There’s something I’ve realized lately, in how I treat my younger self with disdain. Today I text my mom and asked her if she could send me some pictures of myself as a kid at different ages. I almost cannot remember what I looked like then. When I think about it, I know I’ve actively tried to forget because that me felt so unloved, so alone and left wanting for affection and relationship that I think I believed I must not be worthy of love. As I grew, I did everything to earn it. I tried to be thinner, prettier, smarter, funnier, harder working, a good student, a good employee, a better friend, a better partner. Everything I’ve become has been to shame her and further distance myself from her. I kind of want to know what will happen if I start blessing her. If I start loving her.
In The Place We Find Ourselves, a podcast where people tell stories about their life as means of healing in the company of safe listeners; there was recently a guest who talked about how she joined her abusers in contempt for herself. I feel like, in a lot of ways, I abandoned my inner child – just like everyone else did. And while there were a few times I went back and revisited my childhood, I’m not sure I let my younger self experience the presence of Jesus or if I stole the attention from her.
On the way to school today, my daughter said to me that she doesn’t know what I look like as a kid but she imagines that I had a small body and a big head because I’m so smart and probably big black glasses. She said it like that version of me would be perfectly lovable. As if she wanted to be friends with the me of her age.
If she can love her and she’s never met her, why can’t I?
About the Author: Amber Rockey
