I am first

I’m a rebooted old computer. It had been shut down, the viruses were cleared and now it is restarted and ready to work.

It’s stopping time to time, going very slow, opening too many pages and can’t seem to concentrate on the tasks.

It needs to have a really good programme installed about organisation. It needs to learn to classify its tasks and duties and it needs to learn something crucial to its survival: to prioritise its own needs.

Very simply to put itself first.

This programme is brand new for this computer. It had been programmed to serve others, that is the key to acceptance. If it’s useful enough for others, they will like it and deem it worthy to keep.

That’s not how life can be organised. 

It is really not sustainable.

It’s not only my energy that will run out and never fill up, but I can’t even get things done. I don’t know what to do and when to do it, if I’m just constantly running after other’s requirements.

In fact that’s how my life has been so far.

Running after just the next line on the list to tick it. And I was lucky if anything about myself even made it to the list. 

What I actually need to do is to learn how to prioritise my needs. I need to make a list just about myself, and only after that can come the rest of the world. I’m not just my mind and body that can carry out tasks. My soul, that I had freed for years of tiresome work, needs her right to attention. She needs time alone to think, to contemplate, to write.

Being reseted and eliminated the virus that blocked the “soul” programme, now the working soul feature needs its rightful amount of care, attention and supply.

Heart detto.

It is a big confusion right now. I’m still learning to prioritise my heart and soul and sometimes an overload of outside stimuli can be stressful. I can be lost or shaken from sensory overload.

What I need to stick to is myself. My soul. My own needs. 

One of the first of it is time to express my soul, to write. Every day, even weekends at least for an hour. If I do this, I can be there for others and won’t feel exhausted or used. If I don’t, I will feel as if I’m only there as a slave - because my soul is not working, only my body.

The reason I have always run after others’ requirements, apart from the wish to be accepted (and trading my authenticity for acceptance), was that I didn’t know I should prioritise myself. Putting ourselves first was not only “not taught” as I grew up, it was straight away considered something wrong - selfish. Then every code of conduct I had learnt on the way had its own set of rights and duties, with special attention to personal duties, as that can be enforced. My rights - even though that was what made me accept the whole system, that finally my rights are mentioned - were not enforced to be met. Everyone looked away, as if nothing had happened when I was deprived of all my life.

What I was always working on was peace with others and inside me. But I did it in a way that I explained everyone’s rights and reasons, and made myself understand them, neglecting the actual valid reasons for my frustrations. I actually treated my own feelings, intuitions, and reactions as negotiable, not as indicators of something where I should slow down. This way I neglected myself as I have been used to being treated. 

In reality I can be considerate with others and understand the situation without gaslighting myself into believing that I don’t even feel what I feel. But first I need to take myself into consideration.

I took two big steps.

One was that I cancelled a trip. Back in the summer or the beginning of autumn I planned a trip. It seemed so far away, having just started chemo December seemed extremely far, and I haven’t actually counted how long it would be after the last treatment. But now I realised I could not make a plane trip yet. Not now, not in 3 weeks, when I will have only 4 weeks after chemo, while in these 3 weeks I won’t relax at all. So I cancelled it. It was sad, as I never want to disappoint anyone, especially not those who have not many people to count on. But there’s no other possibility. Going now is simply not an option as I don’t feel strong enough right now. I can fully want to be with others, I can understand what would be “the right thing”, but my health and my energy are not something to be discussed. I’m not going very simply because I cannot go. My wellbeing is not negotiable, and by the way I don’t think anyone would want me to do that if they knew how I really am. But it’s only me who truly is able to feel how I feel. I should therefore listen to myself. 

The other thing was after a tiring weekend alone with the kids I felt exhausted, physically and emotionally drained, and totally confused. And then, for the first time in my life, instead of explaining my frustration away by telling myself how teenage brain works and other important and true facts, I simply allowed myself to feel tired and exhausted. The fact that I understand that my son is not intentionally draining my energy doesn’t mean my energies are not drained. I can understand him all the while I understand myself as well. 

I can wish to be there for others and still consider my health important. I can understand others and still accept my emotions. Prioritising others doesn’t mean I have to leave myself behind and that I don’t have the right to have human reactions. 

I just sat with myself. Yes, I want to visit these beautiful creatures, but now I can’t. And I don’t have to feel bad about it, of course I can miss them and wish I was able to do it, but I don’t have to feel guilty. Going through chemotherapy and not recovering immediately is not a choice I made, it’s how my body is slowly recovering after a major life-saving operation and the third chemo session in my life, with reaction 3 times. So I can accept it and don’t have to beat myself up for “letting others down” because that’s not what happened. I’m focusing on myself, on my healing for myself and for everyone I want to be there for one day that I’ll be able to. But now it’s time to slow down.

And I can understand why my children want something all the time and not have any kind of energy for it. Not physical, not emotional. 

I really felt ashamed as I shouted and felt like a neurodivergent. It was evening, they wanted different foods, the little one was running up and down, the big one was asking something else, and I felt like SRK as the cable car was approaching in San Francisco “Yellow, yellow, dirty fellow”. Then my elder one said, why I didn’t ask for help. And it didn’t even come to my mind, because of the sensory overload. I was just in the “I have to do it, have to complete the tasks, have to serve others” operational mode. My self care methods were shut down, and when I lost control, I felt guilty. And then I said to myself, it’s alright. I love my children. I want to give them everything. And sometimes I cannot. Cooking all day is tiring. I can do everything slowly, or sometimes I can’t do it. I can do it while feeling exhausted and after I sit down and write my things, as my best method of self care. And I still love them even if I don’t love standing in the kitchen the whole day.

These are my first little steps of defining myself in this thing called life. It’s new for me. It’s difficult. Sometimes I’m not good at it. But I have started my journey of self acceptance. And I’m not going to give up on myself.