Recovery from PTSD from Childhood Trauma–for Highly Sensitive Souls
Hello everyone. I hope you are able to enjoy the holidays and find some inner peace and joy in just “being wonderful, sensitive YOU!”. For highly sensitive souls, the holidays can be difficult, especially if you are triggered easily due to PTSD from childhood trauma. I relate, however, many big breakthroughs have been happening for myself. I have been wanting to write and connect with you all about all the self discovery and healing I am learning about and how it’s making profound shifts in my own life–I am always listening to my inner guidance and growing. It’s an amazing process once you get on a roll. One day while journaling, the following information just poured out of me from my inner guidance and I knew it was meant to share on this blog. Here it is:
“You can recover from PTSD from childhood trauma. It’s not easy. It’s step by step. Yes, it really is about putting one foot in front of the other-wading through the feelings and voicing your truth. When you have PTSD from trauma in childhood it is your root chakra that continually needs help in your life. This is about getting your legs underneath you, standing strong on your own 2 feet, and feeling safe. It’s about moving forward towards your dreams. It’s about feeling solid, centered, grounded, and safe for your soul to stay in your body. When you voice your deep fears and the truth about their origins to a safe person, it validates you to feel safe and be “in” your body—perhaps for the first time.”
I didn’t know I wasn’t in my body until 2011 and I had memories of terror come up when I was laid up with some health problems. I had to cry and re-experience the terror with a safe person holding my hand 
as I voiced the truth of what happened to me. Realizing it was from childhood and not in the present is part of the relief—you realize you are not dying or going to die from the emotional pain (which is what a child believes) but just releasing a repressed trauma. Afterwards, I had a new sensation and a knowing that I was stronger—I proclaimed, “OMG! I feel like I am in my body for the first time!” I never forgot this moment and I was amazed—you realize the profound shifts that emotional healing can evoke. It propels you to keep feeling more and more of your repressed pain and release it as it comes up.
After this you begin to understand you are building a foundation (healing your root chakra)
—a solid foundation is being laid down brick by brick. It takes time and patience and deep love for yourself. You are lovable and you have always been. You deserve to feel safe and whole and vital. You can overcome all of your fears and step into your whole true self. You are on your way!
More helpful guidance for highly sensitive souls on the way in 2019! Happy New Year to you all!! It’s gonna be a great year!!!
With love and light,
Roxanne 😇✨
“Pain From the Past” Arising for Highly Sensitive Souls
PAIN FROM THE PAST
Lyrics by Roxanne Smith
Feelings coming up from I don’t know where
I don’t want to feel it but avoid it I don’t dare
CHORUS:
‘Cause it’s pain from the past you see
Comin’ up to say hello to me
Just keep it a movin’ until I’m free
Let it move on through and away from me
They say it gets easier as the old layers heal
I can tell I am stronger and I’m more grounded and real
But sometimes it’s thick and pulls me back down
To how I felt as a child when love was not around
CHORUS:
It’s just pain from the past you see
Comin’ up to say hello to me
Just keep it a movin’ until I’m free
Let it move on through and away from me
What happened back then can’t be made right
But I can love that little child in me with all my might
I can protect her and soothe her pain
I deserved love back then and now I’m gonna make it rain
BRIDGE:
Make it rain love love love
Coming down on me
Make it rain love love love
Until I’m free
Wash away all of the doubt
And the fear and shame
Until I’m a bright shining light again
with no more pain
Repeat 1st verse:
Feelings comin up from I don’t know where
I don’t want to feel it but avoid it I don’t dare
CHORUS:
‘Cause it’s pain from the past you see
Comin’ up to say hello to me
Just keep it on movin’until I’m free
Let it move on through and away from me.
Original Song © 2014 Roxanne Smith
Hello everyone! Lots of good things have been happening with my music performances and my coaching in the last couple of months so I’ve been very busy with that. It’s very exciting and somewhat surreal as I keep reaching outside of my comfort zone. HOWEVER, just recently I’ve been surprised by the intensity of feelings coming up that I haven’t felt for a long time or maybe EVER. I know I’m so much stronger because I am observing this happening rather letting it get me down. However, I’ve been surprised at the intensity of old feelings, anxiety, lack of motivation, and emotional pain. I reassure myself that it’s old stuff on the way out but I have the say Man I’m very surprised at the intensity and heaviness of the feelings that been coming and going in the last few days! I look up and listen to youtube channellings on the spiritual guidance about solar flares and energy upgrades and ascension symptoms and things of this nature at times like these when I feel out of sorts. I usually get comfort and confirmation that something big is going on with the planets energy and this time is no exception. One of my favorites for highly sensitive souls and empaths, if you are interested, is Lee Harris Energy. Check his video out at the bottom of this post if you are interested.
So if you are feeling out of sorts, lost your confidence, extra tired and unmotivated, and experiencing bouts of emotional pain, and/or loneliness please know you are not alone and this too shall pass. Highly sensitive souls are feeling it because it’s a gift to be so clairsentient and empathic–it’s not because it’s a curse or a problem. Please allow these times of emotional healing and physical healing to reassure you that you belong to a unique and special tribe of souls here on earth with an innate higher vibration. You might possibly be a lightworker and you might like to google this word and see if you resonate with the meaning of it–it may help you feel supported if you are feeling drawn to learning about spiritual awakening.
If you identify as an empath, introvert, or HSP then you might possibly still be a sponge and absorbing the unfelt feelings of the collective consciousness–this could be happening to you if you are still healing childhood wounds. Learning about grounding techniques and positive affirmations can help a lot. Take solace in knowing you are not alone and you are part of a tribe of highly sensitive people all going through similar emotional healing in similar ways. Please comment if you are needing support from others in this community right now or if you relate to what I am saying. Or let us know if you are doing great and zooming right through because of healing that is behind you. Everyone is different and it’s fascinating to see how we are all healing in different ways and yet similar in other ways. We can learn so much from each other.
One common similarity among us it seems is that pain seems to come up to heal after a success and achievement is reached, that when “wham” old beliefs and insecurities come up to the surface, sometimes the next morning, after you’ve broken through a personal glass ceiling in your life’s journey. Please don’t let your old inner critic/ego beliefs that can get loud after a success convince you that you are not cut out for this new level of success. Just try to observe it happening and write about it in a journal for your eyes only and see how unfair that voice is being to you. That is not the voice of your true self. Self-compassion is the voice of the true self and that is the voice that is best to listen to–your higher self. It’s like developing a muscle when you are learning to tap into this inner guidance–you will get stronger and stronger as you practice recognizing when your inner critic is beating you up. It’s often just a lower vibration energy that is on the way out as your soul is reaching for higher heights–back up where you belong. 😃 Because you were born with a higher vibration–highly sensitive for a good reason and that reason is to elevate the planet with your compassion and innate goodness and positivity.
With love and light, comfort, caring, and compassion,
Roxanne 😇🙏🎶💖✨
P.S. Please leave a comment because your comment will help other highly sensitive souls who have not yet found their voice or inner strength to comment yet. Helping others by writing about your story can lift you up during hard times as well!
Here’s the video I mentioned above:
To All Highly Sensitive Souls–You Are Loved
You Are Loved
Lyrics by Roxanne Smith
I once was lost but then I opened up my heart
It took time to see my journey’s sad start
Strength in me came with feelings inside
Courageous purging with joy on the other side
Somehow I know that love is all there is
Inside every dark and painful fear is bliss
This I know because I left no stone unturned
I face the pain when the bottom was learned
It lays waiting until you let it go
Forgiving those who don’t connect with their soul
The soul has answers and comfort and love
Go within to hear angels from above
Chorus:
They surround each and every breathing heart
You are loved every day right from the start.
You are loved, you are loved, you are loved, you are loved
You are loved, you are loved, you are loved, you are loved
Repeat from the beginning
Add end (slowing)
You are loved, you are loved, you are loved, you are loved
Original Song © 2017 Roxanne Smith
Hello Everyone! I am sharing this song to the public for the first time here on this blog. It’s such a personal song I have not performed it yet, waiting for the perfect audience, the right moment. You all, however are the perfect audience for lyrics like these. Here on this blog I feel comfortable letting it all hang out and feel proud of the healing journey I am on with all it’s ups and downs but always “with joy on the other side”.
I just saw that it has been since April 5 that I have put out a blog post and I apologize for that! Time has been flying by since I decided to start my life coaching business back up. I just completed designing my brand new life coaching website. I’m happy to report that this blog has gotten over 45 new followers in just the last 2 months even though my recent posts were short and not really up to my standards yet. So I am getting the message that my blog posts here are important and to make them a priority in my life!
I am very excited about this. I love talking to you all! I love giving hope to all of you like-minded souls out there who resonate with my message of hope and healing to become your highest selves! We strive to be our healthiest, kindest, most confident, and helpful to the planet while being complex and highly sensitive souls who often feel we don’t fit in with others. We are overcoming deep-seated negative feelings and beliefs from the past that keep popping up out of the blue just when things are going well. Phew! Why are we so hard on ourselves when we already know that extreme self-care makes so much difference in our lives?
Time to pull back again. Get quiet. Go inward. Write out ALL your feelings with self-compassion as if you are writing to your most trusted friend in the world who really GETS you! Be your own container when you can’t find a safe person to vent to. We all need to vent all the frustration we are feeling about EVERYTHING! I had a surprising amount of anger to release in April. It was all about codependency issues that I thought I had healed long ago. Surprise!–there was more! Releasing it all (which was not easy) moved me to a new place of strength and independence at the core of me that I didn’t know existed. And the month of May… well it’s starting out with a virus from some recent airplane travel that has got me layed up and resting to clear it all out. So all my exciting plans for coaching and more performing are on hold while I rest and clear out this virus and with it lots of emotions too. My intuition tells me I’ve moved to a new level of vibrational success so I need to clear out more …whatever! 😳 I’m not as frustrated as I am fascinated and trusting that whatever happens it will be for a good reason.
Sometimes things are so hard and then we get through it and see the silver lining that was there all along. And that is that We Are Loved. We are loved from above. We are here for a good reason. We are highly sensitive souls who are here on the planet at this time because the planet needs our gifts, our light, our true essence. We can relax and just BE and know we are loved.
Just being here is enough. You don’t have to do anything–just heal and learn to love ourselves. If we really GET this we can recharge and become strong and then we have more energy to give more light and love to others. But we can’t do it if we don’t love ourselves first. Let the love in that is beaming down for you at all times. Believe it.
And if you can’t believe it at least be OPEN to the possibility. Let down your guard and allow the possibility that your guardian angel/spirit guide/God/ Universe/Highest Self just might be sending you messages of love and comfort through your intuition. They just might be sending you guidance on your next steps for the highest good of your soul. Follow your heart to hear the inner guidance. Hear it? It is saying, You Are Loved! Exactly as you are! You don’t have to change yourself, you only need to love yourself. Let that sink in. Marinate in that truth for a while. I’m sending all of you so much comfort, caring, and encouragement to see your unique gifts as highly sensitive souls. I’ll be writing more uplifting blog posts soon so stay tuned.
With love and light 💖 ✨,
Roxanne 😇 🎶
Perfectionism, The Highly Sensitive Person, and How Grieving Our Childhood Pain Is Essential To Healing
Hi everyone. I hope you are enjoying the summer. I hope you are not heaping lists of “shoulds” on yourself (home improvements etc.) to accomplish–only to realize, “What was I thinking?! I can’t do all this stuff!–the KIDS are home!” ha ha. Yes I remember, and I still do it somewhat but this summer is SO much better. Back then it was a priority for me to make happy, fun summer memories for my children and connecting with them emotionally. I always ended up throwing out my long list of shoulds. If you don’t, you end up saying to yourself, “I didn’t get this done and I didn’t get that done. Instead make a list of all the things you DO accomplish after they happen–write down each special conversation, each walk in nature, each memorable meal together etc. By the end of the summer you will have a wonderful memoir of how special your summer actually was instead of a list of what you didn’t get done.
Even with my best efforts when my children were growing up, I was too busy satisfying their needs for a fun summer and way too many “shoulds” for myself that I often felt like I missed it–summer would just zip by me and I was left feeling regret.
I think often times we are busy like that to avoid our painful feelings that we may have experienced in childhood. We found ways to cope and survive the lack of love, encouragement, acknowledgement, and acceptance we all desperately wanted and needed. We are perfectionists, compulsive over-workers, compulsive shoppers, compulsive list-makers, and then call ourselves procrastinators because we put things off–but it’s really because we have unrealistic expectations of what we need to accomplish.
As highly sensitive children, it seemed to us that nothing we ever did was praised or applauded as we deserved unless it was something others wanted us to be doing. This was so confusing to us so we rationalized that we must not be doing enough or doing it well enough. Now when we overwork because of perfectionism it is because we are still trying to fill an unmet need from childhood–one that will never be met but can be resolved if we allow our sadness about the truth of it all to come to the surface. Grief is a positive, healthy emotion that is necessary to heal your childhood wounds. You deserved so much more–you deserved…”love”. You did not get what you felt you needed and you may feel you are still not getting it. The problem is not with you…you are so loveable! Aren’t you! You know it. You are smiling right now aren’t you because you know it on some deep level. 🙂 That is the truth that you must listen to. The love you need and deserve exists–we know what we deserved.
For some reason, we may feel we were born into situations where we couldn’t get love the way our souls needed to be loved. I had a hard time resolving this–it didn’t make sense. I was drawn to reading a lot of new age books on spirituality to figure this out. Reading all these books really helped me get a new perspective. I now believe that I may have more innate inner strength than certain family members. I am able to grow and give to others even more because of my childhood wounds. We (HSPs) see the truth, we KNOW we deserve love and better treatment and we know we don’t deserve feeling bad about ourselves any longer. When someone sees you as LESS THAN and you know you deserve more–you don’t have to be around that person. You may need to try a few times to get them to see you and understand you, but if you keep on coming up short in their eyes, and this is causing you a great deal of stress, then it’s time to distance yourself from them and get some healing support. Some of us can’t even try to be ourselves with them–it’s too excruciating to re-experience the rejection, so we must just leave for as long as it takes so that we can begin to heal.
We all NEED acceptance. It’s very important to look elsewhere for people who accept you and understand your self-expression for support. We (HSPs) eventually grow from the pain of it all, and we learn to rely on our selves if we can get away from the negativity that unhealthy family members, bullies, and/or society use to control us and keep us DOWN. They know we are different and special and yet maybe they are not as evolved as we are and so it seems they do not have the inner strength to say, “Wow you have these great gifts of sensitivity and awareness and depth–you are different from us, you should go out into the world and share your knowledge, vision, gifts, and message of love and peace to the world–we understand and we are in awe of you. So GO, fly away and be the best that you can be!” ha ha Wouldn’t that be the greatest to hear anyone say that!?!
In order for them to say that to us, they would have to be very secure and love themselves a lot (or be an HSP like you). It could be they don’t love themselves at all. They may want to control us because they have so much pain and if we leave them it makes them feel their pain so they blame us. They may not have the “insight” to see what we see or want what we want and to see that their pain has nothing to do with us. We are holding ourselves back, waiting for their permission to leave.
Reading the books on spirituality helped me to believe that my spirit (everyone’s spirit) is going to live for all eternity and the lessons I learn in this lifetime will never be forgotten. I believe we all evolve at different levels and different speeds and some of us souls are more advanced than others. We (HSPs) are continuously healing our post traumatic stress from our very real childhood wounds, and it is necessary for us to separate from those who caused these wounds and move forward toward new healthier people. We must not feel guilty for healing–I believe GOD wanted us to be all that we can be and he is with us in all our healing. We each have different limits to what negativity we can be around–we need to honor these limits and take care of ourselves whatever it takes! Alice Miller often talks about the “never-ending work of mourning” in her books and how important the grieving process is for our recovery–we must accept it as essential to our healing and to our eventual freedom from our inner-prison of self-doubt.
Perhaps our highly sensitive souls are more evolved and we chose (with the gift of God’s free will) to have these experiences in this lifetime to learn about the pain of rejection and about our own strength in overcoming it. Maybe we chose them so we could learn what not to do to our own children and develop empathic skills to help others by surviving such treatment as children. I know that I am finally glad to be me, and I am proud of myself for all that I have figured out and how this knowledge has helped a lot of other people to heal.
The grieving process has opened my life up to the most wonderful feelings of joy, love, and trust in my creativity, and this is what keeps me going in this direction. When I love and value myself and my feelings, all of them, I have more to give others to help them to heal as well. I believe we are all highly sensitive for a very special reason and may need to heal separately from our families until we are strong enough to not be triggered and to give back to others…others who are ready to heal and ready to feel.
With support we can grieve for not getting the love we feel we needed and we can have a happy, healthy, guilt-free, and independent life. The joy and relief you will feel when you allow yourself to grieve will feel wonderful and so you will know you are going in the right direction. If you need help grieving and someone to listen, this is what this blog community is here for. Thank you sensitive souls out there for being here on the planet.
Thank you to all my commenters for sharing your pain and experiences and encouragement–your words are so helpful to others who have not yet found their voice.
Please also check out my new pages called “Portrait of an INFJ, …INFP, and …INTJ”. Very many of my clients have turned out to be these three temperament types (but not all) and I believe it would benefit those who are to read the description of your true potential as was written in Keirsey and Bates book on temperament types. (See Recommended Books). It certainly gave me hope when I read it and I hope it does the same for you.
With love,
Roxanne
Techniques for Journaling and Over-riding Your Inner Critic–For The Highly Sensitive Person (HSP)
Hi everyone. I’m happy to be back. I had a wonderful vacation and it is also great to be back home. I am feeling renewed and energetic now (five days after we returned) but I was extremely exhausted when we first got back. And my husband bounced right back after like one day–and so, comparing myself to him, I was feeling very much lost and empty and discouraged…. and then started wondering how will I ever write another post and even…how did I ever write all that stuff I already wrote–I was spiraling negative thoughts again–my inner critic took over! And it was so hard to decipher–I just felt bad and exhausted with no hope in sight. So I wrote in my journal and it helped!–so I thought I would share with you my technique.
First of all, in journaling you must tell yourself that no one is going to read this ever! –and mean it and believe it. Then you let loose with all your feelings. I started out saying ” I feel horrible! I can’t remember who I am or how to feel good.” Within 2 sentences though I remembered, ” I used to feel this way all the time as a child.” And then, “Oh yes this is childhood pain coming up to heal. I just had a wonderful vacation! My inner child is expecting to be punished.” Then my own compassion kicks in with ” I need to be extra nice to myself. I am being too hard on myself. Do nice things for myself today. I am a highly sensitive person. No wonder I am tired–vacations are highly stimulating–just give myself extra time. Everything is going to be okay.” Before long I am cheering myself up. I have over-ridden my inner critic–that negative voice inside my head. This process always amazes me because I feel like I should be “fixed” by now and should never feel bad again. But that is the negative voice in my head–the pressure from my mother to “be happy — just get over it, you are too sensitive blah, blah, blah.” That is the opposite of what I needed as a highly sensitive child. On vacations I would get overwhelmed, over-tired with all the new sights and activities. I know I deserved kindness instead of impatience, rest instead of guilt for slowing them down, compassion for my ability to see the beauty in the small things like nature instead of annoyance about my questions and my disappointment in their lack of carefulness with my feelings. There was nothing wrong with me. There is nothing wrong with me now. My only mistake was believing them when they blamed me. I don’t believe them and choose to be around people who are safe and kind and who like me easily. My husband is one of those people and was the first to remind me to not be so hard on myself and to take it easy. He was right.
Do not be discouraged if this technique of journaling does not come so easily to you yet. This takes a long time and lots of effort deciphering the truth of what you went through and what you truly deserved as a highly sensitive child. The book called The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron is SO helpful in guiding people through the journaling process that helps unblock creativity (finding your voice and your true self!)
Many different techniques help me to find my voice and vitality again. Sometimes it is playing my songs when I am feeling so lost I don’t remember being able to write songs. Reading your own journal helps too especially if you are the kind of journaler who ends up feeling hopeful after you write. (You have to make yourself do it–it doesn’t come natural to read your own stuff when you are feeling bad about yourself–you’ll be surprised how your own words lift your spirits.) Other times I read books or blogs by people with a compassionate voice and I recover my own compassionate voice. Elaine Aron wrote the book on “The Highly Sensitive Person” and was the catalyst that started the HSP support groups that have grown and spread in cities and online. Online, I read her article on “the problem of bearing an unbearable emotion” that she wrote in her newsletter for Feb. 2006 and I immediately felt “found and validated” just by her compassionate words–my energy came back and I was excited about my life again. I hope my blog does the same for you.
I was fortunate to have some time to find myself and work on myself and read self-help books and write in journals while my children were growing up because my husband was so grateful that I was home raising emotionally healthy kids–he is a “thinking” type although a highly sensitive guy (an INTJ), whereas I am a “feeling” type (an INFJ). (See the book by Keirsey and Bates in my Recommended Books section for a test on temperament types.) He had an even more difficult childhood than I did and is grateful for my compassionate ways. When I think of how far I have come, it feels rather miraculous so I want so much to help others who are as lost and hiding as I was. I believe that those of us who are the most sensitive and almost destroyed are an important resource to this planet if we can join together and rise up as a voice of love, peace, and compassion. The fact that you are feeling beaten down is the very indicator that your sensitive ways have been misunderstood and need to be put to better use. All you need is a witness to validate the injustices you have suffered and then you can rise up and start speaking your mind and being a messenger of compassion that the world needs. DON’T COMPARE YOURSELF TO OTHER PEOPLE! You are exactly the way you are supposed to be. Be kind to yourself and learn to love yourself.
Louise Hay’s book You Can Heal Your Life is a book I have been reading on and off for 15 years. The positive affirmations in her book I use daily now but felt so foreign to me when I first got the book. One of my favorites is “I give myself permission to be the best that I can be”. Growing up I was not allowed to express my authentic self (or be my best) because it threatened my narcissistic mother and she would withdraw her love and approval. My mother was jealous of my many gifts. I didn’t know I had any gifts at all because she was determined to control me and keep me close and, in her view, if I knew I was gifted I might leave her. That whole concept was hard for me to grasp because it would never occur to me to be that way or be jealous of a child of mine–it is my responsibility to help my child see all his/her gifts and how special he/she is. So this explains why I couldn’t have compassion for myself–I trusted so completely in my mother. And also then came the question “why would God give me a mother who was so manipulative and unloving?” That was another chapter in my life that I now have completely resolved. God did not arrange for me to have this emotional pain and hardship but has given me the inner strength and compassion to overcome it and become strong. Had I not had a mother like that I would not be reaching out to help others who also experienced a mother like that right now in this moment.
In this moment, I am happy and complete and grateful for all the pain I went through to make me this strong. But while I was in the pain and lost and alone and not knowing how to let God’s love in, I was not grateful–no way! But there was a pivotal moment when I was crying in despair that I became aware that no one but me was going to rescue me–of the two of us, my husband and I, I was the stronger one emotionally. Something Eckhart Tolle said in his book A New Earth helped a lot. He said something to the effect of… I am not all that happens to me–I am ” the presence” that observes all that happens to me…. It made me realize I am not this abused child who is forever a victim. I am all the wisdom from what I have learned from it and can comfort my inner abused child through it. I still keep learning it over and over and each time it gets easier to find myself again. So do not give up. You who are hiding and afraid to speak up–it’s okay and you have every right to be afraid. But that it is not all of you. You have a gift, a wisdom, a compassion, that is sorely needed in the world. Don’t let the bullies and controllers and competitors win. They are not like you and so cannot understand you. But you can understand you! You are on this planet for a reason exactly as you are. Change only the people you are around. Elaine Aron says that HSPs have an easier time overcoming depression just by changing our environment to being around people who love us and accept us as we are. She says “get out of competitive environments where you have to fear that you will be judged, rejected, or seen as a failure, and stay around those who like you.” (see her newsletter the Comfort Zone , and the article called “A Few Happy Things Regarding Depression”). I am adding her website to my blogroll. It is hsperson dot com. I hope I have helped you to feel more hopeful and happy. You deserve it. You are a highly sensitive person and that my friend is a gift. Thank you to my readers.
With love,
Roxanne
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