Dear Toxic Shame:
I'm sorry, but we're through. It's not you; it's me.
Sincerely,
An Old Friend
A year ago, I wrote a post about the shame I felt over my cat scratching furniture that didn't belong to me. I was unaware of the significant damage until someone brought it to my attention.
After this initial communication, I did what any good girl trained by the nuns would do: I apologized and accepted responsibility.
Several times.
To three different people.
I received no response.
I, of course, interpreted the silence as an admonishment and a condemnation of my character. In my sometimes-still-dysfunctional-but-getting-better thought process, I went from good girl to bad girl (very, very, very bad girl) overnight.
Toxic shame will skew your perspective.
An old friend offered her opinion: "Pets are unpredictable. Anything can happen."
True.
But nothing ever had before this. My furry companion has traveled everywhere with me for nine years, to friends' homes and hotels, with never a claw out of place.
This time, "anything" did "happen," despite my usual precautions. Which included covering sofas and chairs, and a scratching post in the form of a beat-up Delsey suitcase purchased at Macy's 16 years ago.
But, obviously, it was a miscalculation on my part. I didn't do enough. And with a skewed perspective, that quickly became I'm not enough. (See, I told you. Toxic shame can really screw you up.)
You might be thinking, get over it (I'm with you on that), and you would have a point. But as they say, you're not over it till you're over it. And I'm, umm ... not over it.
Toxic shame has me in its grip. My error in judgment is still holding me hostage, and my release depends upon one thing: grace. I've been waiting for someone to grant me grace.
And maybe you have been, too.
Did you accidentally burn the meatloaf for that long-awaited, special occasion dinner?
Did you put her size large (now xxx-small) 100% cotton designer T-shirt in the dryer on high?
Did your dog (they mess up, too) chew the bottom of your best friend's brand-new sweater?
You're not bad or stupid or a dummy. As a practical pal told me when I confessed (sheepishly) to buying the wrong size grocery item, "You're human. Humans make mistakes."
Not in households with domestic violence, they don't.
While traveling through Texas on a family vacay, all hell broke loose in the car because my mother couldn't get a map of the U.S. opened fast enough, much less get our location right. Her humanness misread our whereabouts, sending us north instead of south. What followed her error was ... let's just say, Mom, Dad, and I were lucky we weren't kicked out of our motel room that night.
I hate to admit it, but I've lived most of my life afraid of situations like my mother's. (Actually, something did happen once, resulting in me being angrily called a "knucklehead" by a man I was dating. And yes, tears ensued.)
Of course, no one called me or my cat any names. But I sure threw some choice words at myself.
Toxic shame can start at any time, often in childhood, in dysfunctional households where negative self-images are born and bred and supported by the abusive behaviors of family members, in particular, parents.
Grown adults who are berated or violated by abusive or addicted partners also develop a distorted self-image, along with the accompanying shame.
Many of us, weighed down by this toxic ball and chain, love others unconditionally. And we forgive easily, often too easily. We grant grace to partners, friends, and family, even strangers. But for some reason, we don't expect reciprocity. We hope for it, or maybe I should say, we long for it.
We also long to escape the judgments we make against ourselves. I didn't know. I got confused. I didn't see it. We explain the circumstances of our mistakes, flubs, and innocent blunders to ourselves over and over and over again.
And when we're met with silence, as I was, or rage, as my mother was, we slap a big letter "S" on our backs and wait for reassurance, a thumbs up, a simple "It’s OK.”
Unfortunately, we can waste our lives waiting. Unless ... we grant ourselves grace.
I can't remember ever letting myself off the hook for any of the 11,796 (give or take a few thousand) mistakes, accidents, or blunders I've committed during my lifetime.
Maybe I should take a cue from my cat. She granted herself grace immediately following her faux pas. Her thought process? I'm unpredictable. Anything can happen.
Indeed it can.