I remember when I was a kid that terrible feeling when I’d hear the front door unlocking. It meant my mom was arriving home, and that meant trouble. My stomach lurched and I got all “tight.” I didn’t recognize the dynamic at the time, but it affected me. Only many years later could I NAME what was happening. Naming it was the key to recovery.

My mom was a fearsome woman. She was a single mom, working and raising two kids. As an adult I can recognize the stress she felt, and how that may have affected her moods. But at the time, she was just scary. She’d come home slightly angry, focused on making sure chores were getting done. My brother and I were under immediate scrutiny, and we’d probably done something wrong. Even if we hadn’t done anything wrong, still something was wrong.

Her energy in the house had me feeling uneasy and slightly queasy. There was a tightness in my chest. Before I could name it, I just experienced it as “I’m doing something wrong,” “I better not mess up, or a vague sense that “there’s something wrong with me.” The energy in the house had me feeling bad about myself.

But naming it changes that. Now I can name the feeling as what it was: fear. Now I can name the fear: fear of my mother’s anger and wrath. Now I can see that there was nothing “wrong” with me – I was just a kid!

One of the most consistent actions I do as a therapist is to help clients name their experiences. Naming helps create a buffer between client and their experiences. There’s nothing wrong with you; there’s just what happened to you. Let’s call it what it was/is. Naming lets you know that you’re not a freak, you’re not alone. You’re human, you’ve experienced things, and those things have affected you.

If you’d like to explore learning to name your experiences, both past and present, hit me up!