Tag Archives: postaday

Under the table

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English: Wooden kitchen table and chairs

Today I told Doc what I learned from Cate last week. He listened, and then I just heard the world “trauma” and I started shaking badly. He then asked, “Is someone having a hard time? What can I do to help?” I could feel that “the little one” wanted to get under the table next to me, and I told Doc that I was aware of this. She really wanted to get under that table. But I resisted. It was weird, not normal. Loco. Loca. Loony. No! We will not get under the table.

But she insisted, and the more she insisted, the more I shook. The more I dug my heels in, the harder I shook. Something had to give. Then Doc said, “I invite you to get under the table if that will help.” You get to a point sometimes in life when you run out of the plausible normal-sounding options. When you reach this point you are at the end of your rope, and you start entertaining those options that seemed crazy and insane because you are desperate for some kind of peace. This was that kind of moment for me.

I leapt for that table like a lifeline, so much so that I almost hit my head on the table. I feared getting under the table because I didn’t want to “lose myself.” I was afraid of having a dissociative experience that I would not recall, like I had last week. Surprisingly, what happened is that my body became peaceful the very moment I got under that table. I felt peaceful, and then very sleepy. I could have slept under that table  for hours.

We continued our session with me under the table. It was weird, but it worked, and I shook a whole lot less. If someone told me this morning that I would end my day speaking to my psychiatrist from under a table, I would have laughed at the improbability of that scenario. You just never know what works.

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

What you don’t know can scare you

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When I saw Doc near the end of the week I was not doing well at all. I arrived at his office all twitchy and jerky. He took one look at me and said, “Oh no, you’re short-circuiting.” Doc’s the witty one alright.

We decided that the best thing for me was a neurofeedback session, and I did feel calmer after that. However, somehow, I got tangled up in the sensor wires without noticing. When Doc went to take the sensors off my head he picked up my hand to disentangle me from the wires. And that was all she wrote when he did that. I started twitching and jerking and freaking out. He started apologizing, and then the world went foggy.

Next thing I know Doc is asking me if I remember saying “I’m sorry” to him in this little girl voice. I was just incredulous, and I asked him, “Are you serious?” He was very serious. I asked him what he did when that happened, and he said he asked the little girl if he could have Beatriz back, and I came back to the session.

I managed to take myself to the little town cafe that I like so much after our session. I started texting my sister, Cate, asking her how things were with her. Somehow we got on the topic of our mother. She started talking about how the therapist she started seeing thinks our mother has schizophrenia. I thought Cate must be mistaken. I started asking her if she understood what schizophrenia was, and I could tell I was vexing her a bit. She started talking about how our mother saw and heard things that weren’t there. Apparently, Cate did not think this was news to me. According to her, I was present for many of these moments when my mother was experiencing psychosis.

I have absolutely no recollection of such behavior from my mother. There are plenty of negative memories associated with my mother, but none like this. Dumbstruck is an understatement for how I feel. I asked Cate what I did when these things were happening. She said I did nothing, that I never said anything about it or acted as if anything was wrong. I said to her, “I’m sorry, none of it is in my memory bank.” Cate replied, “I wish it wasn’t in my memory bank.”

I can only wonder if this is when my dissociation began. I feel betrayed by own brain, like I cannot trust myself.

Dipping a toe into the world of dating

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Almost one week later I’m still seeing Jimmy, the guy I met last Saturday. At this point he knows the important highlights about me: the fact that I’m in sobriety, have PTSD and a dissociative disorder. He’s actually good with all of that as he’s a psychiatric nurse, so that partially explains his empathetic manner.

However, and here’s where I’m a bit cautious, I really think we may have a significant difference between us. I tend to stay out of my apartment as much as I can because I tend to lose time there. It’s odd, but I do better “out in the world” like hanging out a coffee shop, or going out to a diner. Whereas, he has such high anxiety that his default is staying home, and it sounds like he stays home a lot. He doesn’t travel, go see live music, or go on long car rides if he can help it. It seems like he stays home as much as he can.

Also, early this week he was texting me a number of times a day while I was at work. I did tell him that it was too much of a distraction to get that many texts during the work day. I also told him that I was feeling like it was too much too soon. To his credit, he’s giving me some more breathing space now.

I’m seeing him on Saturday. It’s actually kind of a challenge for us to come up with things to do because we’re so divergent in our preferences. I suggested live Celtic music, and he suggested a movie at his apartment. The compromise is going out to an ice cream stand near the airport to watch the planes take off. We’ll see how things go.