Bermuda's Memories - Overflow Journal 1

[Bermuda]

Thanks. I am finally coming out of the funk. Holiday time really felt like a dip in my mood without any external cause. It's hard to explain that to people. My husband had asked what was wrong, and I told him about my food thought. He thanked me for sharing and said that he doesn't understand why I don't just tell him what is bothering me, and that it makes sense.... Although I didn't express it to him, that was a deeply upsetting thing for him to say. The things that are bothering me can't typically be pinpointed or explained with a simple, "I was hungry once, and now looking at food makes me emotional." Obviously, those were not my words, but you get the idea. It's not like that. That is not CPTSD. That is not my problem at all. So, holidays were sad. There is no logical 1+1=2.

I have been quite down about parenting. I try so hard, and I just feel so inadequate. My son has been very sick. He has a delicate health in general, and it is quite upsetting. I try to be everything for him, but I just don't know how. He doesn't like being held or touched, so I just sit next to him. I try to distract him with stories of dinosaurs or facts about dung beetles. I told my husband my worries, and asked him what he would do, and his response was that I doing fine. My daughter has been sick and is quite different. She is demanding and loud, and I told me husband that I am having a hard time coping and he told me that he forsees difficultly between us when she is a teenager. I also didn't express it, but those comments were extremely hurtful and not helpful. My husband gets upset that I don't just tell him what I expect out of him, so I can't tell him that what he says is upsetting. If I wanted something else I should have just told him, or not said anything. ...

Anyway, what I actually wanted to write about is my worry about my son. He was at the doctor yesterday for his sickness that he currently has. I wasn't at that appointment, but I told my husband that I was quite worried that my son is losing weight, and that during his last bath he looked my like a bird than a boy. My husband said that he noticed the same during the doctor's examination, and that the doctor had asked if his weight was being medically supervised. My husband explained that our son has a whole team of doctors. His next appointment is this week, and I am so worried that this is the time he will be getting the feeding tube. I am so afraid that it has really come to that, and that the benefit outweighs the consequences. I can't convince him to eat.

So, I feel that I am failing.

[Armee]

 

When our kids are not doing well, it's impossible to feel good ourselves. My kids struggle in their own ways too...different than yours, though the girl sounds similar to mine. All I can say is to just trust yourself. You are a fantastic mom. When they aren't doing well it feels like an indictment of ourselves, but we are the moms they need. Imagine if they were struggling in these ways but had your mom, or my mom? You've got this. It's hard. It's crushing. I know. Just bug hugs from here. 

Lol oops *big hugs* not *bug* but if you're into that, that's cool too. I like bugs

[NarcKiddo]

I am so sorry you are struggling. I cannot comment on the issues around your son's health, not having children myself, except to say that I simply cannot imagine how tough it must be at times to care for a tiny human being. I can say that your love and care for your children shines through everything you write about them or say about them, so I cannot imagine you are failing in any way at all. Even if it feels like that.

 

[Bermuda]

Oscillating between believing that my life wasn't even traumatic and that I'm dramatic, and being overwhelmed by traumatic reminders.

A can't get that mugshot out of my mind.

His face.

He has the same evil twisted expression she would make.

Editting for clarity. I was not being intentionally vague, just that the words that tie these things together are difficult to get out, even in writing. If I tie these statements together it's like tying myself to tracks, or connecting myself to the bad, to the bad people. Yesterday during group I opened an incognito tab and put in my brother's name. His mugshot came up. He had been arrested for indecency with a child with exposure. I think it is safe to say that one of my abusers is in custody and can't harm anyone else. I don't know what the nature of the crime was, so I can't grade it within the local sentencing guidelines. It gets between 2-20 years. I don't know if it is his first offense or if minor offenses can be brought up in this case to show character and behavioural pattern. This would drastically change sentencing. I don't know why my brain works like this. I immediately go into assessment mode. He is probably getting 7, minus 2 for time earned. I have 5 years. The world has five years.

This also aligns perfectly with the time that it's been since I had heard nothing from my mother. The stalking stopped suddenly, and it has been putting me completely on edge because I can't track her. I had no way of telling where she is and what she is planning. Now I have some insight. She moved away, and away from that area, and has been silent. It makes sense. His face was in the news, and she is quiet.

I am probably safe. I am probably safe until this is forgotten.

I think I am going to take a DNA test. Seeings his twisted face made me think again how much I don't look like they do, and how it was always noted in the extended family. They favoured fair skin and blonde hair, blue eyes. Then there was me. I was not the pretty grandchild. In a huge family being surrounded with people, and then me. Homely.

[NarcKiddo]

I can understand why you are so upset about this development.

You are safe. You keep yourself safe and you have family now who love you and help keep you safe. I fully resonate with the feeling that you might not feel safe, especially when seeing the face of a past abuser, and I guess that is part of the nature of CPTSD. Never feeling safe. I've been talking about this with my T recently and need to journal some of it.

I also fully resonate with the lack of stalking or other unpleasant attention not bringing relief, but instead a feeling of "what now?". At least you now have an explanation for her silence.I don't know if that helps, but I hope it does.

 

[Armee]

I can see so many many different ways that seeing his mugshot would be upsetting and seeing the similarity between him and your mom would be upsetting. And why it feels like tying yourself to the train tracks to see it because the reality of what you grew up with and what became of the people you grew up with, it makes it hard to brush aside the things you went through and lived with as being "dramatic." It was legitimately bad. Criminally bad.

Periods of intense traumatic reminders often oscillate quickly to denial for me as well. It's a way to protect ourselves. The avoidance symptom.

It sounds to me like your brain is trying to come to equilibrium of knowing the past was bad, without overwhelming you with the knowledge, and balanced with the knowledge you are safe now and the present is different. And if your old family did manage to find you you have ways to stay safe now that do not require you to run away and be homeless. You have your husband you have the law you have money and means and friends. You aren't isolated anymore.

Part of me wants to urge you to wait to do a DNA test until you've processed everything else you already know...that it could be overwhelming and difficult no matter the results.

But then I think back to the things I have done over the years that people would have discouraged me from doing (ordering my fathers autopsy report and viewing the photos being one of a few that comes to mind, also prison records). And I know that even as that brought more up to deal with and was indeed quite difficult to integrate along with everything else, having a more complete story of my past has been incredibly helpful in putting together the pieces. Having a narrative helps. Having a narrative that makes sense helps. Even if it is difficult. Whatever you decide, you have a bunch of friends here to lean on.   

[Papa Coco]

Bermuda,

That mugshot would be a huge trigger for me too. Last summer, my wife talked me into joining one of those people-find sites to see if we could sense if our oldest son is still alive, still in the area, and still okay. I paid my $30 for a month on the site. The site kept saying that I could look up as many as 100 people during my month. So, sadly, I looked up all my abusers. I couldn't stop myself. The curiosity felt innocent enough. But in the end, after I found where they were and that all of them are still alive, I went into one of the deepest funks in years.

I can't imagine how seeing your abuser's mug shot and reading that he's still an abuser to others would trigger. That is a major trigger. I'm glad to hear you are beginning to get past it. I hope that time will continue to remove his image from your inner movie screen. It took me about two months to get over it after I looked at my abusers.

Personally, I'm not going to do that again. Those broken people need to fall far, far into the past and out of my recent memory.

I'm sending you thoughts and joy: Here's a hug:

 

[Bermuda]

You all are so right.

I understand why my mind is constantly trying to solve a riddle that isn't there. I know it is very much part of my CPTSD flavour. It's like the sensing of footsteps in the hallway, except the hallway is on the other side of the world. I don't need to run probabilities and possible logistics. It's CPTSD. Trying to find the data and answers is not going to make me happier or even safer. They can't get me here. There is no phone call to an agency that can affect me. No manipulation can reach me. No job to lose. They can't do anything to me. I just looked up if he can travel internationally. Interestingly enough, he can't travel to Mexico. That's probably another reason my mother left Mexico. See, I'm still doing it. It doesn't turn off.

I'm not going to do the DNA test right now. I constantly think about it, but I don't know why I think about it. It doesn't change anything. It doesn't even mean anything. I have no intention of ever re/connecting with anyone be it a third cousin, nor a half sibling. I have no issue becoming a fabel. I just wish I could know, without seeing, without details. So much of my life was a lie, and I don't want to suppose. I wish I had the certainty other people seem to.

I am doing fine, anyway. I am not in crisis. I'm just keeping busy. Throwing myself into life, deeply. The deepend of life. Swim swim swim.

[NarcKiddo]

I am glad you are sharing this with us, Bermuda. If you decide to do the DNA test at some point I hope you will feel able to share that decision. We are all here for you and are happy and honoured to share your journey and help any way we can.

I sometimes have doubts about some aspects of my FOO DNA, but knowing one way or the other would make no practical difference to me. At least, I don't think it would and I have no practical way to do a test that would tell me what I want to know. I do understand the feeling of wanting to know, rather than merely suppose.

 

[Bermuda]

CPTSD is really testing me, or happenstance is testing my CPTSD.

I was cycling my kids home on the cargo bike. A car reversed in full speed toward us, hitting and flipping our cargo bike over and continuing into the car behind us as I pulled the kids from their seatbelts and out of the cargo container. The kids were shaky but hopefully not traumatised. No injuries, they were checked out in an ambulance. I have ankle pain, muscle bruises in my leg, and pain in my ribs. My bike is totalled. The police are investigating it as a crime.

So, there's that.

[NarcKiddo]

How awful. I am so very sorry this happened to you. I'm glad the children are OK physically and I'm sure you will be able to help them deal with any worries they have so they won't have any lasting mental effects. Children in a loving, caring environment are very resilient, apparently. I am glad the police are investigating and I hope that you feel better soon. Did you get checked out to make sure nothing is sprained or broken?

    

[Bermuda]

Well, they called an ambulance and asked me how I felt, and I answered honestly at that time... Fine. It took a couple hours for me notice things, as these things go. I will be fine though. Just so much more to process now, and my processor was already smoking.

[Armee]

 

[Bermuda]

So much doubt. I'm having a hard time coping. Whenever thing happen in life, I feel so alone. I don't have a place to grieve, a moment to stop and breathe without letting someone down. My husband expressed concern about me getting a new bike. It's a significant chunk of our savings I know, but it's how I exist. It's how I shop. How I take the kids to school and pick them up. It's the only freedom I have. I feel like every step I take for myself is a setback to everyone else around me. This money comes out of the summer holiday plan. So if I get myself a new bike, it's my fault we don't have an exciting holiday this summer. It comes out of our house fund, so then it's my fault we have to stay here. I told an old friend near Vancouver that I could visit her this year, she's the only person who knows me since then, and it's been a decade, and now I am letting her down. I can't rest and heal. I can't cry. All of this is my fault and my responsibility, and I just have to keep going because it's my job, my job that I don't get paid for.

I had to carry my 4.5 year old son to his autism assessment today in a toddler carrier on my back. The doctor commented to him how strong his mother is, and it took all my strength not to say, "Yes, and I got hit by a car three days ago and injured my legs and ribs." Instead, I just smiled and carried him to the shopping mall to where we ate cake together, and the twenty minute walk home.

It's not that I want a medal. I just want people to see me. I don't want to have to steal my needs from other people. I feel like I am just a burden at my best.

Anyway, tomorrow I am going to buy a new cargo bike, whether or not insurance will cover it because I need it to fulfill my job that I can't take time off from.

[NarcKiddo]

Dearest Bermuda, of course you must get a new bike. That is not a luxury for you - it is a necessity for the family. I cannot believe insurance will not cover the cost - if the police are investigating it as a crime then I cannot imagine how the driver would not be at fault, and his insurance should cover it. I don't know what the laws are where you are, but here in the UK every driver must have third party insurance so even if their insurance does not cover damage to their own vehicle it does cover damage to anyone else or their belongings. And the insurance industry must also have a fund to pay third parties in cases where drivers have no insurance at all. I would be very surprised if there was not something similar where you are. In due course there will probably also be some compensation due to you for your injuries - although I guess you would have to claim for those when making the claim for your bike and you would probably have to go and see a doctor sooner rather than later so the extent of the injuries can be checked.

But even if for some reason you cannot get reimbursed for the cost of your bike, and have to pay for it out of the family finances, it is NOT your fault if that means other plans have to be delayed.