Captain save a damsel (Being controlling in the guise of helpfulness)

I’ve noticed that the position I take in people’s lives is often that of an advisor. I give unsolicited yet helpful advice to help people realise that what they’re going through with others is abuse or just unfair. This has led me to ruminate over others’ situations and made me lose myself. I also realised this is a form of being controlling in the guise of helpfulness. Unintentionally, of course, but a toxic trait I’ve taken on due to my abusive household.

In my household, people would trauma-dump on me, and I was expected to listen. I started to learn to become detached, or I just started to dissociate. However, this was emotionally taxing for me. So one day I decided to start giving advice (I was 12 at this time). This advice led people to come back, and I finally felt useful and somewhat present. But just because I felt useful doesn’t mean I wasn’t still hurting myself.

Being the sacrificial lamb for others when they didn’t ask for it isn’t a badge of honour. It’s actually people-pleasing. I can’t blame others for finding solace in me. I can only blame myself. But through this blame, it will not lead to shame; it will lead to growth.

I found it quite common that I would come into people’s lives at the moment they were going through a lot, and I’d sit there for hours on the phone giving them helpful yet unasked-for advice. I’ve now realised, when am I actually supporting them? When am I placing boundaries for myself so I don’t lose myself in this? I feel like this is common in abusive households where you’ve had to take the emotional lead, usually of emotionally immature parents. But this is harmful and not helpful at all.

When the chain is broken and you finally admit to the other person that I think I need to stop giving you advice and actually start supporting you, they may take this as a threat to their body. They may think, “Well, this is the routine. I tell you my problems, and I expect you to be the honest one to call stuff out, as everyone else has invalidated me, and you usually help me understand that things can be unfair for me”. And I can’t blame them for thinking that. But you have to ask yourself. When did they ask? What do they actually need? If they don’t know what they need, then why on earth do I think giving them hard-hitting advice is helpful, rather than just being there for them?

I realised this stemmed from me not feeling like I’m enough if I don’t make myself useful to others. But I can’t take my heart out of my chest, put it in someone else, and resent them when they never asked me to do that. I’m more than enough. I don’t need to be a guru to hold space in someone’s life.

I can just be me. I don’t need to save others.

Photography by Honey Gilmore @iamhoneygilmore on Instagram