An Idea Equating To Informed Self-care In Moments Of Duress...

[Resilientbibliophile]

Hello,

Short response to faraway here. I too find excessive contact hugely draining, whereas one of the work roles I filled was that of a Teen Librarian in a very conservative community. If anything, the close-in exposure to those who extolled in their own reasoned but also distinctly inward-looking way just caught me completely off balance. Imagine if you will all the aspects of social dynamic of a town far more given to the uncritical passage of time via recreational reading, hostile to anything construed as outside their comfort zone, and at nearly every moment evidencing the centrality of family and connectedness that I could not match for being uncomfortably forced to tap my own memory bank concerning such.

I thought I could blend, but the total absence of a support network apart and away from work, my discomfort with what in truth was an invitation into their (by my measure an intolerant and myopic) world, etc. left me terribly vulnerable and set off what became full-blown P.T.S.D. I couldn't be like them, and yet the qualitative difference denominated in terms of social connectedness, support, and love even was so galling that I basically imploded. Rather like a pop song lyric by Pink; i.e. "you're fine, just change everything that you are!". I know I brought a lot in, a predispositon to be triggered based upon many a lack, but still - what an upsetting surprise.

In passing through posts on the work and workplace thread I've stumbled over references to the embrace of work that will be less taxing and less overwhelming contrasted to situations proven too stressful. Libraries and library work is sometimes cited as a direction. For those so-intrigued I would caution that a risk exists to the extent of being pummeled by the social 'haves' if they are predisposed to talk, if for whatever reason you might be branded as different and 'not one of us'. This said, if you are tight with your community, engage in recreational reading without end, and blend well, such a career direction or redirection could be a fair, if only part-time means to add value to your life and the lives of others. Thanks...

M.

 

[faraway]

M, sometimes when I read other posts on here I start to get really paranoid that what why therapist has diagnosed as DDNOS is actually DID. By which I mean, we seem to have found ourselves in exactly the same place in space and time.

I also moved to a rural, closed, hugely bigoted community who, even if I wanted to make friends with people whose views I find abhorrent, wouldn't be interested in me since they are so static in time. Their lives are full with the friends and family they have accrued throughout their stationary, long lives. I am a strange anomaly which they are polite to, but have no interest in inviting in. As I said to an old (faraway) friend the other day: when I do something, I do it properly and I have excelled at alienating myself. I could have not organised a more perfect scenario for alienation if I had consciously tried. Heh.

Maybe you need to move to a city? I know that's where I am headed back to next!

 

[Resilientbibliophile]

Thanks for the kind interest and feedback,

Odd that I've never come across DDNOS before and have no knowledge of it. DID I've pondered but haven't strictly related to. Early on my choice to embrace process addiction manifest as free ranging social science reading propped up a weak ego and weak identity that for long was a pose and not much more. Add years, add a great many titles read, contrasted and synthesized, and gradually what at first seems a disingenuous pose seems an identity that cannot be deactivated or appreciably scaled down. I'm quite terrible with people, restricting myself to short memorized bits that I can speak clearly and audibly to brave what unavoidable social encounters arise before me. If I restrict myself to a benign 'Yes' or 'No' matters more or less glide, but should I really relate my assessment of whatever, it does seem that conversation stops for tonal informality is no more, or people gather and relate to each other based upon a shared reaction to whatever seems different about me. An awful hassle and often not at all pleasant this...

Between my personal interests and proclivities plus where I've worked, there has existed such a gap that amazed I am that an ugly crowd outfitted with pitchforks and such hasn't bound me to a stake and set set matters alight. Materials that speak of passive narcissism seem to capture something about myself, whereas all of the Alice Miller titles such as The Drama of the Gifted Child have been digested, while Kohut and Kernberg have been pushed about my plate. Gosh - such work!

Indeed, I transitioned (or burned up during reentry - call it what you will) between undergraduate work at school in Greenwich Village/Manhattan/NYC dedicated solely to the progressive interpretation of the social sciences to a place teeming with Bible Baptists post completion of a 'back up plan' Library and Information Sciences MA degree. Concerning the public library, about a third of the employees home-schooled their children, whereas only a tiny percentage really seemed to have the stamina and talent to undertake such an effort. The thoughts of most were governed by narrowly-focused ideology, whereas most anything could be assessed and dismissed for short discussion absent reference to anything other than their AM radio dial. When they really let their hair down and opened up, the very strangest folk impressions mixed with severe intolerance issued forth, whereas there simply was no place to go conversationally with the greater majority of them. It was so odd, for most were by their own reasoned standards loving and engaging people, each proud members of their largely undifferentiated community.

Concerning the actual role I filled, imagine if you will being charged to be a teen advocate with a fiction collection made up of what are termed 'issue books' featuring narratives interwoven with upsetting themes really not the stuff of dinnertime conversation for about twenty miles in all directions. I felt terribly trapped, feigned interest in many a thing, tried views on for size to determine the merits of each - but the cult aspect of that environment was undeniable. Wild to be surrounded by those who are convinced they'd be your best neighbor ever, while all the time I'd desire to run away and not look back! In sum, outlier status can be maintained for only so long, whereas how to protest the unconscious cultural air everyone else breathed? So few were the employment opportunities in the field that I felt trapped, whereas depressive fixation upon my lot equated to a freeze posture that prolonged and deepened my suffering. I couldn't adapt to popular needs as manifest by a particular facet of the culture, while this combined with my flaring P.T.S.D. witnessed me fired. Understood in total they weren't wrong, for I could no longer function. The wildly depressed nutty professor-type then.

Please, the very best of luck in relation to your own respective application process, gaining momentum as deadlines approach surely, whereas real is the burden to actively seek community in pockets around institutions of higher learning, meetup groups, UU parishes, online message boards, etc.

M. (seems so sinister - especially if you might be familiar with Fritz Lang)

 

[faraway]

Good luck for your applications as well. Hopefully getting accepted somewhere else will prove a good exit strategy for you.

You don't say if you are getting therapy, but hopefully you are. I think directed reading in relation to one's own mental health is much wiser than reading anything you think is relevant. Often we can accidentally trigger ourselves by reading any and all things which relate to our diagnosis. I take direction from my therapist about what to read and trust him to pick the most helpful books for me.

 

[Resilientbibliophile]

Hello,

Since age fourteen I've seen someone in one capacity or another. For the past year I've been seeing a clinical psychologist specializing in trauma, whereas it does seem the added expense affords better engagement across the couch. Though the experiences of each of us here is and has been different, it has often happened that I'll find myself doing the bulk of the talking without much in the way of therapist feedback; i.e. I'll detect that they're coasting and simply logging hours. Such confuses, such stifles, and yet the need to speak to someone - anyone at times will prompt me to maintain relations even as the level of respect I might otherwise feel erodes. A nasty cycle then, being on the 'quality friend for a fee' plan. While I too rue the corrosive reductionism that denies context and circumstance concerning what have been termed personality disorders or even less-compromising in older texts still - character disorders, I wonder how much movement is possible long-term?

Concerning books, I bring in my materials and run titles and insights gleaned by her. Just from personal experience, unless one is reading the same work or has done so in recent memory, hard it will be to afford direction or strict guidance. It is a bit scary, for given the combination of quite vacant non-parenting I endured amplified by assuming the professional role of a academic librarian, to say that I look up to any authority and trust such is a stretch! I hate that about library work; i.e. the need always to have something to say about matters I'm too frequently ill-equipped to speak of, whereas topical time on target with all the attendant mistakes implied for wrong paths pursued, etc. is simply part of the process.

In lighter moments I might regard myself as an 'Agent of Personal Agency', but then mix in the reading and combine this with trauma-fired hyper-awareness of so much that is poorly thought out, inadequately synthesized with other materials, or just plain inept and I come to feel under assault from all sides. Everything in such moments seems to inadequately developed and in need of a thoughtful rewrite. In part I read so that in turn I too may have something to contribute where often only disconnected facets are sensed. How much of this is bluster only time will tell.

Popular works, or those likely most-accessible tend to put me to sleep. Going into librarian literature review-mode, I feel I'm reviewing the worth of someone else's labors rather than fully tuning-in to what might be relevant and on-target relative to myself. Librarians while away hours spending down purchasing budgets, even if they haven't strictly the background to make choices those with topic knowledge could otherwise employ. The secondary source titles whereby writers cull seminal works to draw wider attention to trends and insights tend to blur together after a while. This prompts a desire to find seminal works, whereas it was rather strange to notice van der Kolk and Hermann missing from the book review thread when I first chanced across the P.T.S.D. Forum via online search. Perhaps if I can keep matters at a fairly basic level I could add a few titles to the list of materials hitherto identified? No fit is perfect in relation to any material read and mulled, but facets of each that evidence some personally felt worth sustain aspects of myself even as I often feel a walking and talking train wreck. Thanks...


M.

 

[faraway]

I'll find myself doing the bulk of the talking without much in the way of therapist feedback; i.e. I'll detect that they're coasting and simply logging hours.

That's a shame. Perhaps you should find a new one? I know my therapist enjoys our sessions (he told me) and I believe that he genuinely wants to help me. I don't think I could have made the trust leap without believing that he genuinely cares. Without that trust (still growing), I wouldn't get much from the session. I had therapists before who just let me talk and talk and they did nothing. This one is an entirely different kettle of fish and has helped me so much already.

Perhaps if I can keep matters at a fairly basic level I could add a few titles to the list of materials hitherto identified?

I don't know how that works, but I am sure the mods would be interested. The only caution with insider lit is that they can be triggering for people, so perhaps that's why they are absent. I don't know though.

However, I do have to say that I really agree with Abstract up there: I think you might find it helpful to back off from the lit.

Good luck with everything.

 

[Resilientbibliophile]

Thanks for the kind interest and attention afforded - it means much to me,

The caution reference in relation to the triggering power of insider literature is entirely apt. I incautiously stockpiled psych. materials while still in my last workplace hoping if you will to erect some defense against toxic relations that took root there, and the flashbacks that gathered in intensity even as the bullying activity ebbed somewhat. For study, what had felt like ten triggers multiplied to thirty, etc. My triggers seemed to grow in sophistication, whereas cognitive deconstruction doesn't really put the fire out if the blaze is feeding on upsetting emotional recall. I was reaching for anything, telling myself that if nothing could be done for the social environment and circumstance that I found myself in that I owed it to myself and to unmet others to put my mental house in order to prevent a repeat. No T. through all of this early effort, whereas I think it is my habit to surreptitiously read more when advised not to do so. A defensive process addiction in a manner of speaking - and don't I know it.

Clinical literature review can be a peculiar and disembodied experience akin to reading the detailed notes of aliens who have landed in one's yard, swept a specimen away, and have in the most detached manner dissected you complete. So much of what I've read seems disproportionately weighed in the direction of identification of what prompts P.T.S.D., the mechanism guiding such, whereas indeed, it isn't strictly a happy discovery to steal the official play book any interested and invested professional would refer to for in essence the mystery behind a conception of cure is lost. Too many clinical generalities, a mix of means identified to address matters, but hard it is to place profound faith in the last 30 to 100 pages of some titles I've read. Some of the best clinical materials are written in a language usually reserved for washer & dryer repair, seemingly denying that anyone could clutch to unique identity for all the dysfunction in evidence. No - there seems no way to extol that tonal dimension of what the clinical material holds versus the popular market treatments that have their place and value. It's fair to caution others to embrace primary sources second, and to start with more accessible materials that are more comforting and accommodating in tone on advice from professional T's acclimated to judging what will be an appropriate fit.

If there is a positive dimension to scholarly literature and more formal academic monographs is that the language and concepts are more consistently presented and identified. Of course there are competing factions, competing schools in relation to how to identify, qualify, quantify and approach matters. It is a formal discipline with a language to match, whereas there exists a continuum of accessibility and academic rigor concerning all thoughts put forth. Sometimes I notice with distaste that efforts to make the underlying concepts accessible to the lay reader sometime misfire if the concepts obliquely referred to are already grasped under their more formal identification. For this, a certain sense of tedium builds that can preclude discovery of valued original content and insights that might nevertheless be harbored within a volume. I imagine I become frustrated, but I also recognize that for other readers such an approach will be rightly perceived as value added.

Though just me, perhaps appreciate that for reading other academic topics I couldn't shift down to register respect and attention to any other level of presentation. Drugstore book section verse just stifles me, but then as admitted in my first paragraph, I well and truly broke open the doors that hitherto held fast many a secret, many a vulnerability, etc. I really don't know if simply seeing a therapist even twice or three-times a week would have filled my mind sufficiently to counteract aspects of pain and fear felt at all other times, whereas now I guess I've come to better appreciate the more scholarly materials for they strike me as more filling. Some of the toxicity of the thirty triggers has lessened, but aspects of the pain and vulnerability implied clearly remain hot as is clear from the volume of words in evidence. And yes, sometimes in desperation others have politely made the point as to whether I should just set all my stuff aside and live. I guess an aspect of myself desires to do this, but then a stronger aspect or facet of my being shrugs off the well-intended advice.

Evolution upon a continuum of healing, of more healthful cognitions and what such may make possible, etc. comes through, but the ache concerning aspects of what was missed, what has been absent in my life doesn't stand to be addressed it does seem. I guess this is where one places hope in the future, in relations not yet formed, in connections that stand to be established and perhaps deepened. Trust? Sigh... May some combination of elements that includes personal growth, assertion, a different and hopefully more challenging environment afford me latitude to feel greater comfort consistent with that most valued of qualities. Thanks...


M.

 

[faraway]

cognitive deconstruction doesn't really put the fire out if the blaze is feeding on upsetting emotional recall.

This is kind of my point. I'm suggesting that maybe it might be good for you to get out of your head and feel instead. Does your therapist do any sensorimotor work with you? I personally find this really helpful since it is away of addressing the underlying and stuck emotions that don't dissipate with intellectual understanding of a problem. It's these emotions that keep you stuck, imo.

On the one hand, I am reading a particular book on IFS (Schwartz) that my therapist thinks will compliment the work that we are doing and won't be too triggering for me (although it is some), but if we hadn't already done the sensorimotor work, I wouldn't even notice how it was triggering me and therefore where and what. And this isn't about specific emotional recall either, as I have dissociative amnesia. It's just about drawing my attention to what is happening in my body all the time, which is something I have not done my entire life. Imo, it's only by getting out of my head and back into my body that I will finally process all this ... whatever it is.

I think it is my habit to surreptitiously read more when advised not to do so.

If you know this, maybe you should take heed of the insight? :)

And yes, sometimes in desperation others have politely made the point as to whether I should just set all my stuff aside and live.

I'm not even remotely suggesting this. What I am trying to say is that perhaps you are over-intellectualising things as a way to put things to the side yourself. You're using it as a crutch, perhaps?

 

[Resilientbibliophile]

Thanks for the kind interest,

At present there just aren't many human actors in my life, whereas developing an identity within a new circumstance where feelings, emotions, etc. might be validated seems some time off. Throw off the crutch of making a creative exploration of the experience feels like further exposure without hope of evolving out and beyond what has been suffered.

My T. also sides with efforts to encourage me to feel more, although in isolation and with no reliable aid to help me right myself, feeling anything seems a terrible risk best avoided. Especially if my perceptions are so-clouded by traumatic recall of matters I cannot quite place; i.e. the dreaded emotional recall of what was tonally traumatic. At least if I read I won't run into a wall of misunderstanding, stigma, or cruelty - but then such an orientation precludes the possibility of any positive social experience. It seems I want to be situated in one of those post-apocalyptic science fiction films where some near-utopian colony of survivors exists to afford me the opportunity to start again in some measure. Always just out of sight though, though alluring all the while. Sorry to be so glum even as I don't wish to be negative. Thanks...

M.