Drop the Bags Bitch
Drop the Bags Bitch
The "Good" Survivor
This episode talks about
- how shamed emotions keep us stuck
-a way our society harms survivors of abuse
-details for a live event coming soon.
Live Event Registration Link
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Beat Provided By https://freebeats.io
Produced By White Hot
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Find out more about my work: www.melindagerdungcoaching.com
Book a session with me: https://calendly.com/gerdungmelinda/coaching-session
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Beat Provided By https://freebeats.io
Produced By White Hot
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Hey my friends. So I saw something this week or I saw this woman talking about how she saw her ex with his new girl and she was saying that she was just so happy for them and that the new girl is so cute and she wishes them well. And that's really cool. Like nothing wrong with that. but then she went on to say, I'm just so glad I'm over the anger. It was so toxic. And then I'm like, No, the only thing toxic is your judgment of that anger. And this is the hill I will die on I swear. Anger gets so shamed in our society and it is complete bullshit. Anger is just an emotion. A chemical is released in our nervous system and we feel certain sensations in our body and we experience what we call anger. That's it. That's all it is. It isn't any better or worse than any other emotion. It's just a vibration in our bodies. But when we shame ourselves for having this very natural feeling, that can start to hurt us. The feeling of anger itself can't hurt us. Those chemicals will fill our system and then be flushed out of our system, no lasting damage, but shaming it and suppressing it can cause lasting stress on our systems. It is so much more harmful than the feeling itself. I think often when people think of anger, what they're confusing with the feeling of anger is reacting to anger. And I actually think that the only people who react to anger are people who aren't allowing themselves to feel the anger and they end up lashing out to try to get rid of it or defuse it and it's because they don't have the ability to tolerate the sensation in their body. They start to feel that vibration and then they just go off the wall trying to get rid of it when if they could just let that vibration be and let it be in their body it would just pass through. Our emotions, including anger, provide us with very useful information. If you're angry about something, it's a sign that something's wrong. Maybe you're not setting boundaries where you need to be. Maybe something is happening and that goes against your internal value system. Maybe you're having a normal reaction to gross injustice. All of that is information that we can use to better our lives. But we don't access that information when we are shaming ourselves for being angry. When we are denying the anger or suppressing the anger, we miss out on the information that it's trying to give us. And what do you think happens when we ignore that message? It gets louder. Most people find that as they develop the skill to allow the anger to be in their body, they actually feel anger less because they're receiving the message the first time. It's like this weird paradox that happens. We worry that if we so called allow anger that we will be more angry but the opposite is what actually happens. I think our society too has this really just sick sick expectation for how survivors should be. This expectation that survivors should be like these forgiving, un-angry, Saint- like people, who have been brutalized and used ,but they are still so generous even to those who hurt them. And then we can stick them on a pedestal and say oh what a good survivor. If you've ever seen on TV after like some sort of tragedy like a mass shooting and one of the victim's family members goes on the news and is like I forgive them. I forgive this person and the newscaster and everyone was like oh that's so amazing. They're so good. But what that does is denies any other way of responding to tragedy or horror. Maybe forgiveness isn't accessible to some of the survivors. What about them? Are they not good survivors? And why should the burden to forgive be put on the survivor? Why put that pressure on them? When you have survivors praised for lack of anger and so called forgiveness and you look down on the survivors that are angry and are protesting in the streets, it makes it feel unsafe for any of the survivors to go off script. There's like this unspoken rule that if you get victimized there's a right way to feel about it and a right way to respond. And if you don't get it right, then it is a reflection of you being a bad person. And that's just all shades of fucked up. First, no one needs that pressure. And second, everyone feels and responds uniquely. Survivors have the right to have any goddamn feeling that they have. And they have a right to express that feeling and there really isn't a right way to be a survivor. Right? It's bullshit. Complete toxic bullshit. I saw an article the other day about a woman and she was attacked by a man and he was attempting to forcibly rape her and she was able to fight him off. And now she is going to court to be tried for assault. How fucked up is that? Like if she hadn't fought him off it would have been Oh poor thing. This is such a tragedy. How can this happen? But since she fought him off, she's the villain because she didn't stick to the script of being a good victim. Our society wants their victims quiet and meek and docile and never speaking out. Fuck that shit. When I was divorcing my abusive ex husband, I actually tried to be friends with him for a little bit. I didn't want to be perceived as this angry, bitter ex. So I went to the furthest extreme of making that mean that I had to have a friendship with him. That being friends with him was the way to prove to myself and to the world that I was not angry. I was trying to stick to the survivor script and be the good little survivor. But the script was a lie. Because I was angry. I was angry because while I was having a horrendous commute to work every day, having daily random bouts of crying, and living in my grandma's spare bedroom with no air conditioning, he was buying a house in my favorite neighborhood. He was making new friends and he was hosting parties every weekend. I mean, I suffered for years at his hand and he still seemed to come out on top. And I can remember just wondering where is karma now? Like, how does this even make sense? But most of all, I was angry at myself. I was angry at myself for marrying him in the first place. I was angry for not leaving sooner. I was angry at myself for dismissing all those years of pain by trying to be friends with him. Angry at betraying myself yet again so I would look good to others and prove that I was not an angry bitter ex. The truth was that I was angry and bitter. And I stayed angry and bitter until I stopped pretending that I wasn't. When I stopped forcing myself to be friends with him and started honoring how I actually felt instead of how I thought I was expected to be, that's when I stopped being so angry. That's when all of that hurt and anger and everything started to be able to even heal. Avoiding the anger and pretending it isn't there doesn't resolve anything. It's still festering inside. Only when you can accept it can you release it. And you cannot accept anything that you are shaming yourself for. And this is how the shaming of anger keeps people stuck. It keeps them from truly moving on and it keeps them from healing. And that's why I get so angry when I see society enforcing a so called "good survivor" script or a "right way" to survivor. So I'm hosting a live event on Monday June 19 called hex your ex and it's going to take place at 4pm Pacific Daylight Time on Zoom. And we are going to be collectively releasing our anger together so that we can heal and move forward. And if you want to join us and attend the event, you'll have to register beforehand. The registration link will be in the show notes. Admission to the event is seven US dollars. And as soon as you register you will get sent the supply list and the Zoom link. So I hope I will see you there and until next time be well.