Boundaries

When you look back at the traumas you have suffered in your lifetime- pretty much everyone’s at some point involves having your boundaries crossed in some way. If you’ve been verbally, physically or emotionally abused, disrespected, or neglected at any point these are all ways that your boundaries have been transgressed. But there are other slightly less obvious ways that your boundaries may have been damaged that we tend to not see in ourselves.

For instance, if the love of a caregiver hasn’t been reciprocated at a young age - a loss of connection is actually a way of damaging your boundaries also. That connection is a reflection of you and helps you establish yourself and where you exist in the world.

Being seen, properly seen as an individual or not can also affect your boundaries and sense of self. It’s one of the reasons I had a strong gut feeling to never dress my identical twin boys the same and never ever refer to them in the collective term in front of them.

And another example is also being really seen by your friends early in life. Being celebrated on your birthday - being supported by your peers for existing. When this doesn’t happen again we suffer the effects from a lack of love.

When we talk about trauma we often talk about it in terms of what was done to us, what transgression occurred that crossed our boundaries. But a lack of support and a lack of love can register just as deeply in the body as a violent physical transgression and so needs to be seen also in terms of something that affects your boundaries, but perhaps one where the damage originates internally rather than externally.

Image courtesy jromethehuman.