How Do I Put Things In A "box"?

[Justmehere]

This comes up in therapy. My therapist says to imagine putting stuff that we are working on (trauma and fears of the future) in a box. Today she told me to put it all in a giant box with a padlock on it. I said okay, and I'll put that box on top of a mountain.

She then said to imagine someone there something guarding the box.

This silly exercise is actually helping with some of my symptoms. Whenever I start to feel anxious about something, I just imagine that stuff is in this imaginary box, to deal with later.

It's not helping my lack of focus and some intense anxiety. The two things seem to be related. I can't seem to get stuff done today. It's driving me nuts.

Does anybody else do this? Is there anything else that helps you put things away to deal with later?

Is there anything that helps with a complete lack of focus?

I need my ability to focus to come back!

My therapist told me to imagine someone or something guarding the box.

 

[Hope4Now]

My T has me do the same thing. I have to get just the right visualization for it to work, and I need to practice breathing and being present in my body at the same time. It does help, but I often need to repeat the process.

I wish I had wise words on focusing. I too would like suggestions for focus...especially the kind of focus that is not what often happens to me where it's a hyper-focus that is sort of dissociative and I don't do what needs to get done. I have been trying different things, but with not much success.

 

[RussH]

Justmehere, imagine a mighty angel, a force for absolute good guarding the box.

I cannot say that I put things in a box, but I do somehow set somethings aside for another day.

How do you focus? That's a good question, hum let me see, what was the question again? Yes I have problems focusing; unless I am focusing on my PTSD and the feelings my abuse causes, then I seem all too focused.

Are you eating regularly? Are you eating healthy? The reason I ask is I know sometimes when I am having trouble focusing it is because I haven't eaten anything and my blood sugar is getting low.

When I got triggered this past october, I was real, real anxious, and having trouble focusing. My Doctor recommended an antianxiety medication, and she told me it would also help me focus. Just a thought.

 

[Deleted member 1860]

The skill you are referring to is known as "containment". I learned it while at Sheppard Pratt. I quickly threw it away because containment is close to stuffing, and I had been stuffing things down my entire life. It was time to let it out and let myself feel. Like with any skill, some work for you and some don't. Maybe you could do a search (either here or on google) for this particular skill. Sorry I can't be more helpful, but it is a skill that works for many!

 

[Chava]

The imagination stuff does sound silly, but it works for me too. I was really panicky but exhausted. My therapist wondered what could help me feel safe...could I imagine an animal there to protect me? Could I hide? I spontaneously imagined a huge king crab on my back. On was laying on my tummy on the beach. I could sleep but this crab would stay awake for me, eyes seeing in all directions, pinchers in a couple directions. I imagined what it felt like...and it was comforting, but also a little humorous, which took the edge off my anxiety.

I sometimes keep notes so I keep trauma stuff separate. Or e-mail my therapist stuff. For getting back to focus, I pick something I enjoy...a book I'm reading, doing steps to some fun 60s or 80 electronic rock...whatever...I re-focus on something that is easy to focus on....that also burns up a little of the scattered energy and helps me move onto more mundane tasks like paying the bills.

Good luck...keep up the imagination!

 

[littlelostchild]

Focus ideas - I put on ambient music in the background to help reduce my attention to small distracting noises. I also break the task into smaller parts and do physical activity between parts (like walking down the hall to get a drink of water), I use an alarm to time myself for a task (say 20 minutes) then take a stretch break. Sometimes I try to stand while I work, use a squishy ball to release energy, or chew gum.

Just a few thoughts that help me.

 

[Mystery]

Hi Justmehere, I have found that kind of visualization really helpful too when there are just too many things to deal with at once. It's important to use the kind of symbols that mean something to you and not just something that someone suggests, unless you like it. For me a box is just not strong enough! Also I wouldn't be able to feel safe with someone else guarding it. When I did it, the T made sure I had two 'angelic' spirit guides with me, who ensured my safety. It's pretty powerful stuff, hacking the subconscious and should be done with great care and awareness, as well as guidance.

When my focus is out, I go and have a shower and fix up my messy hair. I find that looking after my body, which I have usually been neglecting when that happens, brings me back into it, some more. Like file my nails, rub on moisturizer, deep breathe in a bath, pluck my eyebrows, do my feet, put on some nice clothes. Then I feel better and look around my house and feel like fixing it too. This gets the ball rolling for me, when I'm stuck.

There is a saying in Zen Buddhism, 'before enlightenment - chop wood carry water, after enlightenment - chop wood carry water'. Buddhists say that the action of attending to our body and our environment is therapy to balance us and ground the pent up energy in our bodies. I also try to ground myself to the earth by taking my shoes off and walking on grass or weeding. Weeding is a great one, it's amazing how addictive it is once you start. The electricity in our bodies, earths to the ground when we touch it.

I think you have had a big surge of stuff recently from reading your last few posts about pressured speech. When I experienced those kind of chemical/neurological cycles in the past, I noticed they take weeks to settle down. Be gentle to yourself most of all, you have had a lot going on lately.

 

[Hope4Now]

@Mystery...I like your post.
The body stuff is very important, I'm learning, even though it is counter-intuitive for me. @Justmehere, do you do this?

@Solara, for some of us containment is essential to prevent total systemic overwhelm. I wish I could do what you did and just let myself feel all of it, remember all of it, but there's no way. I'd end up in complete psychological chaos. I've come close to this at several points during the past 9 months, and it's not a healthy situation. Containment, for me at least, is not like stuffing. I stuffed for 48 years until my system started bursting at the seams...first with disabling chronic sacral pain, now with all sorts of flashbacks etc. When I stuff things, I'm putting them away and refusing to acknowledge their reality or power. When I contain, I am aware of what's there and how overwhelming it is, but I am "managing" (to some extent) how much and how fast to process it and keep myself safe and integrated at the same time.

@Justmehere, On putting things in "boxes" I had a few other thoughts to share, for whatever they might be worth to you. My therapist started me on this self-managing activity within our first few appointments. I thought it was completely nuts, but I was so desperate on so many levels, I went along with it. It felt like a game I was playing with myself at first (sometimes it still does, but I understand now that this has to do with my dissociative tendencies). Now it feels like a life-saving technique. I have discovered, though, that the containers I visualize often need to change over time, depending on the powerfulness of the energy I'm trying to contain. Sometimes what I'm trying to contain escapes what I've created for it, so I need to come up with something different. So, try not to get discouraged if your visualizations aren't always as effective as you think they ought to be. Just be creative in how you imagine your containers and any guards.

Also, I wanted to share that another thing that has been really helpful to me over the past month or so is a body visualization. I have a lot of really intense energies that make me feel like I'm going to explode, and that I have trouble containing in the other ways we've been talking about. I realized at some point recently that I don't really conceive of myself as a three-dimensional, full-sized person. Working on feeling that is helping give more "space" in my body to some of these energies. Also, someone recently reminded me that our bodies have an energetic field that is much larger than where our physical selves end (our skin). When I am feeling like I'm going to explode, I've started to imagine letting that pressure and whatever those feelings/sensations are expand out into the bubble, rather than trying to hold them all inside my body. It has really helped. I know it sounds totally weird, but I'm at the point where I'm beginning to accept the absurdity of my situation and just go with whatever seems to work.

 

[Deleted member 1860]

@Hope4Now,
Yes, I am very much aware that containment is not the same as stuffing, however, they feel very similar to me, and that's why I said I do not use this skill. I even said that I know it works for many. Again, some skills work for some people, while some skills simply don't. I am happy that this skill works for you. I have not had the experience of total system overload, so again, this skill hasn't been a necessity. I have been overwhelmed, yes, but I don't believe its to the point of total system overload as I only get overwhelmed in the emotional sense and do not have things come back to me visually or with any other of my senses (smell, touch, hearing, taste). My point in the previous reply was to let the OP know what the skill is called, along with saying that I don't know anything else about it because I did not find it useful myself. Oh, and that it is a well known skill taught in trauma hospitals. I wasn't trying to say that she shouldn't use it or anything like that. Actually, there are a number of skills that I learned in the trauma hospital that I don't find particularly helpful, this being one of them. I believe that's part of the reason why they throw so many skills at us, because they know that we are all experiencing things a little differently and one skill may work great for one person while it does nothing for the next. It was like "ok, here is your buffet of skills, pick and choose what works for you!" lol.

 

[Friday]

This is something I do naturally (in fact my first psychiatrists described me as "She compartments like a mofo")... And it's also the hardest/worst thing when I'm in PTSD-land : My compartments start breaking down. They leak all over the place, one into another, and my judgements become compromised, and my behaviors end up being wrong (acting one way is perfectly right in this scenario, in this box... And is the completely wrong thing in that scenario, in this other box).

I don't know how to compartmentalize on purpose. I wish I did.

 

[Suzetig]

I'm with @FridayJones on this one - my coping mechanism from childhood was to compartmentalise and it's something I do without thinking. A useful temporary holding technique, it's a nightmare in the longer term. I'm in therapy working through the "compartments" that keep leaking stuff into my day to day life, contaminating relationships etc etc. I'm sorry, I can't tell you how to do it, but for what it's worth it does work to keep me functional - and as a way of managing between therapy sessions it's really helpful but can become a default position, which is less so.

 

[joeylittle]

I'm with @FridayJones and @Suzetig ; really good at boxing but my boxes leak now.

I've had success with leaving the movie of my trauma running in a room, walking out of the room, closing the door, and I just keep walking through more rooms and closing more doors until I'm very far away from it. This helps me now because I have my trauma running in the background almost constantly, but I only want to access it consciously in therapy.

I think the key to imagery is that it be something really resonant with you. I couldn't picture anyone guarding my room/box. But I can get far away. If you can't come up with a guardian, or it feels false to you, try other things - freeze it in a block of ice, drop it in the ocean....