too late to write a new ending. You only have to pick up the pen.
Grow A Backbone
Believe in your own inner awesomeness
Pick Up the Pen
Trauma survivors often struggle with boundaries. But without them, we leave ourselves open to further victimization. By intentionally practicing establishing, recognizing, respecting and enforcing boundaries, we protect ourselves and create a safer place for our identities to heal
Believe in your own inner awesomeness
Believe in your own inner awesomeness
Believe in your own inner awesomeness
If your personality has been pathologized or you've been bullied for being different, you may be accustomed to masking your quirks. When you insist on seeing your unique strengths and gifts as assets and enhancements instead, you can reframe your existence and see yourself in a new light
Remember Who You Are
Work on your character
Believe in your own inner awesomeness
When we go through extremely traumatic experiences we can feel disconnected from our core selves, the set of traits and preferences that feel most like us. Reconnecting with this core identity can help you feel more secure as you work on healing.
Work on your character
Work on your character
Work on your character
Grit, Agency, Honesty, Integrity, Compassion, Responsibility, Identity, Sincerity, Patience, Generosity. All of these traits can be built within us, or neglected or suppressed. Character is to identity like a foundation is to a house: the more sturdy your foundation, the more sturdy the self you can build upon it.
Tend Your Temple
Work on your character
Work on your character
Without your body, you wouldn't have much to work with. So take care of it! As you work on healing inside, don't forget to take care of your outside as well. Drink water, get sleep, eat fruits and veggies and food with actual nutrients. Stretch your muscles and try to get some movement. Don't forget to floss.
Pick It UP
Pick Up the pen
When neurodivergence is treated like mental illness, it can leave you feeling like you aren't trusted to make your own decisions or plan your own future. If you've been gaslit or abused, you may have endured long periods of powerlessness or dependence on people who were not acting in your best interests. If you are trapped in or recently escaped from an abusive situation, you may still feel this sense of helplessness. It takes time to begin to feel in control of your own destiny, but it's a liberating and empowering process. The goal is to build confidence in your inner voice so that it feels more comfortable speaking up. Often these inner voices are shouted down by people who are intimidated or threatened by our deep emotions, strange ideas and flexible, creative thinking. Here are some exercises to help you practice holding (and using) the pen that writes your story.
-Imagine you won the lottery, enough to live on for the rest of your life. What would you do? Who would you want in your life? What would you do with your time? Where would you go?
-Imagine yourself in a parallel universe, but the parallel you did not experience the trauma you did. The parallel you received support, love and patient guidance. What does parallel you's life look like? What are they doing with their time? Where are they? Imagine you can exchange knowledge, and you know everything they know. Imagine you could absorb the knowledge and memories of those parallel triumphs and joys. Let yourself imagine 10 different potential parallel yous, all with different, parallel lives full of different triumphs and different joys. You're a different person in each life, because each life has diverged to a different path. Yet you are still fundamentally you, with the same underlying predispositions, preferences, quirks and differences, Let yourself feel each life like a different outfit and try them on without judgment.
-Write yourself an alternate ending, one in which a miracle occurs, or a plot twist, or choose your own adventure. Write it as though you are a descendant three generations from now describing the life of your ancestor. What did you do with your time? What did you leave behind? What are you remembered for?
-Write your wiki bio, as though you were a stranger reseraching your life for your Wikipedia entry. Don't ask anyone else for input. Look at yourself through the looking glass. You can see into your heart, into your darkest fears and brightest hopes. You know your deepest wish and all of your secrets. You are being honored for something: what? Did you do a good deed, or a remarkable feat? Were you the first or the last of anything? Did you find , invent or discover something? Did you create or bake something worth commemorating? Will there be a statue of you, or a portrait, or plaque, or monument? Do you have a nickname bestowed by a fondly nostalgic community, or one that strikes fear in the hearts of your enemies? Is there a holiday in your honor? A parade? Community theater reenactment? Pancake breakfast? Don't be limited by the constraints of our current universe. Invent one where anything is possible.
-Craft a Mission Statement, Mantra, Official Motto, Trademark or other Catchphrase: write something to rally behind, something to repeat in your mind when you're ready to quit. An anchor crafted of words that you can sink into the solid mental floor when the storms of trauma threaten to capsize your vessel. It's your prayer to your self, your safe word, your key phrase that will activate your inner warrior. Imagine that deep inside you is a sleeper agent of unimaginable strength and skill, and when you utter your phrase, this agent awakens to steady your hand, open your heart and sharpen your mind.
Grow A Spine
Grow A Spine
When neurodivergent people are abused by loved ones or intimate partners, especially if the abuse involves gaslighting and manipulation, they can struggle with boundaries. Some of us were not allowed to have boundaries, and our survival depended on how well we could mask. Some of us were not allowed to have preferences or identities that deviated from what was projected onto us. Our survival may have depended on how well we could please our families or partners. Our own boundaries may have been ignored or trampled for so long that we don't even know how or where to set one. We may struggle with acknowledging the boundaries of other people because we've haven't been taught how to recognize them. Neurdivergence is often a hereditary trait that can be identified along family lines. But stigma against mental illness in previous generations prevents many families from ever openly discussing something they consider taboo, or something to be gossipped about behind the "craziest" family members' backs. When people think you are crazy, they don't feel obligated to treat you as they would an equal. They feel even less obligated to be honest with you, or to treat you fairly. You lose status and gain a level below that of a child: many people think every child should have a home, but would walk with disdain past a neurodivergent adult sleeping in a box like it's what they deserve for being born different.
Escaping an abusive environment when you're neurodivergent can be like leaping from the frying pan into the fire. If neurodivergence is considered shameful or taboo in your family, you may find yourself scapegoated and cast into a pasture of black sheep. You may suffer insults from former loved ones on top of injuries sustained at the hands (and mouths) of others. You cannot rely on the people who hurt you to heal you. They will sometimes feel better about themselves by causing you pain. The cycle of abuse is one that is ingrained in many families; patterns of behavior that swing between cruelty and guilt that keep you trapped in eternal suffering, a pervasive sense of never being good enough, and feeling unworthy of love or acceptance.
After I escaped my abusive marriage, I hit a bunch of massive obstacles. My ability to overcome these obstacles was hindered further by a judgmental and unsupportive family who preferred me in a state of quiet, compliant sedation to my natural autonomous self. Setting boundaries between myself and loved ones who did not respect me or value my independence was crucial to giving my inner self time to heal and grow strong enough to emerge. It needed to be protected from their biased criticism, their hurtful mockery and cruel words.
When you start to set boundaries, the people who are accustomed to violating them may react strongly. After I began to set boundaries between my abuser and myself, it became clear that my brother preferred my abuser to me. My family pressured me to ignore my own healing from years of severe abuse that sent me to the hospital and accept the person who inflicted it because he was my brother's drinking buddy. I held my boundary, and they chose to write a jointly signed letter declaring me a "nonentity." My own parents went to cruel lengths to attempt to force me back into a state of dependence and used the knowledge of it to hurt me, hoping to sabotage my progress as I continued to hold my boundary. They convinced other family members to turn their backs and remained in contact with my daughter through my abuser, so that I would get questions about why her gradnparents, my own parents, love Daddy but not Mommy.
But as painful as their multiple betrayals have been to endure, the absence of their voices and opinions from my life has been a tremendous relief. I'm free to wear or eat what I please, think whatever I choose, be myself without hearing about what or who I am "supposed" to be. My inner voice had been drowned out by the voices of people who didn't respect me for so long that I could barely hear it at first. But the longer I held that boundary, the louder it got. The stronger I felt. The taller I stood. And a little seed of confidence began to take root.
Now that seedling is a young tree, reaching for ever loftier goals. I'm rooted in my inner voice, and those boundaries do more than protect me from those who prefer to ignore them. When you find others who will come knock at your gate (instead of bulldozing the fence), you can invite them in for tea.
SO AWESOME
Believe in Your Own Inner Awesomeness
A lot of neurodivergent people grow up being teased or mocked for their quirks. We cannot hide our big emotions or literal minds, which make us targets for bullies and predators. School can be hard, families can be cruel. Many of us grow up feeling like we are more "cringe" than "cool" and heavily mask or self-medicate to cope with (or avoid) social situations.
Sometimes after surviving something truly horrible or life-threatening, you lose all your fucks about what other people think of your preferences or choices. This state of complete indifference to the opinions of others is a state of peace and freedom: you can experiment again, you can play around, try new things and toss the things you never really liked. You can be 100% unapologetically you, and you can borrow traits or aspects from any of the infinite potential yous that abound in the multiverse. In some universe, you've won a Grammy. In another, a Nobel Prize. In at least one, you're a famous celebrity and in another, an infamous villain. The possibilities of you are as unlimited as your ability to conceive of them. But the potential for awesomeness is consistent: it is up to you whether and when you express it.
Tap into your awesomeness by finding something that you feel confident in doing, something you are good at, something that gets you feeling in the zone. If you cannot think of one, think back to childhood. What did you used to be good at? What did you use to love? And if you are still stumped, try something you haven't done yet. Something you've always wanted to do, or were curious about. Practice it a few times. Get good at it. Get REALLY good at it. Or switch to a new thing. Keep going until you find a thing that you feel awesome doing. Reward and celebrate yourself when you get better at it. Coach yourself, be your own cheerleader. Go, self, go!
remember
Remember who you were
Many neurodivergent trauma survivors have endured years of trying unsuccessfully to "fit in" with our peers and loved ones. We often hide significant parts of our identities to blend in and avoid being labelled "weird" or "cringe." Many of us spend huge parts of our lives trying on parts of other people's identities in an attempt to find the social acceptance and support that our species depends on for survival. But this process can come at a steep cost: by sacrificing our true needs and preferences, we are diminishing ourselves and sacrificing something precious and irreplaceable. We may feel intense pressure from loved ones, friends and peers, the media and society at large to cut off or suppress pieces of ourselves in order to better "assimilate" into "mainstream society." Some of our friends and family may do this out of a misguided idea that they are somehow protecting us from the judgment and cruelty that so many impose on those of us who are born different. In reality, many people work to force others to conform to their own prejudice and bias because it is easier and more comfortable than widening their idea of what is "ok" to be or do. It's simpler and more comfortable to force an anomalous child to appear to be a "typical" child than to adjust expectations and challenge bias in order to accept an atypical one.
When we attempt to modify and diminish ourselves to meet these external expectations of how we should exist in the world, we are committing an act of cruelty to our innermost selves. Our authentic identities deserve to not only exist, but flourish. By celebrating and honoring our true selves, we build confidence in our capabilities and our decisions. We can become centered within ourselves, instead of centered on someone else's prejudice. A solid, secure identity provides a stable foundation on which we can build a rich and rewarding life. Attempting to live as an adopted identity is like trying to build a house on a pile of sand that never stops shifting; living as an authentic self is building on a sturdy foundation built to the exact dimensions and requirements of your house. So how do we reconnect with our authentic selves after years of trying to live as someone we are not? Here are some ideas.
1. Go Back to Your Roots: dedicate time to looking at old photos of yourself. Try to identify photos where you felt confident and powerful. When you were a kid, what brought you joy? Where did you feel safe? What did you choose or prefer? If you have loved ones or old friends that you trust, ask them to tell you about times they remember you being happy or content. Approach this task with gentle curiosity, as if you were asking about the child of a dear friend. Try to distance yourself from assigning judgment to these memories. Imagine you are an alien observer from a distant galaxy just learning about human behavior. Describe your younger self as if you were a subject of observation. Who were you? What did you want to do with your life? What did you look forward to? What did you dread? Jot down some of these insights to reflect on as you heal. Eat your favorite childhood treat or food. Watch your favorite childhood cartoon or show, listen to the music you loved, play a favorite game from your youth. Reach out to your past self and let it know it's safe to come out. Reassure it that you won't judge or shame it for revealing itself.
2. Invent a new you: Imagine someone who has never met you is going to make a film with you written into it as a character. Who would you want to play you? What would your character do and say? What costumes would you choose for your screen self? Imagine this film will never be seen by anyone who knows you in real life, and that it doesn't have to be accurate. Assign your character the following details:
-Name: What would you be called if you could be called anything?
-Back story: Generate an origin story for yourself. Where were you born? What forces shaped you? What hardships or opportunities did you experience? What life events affected your decisions?
-A loyal sidekick: this could be a person, a pet, even an imaginary friend. Invent someone who always has your back, no matter what. Give them a name and a backstory too.
-A nemesis: invent someone or something to work against you. They may represent a deep fear or painful memory, an obstacle or past bully. What do you find yourself fighting against? What do you struggle with? Turn it into a character and give it a name and backstory.
-Wardrobe: what does your character wear? What do they NEVER wear? What does their hair look like? What gender are they and how do they express it? What is their power outfit?
-Superpowers: list traits that are natural to you and turn them into superpowers. Create or identify upsides to each trait, situations where they become advantages or assets. Choose a name and symbol for your secret superhero identity based on these traits.
-Weaknesses: what is your Kryptonite? What are you powerless against? What is your greatest fear or deepest regret? Give it a cool name and an embellished back story. How do you defend against it? How does your nemesis exploit it and why?
-Soundtrack: make a playlist of songs to include in your film. What's the main theme? Which song makes you cry? Which songs have lyrics that resonate with parts of your story? Arrange the songs in an order that tells the story (it doesn't have to be accurate! This is a soundtrack to the life you dream of and aspire to, the one you would choose if you could wish it into existence).
-Catchprase: write down some catchphrases for your character to exclaim. What would your character say after a victory? After a defeat? To be funny? To feel powerful?
-A Tagline: what would be written on your movie poster? Try to generate a few sentences or phrases to sum up your character's film life. Maybe it makes sense, maybe it doesn't. Maybe it sounds like a horror film, or a comedy, or a tragedy, or a tragicomedy, or a surreal arthouse lucid daydream.
3. Give yourself permission to play. Try on clothes you wish you were brave enough to wear in public. Try out different styles, types of shoes, including clothes of different genders. Pay attention to how you feel when you are wearing them. Remember the ones that let you feel confident, powerful or comfortable. Do the same with different kinds of music, books, movies or tv shows. Dye your hair to a shade you've never worn. Try on wigs or hats. Experiment with cosmetics. Use makeup or markers to give yourself a temporary tattoo and try out different designs. When you encounter something that doesn't feel right, discard it without judgment. When you encounter something that feels good, accept it without judgment. Make a note or take photos of things that felt "right." Occasionally revisit the notes and photos to remember what you liked.
4. Imagine yourself 20 years older than you are now. This future you is the authentic you, after losing all of your fucks about what other people think or expect from you. What do you wear? What do you listen to? What do you do during the day? Where do you live? What do you regret? What are you proud of? Who are your friends? Where do you spend your time? What is important to you? What is NOT important to you?
Character
Work On Your Character
People like to talk a lot about character, but when it comes time to reflect, find they've build their identity on an assortment of prejudices and other people's opinions instead of a set of values and principles. When you start healing, take the time to tour your bones. Look at your hidden infrastructure. What are your decisions rooted in? What are your priorities and why? What are your values? What is important to you? You can think of your character like a skill tree in the Borderlands video game series. There are branches that you can develop if you put energy into thinking about them, reflecting on them and trying new ways of thinking and being.
Grit: This is your level of resilience, your determination and perseverance against adversity. It's flexibility with conviction to exist and survive. It enables you to endure the night and greet the dawn. Like scar tissue over heart wounds, it's an inner toughness that buttresses you against pain.
Backbone: Courage in times of crisis. A voice in times of injustice. A central immovable force that may bend, but refuses to break. Your moral conviction is here, the inner strength and column of determination holding everything together.
Agency: This is your sense of independence and drive for autonomy. The urge to determine your own future. The drive to make decisions for yourself and write your own destiny..
Honesty: How honest are you with others? With yourself? Do you value it in others? When you communicate, are you direct and truthful? Or do you exaggerate or mislead? Do you deal in good faith, or do you deceive to gain advantage?
Integrity: The degree to which you adhere to your set of values and ethics. Do you practice what you preach, or do you hold double standards? Are your choices consistent with your ethics, or do you give yourself and others like you exceptions? `Do you have an organized set of principles that you try to live by, or do you change your opinions to suit your prejudice and avoid having to admit you were wrong?
Identity: Are you authentic in your choices, words and actions? Are they based in your preferences and experiences, or on someone else's? Could you describe yourself to someone who has never met you? Do you have a complex origin story and a nemesis (or three)?
Compassion: Does it bother you when another creature suffers? How much concern do you have for the wellbeing of others? Do you feel kindness towards other beings? Can you empathize with people from completely different backgrounds? Would you choose to cause suffering or cease it?
Generosity: Do you give your time, energy or resources to benefit or empower another? Do you mentor, volunteer, or support your friends? Do you gift money or resources to those who struggle? Do you share your abundance with your loved ones or community? Do you enjoy giving, or do you prefer taking?
Patience: with your kids, your friends, your loved ones, and especially with yourself. Change can be a slow process. It can feel like forever when you start making small changes. But small changes, over time, lead to amazing transformations.
Justice: Your sense of right and wrong. What is good and what is bad? This is a highly subjective question and varies from person to person. What is forgivable, and what unforgivable? How do you handle injustice? Or do you perpetuate it? Do you right wrongs, or ignore them? Or create them?
Flexibility: the ability to entertain an idea without accepting it. The capacity to weigh evidence or arguments before deciding on truth. The able to change an opinion or belief in the face of new evidence. Your openness to new experiences, conditions, ideas, beliefs or behaviors. Your ability to change or adapt to changing circumstances.
Expression: How you communicate your ideas, feelings, experiences, emotions and trauma to your peers, communities and loved ones. Can you name it? Do you lack a voice? Or do you lack the words?
TEND IT
Tend Your Temple
Someday we will know a heck of a lot more about exactly how the gut and the brain interact and perhaps our lives will be improved by a better understanding of how what we eat affects what we think and feel. Until then, try to take care of your body the best you can. Drink a lot of water, get lots of sleep, try to eat fruits and veggies, and get some movement in once in a while. Self-care can be one of the first things we sacrifice when we have to conserve energy. But maintaining your health gives you the best shot at generating more energy. So when you're choosing how to spend however many spoons you wake up with, try to choose things that benefit your body as well as your mind.
Stay Hydrated: Dehydration can make you feel tired and crappy. Get yourself a big water jug and decorate it with stickers. Squeeze some lemon into it for a Vitamin C boost. Chill it in the fridge to cool you down on hot days. Carry it into the wilderness, bestow it with a name and let it be your castaway compaion. Remember to wash it every once in awhile.
Eat The Rainbow: When you're overwhelmed with fundamental questions like whether or not to exist, eating a healthy diet can feel like an irrelevant luxury. Why invest in yourself if you don't want to be here? Because the whole point of this site is to help you remember why you're here in the first place and to build reasons to stick around. It also requires healing. The more nutrients your body has to work with, the better your chances to make a happy life and the longer you'll have to enjoy it. If you get overwhelmed or triggered by nutritional/dietary information, simplify the idea to one of variety, with an emphasis on freshness. Eating foods that grow in a rainbow of colors (red beets, green leafies, purple roots, white cauliflower, yellow & orange peppers, blueberries for your brain) you give your body a range of nutrients and other good stuff to work with. Don't forget proteins, and try to limit sugary drinks (fucks up your blood sugar, which affects your mood) and alcohol (which is a depressant).
Move Your Booty: If I had a dollar for every time I've been told to exercise when I was depressed, I'd be a homeowner. It's the most trite and often the least useful piece of advice you can get when you don't even want to live, let alone move. The cruel irony, of course, is that it's accurate advice. Moving our bodies can produce feel-good chemicals that can boost your mood and give you further energy. But this only works if we are willing participants doing something we actually feel good doing. Forcing me to run laps when I'm depressed would not result in pleasure for anyone involved. But give me a beach, some sunscreen, headphones and plenty of water and I can happily dance for hours, until my muscles and joints fail me. The key is to find some kind of physical activity that you enjoy, like dancing, ultimate frisbee, mountain biking, skateboarding, or challenging neighbors to foot races in the street. It won't feel like exercise if you enjoy doing it, and your body will get all the benefits of movement without the mental torture of coercion. To start, try just stretching your body every day and walking at a slow pace around your neighborhood. Stretch your arms and legs, your neck and shoulders, your back and hips, your hands and feet. Try lifting some light weights (or jugs of water) to build some muscle, which will support your joints and prevent pain.
Sun Your Buns: When sunlight touches your skin, your body turns some of it into Vitamin D, which is one of the vitamins that stimulates happy chemicals in the brain. Too much sun can kill you, so remember to protect your most burnable spots (ears, nose, scalp if you're barely melanated) and don't fall asleep in the sun. Try to get your arms and legs about 15 minutes of sun exposure at least a few times a week.
Touch Some Grass: At least one researcher is investigating the stress-relieving benefits of encountering dirt (and the microorganisms who dwell within). Others have found that growing up around animals and dirt helps protect against depression and anxiety later in life. It's an emerging field of research, but evidence suggests that spending time out in nature with the plants and bugs can boost your mood, and my personal experience supports it. Go jump in a pile of leaves. Climb a tree. Roll down a grassy hill. Dip your feet in a stream. Walk barefoot in the mud. Look for a 4 leaf clover. Gather a bouquet of wildflowers. Be a babe in the woods for a minute or two.
Tend Your Teeth: The bacteria in our mouths do more than cause stinky breath; left unchecked, it can cause heart damage and painful infections. Most of us don't like the idea of spending hours in a dentist chair, but we also don't like the maintenance that will help us avoid it. Try to make brushing your teeth (and yes, flossing) one of those things that you do without thinking. To make it a habit, you have to make yourself do it every day, even when you feel like you can't. Overrule your body when it refuses to lift the brush. Imagine all those little bacteria dudes glomming around your teeth and piling on thicker. Think about the hours of uncomfortable drilling you'll save yourself with a few minutes of brushing and flossing. Trade a few minutes of prevention tonight for an hour of future intervention.
Turn Out The Lights: For most of our existence, humans have had periods of rest and darkness. The day/night cycle is older than our circadian rhythms, which evolved to wake and sleep with the sun and moon. The abundance of glowing lights and screens have allowed us to escape the limitations of ancient lifestyles. But there is value in darkness and quiet. Turning off screens forces our minds to turn inwards, which can be a scary place when you've survived scary experiences. It can feel easier and safer to keep looking outwards- at our phones, televisions and monitors- instead of looking at what we are trying to avoid acknowledging or reliving. Some of our brains have a mind of their own, and won't heed our commands. You can listen to guided meditation or relaxation recordings (there's an app for that) to help you rest your brain while you rest, or put on noise-cancelling headphones with a playlist that soothes you. A Bluetooth speaker playing ambient sounds, electric fan or white-noise machine can provide a helpful background hum if it helps you relax.