Lessons from the sea-otter

Sea otters hold hands while they sleep so they don't drift away from one another. I like how reliance and snuggling are valued in the larger animal kingdom. You see, otters share a wise snuggle because the sub-text of the snuggle is: we connect when we're vulnerable. 

Unlike otters, it's hard for some people to connect when vulnerability is strong (for a variety of reasons). For some, the nourishment is an unequivocally positive and balanced experience; so they don't think twice about holding on. Other people hold on with an anxious grip. Alternatively, many of us avoid human contact when we feel vulnerable. I'm sure that most people use a combination of these methods without even thinking about their actions. 

I’m going to speak to the resisting behavior that I described last because it is the one that I deal with the most in my personal life. Often, for those of us who cope with eating disorder recovery, fear of interpersonal nourishment overrides the human inclination to connect. Why do we fear it? Well, here are some examples: When you have reason to believe that a nourishing feeling will go away, it does not make sense to get used to it. When you don’t understand why the nourishing feeling was not offered to you as a young person, why would you want to go towards it as an adult? When that nourishing something feels foreign because you’re not used to it, then it won’t feel comfortable. Even though it’s considered nourishing, it won’t feel as though it is. Then, you’ll feel like there’s something wrong with you for not feeling nourished by something that is supposed to be inherently nourishing! Do you follow? Here's more: When you’re taught that you’re bad if you cry in the presence of others, than going to treatment and learning to cry in the presence of another person is going to feel like hell. If your life experience has taught you that eating makes you disgusting, out of control, or ___ (fill in the blank)___, then re-learning how to feed yourself is going to feel like absolute hell. That’s why recovery hurts and helps simultaneously. The nourishment doesn’t begin to feel like nourishment until you’re willing to experience the suffering again and again and again, until it becomes emotionally diluted via repetition. In a way, the suffering is a re-experiencing. There was a time in all of our lives (those of us who resist emotional contact) when not having the emotional attunement that we needed began to hurt so badly that we emotionally separated ourselves from the longing. We disowned the longing for nourishment because it hurt too much to have an unrequited desire and need for loving attunement. Among the many ways to describe this emotional exiling, it is an act of anger. It is a rageful and viciously mournful ripping-away from the one who is supposed to nourish us. And s/he was supposed to nourish you. And me. And all of you. You see, the re-feeding and re-connection is a re-experiencing of this separation. It’s painful and it hurts, but it's necessary for evolving away from the eating disorder. It may feel risky. You might sense impending doom, but it is extraordinarily important element of the healing process.

I have been practicing going towards others during times of emotional distraught and I'll be the first one to stand up and say that it’s frightening. I still have a lot to learn from sea otters. I really appreciate their attitudes. They don't distribute rules about emotional vulnerability. They say: Hey buddy, you're unsteady when you sleep and so am I, lets help one another. They’re not afraid that their buddy the sea-otter is going to think that they’re too clingy. There are no judgements. They ask for what they need and they give what they feel like giving. It might take time for those of us resistant humans to feel a sea-otter-esque comfort when connecting with one another during times of emotional vulnerability. It may take white-knuckling-it through a torrential nightmare in order to get there. You’ll hear all of the fears. You’ll hear the old rules. You’ll see memories of longing, loneliness and wretchedness. The key is in these moments, to give yourself compassion even if your mind tells you not to do so. The key is to follow the compassionate discipline, which is to keep moving forwards despite your fears. The key is (perhaps) to visualize a warm light, a light of love, expanding around you and holding you while you re-experience the emotions that are bubbling up from your unbearable past. Once you do this often enough to believe in the compassion you give yourself, you’ll have set a new pattern that you can work with and you won’t ever have to believe in self hatred. You won't have to believe that you are helplessly destined to be disconnected and alone ever again.