Messages

DF, i really liked your visualization of the stream, letting the note drop into it, watching it flow away, and then the boxes of 'stuff' going in afterwards - i think it was not only a beautiful way to let things go, but very powerful as well.  i want to remember this for future 'letting go's'.

and i agree w/ SO about the concept of 'stay'.  again, so powerful and meaningful.  i recall too many times when i haven't been able to stay and just dissociated instead, sent a surrogate in to take my place who had little to no power at all, but was just a means to get thru the situation.  some really good stuff here.  thanks for all of it.  love and hugs

ah, yes, SO, the constant over and over again of the c-ptsd beast.  relentless until we are able to get to a point of figuring out what we actually need now.  that you're seeing what your little one inside didn't get, and who he didn't get it from is a major step.  is there grieving attached to that realization?  if so, you may need to go thru that process before you can get to the acceptance part of it all, and be more at peace with it.  i think for a lot of us, the depression and anger stages can take a lot of time and work to get thru before we make it to the other side.

i hope you can be patient and care-full with yourself as you go thru this.  those triggers can definitely knock us sideways, and it sometimes takes a little while before we can right ourselves and take another step.  i think you're doing good work, really.  love and hugs

DF, thank you.  you said exactly what i needed to hear.  i fight to fall asleep!  that's not conducive to rest, either.  the reminder to rest if nothing else really helped. 

DF and NK, thank you for your care.  the smoke is gone for now.  

it's 5:30 a.m., i slept for 1 1/2 hrs. earlier, now i'm sitting here playing games, typing here, keep asking myself 'can i go to sleep yet?' but something doesn't allow it.  i'm fighting with getting the temp in my room comfortable, worrying about the extra money for the a/c, then it's too cold, it's warmer in here than outdoors, why this room is so warm to me, i don't get it.  no air flow at all, my feet are too hot then too cold then back and forth, same w/ legs, pull the covers up, aaah, feels good, then w/in 5 min., i'm too hot, too many covers.  this is driving me freakin' nuts!

docs are on my mind, i told my D today i think she should get a new doc, she's asked for help, to write her a note saying she can't work cuz she's too tired all the time, doc told her she didn't do that kind of thing.

i got so pissed!   and i think part of my not being able to sleep is a hangover from that.  my D did say that she's thought of that, when she goes in next time, she's gonna ask again, and if there's still a 'no, i don't do that', my D is gonna tell her that she will have to find a different doc who will help her w/ this.

my D's brain goes on and on - the amount of thoughts that run thru her mind in ten minutes, she's told me, given me a 10 min. example of all the things she's thought of in that amount of time, and i just went - no wonder you're so exhausted all the time!  your mind gives you no rest whatsoever!

i was exhausted just listening to her.  and now i can't sleep.

DF, i've struggled w/ something similar in my life regarding a parent.  in my case it was my dad.  when he was dying in the hospital, and i was living across the country, i called my mom every nite to let them know i cared, asked after him, and she finally told me that he'd rather have cards sent.  so, i started sending cards. he never got them cuz he died before they reached him, and they came back to me with the stamp 'address unknown' or something like that. i was devastated - why didn't i do this sooner?  why didn't i know?  why . . .  why . . . why . . .? i should have . . . etc.  i even went as far as thinking if i'd been there, where they lived, i'd have gotten him to a doc sooner and he wouldn't have died. (absolutely not true - incurable cancer).

i carried the weight of that guilt for decades, and if i'm totally honest, it can still get to me at times. the idea of not being perfect, when it's been expected of us - even tho we now rationally know it's impossible - has been so very difficult for me to release.  i carry it about my estranged narc daughter as well.

maybe it's the people who we most wanted to show us love that we carry the guilt about.  that just came to mind.  the people who were the most unreachable when we did everything we knew to reach them.  and more.  the ones who were the most critical of us as human beings.  we keep trying to prove to them that we're worthy of their love, attention, kindness, but since they didn't give it, well, they must be right.  we should have been perfect.  so, we're the ones who failed them instead of the other way around.

ahhh, it's a tough one.  i have to believe these are part of the wounds they inflicted on us, and because of their importance in our lives, those wounds are the deepest, most difficult to heal.  i do think time helps in this - my guilts are less now than they were.  maybe that's all any of us can hope for.  i'm with you.  love and hugs

thank you, DF, for your caring and kindness, for telling me not to take on too much of this 'emotion' thing at a time.  it was reassuring to hear.

we've got smoke in the air from wildfires.  it got to me last nite, so we're all shut up inside today.  hopefully this will go away soon.  i've been thru this before in other places i've lived - seems like we can't hardly get away from it anymore.

couldn't get to sleep till about 5 this morning, so i'm not feeling the greatest today. 

hey,  SO, so glad to hear from you!  i've missed you.  very happy to hear your gardening is going and going and going, even if late or stops and starts.  sounds very much like you're finding your way at your pace, and i don't think we can ask much more than that.  keep it up, ok?  love and hugs

hi, hope, thank you for your thoughts and ideas - much appreciated.  i haven't really gotten into parts work, per se, so i don't know for sure if this discomfort w/ fear is part of that.  i do struggle w/ alexithymia, tho, which is the inability to recognize and/or access emotions, and can see how that's been a major player in my life.  the idea that i can even feel fear now, where i hadn't for most of my life, is what makes me uncomfortable w/ it, i believe.  however, to your point, that fear may be attached to one of my parts.

for me, just the idea of being able to feel some of these emotions, like fear, is still a big deal.  if i want to look into the idea that the fear is a part of me making itself known is a whole nother level of processing.  i'm not sure if i'm ready to go into 'parts' work yet.  frankly, the idea produces fear w/in me. i can feel that right now.  and for some reason, my last T, altho she was familiar w/ parts work, when i brought it up, she seemed reluctant to delve into that w/ me and it never went anywhere.  it may have been because of my abnormally extreme reactions to feeling some of my emotions.  at times, they would get me physically ill or incapacitated to some degree for days, sometimes weeks. we had to really tiptoe around emotion realizations.

thank you, tho, for bringing this up as a possible explanation.  you may be spot on. i do appreciate it a lot.   

felt a bit better the past couple days, but had a bad nite last nite, so i'm lagging/dragging today.  the weather is wonky - cool, cold, rainy, hot, repeat, and that knocks me off center, too.  i had 2 naps yesterday cuz i was so tired and feeling worn out.  i just fell asleep while sitting watching tennis. 

ok, i read hope's response again, and i do remember one of the first times i actually felt afraid - i was in kindergarten, was sent home for milk money, tried to get into our house but the door was locked, i pounded and pounded on the door, but no answer, and i remember standing there, crying so hard, so scared, as if i'd never be able to get into my home again.  my mother did eventually hear me - she'd been vacuuming -  and i was an emotional mess.  when i told her why i was home, she gave me my milk money, sent me back to school.  it was a couple blocks walk, and i was 4 or 5.

having to take care of myself emotionally was a lonely endeavor.  i can feel the sadness right now just thinking about it.  i had to not be scared in order to do what needed to be done, so it just wasn't allowed in my life.  i'm thinking this may be the first time in general where i've felt safe enough for some of these emotions to make themselves known, since i've been living w/ my D.  so, about 70 yrs. w/o feeling fear, and now sometimes i can. it's still a lot to deal w/, not only the emotion itself, but its presence in my life.  i can feel the distress inside me just writing about this.

my trip to my galpal's place was good - i saged her place cuz she's been feeling like there are spirits who don't belong there, playing tricks, and it's been scaring her.  she hasn't been able to sleep well since she moved in.  i've got to check in w/ her today, see if there's any difference.  when we were finished - she got into it, which i was glad to see, shoo-ing anyone unwanted out the door - i asked how she felt, she took a minute, said she felt lighter.  i hope it's stayed that way.

i did have to take meds to drive there, tho, scared of another dissociation event.  but it turned out ok, and i was able to rock 'n' roll a bit on the way home, which always feels great, feels like my old, upbeat self.  i don't see enough of that side of me anymore, but it's wonderful when she can come out, make an appearance.

i do not like feeling the emotion of fear.  i got along so well w/o it for most of my life.  it still feels foreign and intrusive, very unnatural.

hope, thanks for your caring and support.  w/ my D's help, everything was wonderful and everyone enjoyed themselves.  these people are not judgmental at all to begin with, and it would have worked out just fine no matter what.  i just get so frizzed anymore about things that never bothered me in the slightest before.   

and i guess that's a big part of it - i walked thru the world w/o fear for so much of my life, and now that it's around me, i don't always know what to do with it, how to function w/ it, how to just 'be' with it without it overwhelming me to the point of being frozen.  still working on it, i guess.

driving to my galpal's today - haven't driven since that dissociation episode.  i'm already sure i'll be taking some meds before i go.  i so do not like walking around in life w/ fear, still don't understand how people who experience it every day keep on going. 

thanks for the hug, hope, and back atcha.

well, i freaked out yesterday before i could even get started on the prep for the food - needed meds to calm me down.  it was awful.  so glad i told my D, cuz she offered to help me, and that went really well.  i've made these things 1000 times, if i've made them once, but suddenly i was doubting myself all over the place, and it was horrible.  what if this?  what if that?  i used to entertain a lot, made food for others all the time, but i've flubbed it a couple times since i've been here and you know?  i just want to be normal again.

so, having a hard time accepting that things are not the same for me, i can't think the same way, can't act the same way, can't judge things the same way to have them work out the way i want.  it's a lot of acceptance, and i hate that so much has changed for me.  some of it might be age, but some of it is aftermath of trauma.

my D asked me what would be the worst thing that would happen if i messed up?  being judged?  making a mistake?  doing so in front of people?  nope, none of those, altho they'd play a part, but the biggest thing that came to mind was that i'd feel so terrible about it, about wanting to make something for someone else and i couldn't, so they wouldn't be able to enjoy the gift i wanted to give them.  i'd feel just awful about that.

and maybe i need to stop trying to do this if it's going to give me such a terrible feeling, so much anxiety, but i doubt if i'll stop.  i need to learn more about how much heat the stove gives off so i don't burn things, stop believing that i can do things the same way i used to, cuz, quite honestly, i can't.  i used to do this stuff w/o thinking, like driving, but now i do have to think about it, do it mindfully.  ugh!  changes to practice. 

Blueberry, i was so glad to read that you were able to distinguish the idea that your added rest was, indeed, self-care.  i think that's an important step, something we all can use, but, unfortunately, it's too often lost to us.  and the idea of resting, releasing tension, wow!  that's something i'd like to utilize for myself more often.  thanks for the reminder.  i carry too much tension on a regular basis.  that would be a good thing for me to do, i know.  i want to keep your example in mind.  so glad for you, whether it's just for today, or it becomes a regular habit eventually, it's a great start.  love and hugs

thank you hope for the support.  much appreciated.

still resting, but i can feel some energy coming back, so that's nice.  i'm hoping to see my B and SIL tomorrow, want to make some food for them, but have already thought about doing the prep today cuz there are a lot of steps to what i want to make - french bread pizza burgers, my personal favorite food.  i hope i don't exhaust myself by being too ambitious.  it's just when i feel some energy, i want to do something with it before the next bout of feeling down and out.  yeah, i don't trust myself at all on this front.

but, i'm gonna give it a shot, so i'll stick w/ something pos. to end this.

i'll add a few more, blueberry!         so many things you're doing for yourself in a good way, and very glad to hear you got help w/ housework.  that's great!  i absolutely love hearing about you taking care of yourself and allowing it.  love and hugs

i hope you enjoy your 'mindful' walk, hope.  and good for you for being able to use the phone, be appropriately assertive, and get some positive result.  love and hugs