I sat down (literally) and rolled up my sleeves (metaphorically) as soon as it registered we were gonna be talking about shame here. One of my favorite topics (along with grief, trauma, and addiction for this good time Sally here. lol.) The lump in my throat formed almost immediately because every time I get out my shovel, I hit another layer of inexplicable shame. This runs deep for me—deeper than my memory. And I’ve been digging for a while now.
As someone who has lived much her life as though apologizing to most everyone around her (for no good reason until there were endless ones), it never made sense to me. I can tell you a million ways shame has harmed me, but I’ve never considered viewing it as somehow serving me—my punishment as a form of protection. Three little words you wrote really stuck out to me: “I deserve it.” That activated instant ugly cry face for me, so clearly the shovel is striking something solid, yet below that layer exists a deeper knowing that it’s not true, but I just can’t quite seem to get to it.
I asked you once when you knew you’d reached a place where you were ready to write. Like when did you know that enough healing and understanding and insight and hindsight had occurred that you were ready to plant your flag and own your story in a book. And you told me words that I’ll never forget—that we don’t want to hear some tidily packaged story by someone who claims to have figured it all out. We want it real. We want it to touch us, not tell us. So give me the view from the belly of the beast over some field of tulips any day. This is raw truth, and because of that, far more beautiful. Breathtaking, really. ❤️
Just please know that your ability to put words to it is astonishing. It’s massive. My shovel is shaky (you know I’m a shaker, too), but I would have dropped it a long time ago and just settled for many things in this life had it not been for you. 🥹🙏🏻🙏🏻🙏🏻
“It feels like a battle for my life because that’s what it was. As a child, because I could not see my caregivers as bad (because I needed them to be good), I had to see myself as bad instead, because at least that’s something I could control.”
I had to pause after this paragraph and take a few deep breaths! This! I could never find the words - but you did. Thank you, I feel such a weight lifted!
Reading this felt like witnessing emotional open-heart surgery in real time: raw, unflinching, and incredibly generous. Your reflection on shame as a “master tool of protection," a way to make sense of the impossible and control the uncontrollable, brings so much compassion to something that usually just feels like an endless swamp.
I also resonated with what you wrote about outgrowing all the old buffers. It’s such a painful but honest place to arrive at, when it’s just you and the truth, no matter how searing.
The way you describe talking to shame instead of from within it, that simple shift of “Hi shame, I see you," feels like such a humane invitation, a way to reclaim the agency that shame tries to swallow.
I just want to say: yes. This feels true. Uncomfortably, clarifyingly true. Thank you for letting us see you in this vulnerable place, it is a gift.
Can’t wait to hear the podcast episode with Holly, and even more excited for your next book!
Thank you for sharing your deep struggle – which we can all relate to in our unique ways. It’s powerful (and likely an antidote of sorts) to acknowledge shame. I think for me shame is very much intertwined in the parts of my identity that don’t easily fit or blend in with expectations. It’s this feeling that those must be hidden – even if they are strengths. As women in particular, we are punished for the parts of us that stick out and define us - and that we can’t change. Sometimes I feel that if I had a unicorn horn, I’d be told it’s a liability and that I should tear it from my body, even if I would bleed to death without that part of myself. Shame - whether it comes from the actions of others or what we have internalized within ourselves – is designed to annihilate through self-abnegation. When you talk about it burning you down, that really resonates for this reason.
Thanks for your honesty, and for sharing the darkness even on a summery Friday. You have an extraordinary way of dressing feelings in words that capture the full range of being human.
Laura, my entire body is screaming yes to your insights here. I’m sorry you’re going through this, and sorry that so many of us are, and yet I have a very clear awareness that we must. We are fighting our way out of the cage that we built to keep ourselves feeling safe enough, until we could grow up and tear it all down. For some reason I’ve recently been able to digest the CPTSD books I amassed during my first few years of sobriety; previously I couldn’t read a paragraph without buckling into a shame spiral. But with just a little space, a millimeter of distance from that auto-reaction of self-blame, I can now hold the injustice of being parented the way I was. I can remember it. I can admit that I was wronged. Unsafe. Unloved in all the ways I needed to be. Disregarded. Dismissed. That was wrong. But I am here. I can make a different choice. I can love myself better than they showed me how to. Dear gods, I cannot wait to read your book. 💓
The needing one’s parents/caregivers to be good is so formative it scares me. I see this happening with some kids I know - the reframing of parents (bad) behavior to keep them safe and secure. It’s hard to witness. I hold my spouse accountable for stuff like this that he misses “seeing” all the time, and know I’m probably doing things as well that my kid has to wrestle with. It’s a real stress point. I’m probably overdoing it but I can’t help but feel we need to shepard our children in the most thoughtful attuned ways we can, and without one’s own deep work we just pass along all the aspects of our unexamined lives because of pride, fear, trauma or sheer ignorance.
Wow. Wow. Shame and taking the burden for everything - even when it’s not your fault. I can relate to that so deeply. It has made me accept untenable situations. I am still crawling thru stuff at 62. I am just so grateful for my most amazing Thearapist I am now working with. I am grappling with my belief in my Higher Power. She is what I call emergent right now. I loved this post. I can not wait for your next book - your last 2 were brilliant. I love Holly and will go listen to her podcast. You both have been the such influential woman on my path of sobriety and life. Truly. Thank you.
s h a m e. yup. i have a game with myself for this deleterious time sucking human choice. How fast can i name this shame aloud, to myself or to someone whom I've harmed (mostly my man or my kid), and then offer myself empathy. The speed with which I try to make this happen isn't about repressing or hiding the shame, it's about creating a swift, smooth evolution, a melting of the ice of the tension I was feeling.
This little tiny loving race to remind myself of how human i am to have done/said/felt that.
This is the perfect summer topic. 💖 For me, this is the season where all the shit I’ve been avoiding comes up for air bc there’s space to do so.
I was just listening to a Jungian episode on the inner critic (my self hatred burden is a clingy shapeshifter) and toward the end one of the hosts said something that pierced me:
“And what I would say is that when these ancient, primal gods get you in their crosshairs, it takes a god to save you from a god.”*
It was a drop of water that made its way into my deepest crack. 🤍
And like you I am not trying to patch over or fix the cracks—just trying to appreciate the shape they give my life and love on them by any means necessary.
This whole post, Laura, was also water that got inside there. Thank you for that. 💙💙
*From This Jungian Life Podcast: Taming Your Inner Critic: Turn Self-Attack into Self-Awareness, Jun 26, 2025
It’s roundabout IMHO but if you hang on until the end when Joseph speaks then it will be worth it. 🫶
On another note I am reading Hello Beautiful for the 1st time (I know you highly rec’d it a while back) and am loving it so much. “No bullshit, no secrets” for life!!!!!
They say that we are starving, that we have done bad things, that we have nothing. They say that we can’t measure up, there is lack. No, it is all abundance, it is magic writ. All in the blood and the breath. We reach for ethical connections in to love unconditionally. We are love.
This has stopped me in my tracks Laura and I can feel my heart beating because it’s so hard to even read about shame… the weight of this feeling has stopped me from loving people, because I feel so bad…this for me has ran my life for as long as I can remember. You have brought this to the light for me and like every piece you write it’s meant to be now for so many reasons. I hide all the time when i feel the shame, and it really dosent work anymore. Such an insightful piece and I will read over and over and hopefully now have the courage to look at it.Thank you 🙏
I HEAR YOU. I can empathize with your shame…I felt nauseated reading about it. I have battled my own. I feel like I’ve done a ton of work around it..even EMDR…which was helpful. There was a traumatic event that I had shame around…because I blamed myself. EMDR actually lifted the weight of this shame. And it was at this very EMDR session that I realized even more traumatizing than the traumatic event itself was the blame I was putting on myself. I was able to see and feel much freedom after 20 years of holding that shame and never even discussing with anyone.
As always, I appreciate your honesty and humility. Bringing your truth to light. And your crack of insight!BIG WIN. I’m definitely going to listen to the Unfawning discussion between you and Dr Ingram Clayton.
Such a powerful piece Laura! I believe shame is the root of why I began drinking. Managed to put that down finally but the shame is like a fucking weed in my new garden that refuses to die.
I sat down (literally) and rolled up my sleeves (metaphorically) as soon as it registered we were gonna be talking about shame here. One of my favorite topics (along with grief, trauma, and addiction for this good time Sally here. lol.) The lump in my throat formed almost immediately because every time I get out my shovel, I hit another layer of inexplicable shame. This runs deep for me—deeper than my memory. And I’ve been digging for a while now.
As someone who has lived much her life as though apologizing to most everyone around her (for no good reason until there were endless ones), it never made sense to me. I can tell you a million ways shame has harmed me, but I’ve never considered viewing it as somehow serving me—my punishment as a form of protection. Three little words you wrote really stuck out to me: “I deserve it.” That activated instant ugly cry face for me, so clearly the shovel is striking something solid, yet below that layer exists a deeper knowing that it’s not true, but I just can’t quite seem to get to it.
I asked you once when you knew you’d reached a place where you were ready to write. Like when did you know that enough healing and understanding and insight and hindsight had occurred that you were ready to plant your flag and own your story in a book. And you told me words that I’ll never forget—that we don’t want to hear some tidily packaged story by someone who claims to have figured it all out. We want it real. We want it to touch us, not tell us. So give me the view from the belly of the beast over some field of tulips any day. This is raw truth, and because of that, far more beautiful. Breathtaking, really. ❤️
It’s the not being able to get to it part that’s the kick in the teeth. When I’m in it, I can’t either. It’s awful.
Just please know that your ability to put words to it is astonishing. It’s massive. My shovel is shaky (you know I’m a shaker, too), but I would have dropped it a long time ago and just settled for many things in this life had it not been for you. 🥹🙏🏻🙏🏻🙏🏻
🥹🥹🥹🥹🥹
“It feels like a battle for my life because that’s what it was. As a child, because I could not see my caregivers as bad (because I needed them to be good), I had to see myself as bad instead, because at least that’s something I could control.”
I had to pause after this paragraph and take a few deep breaths! This! I could never find the words - but you did. Thank you, I feel such a weight lifted!
Honestly, same. That paragraph was a heater!
Reading this felt like witnessing emotional open-heart surgery in real time: raw, unflinching, and incredibly generous. Your reflection on shame as a “master tool of protection," a way to make sense of the impossible and control the uncontrollable, brings so much compassion to something that usually just feels like an endless swamp.
I also resonated with what you wrote about outgrowing all the old buffers. It’s such a painful but honest place to arrive at, when it’s just you and the truth, no matter how searing.
The way you describe talking to shame instead of from within it, that simple shift of “Hi shame, I see you," feels like such a humane invitation, a way to reclaim the agency that shame tries to swallow.
I just want to say: yes. This feels true. Uncomfortably, clarifyingly true. Thank you for letting us see you in this vulnerable place, it is a gift.
Can’t wait to hear the podcast episode with Holly, and even more excited for your next book!
Thank you for sharing your deep struggle – which we can all relate to in our unique ways. It’s powerful (and likely an antidote of sorts) to acknowledge shame. I think for me shame is very much intertwined in the parts of my identity that don’t easily fit or blend in with expectations. It’s this feeling that those must be hidden – even if they are strengths. As women in particular, we are punished for the parts of us that stick out and define us - and that we can’t change. Sometimes I feel that if I had a unicorn horn, I’d be told it’s a liability and that I should tear it from my body, even if I would bleed to death without that part of myself. Shame - whether it comes from the actions of others or what we have internalized within ourselves – is designed to annihilate through self-abnegation. When you talk about it burning you down, that really resonates for this reason.
YES. To all of this.
Thanks for your honesty, and for sharing the darkness even on a summery Friday. You have an extraordinary way of dressing feelings in words that capture the full range of being human.
Laura, my entire body is screaming yes to your insights here. I’m sorry you’re going through this, and sorry that so many of us are, and yet I have a very clear awareness that we must. We are fighting our way out of the cage that we built to keep ourselves feeling safe enough, until we could grow up and tear it all down. For some reason I’ve recently been able to digest the CPTSD books I amassed during my first few years of sobriety; previously I couldn’t read a paragraph without buckling into a shame spiral. But with just a little space, a millimeter of distance from that auto-reaction of self-blame, I can now hold the injustice of being parented the way I was. I can remember it. I can admit that I was wronged. Unsafe. Unloved in all the ways I needed to be. Disregarded. Dismissed. That was wrong. But I am here. I can make a different choice. I can love myself better than they showed me how to. Dear gods, I cannot wait to read your book. 💓
The needing one’s parents/caregivers to be good is so formative it scares me. I see this happening with some kids I know - the reframing of parents (bad) behavior to keep them safe and secure. It’s hard to witness. I hold my spouse accountable for stuff like this that he misses “seeing” all the time, and know I’m probably doing things as well that my kid has to wrestle with. It’s a real stress point. I’m probably overdoing it but I can’t help but feel we need to shepard our children in the most thoughtful attuned ways we can, and without one’s own deep work we just pass along all the aspects of our unexamined lives because of pride, fear, trauma or sheer ignorance.
Wow. Wow. Shame and taking the burden for everything - even when it’s not your fault. I can relate to that so deeply. It has made me accept untenable situations. I am still crawling thru stuff at 62. I am just so grateful for my most amazing Thearapist I am now working with. I am grappling with my belief in my Higher Power. She is what I call emergent right now. I loved this post. I can not wait for your next book - your last 2 were brilliant. I love Holly and will go listen to her podcast. You both have been the such influential woman on my path of sobriety and life. Truly. Thank you.
Miranda ❤️❤️❤️
s h a m e. yup. i have a game with myself for this deleterious time sucking human choice. How fast can i name this shame aloud, to myself or to someone whom I've harmed (mostly my man or my kid), and then offer myself empathy. The speed with which I try to make this happen isn't about repressing or hiding the shame, it's about creating a swift, smooth evolution, a melting of the ice of the tension I was feeling.
This little tiny loving race to remind myself of how human i am to have done/said/felt that.
love you
This is the perfect summer topic. 💖 For me, this is the season where all the shit I’ve been avoiding comes up for air bc there’s space to do so.
I was just listening to a Jungian episode on the inner critic (my self hatred burden is a clingy shapeshifter) and toward the end one of the hosts said something that pierced me:
“And what I would say is that when these ancient, primal gods get you in their crosshairs, it takes a god to save you from a god.”*
It was a drop of water that made its way into my deepest crack. 🤍
And like you I am not trying to patch over or fix the cracks—just trying to appreciate the shape they give my life and love on them by any means necessary.
This whole post, Laura, was also water that got inside there. Thank you for that. 💙💙
*From This Jungian Life Podcast: Taming Your Inner Critic: Turn Self-Attack into Self-Awareness, Jun 26, 2025
You’re the second person to recommend this podcast to me this week. I’ll listen.
It’s roundabout IMHO but if you hang on until the end when Joseph speaks then it will be worth it. 🫶
On another note I am reading Hello Beautiful for the 1st time (I know you highly rec’d it a while back) and am loving it so much. “No bullshit, no secrets” for life!!!!!
They say that we are starving, that we have done bad things, that we have nothing. They say that we can’t measure up, there is lack. No, it is all abundance, it is magic writ. All in the blood and the breath. We reach for ethical connections in to love unconditionally. We are love.
This has stopped me in my tracks Laura and I can feel my heart beating because it’s so hard to even read about shame… the weight of this feeling has stopped me from loving people, because I feel so bad…this for me has ran my life for as long as I can remember. You have brought this to the light for me and like every piece you write it’s meant to be now for so many reasons. I hide all the time when i feel the shame, and it really dosent work anymore. Such an insightful piece and I will read over and over and hopefully now have the courage to look at it.Thank you 🙏
I HEAR YOU. I can empathize with your shame…I felt nauseated reading about it. I have battled my own. I feel like I’ve done a ton of work around it..even EMDR…which was helpful. There was a traumatic event that I had shame around…because I blamed myself. EMDR actually lifted the weight of this shame. And it was at this very EMDR session that I realized even more traumatizing than the traumatic event itself was the blame I was putting on myself. I was able to see and feel much freedom after 20 years of holding that shame and never even discussing with anyone.
As always, I appreciate your honesty and humility. Bringing your truth to light. And your crack of insight!BIG WIN. I’m definitely going to listen to the Unfawning discussion between you and Dr Ingram Clayton.
Dr Ingrid Clayton
(Also, this is so brilliant, so smart to write from the belly, and your adult self is just, so wise and present here.)
‘She’s still there, she’s just not running the show atm’ is one of the most helpful things I’ve seen recently.
Such a powerful piece Laura! I believe shame is the root of why I began drinking. Managed to put that down finally but the shame is like a fucking weed in my new garden that refuses to die.