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Some Days the Nightmares Win

March 27, 2015 //
1

Disclaimer: This post is about emotions. I sometimes work through them more easily with words, in text, that I can see reflecting the experience back at me. It is a way of getting perspective. This post, though, may be a downer – I say that before I even write it, because I am having my own experience, and I feel what I feel in this moment. I am so very human. So…do yourself a huge favor, take a moment for ‘informed consent’; if you are in a place emotionally where someone else’s pain and struggling may wound you, throw off a good vibe you are enjoying, or change your experience for the worse, I recommend skipping this one. Hey, if nothing else, the writing is likely to be of poor quality, and angst-y, and rife with spelling errors and weird grammar fails – who needs that on a Friday morning? I’ll understand, I promise.

Still here? Okay…

Some other morning, a coffee.

Some other morning, a coffee.

I woke crying this morning. I fell asleep crying last night. In between, I found myself ambushed by Demons in The Nightmare City. This is not an emotional space I want to occupy. I am frustrated by my lack of resilience, my lack of emotional regulation, and my lack of perspective. I feel sad. I feel angry. I feel resentful and let down. I feel. Yeah. I definitely feel. I feel mistreated, and mislead. I feel set up and I feel sabotaged. I feel hurt.

“That’s a whole lot of feelings there, lady, what gives?” I’m a human primate. I am an emotional being more than a rational one – it’s a balance. Today it isn’t balancing as well as I’d like. Stress kicks my ass, being hurt kicks my ass, abrupt change kicks my ass – and it takes me a little time to recover, even with some support. Emotions are not criminal actions. Assaulting people with them is, I hear, avoidable. That sounds like fine thing to me, and I turned the little sign on my door this morning to ‘do not disturb’, meditated a while, had a shower, meditated some more… I still don’t want to be as disturbed as I feel, right now. The sign didn’t do much to help with the feelings, but by design it may prevent anyone else from walking through the mess I woke to, within, this morning.

Meditation, mindfulness practices, good basic self-care are all going a long way to improve my experience of me, very nicely. I feel a momentary hurt, recalling with sadness how quickly encouragement turned to criticism, a few months after I began this journey. I was taking a moment to feel proud of my progress, and I was feeling pretty impressed with new tools and practices being effective at helping me on a level nothing else ever had… I got called ‘smug’. I was incredibly hurt. Admittedly, I had been foolishly trying to explain or share the experience with someone else… maybe they hadn’t asked? (I suck at that – put a person in front of me and I will probably just start talking. Are you aware that your executive function manages that for you?) It hurt, nonetheless, and since then I am self-conscious about feeling encouraged by progress, and reluctant to share positive feelings about it in conversations. (Sticks and stones? Fuck right off; words matter.)

I feel confused. “Emptied out”. I feel overburdened by unmet emotional needs piling up over time. I feel like I am not making the progress I could be, right now. It’ll be okay, I think – I hold on to that tightly. I’ve got the hotline number in my pocket, just in case it gets too hard.  I lost a beautiful niece to suicide this year, and I see how it hurts my cousin every day she is without her daughter; I won’t put my traveling partner through that, and I can take the steps to avoid it. Despair is a motherfucker – it is part of our human experience.

...and another...

…and another…

I can’t be certain that the intensity of my emotions this morning reflects something ‘real’ or necessary; they are only emotions. For all I know, this is a 100% bio-chemical experience with no grounding in events or experience. Does that matter in the moment? Well, sure. It matters the way anything true ‘matters’. One true thing is that my emotions are this intense, and unpredictably so. Another true thing is that my emotions, and lack of top-down control, are incredibly uncomfortable for some people to live with. (I don’t get a choice, myself; this is my experience and I live it.) Unfortunately, in a live and unscripted real-life environment, I also don’t get much compassion specific to the ‘invisible’ issues associated with my TBI or PTSD. I rarely fight for it; if it isn’t there to be offered, begging for it, pleading for it or wishing it were there will not make it appear. Compassion can be taught – but that phenomenon also requires an active learner. Change is, but forcing it on someone isn’t appropriate – and generally isn’t effective.

My traveling partner encourages and supports me – he frankly provides a level of emotional support that I can only describe as ‘super human’ – but the environment in the household, generally, is unhealthy for me. I feel aggravated and moody about looking for a place of my own, because I’d honestly prefer to continue living with my traveling partner – he’s wonderful to live with [for me]. I am painfully aware, though, that living with me can be hard on him. Right now so much of what I am working through touches on sexuality, gender, individual identity, boundary setting/management, and relationships with others that it’s harder to treat each other gently in moments when we need it most from each other. So…yeah. I need to be on my own a while – not a break up, not even a separation, just a different living arrangement. It still sucks to hurt over it. I hope by day’s end I am embracing it in good spirits.

I leave other household members out of this, generally; I am writing about my own experience and the other people in it are entitled to be free of public scrutiny of their values and choices filtered through my chaos and damage. But…I am not willing to continue to over-compromise my needs, or undercut my values to keep peace, and the time I spend in the arms of my loves is too precious to taint it with OPD, or games. As a population of individuals, we don’t want or need the same things, and at 52 I have no time to waste on fighting to get the most basic emotional needs met; we are not all equally committed to that endeavor. I don’t yet have the emotional resilience to hold enough in reserve to continue to take care of me when common place bullshit goes sideways, and often find myself without any emotional reserves left to care for me, myself, by the time I have a moment to do so. I feel positive about the choice to get my own place…and for the moment, sad that it is necessary at all.

You know what I don’t feel? I don’t feel guilt or shame over the choice to move out, it needs to happen; I don’t thrive in an environment in which my emotional quality of life is poor. Hell, right now in this moment… I’m okay. (Thanks, Dearheart!) My tears have dried. I’m not feeling social, but I’m not enthralled by Demons in The Nightmare City.  (If I knew that I would have the kind of nightmares that I had last night, in nights to come, I’d never sleep again.) I don’t have the headache that followed me around all day yesterday, which is a huge improvement.  My coffee tastes good – I feel a pang of sadness sweep over me when I realize I won’t have an espresso machine in my kitchen for some time to come after I move; it will be a frugal lifestyle, focused on painting, meditation, and love. Wow. Suddenly that sounds fucking amazing – and all over again I wonder why this hurts at all. I enjoy solitude. I dislike drama. I have musical and culinary tastes that are not shared in the household at large… and I miss a good French press in the morning; it’s a lovely ritual to prepare coffee that way, time it carefully, enjoy the outcome at leisure… I miss living a gentle life. (The most humorous thing about that is how little time I have ever spent living that kind of exceptional quality of life – across years and relationships, I can’t really pin down more than a total of about 18 months that qualify as ‘gentle living’ in 52 years!

I’ve already found my way to a better place. It’s nice. No rushing, either; I’ve made changes to my schedule, effective this week, intended to dial down some of the fatigue-related stress, and don’t have to rush off so soon on Friday mornings. Have you actually read this far? Are you okay? Thank you for being interested, curious, or concerned enough to come all this way with me – whether just this morning, or over these past couple years. I appreciate it. You help me feel heard.

Yeah. Some days, the nightmares win. Today they didn’t. 🙂

Because love matters more. "Emotion and Reason" 24″ x 36″ acrylic on canvas w/ceramic details and glow 2012

Because love matters more.
“Emotion and Reason” 24″ x 36″ acrylic on canvas w/ceramic details and glow 2012

Today is a good day to put down some baggage. Today is a good day to practice good self-care. Today is a good day for self-compassion – first, not last. Today is a good day to enjoy this amazing woman I am becoming without competition, dread, or games. Today is a good day to treat others well, and understand that they are walking their own path; their story, and experience, are not mine to endure, to manage, or to criticize – and participation is a choice.

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Categories Anxiety, art and the artist, Brain Injury, Free Will, grief, Healthy Living, Logic & Reason, Love, Metaphors, Mindfulness, more than a little bit of bitching, pain, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Rape, Relationships, Sleepless Nights, Spring, The Big 5, women, Words

Yesterday’s News

March 24, 2015 //
1

There’s a quality every yesterday shares with all the other yesterdays; they are in the past. Sometimes that’s a sad thing, because we enjoyed the day so much while it was ‘today’. I will admit that yesterday – the yesterday that was most recently today, and is not now, having become yesterday in the most clearly defined way – is not a day I’m sad to see in the past. Yesterday was a difficult day. I hadn’t slept well the night before, but woke feeling good and enjoying the morning, it didn’t last because… well… hormones, mostly, I guess. Not much to be done there but wait it out, treat myself gently, and show great consideration and courtesy to others – and hope for the best.

The evening was okay. No big blow ups, no significant stress, no baggage; I retired for the evening shortly after I got home, moodily wrote for a while, and crashed out early. The writing won’t see sunlight; it was hormone-fueled, angst-y, discontent, and sad. Not share worthy, just very human. Keeping to myself was more a matter of caring for my family, than a self-care practice; the storms and tantrums that sometimes result from the combination of fatigue, hormones, and a disinhibiting brain injury are pretty nasty to go through – and quite possibly worse for the loved ones who must helplessly bear witness. It is by far the easier to choice to reduce the potential for such things completely, by withdrawing to a quiet private space with less stimuli. I kept an eye on the clock and was firm with myself about going to bed ‘on time’; I needed the sleep, for sure, but the routine itself provides structure that helps me maintain balance.

I slept last night. I slept deeply, and I slept through the night. I needed the sleep. I woke with some difficulty when the alarm went off, and I suspect if I were horizontal right now, I’d be asleep in seconds. The hormones are a component of my sleep challenges, which is more obvious now that they are entirely of the replacement variety. At some points in my natural cycle, as well as on this replacement, there’s a particular point at which my estrogen level seems to drive wakefulness; I don’t know with any certainty if it is the high or the low, or an intermediate level that complements some other feature of my biology. I’m not doing the science – I am living the experience. My observations are subjective.

We all need restful moments, and real rest, to recharge for the next challenge.

I need restful moments, and real rest, to recharge for the next challenge.

When I am tired or run down, great mornings hold greater potential to become difficult days later on; I lack emotional resilience when I am fatigued. By the time I am really aware that the emotional weather of the day is changing, I’m often already drenched in the sudden downpour, unprepared. I think I could easily address the ‘unprepared’ piece, though, if I go forward with more awareness of how fatigue does affect me – and that the effect is often not felt immediately, but later in the day. Being prepared is sometimes enough to change the outcome of events that tend to follow a pattern. 🙂

Today is a whole new day. I am still dealing with the hormones; hot flashes and nausea this morning. I’m in a decent mood, though, and I feel rested. Being well-rested is a very big deal.

I hear the household waken, early. I resist the impulse to rush into morning interactions; I’m quite honestly not at my best first thing, and I’m still waiting for my pain medication, and morning coffee to kick in for the day. 🙂 Good self-care is sometimes about simple practices, and discipline learned over a lifetime; I try to stay to myself first thing in the morning, until I am really awake.

It’s interesting to note that I’ve been finding a great deal of value, recently, in reading literature regarding development of executive function in children; it tends to shed light on the tantrums, the fury, and loss of emotional regulation…things we see, and even expect, in young children but that appall us in adults. The literature has enhanced my understanding of why some practices do seem to genuinely improve the state of my overall executive function over time, while other practices provide soothing, comfort, or ease the social impact of behavior widely viewed as uncomfortable or inappropriate from a woman of 52 (even by family members). Even practicing good practices, there is a desirable balance of outcomes to find; if all my best self-care practices are focused on easing the impact on loved ones, rather than improving my own experience, I could predictably be facing a whole lot of resentment down the road – and no real change in my own experience, internally. If I focus entirely on self-care practices that tend to take a longer view, improving my emotional resilience over time, potentially building lost executive function, but take no steps to ease the day-to-day stress of living alongside this injury, complicated by post-traumatic stress, I am less likely to make the progress I am seeking – because I will likely lack support from loved ones who don’t ‘see the work in progress’ as easily day-to-day, and don’t benefit from it, themselves.

A lovely spot for a moment of meditation; is that about time or place?

A lovely spot for a moment of meditation; is that about time or place?

Balance. Perspective. Verbs. (Your results may vary.)

Today is a good day to smile. Today is a good day to practice good practices. Today is a good day to exist right now, unconcerned by yesterday’s moments. Today is a good day for good practices, and the secure knowledge that incremental change over time can be a subtle thing – but it is a thing. 🙂

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Categories Brain Injury, Healthy Living, Hormone Hell, Menopause, Mindfulness, Oregon Trails, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, Sleepless Nights

Something, Something, Regrets…

March 18, 2015 //
3

I am awake. Nightmares. I drifted happily back to sleep in the arms of my traveling partner sometime in the wee hours. I didn’t check a clock. Sometime after, nightmares got at me. It happens. My brain is efficient about attacking me from within; it reaches deep into my consciousness for the deepest fears, the worst doubts and insecurities, and has no regard whatsoever for the hour of the day – or night. I woke weeping.

It doesn’t matter one bit what the nightmares were ‘about’; they are an experience of pure emotion, there are no ‘facts’ involved. Realistically, they are not ‘real’. I suspect that lacking substance they try harder…or something that feels similar but isn’t quite that.

It’s shortly after 4:00 am now, and there’s nothing at all about sleep to which I would choose to return right now. I’d like not to just sit here feeling sadness and regret, though, or as though my life is slipping through a sieve very quietly, and everything I enjoy, everything that meets my needs, everything that feels so good…is just slipping away, as if I have had my share, used up my turn, and now…something else…or something that feels similar but isn’t quite that.

It is not yet dawn, the day hasn’t really begun, and I am grieving losses quietly, weeping in the darkness. A year ago I would also be seething inside, resenting the intrusion of subtle emotions and the lack of ability to regulate, control, or manage them. I would escalate slowly, becoming a spring-loaded emotional train wreck; a brutal surprise for an unwary lover first thing in the morning. By the time anyone else thought to wake and great the day, I’d be at some invisible breaking point, wounded and ready to attack. This is not that. It’s not that moment. It’s not that experience. I approach it rather differently this morning – sure, tears, regrets, and a profound sense of loss and…a clock ticking. Aging is. I will never be young again. I will never know again some of the moments I have known before…. but I knew them once. I did have my experience over time, and it is mine, and it can’t be taken from me. Grieving is not a bad act, even when we grieve things that are intangible; lost dreams, lost passion, lost… something… are still losses. Pain hurts, even emotional pain hurts. I cry when I am hurting. This morning I am also here with me, compassionately so, comforting myself in my grief, reminding myself ‘all’ is not lost and that life is, and love is, and a future that is not yet, also is.  The tears fall, sure, and while that may be regrettable – and uncomfortable – it’s okay to grieve losses.

This morning I grieve knowing that the grieving, itself, does come to an end. Regrets are what they are, and I will perhaps always feel some pangs of regret over meaningful losses, reluctant changes, and the things that just didn’t go as planned, hoped for, or intended. Attachment is a tough puzzle. I give myself time, this morning, to grieve in an honest way over meaningful losses. It hurts, but denying myself the honest opportunity to grieve hurts too, and becomes a festering wound over time. I don’t need that. I’ll take grieving and moving on, thanks.

Half empty? Half full? Why does the size of the glass matter if the contents meet my needs?

Half empty? Half full? Why does the size of the glass matter if the contents meet my needs?

Later today, I head for the trees for a few days. I need some real downtime, and although having spent a week quick sick leaves me a little drained, and feeling weaker than I otherwise might, my heart needs this time, and I can take it easier in so many small ways and still be out there, under a canopy of tiny new spring leaves unfolding to fill the sky, wrapped in sweet wildflower breezes and stillness. Perhaps the contentment and joy I seek is to be found under the stars, or along some little-used trail in the forest, or some forgotten corner I have not yet explored? I know that I carry the seeds of my contentment with me everywhere…I know, too, that sad yearnings, and regrets, are soothed with new joys and the pleasure and delight of the moment, if only I can stand firmly within it…or something that feels similar, but isn’t quite that.  I’m still working out the details of what I want of life…and even though these damned tears blur my vision of the future, I’m still aware there is one. That’s progress, right there. 🙂

I’m okay. Nightmares are a shit way to start a day, but it happens now and then. Tears dry. Moments pass. Emotions are – and reason often has to catch up later. Given time, I find my way ‘home’ to a different perspective, aware of other things. Aware that I woke without a headache this morning. Aware that my arthritis isn’t bad, and my freedom of movement is better than usual. Aware that today I head for the trees, and the feeling of eagerness to be out there in the stillness with my blue jay and chipmunk neighbors. Aware of love. Aware of this gentle moment of now that is actually quite sweet and calm and still, itself. We are each having our own experience. There’s nothing about that to imply it is a static or unchanging experience.  My experience of now is already substantially different from my experience of waking some short time ago.  Soon, a shower, a routine, the start of a new day… a new experience, different from that last one, already in the past.

Today is a good day for perspective, and a good day to walk on. Today is a good day to take care of me, and trust that emotions are part of the process. Today is a good day to practice good practices. Today is a good day for acceptance – easier when things that feel wonderful are involved, sure, but every bit as needful when it is time to accept something that hurts (maybe more). Today is a good day to embrace now, as it is, and to be reminded that seeking is not always about finding…or not about finding what we thought we sought.

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Categories Anxiety, Brain Injury, grief, Healthy Living, Hormone Hell, Logic & Reason, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, Sleepless Nights, Spring, The Big 5

Basic Problem-Solving

March 16, 2015 //
0

This morning my mind wanders through all manner of oddness, sifting through bits of things as I resist sleepiness and try to shake off the grogginess which is the most common outcome of waking up on time, after too little sleep. (I rather foolishly caught myself still sipping coffee at 3:00 pm; a rookie self-care fail.)

When I realized, last night, that I just wasn’t succumbing to sleep, I got up for a little while, dimmed my monitor to avoid rousing my brain further, and archived photos to make room for more photos, and puzzled over camping comfort ‘how to’ questions; there isn’t really such a thing as ‘too well-prepared’.  I meditated a while more. Then I considered my common overuse of figures of speech, adjectives, and semi-colons. Sometime after that, and after returning to bed, I began sorting my dreams into categories, looking for patterns. This morning feels more than a little like a continuation of last night’s unfocused, undisciplined activities of mind. I’m okay with that, for now; my brain isn’t hurting anyone, not even me.

Perspective still matters.

Perspective still matters. Enjoying the night is vastly more pleasant than fighting wakefulness.

Last night could have gone much differently. I went to bed feeling vulnerable and anxious after a very frank, explicit conversation of the ‘where I’m at with this’ variety. It wasn’t a confrontational exchange, and my emotions remained generally well-managed. I’m pleased that I didn’t react to my own emotions as though they were ‘causing’ something – or being caused by someone else – they sometimes take on a life of their own and get way out of hand before I can do much about it. I work on this a lot, and the practicing of a great many practices related to emotional intimacy, emotional self-sufficiency, and good communication in general, really proved themselves last night. I had a conversation about emotional quality of life and actions I anticipate taking to meet my own needs over time, and felt mostly heard. No meltdown. No tears.

I also learned some things that I’m still sorting out; we are each having our own experience, no surprises there. Seeing my experience reflected back at me through the lens of someone else’s perspective revealed some interesting misconceptions, or differences in understanding, that I am unsure how to correct simply; they fall into the ‘you had to be there’ category of misunderstandings. It’s thought-provoking; I’m not actually sure there is any need to correct them, or that there is value in attempting to do so. We’re still having our own experience, and mine will not be understood from the perspective of living it by anyone but me. Seeking that level of understanding would be a fool’s errand.  Still…some factual issues were apparent that are likely correction-worthy at some point. At the time it mattered more to be heard – comprehension was less critical in some hard to describe way – and it meant more just to enjoy the time with someone dear to me, knowing I’d be out of the household for a few days, quite soon.

It's just one night...

Tonight is just one night…

My traveling partner is out-of-town for a work conference. It’s strange to miss him so greatly for an over-nighter. Although I am generally very aware of his absence when he is away, and often find myself thinking of him, last night I felt myself yearning for his company, his presence and his touch in a very earnest and almost adolescent way. Strange to feel it so strongly when he’s barely been away hours… We’ve got time set aside to spend together tomorrow evening, before I head to the trees. I am self-conscious about the lingering cough that may be with me a few days more…coughing is not particularly sexy.

I feel a bit of anxiety surge at the self-conscious, self-critical observation; I apply basic emotional trouble-shooting, which for me comes in the form of the titular ‘basic problem-solving’ – the first step being (for me) ‘determine if there is an actual problem requiring a solution’. I did the same with my anxiety last night. (It’s been powerful for defusing internally driven emotional escalations of the sort that begin with an attack on myself, and generally result in lashing out at someone else once I have reached a highly aroused emotional state they are unaware of.) I observe that the anxiety began with the self-critical observation pinging against implicit expectations I was unaware of until that moment. I pause, take some deep cleansing breaths, and work on letting go of the expectations; they aren’t entitled to existence, and are entirely within my control. I choose what I expect in life. Further, in this instance, those expectations exist on a deep level; they were set by some element of the chaos and damage, and are not expectations I set with intention. This doesn’t necessarily make them easier to let go of…but it does function as a handy mile marker on life’s journey that I have reached a new point of self-awareness, and acceptance, that feels very solid. I reinforce the positives by lingering on this experience of improved self-care and improved awareness with contentment, and an almost merry pat-on-the-back sort of feeling.

Taking time to appreciate pleasant moments gives them lasting impact on my day-to-day experience.

Taking time to appreciate pleasant moments gives them lasting impact on my day-to-day experience.

Today is a good day to take time to celebrate small victories. Have you had any, yourself? Today is a good day to share your triumphs, too! If not with someone else, surely with yourself. 🙂

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Categories Anxiety, Brain Injury, Free Will, Healthy Living, Logic & Reason, Love, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, Sleepless Nights, The Big 5, women, Words
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