“It doesn’t help when little girls are pushed too far and too damned fast. They grow up to be the woman dancing in a cage, and learning too late that acquiescing turns to rage.” – Paula Cole
When I was 7 years old, I was playing outside of my best friend’s, Karen, home.
She, an athletic tomboy. Me, a socially awkward bookworm.
Karen was climbing a tree as I stood below. And then she got stuck.
Seriously stuck in the tree. Her foot caught in between two large branches as she held on with her arms from the limb above.
I didn’t know what to do or how to help. Karen panicked and started screaming, “Help, help!!! Go get my mom, go get my mom!”
I ran inside her house into the family room. Looked up the 4 stair 70s-style split level home to the kitchen to see her mother making dinner. And I froze. I couldn’t speak. I was so afraid of asking for help, of speaking up, that I couldn’t say a word.
I immediately ran back outside and frantically told Karen, “Yell louder. Just yell louder!!!.”
This was my solution to not being able to ask for what I needed, even when someone else was in danger.
Fast forward 15 years. I was 22 years old. A newly licensed Occupational Therapist working in a large academic teaching hospital in acute care (where people go when they’re really sick).
I was afraid to press the nurse’s call button in my patient’s room when I or the patient needed help.
I thought to myself, if I don’t get this fear under control, I am seriously going to inadvertently kill someone.
So I started to do things that scared me…the most terrifying thing of all? Asking for what I wanted. Asking for what I needed.
These two scenarios are extreme examples of minimizing my needs. Not only was I afraid to speak up when someone else needed me to, but I was terrified of saying anything that would rock the boat, potentially upset another person, or make me feel like I was a burden in any way.
I spent the first 30 years of my life protecting myself from ever feeling like I caused someone discomfort…protecting myself from feeling like a burden….protecting myself by constantly and consistently acquiescing to what other people wanted, needed, and expected from me.
I was the master of acquiescing. Even though I appeared opinionated and strong to the outside world, I was the master of minimizing my needs.
I compensated my fear by doing things perfectly, over-achieving, and being socially adaptable.
No one would ever have to know that I was really terrified of having needs, much less asking for help, saying no, or standing up for myself. That would have been too scary. Too uncomfortable. Unbearable to live with….so here, let me take on that project….let me accommodate your neurosis and anxieties….let me make sure you always feel OK, even if it is at my expense.
Do you see how operating like this lent me into an overextended, chronic stress crisis? I took on responsibility for everyone and everything so I didn’t have to experience my own terror of asking for what I needed.
Although some of my examples may be extreme, I am far from alone in this experience.
Women everywhere have grown up as “the good girl,” making sure to not make waves in their relationships with family, friends, co-workers, bosses, partners, and even their offspring.
But all of this has a cost, and if you haven’t experienced it yet, it’s coming.
Acquiescing turns to rage. To resentment. To a wall around your heart so hard you’re impenetrable. And in turn, you feel disconnected and exhausted. Or even worse, you may feel nothing. Numb. Tuned out because it hurts too much to tune in.
Woman, this is no way to live. This is no way to stay safe. This is no way to be true to yourself or true with others.
Letting go of minimizing your needs doesn’t happen by an affirmation or a proclamation of worthiness. Letting go of minimizing your needs doesn’t happen from believing your needs matter as much as another person’s, either.
Sorry to disappoint, but I speak from experience when I say letting go of minimizing your needs comes from having the heart to accept and embrace the most wounded part of yourself with tenderness and compassion, instead of pushing her away.
Acknowledge the pain and vulnerability the little girl felt from covering up abuse, from taking care of adults who couldn’t or wouldn’t take care of themselves, from trying to keep her parent’s happy, from being scolded by not being perfect, or from being shamed by expressing her fear, anger, sadness, or a necessary no.
You can push yourself away from the fear of speaking up for a long time, but you can’t push it away forever.
You have to take 100% responsibility for yourself to speak up. Then sit with the discomfort of speaking your truth and saying what you need, even when it feels terrible.
Your fear, your guilt, your anger, your desires, your needs, and your uneasiness are all part of your wholeness, not separate from it.
Herein lies your liberation.
Go inside the deepest cave of your heart, and love what’s hurting. Love what’s missing. Love what may never be fully healed. And let yourself cry and get angry for all the years of self-sacrifice at your own expense. It’s long overdue, and the temporary discomfort of sitting with this deep understanding won’t last forever…of this, I am sure.
Once you are broken open, you have a gentle strength toward yourself that can contain anyone’s reaction to you without ever having to minimize who you are, what you want, or what you need ever again.
May you stop looking outside to please other people at your own expense, and look within yourself to welcome a tender heart that is dying to be set free.
No More Protecting. No More Defending.
Peace Now,
Angela
