If you were taught ...

If you were taught to abandon yourself for connection, it's almost guaranteed that guilt will who up the moment you choose yourself. 

Guilt isn't a sign you are doing something wrong. It's a nervous system signal that you've stepped outside a survival pattern that once kept you safe. 

 

Complex Trauma taught you to stay small to keep others close. You shaped yourself around other people's needs to stay safe and connected. 

 

In somatic terms, your nervous system paired connection with self-abandonment. It was taught: if I disconnect from myself, I stay connected to others. That feels safer than being alone. 

 

Now, when you set a boundary, express a need, or say "no", your body interprets it as a threat to your survival with cues like guilt, shame, fear, freeze, or collapse. 

This doesn't mean you're not ready to choose yourself. It means your body is doing what it knows. And now, it's learning something new. 

The presence of guilt doesn't mean go back to self-abandonment. But it means go slow. Support your body and let it learn that choosing yourself isn't dangerous anymore. 

This is how self-trust is built: Not by feeling good every time you choose yourself. But by learning to stay with your body and choose yourself even when guilt shows up.

 

@the.trauma.educator

 ere are a few pictures from our time: