Another feeling-healing example:
I became aware I was feeling bad
Late yesterday afternoon I suddenly felt it. My throat was sore. Swallowing hurt. Gee, it came on fast!
I accept, honour and describe my bad feelings – I tell Marion about them.
‘Suddenly I’ve got a sore throat. It hurts right across the back of my throat, from ear to ear. It reminds me when I had my tonsils out, but it’s nowhere near as sore yet. I feel like I’m coming down with a cold. My head feels light, yeah, I even feel a bit sick.’
I express how feeling bad makes me feel.
‘I don’t want to get sick. I feel scared. I hate getting sick. I don’t want to get all coldy: coughing, runny nose, all blocked up.’
‘What’s the worst part you fear?’
‘It’s if I get really sick and I have to go to the doctor. I don’t want to go to doctor. But what if I have the flu, the Swine flu, and what if it makes me really sick? I don’t want to get really sick. I don’t mind a bit of a cold, but not the flu.’
‘Why don’t you want the flu, what’s so bad about it?’
‘I hated having to go to the doctor to get the injections. Whenever we got sick mum took us to the doctor. I hated sitting in his waiting room, the horrible smells, the old leather chairs all placed so far apart. Other people there, and everyone so quite. The mother’s all telling their children to shush. It was always so scary, waiting to be called. And then it was always another injection. “Yes, well we better give him an injection just in case it is the flu”. And at other times, “He better have a tetanus injection, he hasn’t had one for some time, and you just never know what might happen with summer coming up”. Always bloody injections – god I hated them, they always hurt so much.
‘One thing I did like about being sick however, was hearing those magical words… “I don’t think you’d better go to school today, keep him home for a week and then we’ll see how he is”. At least that was some compensation for having to go to the doctor, he was always on the side of allowing me to stay at home, but I still hated going to see him.’
‘What other bad feelings do you feel?’
I long for the truth of why I’m feeling sick. Expressing my feelings takes me into it.
‘I hate feeling so powerless being sick. Just having to lie around in bed, doing nothing, waiting to get better. Yes, it was always that this thing was making me sick and I couldn’t do anything until it – the bad thing – went away. So I’d take the pills or do whatever, but at least now I know I can speak about how bad I feel and look for the truth of it, that makes me feel not so bad, not so useless…
‘… Now a new bad feeling is coming up… yes, it’s anger… yes, now I feel really angry. And I feel angry with them, with mum and dad, with all the bullshit I had to put up with from them. It was how they treated me that made me sick. I can feel that now. I am so angry with them. They made me sick, they fucked me up so I had to get sick. It’s as if some part of me was even trying to get sick to stop them interfering with me, to make them see what they were doing to me. Gee it’s so clear, I would have never known that, but I can see it. They made me sick, then they fussed over me as if they were the nice and caring ones: “would you like me to bring you back something from work, are you comfortable, do you need another pillow, are you warm enough, how about I buy some fresh oranges, they’ll help you, what about a nice book to read over the week?” It was all such crap, they didn’t really care. If anything they were probably happy that I was out of the way – I wasn’t any trouble for a week. I’m so angry, I can feel it within me, it’s my bloody anger, the fact that I wasn’t allowed to express it that is making me sick. I’m all blocked up with it. I feel so cramped in my chest, like I want to hunch over, and I also feel like I want to break my chest open, expand it somehow, blow out all my anger, and blow it out all over them. I want to rip myself apart, rip it out of me. I want to smash them up with it. Give it all back to them. They can be fucking sick, they can have it all, they can leave me alone. I am furious at how they treated me. It was all such shit.’
More repressed anger, that’s what’s making me sick. How much of it do I have within me? There’s an endless supply. When’s it all going to come out? I don’t want to be sick… I hate being sick… I don’t want to get a cold… I don’t want to feel bad!
Some time later, just before bed.
‘Fuck it, you know, I can’t be bothered trying to fight it. And what am I trying to stand up to it for anyway? I can’t be bothered fighting with them, it never got me anywhere, they always won. So I’m giving in. Now I feel to give up, just let it come. Yes, if I am to be sick, so be it. Bring it on, just do me in, kill me, I don’t care anymore. I’m not going to resist it, it can overwhelm me. And so what, what will happen, just more bad feelings. I already feel so bad, what’s more bad feelings going to do to me? And I can speak about them to you. I feel bad. I feel sick. My throat hurts, it’s soarer down the back of it now when I swallow. And my nose is getting runny. And I don’t care. They can yell at me, they can make me do whatever they want, and I give up trying not to do what they say. I hope I do die, it would be much better than always being angry and trying to make them stop. I will just let myself be as miserable as I feel. I feel miserable anyway, so I’ll feel worse – so what! I hate them. I hate my relationship with them, it just always makes me feel bad. You know, I still can’t believe that I loved them, that I thought we all had a nice time together, when now all I feel – the truth – is that they make me feel bad. It’s a wonder that I wasn’t sick more often. I nearly died that time when I was around six, but that was all, other than bad colds. I wish I had died back then.’
Having said all that to Marion, now I feel my cold moving more into my chest. But I feel okay about it. I no longer feel angry, and in fact I actually like feeling a little bit sick. It makes me feel like I’m changing, like yuk in me is breaking down and coming out. I want to change, and it feels like a good cold, firing up my system, will help me. I’ve seen so much about myself of late that I don’t like, and I want it all to go, so perhaps this will help it. I’m looking forward to speaking about the next good or bad feeling my cold makes me feel…
