digging out of the muck

[rainydiary]

Thinking of you San.   

[Snowdrop]

 

[CactusFlower]

   Wishing you energy, rest and peace!

[sanmagic7]

armee - if only!  a car fairy would be more than welcome.  fingers crossed!

thanks, rainy

love that hug, snowdrop!   

thanks, cactusflower. 

still quite wiped out, the heat is gonna hit again this week, so gearing up for that. 

i don't know anymore what it is to feel normal.  some days are better than others, but nothing i can pinpoint as being 'normal' for me.  some days i don't understand why i can't get my fighting spirit back up, as i've done in the past, and say '* no, i'm not letting this beat me!' and feel renewed energy.  it's not happening lately.  last time i was able to feel that was about a month ago. 

lately, it feels like i'm hanging on by my fingernails, like i'm on the verge of cracking altogether.  it's so unsettling.  i can't feel rested or calm most days, even w/ meds.  i'm now finding myself riding in fear on the road that some car is going to smash into us.  i've talked about driving again, but, honestly, i don't think i'm capable of that, and it breaks my heart.  driving was my way of getting away from everything - my car had no chip, i have no smartphone, nothing could track me.  it was true freedom and independence and i miss that terribly.

i don't know how much of this is related to cptsd anymore, or the months of stress or a combo.  i'm defensive, and just want to be left alone, but that isn't possible, except for an hour or so like now.  my freedom feels like it's been sucked away, kind of like when my kids were growing up.  my D's anxiety is so pervasive, her frustration and anger levels (not toward me) are up while her tolerance levels are down, and it sears me that i can't help.

just needed a place to vent.

[Armee]

Vent away. I often feel more upset that I don't feel well than I would feel if I just embraced not feeling well. But still giving myself that nurture and permission is no easy task. Still, San, it was a lot in short time and a lot of stress leading up to the move, too. After a bog period of stress we usually fall apart a bit instead of falling apart during.

Also, and you'd know better than me... but it is sounding a bit like signs of regular PTSD might be popping up in addition to the CPTSD? Might be good to treat that sooner than later before it blossoms into full fledged PTSD for this event?

Come 'ere. Big bear hug is called for today!

[BeeKeeper]

san,

i don't understand why i can't get my fighting spirit back up, as i've done in the past, and say '* no, i'm not letting this beat me!' and feel renewed energy.

Me too! But guess what? it may be a time warp? Or it may be resiliency has parameters just like physical things. Being able to rise up again may have a physic "load" we can bounce back if  X number of discrete problems happen, or specific problems occur. I don't know. I noticed my resiliency factor seems to be connected to (shhhhhh) age. Just sayin'.

The independence and freedom of a vehicle is unquestioned! and the fear of losing it real. I don't have answers, but  relate 150%.

[sanmagic7]

armee and bee, you two made my day this morning when i saw what you both posted.  absolutely wonderful feeling i got from you.

more later - just got finished w/ a significant session w/ my T, but can't talk about it yet.  it's good, tho.

[Hope67]

   That's a big hug for you SanMagic. 
Hope 

[sanmagic7]

as always, hope, your big hugs feel so warm and caring.  thank you.   

major realization fri.  while in session.  these past couple weeks, after once again becoming overwhelmed while processing and put out of commission for a week or so, my T and i realzied that, because of my lack of emotional feeling at the time of incidents and situations, that particular element has been missing from my life.  now, as i'm processing, the appropriate emotions/feelings are making themselves known.  i've been recognizing, at least  the appropriate emotions that would have belonged with the situation.  it's in recognizing what should have been there, finally knowing how to feel about what happened that has been a 'double whammy' (my T's words) to my processing.

since i haven't really felt emotions most of my life (that i can remember), even the big ones like anger, fear, happy have been basically absent, digging into my mind now is beginning to bring some of those up and it's been very difficult for me to deal with them.  the other day, i was talking with my D and during the conversation she said she remembers, just a couple years ago, when i told her i was afraid to take a walk by myself, and that i asked her how people live with fear every day.  i've asked that question here on the forum a few years back as well.  it was such an awful feeling to me to feel afraid.

responded to her that the thought of feeling emotions is horrifying to me.  that's exactly how that concept feels - horrifying - and i told my T about that.  we decided i would have to process things in tiny pieces rather than small pieces, because i'll have to process not only the memory/situation but the emotion i would've normally felt at the time that i can now recognize.  it's opening my mind up in more place than one, i guess, and both are traumatic to me.

one example of how i was stunted emotionally was that i could only ever remember 1 fight between my mom and dad.  my household growing up was without adult fighting, name-calling, acts of anger, or even expressions of anger, except for that one time.  and, while they worked it out in just a couple hours, for a minute my dad had packed a bag and threatened to leave.  that set the stage for my lack of anger, especially in relationships.  if i were to get angry, my mind told me, dire results would happen and the other person would leave.

so, not a lot of experience w/ emotions while growing up, besides which, when i cried out of whatever i might have been feeling, i can still hear my dad say 'stop it. crying doesn't solve anything'.  it was like the tap on my emotions had been firmly shut off. the only one i ever really felt on a regular basis was sadness.  the rest were gone.

now, beginning to feel human emotion is akin to another trauma, mainly because i don't know how to cope with hardly any of them.  i don't really know how to function in a world where i feel these 'things'.  i've always been strong enough to work myself through whatever was happening, but i suspect it's because i had no emotions holding me back.  even now, as i write this, i can feel the weight of all of it pressing heavy inside my skull.

[Dante]

I can relate to that lack of fighting.  I never really thought about it before, but I never saw my parents fight, never knew that people could - and should - fight and certainly never fought myself.  My spouse fights something awful (like a tomcat), and it was so overwhelming for me when we first got together that I would flee for days on end during a fight.  We fight less now, fight more fair, and I've learned (a bit) to fight back.

I too stuffed my emotions so deep when I was a kid that I think I lost them.  Whenever I start to feel something, it scares me.  I'm not used to it.  I'm trying to learn to sit with them, but it's uncomfortable.

Wishing you peace and "feeling" good!  :-)

[rainydiary]

San, I appreciate you articulating this as I process in a similar way and have noticed myself slipping back into this recently because I am overwhelmed.  I appreciate you sharing the idea of processing tiny pieces.  I am thinking of you during this time. 

[sanmagic7]

hey, dante - it's definitely uncomfortable to 'sit with' feelings that we've rarely, if ever, known.  i've been working on reclaiming feelings/emotions for about 5 years - it's slow, sometimes painful, and can be scary.  i give you lots of credit for working on this issue.  it can be tough.  thanks for the well wishes.   

rainy, it's definitely a new-ish thing, of being overwhelmed when processing.  after a few times of it happening, i began to be scared of processing, which i told my T.  since then we've been breaking off smaller and smaller pieces for me to process, but this whole thing w/ my emotions threw a new wrench into the works.  i will keep on with this, but, as i've often heard here, slower usually allows for faster recovery in the end.  here's to tiny pieces!   

finally feeling better this morning.  we've still got stuff hanging over our heads re: the move, but they've been whittling down.  this is our last week to use our friend's car, so we have a deadline on being able to get to the food pantry, pick up extra cat supplies, and clean the car out from our jaunts to the farmers markets.  so, we still have to push ourselves a bit, which is not good yet.  we had to cancel the market this past weekend cuz my D got too sick from the stress we've been under to stick out the last weekend.  since we've moved, she doesn't have a T to talk stuff over with, and i suspect she could be helped a lot by one right about now.

therapy tomorrow.  we'll see what happens.  i think one of the last things my T said to me on fri. was that she wanted to somehow get me to the place where i could actually feel happy.  i used to ask myself why, when i had a house, hub, 2 kids, the stuff other people dream of having, why didn't i feel happy?  that feeling has been extremely elusive, along with the rest.  some of these emotions, like fear and anger, are beginning to surface more regularly, but happy just isn't there.  i can be glad about something, either for others or myself, but i haven't been able to get to the place of just feeling happiness on its own.

the weather has changed, heat is gone, and it's amazing to me what a difference that is making in my energy level, my feeling of well-being. 

i'm getting a gravity blanket this week.  when i did some research on them, i nearly began crying.  i remember some of the best sleep i had was with a man who encradled me as we slept.  it was a little hard to get used to, but it amazes me to think of what a difference it made to my feeling of safety and comfort and feeling cared about.  since i've lived with my D, i've been making my bed as soft and cushy as possible.  i had a very hard mattress i brought w/ me from mexico (it was hard cuz that's what my hub wanted) but i can kind of see now how some of my sleep problems there might have been connected.

so, my D and i switched mattresses - she likes them hard, and hers had gone soft - and i got a feather pillow which my head sinks into, as well as a mattress topper for even more softness.  it's been much better with those changes, but i lately heard of gravity or weighted blankets and looked them up.  the idea behind them is to help relieve anxiety and depression by giving a person a sense of being swaddled or swathed, and it's supposed to also release pos. hormones because of that, including melatonin.  i am so looking forward to using this.  it feels like the last piece i've been looking for to help me sleep.  does anyone else use one?  any thoughts?

moving forward, one step at a time. 

[BeeKeeper]

Hello San,

I've been reading  but not posting.

here's to tiny pieces

Yes, tiny, sometimes microscopic does the trick. I admire you for pushing on and through your unexpected reactions from the last session and making sense of it. Your T sounds so caring and sensitive, you're one lucky person!

Even since I learned about the weighed blanket I knew I'd probably love it. I'll wait until you get yours and give it a review. It makes a lot of sense for your D and you to mix and match, that alone deserves acknowledgement because that says you trust each other. I like that a lot.

[sanmagic7]

thanks, bee.  i'll definitely give a report when i get the blanket, give it a few nights, see what happens.  i'm so hoping this will make a pos. difference for me, and possibly for you, too.   

[Kizzie]

 

it's definitely uncomfortable to 'sit with' feelings that we've rarely, if ever, known.

Absolutely the case for me too San, it's exhausting and sometimes terrifying.  I often wonder if therapists understand this, how incredibly difficult it is to sit with feelings when in the past they have overwhelmed us.  Like your T, mine is all about small moments and building tolerance, of being OK with me saying I'm done, I need to step away from all these feelings for a bit. I feel much safer knowing she will not push me, that I am in charge of when and what and how much trauma I try to deal with. 

I remember writing here a while ago that I was not a happy camper to have given up dissociating and that was and sometimes still is true.  So like you I'm trying to find ways of comforting myself - love that you are making your bed a cozy, safe and renewing place