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Friends / Re: Dropping Everyone Like Flies

« on: June 12, 2021, 09:03:52 PM »

Hello Phoebes,
Just wanted to say how much your thread title seems to reflect my life atm too. Take care.

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Other / Re: Our Wonderful Healing Porch - Part 7

« on: June 12, 2021, 09:00:27 PM »

Beautiful image, woodsgnome. 

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Introductory Post / Re: Time to come back.

« on: June 12, 2021, 08:58:17 PM »

I remember you too Libby. I smiled when I saw you on the forum when I signed on this evening. Welcome back

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Sexual Abuse / Re: Therapist used the word. . . TW

« on: June 12, 2021, 08:55:38 PM »

Yes, 13/14yo notalone, that was rape that happened to you. It counts, even if you didn't say "No."


That didn't happen to me, but I'm standing with you from afar anyway.

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Recovery Journals / Re: Moving Forwards

« on: June 12, 2021, 08:46:37 PM »

Thank you san, Jazzy, Armadillo and notalone 

Today I feel mostly better again physically. The vaccination spot is still raised and a bit itchy but other than that no problems any more. I can do anything and everything again. All in all, it was probably quite good to have an enforced break of a few days where I was either lying down resting or taking things very slowly. Lovely weather here but not too hot, so spent a few hours in the garden with my Fur Babies. They did haphazard lawn-mowing while I did gardening work and picked wild herbs and flowers aka weeds for my supper. I took part in an insect count. Earlier in the day I did quite a bit of housework. That all feels good. I feel happy.

The friendship boomerang is a continuation of one I undoubtedly mentioned earlier. I've just checked back in this Journal. It started in mid-May. Today as I'm feeling more grounded again, more purposeful, more able to get on with things, I realise that this friend commenting on me having disputes with so many people close to me must have been pretty triggering though I didn't consciously realise it at the time. Since then in our correspondence she mentions that she thinks I'm taking things from my childhood out on her and her family, which feels like an emotional punch in the gut. I am still thinking and corresponding though.

 I phoned my little godson today for a chat. I think he liked that I phoned or at least wasn't averse to it.

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Recovery Journals / Re: Moving Forwards

« on: June 10, 2021, 09:04:38 PM »

I am reading from time to time atm but not posting much partly because of a further friendship boomerang. Then I got my second vaccine on Tuesday and have had a bad reaction so mostly lying in bed  It'll pass I'm sure but typing hurts.  to everybody esp. those in need of it

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Having an Exceptionally Difficult Day / Re: Bad EF

« on: June 10, 2021, 09:00:02 PM »

 

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Recovery Journals / Re: Further Adventures of Elpha

« on: June 05, 2021, 07:56:18 PM »

 

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Recovery Journals / Re: Moving Forwards

« on: June 05, 2021, 07:54:56 PM »

Today I realised a sign of progress: My dreams are pretty active and FOO is in them a lot but they are either not as toxic as normal or even trying to help me. Add to that, I am able to turn their offers of help down and say that no, actually, I've chosen a different route.

Up till not so long ago, I used to have nightmares about being back in the family home that was sold a good long while ago, but where I spent the longest time and the worst years. In those nightmares I was desperate to get out but I had no idea how to leave the house and get a rental place and I had no job and couldn't get one either. Just a few nights ago I was back in that house with FOO and I wasn't running from them, the house wasn't all shadowy and I was actually sitting down with my parents talking about how to get back working. M made some suggestion of where I could look or where she could give me a leg up (that never would have happened) but I calmly stated that I was staying in my current field. And nobody tried to convince me otherwise or criticise my choice.

So does this mean FOO has suddenly changed? Sadly no. But I think it's an additional sign that I made a correct move when I told that friend: me or them. It was retraumatising for me to know I had a seemingly good friend who thought she knew more than I did about trauma recovery and all the rest of what was going on. I am back to feeling pretty depressed today, pulling back from thriving into surviving or maybe into just zoning out. but then I went into the garden - good move - and remembered the dream.

My stating in the dream that I'm staying in my own field (I was meaning the more difficult one that I have decided to give up before and then gone back to) is probably reflecting how it is that I am quite simply doing better - more able to give cost estimates i.e. it's not half so exhausting any more; more able to shrug if I don't get the job because the client thinks the job should cost half that; getting better bit by bit with the new Word version; more able to write invoices - as with cost estimates it's a lot less exhausting. Now that I think about it, that's a lot of progress too. 

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General Discussion / Re: Running and trauma

« on: June 05, 2021, 10:50:32 AM »

It just shows how trauma is complicated and not one size fits all.

  a thousand times.

I get triggered by exercise too but I think that could just be a FOO thing, like the way I always got criticised etc for being 'fat' though I wasn't back then, so too I got criticised for being 'unfit', not to mention slow and weak. I remember in my teens I was always ashamed if I started panting. Actually I was pretty much always ashamed for a lot of things. I used to get dizzy during exercise, start fainting, collapsing, seeing 'grey' as opposed to black. In fact once I saw a list of things like that where it said if you are experiencing one or more of these symptoms during exercise, speak to your family doctor. I was experiencing a lot more than one of those, but also knew by then that a trip to the doctor wouldn't help anything. They would do some physical measurements and declare me healthy and 'nothing to worry about'.

How things are these days I note I cannot even begin to write so I won't this time. maybe another time.

Armadillo, my current T does breathing exercises with me to bring up emotions, but of course in a controlled way. So I'm not surprised that the breathing in yoga was deeply triggering for you. 

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Having an Exceptionally Difficult Day / Re: Further down than I've ever been ...

« on: June 05, 2021, 10:36:46 AM »

Dear woodsgnome,

I'm really sorry you're feeling so down. May I offer gentle hugs? 

I think of you here on the forum as a giver of wisdom and care, never as someone who takes and asks too much. Never. 
So please come and take and take as much as is possible and good for you. 

Good on you for reaching out when you feel so low

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Recovery Journals / Re: Moving Forwards

« on: June 05, 2021, 10:26:48 AM »

There's a lot of wisdom here in this thought BB. I'd like to keep this quote with me for a long time.

Blueberry is extremely wise. I've learned a lot from her too, and I still am. 

Thank you, thank you, thank you. This means a lot to me, especially atm with all the flack I'm getting irl.

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Introductory Post / Re: Me in a nutshell (Trigger warning)

« on: June 05, 2021, 10:24:57 AM »

Hello SecretsOfTheHeart and welcome to the forum 

There is tons of information on this forum and it's a very supportive place so I hope it's as good a place for you as it is for me and many others till you can get into therapy and during it too 

btw you don't have to have an actual diagnosis to join in here.

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Recovery Journals / Re: Armadillo's Not So Trigger Filled Journal

« on: June 04, 2021, 12:47:33 PM »

Silly cPTSD. When you referred to the OOTF website you know how I took it? "You don't belong here. Go to the other site." It's not what you said or how you said it, it's my filter and core belief. One of my top 5 automatic thoughts.

Even though I didn't know, I'm still sorry that that is how it came across. Of course you belong here! Sometimes there's additional useful information or experiences over there too.  A fairly long-time mbr there says something like: contact to people with personality disorders leaves you shattered so plan time to recover.

But maybe you too  - like me - simply need time to go through this and take your steps? And feel just fine on this website only? No response necessary. 

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Recovery Journals / Re: Moving Forwards

« on: June 04, 2021, 12:38:34 PM »

Thank you Jazzy, I'm feeling better already. Thank you also for your longer post and the sort of p.s. after it. Also thanks for not trying to give me a solution because I think only I can find that, especially since it is all kind of complicated and quite often I simply need time. I often forget that somehow.