Ep. 209 Returning To Self-Love After Trauma ft. Jerry Henderson

Find Jerry HERE and make sure to check out his book ⁠RETURNING ⁠ .

"For nearly five decades, I lived with the palpable pain of unhealed trauma and shame. Growing up in a house filled with poverty, substance abuse, and physical, sexual, and emotional abuse left me with profound wounds. 

The trauma and abuse started as early as I can remember and so did my use of drugs and alcohol. At age five my parents began giving me alcohol to reward me for chores. At 9 I began using drugs with family members, and by the time I was 14 I was in rehab for drug and alcohol abuse.

At 17, I decided to change and devoted my life in service to God, I served as a pastor for 13 years, and spent 16 years serving the poor. None of this removed the shame. The pressures and failures of trying to be a “good Christian” and to “please God” only filled me with more shame. 

By my mid-forties the never ending need to try and prove myself turned me into a workaholic, wrecked my nervous system and led to severe burn-out. I was emotionally numb, suicidal, having constant anxiety and panic attacks, and was drinking myself to death.

Finally it all fell apart. Over a two-year period, I had a heart attack, open heart surgery, a stay in rehab, a second divorce, and another visit to rehab.

My last stay in rehab opened my eyes to the unhealed trauma and deep shame I was living with. I saw how my drinking and destructive behaviors were my best efforts to survive the pain I was in. 

On my final day of rehab during my last group session, I spoke the words, “I am worthy of my own love.” When I said those words something tangibly shifted deep inside me.  

For the first time in my life, I realized that the source of my suffering wasn’t just the pain of trauma but a separation from love, my own love. I decided at that moment I was going to learn what it meant to love myself, and how I could heal my life.Since that day, I have been researching and experimenting with the ways we heal. A journey that has taken me around the world and into places and spaces I never dreamed I would have ventured into.

I’ve explored sources of suffering and the science and spiritual practices that heal us from within. Dissecting how trauma, toxic religious beliefs, unhealthy relationships, and society can contribute to a deep sense of shame, suffering, and addictions for many of us. I became a student of how mindfulness, meditation, self-examination, traditional and non-traditional therapies, self-love, and self-compassion help us rewire our systems and heal. 

I discovered that we are the healers that we have been looking for all along. I began to see how we can awaken to our own ability to heal ourselves, how we can remove roadblocks that we have in loving ourselves, and the practices we can use to heal ourselves.

Ultimately it is about healing our relationship with ourselves, and that relationship begins to heal when we give ourselves permission to love ourselves"

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