Gender Identity
Wednesday morning the talk was about gender identity. I felt Jesus nuzzling my neck again but I kept pushing him away. Why? Did I want to stay in the pain of all the speaker shared?
Our gender is physical. We can look down, see what parts we have and know whether we’re male or female. Gender identity is much more complex. Three questions were asked. What do you know about your gender identity? Why do you know you know (who informed you)? How is it impacting you now in your relationships, even in your relationship with God?
Our parents are like the curved mirrors in a fun house. The curves are the result of their own woundedness but because of the curves in them, we see distorted views of ourselves which become our identities. The mirror of our gender identity comes from our same-sex parent. The opposite parent affirms that identity. This affirmation enables us to relate to the opposite sex and without the opposite-sex parent, we get confused about how to relate to the opposite sex. (Now THERE’s a profound truth that I have experienced.) We need both mirrors for balance. And if we don’t have a good foundation regarding our gender identity from them, we will look to our peers who, as we know, can be quite brutal as children.
Our culture is a liar, giving us a distorted view of life and gender. It teaches us that we are never enough—never smart enough, tall enough, thin enough, etc. We are a culture of orgasm. Just look at all the magazines at the check out that offer to improve our sex lives. And, in our warped culture, our sexuality forms our identity rather than God giving us our identity and our sexuality coming from this.
As children, we’re like little birds with their mouths wide open. We’re always taking in things, both good and bad. If there is enough good, when the bad happens, the bad just bounces off. The reverse is also true. If there is enough bad, when good happens, the good bounces off.
Attaching is warming up. When a child is in an environment that’s less than the best, she detaches. When she does that, she can never warm up. She’s unplugged from the sources of warmth around her. And once she has detached, even when the environment improves, she may not be able to accept it because she is already detached. As an adult, she is unable to sustain meaningful relationships with people and this feeds into the cycle of addiction. When we’re cold, we feel the need for warmth but as soon as we feel warm, we panic and withdraw so we grow cold, and so on.
I know I detached in childhood. I know I disassociate and detach now. I seem to either detach or I get enmeshed. I find this all very confusing. I know I’m very detached from my husband. The statement above, “even when the environment improves, she may not be able to accept it because she is already detached,” is very true for me in my marriage and I don’t know how to change it.
Remember, in a previous post about the conference, I had written, "There is only one person whose love I’ve KNOWN, whose love I’ve been certain of even in my soul. But her I had to walk away from. The one person who loves me, I can’t have." I’m not sure at what point it happened but I remember going to my small group with an incredible insight. Pearl didn’t love me. What she loved was what I gave her. Funny, but I don’t feel the same sense of sureness about that now that I did then but it was very strong at the time. And my husband, whom I have never believed loved me, really does. Again, at the moment, I’m having trouble believing that but at the time it seemed so clear, like I had gotten things all twisted and backwards until then. This is all so hard to write. Is this why I kept pushing Jesus away as he came to me during that morning? I don’t remember. I find myself wanting to push him away now too. I don’t want to believe what he showed me. Now isn’t that stupid?
Our gender is physical. We can look down, see what parts we have and know whether we’re male or female. Gender identity is much more complex. Three questions were asked. What do you know about your gender identity? Why do you know you know (who informed you)? How is it impacting you now in your relationships, even in your relationship with God?
Our parents are like the curved mirrors in a fun house. The curves are the result of their own woundedness but because of the curves in them, we see distorted views of ourselves which become our identities. The mirror of our gender identity comes from our same-sex parent. The opposite parent affirms that identity. This affirmation enables us to relate to the opposite sex and without the opposite-sex parent, we get confused about how to relate to the opposite sex. (Now THERE’s a profound truth that I have experienced.) We need both mirrors for balance. And if we don’t have a good foundation regarding our gender identity from them, we will look to our peers who, as we know, can be quite brutal as children.
Our culture is a liar, giving us a distorted view of life and gender. It teaches us that we are never enough—never smart enough, tall enough, thin enough, etc. We are a culture of orgasm. Just look at all the magazines at the check out that offer to improve our sex lives. And, in our warped culture, our sexuality forms our identity rather than God giving us our identity and our sexuality coming from this.
As children, we’re like little birds with their mouths wide open. We’re always taking in things, both good and bad. If there is enough good, when the bad happens, the bad just bounces off. The reverse is also true. If there is enough bad, when good happens, the good bounces off.
Attaching is warming up. When a child is in an environment that’s less than the best, she detaches. When she does that, she can never warm up. She’s unplugged from the sources of warmth around her. And once she has detached, even when the environment improves, she may not be able to accept it because she is already detached. As an adult, she is unable to sustain meaningful relationships with people and this feeds into the cycle of addiction. When we’re cold, we feel the need for warmth but as soon as we feel warm, we panic and withdraw so we grow cold, and so on.
I know I detached in childhood. I know I disassociate and detach now. I seem to either detach or I get enmeshed. I find this all very confusing. I know I’m very detached from my husband. The statement above, “even when the environment improves, she may not be able to accept it because she is already detached,” is very true for me in my marriage and I don’t know how to change it.
Remember, in a previous post about the conference, I had written, "There is only one person whose love I’ve KNOWN, whose love I’ve been certain of even in my soul. But her I had to walk away from. The one person who loves me, I can’t have." I’m not sure at what point it happened but I remember going to my small group with an incredible insight. Pearl didn’t love me. What she loved was what I gave her. Funny, but I don’t feel the same sense of sureness about that now that I did then but it was very strong at the time. And my husband, whom I have never believed loved me, really does. Again, at the moment, I’m having trouble believing that but at the time it seemed so clear, like I had gotten things all twisted and backwards until then. This is all so hard to write. Is this why I kept pushing Jesus away as he came to me during that morning? I don’t remember. I find myself wanting to push him away now too. I don’t want to believe what he showed me. Now isn’t that stupid?
posted by Magdaleine at 10:29 PM
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