Taking care of everybody?

Hey there ,

I treated myself horribly for years.

Many dangerous situations behind my addictive behaviors, poor physical self-care, and conflict-filled relationships—and trying to please everyone at the same time.

It never occurred to me that I was slowly killing myself.

So many wake-up calls that I didn’t answer.
Health issues.
Legal troubles.
Burned bridges.
And still—I kept going.

It took the loss of a child…
and the end of a marriage
for me to finally stop and say:

What the hell am I doing?

That’s when I learned something simple, and heartbreaking:
No one else is going to take care of me.

Not really.
Not in the way I actually need.
That’s my job.
And for most of my life, I didn’t know how.

Why we treat ourselves so badly

Most of us were trained, in some way, not to care for ourselves.
We were told—directly or indirectly—that our needs weren’t important.

If our caregivers were overwhelmed, we learned not to be a burden.
If our caregivers were emotionally volatile, we learned to stay small, quiet, pleasing.

Some of us learned to be tough.
Some learned to be nice.
But almost all of us learned that who we were was not acceptable—so we left ourselves behind.

We internalized our caregivers’ pain.
And their shame.
And their self-abandonment.

They may have been doing the best they could.
But the damage was done.

The result?
We learned to abandon ourselves, too.

The lie that says you must fix everyone else

Those of us who are the most exhausted often have the same unconscious program running:

But here’s the truth:

It’s not heroic.
It’s not noble.
It’s codependency.

And it’s not helping.

In fact, our obsessive fixing of others is called enabling—and it blocks the growth of the people we care about most.

We say we’re doing it out of love.
But the truth is, it’s usually about control.
It’s about anxiety.
It’s about avoiding our own pain.

The real work isn’t out there—it’s in here.
Inside your own body.
That’s where the shame lives. That’s where the trauma got stored.

The trauma lives in your body.

You can’t talk your way out of trauma.
You can’t positive-think your way out of shame.
You can’t journal your way to self-worth.

Those are helpful tools.
But they’re not enough.

Because trauma is not just a memory.
It’s a pattern of dysregulation.
A nervous system that learned to brace, fawn, freeze, collapse.

This is why treating yourself well is not about an occasional spa day or inspirational quotes.

It’s about learning to feel again.
To listen to your body.
To rest when you're tired.
To say no when you're overwhelmed.
To stop betraying yourself in the name of being “good.”

Self-care is not selfish. It’s sacred.

“Self-care is never a selfish act…”
Parker Palmer said it.
And he’s right.

Self-care is the opposite of selfishness.
It’s the foundation of everything good we offer the world.

If you want to show up for others…
If you want to make an impact…
If you want to love well…

You have to start by loving you.

And not in a cheesy, Instagram-quote kind of way.

I’m talking about the messy, daily commitment to actually meet your needs.
To eat when you’re hungry.
To stop when you’re full.
To let yourself cry.
To ask for help.
To stop pretending you’re fine.

This is the real work.
And it’s not glamorous.
It’s vulnerable.
And slow.
And profoundly healing.

You can’t skip the grief

Most of us avoid taking care of ourselves because of one thing:
Grief.

When we stop running, all the old pain comes up.
The losses.
The unmet needs.
The child inside us who tried so hard to be perfect.

It’s too much to face all at once.

So we keep performing.
Fixing.
Pleasing.
Disappearing.

But eventually, the body says no.
We crash.
Burn out.
Break down.

And if we’re lucky, we listen.

When the grief comes, let it.
It will feel like death.
But, with support, it’s the beginning of a new way of life.

This is your one precious life

No one else is going to hand you a permission slip.

There’s no applause for taking a nap.
No gold star for saying no.
No parade for stopping to feel your pain.

But this is it.
This one life.
This one body.

You either begin to treat yourself well—or you stay caught in a destructive pattern that repeats.

It doesn’t matter what your past looks like.
You can start today.
Right now.

Ask yourself:

• What do I need?

• What do I feel?

• What’s one small thing I can do to care for myself?

Then do it.

Because the truth is:

You’re worth taking care of.

And when you begin to live like that’s true—
everything changes.

I'd love to hear your thoughts on this. Just hit reply.

Take care of yourself,

Bob

PS. I’ve created a free course that will help you with this. Click here: Emotional Integrity 101.

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