Screaming at the Cotton Fields

Radical acceptance is espoused often in PDA parenting circles. We cannot change the child we have in front of us; it is futile (not to mention ableist) to try and "fix" PDA, or "make" a child with Non-24 sleep on a typical schedule. At this point in my journey, I have done the work to move past that type of thinking. I know there is no "fixing" required. When something is too hard for my children, I adjust my expectations to come alongside side them and support them where they are at (this is the basis of Low Demand Parenting). I know that my son is a wondrous human with unique brain wiring and that this is our real life, in all it's joy and complexity. Radically accepting the complexity is a pathway to peace.

As an eternal optimist, this part of radical acceptance comes easily to me; I naturally take note of the glimmers all around us and those golden moments keep me anchored through the chaos. I can accept that our situation is both beautiful and difficult because I experience the full spectrum of it every day, and I recognize that the external world is not something I can control.

The harder part, for me, is not only radically accepting the situation, but, more importantly, accepting how I feel about the situation. I spent most of my life believing "good" people didn't have "bad" feelings. Why did I believe this? Because I was an exceedingly "good" child (which really just means I was naturally compliant and eager to please those around me).

Growing up, my "goodness" was reinforced over and over again, in every environment, as it related to my positive qualities; I was "good" because I was responsible, intelligent, quiet, compassionate, helpful, creative, determined, tidy, etc. Negativity didn't factor into the equation of who I was in any way. I avoided conflict. I was a perfectionist. I was a high achiever. There was no opportunity to sit with uncomfortable feelings because I could avoid having to feel them by being "good." I could overcome any obstacle with hard work and a smile. I didn't even realize I was repressing negative thoughts in this way, or that this was a form of control that made me feel safe. It's just who I was. This way of being in the world worked very well for me for many, many years.

It worked, in fact, until my oldest child turned my world upside down when he was 4.5. He was the first thing in my life that I had expected to be able to control and could not. Moreover, I could not control the plethora of feelings I had about the situation, nor the feelings that others had about it. And that broke me.

"Good" parents don't have wildly aggressive children. "Good" parents don't have negative feelings towards their offspring. "Good" mothers don't have grief about not being able to live the life they envisioned. I felt all these things and more and it was shameful and terrifying because I was confronting this side of me for the first time. Who was this person who resented her child? That is not at all what a "good" mother would feel.

And, for the first time in my life, people in power were questioning my "goodness" and blaming E's aggression on my parenting. For the first time, I had to figure out who I was if others didn't approve of me.

When we chose to unschool and to live a low demand life, a lot of people did not understand why. I had to become ok with not pleasing everyone.

I worked on I radically accepting the child in front of me, and accepting that I can't control the feelings of others, but it was much later in my journey, as I healed from parental PTSD, that I realized an important step I had been missing - I wasn't radically accepting myself. Even the uncomfortable parts. Especially the uncomfortable parts. I spent a lifetime existing in a way that allowed me to evade discomfort. But that approach was no longer helpful.

Having a challenging child forced me to face the parts of myself that I was most fearful of. I am not comfortable with messiness, neither physical nor emotional. I am not comfortable with people being displeased in me. However, unschooling a PDAer with Non-24 is very, very messy indeed and most people do not understand the full breadth of what I deal with and therefore question my choices. Why was I so fearful of feeling this discomfort? Because having automatic negative thoughts makes me feel out of control. And feeling out of control of my internal experience is the scariest feeling of all. (As I write this, I wonder, not for the first time... am I an internalizing PDAer?! I certainly do have an anxiety-based need to be in control... But I digress.)

So here I am, 37.5 years into my life, never having let myself sit with discomfort. Never even letting myself acknowledge discomfort, until trauma completely overwhelmed me and my mental ill health left me no other choice but to face it. For years I repressed any feelings that didn't fit the narrative of the "good girl" or the "good mother" I was supposed to be, but eventually those feelings were too loud to ignore.

My trauma from parental PTSD has resulted in a nervous system with a razor thin window of tolerance. There is nowhere for discomfort to hide. It bubbles over whether I want it to or not. I snap at my husband and yell at my children and then feel shame and guilt that I felt that way and lost control.

I can't make it through a full day of parenting without feeling anxious. Panic can overtake me at the slightest trigger and it sends me reeling; just the other day, B dropped a wooden cutting board on the kitchen floor and it made me scream so loud E came running from his room to see what was wrong.

I know these are all indicators that I still need to take better care of myself. That I still have healing to do. That my nervous system still needs to rest and recover. I have PTSD from parenting, yet I still have to parent every.single.day. Will I ever get back to feeling the way I did before the trauma? I don't think so. Complex PTSD has changed who I am. Living through the trauma of E's burnout years affected me so deeply that my nervous system will never be the same. But perhaps that's actually a good thing.

Early on in our journey together, my new therapist noted that she thought I had a lot of anger, and perhaps that was a stumbling block for me. I was doing everything "right" to heal from my trauma (oh the perfectionist in me never fades), but I knew there was more work to be done. So, in her wisdom, she invited me to join her at a park on the outskirts of town for one of our sessions. It's a park that backs on to cotton fields and it's a perfect place to scream your heart out to the empty fields in a safe and healthy way. Never having done anything of that sort in my life, I thought... why not? So, I went with her to release my rage at the cotton fields. I didn't know what to expect. Well, I screamed for 30 minutes. My voice was hoarse by the end. A lifetime of rage was released. I didn't even need her to go first (apparently most clients she takes there don't feel comfortable letting it all go until seeing and hearing her in that vulnerable state - well, I was ready!).

That release was just the beginning. In the months since, I have thought more and more about that part of myself that I didn't give space to for over three decades. It's still uncomfortable to meet my negative thoughts without shame, but I'm practicing. In order to be a whole human being, I have to welcome every part of me. There's no shame or guilt needed when negative thoughts arise because all feelings are valid. I have agency in how I choose to act on those feelings, to be certain, and it's not ok to hurt others with your actions, but the feelings themselves are natural and unstoppable. It's taken me years to come to this realization.

So I'll end this post with lines sung by Aaron Burr, sir, in the song Wait for It from Hamilton. (The show is coming to our city in July and the music is ever present in my mind right now!) All the feelings will come whether I want them to our not, but my actions are the one thing in life I can control (and I won't shoot anyone in a duel, I promise!).