Perfectionism as a Conditioned Trauma Response: My Journey Toward Integration.
By Brooke Jean, MA, LPC
2012 was a massive, game-changing, kick-you-in-the-ass year for me.
At the height of my corporate career while raising a son for the past ten years, my work community was hit with a massive collective trauma. Half of my team was in the movie theatre seeing Batman the horrific night of the Aurora Theatre shooting. What unfolded next was nothing short of true terror. We shockingly and devastatingly lost a team member that night.
That same year, I married the man who I had met and began dating eight years prior. The solid, loving, loyal and stable mid west boy who showed up in our store in Longmont, CO transferring from Wisconsin. We worked together and while I wasn’t ready for a serious thing he waited patiently and ultimately broke through my thick walls. We waited eight years to get married because, well, to be frank after being royally fucked by the last man, the father of my child, I was hesitant. I needed to make sure he was good for my son and I. And friends, he sure was and is.
We got married and headed to Maui for a ten night beach-front stay. This was the first time in a decade I had actually relaxed. I had my son in college and had been climbing the corporate ladder, trying to build a future for my son and I.
I was endlessly busy, but here is where my nervous system regulated just enough for my psyche to reveal to me what I had been suppressing since I was a child.
In came a flooding of memories from my childhood that were disturbing. Traumatic. In came the surge of anxiety as I had my first panic attack thinking I was suffocating from over-eating quietly in bed as I didn’t want to disturb my partner. In came the body sensations I had pushed down for decades. Even though I could compartmentalize, shove shit down in layman’s terms and enjoy many parts of the honeymoon, it was on this trip that I knew it was time for a major life overhaul.
this is how i discovered that often the most brutally intense experiences open us up for the most bad ass transformation.
The trauma of the community crisis, although completely unrelated, triggered my childhood trauma. Thats how grief and trauma work.
I did a scary thing and left my stable corporate career to start my healing journey, knowing there simply wasn’t enough space for the big job with lots of pressure AND the personal development work I was going to do.
Once I started doing the healing work, I learned that the perfectionism, the constant strive for more, for better, for high achievement was actually a conditioned trauma response.
One that gave me an illusion of control. That hid my wounds keeping me distracted by titles, bonuses, big responsibilities and big material rewards. Dopamine hits all day long. Anyone who works in corporate America can probably relate to those high high’s and low low’s. I wore this badge of honor proudly with a “look at how good I am” smirk.
Taking that armor off, I met my inner younger version of myself who was pissed off.
Boy oh boy did she have some rage to express and here’s why. One of my deepest wounds was that no one protected me as a child from the circumstances that led to the traumas. And this is not about blaming parents, thats not healing or purposeful. This is what generational trauma looks like.
We don’t know what we don’t know, we do the best we can and we can never fully protect our kids from harm or from being kids. This IS to acknowledge that my inner child did not feel protected or validated in her big feelings.
And here I was as a young adult re-enacting this reality. Not protecting myself by way of an eating disorder, tolerating bullshit men and their bullshit treatment, one of which I had a child with who cheated on me the whole time. Drinking, drugging, and putting myself in reckless situations to be hurt or hurt someone else.
That rage was my inner younger self screaming from the rooftops “You are supposed to be my protector now and you are not protecting me, wtf are you doing”? I understand now why I was so angry. Why all the outbursts.
It took me too long to hear her. Why? Because I was busy doing, perfecting, performing, producing. Chasing safety and control in achievements. Running away from myself because somehow I knew deep down it was too scary a place. This is how perfectionism made me sick - it covered up what needed tending to and perpetuated the incessant experience of not enough-ness.
The healing has been a discovery back to my most authentic self and all my parts. It’s been a shedding of layers I built out of protection or seeking approval.
An exploration of self, what lights me up what doesn’t and what I am passionate about. It’s been about asking myself hard questions and being brave enough to listen to the answers.
And now here I am, on the journey still but living a completely different life. One where I show up for myself and protect myself in all the ways I didn’t before. Following my bliss, I went back to school got my masters in counseling psychology and launched a private practice seven years ago that has grown and is thriving. I grew my family, bringing my precious daughter into the world five years ago. I allow myself to dream big, as I have an unwavering belief in myself and my abilities now, honing my gifts.
You see, all this yuck. The trauma. The broken parts and missing pieces. My shadow. My pissed off younger parts. The journey itself. It all adds up and helps me know what the fuck I am made of.
She’s a bad mama mama folks and this is what organically propels me forward. To be who I authentically am. To live in alignment with my soul’s deepest desires. To work and live in a way thats rich and meaningful to me. To accept myself and be more than okay always being a work in progress as not all parts of my lived experience are where I want them to be.
It’s all part of my story and is preparing me for this very moment which I can now be present for because I am no longer buried under the pressure of who I thought I was supposed to be. Buried under my hurts trying to out perform the pain and for that I am so deeply grateful.
i am at peace knowing i am making my inner younger self feel safe and proud.
Honoring her, giving her a special seat at my life’s table and checking in with her often. Valuing her and knowing her big feelings are actually my superpowers.
Lately I have been sober curious and taking breaks from alcohol as this was a major culprit in my self-harm, self-sabotage and not protecting myself. I am sixty days AF today and in my journal was reflecting on how emotionally stunted I was and in some ways still am. I am just now learning to regulate myself and to express my emotions.
I finally have true self-respect as I used to have a swiss-cheesy foundation of self-worth where the holes were the parts and pieces I left behind in each trauma. I’ve gone back and patched those holes up to build a steady foundation. Pulling all the pieces of me back into Self to be more whole. Especially the parts that were absolutely fucking reckless just trying to survive. She did the best she could to hold it all down but it was just too much. I was slowly burying her but I’ve pulled her up from under the water, given her a towel, warmed her up, looked her deep in her eyes, thanking her, assuring her I can take it from here.
***This is what my journey of integration looks like***
What might perfectionism; the over-doing, over-achieving, over-controlling be covering up for you? What kick in the ass are you experiencing from the Universe thats trying to get on a different path? What parts of you can you face, meet with grace and compassion and allow in?
