Emerging From Under the Rubble …

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After a triggering event I often feel like I’ve awakened from a deep sleep. That is how I feel now. I slept a ton, which is also par for the course after being triggered. Hope is back in my psyche. (thankfully!)

I am in the calm and quiet of the Barnes and Noble Starbucks. Books, central air conditioning, and iced tea are just the right potion right now.

Two months ago I attended a wonderful workshop at Kripalu on using yoga and music to heal trauma. A special shout out to Louise Montello and Shari Friedrichsen for this beautiful 3 day workshop. I hope they do it again. We had the privilege of being the first to experience this workshop. I mention this workshop because today, in my regained sense of calm, I started reminiscing about this experience, and it led me to the notes I took during those three days.

On the final day of the workshop Louise asked us to write a “story song” to summarize our trauma and how life was now, and we needed to do this in five sentences. In that moment it just came to me, and it came to me as a poem. I didn’t exactly adhere to the five sentences, but I found I came closer than a lot of people. Here’s what shot out of me like a bullet:

Bye Dad, no Dad.

Scary Mom, run away.

Bad Men.

Drink it away.

Wake up.

Put the drink away,

And live.

It was nice remembering this poem, and how I felt in the moment I wrote it. The “And live” part is what I try to focus on these days. Some days are more successful than others. Today is one of those more successful days.

Mayhem in my mind

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There is no easy way to put this. I am in an emotional meltdown. My therapist is out for a week with surgery, and my psychiatrist is new, and I am uncomfortable with calling him over the weekend. But, if I don’t improve by tomorrow I may be calling him because I am scaring myself with the depth of my hopelessness.

Today was a better day at work, but just a smidge. I didn’t break down, and I kept it together. But I certainly felt teary and on the verge of tears. I had this heavy feeling of dread that I could not shake. I made it through the day, and cried on the way home.

I got home, glumly ate dinner, and cried while I ate. My friend, Dave, called me to see how I was doing, and insisted on coming to get me. He brought me to his place, and I’m starting to feel somewhat safe again.

This morning was a huge fog. That is not unusual after a huge triggered event. I felt very dissociative, as if I was walking in huge swaths of cotton. My body was heavy and felt leaden. I found my electric toothbrush on it’s side, out of it’s stand. I always return it to it’s stand. This means that I’m losing time again. That has not happened in many months. Damn. I’m regressing, going backwards.

A Move

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This was one of those very bad days. Let’s be clear, it was a historically bad day in the history of my bad days, and that’s saying quite a bit. Where to begin? Perhaps with some context …

Moving, any kind of moving has been a trigger for me for the longest time. I don’t know if it has to do with my childhood fear of homelessness, as that’s the only clue I have as why moving is so upsetting to me. Moving a residence, an office cube, even a bedroom is triggering for me. I wish it weren’t. Honestly, I do. Truly, I feel like a nut case that needs to be put away because this is such an issue for me.

So, where am I moving? Out of the state? Across the street? No, that would actually make a bit of sense. I am moving from one office cube to another on a different floor, and I was a basket case today about it, an authentic loca woman. I’ve been freaky friday stressed about it with all the packing and distraction from my work. However, today was the breaking point with the discovery that the area that I indicated would be best for me was given to another colleague who was asked if they wanted the very same cube. Yes, for normal people this would not be a breaking point. I get that completely. However, when I saw that I was sitting right in the middle in the midst of racket and noise I just fell apart. I felt disregarded and dismissed.

I started to get that feeling like I was in a tunnel of which I could not escape. I’ll spare you the details except to say that I melted and cried and felt floaty.

I wish I could have remembered how to do the tapping technique during this mess, and a mess it sure was.

We just have to get though this. I can get through this.

I have to convince myself that moving my cube is not homelessness. It’s not. It’s just moving from one work space to another. That is all. Nothing more.