Death Cougar... and the past

[Movingforward10]

Honestly what I think would help the most, are cats. Inside, safe. This was my emotional support animal, even though she wasn't mine. If I could find someone who would let me hang out with their cats, it would help. I know a few people who would likely let me do that if I asked.

Go ask to hang out with cats inside! That sounds a fabulous idea.
My cat would love that. She's a social little thing and just loves people and playing.
I've already offered my neighbour here to come out and hangout with our cat as his died and he is so sad about it. I bet a cat owner would totally get it if you asked.

 

[Guest for now]

Go ask to hang out with cats inside! That sounds a fabulous idea.
My cat would love that. She's a social little thing and just loves people and playing.
I've already offered my neighbour here to come out and hangout with our cat as his died and he is so sad about it. I bet a cat owner would totally get it if you asked.

That's really nice of you, I'm sure your neighbour is grateful for that gesture and will be soothed by the time with your cat.

 

[Guest for now]

I have this problem sometimes in therapeutic situations where the practitioner thinks I am getting my feelings out because they can see me crying, but what I am actually experiencing is the opposite. The emotions I usually need to express are loud and intense. It's not that I need to cry demurely. I need to howl. I'm not just experiencing grief, I'm experiencing agony. So people see the tears flowing and me sniffling and think "good, you're getting your feelings out" but really I am all knotted up trying as hard as I can NOT to let them out, because the container isn't big enough.
That's always been true. There has only been one person I can think of in my entire life who I felt could handle this intensity enough that I could let go and really scream and cry and writhe like I needed to, so it would actually be cathartic. And they're not with me anymore.
It was like that at my acupuncture appointment. Just telling the basics of the story as background for why we needed to work on shock rather than what we would have been doing otherwise, had me almost hyperventilating trying to hold in the agony I was feeling. Probably the needles themselves did some good. I hope. But it was that same thing again, she was asking me how it felt to let go and I kept saying "I'm not letting go, I'm trying as hard as I can to hold on."
The counselor from the community service society is going to call in a bit. I worry about the same issue. I think I'm really sensitive to people's capacity, or lack of capacity, to handle intensity. I can tell really quickly if my trauma is going to be too much for people, and then talking to them might actually do more harm than good.
Which is alarming, because that covers a lot of people, and I really do need help. I could tell just how much today when trying to talk to the acupuncturist between the sobs I was fighting to contain.
This is the trauma the cat was helping ease. She was more help than any therapist has ever been, actually.

 

[Guest for now]

The counselor at the community service place sounds well-meaning but very young and inexperienced. I can't expect much. And that irritates me.

There is a lot of talk in mental health circles about how people are often ashamed of needing help and that keeps them from reaching out. I guess it could be true, but I have to say I've never met anyone who spoke of feeling that way. What I have met, are people galore who spend a great deal of time, energy and money trying to find help that actually helps, and often going through retraumatization, invalidation, and all the other things that come with incompetent help. I count myself among those thus wounded.

Which makes me wonder whether the "there is help available but people are ashamed to reach out" line is actually deliberate gaslighting to cover for the inadequacy of the system. I never thought of that possibility till now.

@Movingforward10 said something a few days ago that I missed until now, about how I am aware of what I need and am further along in healing than I think. I'm thinking about that and hoping it's true. In some ways I've just given up. I've become so aware of my feelings and needs that therapists can no longer keep up with me. I am not going to start a therapeutic process with a new one. For one thing, it would have to be someone highly specialized. Like... really, really, really specialized. Hence likely expensive. And then it would take ages to get them up to speed, all the while dealing with my reactivity that comes with getting my hopes up once again. I'm just too worn out. Now, I'm reaching out to therapists more as temporary consultants, and not taking what any of them say as gospel truth. The problem that still doesn't cover is the attachment trauma. I honestly don't know that I can heal that in this lifetime.

Which is a wound that was being soothed by this little kitty I just lost. That's why this is so much bigger to me than it looks on the surface, which is plenty big enough.

I had a lucid dream a few nights ago, where I faced a monster... not a cougar, more of a humanoid monster... and asked it what part of me it represented. That's what I was doing before this trauma, shadow work through lucid dreams. Which, I agree, requires a great deal of self-awareness. So I asked this character what part of me it represented, and it wouldn't answer. I asked again. Again, no answer. I tried to smooth its face with my hands. No luck. Then just on a hunch, I asked, "if I lie on the ground, will you lie with me?" Yes. We both just lay on the ground together, not moving. Then I woke up. And realized this is the part of me that is so exhausted with all this healing work that has so often led to more pain, that it doesn't even have the energy to speak.

I'm just rambling, but it does help to get my thoughts in order. And I appreciate that people grappling with their own trauma and pain have been here for me.

 

[Guest for now]

"The problem that still doesn't cover is the attachment trauma. I honestly don't know that I can heal that in this lifetime.

Which is a wound that was being soothed by this little kitty I just lost. That's why this is so much bigger to me than it looks on the surface, which is plenty big enough."

Bingo. I've identified the core of this trauma. I know because when I think of trying to express this to someone I hope might help me, it feels like I would trigger myself to the nth degree just trying to get the words out.