(cw – light talk of unaliving but not in an “I want to actually do that” sense)
As I suspected all day the other day, I was going to end up feeling alone and clingy because of my nighttime thoughts. Don’t worry, I was already ahead of that — I’d taken my melatonin and am drinking rose petal tea to wind down. The aroma of the roses filled the entire area where I sat and typed, and it created a very serene feeling, since the scent is so velvety. Alas, I was still sitting with the hypervigilance of abandonment and fear. There’s extensive research about how our thoughts change after the sun goes down that are available on the internet from trusted researchers, psychological organizations, and similar entities, and I plan on making it a post for the beef of the website, but for the moment, I was dealing with the feelings, and was more focused on seeking comfort from within.
I can recall back in 2009 when I was at the top of my game. I looked great (sitting at around 188lb), felt questionably good (on the upswing of the trauma recovery / counseling from that era), was active in my church, and was working a very good full time job with the government. My schedule was impeccable. 5 on, 2 off, and six days at the gym. I also attended three support groups every week. I had no unhealthy attachments, a great friend, six good friends, and a million acquaintances (I never met a stranger, as they say). I didn’t have a reason to be scared of people. Much like now, when rational mind is thinking properly. I had a favorite back then, but she was a mutual favorite. We both thought the other was pretty damned cool, and loved to hang out with each other on the regular. Our favorite part was that we went home to ourselves at the end of the day, where we played Facebook games together (anyone remember Gardens of Time? It’s still a thing, apparently) and shared memes before they were called memes, and I eventually introduced her to her current husband…they’re about to celebrate their 15th anniversary as well as their first son’s 12th birthday.
Oh, my, how time flies.
But my life was normal back then, and a lot has changed since. Like the fact that something else happened to put me in round two if some fairly intense therapy…again. One one hand, I’m doing great! I’ve a decent length of sobriety (finally), I’m starting a new job next week (an actual hourly stable job), I’m active in therapy, and we’re hitting the darkest parts of my history and sorting through all of that already.
But another side is in a lot of pain. I’m still unsure who or where to reach for support, due to second-guessing myself a lot. Part of me wants to scream and part of me wants to hide. My coach knows, and knows about the dirty thoughts of wanting to go to sleep and never wake up. In fact, she even explained where it’s coming from and why. Trauma and the therapy and recovery and healing that occurs is not a “feel good” solution. It’s the necessary work one must do in order to get through the darkness and learn to live beside it, and to learn how to drag yourself out of it when it engulfs you. It gets quieter and brighter the more you practice what you learn, but there will be days that you struggle to manage, especially early on, and especially when you work on the more damaging parts of your past, as I have, recently.
Be that as it may, it still pays dividends to be honest. I say out loud “I am in pain, I am struggling.” I tell people that I’m sorry for things that happened forever ago that probably need no attention on the matter. I text people to check in, even if we literally just got off the phone, then I apologize for that, too. I’m looking for anything to regulate the fear and sadness that comes from daring to face down what I’ve refused to talk about all this time. Even to the point of wishing it all to be over…completely over. But my coach, again…says that this is actually an empowering thought. The fact that I’m able to say “I’m so fed up with how I feel…I’m so overwhelmed that I don’t want to be here anymore” is the first step of actually not being here…not being here as in being alive…but being here as in being in this state. It comes out as such because that’s a tangible visualization of how it feels in my head, and anger, resentment, and revising the shame and such of what happened don’t have a tangible, visual equivalent.
She even framed my alcohol abuse as one way to “not be here.” Remember how I would say that I didn’t want to exist sometimes? This was it! This was why! I don’t want to be in this state. I just don’t have a way to get out of it. So…lack of existence in the moment = get out of this state. Six months later, and it’s in my mind and I ruminate and circle the thoughts like a buzzard, trying to dissect where the hangup is, how something so far off in the past can be so prevalent now, if all I did was just open up about it. Because that, too, was a wound that needed to be reopened so it could be properly sutured shut so it would heal properly. And the reason it hurts is because I am learning to accept this as a part of my reality.
Yes, this bad thing happened to me. And yes, I’m still upright, even if I’m on my knees and searching for ways to cling without clinging. This is the part where I’m grateful for friends and friendos who see through the bullshit, step back and stand by. Because once again, I texted a friend and told her I was still dealing, and she said “it’s 2am, my child, take yourself to sleep.” She can call me child, she’s old enough to be my mother.
My coach has given me a task, and it’s basically to practice self-regulating for the next week with the difficulty level of her being out of town. I know very clearly what I can do to self-regulate (as in, follow through on the practices that prevent me from ruminating and spiraling). All I have to do, now, is follow through. She did say when she returns, if I’m successful, we can move on to the next stage of therapy.
She did say that the next stage is something I’ll probably be better at than this one, and it’s managing obsessions and compulsions.
While she is away, I’m writing down things that I’ve ever obsessed over. Relationships/connections forever, but her focus was on things that don’t involve relationships or ideals of them. So…there was the time I was obsessed with squats. I wanted to squat my initial bodyweight of 345lb. In order to do so, I had to eat healthy, hit the gym and get my whole body in proper form, and by the time I could, it was four years later and I’d gotten myself down to 165lb.
Then there was my passion for indie rock. If the band didn’t have a label, they qualified, and there were some amazing bands that weren’t under big umbrellas. Where I lived at the time was a hot bed for this kind of music, and a friend of mine and I made a point to hit a concert at least twice a week, even going pub crawling on occasion. This was also a thing while I was building a stronger body.
I was obsessed with hockey and stats, and my passion was three league levels deep — I knew every player in most major North American leagues, their stats, how they played, who they’d play great with, and was number one or two in the fantasy league every season that I participated. Not only that, but I was (still am) a huge logo and jersey design buff, and there was a time where I knew the history of all the teams for those three leagues (there were more like 11 leagues, but it was 3 levels deep).
Then there was the food fixation and learning how certain supplements actually work well with certain foods, learning how to introduce different types of diets, for how long, and in what scenarios they were needed. I was extremely knowledgeable about vitamins, minerals, chemicals, and herbs, and knew their roles and why some companies chose to add them (some were 100% snake oil).
I was also very much a leadership nut, and was big on translating professional/business leadership into a more personal variety, which I wrote about at length in a very old blog. This was also around the time that I began to realize that with the way my mind works, less is best — minimalism is where I felt most comfortable. My grocery list had less than ten items on it, and that included my bulk purchases.
I would mention writing, but writing is my favorite form of communication, so I don’t think it qualifies as an obsession, merely my favorite way to communicate. Reading on the other hand, I was a big fan of classic literature, which I discovered after buying some $1 books at a thrift shop. One book in particular, which I read for my first year English paper in college, was one that read so innocently in grade school, but reading it as an adult opened my eyes to the story of something deeper and more profound. Like The Secret Garden – what feels like a girl going off to the fantasy place of her dreams (when I was a child) is more like Mary getting abandoned twice, and the garden became her place of solace and comfort. Then her cousin being treated like an invalid…it’s a lot different as an adult. I could throw The Giving Tree in there as well, as it highlights codependency when the child grows up, only coming to the tree to take, and the tree gives gives gives until it basically gives all it had to offer. Lord of the Flies, I feel, is self-explanatory. But it’s still been a hot minute since I’ve picked up a good book that isn’t non-fiction, and I plan on remedying that soon.
I know what I liked. I’d be interested if any of these would still work for me now, but I have a feeling there’s more to this list than just “hey what kind of healthy obsessions did you have?” Because now, I find myself reading extensively on abandonment trauma, attachment theory, methods of self-regulation, how to not be so stubborn when taking care of your own needs, and something that, after reading books by Rick Hansen, James Clear, and Brene Brown, I’m actually interested in now: CBT and ACT (with a small dash of REBT in there as well). I’m also starting to realize that the reason those three types of therapy were so off-putting is because while I feel like I’m empathetic toward others, there was a time where I’d be damned if I was going to be that way toward myself. Now, I understand that I deserve it as much as the next person, and honestly, I need it. I need to be okay, and
So what now? I keep moving. I keep assessing my emotions, analyzing my moods throughout the day, and keep looking for self-sufficient forms of regulation. I keep finding ways to mitigate my own stressors and slowly pull myself up into that state of confidence that I had so long ago. I avoid the pitfalls of the guilt that comes from being incapable of regulating properly and take those moments as an opportunity to learn and grow. Everything is forward movement, not stagnance or stepping backward.
Anyway, I start my new job either Sunday or Monday, and it’s looking to be a good one. Nothing fancy, but it more than just pays the bills. It’s the kind of job I won’t have to take home with me, and also the kind of job in which the hours will go by quickly (as long as I keep my eyes of the very large clock on the wall). Hopefully that means I can focus on my writing in the off-hours. I have some WIPs that need to be finished…and [REDACTED/NDA].
Also, apologies for any spelling/grammatical errors, I’m writing this from my phone in bed.