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Connecting the dots...

Susan Jane

Diamond Member
My sister just left; she was here visiting for 3 weeks. Normally. we cancel if one of us is not great, as we both suffer from mental heath stuff. I took her to the airport this morning, and was proud I could drive...like hey I have had a drivers license for three plus decades and driven on both sides of the road, but in a bad episode and I feel like I have never driven. 🤣 After getting her to the security check, my sister has trouble using her mobile phone, computer etc. and therefore often asks me. Now under normal circumstances I roll my eyes and help. Lately it makes me so stressed I can hardly deal. Well guess what the universe decided? After getting through security someone stole her wallet as it was coming off the trays! Super! She called me and her CC, residence card, drivers license and health card are now gone. We are on different ends of the telephone, her with the police and me. One added complication, she doesn't speak German. Guess who dealt? After hours of dealing and cancelling CC all is back in some order. Nevertheless, I was tired and fell asleep for an hour. This is not something I do, as I often cannot sleep at all. I thought it would be okay, but I woke up in my panic, sister gone, all alone. I called her and told her I was panicking, and we felt slightly better. Why the story?



It made me realize just how deep memories of being afraid go down, even decades later. It reminded me I do not trust anyone to be there in the long run. Why? Well, my early childhood was just so unpredictable, abusive, I felt so alone and afraid. How the effin hell did my mother not know what she was doing to us? I get angry but then tell myself ...Do not go down that road, she was doing the best she could and was mentally unstable herself. Then I land again on the reason I have this nervous disorder that flashes and freaks me out and then changes into depression, because I cannot see my way out. That is my trauma. I breath and say to myself "do something to make this go away, anything!" Then I realize, I do not have anything to make it go away, I don't do Valium, alcohol or call someone not good for me to try and make me feel safe. Why? These are temporary measures, and they do not work, they prolong everything, and I must deal with the same shit afterwards. Now what? I calmly tell myself, this is a scared child, not you. You are an adult; you are not back there. The airport across from my house, the anxiety I felt, the noise from the small planes buzzing in my ears and I am back there scared and helpless. This feeling, the dread of the noise, the outside, my sister, who just left visiting .... tormenting me. My sister and I have since worked it out, she apologized for years to me about her abuse, and I knew she was passing down the abuse she was getting being the older sister. I used to cry in our room when my mother would scream at her and hit her, belittle her, even though she tormented me, I loved her. This is but one of so many points I go back to... that house, the carpet color, the floor plan, the back yard...and my primal fear. This was even before I was given away to the foster system. What all happened in that house? Is it important? The second memories is the house across the street, my best friend, Monique and her brother. We loved to play, and unfortunately her father did as well. He used to walk around naked in from of us. He masturbated as we watched TV, and we pretended not to notice. He scared me. He used to tell me I could show him my pussy if I wanted to and pitch my private parts. He would try to get into the bathroom when we were having a bath and would shake the door and yell at us. She used to say ignore him, and I was terrified. I do not know if anything else happened. I finally told my mentally unstable mother, and I remember her going there and speaking to him. I do not know what she said, I think I was happy for the protection. Nevertheless, she left us soon after, she sent us to foster care. They separated us my sister and I and we didn't see much of each other for 6 years. I was 8 foster homes, she was in 3 and then lived on the street and sold drugs to survive. During this time, she was raped by gun point, and I was well, not very well. I met an older boy, and he was abusive, and I got pregnant at 15.

I have never talked about this with a therapist me getting pregnant, my sister getting raped at gun point. It just seemed like someone else's life and I disassociated into my dream world. How do I speak about such things?

My parents abandoned us. My mother was partying in Hawaii, and my father was remarried and wouldn't take us, even though he had the money to do so. How does one feel any amount of self worth?

This shit is just the tip of the iceberg, and I still question if I have trauma issues? why has it taken me so long to let myself off the hook? To say yes these and other shitty things happened to me from 0-15 and I am not at fault? I was a child and had no direction. 🧚‍♀️
 
I reread my last entry, and I felt my nerves were really in control yesterday. I feel a bit more in the drivers seat today. That only took 1 real phone call to see that my sister landed safely, and a short chat about my effin feelings. Then a check in with a very good friend, and I felt somewhat safe somehow. It is the fears of the future that get me into catastrophic thinking, how to handle each part of the future, with a full blown picture of all the things that could go wrong, thank you my nerves, thanks for the support. 🤣 Mental f*cking gymnastics and then trying to calm myself out of the doubts. I talked to my sister about this and she said that is when she used to smoke pot, when these feelings come up. Other friends drink and those are things I cannot do. Any form of drugs or alcohol make my symptoms even worse. So I breath in and out and tell myself, this too will pass. The days are long during these times of the cycle of PTSD.

The truth is that I am absolute isolated in my head, and I am so so f*cking lonely there. Now I am a strong capable women, and have accomplished so much before now. I KNOW I am responsible for myself. BUT I have been alone with it for so long. I am so jumbled at the moment. Take one step at a time I keep telling myself, get back out of this episode, and be patient. I cannot read another self help book or listen to another self help podcast, cause I already know what they are going to say. So I am in isolation, not well enough to engage in the world properly, and so lonely from being alone. I work hard at balance, eat well, sleep well enough and I know I have to support myself. Wouldn't it be nice to have a magic wand and just feel your best self without all these PTSD symptoms coming up at you even with trivial tasks? Yes I am being a baby boo hoo... I know but I am frustrated at the moment. 🧚‍♀️
 
Still stuck and reread the thread. I still believe everything I wrote. The depression has a grip and it won‘t let go. I am separating my healthy thinking from the illness. Reminding myself I am not my depression, I am a warrior. I practice acceptance, and my mind is so tired of all the negative memories of depression. It moves from one place to another reminding me it might break me. I take a breath, I tell myself feelings can‘t kill me. I put the depression in the corner ask it to stay there and let me live in peace. I am not exercising much, losing weight and feel weak. I don‘t want to lose hope, do I forced myself out of bed to my chair. I need some stories of hope that I will be myself again. Being myself means coping with my mental heath. I don‘t need tips about exercise, I know the drill, my depression is stronger than my rationale mind right now. Hanging on and not giving up is my small step for now. 🧚‍♂️
 
So I have been writing about how to get through the day for about since March 12, it’s been a rather rough ride. I checked myself in the clinic at the end of March because I had lost 9 kilos and began feeling suicidal. I got an emergency note from my psychologist and asked my son and his girlfriend brought me in. Unfortunately I had to stay in a locked ward for 5 days… no openings on the other wards. I did what I had to do for my family. My son is a beautiful soul and although he helps, he is finishing up his studies and I don’t believe he should be responsible for my eating and staying alive. I decided that I could kill myself without a testimonial for my son, so it took 4 weeks of EKT but the suicidal thoughts are under control. That’s is the think about my mental health issue. I normally have the stuff undercontrollish. When I can’t get out of bed for weeks and I stop eating….. and the bc suicidal thoughts come, that’s a warning sign and I have to ask for help. It has nothing to do with weakness or lack of knowledge. It’s a place I cannot reason with other than stay alive. I am going to write a bit about it over the next few days. I am still in hospital but feeling like I might have a better understanding about how it happens to me and how I can do more to help myself not get this bad again 🧚‍♂️
 
Been following along your journey over the last couple of months. ECT is a difficult treatment to have to sign up for (been in that situation myself), but it’s so good to see it’s helped you get back to where you want to be.
 
Thanks still a long road but what isn’t ☺️. This is my third journey and what’s different now is my main goal is to figure stuff out so I won’t have to do a fourth…. Found a good doctor as well! My next session is on Friday and I am hoping to get to the maintenance part within the next 3 weeks. The last 3 before sessions I just wanted to return to life as it was. This time I am sure some of my choices and need to be perfect at work sent me down this road. Looking forward to sharing my findings @Sideways. I finally really believe I have the illness which means I have to take better care of myself than before 🧚‍♂️
 
I grew up in West LA with my mother until I was about 9. My parents divorced when I was 1 year old. Both of my parents should have had to get a license to be parents. My mother left my father and, my older sister and I lived with my mom until she broke down. Both of them did not possess the selflessness to put us girls first. Now, I do not mean spoiled rotten, I mean not embarrassed to attend school due to their behavior. It was the 70's and divorce was frowned upon. My mother though it was cool not to where a bra. Now these things may seem normal nowadays, but back they weren't. I have no problem with these things but society back than did. I paid for my mother's behavior at school. One might say well, she is allowed to express herself, which is true, but she could have done it slightly quieter. I spend the first 9 years of my life being bullied at school by other students, by my older sister and also occasionally sexually assaulted by my best friends father. The problem was I had no one to go to, the basic care and support that is essential to children. These are just some of the treats I lived through. I hid most of the time and was afraid to go outside. My mother was no support. My father was absent and when I did see him he viciously teased me, because I looked like my mother and he hated her. My father enjoyed making me afraid and loved to see me cry. After that period I was placed in foster care, separated from my sister and moved through 8 homes by the age of 16. These things affected my nervous system tremendously. I started having dissociative panic attacks at around age 7. I didn't know what they were so I just hid or froze. It took me 40 years to understand what was happening. Growing up unwanted and neglected messed up my own perception of myself, and it is just in the last 2 years, 57 years later that I understand why I have made so many bad choices in relationships, and why I am a perfectionist. I intend to slowly change that when I finish my ECT treatment and get out of the hospital. ECT has saved me more than once, but it has a cost to me. It's difficult and terrifying. It's a last resort when my depression gets so out of hand that getting out of bed isn't possible. I thank my son for standing by me, getting me to the hospital, and not judging me. I share as little as possible bout the cause of my illness with him. He isn't dumb, and the gory details are not something I want to stick in his beautiful mind. He does however, sometimes speak to me when I am in recovery, to remind me that I will get through it. I think ECT is a valuable tool, but should be used with caution.
 
I never realized how much being neglected affects a person’s core beliefs. I think after this session of ECT I am going to go to a holistic healing center. Western medicine got me out of the worst but I have work to do 🧚‍♂️
 

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