General Sleep, Anxiety, And Partner With Nightmares

[kahlan]

UOk, so a little background. My ex, nearly every Friday and Saturday night would come home drunk and belligerent. Doors slamming, furniture upended, yelling, you name it. It got to the point I wasn't sleeping well because I was anticipating the blowup, to the point any noise sent me into a heart racing panicky mess. I moved out a few months ago and haven't had an issue since, til tonight. The little guy(my 3 year old) got up and when I heard the bathroom door shut I shot out of bed with the expectation of being screamed at and worse. I

Now I'm worried. If the bathroom door shutting is enough to set me off now (happened an hour ago and I'm still shaky) what's going to happen when N. is here and has a nightmare or flashback while I'm asleep and wakes me. Any advise on how to keep cool or relax would be apreciated.

 

[franciemarnie]

I'm so sorry you are going thru this. I know the feelings well.

My only recommendation based on what works for me is grounding and mindful meditation. I do body scans thru out the day. I check in with my sensory experience of real time regularly. What do I see, smell, taste, hear, feel right now.

You startle up from past trauma. Anything you can do to connect with your safe present- day would be great. Maybe there is something that anchors you to safety and the here and now you could keep by your bed.

I hope this doesn't go on too long or at leasy isnt every night. Being triggered and going thru sleep deprivation are a total total drag to say the least.

 

[kahlan]

Thanks :)

 

[Abstract]

Gosh Kahlan, that is not something anyone should have to live with.

I am assuming N doesn't behave in this way and that you feel safe with him in general? If that is so then doing affirmations along that line may help as well as bringing down your base level of stress hormones in the way that Franciemarnie said.

Its difficult when it is happening when one is asleep as we don't have an opportunity to protect ourselves psychologically .

Is there something grounding that you could have on hand for when you are woken? You can "fill" it with safe thoughts etc.

 

[kahlan]

I do feel safe with him which is definitely a new feeling for me in general :eek:. I'm just worried about frreaking out on him when (because he'll have nightmares around me at some point) this happens and make things worse. I'm going to try to find something to keep bedside that may help because chainsmoking and overthinking obviously don't help lol. I just remembered a book I got on relaxation that my old therapist recommended but I never read. Going to havr to dig that out and look through it.

The wholr thing last night just kind of scared me. As much crap as I've been through this is the first time I've ever felt like that.(I have occasional panic attacks but nothing that felt like I was somewhere else specific like that. Even when I have them I still am very aware of where I am) This time I truly felt like I was back in my old bed just waiting on him to come in. Add being scared of my reaction to the door sound and my obssessing and over thinking everything, the whole thing just has me worried :(

 

[Abstract]

Is there anything in your life at the moment that might have brought some of the past stuff back up? Could it be that N's stuff is doing that for you?

The mind is a strange thing. Sometimes the subconscious just spits something out randomly and for little reason.

Grounding can be very helpful and doing lots of affirmations about safety.
Actually I just wanted to add Kahlan that I think it's fine if you need to sleep in a separate room if you are not feeling up to being exposed to it.

 

[kahlan]

Had a very long weekend at work plus N. has been isolating for about a month because a very close friend he served with committed suicide an I worry about him. The rest is stuff I've been dealing with since I moved out. If I didn't have a kid with my exr it would be so much easier because I could cut all contact with him, change my phone #, not let him know where I live. As it stands I still have to keep some level of "communication" open which he abuses. Maybe the stress of all these things together just had me more on edge than I was aware? I'm really hoping that this is just a temporary stress reaction. As much as I can identify with a lot of the feelings here in this forum I don't think I'm nearly as strong as most of you here having lived with this kind of feeling and worse fot as long as some of you here have. Again I'm probably overreacting but it really scared me.

 

[Abstract]

Try not to judge or minimise your feelings. They are yours and are important. Ongoing contact with an ex that has been volatile is not something that anyone can deal with easily. It may help to think of anyway you can impose boundaries that will help you feel safer. Even little things can potentially help.

Try to bring your general stress levels down. There is some great info on this site http://www.dbtselfhelp.com/html/instant_mindfulness.html

I am sorry about the suicide too. That is awful.

 

[kahlan]

Its funny you mention minimizing my feelings. That's one of my bad coping mechanisms. I tend to worry to much that my negativity is going to effect everyone else too much so I don't allow myself to feel it as much as a could/should. I tend to focus on how others are feeling and shutting out my own (again poor coping skills from childhood-any emotions could potentially set off my mom, not pretty).

I think I'm.going to write down some of this for my therapy session next week. Abstract not sure if you meant to get me thinking about the minimizinng this much, but that probably is something else I need to work on so thanks :) lol I'm a hot mess!