Strange Star

[Hope4Now]

It has been a wildish 24 hours. In 24 hours, I have discovered that my daughter and her two friends are being bullied by the mean girls at school. Not physical bullying...just really passive aggressive stuff. I have to call her advisor today to express my concern. I have learned that her friend wants to be a boy but doesn't know how. Her friend's mother confided in me (!). So I allowed to her that I consider myself genderqueer. Told her she can talk to me all she wants, and her daughter can talk to me too. I discovered another friend's husband has terrible cancer and friend has not told her daughter about it. And it just goes on and on. I have to stop listening to NPR and stop looking at the newspaper again. I feel so selfish and ignorant when I have to shut out the world's news, but I am really no good to anybody when I take it in. I just don't seem to be able to manage it anymore.

I woke up this morning with terrible shakes so baby part is probably breaking back into consciousness. Husband had to basically drag me out of bed which was terribly annoying at the time, but helped because I managed a shower and some hot drinks and kind of re-centered enough to get daughter to school.

I see Mr. Famous today. Will be stuck in traffic for hours on the way back. I am planning to talk with him about tapering off the prozac. I would like to try a go with no meds at all and see what happens. I am not convinced the prozac is doing much at all for me. Yet I'm also sort of afraid to go off of it. I got off the other meds fine, but I had not been on them for this long. I've been on prozac for around 10 months now. But something in me wants off, so I'm going to go off. I suppose mostly I am afraid that Mr. Famous will think that I want to be sick. But I don't. I just want to be healthy without taking medicine. Maybe this is naive. I don't think so. We'll see.

Besides, I have a lot of strategies for coping with getting flooded so long as I can remember to use them in time. And I'm not as afraid of what is happening to me any more. Parts are afraid a lot, but I seem to be tuned in enough to SELF, just enough, that I don't get overrun by anxiety with my physical symptoms or the flashbacks or the nightmares or the myriad of other "symptoms" as I used to.

This living life stuff is exhausting. But I think I'm getting stronger. I don't think anybody else thinks I am, but I think I am. I think I'm going to be able to process some stuff soon. I hope so. I need to get back to regular meetings with Yoda. He has helped me more than anyone and I am deeply grateful.

 

[Pietro]

Hmmm. I feel another boating analogy essay coming on.

I like this analogy. :D It is much like this.

I am not convinced the prozac is doing much at all for me.

You might be surprised at what the drug is doing. I went-off an SSRI, a few years back, and it was a bad decision. I wasn't ready. My situation was different from yours, though. I'd been on the drug for 13 years, at that point, and had no trauma therapy yet. It may be worth making an attempt to see if you can get off the drug, but just be prepared if you end-up feeling you need to go back on it again.

 

[Hope4Now]

So...I start tapering off today. By the end of three weeks, I will be off all meds except my vitamins. Then I'm told it will be another 6 weeks or so until my receptors readjust. We'll see what happens. I think that Mr. Famous thinks this is not such a great idea but also understands that some part or parts of me are quite invested in knowing whether or not meds are actually helping. And part or parts that are profoundly upset by the weight gain. I told him that maybe I will be wrong and will come crawling back asking to go back on them. We've made an appointment for December.

I'm pretty activated in these past few days. Lots of dreams. Lots of physical stuff. More shifting happening in the system, I think. Kind of maybe still in the process of "realization."

It's funny that I can sort of get this more in hindsight than in the moment. I've begun reading my journals again. I have tried this before but abandoned the project because it was too activating. I'm determined to do it now. What I've begun to understand is that I DO know all this stuff...that somehow it does actually all connect with me...that somehow it is actually all real...I know that sounds so weird. But seriously--yesterday I read my journal entries from the weeks prior to entering psychotherapy...and I was pretty stunned to discover how consistent my reflections were with what I've come to know about myself in the subsequent two years. I was much more confused and defensive and unbelieving, but the stuff was mostly there sort of sketched out in vague shadows.

I understand now that I have a part of me that is very deeply invested in preventing my system from acknowledging the realities of my present and my past. And it is quite ingenious at convincing me that I am making this all up. In the face of every evidence to the contrary. I am so good at this, in fact, that I have realized a stunning truth.

Something happened my senior year in high school. It involved running away and later being hospitalized and put into traction and undergoing dozens of tests to determine the cause for my physical pain. The whole thing was rather a crisis in my family and in my educational career. I have felt guilty for my whole life because I was convinced that I faked it all...that I was just trying to get attention or something. That what happened didn't really happen. Or it did, but it was not me it happened to. Or something. I'm beginning to grasp that I didn't fake anything. That this part of me has convinced me I am a liar and a faker and etc. but when I can get myself to stand back and really remember what was happening and the people involved and the circumstances...things were actually pretty abysmal. But somehow I morphed the external hideousness into something that I made up. Something that happened to somebody else. I suppose maybe this is this part's way of maintaining control over what was uncontrollable.

As I have relived much of my life in flashbacks of varying sorts over the past two years, I am beginning to realize that this part of me controls most of the way I have perceived myself in relation to the external world. This part is not willing to acknowledge the extent of my hurt and helplessness. It is terrified. So it convinces me I have made it all up. It is all very confusing. See, I have another part that zooms in when that first part gets too tired. The other part just makes me confused and tired so I stop thinking about it and forget what has happened, and I just keep going. Kind of like a chicken with its head cut off, but it's body keeps moving.

But then I keep going until I crash. But then I can't acknowledge that I have crashed even when I have. It is too humiliating to crash. Perhaps this is why I manage to "forget" so much. So that I can just keep on keeping on. Because parts of me are afraid I will die if I don't. It's not so much forgetting as it is having parts that prevent me from remembering. If that makes sense.

But now that I have moments when I can be okay with the fear of dying...can accept it as part of living...then everything shifts and I see things completely differently. Paradigm shift. All the confusing bits and pieces of my life make so much sense when I can get into that place. And I don't die from remembering. It's bloody uncomfortable and miserable, but I don't die. The more I can embrace the uncomfortableness...the more I can give space to feel it, experience it...the more things open up. And I remember. And I can see who I am now in time and space. And I have hope that maybe all these mixed up bits of myself are actually okay. Maybe a bit hard to look at, but okay. It's a bit like an abstract painting, I suppose. I have "hung" myself in my own conception just one way. Almost two years ago, the painting started to spin and left me a mess in my efforts to understand it. The spinning has slowed some now. Finally. I have moments of clarity when I recognize that I have been looking at everything the wrong way around.

Well, maybe not the wrong way around, but just that there are different ways to hang the painting so that it makes a bit more sense...so that the movement and space and color flow better even if it remains a disturbing picture. I just have to get used to looking at it from this new perspective.

I am okay with looking at miserable ugly things once I get over being afraid. And then they are not so miserable and ugly any more. They're just vulnerable. Whether it is peering under the pressure bandage to see how bad the cut really is, or having a conversation with the terribly burned and deformed woman I worked with long ago, or that moment of realization at the motorcycle accident when I took in the whole picture and recognized the inevitable outcome, or any of a million things. What really happened in the dorm room in college. What really happened in my bedroom as a kid. And in the bathroom. And the kitchen. Etc.

I suppose my parts are beginning to let me "see" some of this stuff with increasing frequency. And I'm not reacting as much in my old ways. I am learning new ways to look without being quite so afraid. And the perspectives are beginning to shift. And I think maybe, just maybe, I will be able to become a person whose insides and outsides all match up even if they are difficult to be with.

Feeling very philosophical today, I suppose. Probably just avoiding going to see my mother. I don't want to go see her. I have been putting it off for a week now. Somehow it seems the right thing to do, though. Something is keeping me from going there, and I think maybe, just maybe, it is a sense that I need to sit with these newish insights without getting derailed. We'll see.

 

[KwanYingirl]

I haven't read your whole diary @Hope4Now but wow I love how you articulate living and healing and making some hopeful insights. Just wow!! You helped me so much when I started getting body memories. What we learn over time is hey, maybe I can be "not me", that those parts that hold us together can remain strong even when we're decompensating. Like scaffolding. I recently had an experience in which I became 4 again and I wasn't afraid. So awesome. Also, I told my shrink I want to stop Geodone because of the weight gain. What if all this work we've put into our healing really heals our brain? We won't know unless we try. I have so many tools now than I had 15 years ago. I have to wait til December. Thank you for sharing.

 

[Hope4Now]

Thank you for your note, @KwanYingirl. I'm glad I was helpful with the body memories. Just paying it forward, or whatever. I was so confused and freaked out when I first started on this site...and so many people were so helpful to me.

I suppose maybe that is part of why I want to write something of my experience now. Partly because I think it would help me to get some sort of concreteness of experience onto paper, and partly I want to write the book that I wish I could have read a few years ago. I've read a few memoirs that have helped me a lot. So maybe I will throw mine into the wind and see what happens. It won't be a memoir though. That is too coherent and I am not there yet. I'm not sure what it will be. I suppose I have to write it first, and then decide.

A bit like living my life or painting a painting. I've never been very good at planning...I'm much better at just jumping in altogether and then figuring things out as I go along. I have a part that wants to plan. That wants to control and predict and manage everything. If it gets too intense I probably would be OCD-ish. But it's just a part. I think perhaps it is the part that keeps derailing my creative attempts.

I recently had an experience in which I became 4 again and I wasn't afraid.

That's GREAT! That you were able to be with your 4-year old part...not IN it! That's the difference for me. Too often, I'm IN my parts. It's a very fine balance. I still fall in most of the time. But not as much as I used to. And I still keep going back to try again. Sounds as if you are doing the same. Good work!

What if all this work we've put into our healing really heals our brain? We won't know unless we try. I have so many tools now than I had 15 years ago.

This is basically the conversation I had with Yoda and Mr. Famous. I won't know unless I try.

Peace, K-girl!

 

[Hope4Now]

I was doing okay and suddenly it seems I am not. Back to the cutting of arms. Not bad. Not deep. Really in grand scheme of things not bad at all, but bad for me.

comes after a day of journalling about s.ome really serious stuff. Had auditory hallucinations multiple times. Parts trying to distract me from what I was writing about. I know that. but stil. Guess flooded or bleneded tonight. Not good. I thought I had done with this shiit. But it is back again. I am okay. Am gong to sleep now. I hope. Typing here is hard. Not a good night I will likely regret this post in the am. Crap crap crap. was writig today in journal that thought maybe hospital time again but this time voluntary \. Then laughed at myh entry. But maybe time again. Don't want this but some sort of schit is going gon. Sorry Not sure why I am event typing here. last connect maybe. I will be okay in am. goin to bed now. It is a good siogn that i am seeing all the we9ird ty[os I am maklng I think. and correcting most of them/ Iam really messed u[ at the moment. so I am going to stop writing and go to bet.

 

[Hope4Now]

yep. regret. I just read what I wrote last night. I hate dissociation.

 

[Deleted member 12723]

Me too. It is a tricky thing to deal with on a regular basis and so unhelpful to our plans. You are a gifted and talented writer so have no regrets about what you write here.

 

[shimmerz]

It is a clue that something is wrong. Not all bad. Honest. @gizmo is right, you are a very gifted writer. We all know that. You are allowed (believe it or not) to have a bad night. We love you through it all. :hug:

 

[Hope4Now]

We love you through it all. :hug:

Wow. Okay. That helps with my disorganized attachment issues! Lol!

 

[Hope4Now]

Yes, as @shimmerz says, something is wrong. Or right? Who knows. Stuff is coming up hard and fast and parts of me don't like it at all and I feel very, very discombobulated. (Yes, enough that my husband asked to talk to Yoda...so things are not good). Parts of me feel like I ought to be in the hospital again, and parts of me feel like that is simply stupid and ridiculous.

I don't think I am going to truly hurt myself from the outside. Scratches etc., maybe sometimes when I get flooded. But I think I have enough drive to live, enough drive to feel like I still have some sort of purpose in this world, to keep going no matter what. But the parts of me that want to self destruct (firefighters) think otherwise, and I'm having a bit of a hard time keeping them toeing the line.

What's funny (not ha ha but in the ironic sort of way) is that I have always, as an educator, been most bonded with the kids who fall between the cracks. The ones who aren't in "crisis" but who are desperate nonetheless. I suppose I understand this all better these days. It's just me projecting. How egotistical! (:wtf:). Because I am like them.

I am not going to do away with myself if I can manage any semblance of SELF-ness. There is too much good and interesting stuff in this world. As Robert Frost wrote, "earth's the right place for me." And yet, parts of me are scared of these self-destructive parts. As if I don't stay vigilant, they will take me over. And yet, in order to get better, I need to calm the hyper-vigilance. But as soon as I calm it, (i.e., get the protectors to chill), things get overwhelming. I'm not good at this balancing act that is life as a person with trauma who hasn't yet figured out how to love myself. Sigh.

I wish I knew how better to live in this world.

I have been telling people for a year now that I am not depressed. Really, I don't think I am. I think I am just overstimulated. Too much all at once and my system can't handle it. Then. Now. Thennow. Mindfulness is good. I am working on that. Working on reminding my system that I am here, now. That it (all of "it") is over. And that it is time to come together and sort all this crap out. But some of my stuck protectors can't quite go with that, and the firefighters come zooming in.

So I am just trying to "be" with the sad. Because there is a f-load of sad sad sad.

Yoda seems to think I am doing good work. Parts of me think I am doing good work. I am doing good work. But it is really sloggy, crappy work and I don't like this shit about not feeling safe in myself.

It is good that I notice this. But my panic system gets panicked still when I am not shutdown.

I need someone to stand in the middle of my see-saw to help balance things. And I can't do it much of the time. I know what I need to do. I need to be in SELF to balance the see-saw of exiles and protectors/firefighters. But I just can't do it most of the time. Will a hospital help? Maybe. Maybe I am ready now to go to a locked unit that can help keep me safe while I figure out this damned see-saw thing. But I wish I could do this on my own. So...one moment at a time. I am balancing the see-saw tonight.

Went to my writers' group that hasn't met since June. Good stuff, hearing from these folks what they are doing. They gave me an assignment. We'll see if I can manage it.

Time for bed.

 

[Hope4Now]

This morning, early, I had the worst nightmare I've had since I was a very small child tormented by nightmares. I woke up making a lot of noise. Woke up my husband who calmed me some. Finally fled the bed to make coffee. It has stayed with me all day long. Lots of parts wildly activated. Because the dream was pretty obviously about the night in the bedroom when I was three. The night I exploded into parts. And the parts were all in the dream. And it was terrifying and painful and awful what happened. And I am just working on tolerating it. And it is really, really hard to do.

I have been in my bed most of the day. It is the only place that feels sort of safe. And warm. I have been freezing cold all day long. And I am just being with my parts as best I can. And I keep reminding them that it is all over even though they don't believe me. I am here. Now. I survived.

I think some of my parts from that night are trying to integrate their experiences by showing me each of their separate experiences in the dream so that I have to put it all together. The physical pain and the terror and the lapsing in and out of consciousness and the panic and the frozenness.

This dream felt so real. Because I could FEEL things. FEEL pain. FEEL emotion. These kinds of nightmares are happening more and more frequently...where I'm not just watching myself without feeling anything, but I'm kind of in and out of myself. And I am feeling the emotions. In my body. But this morning was the first time I felt the pain too in the dream. It was terrifying.

It left me wondering whether it was sort of half dream/half flashback. It was a kind of follow-up to the terrible flashback on Monday morning. That one still has me reeling.

I am exhausted even though I slept all day. I am scared that I will not be able to do everything I need to do tomorrow. My husband leaves for five days tomorrow morning, and I need to get my daughter to three different places--one which will require a great deal of walking. I am considering buying a wheelchair that would allow me to get around.

But I did something nice for myself. I scheduled a massage for tomorrow afternoon. I haven't had one for three months and I think I could really use it.

This FEELING stuff is pretty hideous. But I know I need to open to it if I am going to get whole again and be alive and not just a walking brain. I need a whole SELF. One. I am too tired of all the chaos and shutdown.