You are worth protecting. You always have been.
All of our children were born looking like hairless baby monkeys.
Our eldest was born in a birthing pool, so was floating around at the bottom of the water, curled up and wrinkly like a tiny version of ET.
Our second was born in the bathroom of our old house (not planned that way) and I held her as she came out, purple and scrawny, with a head like a very old man.
Our third was born on a hospital bed, tiny and wonky.
None of them had done anything yet. They hadn’t achieved anything, completed any tasks or done things to make someone happy.
And yet, there they were: already and entirely worthy of love. Worthy of being treated well. Worthy of protection. Not because of the things they had done, but just because they existed.
Somewhere along the way, during their lives, they will pick up some ideas about what makes them more worthy or less worthy of love. Some of that will come from us as their parents. The things we praise them for, the things we tell them off for. Some of that will come from society, from peers, and from their experiences.
They might even come across people who explicitly make them feel like they aren’t worthy of care. Or that their worth is entirely dependent upon their looks, their obedience or their work rate.
I think it’s quite common that we might find ourselves questioning our worth or our value, or rating by the things we have done or how we have been, but I think it’s worth coming back to this:
You were born worthy of love. Whether people always give you or gave you that love doesn’t take that away. You were born worthy of care and protection.
And you still are.
Even if you don’t achieve the things you wanted to, or look the way you wanted to, you are still worth of protection and love. It’s not “You are only worth protecting if…”
You are worth protecting. Full stop.
Thanks for reading. Until next time,
Ted
P.S. The baby being born at home story is a good one. I might come back to that.
Ted Bradshaw
Cognitive Behavioural Therapist and Coach
My name is Ted Bradshaw (@cbtted on Instagram and TikTok) and my main aim is to make mental health and anxiety in particular much easier to understand. I am a Cognitive Behavioural Therapist accredited by the BABCP and have been working in this area for over 15 years. I am an honorary Assistant Professor of Psychological Therapies at the University of Nottingham and I also work as a coach, accredited by the International Coaching Federation to PCC level. On my first day of training as a therapist, I was immediately annoyed. The things I was learning seemed so useful, and I was confused as to why I had never been taught any of this before, because it would have been so useful. For me, it seemed ridiculous that we would wait until people feel really bad before we offer them any information or insight into how anxiety or how a mind works. That is what led me to look into coaching and it is also why I spend a good deal of my time writing about and making short videos on lots of different aspects of mental health and anxiety in particular. As a parent, I have also found that what I know about anxiety has been so useful to me when dealing with my own children, so a lot of my focus is upon parents understanding anxiety for their children, too. These days in my 1:1 work with enduring mental health issues such as depression. OCD or PTSD, and I also work with people who might not be sure whether it is therapy they need but who are looking to improve something, like confidence or self-esteem. Finally, I also run workshops for schools and businesses on all of these subjects, including how to help an anxious child, good mental health in the workplace and more. You can find me across most social media platforms @cbtted, on Instagram and TikTok in particular.
