I see you......Shame

After a night of insomnia, I got up and went on some sort of mini cleaning frenzy which only included using my beloved cordless Dyson until the battery ran out (around 10 minutes) and then scrubbing/bleaching my sink. When I was using the sprayer to rinse and the sponge/scrubber to sop up the water mess that had gotten itself outside the sink, I had to wipe around my knife holder and then I needed to pick up my knife holder as the water was encroaching around it. Some how, and this is weird, the way I picked up the Kapoosh Cutlery block allowed it to tip forward. My most expensive knife in the block, my beautiful Wusthof Grand Prix Chef knife, was out of the block about two inches. As I was holding the block by my pointer and thumb, the block fell forward and the knife cut my skin between my pointer and thumb, my web. It was just a nick but as per usual, any cut on the hand begins to bleed. I fumbled around looking for a good sized band-aid. After breaking into those fort knox wrappers and rejecting several based on their size, I finally found one large enough for my left web. I also admit that I was wrestling with thoughts of betrayal aimed at my Wusthof.

After the band-aid was secured, I kept thinking about how this injury seemed vaguely familiar. I then remembered a time when I was around 16 years old and working at a local steakhouse as a cashier. I was closing which meant one of the things I had to do was put the unused food away. As I was getting some saran wrap off of this massive gigantic restaurant sized spool, it slipped and when i went to catch it, the razor sharp, um, razor that tears the wrap, sliced my hand. As I sat staring at my hand to remember where the cut was by looking for the scar, my memory settled into that the current wounding is where the original cut happened and the scar is under the freshly applied band-aid.

I found this whole event extremely odd and started some questioning to see what the heck this was all about. It all seemed too coincidental and especially since the current cut was only a very slight nick. Well, and here is the good part, I started feeling into what I was feeling at that time. What had happened around 33 years ago is that when I sliced my hand, I started wrapping it in paper towels to try and stop the bleeding. I kept doing my job and can still remember taking the crocks out of the salad bar which was packed in ice back in the day and blood seeping out into the ice water which had melted. No matter what I did, I couldn't get the bleeding to stop. I think the manager finally noticed my hand and then called my mother. Why didn't I just ask for help? Drum roll please.........because I was ashamed that I had hurt myself. I felt ashamed.

As I took this feeling of shame into my heart, there was a quick acknowledgement by way of tears, very brief, but a release. Where did I acquire this shame from hurting myself, that some how I made a mistake and I was a bad person because I hurt myself? My guess is childhood as it fits into my theme of being raised to deny my own needs. So this little nick was a gift in that it allowed me to release shame I have been carrying around since pre-memory. So, thank you, my beloved Wusthof for you helped me release a wound I had no idea I was still carrying.