Updates

As some of you know, yesterday was an extremely hard day for me. What probably most of you don’t know is that I was having the strongest suicidal thoughts that I’ve had in years. So that scared me a bit. I’m glad to be out of that storm. There are also other personal issues that have arisen that have caused me grief, but sometimes you just have to know when to let go of something and not let it bring you down. So that’s what I’m choosing to do.

I’m feeling in a bit of a vulnerable place, and I’m not exactly sure why that is. I feel like my “outer shell” if you will is quite thin, so that if someone really wanted to hurt me right now, they could. I suppose I just need to be gentle with myself and ask others around me that they be gentle with me as well…

 

Travel

I will be traveling for almost an entire month with the family I work for, starting on Oct 1. When I say traveling, I mean we will be staying in one place, but that place is very far from home. A six hour plane ride to be exact. And it’s in a very remote place that is quite expensive to fly into, otherwise my partner would consider flying out to visit. This will be the longest I will be without my dear partner since we met. It also means that I will be going several weeks without seeing my therapist. Also, because my hours are completely unknown at this moment – I’m going to be working very long hours most likely – it’s not possible to schedule phone sessions while I’m away. I’m sure I will have time to blog though – especially when Little Guy is sleeping. I will probably have nothing else to do to keep me occupied!

 

Therapy

Therapy is going well. When I say well, I mean excruciatingly painful, but I feel like we are finally starting to get somewhere. I know I haven’t been writing about my therapy much lately. I suppose it’s because it’s been so intense that I just needed to set it aside and focus my mind on other things so as not to overwhelm myself.

I don’t remember much of my last therapy session, except that I revealed something that I had done that I felt extremely guilty about and told her that I deserved to die. I had been triggered earlier that day by an event that I was angry at myself for and felt bad about. This event led to feelings of extreme self loathing and self hatred. At some point, I switched, and a very angry part took over. I assumed that it was R, but when my therapist asked if they were R, they didn’t answer back. So perhaps it was and perhaps it wasn’t. And perhaps if it wasn’t, then I’ve been thinking that this angry part who spouts off about hating the world and everyone and everything has been R when it really hasn’t. DID is so confusing sometimes…

 

Thoughts about my DID

I’ve also had some revelations about myself, my dissociation, and my DID lately that I’ve been wanting to share on here, but haven’t seemed to have the chance – I am a bit distractable aren’t I! (Is that a word? It seems like it should be…)

I’ve realized that my DID is different than many others with DID in the sense that my parts aren’t that separate from myself (they don’t have their own names, physical traits, etc) and yet they are separate enough so that I am still considered to be DID. Does that make any sense? R has the name R, simply because I forced her to pick a name (other than “my” name), and the name stuck. Same with Coraline, although I don’t call her by that name anymore. She is just “the difficult younger part” or something to that effect. But for the most part, these different parts of me don’t have that strongly developed senses of self. Most of them know that they are not me (and get quite upset when our therapist calls them “brandic”), but they also don’t know who they are.

 

My therapist is under the impression that the trauma is wanting to reveal itself. That that is the reason behind all the unexplained uncomfortable body sensation, the panic, the anger pushing up, etc that I’ve been experiencing very strongly in the last month or so. I don’t know what I think about this, other than that I hope she is right. I want to know what was so awful that caused me to have such severe PTSD and dissociation. Because truly, besides some emotional difficulties with my FOO, and a few uncomfortable sexual experiences, I can’t quite think of anything that would be traumatic enough to cause me to have the severe symptoms that I have. But most especially the PTSD. Because I can deny the DID at times, but I can’t deny that the PTSD is there. And for there to be PTSD, there needs to be trauma. So… what is the trauma*?

Hope all of you are well. I extend warm thoughts to all those out there reading, near and far. I am grateful for each and every one of you.

Next up: My next Truth from 30 Days of Truth!

 

* That’s the million dollar question

30 days of truth – day 01 – something I hate about myself

Days of truth, here we go.

I’ve really been struggling the last few days (or last few weeks when I really think about it), so I figured I’d do this as something to focus my mind on so that it isn’t consumed by all the turmoil going on inside. If you are unfamiliar with what 30 Days of Truth is, my dear friend WeeGee has written about it. I recommend you popping over there to learn more.

***

Something you hate about yourself: my dissociation*

Probably one of the things I hate most about myself is my dissociation. I know that it is a coping technique – one that probably saved my life- I know that it got me through the worst periods and events of my life, I know it’s the reason I’m able to function now… Regardless, I hate it.

I hate it because I cannot remember most of my life, only bits and pieces. I hate it because I cannot consistently feel connected to people, places, events, and things. I hate it because I feel mostly disconnected from myself. I hate it because I don’t know what I’m feeling most of the time, and when I do know what I’m feeling, I often don’t know why. I hate it because it makes me feel out of control. I hate it because it makes me feel so alone.

And probably the biggest reason I hate it is because the person who is “brandic” doesn’t feel like a whole, unified person, but rather a sum of disjointed, fragmented parts. I don’t even know who “I” am.

Like I said earlier, there is a reason for it, and it helped me get to where I am today. But I can still hate it, can’t I.

Sorry I don’t have anymore more in me at the moment. I apologize if this is a sub-par first 30 Days of Truth entry. Oh well, it is what it is.

* if you are unfamiliar with what dissociation is, I suggest checking out Wikipedia’s page on it

Silent protest

One by one they cut

Another gash into my chest

Making me a mess

Wanting to escape

Not wanting to wait

For death to come knocking at my door

Ever more

Screaming out in silence protest

 

***

 

How is it that I can be feeling okay (albeit sick) one moment, and totally overwhelmed with anger, frustration, and discontent the next. Want to shout at the world to stop turning. Scream at everyone that I’m hurting. Yet it all stays locked inside. Inside where the gashes continue to bleed.

 

Sorry for the heavy post. It’s just how I’m feeling at the moment. Want to crawl up into a hole and die. Hating the world. Hating myself. Hating this heat. Hating my own mind. Wanting to sleep forever. Never wake up.

I want to say no to all of it.

I will not survive

My mind and body are screaming in horror and agony. The end is closing in on me. I will not survive.

At least this is what it feels like. I try to tell myself that this is not real, that this is not really happening, that everything is okay and that I am safe. It’s not helping. I feel like a cow that’s being dragged to slaughter. It knows its own fate even before seeing it.

Why do I perpetually feel this way? What has happened in my life to create these feelings in me that I’m heading, overcome by terror, toward my death. That I will not survive.

Impending doom.

Pure terror.

Screaming in agony.

I know these. But how? Why? What has happened in my life that I would know such terror?

I want to know and yet the answers are eluding me.

To my body and mind,

I want to know. Please tell me what it is you’ve been trying to tell me. I can feel this horror, this unbelievable pain, this sheer terror. I can feel it. I am experiencing it, with no reprieve. Can you not share with me the source of these things? I want to know. I can handle it. I feel ready to handle it. I want answers. I want my life to make sense. Right now it doesn’t make any sense. Right now I can’t think of a time in my life when I’ve ever been truly terrified. I want to know the source – of all this pain, of all this fear, of all this torment. I want to know. I am ready. Please please let me know what it is that you are trying to tell me with these flooded feelings and sensations. This is my life. And I want to know. I want to know so that I may heal. Please please tell me what it is so we can all heal from it and move forward. Because if I don’t know the source of these feelings, the healing can’t happen, plain and simple. I may not have been ready before, but I am ready now. I am tired of feeling like an emotional punching bag. One emotion punches me from one angle; another emotion from another angle. It’s truly exhausting, and I don’t feel we have to live this way. We deserve better. We deserve to be free from this torment. We deserve to live. We deserve to heal. We deserve peace.

Miss sickie and other updates

Hello everyone. I know I’ve been a bit out of it lately, with writing and sharing and all that. These past couple weeks have been hard to say the least, but I’m hanging in there.

I’m miss sickie at the moment. Sore throat… congestion… I think all the emotional upheaval has finally worn me down physically. I wish I could take time off work but I can’t. So fingers crossed that Little Guy doesn’t get it.

I have gone ten full days without smoking. Each and every day is so hard. But I’ve been doing it and I continue to keep doing it. I just truly can’t wait for the day where I don’t have overwhelming cravings for them.

I had my therapy appointment with Bean yesterday. All that I said about therapy being a waste of time and going nowhere and not helping? Yeah, I take that all back.

Yesterday we talked how “up” my defenses are. Especially when we get even the slightest bit close to talking about anything serious, trauma related, etc. That my system either shuts me down or brings forward another part to prevent “us” from having to face anything uncomfortable, whether they be feelings, memories, etc. It makes therapy hard to say the least.

One day at a time and one step at a time. I hope to get to the point where my defenses aren’t so high as we can actually start doing the “work” that is needed to heal. Bean tells me that I have lived in this torment for so long, that I deserve to be free from it. That I shouldn’t have to live in it any more.

My apologies for not reading/commenting on others blogs lately. I’ve just been feeling too overwhelmed to do much of anything.

I also have thoughts about my DID, my parts, and my dissociation that I want to share, but it will have to wait for another post. I’m already feeling exhausted just having written what I have. Miss sickie gets tired out easily!

Sending smiles and hugs to all of out there in cyberland. xx

Not even close to okay

I’m trying to cling with all my might to okay, even though I know I’m far from okay. I’m nowhere near okay.

Why does my therapist keep saying that things are “shifting”? I don’t think anything is shifting. I’m not learning anything about myself. I’m not feeling any forward movement. The only thing I feel is as though I were stuck in mental purgatory with no escape. Is that “progress”? Is that “things shifting”? And if things were shifting, wouldn’t it shift into something else besides this pure and utter hell I’ve been living in for these last couple weeks? How does she see what I’m going through as progress. I really don’t get it. I just don’t. I’ve felt these things before, it’s not like it’s anything new. Sadly, I thought my days of feeling this awful were over. I was sadly wrong. Perhaps her thinking these are “good signs” is just a way for herself to feel better, to not feel like she’s totally helpless or that our therapy is not benefitting me in the slightest but could in fact be making me worse.

How the hell is therapy helping? It’s gotten to the point where I spend most of the session with her dissociated and unable to speak. How is that progress??????

What I’m hanging onto

I’m hanging onto…

• the hope that this will pass
• the idea that this is happening for a reason
• the thought that I can learn something about myself through this
• the idea that mental/emotional upheaval isn’t permanent
• the thought that if I persist through this, I will become stronger as a result
• the idea to not resist it but allow it to be, and that whatever “is” is okay (despite however okay it doesn’t feel)
• the thought that memories will come when I’m ready
• the thought that these feelings cannot kill me
• the memory of me feeling more at peace
• the memory of me feeling sane
• the memory of me feeling like things make sense
• the memory of me feeling connected to and with myself
• the time when I was happy not smoking, before I started smoking again
• the time where I didn’t crave cigarettes, and didn’t need that crutch
• the knowledge that I once found pleasure in things, and that I will experience that again
• the knowledge that no storms last forever; they all pass eventually. That you just need to ride them out if you can’t escape them.
• the knowledge that my PTSD symptoms are just that: my PTSD symptoms. They are not who I am
• the knowledge that my dissociative symptoms are just that: my dissociative symptoms. They are not who I am
• the hope that one day I can be free from this torment that plagues my mind
• the hope that one day I will be okay enough to have children of my own
• the determination to get better
• the determination to heal
• the determination to not only survive but to actually thrive, and that yes, this IS an option for me
• the thought that I don’t have to let my past win
• the thought that it is okay to feel angry, no matter how “not okay” it feels
• the idea that I can accept all parts of me, even my angriest parts
• the idea that am okay (despite my own mind screaming at me that I’m not)

Lost in translation

Things have been a bit crazy/chaotic/strange these past several days. So much so that I don’t even know how to put any of it into words. I’m sure the withdrawal from the nicotine and cigarettes is contributing, although exactly how much is hard to say. Suffice to say at the moment that I’m doing my best to ride out this storm. More thoughts later if/when I can verbalize what is going on.

Hope you all are having an okay Friday so far.

Holding my pieces together

I just got out of therapy a little bit ago. I feel as though I am hanging on by a very thin thread. I told her about the weekend, about the dissociation, about the depersonalization, the disconnection. About the crying. I spent most of the session moving in and out of these states that I can’t even identify. Some more familiar than others. Angry and glaring, terrified and hiding, unable to speak, feeling as though I was wading through mud, feeling as though I were lost in a thick fog, disorientation to where I kept having to remind myself where I was and what Bean had just asked me. Or I wouldn’t be able to remember and would just sit there arguing in my head about whether we should say something or not. [Most times the part who didn’t want us to speak won out.]

Bean thinks that stuff is pushing up. Memories. She thinks that the feeling states for the memories are starting to surface, and that they don’t have a “narrative” yet but that they will come. She said not to be afraid of the dissociation (because to be completely honest, I was feeling very afraid of all the dissociation I’ve been experiencing over the last several days). She said the dissociation is actually is there “to protect.”

I said, “Protect who?”

She said, “Protect you.”

She said the role she sees dissociation playing at the moment is to titrate* the memories so they don’t come at me all at once and overwhelm me. She says, however, that things are loosening up and shifting, and she sees this as a really good thing. She reminded me again not to be afraid of what’s happening: of either the memories or the dissociation. Although I have to say, both are a bit difficult at the moment. The memories, because I’m afraid of what’s there and what I don’t know, and the dissociation, because it’s making me feel crazy and all over the place and not tied to this earth.

I told her that over the course of the weekend, when the dissociation would get really bad, I would think to myself,

“I’m not well. I’m not well.”

She told me that I am, in fact, quite well, and doing quite well, I’m just in the midst of processing some big stuff. I suppose I’m a little bit relieved to hear that, but on the other hand I’m not sure if that makes it any easier. All I know is that it feels like I’m coming undone, and it’s all I can do to simply hold the pieces of me together.

She said that the answers (and memories) will come when they are ready. I do also wonder just how long I will have to wait. And if there’s even anything there at all…

Ugh why is healing so hard?!

*I had to look up this word, and here is the definition that seemed most fitting:

Titrate: Continuously measure and adjust the balance of (a physiological function or drug dosage).

A fall-apart night

Yesterday was, what should I say… intense? I was tired, I was moody, the heat wasn’t helping. Also what didn’t help was going clothes shopping. Some people might enjoy clothes shopping. I enjoy the end result, but the whole process to me is just awful. Having to browse through the racks, all the people also browsing through the racks, trying to avoid eye contact, waiting for the dressing room, the dressing room itself, having to assess whether an item of clothing looks good on oneself… I was already in a triggered state when we left to go shopping, and the shopping only made it worse. By the time I got home, I was tired and hot and extremely moody.

The party was fine, although when we left I could tell something was wrong with myself/inner world, I just couldn’t figure out what. Anger was pushing up from inside but I couldn’t tell what was prompting it or where it was coming from. Screaming voices inside… Once home, I then got triggered when my partner turned off the fan and I asked her to please turn it back on. She said, “well, why don’t you take your long-sleeve shirt off first. Maybe you wouldn’t feel so warm then.” This triggered off inside the equivalent to world war III. Intense switching, then everything being stuck inside and body is paralyzed, then fuming anger, and then finally falling asleep in the living room on the couch. My parter came out and woke me up, at which point (and this is where things feel foggy and uncertain), I cried and sobbed for what felt like a long time. It was a bizarre experience though, because “I” didn’t feel sad, yet I was watching myself crying and sobbing. I also heard myself say, “My body was never mine,” and “I don’t even know what it’s like to have my own body.” Quite honestly, I’m not exactly sure why I was saying that or what I was referring to, although I imagine something related to the abuse. I know that I was in an extremely dissociated state. Not really sure if it was “me” talking or another part of me.

And then quite suddenly, almost like a genie being sucked back into a bottle, all the sadness and grief (?) got sucked back inside my body, I felt like I was back to myself (rather than watching myself), and I could quite literally feel the physical weight and pressure of the sadness and grief pushing up inside my body. I no longer felt the sadness as sadness (even though I’m inclined to say I never “felt” the sadness at all), I felt it only as an intense anxiety. The sadness and grief that had been pouring out of me with tears and sobs virtually disappeared in the matter of a few seconds, and I was back to being my typical numb and shut down self.

By this time, it must have been well past 2am, although I don’t remember looking at a clock through any of this, and finally we came back to bed and I fell asleep in my partners arms. Upon waking this morning, screaming, angry voices in my head. A typical start to a typical day I suppose.

I just wonder, if I could feel all those feelings of grief and sadness, without feeling the need to shove it all back inside like what happened last night (even though it felt like an unconscious process much more than a conscious process), I’m wondering if I would then heal? That the key to my healing is feeling the pain and sadness and grief from the betrayals of my childhood, both physical and emotional? Do I actually have to “remember the trauma” in order to heal? Or perhaps simply feeling the feelings and releasing them will release their hold on me? I really don’t know. What I do know is that I feel no better as a result of my hours of crying last night. In fact, it didn’t even feel like “me” who was crying, and perhaps it wasn’t. Where does that leave me then…?

I guess I am left with myself. The numb, emotionally shut down self. The functional yet dead-inside self. The fake, the phony, the fraud, the lie. The mask, the pacifier, the pleaser, the chameleon. The empty, hollow shell with nothing inside. That is me. Whoopee.