Living As All of Me

[SenseOrgan]

Look at you go HannahOne! Fantastic to witness, even through text. Go team life!     

[Blueberry]

Hannah1, i find your post from July 27 really inspiring! Also the title for your journal, it fits with my own healing journey.

I find intake paperwork or even just questions where I get to answer orally really difficult to the point of emotionally exhausting. That's probably the same as triggering. I am getting better at them, but then I have been doing them off and on for a long time.

[HannahOne]

Well....

Thank you, Blueberry and SenseOrgan, for reading and cheering.

I am ashamed to say I did not go to the wildlife rehab. And I spent much of the day in bed.

What is going on?

Part of me is scared. Part of my is embarrassed. Part of me is hypercritical.

Maybe this is an opportunity to consider more what integration means. This is the biggest problem I have across all my life, and it's a very human problem, it's just much more pronounced in me: I do the things I don't want to do. And I don't do the things I want to do.

I'm just so state dependent. In one state I am crystal clear. I talk such a good talk. Or walk such a good walk. In some states I can paint like no other. I'm amazing! In other states, I sob just looking at the brush. In some states I know I want to go out and explore. In other states, I call out with an excuse that doesn't even make sense and then stare for hours.

I have worked to become more aware of what state I'm in. I've worked to have more of a handle on moving between states, on regulation, on grounding. I've worked to help my states communicate, to tolerate more than one state at a time, to both not want to go to the wilidfe rehab while also going and remembering that part of me thought it was important and will be very upset if I blow it up...

And it's such a working in progress. AFGE. Another ___ growing experience. Part of me is so FRUSTRATED. Wants PROGRESS. Whatever that is? It's not progress if All of Me cannot sustain the insights, cannot sustain the awareness, cannot regulate enough emotionally to do what the insights and awareness propose.

How can I get better? Despair.

I can remember that, so far, it doesn't matter if I don't show up. If they fire me they fire me. And, there are things about it that are triggering and maybe too triggering. Working with the squirrels was good. But it's not squirrel season, so now most of my time is spent cutting the heads off meal worms and packing cups with frozen mice. I just don't have a strong stomach, a strong soul for it. It's why I dropped out of pre-vet studies. So it's possible this is not the right fit. It's also true I've become scared socially of the bosses, scared of not knowing what I should be doing, generally afraid. But some of that might be the triggers of the dead creatures.

I can not catastrophize. I'm disappointed in myself, and, oh well.

I can get up and try again tomorrow. And the next day. And keep trying. ?  Part of me is so tired. So so so so so tired of this "trying" thing. Trying what, why? What am I doing? How is any of this worth it? Here comes the skeptic and the existential questions that have no answer....

I don't know what so dysregulated me this morning other than it was early morning and I couldn't make a good decision.

And also, the only part of me that wants to go is the part that wants a job, wants to be productive, wants progress. And that part cannot override the parts that are turned off to it now, maybe because of the death, maybe because the social situation started to feel too scary, maybe because of the boss with her "that look on your face" comment.... does it really matter? I just don't like it anymore.

I am sad to leave, and unsure what to do next. It's hard not to put it in the "another thing HannahOne failed to do" column. But it was only ever an experiment and I learned some things. I learned I can do tasks and learn routines, I learned I like doing things with my hands and not so much thinking, I learned I like some social structure. What didn't work is major lack of clarity about my tasks, that it started at 8 am when I'm not able to really make good decisions that early, that squirrel season ended and also the boss that was my boss went out for surgery 5 weeks ago? And without her I felt quite lost. And all the death.

his is what being All of Me looks like, I can't just imagine something I want to do and then do it, I have to learn, try, explore, negotiate, and accept if something doesn't work even if part of me really wants it to, if only out of pride. Pride goeth before, and all of that.

Ah, the highs and lows, the ups and downs, as I tell my kids. NBD. Carry on, HannahOne. Tomorrow a man comes to the house to fix various things. A nice triggering event! Let's see how that goes. And I need to schedule a few appointments. T And look online for more volunteer opportunities to try. Try, try, try again.

[Blueberry]

  
 

I resonate with your post so so much. The number of things I've planned to do, even wanted to do in the last weeks, but then stayed in bed or went back to bed... It seems to be part and parcel of cptsd for some of us. As is feeling ashamed, for many of us in fact. So, at least you're not alone and can maybe feel some comfort there?

[HannahOne]

Blueberry, I'm sorry to hear you struggle with this kind of thing too! I find it so FRUSTRATING.

What is it about CPTSD that causes this? It's a lot of emotional flashbacks, I think. That's the "state-dependent" thing. Is that it? Well, also avoidance. And hyperarousal....and the disturbance in self-organization: the dissociation, negative self-concept, relationship struggles (the boss!). UGH.

Ugh ugh ugh. UGH!!!!! 

Frank, have mercy. Frank was served a giant pile of dandelion leaves, and then literally leaped into the air and came down on his side, immediately asleep.. He flings himself around in the most hysterical manner. FLING! He switches from one state to another so smoothly, from alert, to chewing, to pausing chewing to listen, back to chewing, to asleep, suddenly AWAKE! and on all fours.... how does he do this sorcery? Why do I not have such a gearshift inside?

I know I am avoiding the wildlife center because I got scared socially, about the shoe covers but more about the boss, not knowing her name, and her comment, and not knowing what I should be doing... I just could not make myself face it today. Next two weeks my kids' schedule interferes....I don't know. I know I am hyper vigilant when there. And struggling with the relationships, feeling surreal. Dissociating. Having emotional flashbacks, hiding and feeling like I'm going to be punished. Part of me thinks that's ridiculous. I can see how absurd it is, how it is a prediction error. Yet my nervous sysqtem does what it does and my prefrontal cortex just can't reason with it. And I do think the dead animals are triggering. Taking a deep breath involves breathing in the smell of dead animals, meat, guts.... noticing my environment involves seeing the worm squirm away while my job is to kill it... I think it is too triggering, I can't be present, I don't WANT To be grounded there. I'm sad because I loved feeding the squirrels and cleaning their cages. It's just that's not all of the job and now it's none of it. The others who work there are literally former physicians, or animal control officers, or pre-vet students, one said she LIKED gross things.... I need to try the library next, I guess. I'm sad.

Frank, have mercy.