Healing Really *is* my Special Interest

Some notes on processing pain in childhood and beyond

Welcome to Healing is my Special Interest, the newsletter at the intersection of late-diagnosed neurodivergence and healing from high control environments. Today’s post is behind a paywall, as are most of my most personal essays. For today, if you would like to hear more about my childhood and how I am making sense of it, you can listen to my story on any audio platform at the STRONGWILLED podcast. Or you can listen / read the transcript (complete with images) here.  If you are unable to afford a subscription but would like to be a part of this incredible community, please email me at dlmmcsweeneys @ gmail. com. If you are able to support this project, thank you from the bottom of my heart!

Photo by Sean Sinclair on Unsplash

My husband was in our office, sitting in a large egg shaped chair while listening to a record. Surrounded by comfy cushions, light streaming in through the window, plants and books and crafting supplies scattered around him, he looked so happy. I crept into the room, a chocolate mint brownie in my hand. I wanted to be near my husband, hear his heartbeat and smell his particular scent right around his collarbone. It has always been instantly comforting to me, the way he folds his arms around me whenever I am near, hugging me, touching me, reminding me that I am not just a disembodied brain roaming the earth. I am a human. I am made of flesh and bone. I have my own smells and tastes and comforts. I am alive, he reminds me, just by being near me. 

I scootch myself into his chair, and he doesn’t mind. I stare out the window and eat my brownie. I listen to music—something from the 70s—wash over me. Am I living in a movie right now? There is the strangest sensation in my chest. A tingling, burning. A warmth, washing over me like sunshine coming from inside of me. I am happy. I am so happy I start crying. I hope my husband doesn’t notice the tears sliding down my cheeks. This isn’t a movie, this is my actual life. A house, filled to the brim with things I like and that bring me comfort. A partner who loves me just as I am. A chocolate mint brownie I don’t have to share with anyone. The sunlight streaming in and reminding me that the earth keeps spinning and shining year after year. I am so happy, so grateful, so present, that it feels almost painful.

By the time my husband notices the tears and wipes them from my cheeks, the tears have turned to sobs. I am crying because I am surprised at how good it feels to be happy. I am crying because it is such a foreign feeling to me. I am crying because I am only just now realizing how deeply sad I have been my entire life¹. 

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The title of this newsletter is Healing is My Special Interest, and this still remains true for me. I am captivated by the concept of healing from trauma. For many years I worked in spaces where I was surrounded by traumatized people — refugees, mostly — and then for the past 8 years I have become interested in religious trauma. But it has been only the past few years where I have been able to start to dip into my own childhood, and to reckon with what happened to me when I was small, defenseless, isolated, and powerless. When I was vulnerable and had to choose survival strategies that worked for many years until quite suddenly they didn’t. 

I have crossed a river that so many people never will: I have decided to spend some time with my younger selves and listen closely as they tell me about what it was like to be them.