DollFace

My inner child guides most of my behavior…

There’s no school this week and…I’m in my feelings. I’ve always had an issue getting too attached to people which is why I’ve gotten so good at being the one who leaves first. It’s a defense mechanism to compensate for my fear of abandonment…and it’s the life jacket that allows me to feel like I’m in control of who has the ability to hurt me. But when I can’t avoid attachment…i.e nieces, nephews and second cousins…pretending like I’m not attached isn’t an option. It’s a running tradition for my ‘family’ to cut all the communication I have with my niece when she isn’t in school because…they’re bitc…emotionally unstable. The way I used to handle the disconnection was comfortably toxic because I had never learned how to process my fear of losing control. My past relationships introduced me to my toxicity and before consciousness, I gave kryptonite. If anything was ever off with communication, I would do whatever my insecurities told me to do to get it back to where I thought it should be. So pop-ups, back to back…to back calls, colorful text messages, and tearful apologetic voicemails…once I realized I went too far…were always on the table.

In a lot of ways…the triggers pulled by my ‘family’ have helped me grow up. I look at some of my past behavior and can’t believe I ever took it as far as I did…without going to jail. I…have…stories…on stories of behavior that can be seen as ‘bipolar’ but at the end of the day…my feelings were just hurt. Self-control is what I was supposed to be exercising with these people but I never respected anyone enough to learn how it worked. So God gave me the child that I kept refusing to birth…so I could calm my a** down. Not talking to my niece for extended periods of time used to have me texting the group chat all day…as a way to let my pressure off. Those energetic exorcisms helped me purge my anger but all I was showing the chat was how much control they had over my behavior. I used to try to pretend that I could stop texting if I wanted to…but I could never stick to staying silent when I claimed I would. I would always find another reason to speak because I didn’t feel heard. I’m not sure when the switch happened but I do remember asking God to help me release my fear. Once He showed me that my inability to let go came from my lack of trust in His ability to protect…I loosened my grip.

I did have to have a few words with my twin and her little sister after keeping my niece longer than I normally do on the last day before her break. We came back to my house and she asked to play dolls…and that turned into playing chef with kinetic sand, slime, and random ingredients that have been sitting in my refrigerator.…and that turned into a judging competition for her dolls to choose who made the best make believe meal. It was a whole thing. I didn’t even realize what time it was when I got a text asking when I was dropping her off and after I said the time…I was told to keep her overnight if I didn’t come sooner. I had plans to sleep all the way in so…we cut our playdate short. On the drive back home I started asking myself if I had intentionally kept my niece as a way for my inner child to store up on the energy she gets from being allowed to be a kid. And…yes. The way I am with my niece is a double sided cure. The little girl inside of me, who I’m assuming dealt with a lot of trauma when she was my niece’s age, needs the therapy that comes from being allowed to be herself without judgement. I honestly feel like it’s her sadness I feel when we go extended periods without it. But we have to learn how to balance our emotions in its absence…which is why God birthed me into the kind of family that thrives off of taking what I need. They force me to heal.

Love,

Choosy