"As I Am, I Am Enough" by Chanta Pelham
As far back as I can remember, I have been called pretty. I remember being a small girl,
and people stopping my mama to tell them how beautiful they thought I was. With full cheeks
and a round face, I would smile. It didn’t take me long for me to realize that I was being
complimented. As trauma would have it, that smile would diminish as years passed. Moving
through adolescence I would hear things like “you’re so pretty, you should smile more” and
“you’re too pretty to not be smiling.” It got to the point, in my teenage years, that I felt like the
acknowledgement of my beauty was just something people said; I did not quite understand what
a compliment was.
Furthermore, it happened so often, I started to become jaded. That became clearer to me
as I approached young adulthood. I started to wonder why I didn’t feel internally what so many
people acknowledged about me externally. I would think to myself “everyone can’t be lying. If
it’s true, why don’t I feel pretty? Cognitive dissonance is defined as anxiety or discomfort that
results from simultaneously holding contradictory or otherwise incompatible attitudes, beliefs, or
the like. While I wouldn’t be able to define what I was feeling until much later in my life, this
disruption within me is what inspired my journey toward mental wellness.
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy has been a part of my life for the last ten years. I recall the
early days explaining to my then therapist, my deep frustration. How was it that others could see
in me what I was unable to see in myself? I felt like I was losing my mind. I wanted so badly to
be able to agree when someone said something kind to me. I would dismiss compliments or
change the subject. The more I settled into the fact that I did not agree with them, the more
uncomfortable I became. “What is wrong with me,” I would ask her. At this point in the journey,
my analytical brain told me that this was a problem to solve. If I could just figure out where the
disconnect was, I could close the gap and quell the anxiety. I laugh now thinking about how
wrong I was.
My intuition has always been my superpower; even when I was unaware of how it
worked for me. I have the God-given gift of self-awareness. I call it a gift, because it is not
something I was taught. A gift and sometimes a curse. As a full-grown woman with children of
my own, I now understand why ignorance is bliss. There were many times throughout my life
when I wished I just didn’t know. I felt accountable to the knowledge and truth of who I was,
who I wasn’t and the areas within me that could use some work. Again, I was approaching this
entire thing from a logical space. Surely, I could rationalize all of this. Understanding how
trauma informed my adulthood would be the key to “fixing” me, right? According to my
therapist, that was only a small portion of the process transforming from the inside out.
It wouldn’t take long for me to learn that the trauma of what was done to me in my
childhood changed the chemistry of my brain. How I felt about myself, at this time, inadequate,
unworthy, insufficient, insignificant – was absolutely a result of the pain I endured. That known,
it was still my responsibility to heal. It was a tough pill to swallow accepting that what was done
to me was not my fault, yet I was responsible for the relationship I had with myself as a result.
I started going to therapy because I wanted nothing more than to love and accept myself.
I wanted to be kinder to myself. I wanted to extend the compassion to myself that I so freely
offered to others. I couldn’t seem to reconcile how I was seemingly able to show up in ways for
others that I refused to show up for myself in. Through years of unpacking what seemed like
thousands of bags full of shame, guilt and immense pain, I am proud to be in a much more
peaceful place. Healing is messy. It isn’t linear and we never “arrive.” It is a lifelong journey.
What I have learned in therapy, is that the chemistry of the brain, the neural pathways, can be
changed. We can adopt new thought processes; new behaviors and new relationships with
ourselves.
I could write a book on how much I’ve learned. The practices and tools have changed my
life. Learning the importance of boundaries and positive self-talk, for example. Learning how to
be my own advocate; how to support, encourage and hold space for myself. All of me. On the
good days and on the not-so-good days. Of all of these things, what has resonated with me most
is that I do enough, I have enough, and I alone am enough.
