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And There Was This One Time…

July 20, 2014 //
0

It seems a strange morning to write. My thoughts are incoherent and disorganized. Various ‘reasons’ I’m sure, though I don’t think it really requires an explanation, does it? I’m smiling and thinking how rarely an explanation changes an experience, however it may change my perspective.

I slept restlessly last night. I woke in a state of panic and dread at 1:42 am. I had no recollection of my dreams, and no awareness of any startling sounds or movement in my environment. I still occasionally have night terrors, and having crashed out around 10:30 pm, the timing is right. Knowledge offered no relief from the feelings, but it gave me leverage to use new skills to soothe myself, slow my heart rate, calm my breathing, settle my emotions, and eventually return to sleep. Meditation – the most powerful Rx I’ve ever been prescribed for a whole host of bullshit that challenges me.

The mysteries of the sleeping self are sometimes best left as mysteries.

After waking, dreams fade into the distance.

I woke abruptly, later, and still early (for a weekend day, when I could theoretically choose to ‘sleep in’). I woke shortly after 6:00 am, and feeling uneasy and vaguely pissed-off. I started the morning with more meditation, no agenda, no pressure, and from meditation I moved on to yoga; this gentle routine has become such a feature of my experience that I no longer plan it on my calendar, or set a reminder on my phone, or put a sticky note on my monitor. This slow unfolding of self in the morning is part of who I am now. It’s a nice change. By the time I got to the kitchen to pull a shot of espresso I felt calm, and content. It isn’t always that easy – honestly, the words make it sound ‘easier’ than it actually is. There is an implied commitment to practice, a commitment to self, a commitment to healing – and these require real effort, and a willingness to come back to the practice again and again, in the moment, and the will to face myself in the mirror of my minds-eye in a truly vulnerable and honest way, aware and still, inside myself. ‘Easy’ is not an accurate descriptor.

Practice. It's the practice that is the point; there is no 'mastery'.

Practice. It’s the practice that is the point; there is no ‘mastery’.

I still feel whatever is agitating me lurking in the background of my consciousness, an anxiety that comes and goes, as if it is preparing for some sneak attack, and checking regularly to see if I am still aware. (Personifying my issues isn’t something I take literally – or lightly – but I find that some of my issues are more easily faced when they have, well, faces. lol. 😉 ) I am hopeful that continued practice, presence in the moment, moving through my day mindfully and with great self-compassion will be enough to prevent some nasty attack on my equanimity by my demons. My analyst-brain urgently wants to pick at this sense of unease that returns now and then, to force it to give up its secrets, and tell me ‘why’, but it is a misleading temptation; giving in to it would likely result only in more pain and distress, because most likely there is no ‘why’ at all. Not in my here and now, at least, and perhaps not even in the remnants of last night’s dreams.

When I feel aware of the unease, this morning, I face it. I breathe. I feel myself relax. I move into the moment in a more present way. I take time for a few moments to be still, aware, to be compassionate and show myself kindness; I am human, these experiences of unease are uncomfortable, and result in more emotion on that blue end of the spectrum unless I slow down and take time to care for me. This morning, I have many small opportunities to practice emotional self-sufficiency. This morning life’s curriculum seems to be of the lab variety; hands on, and practicing. I’m okay with that; I expect willful change to require both choice and effort.

The map is not the world. Hell, the map isn't even the journey.

The map is not the world. Hell, the map isn’t even the journey.

Today is a good day to practice taking care of me. Today is a good day for compassion and for kindness. Today is a good day to build equanimity. Today is a good day to change the world.

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

Autumn Rain and a Good Latte

September 28, 2013 //
1

I am awake before dawn, on a morning I had hoped to ‘sleep in’.  The rain is pounding insistently on the skylight, lest I overlook that it is raining. I enjoy rain, and the sound of it is slowly soothing my raw nerves. I woke face to face with my PTSD, in the form of profound anxiety, fear, a pounding heart, and a distinct awareness that ‘something’s wrong’.

It was quickly clear what woke me, when a firm click of a door elsewhere communicated what it could; frustration, hurt, anger, a limit reached, a moment passed… doors do not communicate with specificity, and it isn’t really possible to ask a door a clarifying question.  I dislike communication via door, whether it is a slammed door, or a firmly shut door, or simply a closed door that blocks communication in a non-verbal-message-sending way.  Doors lack precision for communication. So do drawers, windows, dishwashers, refrigerators, and all manner of household tasks and processes. These are not the tools of clear explicit compassionate communication, any more than yelling is.  We each have so much potential to communicate more clearly than via door – but I too have slammed a door, more than once.  😦

I am working on taking the approach that there is something to be learned here, or progress to be made – for me.  Maybe a chance to learn not to let doors talk to me in the first place? A door clicks closed; I hear the hurt feelings and rejection. Another click, firm and solid and no-nonsense; I may hear resolve and anger. Another click, a different room, a different hand perhaps; I could hear the sorrow, regret, and stress. The doors click closed. They open.  Occasional voices, and I put some space between my consciousness and the words; privacy matters, and it is a matter of respect and consideration.  We all have rough moments, bad times, things to work through. How do I take care of me when private matters between others impinge on my consciousness and drive my symptoms? Well, this morning, I meditated, then got up – sleep clearly wasn’t going to be possible at this level of wariness and anxiety – a latte just the way I like it [vanilla syrup, 4 shots of espresso, whole milk], and some quiet moments contemplating the falling rain.

This morning is an improvement over similar past mornings; I am calm.  I have a pretty serious aversion to angry confrontations, just in general.  Right now I am pleased to find that I am able to have my own experience, without becoming mired in unpleasantness borrowed from someone else’s experience.  A clear (and highly valued) improvement, for me, although I have to admit I don’t necessarily ‘understand’ this change on a level that would allow me to break it down by steps to see what exactly I am doing for this result.

I am able to have my own experience… this morning that has includes some moments of anger at being awakened on one of the rare days I could sleep in.  My experience includes feeling a bit uncomfortable about being able to overhear moments of private conversation, and regret that valued privacy isn’t ‘a given’ (pretty easy to hear through these walls).  My experience also includes feeling cheated out of a lovely morning with my loves, and some irritation about that, and recognition that the morning is far from over. Even sympathy, compassion, and sadness make an appearance this morning.  My feelings don’t seem unreasonable – and this morning they have not dominated my experience, or overwhelmed me. I felt them. I heard myself, and understand what my feelings say about my needs, and my now. Making room in my heart for my own feelings didn’t seem much of a challenge this morning… another improvement.

A rainy autumn sky.

A rainy autumn sky.

It’s later now.  It’s been about 2 hours since I woke to the sound of a door clicking closed. I’ve almost finished my latte. Daybreak has come, and the gray pre-dawn sky has shifted just a bit toward blue, still sullen, gray, and stormy. The trees beyond the window do a slow hula in the wind.  The house is snug and warm, and quiet.  I didn’t get to sleep in, but these quiet hours are precious to me,  and this morning they will not be interrupted by the realization that it is already time to go to work. That may be worth the unpleasant wake-up call.  The trees outside are whipped back and forth for a moment, as if nodding in agreement.  A difficult start to the morning, but it is no predictor of the day to come, and my ‘now’ is actually quite pleasant and serene.

There are only so many days, hours, minutes, ahead of us… and so much to yearn for, to learn, to do… today is Saturday, so for me it will be about mostly practical matters at home: laundry, gardening, a water change for the aquarium, getting ready for a new week and having a quick tidy ’round, in general.  These quite hours before the more organized hustle of task completion, and checking things off a ‘to do’ list, are precious, indeed. I enjoy taking some time for me.  🙂

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Categories Anxiety, Brain Injury, Healthy Living, Logic & Reason, Love, Mindfulness, pain, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, Sleepless Nights

Small Things Matter

September 19, 2013 //
2

I woke this morning in a good place. I would say, if asked, that I ‘feel pretty good’. Everything this morning has gone smoothly, right down to the basically perfect latte I am sipping now.  Why do I also feel a growing edgy discontent?

Big jobs need big tools.

Big jobs need big tools.

I remember that I have new tools, new skills, new ways of viewing old things… and I take a moment to do a quick self-inventory. (“Hey there, Self, just checking in – how are things?”) A couple deep relaxing breaths, and some calm consideration of self, and i find that although I do feel good, and it has been a nice morning so far, I also have a headache – and I so often have headaches that I fail myself on self-care because I don’t acknowledge the pain, discomfort, and reduction in emotional resilience that go with a headache. Generally I ‘don’t notice’ – and what that really means is that I reduce my level of mindfulness until I am no longer aware of the headache – and open myself to a long list of risks and consequences of moving through my day mindlessly. So, this morning, I am allowing myself the freedom to both be in a good place, and be there with this damned headache. 🙂

I have a few things on my mind that I do want to talk about, write about, think about… I am finding it hard to find ‘cognitive space’ for that, and the intervals in my day still available to write, or think, seem to be dwindling away.  (I write those words and suddenly feel so tired…)  There is new stress in my experience – at work – and my routine is being upset.  Doesn’t sound like a big deal, I’m sure, although ‘routine’ is something I use to get around some of the lingering cognitive consequences of my TBI.  I keep expecting that to matter to someone besides me. lol.

Last night was an exceptional evening; hanging out with an old friend, dinner as a family, a leisurely evening hanging out and talking.  I feel like I’m forgetting something… maybe we watched a movie? If we did, right now I don’t remember what it was.  It was the delightful time together that was important.

Today is my new therapy day.  My schedule is changing and I feel uprooted and confused.  It sucks.  I’ll be changing to a new time, too.  I really like stability, and this is not that.  I already feel the effects of these small changes – for one thing, my therapy day is now also a work day. Instead of being entirely focused on my needs, my recovery, my wellness, and therapy-related thinking and self-work, I will be spending it thinking about someone else’s needs, someone else’s work – then racing across town during peak traffic to drop exhausted into my therapist’s office and try to switch gears efficiently and ‘take care of me’ for an hour, then hurry home and try to get enough head space to decompress from what are usually pretty emotionally complicated visits with my therapist, so that I can sleep.  I am aggravated and feel like I am being undermined at a time when I am finally making real progress.  There have been very few experiences in my life that have made me angrier – a bitter seething anger that lacks expression, poisoning me slowly; it feels very connected to ancient anger about powerlessness.  More of life’s challenging curriculum.

Changing seasons and roadside wildflowers as a metaphor.

Changing seasons and roadside wildflowers as a metaphor.

It seems noteworthy that this few moments and words reflecting on my feeling of ‘growing discontent’ and edginess (and realizing that it was my stress about my schedule changing and the knowns and unknowns about that change driving the shift in my mood as I got closer to heading to the office for the morning), positioned me well to observe the feelings, identify the concerns, accept the potential that my experience in therapy may be affected by my change in schedule.  I feel less like I’m driving past a ‘caution’ sign and more like I saw one and slowed down. 😀  I get a real jolt of delight when my new tools work well in a way that actually improves my experience.  My headache even seems to be slowly easing – although that could be the quad latte, and the lovely sunrise unfolding before me.  lol

...sometimes taking a moment for simple beauty is enough.

…sometimes taking a moment for simple beauty is enough.

In spite of challenges, I am making real progress with taking steps beyond just ‘managing’ my PTSD, to real healing, as well as slowly doing what I can to rehabilitate a decades-old TBI.  I’m even satisfied with my progress, and able to appreciate the work I am doing.  This is change for the better – used to be I just couldn’t detect any progress at all, and any hint of improvement in my experience seemed quite fleeting, or even illusory.  This new ability to observe, recognize, accept, and be pleased with growth and improvement is wonderful. 😀

Sometimes it helps to talk things over with a friend... thank you for 'being there'.

Sometimes it helps to talk things over with a friend… thank you for ‘being there’.

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Categories Anxiety, Brain Injury, Healthy Living, Logic & Reason, Metaphors, Mindfulness, pain, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress

An Unwelcome Presence

July 2, 2013 //
6

I am a woman of few words, this morning. I woke ahead of the alarm – no surprise – but I woke gripped in a state of anxiety that was…remarkable, only I don’t have adequate words to describe it at all.  It felt rather like this…

"Anxiety" 2011

“Anxiety” 2011

It wasn’t a pleasant feeling. I could barely breath, and for the first few minutes of ‘consciousness’ it entirely commanded my attention and controlled my experience. I was nearly overwhelmed by panic at the momentary sensation accompanied by the thought “how can I take a few deep breaths when I am unable to breath??” and the vague urge to claw at the walls, the air, my flesh… anything… to find some way to make it stop. I was on the edging of screaming with terror… and there was just nothing at all ‘wrong’.  I didn’t even have a recollection of being awakened by a noise, or having bad dreams. I simply woke – anxious.

As difficult as it seemed in the moment, I kept returning to the task of taking a couple deep relaxed breaths, full and easy and slow, committing to that and nothing more was itself an exercise in calming myself. I found a calm place within myself, and eventually put my feet on the floor, and got on with the day.  A latte later and those anxious moments were a dim memory. Meditating first thing is huge on a morning like this one. Watering the summer garden before the sun rises beyond the horizon is as good for me as it is for the roses, and the seedlings in the greenhouse, and those precious moments connected with the earth and life beyond my own limited experience helped me get centered and find serenity.  I’m even having a good day.

Is this really me? Did I wake that way, and still find my way here? How extraordinary…how precious…

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Categories Anxiety, Art, Brain Injury, Free Will, gardening, Healthy Living, Logic & Reason, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Roses

Building the Foundation

May 4, 2013 //
3

It is well past dawn. I went to bed angry, probably more than a reasonable amount. I slept restlessly, frustratedly fighting my demons in my sleep.  I woke with residual anger left unexpressed from the night before. I am human. I struggle with anger.  I’m taking on my own anger, and my relationship with the emotion of anger, in a serious way as a ‘next step’.

It is worth observing that I do not face the challenge of anger in my experience as an indication that I have any perception that I’m ‘done’ with ‘everything else’, or that I am comfortable that I mastered other challenges in my life. It’s just time to take it on. I think I can make improvements and learn and grow, at long last,  where anger is concerned. I am ready to stop running from anger, whether it is my own anger, or someone else’s anger. (Wow – saying that just made my heart pound in earnest.  Anger – still scary. lol)

I’m not sure how much I’ll share about this particular challenge of mine, at least initially…and hasn’t that been part of the issue, for me, all along? I reject anger, refuse anger, deny anger, avoid anger, run from anger, cower in fear from anger, wish it away, rationalize it, fight it with words and actions, ignore it, take any conceivable step to dissipate it…even to the point of injuring my own heart, disrespecting and dishonoring my own experience, and damaging myself, and my relationships…all in the name of protecting myself…from…what exactly?  An emotion.  Of course, it doesn’t work out well in the long run. You know where it leads, right?  I’m sure anyone who has ever been in a relationship with me knows… it explodes out of nowhere, unexpectedly, uncontrollably, and often disproportionate to the event of the moment, due to the impetus of long-time resentments that have built up from…wait for it… unresolved anger from earlier events.  😦  Not ok.   And since I do understand that it isn’t acceptable to fuel conflict with ‘old business’ that isn’t relevant to the conflict of the moment, the frustration, helplessness, and ancient lingering rage of residual anger rarely gets addressed in a fair and honest way… I end up stuck with it.

I may be one of the angriest people I know…I don’t actually know for sure, though, because I have refused for so long to give myself the courtesy of really hearing myself and tending to my own heart and needs on issues of anger.   (I wrote a lot of very different words  here, initially…and deleted them. They were raw and visceral, and such an intimate look into my relationship with anger and explicit about my trauma history I couldn’t really consider clicking the ‘publish’ button. I am not that strong.  Is it enough to say I am damaged and anger is a challenge I want to face next?)

I did something new with anger this morning. I told someone I was angry.  Simple, clear, honest – no games or bullshit – I said “I feel angry about…”.  Interestingly, doing that, and having the experience of being heard without any objection or rejection, or argument, seemed to allow the actual in-the-moment emotional experience of anger to dissipate. I would still say that the thing that I felt angry over would still be something I consider hurtful, and as an experience unsatisfying and unpleasant, but I don’t still ‘feel angry’.  I feel a little lost though, at the moment;  like so many things lately, I wonder what else about anger will prove to be very different than my fears.

Human endeavor; a complicated metaphor.

Human endeavor; a complicated metaphor.

Where does anger fit in with my ‘Big 5’ for my relationships?  (Respect, Reciprocity, Consideration, Compassion, and Openness) Lately three other words that don’t typically come up for me have been regular points of contemplation with regard to my own growth; holistic, coherent, and integrated.  They seem important concepts relevant to my journey, but I feel rather like I did the first time I heard the term ‘mindfulness’…they are words. Something about each one seems urgently important to understand and to understand in the context of my own growth and healing…but for now they are simply words.

Building on what is...

Building on what is…

50 isn’t far off now, just 39 days, barely more than a month. I’m eager to get there, eager to prove to the cynical 14-year-old me lurking in my memories that I lived to see 50, in spite of my grim certainty that seeing 35 wasn’t likely.  I spend a lot of time building a better foundation for the next 50 years than I had for the first 50. I’m more fortunate than I can measure that I have so much support in that endeavor, and no noticeable resistance to it.

Hoping for something splendid and wonderful, however humble, however simple.

Hoping for something splendid and wonderful, however humble, however simple.

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Categories Anxiety, Brain Injury, Free Will, Healthy Living, Logic & Reason, Love, Menopause, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, Turning 50, Words
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