" Are you saying I am not good at belonging? And being human because of that? I guess that is how I read it and I suppose it is true sometimes, often, I don't really belong." quote Jane

I was very tired when I responded to this question last night, had a long day working. I wanted to think about it more, because I don't want you to think that you just can't be "a part of" somehow.

Not feeling a part of is normal to human nature. It is because of this feeling that we are so maleable and try to do things that are considered "a must to be part of". If a person spends so much time trying to "must do in order to be a part of", then that person will experience "stress" whenever they feel they fail to keep up with some kind of standard that goes along with "do this or accomplish this and you are worthy".

If you consider different cultural traditions in human nature that are or were practiced in order to "be worthy", some of these practices were very strange. To wrap one's skull from infancy in order to change the skull to purposly deform it was considered a must to prove worthiness. Well, not only was that "crazy" but it was "crazy" that so many in that time and culture followed along with it deforming their infants and themselves. When Chinese women wrapped their feet to make them small and deformed, so much so that they could not walk, that was "crazy" and it's so hard to see that women "thought" it was something they needed to do in order to be "worthy". Oh, there are so many examples of how different cultures within humanity practiced and believed in things that were so strange Jane, for the sake of belonging and feeling worthy, yes it's just incredible.

If one struggles with some life challenges where that person was "traumatized" in some way, by what standard does that person "judge self worth"? Who or what was the "threat" that came into one's life that challenged so much that it was "traumatic"?

It takes time Jane to review the things in our past and in the now that create "stress" in each of us. If a relationship did not work out, was it really "your fault"? The answer to that question is "no" and what really took place is that the other person, for whatever reason in their own history, did not recognize "your needs" and only focused on their own needs. That is typical to human nature Jane.

It is my understanding that you work with individuals that are challenged in some way.
When you meet these individuals, you may be able to recognize certain symptoms that might express that person's unique labeled challenge, but you do not really know that person's "history". Without a person's history, how can one "care enough"? And how can one care enough if they were not taught how to care enough? If you were hurt by a person who was never taught how to "care enough" did or does that ever mean you are the one who is "unworthy"?

When working through what is called "complex PTSD", it is important to "gradually" allow one's self to slowly look beyond one's own fears/hurts/lonliness/stress and view the different individuals that were also present in one's life too. It isn't just that different individuals were not "there" for you, it is allowing one's self to understand "why" this was so, because there are always reasons, and most of these reasons have nothing to do with one's worthiness.

If you visit a beautiful beach and are very alone and confused, you can be just as bad if not worse off if you visit a beautiful beach with others that don't know how to "enjoy you or that beach" in a healthy way. When someone experiences "PTSD or complex PTSD" that person often wishes they could "just igonore, not dwell, forget, get over" like they used to do. But, what that person really did was learn to ignore things that were just not "healthy" for them somehow. In the culture where individuals purposely deformed themselves, they all believed it was right and a must do in order to be part of, when in reality it was not a "healthy" thing to do. If an individual doesn't go along with that pattern, is that individual "unworthy or crazy"?

IMHO, what makes life hard is when a person believes they have to "follow" along in order to live life right. If a person has a life experience where they are trapped with a person who is intrusive in some way, they do whatever they can to "survive" that situation and finally get away from the person who is threatening them, it doesn't matter exactly how they did it, what matters is "that person survived" that bad situation. And if that person looks back on that and sees the warning signs they missed, it doesn't have to mean they "failed" somehow.

Jane, when we view others who "seem to" have the good life, we are only seeing what they want us to see, it is like that for everyone. If we could be a fly on the wall behind what we see out in public view, oh how we would see something very different.

I have sat with my therapist in shock with the things I was experiencing and how I have come across so many different people who have shocked me in the ways they behaved.
My therapist said, "yes, people really do crazy things" and he has shared some of the terrible things people he has treated have experienced in their lives (in general without identifying these individuals of course). People who have a public persona of "balance" when in reality there is a great deal of "bad" that person has dealt with in their lives.

Therapists hear things constantly that are very hard to hear, I don't know how they do that. My therapist told me that it took him time to learn "how" to listen to others that have "horrible things" they are dealing with and have patience to "listen and help them learn how to help themselves" because often he wanted to "rescue them" and do more and "fix". He told me that sometimes patients don't make much sense when they are all confused, but he is "patient" with them as they are often struggling so much to make sense of their challenges. After a while, when he just listens, his patients slowly begin to make more sense, why?, because these patients are typically not exposed to other individuals that ever really "listened" to them.

My therapist told me that often he wishes that he video taped his PTSD patients from when they first present to him, verses later on when they have made gains and are in more control of themselves. These patients may still struggle greatly, however, the gains they have made in therapy are very visible and his patients begin to do much better at verbalizing their challenges and show a lot less "desperation" then they had when first meeting with him. I do remember when I was very bad myself tbh, my mind was racing and I felt very hurried to try to get him to a point where he had enough of my history where he could see how very "overwhelmed" I really was.

When I say that you are more "a part of" than you realize and that after a while in your own healing process you will slowly begin to realize that and see others in a different way, it was not meant as a criticism or to imply you have ever been wrong about, or unworthy of, or bad in any way. It is that your "disconnect" is more "normal" than you realize and that there are "many" that go along with, yet in their own way are disconnected from. Many people walk on a beautiful beach at some point and are so challenged with "life" they cannot seem to "enjoy" the true beauty of that beach. In that you are more "a part of" being humanly normal than you realize right now.

One day I went to a therapy session and my T had forgotten to make it a point in my last session to make sure I knew he was scheduling me earlier than normal because he had a doctor's appointment. So, I arrived at my normal time and was waiting and he opened his door and was leaving. I was triggered because I did not understand what was taking place, but managed to keep my cool. Then my therapist explained that I was supposed to have my appointment earlier because he was going to the doctor to have a lump biopsied to see if it was cancerous. My therapist is a cancer survivor, which I had not known. I stopped thinking about myself, and realized that he must be so scared. He "was" scared and had not shared that deep fear with his family, and in that moment I could see how very "alone" and frightened he was. I gave him a hug and recognized his fear with him in that moment, and I was grateful that I had been able to do that with him as he really "needed" that hug and for someone to recognize his fear right then as he was "afraid" of what may come from that visit he was heading to all by himself. In that moment, whatever I had shared with him, however I was "not right somehow", did not matter at all, he was "grateful" to have my hug and comfort so he did not have to feel "so alone". It doesn't matter "what I failed at, how I struggled, what may not have been right about me at all", in that moment, I was "a part of" because he needed to have a hug and not feel so alone that day. So, because I do know "fear and being alone", I was able to see that need in him, the rest did not really matter, what mattered was one human seeing a "genuine need in another human".

A lot of people don't know "how" see a need and reach out.
There are lots of times we all experience this challenge. Just as there are lots of people "who need" and don't know how to ask for help or comfort too. There is a lot of "challenge" with that in "human nature".

((Caring, Understanding Hugs))
OE