Catching and Processing my Memories (Time Line Process)

[Hope66]

I am just putting an idea together that I am planning on trying - and wanted to see if anyone has any comments/thoughts/suggestions/anything - please feel free to comment.

I have been reading various self-help books, and see that 'time lines' are mentioned, and I am thinking about ways to organise something that will work for me.  I considered a book with pages for different ages in my life, but somehow that feels too 'fixed' and I suspect it wouldn't work for me.

I have now decided that I'll get some large A4 envelopes, and put a time frame on each envelope:
Maybe 0.2 years; 2-5 years; 5-10 years; etc through to my adult years.

Then when I have a memory that I want to write about, I will do so on whatever piece of paper I have available, and I'll then place that piece of paper in the corresponding envelope.  This means I can literally work on the memories or thoughts/feelings relating to whatever comes to mind, and I can just put it away in the envelope. 

Then on occasions when I want to think about a time period, I can just open the envelope and look at the things I've put inside - and the fact they will be on separate pieces of paper means I can move them around, sort them, discard any that no longer feel relevant etc etc.

I hope to do drawings and write poems/stories sometimes too - to put in the envelopes - so there is a mixture of things there.

I want to make the process meaningful but also 'fun'.

As I'm writing this, I'm considering putting some kind of colour coding into the mix - in that 'positive memories' might be written on pink or lilac paper and more upsetting and anxiety provoking memories might be on a different colour - and that things that I consider to have a 'trigger' would perhaps be coded on the outside of the paper...  Am I making this too complicated - I don't know, just sharing a thought that came to mind.

I'll play around with it and see what works for me.

But I would value hearing anyone's thoughts about this - and if you've done anything similar, and what your experiences have been?

Hope 

[Candid]

I've tried many times to write my autobiography, and it's been feeling damn near impossible. I've heard from several sources that abused children have trouble, as adults, telling a coherent narrative. I can only agree. I suspect it shows the degree to which we've been FOGged. My first attempt shows me minimising abuse or considering it a funny story, which is no doubt what They made of it at the time. Other memories I'm still struggling with have been left out altogether. If I think of writing my autobiography now, it's nothing but abuse from FOO confounded and compounded by my struggles in the workplace and my many financial losses. I feel exhausted at the thought of it.

Your envelope system sounds like a good idea, and one I might adopt if I ever feel moved to have another go.

[Hope66]

Hi Candid,
Thanks for your reply and I agree it's tough to put together any kind of coherent narrative - and you sound exhausted from attempts to do that, but I sincerely hope that one day you will be able to do your autobiography - if that is something you would still like to do in the future. 

Thanks for your feedback - and I am going to look out for some envelopes at the next opportunity to get some.

In the meantime, I will be considering the age ranges to include in each one - I hope I am able to actually 'do' this - as many times I have ideas and then don't follow through with them.  I am sure there are various reasons for that - including a fear of processing things.  But at the same time, I want to make progress and I feel it could be a way forward to doing so.

Hope 

[Blueberry]

Hope, those sound really good ideas! I have boxes full of photos which I can't put in albums, not because the photos remind me of bad times per se, but because the very idea of all the work involved putting them in a chronological order, well, a combo of    and             

So over time I have made posters of some of them and written positive things about myself next to the photo, whatever occurred to me looking at myself. No negative comments allowed. And then I had a poster or two on my wall for a while. These were of more recent photos, nothing from my childhood.

I guess the relevance to your idea is the problem with doing things chronologically and fixing them somewhere, like in a journal or photo album. So with your envelopes, you're allowing for your memories to come up in non-chronological order, which they probably will.

I also like your idea of allowing it to be 'fun' or at least creative. That helped me process, e.g. with these photos. I didn't start out planning to add colourful comments i.e. with coloured pencils    I don't know how it is for you, but for me often just allowing myself to go with my own flow is healing. I wasn't allowed that as a child, much. I was ridiculed etc instead. So for a long time I've been almost stunted in my expression. With the idea of your coloured writing paper, your creativity is flowing, and if you go with it more will come. Part of my healing involves allowing and encouraging the use of all my senses. I'd say that's part of creativity.

Good luck with this. Maybe you'll write some time how you're progressing with it?

[Hope66]

Maybe some Triggers here - so Trigger warning.

Hi Blueberry,
Wow, your reply was incredibly helpful to me today - thank you so much!     You spoke about how you were "almost stunted in your expression" - and that resonated so much with me - I've got memories of my F burning my childhood stories (which had been a source of pride to me, until they were apparently 'accidentally' burned by him - I think it was probably accidental), and I also remember when I was a small child at primary school and I was painting something, and I was happily mixing colours on the wet paper (rather than mixing them in a mixing palette) and the teacher just saw what I was doing, and then just 'whacked me' across the face causing me to knock over the water onto the floor - and then she shouted 'Look what you've done!' - accusing me of spilling the water - when she had clearly done so in the act of hitting me.

Just small memories, but they both really stuck with me, and I am only recently beginning to try out some creative expression (in my early 50's) as a way to enjoy that side of myself and see what happens.  But I feel 'stunted' and 'frozen' about it - as if I can't do it 'right' - I know logically there's no right or wrong to it, but like you, I wasn't allowed to flow and 'do my thing' as a child - and it really does hamper expression.

I feel more hopeful about this - and I appreciate your feedback.  Thank you again.   

Hope 

[Elphanigh]

Thanks for starting this thread. It is so helpful for me right now. I have been working on a timeline for about a month now. It is truly hard to sit and right one that is chronological and coherent. I have made it to about 6th grade (some of this slow progress is just not having time because life has been crazy).

It is nice to be given some creative ideas about how to do this. It is helpful for me and my T to have this so she can more fully understand the extent of what I  have been through. It is hard to explain and ever harder to grasp I am afraid.

Thank you Hope66 and Blueberry for some great inspiration.

[Hope66]

Hi Elphanigh,

It is so great that this thread has helped you - and I'm glad I posted it because I've had some great suggestions and comments made here - this forum is really amazing.

Well done to you for starting your timeline - I wish you well in progressing with it, and I'm hoping to start mine this week - I admit I've still not purchased my envelopes!  Procrastinating maybe, but I fully intend to start it - because I do think it will be helpful to me. 

Interesting that even just thinking about it, has brought some memories and 'flashbacks' to the surface that I'd not recalled before. 

Good luck with your timeline, and hope it goes well.

Hope 

[Elphanigh]

Thank you. Good luck with yours as well. I am interested to hear how yours works out. It sounds like a great concept.

[GlassChild]

This is a great idea, I want to try this. I'm going to try it by hanging a sting across the wall in my loft and clothes-pinning index cards to the time in my life when things happened.

[alchemist]

I've done that on My Ipad and it frees me from having paper clutter.  I carry a small journal in my purse when out to jot down anything that comes to mind and add it when I get home.

[Elphanigh]

That's a great idea alchemist  I think I need to start doing that, as I am starting to remember more things

[Hope66]

GlassChild - I hope your index cards are working well - great idea to put it where you can see it daily.

Alchemist and Elphanigh - I hope your ideas to use it on the I-pad is working - I think that's a great idea. 

I have started my time-line, and I ended up doing it in digital form, rather than on paper - I think it was good to have made a start.  I can already feel memories coming to the surface, and I am hoping to keep track of them and write them down as well.

Hope 

[Blueberry]

Hope, I was just reading this again now and felt compelled to add a comment. Better late than never, I hope.

I've got memories of my F burning my childhood stories (which had been a source of pride to me, until they were apparently 'accidentally' burned by him - I think it was probably accidental),

I'm so sorry this happened to you! It must have been devastating. 

TRIGGER WARNING Physical abuse

I also remember when I was a small child at primary school and I was painting something, and I was happily mixing colours on the wet paper (rather than mixing them in a mixing palette) and the teacher just saw what I was doing, and then just 'whacked me' across the face causing me to knock over the water onto the floor - and then she shouted 'Look what you've done!' - accusing me of spilling the water - when she had clearly done so in the act of hitting me.

This part of your post makes me really angry, which I don't think happened when I originally read your post. I probably wasn't letting it affect me in any way then. Now I think to myself: "How dare she hit a small child across the face??!" A small child, just innocently experimenting. And then to add insult to injury, blame you for knocking the water onto the floor. That is wrong, just plain wrong. Where did she get her teacher training? But I know, at that time in your country and mine corporal punishment was permitted in schools. Though I'm not sure that that included hitting a child across the face.

I suppose the anger coming up is because atm memories of physical abuse in FOO are re-surfacing. Don't worry, feeling anger for somebody else about what was done to them can help me eventually feel anger at what was done to me, or help me channel my own anger into something constructive.

End of Trigger Warning

Just small memories, but they both really stuck with me, and I am only recently beginning to try out some creative expression (in my early 50's) as a way to enjoy that side of myself and see what happens.  But I feel 'stunted' and 'frozen' about it - as if I can't do it 'right' - I know logically there's no right or wrong to it, but like you, I wasn't allowed to flow and 'do my thing' as a child - and it really does hamper expression.

I hope your creativity continues to grow bit by bit and especially that you get pleasure in and comfort from it. That the stunted and frozen feelings lessen, they have for me. 

[songbirdrosa]

I have a system kinda like this for 'recovery reminders'. I write in marker on different coloured cards things I think I need to know or remember. Yellow cards for anything to do with my emotions, and blue cards for actions or behaviours. The style of writing is an indicator of what's on the card, too. Cursive is for quotes I like, and ALL CAPS is for therapy reminders. I stick them to the wall beside my bed so I can see them easily 

[Hope66]

I've just been re-reading this thread, because I was keen to think about where I've got to with this process of 'catching and processing my memories (time line process), and I've just re-read the reply that Blueberry gave to me about when my F burned my stories, and when my teacher hit me for experimenting with paints as a small child - I really appreciated your validation of the fact those things were challenging to deal with for many reasons.
So thank you again Blueberry - I really appreciate your feedback and validation.

Songbirdrosa - you wrote your reply in July, and I've only just seen it - but I really like your idea of colour-coding.

So - what have I done?  I did buy the envelopes - and typically I have forgotten where I put them!!!  So I didn't do the categorising in the envelopes - even though the intention was there.

However, I HAVE managed to buy myself an A4 wide ruled notebook which is 'colour coded' with pages edged in bright colours - which means I have a way of writing on appropriately coloured pages - to match whatever I decide to put with each colour.  So I am hoping that I can manage to make a start on that - over the next week.

I re-read some earlier comments too, and remembered how Candid wrote about it being difficult for a traumatised child to be able to put together a coherent narrative - and I totally empathise with that - it is difficult to think coherently about things - they come as fragments of memory to me - and don't always make sense, but I am hoping to process things more by beginning to write more things down.

Even as I'm writing about this now, I am getting flashbacks of different things - and I am thinking - Yes!  I need to process and talk about that - here in the forum - but 'where' do I put that?  Thinking about the different topics listed here...  At the same time, a feeling of 'This is over-whelming' comes upon me.  Then I shut down for a bit - distract myself, and the thought/feeling passes me by.  I'm hoping that 'catching the thoughts/feelings' and writing them down will help me to then organise and process them better.

Anyway, I am glad to have re-read this thread today - and I am grateful to all of you who have contributed to it.  I'm intrigued about how you are getting on with your own processing of time line - if you are doing it - I hope it's a good process.

I sometimes think I should call myself the 'Procrastinator' - but I think I am facing a lot of things these days that previously I was totally in the fog with.  So I am 'seeing' things clearer.    It's worth it.

Hope