Today I’m grateful for feeling…

Tentatively enlightened maybe? For as long as I can remember I’ve always HATED the sounds of babies/toddlers crying. Not a regular “this sucks, I wish I wasn’t hearing this” but elevated heart rate, restricted breathing, NEED to leave feeling. Reading this Complex PTSD book has made me catalog what it feels like to be triggered and clearly these are signs for me. It also talks a lot about the effects of neglect in children, particularly before the age of two. I know I was neglected and even screamed at for crying through that entire period. So I think hearing a young child crying triggers that primal feeling of neglect in me, the overwhelming fear of the world that a baby adopts though a lack of soothing is suddenly all I feel. I think I’ve cracked it, which is so surreal. I thought this was a trait I’d always have, that it was just part of who I was and didn’t look at it deeply. But after realizing this, I heard a toddler crying at work and was able to regulate rather than immediately flee the area. It was incredible. I feel free, but tentative. I’m always worried about false breakthroughs. 

Deep grief for Child Me who went unsoothed and nurtured for those formative years. Grief for a baby in a crib that was screamed at by her father and learned that the world contained terror rather than comfort. Grief for the later me’s who didn’t consider neglect to be such a burden and took them blame on themselves, thinking themselves deficient in every way rather than simply disconnected from love. Grief for my father and mother, who couldn’t be good parents due to the sufferings in their past. Grief for my current self, as the book says to consider Complex PSTD like Diabetes: increasingly manageable but always present and flare ups will occur as a rule. The burner will get less hot, but I’ll likely still need to spend energy managing something.

Nervous about my therapy session with my mom tomorrow. And now that I’m writing it, I realize that’s a cue to self-soothe rather than ruminate. I guess wish me luck on it? 

Sad and tired about going back on SSRI’s. I got my prescription from the psychiatrist today for Prozac/Fluoxetine. I spent the entire car ride home crying and soothing my inner, highly over-medicated teen who equates mood medications to the end of the world. Years 12-19 were full of a slew of rotating medications and the hardest period of my life. Something about medicating again kicks up all the dust I haven’t dealt with from that time period and it’s been a weepy time. Also a lot of effort convincing myself that these pills won’t hurt me, they work for millions of people and can help me work through the PTSD, like they were designed to do. It’s all a bit messy.

Really nervous and frantic about Tuesday and Thursday. Tuesday Cubu will be gaming with friends while I call you, and on Thursday he’ll be working from home. My two sorest codependency/trauma spots struck in the same week. I’m doing a lot better than every other week in my past where just one of these things are happening. But it’s exhausting. The mere brush of the thought of either of those days has me in full fight or flight, then I have to drop what I’m doing and mitigate that stress response. It’s like having a kid that’s overtired that has meltdowns at the tip of a hat and I don’t always have the time or energy or inner peace to deal with it well. Again, doing better than ever before but I almost feel like an imposter, like I’m making up doing this well or it isn’t part of real life. There’s a surreal quality to it. Jesus, just realized I’m in a constant battle with dissociation really. We’ll see if I can maintain this on the days of. And Cubu is acting weird too, scared of whether I’ll be able to contain myself or not. This whole thing is a codependent mess. One step at a time.

Feelin’ good…

• I swam in the river in the morning!!!!! I’ve been wanting to do that for years but always had some weak excuse (or several) not to. But I had quietly set up the conditions with work and with transportation and I fucking did it. And?? It was everything the “take cold showers” “workout in the morning” people said it would be. I saw a foot wide snapping turtle underwater, I was followed by a heron, I floated underneath the tracks as a train passed over, I got to feel super slow going up river then SUPER fast going back down. The best moment was when I stopped at my turning point and just sensed the world. The pale morning light, the crickets dying out, the birds doing their morning routines, the soft water sounds all around. It was true bliss. I felt powerful, capable, and like I was just another fish in the water. I’m so grateful I seem to have “trained” on accident with all the lap swimming before, it really enabled me to keep a pace and intuitively know how many strokes to take between breaths to keep the swim a smooth one. I did not at all need to worry like I did about this swim. How many times do I say that on here? I should start processing my worry differently, since it’s so rarely relevant after the fact. 
• released from my unrealistic expectations of my mom. I realized talking about childhood experiences just isn’t a route I can go with her because she takes them personally (which makes sense). But in all her ruminating, she never acknowledges my feeling or tries to soothe it. And I don’t really need her to now that I have my own inner loving parent. I feel like a weight has been lifted, that I can stop fighting against that tide. We have therapy together tomorrow with her therapist so we’ll see how that goes. 
• small win today where I was feeling insecure about going to an SIA meeting when I knew I would have to leave halfway through. I’m a regular at this meeting and knew they’d be fine with it, but felt compelled to text a member to ask them if they thought that was okay. I drafted the message then stopped myself from sending it, realizing I wasn’t trusting my own knowledge on something that was within my realm, and didn’t send it. I felt accomplished, like I had taken a leap away from a long-term codependent behavior.
• had a great therapy session where I got new tools. I really like this new therapist, our brains work in a similar way. I told her I’ll be ready for EMDR with her within the month, that I feel good enough about our relationship to try being that open. I’m grateful to have insurance that, while it can be a headache, enables me to have a therapist at all.