Are We Going Forward
We had a decent Supreme Court ruling on recent weeks, but this morning saw a terrible rolling. I think of that saying, "One step forward. Two steps back."
Except I really am not sure we've gone forward in a while. I'm feeling disillusioned tonight. I'm wondering how we can get to Canada when the borders are closed. I'm wondering when the masks I ordered will get here.
I had physical therapy today and IW worked on my jaw and the drainage of my ears. Any time we work on my jaw at all it's uncomfortable and it wakes up anxiety, trauma. Holding all that, and Tuesday was trauma therapy day, in perspective.
I'm excited about my new gardening tools!
Eddies of Rage
I felt pretty good at the end of therapy today and physically even better after soaking in a floatation tank right afterwards. I am so grateful to find out that the float center had opened up. I'm treating myself to one after therapy for the next few sessions. My body had been hurting so much.
CK and I had minor conflict around dinner, exacerbated by the world at large. It left me feeling like such a failure.
I never ended up eating dinner. My stomach is still upset. I had some digestive biscuits which seem to will better for me these days than saltines.
So often on therapy I'm dealing with the fallout of being considered too emotional, too wierd, too much. Anger was a forbidden emotion. I found ways to express it by physically separating myself from them, but I never integrated it. My brain wasn't capable of integration, compartmentalizing was the best it could do.
I likened trauma therapy to pulling out all these pressure-sealed compartments and breaking them open in a controlled way. They're potentially explosive, so going into them can feel like being blown back or caught up in the swirling eddies of rage that were once locked up tight by my child self.
Everybody Mask
Statewide mandate came out today that everyone, everywhere across Oregon must wear masks. There's a lot of anger. I'm sure there must be others, like us, who are relived.
Saw my doctor online today. We backed off the plan to begin tapering off my antidepressant medication. 2020 is not the year to change that since I'm having days where it feels physically difficult to move.
Aside from bouts of depression and anxiety in response to the times were living in, my mental health feels better. My health is better than it has been in a long while; sheltering in place has curative powers.
Cleaning Up
Today began when Obie woke me up at 6:14. That was after a chilly night because I’d discovered our elder dog had peed on our bed and stripped off all the blankets at 2:20.
I got a lot of chores done today after yesterday’s gardening efforts. I have many moments where I feel like such a failure when it comes to the house. We’re getting better, but it still feels terrible sometimes and I really dislike not being able to physically push myself to go all out.
There’s Sunday lull in the death rate from COVID, only 504 since Saturday. We’re well over 125,000 people who have died, over 2.5 million infected, and so many Republicans are still fighting to get get rid of the Affordable Care Act.
Incremental Progress
Teaching was slightly earlier today. Trying to work on things. My brain functions in fits and starts, I get a a few emails answered and then I go to therapy and I'm done for a day or two.
This memory from age 4 isn't quite ready to integrate. Some details slipped in again today, one sad thing that provided more insight into my lifelong insomnia. Another glimpse of me in the woods, alone, soothing myself. I was tremendously resourceful and resilient as a child.
I still am.
Today I made the first of a few special dinners for CK's birthday tomorrow. Something light and cool for the very summery, hot day we had. I shared her birthday wish with folks on Facebook and one of her college friends immediately got in touch.
Heavy
I realized that I often am experiencing my depression as a somatic effect. Not surprising, given how much I do that with other emotions. It wasn't safe for me to express a range of emotions in my family.
Yesterday I felt so down that it felt physically difficult, even painful to move my body. Trying to focus to make art left me wanting to cry and I had to give up on doing all the dishes. I felt so useless.
Today I taught a subdued class, no kirtan. I made us each chili and a fresh fruit crisp with all the over ripe produce! All that helped, I feel more grounded even if its almost 1am.
I stayed up to do the dishes and take a hot shower. Lost power as I was soaping, conditioner in my hair! Total darkness and shower for a disconcerting moment. It came back on quickly, thank goodness, but off long enough to reset the dishwasher and a free clocks.
Toxic Women
My peer wrote a passive-aggressive post what're she doesn't name me, but shames me. She uses language my Mother used. She lies in her framing.
I also told off people posting misinformation anchor wearing masks. Another, different white yoga teacher.
CK helped ground me past the triggering language. I've got a lot to unpack about the way white women use shame and manipulate to make themselves always look like the virtuous one.
In response to this I submitted two proposals to present at an online yoga therapy summit.
Comfort Gaming
I’m embracing my foray into online gaming that is Animal Crossing New Horizons. It’s hard because it really feels like I should be doing anything but playing a video game.
There’s countless homeowner tasks for the yard and house. Getting the budget done. Making great meals. Writing my memoirs. Meditating or asana practice. I should be creating art! Making my website better, or any number of business tasks.
I realize how hard it is to rest, still.
I’m feeling sad about COVID19 tonight and all the ways it’s made life harder and less fun. I wanted made-to-order food at the market yesterday and it still isn’t available. It’s the closest I’ve come to take out since March 13.
Mother Act
Today's Therapy Hangover hasn't been as intense as prior weeks. I've been pretty worn out today and going to the market overwhelmed me a little. I'm grateful for easy dinner and time spent sitting on the patio playing a video game.
It's my first time going out in a county that's reopened and I wasn't prepared for the number of people without masks. The market I went to requires that customers wear them and staff do too, but there wasn't any requirement at the craft store, a Michael's, and I saw many people unmasked.
I'm still trying to get my head around my Mother leaving me home alone as a very small child. Trying to reconcile the mother act, the involved, protective mother with the truth about the mother I had when no one could see.
Never a Fit Parent
Today was Trauma Therapy Tuesday and we nudged my memory from age 4 ever closer to integration. I forgot my mask going out today and it left me feeling so anxious!
⚠️ ⚠️⚠️⚠️CW: Childhood abuse; neglect, emotional & physical abuse.⚠️⚠️⚠️⚠️
It wasn't a big shift because it suddenly got me that the memory of homelessness was caused because my Mother was fired from her job for lying about being out sick. I had answered the phone while home alone and truthfully told the caller that my Mommy was out shopping.
She told me repeatedly that it was my fault we were homeless. It seemed pretty obvious that if I hadn’t answered the phone, she wouldn’t have been fired.
Of course this is ridiculous, I was 4, how could her bad decision be my fault.
What finally really landed for me today was that my Mother had left me home alone at age 4 to go hang out with her friends. That it was not unusual for her to do that. She did it knowing I’d play quietly because I was already terrified of what she’d do to me if I got into anything.
The scenario of my getting into something while home alone, then violently punished by my Mother, plays out several more times. She would leave me alone all the time.
“That’s a CPS call.” My therapist noted as I was talking through this realization, “Maybe age 10, some kids can be left alone.”
“Your Mother never was a fit parent.”, she commented, as we unpacked the knowledge that she regularly neglected me this way.