What’s in Your Pressure Cooker? Finding Healing for Buried Pain

BANG! What the bleep was that? I ran into the kitchen, and then I saw it. Stew plastering every bit of surface area it could find. My mom’s dodgy old pressure cooker had finally blown. It was the old kind where you screwed on its little pressure regulator doodad, and getting the lid on was always hit and miss. So, as pressure built up with the lid not on quite right, at some point, the lid gave way. You see, the issue wasn’t the pressure; it was the lid.

I remember another day. I wasn’t allowed to go to school that morning. My mom and stepdad had gotten into another fight. Neither was in any condition to work in our supermarket. So, it fell to me to open up and work the tills. Until now, no one knew what was happening in our home; they suspected, but like all “good folks”, they minded their own business. My parents’ shame had become my shame, and I didn’t want anyone to know. I remember ringing up someone’s purchase, saying thank you, and then looking up to see one of the teachers from my school looking me in the eye. I went cold. The facade had broken.

It always does…

One more day and we’ll get going… About two years into our parent journey, our beautiful little girl was coming to grips with BIG emotions and had started to smack us to get our attention. I was overtired (pressure), overstimulated (pressure), and overworked (pressure). On the floor playing with her, I turned my back, and WHACK!!!! She hit me on the back of the head. My lid started to shift. My rational mind told me that she was just a baby, that I had to reroute her behaviour, and that it’s a natural part of her development. But each time she hit me, it triggered something… My body reacted to each impact. And even though there was no malice in what she was doing, I reacted. I had to walk away.

How about you, Dear Reader? Has that ever happened to you? When your past, a memory, some pain, or something long buried pops up to say hello?

Let me ask you: What’s in your pressure cooker at the moment? And how’s your lid?

No matter how well adjusted we are, we all have things in our past that have shaped us, not for the better, but for the worse. And by that, I don’t mean that they’ve made us worse people, but they’ve taught us narratives that are unhelpful or untrue. Perhaps you never saw your parents argue, and now, you don’t know how to deal with conflict. Maybe your Dad was away a lot, or walked out on you, and now you crave the affirmation you never got. Or you grew up with a mom who expressed her “love and concern” through constant criticism, and now you battle that narrative as an adult. Maybe something happened at school, university, or even in your adult life, and you’ve replayed that moment a thousand times. And now, to cope, you’ve repressed the heck out of that thing. It is pushed so deep down into your spirit that you have determined never again to let it see the light of day.

The problem with pushing it down is that it’s still there. And one day, when the pressure has built up just right: work is crazy, your three kids are fighting, the dog threw up on the carpet, your budget is hopelessly overspent, the geyser has just burst, you’re emotionally depleted, and you can’t remember when you last had your eight hours. On that day, the lid will fly off, and all the stuff you’ve so carefully repressed will come out. You’ll find yourself triggered by the kids screaming. You’ll say things to your spouse you never knew you had in you. Or you’ll push it down, medicating the pain you’re feeling with alcohol or porn, mindless doomscrolling or food, or your credit card. And you’ll tell yourself it’s OK, because it helps you to keep going. Well, how’s that working for you? ‘cos it didn’t work for me. 

Many of us experienced this in our homes growing up. Our parents (most of them) were not inherently malicious people out to hurt their children. They came from a generation that didn’t deal with, but simply suppressed their traumas and their pain, and still are. Because make no mistake, many of us grew up in trauma, because our parents grew up in trauma. And there was nowhere for them to take the things that happened to them. So they replicated their trauma, often unwillingly, or without realising it. Sometimes it wasn’t even trauma, but our parents were doing the best they knew, and still left a mark. I know that the probability is high that, despite our best efforts, our beautiful little girl will be sitting in a counsellor’s office somewhere one day, sharing about how her parents messed her up. And I’d rather she do that, and deal with her pain head-on, than try to suppress it. Heck, I’ll even pay for it. I want to ensure that the list she walks into that office with is as short as possible. And while I empathise with those who went through trauma or a difficult upbringing, as adults, we have a choice to recognise our hurts, pains, addictions and trauma and to do something about them. Because when I don’t deal with my stuff, it will inevitably resurface, often at the worst possible times, and sometimes with devastating results for my marriage, my family, or my calling. The rule of life is this: what is ignored or undealt with will inevitably resurface. When I choose to avoid what is painful, what I communicate to those around me, often unintentionally, is that I love you, but not enough to do the hard thing. 

Dealing with our stuff is about us loving others, but it’s also about loving ourselves. Can you love yourself enough today to recognise this truth: When we don’t deal with our pain and trauma, we are choosing to stay in prison. We’ve just convinced ourselves that our prison bars keep us safe. We don’t have to be in pain. We don’t have to hide what we’re feeling. With the help of God and counsellors, our spouse, our friends and family and community, we can walk straight out of that prison. YOU can walk straight out of that prison. After all, you have the keys. It will be hard, but let me tell you, there is more life out there for you than you have convinced yourself you are worthy of.

So, what do you do? You’ve recognised that your lid’s a bit bent, and you’re tired of stew on the walls…

First, name that thing. If we can name the hidden things, it helps to drag them into the light. It removes their mystery. And now that I know your name, I can begin to unravel you. You look a little smaller somehow. I know journaling is not for everyone. But there’s something about sitting with pen and paper and inviting God to be a part of the conversation that helps us start. After all, He knows you. He knows what you’ve buried, and He wants to help you gently excavate and find healing for what happened. You can do it without Him, but the healing is so much more complete when we do it with Him.

Secondly, find the people who will walk alongside you out of that thing. I needed to talk to close friends, my spouse, counsellors and even a good psychologist to unravel all that had happened to me. With their help, I could start to unravel some of the mess. I know not everyone is into therapy, but some messes we just can’t unravel on our own. Sometimes, we need tools, conversations, community, and fresh eyes on the problem in order to see a change. Please don’t let old conventions, thinking and misconceptions around therapy keep you from finding healing. It is the bravest thing to share your hurt with someone who can help you do the unravelling you could never do on your own. That said, years of narrative and patterns and lies do not unravel overnight. It took time. It took accountability, and it took help. And there are parts of what I went through that I am still dealing with; some days are better than others, but every day I am a little bit freer than the day before.

Lastly, you’ve got a decision to make. You can know what’s buried, you can even speak to someone about it, but at some point, the question you need to answer, Dear Reader, is whether you want to stay as you are, or whether you want to be free. Because it is a choice. Many people choose to remain as they are. I had to consider the cost of finally bringing the things I had pushed down and hidden into the light, and you know what? The cost is always greater in our minds than it is in reality; we make up the most convoluted scenarios of what will happen when we start to deal with our mess. But the very first time I spoke it out loud, I couldn’t believe how free I felt. As much as I had to consider the cost of letting go of this thing that had become a part of my identity, I also had to consider the cost of not doing so. The cost for my family, the cost for my calling, the cost for myself, in deciding to stay as I am. And the cost was just too high.

So, would you take a leap, Dear Reader? Would you recognise the hurt you still carry, and invite God into those places and spaces, and watch Him start the work of restoring what has been taken from you? You can do it, just take one step… Know that I’m praying for you in the journey…