On making a birthday wishlist as a somatic healing exercise
It’s my birthday eve. Don’t try and tell me that a birthday eve is not a thing, I am a Libra and birthdays are important to me.
My kids get to pick either a party, a special family outing, or a big present for their birthdays, and usually we end up doing more than one, not because they demand it, but because *I* want to celebrate *them* as much as I can.
My birthday brings up some baggage that I haven’t been able to articulate until recently.
As a single mom, I don’t really have anyone to volunteer to set up a celebration FOR me, nor do I have a cohesive group of friends to celebrate WITH, but, mostly that’s been fine.
In recent years I’ve just planned something *I* want to do ON my birthday (traditionally, skip school and cancel all appointments to go to Disneyland) and maybe on an adjacent day someone in my family wants to meet up or something.
However, the years have gone on, it’s been harder and harder to feel birthday-ey, and I couldn’t figure out WHY.
Last year I just… kind of dissociated at my family dinner, and never even spent the $100 my mom gave me to go out for a nice dinner (it’s literally in an envelope with all the other cash I’ve been gifted for the past couple of years). The year before that, I was DEEP in the trenches of what can only be described as an inhumane sequence of traumatic events (and one week from the emergency hearing where I got sole legal custody of my kids).
This year, I am just like… wtf this is some “back when I was trapped in a marriage with an abusive narcissist” levels of un-enthusiasm about my birthday. I mean, about everything, but the birthday thing is the most confusing. Because even at my worst, I STILL FUCKING LOVE BIRTHDAYS, ESPECIALLY MINE.
But then I remembered a video I saw on TikTok about burnout that embedded itself in my brain. It was about how when burnout gets bad enough, you don’t just not have what you want, or not know what you want, you fully lose the ability TO want. That explained a LOT about what I’d been going through, and why the offers of help and advice from others was so frustrating. I didn’t know what I wanted, I couldn’t even imagine having the capacity to want anything beyond basic survival.
It’s been a few years now of “let me know if there’s anything I can do to help!” or “Well you can just do whatever you want to!” and these conversations have just been frustrating all around. To the point where, I just don’t have them anymore. I don’t know what I want because I am so far beyond the ability to allow myself to want and that doesn’t seem to be something that others are willing/able to understand.
Since I haven’t had the energy to even consider what I *want* for my life, I haven’t been able to make the kind of decisions that would help me break out of the patterns that have me circling the drain waiting to die and into a life that I would actually enjoy and be able to share with others.
Obviously I know this is not ideal.
I’m in therapy about it (have been for years), I’ve tried several different medications (they have all made it worse), I’ve gotten deep into crystals and journaling and all that woo woo shit to the point that that was my main source of income for multiple years.
Nothing has really *worked*
But legally I am my kids’ only parent so I don’t have the luxury of giving up.
I HAVE to keep trying things.
Recently, I’ve been getting into *somatic* strategies, which are more activity based and focused on just letting the nervous system and body reconnect in safety without pushing for “results.”
I bought a vibration plate and start EVERY day with intentional, nervous system regulation, showing myself that I can just feel feelings in my physical body and that is a totally safe and neutral thing that does not have to throw my into survival mode.
Yeah, I’m that broken that just EXISTING in my body feels existentially unsafe. I don’t even know how to give myself grace or allow myself to rest or enjoy things when THERES NO ESCAPING BEING IN MY OWN BODY.
But the vibration plate has been helping with that.
It also gives me ten minutes in the morning to just BE, and as I’m learning to feel safe just BEING, my mind wanders and sometimes I think about what other areas of my life I could benefit from feeling safe.
This line of thinking eventually led me to this thought:
“Maybe in order to train my brain and body to feel safe enough to want a better life for my family, goals, dreams, the whole thing… I need to start with small, inconsequential wants. Maybe I need to just play with the idea of allowing myself to WANT little things without needing to justify it or worry about how other people will judge it”
UM. THIS WAS A HUGE REVELATION.
And to have it right before my birthday?
I mean, what are birthdays, if not the one annual excuse to focus solely on WANT and not on survival? The WHOLE POINT is light, frivolous fun.
What if instead of needing to figure out what I want to DO WITH MY LIFE, I started with something MUCH smaller and just got comfortable with allowing myself to identify items I would like to own.
So I gave myself a challenge:
Make a birthday wish list with 36 items on it.
A real, public list, with links out in the open. Not because I’m expecting anyone (and especially not random internet strangers) to buy me birthday presents, but to show myself that it is TOTALLY 100% SAFE AND OK TO WANT THINKS NOBODY IS GOING TO SHAME ME ABOUT IT.
I can not overstate how HARD this was, as a person who has spent YEARS struggling to even think of ONE thing that I want for my birthday/Christmas (even my mom, who is GREAT at gifts and even found something I mentioned liking years ago last Christmas still ended up giving me money because I didn’t *ask for enough things to use up her gift budget*).
· But I’m proud of myself because I got through it.
· Unfortunately, at first, I could only think of practical items with an EXPLANATION.
· A new linen duvet cover, because mine lasted four years before getting too raggedy to use anymore, and I got too spoiled to just replace it with a cheap cotton one.
· Some cat treat puzzles which I guess aren’t really for ME I’m just getting really annoyed with my boy cat being so understimulated after my girl cat went missing.
· Some new pants because I hate all of my pants.
· Some packaging things for my business that I can never remember to buy before it’s an emergency and you know what it would be a gift to not have to worry about that.
· New, plain black sandals because my favorite pair from 2017 is finally wearing out
But EVENTUALLY I started to connect some things in my life that I DO like with items that could be purchased.
· Some more nail polishes that go with the gel nail kit I got for free from the TikTok shop because I love it so much.
· Oh and while we’re doing nails maybe a glass nail file?
· The perfume I tried at Sephora on my last birthday and couldn’t stop thinking about until I went back and figured out which one it was!
And FINALLY, like an hour into this exercise, I started to have some fun and ACTUALLY start thinking in terms of “want” and “for fun” with items like
· Lego sets that are for ME, not my kids
Y’all. I did it. The list has 36 items on it.
I think I healed something big.
I allowed myself to go through the process and look PAST the things I *need* to survive or could *justify* as not a stupid purchase, and allow myself to dream in a little, tiny way that was, in fact, completely safe.
Nothing bad happened because I wanted something.
And in looking for 36 items that I DO want, I was able to recognize plenty of things I DON’T want but maybe feel like I’m SUPPOSED to want, and made sure to not include them on the list.
Maybe this doesn’t seem revolutionary to a normal, not traumatized person, but this is huge for me.
Maybe I won’t have such a hard time this Christmas.
Maybe I WILL be able to figure out what I want to do with my life.
I mean, eventually, clearly I need to work up to that given that finding 36 birthday gift ideas was so difficult…
But it least there are some baby steps in that direction.
(Disclaimer, I did use Amazon to create the registry and all links in this post are affiliate links which earn me a commission on any purchases made after clicking through them. HOWEVER, I am not asking anybody to purchase any items they would not purchase otherwise just for my benefit)