What You Really Need

“We have been raised to fear . . . our deepest cravings.

And the fear of our deepest cravings keeps them suspect,

keeps us docile and loyal and obedient, and leads us to settle for . . .

many facets of our own oppression.”[1]

—Audre Lorde, The Uses of the Erotic

 

I used to think it was indulgent and selfish to acknowledge my needs and desires, especially when so many people in the world suffer so much more than I do.

I grew up with few models of self-love and care, and I was painfully aware of my white privilege from an early age. In my teens and early twenties, my reluctance to take good care of myself and my white guilt mixed together into a brew of savior mentality. I showed up in less-than-helpful ways and lived on the brink of burnout.

Luckily, life sent me a wake up call at a relatively young age. My moment of truth came while lying on my bed in Oaxaca, Mexico, thirty-six weeks pregnant. I’d just returned from an appointment with my midwife. The hospitals in Oaxaca had extremely high rates of medical intervention in births, and I wanted a home birth. My midwife told me that my baby was breech and that my son would need to turn soon in order to have the birth I was hoping for.

Lying on my bed, I placed my hands on my belly and asked my baby what he needed. I sensed his response immediately—Settle yourself.

I’d been through a lot in the year leading up to that moment. My partner, who was undocumented at the time, was racially profiled while driving to work, and six months later, he was deported to Mexico. I had transferred with my job with the hotel workers’ union from New Haven, Connecticut to Phoenix, Arizona to be closer to him.

A few months after that, I discovered I was pregnant, and I spent my pregnancy bouncing back and forth across borders, trying to figure out where we’d live next. Finally, at seven-months-pregnant, I moved to Oaxaca, Mexico.

With my hands on my belly, I realized that to be the mother I wanted to be for my baby, I needed to feel settled in my body, which meant doing many things differently. I promised my son that I would learn to take better care of myself, and that started my journey to share this with you today.

Now, it wasn’t an immediate jump from A to B—from neglecting my needs to honoring them at all times—and I am definitely still a work in progress, but I am so grateful to my son for the wake-up call and for starting me on this path toward aligning my life with my deepest needs and values.

So, now that you know a bit of my story, let’s turn to you.

How would you describe your relationship with your needs?

When people ask you what you need or want, do you know exactly how to answer? Or do you struggle to respond?

And, if you do know what you need, do you prioritize your needs?

Would you like some acknowledgement of how hard it can be to meet your needs, with all of the demands that are on you and the lack of support we receive in our splintered society?

Or would you like some acknowledgement that no one ever taught you to meet your needs well?

One reason I see that many people struggle to understand and prioritize their needs is attachment wounds. So, before we go further, I want to take you on a brief detour to explore attachment theory and how babies learn to honor their needs—or not.

Although most of us come into this world with the capacity to express whether or not our needs are met, we are not born with the ability to meet our needs. Instead, we rely on our caregivers to teach us to meet our needs.

Here’s how we ideally develop the ability to identify our needs and feel safe, seen, soothed, and able to trust ourselves and others, an ability known as secure attachment:[2]

Secure Attachment

Let’s imagine that there’s a baby. The baby wakes up after a nap and starts crying. The caregiver comes into the room, coos lovingly to the baby, picks the baby up, and rocks the baby back and forth.