Strange Star

[Hope4Now]

Thanks for your validation @shimmerz and @Pietro. It means a lot to me. A bunch of things have come together to send me into a real downward spiral. I am going to have to work very hard today to keep it together for my daughter. It will be a long day. We are leaving at 9 and will probably not be back until 9 or 10 tonight. I've completely gone off my routine that has been helping me to some extent. Tomorrow, I will get back to the radical resting and self-care. And I see Yoda on Friday. I'm still waffling about just ending all the therapy for a while, but I think I should continue. Don't know. Very confusing. Pouring rain today. Of course it is. Hasn't rained most of the summer, but here it is--move in day, and it's pouring. Same thing last year with my son's move-in day. Argh. And we're not sure we can fit my scooter in the car with all the stuff. Argh. But I will get through it one way or another. Today is about my daughter, not about me. I will not make it be about me.

 

[Hope4Now]

Yesterday, I was so fragmented and exhausted. I knew the crash was coming, and it came. BUT...it did not come in the same wrappings as it has in the past. All the work I've been doing is evident with that. I think...I hope...I am beyond the really rampant self-destructive stuff. I woke feeling terrible--physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually. I managed all the self-blaming stuff. I just accepted it and approached it with curiosity. "Hmmm. This is how feeling shitty feels in my bodymind. Is there something that would help me?"

I dragged myself to my trainer because I know that physical activity does make me feel better, as long as I don't push too hard. That's what he's for--helping me regulate when to push, when to slow down. We did an easy strength routine (and I even managed to break my record for planking!). I rode the bike but got off after 20 minutes when I felt myself tipping over into my former push-it until you drop mentality. 20 minutes is better than nothing. So I stopped before I dropped, drove home, and slept for 4.5 hours. The sleep was very restless and filled with nightmares and all sorts of crappy stuff. This happens when I am over-tired.

Anyway, last night I had some quiet time and I was reflecting that it is time for me to stop thinking about all this stuff so much and begin to put into action more things into a coherent routine of self-nurturing and self-care. The most important of all of these is the physical for me. I need to shed 60 pounds, and I need to deal with my poor sleep (and these, I know, are profoundly related). This is part of the over-arching efforts to get my inside worlds and outside world to match up better. To live inside my body. To accept that I am a real person, and that my body and my life belong to me.

I've been working toward this for many months, I think. In bits and pieces. In the times when I feel a bit more integrated. It's as if I have been practicing claiming myself for myself, and now I am ready to actually take the leap. I think I am.

So I am not aiming to "lose weight" but rather to shed the fat that does not belong to me. I like to think of it as all the accumulated stress of taking on energy that doesn't belong to me and the suffering that has caused. It is time for me to help melt it away. I fully believe that this next phase of my healing has to be focused on the physical--the external body. Of course the mind has a lot of say in this too...but I need the concrete evidence of the body: increased strength (measurable), increased fitness and fatloss (measurable), increased sleep (measurable through my fitbit).

I've set a time frame of 9-10 months. So it's a bit like I'm planning to rebirth myself. No, not a bit like. A lot like. I have been gathering the resources for my own rebirth for several years now. And slowly learning about myself and my bodymind system...my "parts". I'm not fighting myself in the same way I used to, or with the same vicious intensity. I think my SELF is slowly emerging from whatever dark and distant place it has mostly been hidden away for all these decades. This time, I am building myself with the guidance of my SELF...not to be "normal" or to meet others' expectations or to bow down to the demands of my over-zealous manager and firefighter parts.

It is time for me to be brave and strong and true enough to claim my body as my own, and to claim my power. I have consciously and unconsciously abdicated my power to others for what seems like forever. When I was doing it, I thought I was claiming my own power. Thought I was creating the person I wanted to be. But I was not. It was my most dominant parts doing it...the managers who tend to be out 95% of the time. I could not and would not have seen this until the past year or two. Now I can. There is a major difference between being SELF led, and being led by parts. I have only begun to really see and feel this with any clarity during the past year.

Why it has taken me so long to accept with open-hearted compassion what I need to do to heal, I don't know. But it has. I know I will continue to work on the self-sabotaging energies. I know the "answer" to healing is a process, and a long one. But this new dedication to claiming myself for myself feels pretty good. I just have to REMEMBER it! (But this time, I will NOT cut a reminder tatoo into my arm...I will find other ways.) Because the biggest issue with keeping this intention is that I forget I have set it. I forget I have had these great breakthroughs in consciousness and integration. And then everything falls apart again until I remember and have to start all over. That is my pattern. I am going about breaking this pattern with renewed energy starting today.

There. That's my declaration to myself. And I've made it semi-public by writing it here. ;).

 

[shimmerz]

You know, this is a great posting. I think we can tend to get so caught up in the mind aspect of this that we completely lose any aspect of our body. And most of us have real struggles attaching to our bodies before our mind goes.

I am happy to jump on board with you on this one to not only offer support, but as well, I am at this stage now as well. So, I will absolutely be walking with you on this one my friend.

 

[Hope4Now]

So, I will absolutely be walking with you on this one my friend.

She jumps up and down, fist-pumping. Yay! Maybe we can support each other in this one.

 

[shimmerz]

As always my friend. As always.....

 

[Hope4Now]

So... :laugh::laugh::meh::roflmao::banghead::banghead::laugh::laugh:
I saw Yoda today. Decided, in the interests of consistency that this would not be a good time to take a hiatus from the psychotherapy that has been helping me so much. It was good to see him. And my young parts were very happy to get a giant hug at the end. :).

The laughing, head-banging imogees refer to this:

I summarized all the crazy stressful stuff that has happened in past 10 days. Among these, we talked about the dental fiasco for a while. Toward the end of that conversation, I said, "I just don't get it. I've been seeing this guy for 25 years. He's a good dentist who does not take advantage of people by proposing unnecessary work. I never had such huge problems as I've had the past two times I've seen him. I've always gotten through it."

And I heard myself say that last sentence. And as he was leaning forward to say something, I said, "Ding Ding Ding...and she wins the prize..." We both started laughing as we noted "gotten through it." He said, "That's what you've always done...gotten through things."

My unenlightened selves are saying, "Um, yeah. So? What else do you do? Isn't that what you're supposed to do?"

Seriously. I didn't know there WAS another way. With anything including the dentist. That there was even something called trauma-sensitive dentistry (thanks @shimmerz and Yoda) or "sedation dentistry." Seriously. I am so clueless. But even if I had known, I would have thought, "Oh, I don't need that. I can manage."

So now I am in search of a new dentist. Yoda is going to help me yet again on this one...has some names to provide.

Also...on a whole other :banghead::banghead::banghead: topic. Today I did a special session with a trainer on using a foam roller on my muscles to help with the lockup. It was excruciating, until I realized I could be merciful with myself and do a little less. I found whole sets of screamingly tight muscles that I didn't even know I had. And afterward for a little while (until they locked up again) my legs felt lighter and my walking was smoother. The T-band. Hmph. Muscle thing along the outer thigh around the knee. That's one of the new keys to maybe unlocking my hips so I can sit and walk again! So they sent me home with this big ugly foam roller and I'm to work on this a couple times a day. I will happily torture myself if it means I might be able to have less pain!

Now, I am going to sleep again. Because I have a dinner to attend tonight. Sigh. But it is with people I like, and it is close to home so if I get tired and can have the courage to speak up about it, I can just ride my scooter home and go to bed.

It's "Be nice to my body" day so far.

 

[Hope4Now]

post deleted.

 

[shimmerz]

Damn, I wish I hadn't missed that posting. Dangit!

 

[Hope4Now]

@shimmerz, I was venting my chaotic feelings about what is happening with my daughter. But I decided to delete it because it was too chaotic. And in my own paper I can swear a lot in big-sized letters. Lol!

 

[shimmerz]

Great hugs to both you and your daughter my friend. :hug::hug::hug::hug::hug:

 

[Hope4Now]

Thank you. We need them. We picked her up today and are having to process with her tonight whether she has it in her to tough out the living situation until a smaller dorm becomes available, or to take a year's medical leave and plan to return next year after she's sorted out whatever anxiety issue this is. It's been a tough parenting week. We simply cannot suss out what the heck is going on with her. Not sure whether to push her to develop some grit, or to help her accept that she's just not ready for dorm living. And to figure out whether all this is masking some deeper issue of yet unresolved PTSD from the car accident last year, or something even beyond that--some kind of separation anxiety. I'm glad to have her home here so I can talk with her face-to-face. My husband has been the one who has been with her and talking to the advisor and the therapists and the dean. I'm hoping my intuition can suss out which way to help her go. I'm so aware that this is a first-world/world of privilege problem...and that adds a whole other layer of guilt onto what I already feel. But even so, it sucks to see your kid so profoundly upset. Ugh.

 

[aut555]

So, I'm getting obsessive about this site. Something is driving me to think about all this stuff all th...

Felt all that at the bottom of the stairs with you. A helplessness. I suffered learned helplessness, a tactic used on me from a very bad marriage . It's interesting how a fall brought this all out in you. Your body's pain has forced you to examine everything in your life. I broke my ankle, but it forced me to meet my mental demons head- on. Kind of the exact opposite of your story. I was forced to rely on myself to heal for 6 months with limited use of the ankle. Hope you receive clarity and relief of all that holds you back.