Messages

Chart, sanmagic7
Sorry for being so cryptic. I was in a state where it's difficult to express myself. This was about all I could write. The internal pressure to send some sort of distress signal was immense. I'm grateful for you showing up. Thank you.

As a kid, there was no safety in connection. Relating to others equaled pain. Very young me checked out. He's still floating around in a desolate universe. As are older parts of me. I've learned to reach out to a degree. When the exiles get to the forefront, that ability shuts down almost completely. Especially when I've been isolating for a while. It took great effort to log in and type those few words yesterday. It took me three attempts to make myself. There was only a hint of adult online.

Integration of the past reality is messy and extremely challenging. Those dissociated parts are dissociated for a good reason. I can welcome them home to the degree I'm willing and able to feel their pain. Not so much the part of it I think I can handle. Or the part that fits nicely in a psychological theory. That is out of the window when it hits for real.

Framing EF's as bouts of integration probably works better for me. This is how it integrates. In this brutal fashion, far outside the window of tolerance. Where trauma lives. Psychedelics unlocked that door, and from time to time the pain has been flooding out ever since. If I hadn't stumbled on that key, I wouldn't have survived. I don't have a neat formula. I do know that it had been too long since I had a good cry. Rania is one of those artists who just plucks my heart string the right way. It's not only her piano playing, but also her singing voice. Mesmerizing. I can't believe I only discovered her this year.

Thanks again for being here.   

I remember Arte being on cable over here in the nineties. Interesting info!

Currently crying my guts out listening to Rania. I need to connect. But I can't.

Hania Rani - ‪@arteconcert‬'s Piano Day

I'm sorry you're struggling with this. I recently got hit with something similar after a very long time. It's okay to be "unreasonable" [at least in your own mind]. It's a healthy response to what happened. Part of the grieving process of the child you were, and the person you are today. It's a bitter pill to see the consequences of such a start, in so many aspects of life still. The freedom from this kind of bitterness is a byproduct of feeling all the hurt. I've had a very good taste of that for many years. I hope you have too. It seems to be a non-linear process. Sending you a big hug 

Again I'm in an EF. I woke up scatter brained. That I skipped meditation because I didn't feel like it, should have been a red flag. That very rarely happens. My state got worse. I had great trouble selecting something to focus on, or to get it done. I needed to create more order in my chaotic environment. A good thought. I picked something involving a new operating system [OS] on a computer, which I had been working on for a while. Wrong choice.

Something very simple became something impossible. Not because of me, but because of the OS. In order to do A, I first had to do B. And to do B, I first had to do C. And so forth. In the end I ran out of options and everything failed. I got nothing done, except exacerbating my state. I was growling and cursing. I felt so bitter for life working against me all the time. Why do things have to be so * hard and complicated all the time? Give me a * brake for once!

I'm desperate and panicky. It scares me that I'm questioning the possibility of having a life instead of a survive. I'm convinced there's no hope for me. After all I've done, I'm still back in this horrible place. I see what's happening, and I don't care anymore. I'm sick and tired of working so damn hard and not getting anywhere. This state is a lot like I used to be in a very long time ago. I need a good night sleep. A benzo tonight. Tomorrow helping in the garden. I don't feel like it at all.

NarcKiddo
Thanks for dropping by and sharing some of your own experience. I feel so lucky to have found a community with people like yourself. It's so important to be able to communicate about EF's with people who've been there too. It's great you're getting better at sitting with emotions. There's a limit to that, isn't it? Being alone with it is the factor that makes it so unbearable and seemingly forever in my case. That part of the EF is the pinnacle of what went wrong, which is relational. I find it very hard to organize a relational container to provide a safe enough space to process this. It's like no part of me is big enough to hold something of this magnitude on his own. A very good therapist I once had framed it as the feeling having you, instead of you having the feeling. 


sanmagic7
Good observation. That very much happened with the woman who organized the whole thing, who was present throughout. It was all sorts of unsafe for me to be there. As you know, that can get wildly out of hand when psychedelics are involved. Since the shaman was from a completely different culture [Shipibo], and I wasn't much into the shamanic side of things, or the worldview of many other participants, that felt very unsafe. It was an unwise decision on my part to attend. Even though I had talked to the woman who organized it quite extensively via e-mails. When I saw her IRL, I should have walked away. She was a trigger fest for me. Domineering and all over the place. It doesn't get much worse than to be at the mercy of somebody like that, when you're defenses are stripped down by psychedelics. It's a horrible combination with developmental trauma.

The environment triggered such alienation and fear in me, that my paranoid mind came up with that vision. I didn't expect there to be so much ritual involved, which triggered me like mad. I felt utterly out of place. My fawn response went through the roof. And a big dose of freeze was mixed in with it. I was reduced to a terrified, helpless little boy. I temporarily lost a lot of autonomy/ego strength that week and in the aftermath of that.

The shaman himself was actually a nice guy. He only spoke Spanish, which I don't [except for the part where I briefly could a bit!]. Since those experiences involved psychedelics, it's all kinds of unexplainable. A far away part of me remained in everyday reality, and knew the demonic vision was not real. In the midst of it. There was also a moment where the entire group, me and the shaman included, burst out laughing. A very special moment, in the otherwise dead silent, and pitch dark hall. When it was my turn to undergo the ritual that he did for everyone, I uttered "muy comico", which initiated a bit of a rerun of the hilarity for no apparent reason. It was summer 2019, and speaking with you about this now, does help to shed some light on these experiences. Thank you for that. In the end, the * is usually about the relationship with my mother.

I feel stronger today. Not so much in the EF. I wrote the below last night. It feels like I've taken some power back from the overwhelm again. Thank you for being a factor in that. 

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Today I spent a couple of hours with a questionnaire. A friend wants to know if he's on the autism spectrum. I'd be surprised if he isn't. If I would be asked why, I wouldn't have an answer straight away. I'm intuitive. It takes time to English or Dutch that. I just tap into that and try to translate until it feels "right". My shrink tends to believe it's perfectionism. To me it's wanting to say something that I actually agree with, and filtering out the rest.

The way I tick has been a great source of suffering. I remember drawing a translation machine in group therapy. It was tied to the ocean floor with a chain, and the machine itself was being smashed around by the waves, while it churned out unintelligible characters. Many years later it struck me how well the image captured how I often felt. The irony was that the group session ended with the therapist and the group putting pressure on me to accept some story they had formed about it. What I remember is that I felt completely misunderstood. The very kind of lonely and powerless desperation I had tried to communicate with something else than the words I couldn't find for it. A whole group of steam rollers drove over me. No space for my experience here either. No space for me. Client centered therapy. Looks great on paper. I still don't regret honoring my experience and refusing to swallow the force-fed meal. Not in that, and not in any other of the gazillion times this sort of thing happened. Sure they all meant well. And it was a very painful rerun of the invalidation that had pushed me to this place to begin with. The only place that was available for me at the time.

In all therapies in that clinic, the idea seeped through that being mentally ill is some kind of wrong view or missing insight. I never understood how clearly intelligent and professionally trained people could navigate with such a reductionist premise. Even though there's a place for questioning the patient's beliefs and experience, this kind of angle inherently further undermines the very thing which has been damaged or even destroyed by abuse. It's the opposite of helping a person to trust his inner voice and self-validating his experience. If the therapist doesn't believe in the client, who will? A therapist not placing his bets fundamentally on the self-healing capacity of the client has not understood what healing means. That is dangerous, with so much power and so much vulnerability confined in a tiny space.

Being at the mercy of these people, and having them deepening the invalidation, and insisting on self-abandonment made me want to scream at them. I did a couple of times [not that I could translate what I felt so clearly]. It was all pathological in their eyes, off course. That's how they labeled me. It was re-traumatizing to be in that situation. A whole year. I chose me regardless. Over and over. That was what I considered actual therapy. Not what was presented as such. Anger is hard for me to express. It evokes a lot of anxiety, and it takes a lot for me to go against the shame that keeps it festering in a hidden place. I don't regret ever trusting my gut over any kind of psycho babble.

Many years later I understood that a good enough therapist has faith in the patient himself. A lot of people are afraid of not knowing, of letting go. Therapists are just like people. There's a place for top down. Not so much in "treating" developmental trauma. The best therapists I had were very good at attunement, and not afraid of any emotion. It's a specific blend of humility, compassion, courage, experience, and wisdom that makes a good therapist. A prerequisite is having done a lot of your own work first. That makes up a significant proportion of where the rub is, I'm sure. Inevitably transference does kick in. As a patient, therapists basically tried to teach me how they themselves deal with difficult stuff. Which most often was a version of altering the story around it. That's not how trauma stops ruling your life.

How about those feelings being the story that needs to be finally heard? How about experiencing that buried reality in the presence of an attuned other being the very thing that sets free? How about not abandoning, about not choosing fear once again? How about staying? How about opening your own heart and connecting from a human, vulnerable place yourself? I can go on and on. I met a lot of therapists who are afraid of themselves, and therefore didn't bring their heart to their job. There's no such thing as professional distance and being there for a human being in great need at the same time. A traumatized child or a regressed adult smells that from miles away, even if it doesn't happen on a conscious level. Safety can't be faked. What kind of healing will happen if that basis isn't taken care of? Any person in touch with his own emotions doesn't need to be taught that. It's very taxing to be a therapist. Because it requires you to show up, and welcome things in yourself that get triggered. Like "failing".

They blamed me for not getting "there". Like I was a recalcitrant kid sabotaging his own treatment. I was asked what I needed to feel safe. So they did pick up that I didn't. On the surface, it looks like a good question to ask. But it not being obvious that the angle they came from prevents that foundation to get established, makes that a very sad thing to say. If you ask a desperate child that question, you are stating that you are not attuned to him. That itself is the seed where attachment trauma, and thus the danger in connection, sprouted from. How therapeutic is it to recreate that environment and to blame a traumatized person in your care for blocking his own progress?

Because I listened to my gut, I knew exactly what I needed to. Even though I didn't know it intellectually. I'm so glad I didn't let these people in any more than I did. They had no business there. I guess that what I refer to as my "gut", or my intuition, is a bit like that ocean floor the translation machine was anchored to. It has always been my connection to home. Deep below all the turmoil. The sense of belonging is infinitely greater there than what anybody tried to convince me of. No words are needed to make that clear. Just like you know when you're at home. Because it's me.

sanmagic7
I appreciate your kind support a lot! I'm grateful that you're here. I have to work a bit on receiving compliments, but thank you. And right back at ya again 

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Oh god it was bad again last night. I woke up dozens of times, had terrible nightmares. My whole being was invaded, overpowered by a parasitic force, sapping my life energy. I experienced my mother as a demon. That's a part of it I remember.

When I woke up I was reminded of a terrifying aya experience, where the shaman turned out to be a demonic creature with hooves. I never realized this was what my subconscious projected onto him in this specific way. I could have walked away to never come back at any time, yet I felt completely powerless to do so. Even when sobered up in between the series of ceremonies that week. It looks an awful lot like a freeze response. I've always struggled a bit determining my F-type hierarchy. Freeze actually never crossed my mind as having much significance for me.

The utterly lonely, desperate stuckness I ended up in during several psychedelic experiences had the same feeling tone as my EF's. It seems quite odd now that I did go there to process trauma and somehow not recognized those experiences for what they are. They never come with a label, and the overwhelming emotional storm disguises it into something of the present. My mind has ways to be aware of things and keeping a lot of their depth out of consciousness at the same time. The reality reveals itself in bits and pieces of emotional hieroglyphs.

The state between waking and sleeping is very rich in this regard. I sometimes have a lot of access to my subconscious at night, which can be terrifying. If I don't write it down, it quickly disappears from my awareness. Just like with psychedelic experiences. Working with psychedelics has made my subconscious stuff a lot more accessible. That never gets easy or straightforward though.

During EF's, the most difficult parts are by definition overwhelming and confusing. That experience where it feels like it'll be like this forever and there's no way out whatsoever, it strips me of ways to deal with it or my ability to tap into perseverance. It reduces me to a ping pong ball on the waves of a stormy ocean. I forget what's up and down, left and right, front and back. But what hits me hardest, is the collapse of perspective, of the factor of time. I guess this is what happens when parts of the cortex go offline and things get primal and panicky. I hate those kind of nights. And trips for that matter. I never could get my head around people tripping for fun. What my mind manifests generally isn't that at all.

Whatever happens during the day, I'm never completely gone. I nearly always have the ability to do some things, however little or chaotic. It's more like most of the bandwidth I have is used up by this trauma stuff being triggered, and it takes a lot of effort to add anything else. Except if I'm floored by a sleep disorder, which is another branch of the same beast.

sanmagic7
Thank you San! I'm so grateful to be part of this community and I'm so happy to hear it has been life-saving for you! Not sure who I'm quoting here, but when C-PTSD ever gets its due, there will be very little left of the DSM. I'm having visions of this forum getting extremely crowded in any case. Heaps of people are figuring things out for themselves and go online to find support because it's hard to find elsewhere. I feel bad I haven't found the space to give new members the welcome they deserve. Love and hugs right back at ya 

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TW/suicidal ideation

What started with a trigger several weeks ago, led to an EF that still waxes and wanes. Last night was torturous. I kept waking up. In the state between waking and sleeping, I was in suicidal despair. I was drowning in the abandonment melange. There was no way out of this unbearable loneliness. I felt the pull of death as the only relief for this. Like I used to on an ongoing basis.

I grew up in utter loneliness, despite having parents. Because of them. Those words are nothing more than an abstract concept of a horrific reality. A reality that is as alive in me as it was when it got created. The slightest misattunement has me reliving the torture of not being seen or understood by a single soul. Misattunements are a normal part of human interaction. Which makes this a no win affliction. It's so depressing to have felt so much of this, and still ending up here. There seems to be no end to the depth of this pain. And to it's devastating influence on everything. It's an extra bitter pill that virtually nobody knows what C-PTSD is. Health care professionals included. This perpetually feeds into the loneliness which is central to the trauma itself. This feedback loop is hard to bare. Especially when the past reality overshadows the current one, and safety in connection is needed more than ever.

I don't blame myself for withdrawing. It's not just my trauma talking when I state that people generally do not get C-PTSD. They don't. They can't even imagine. Opening up to people who have no clue, is pretty much guaranteed to backlash in such a vulnerable state. Just to make things not worse for myself I need to be extremely selective in who I interact with and how often. This excludes almost everyone. It makes life a balancing act on a tight rope over a lake of hydrochloric acid. If I don't interact that feeds into the loneliness, if I do it often does even more so. More than the pain itself, this catch 22 leads to suicidal ideation. It's the lack of a solution, however difficult it may be to achieve. So this is what it's like inside an EF. Just verbalizing and venting that is helping.

Meanwhile I've started planning a hike with a friend. A part of me is aware that I'm largely in an EF and my feeling tone can be dramatically different. A change of scenery and company has the potential to facilitate this. My cognition isn't fully bound to the EF all the time. I have just enough recollection of positive experiences to peak beyond my current constricted state. The trip brings it's own challenges, not in the least part going through customs and dealing with uniforms. My response to those passing on the street has gotten better, but I'm not over the incident. I feel like letting that block something like this would be a mistake. I may regret that when I'm actually face to face with the uniforms.

I've been mostly overwhelmed in recent weeks. It's been the reason for my absence here. Even interacting here is taxing than. It's so sad to conclude this is the case. You guys are great, and I hate to disappear in what feels like the middle of a conversation. Much love to you all. 

Chart
The feeling is mutual. It's only been about eight years since I realized that I'm perpetuating what makes life so difficult by defaulting to isolation. Having that insight doesn't solve much, since people who grasp C-PTSD are few and far between. It's been the source of a lot of despair. A lot of people simply aren't safe enough when I'm in a very vulnerable place. And that's the moment when I need connection most.

I discovered OOTS a few years ago and bookmarked it. I didn't sign up before, because I felt/feel uneasy about the term C-PTSD. When I finally did sign up, I got a very warm welcome. I remember your response to my introduction was very validating. It helped a great deal to feel safe here. When you mentioned developmental trauma, I knew I had finally found someone who was dealing with the same stuff. That's a big deal when that never happened before in decades of therapy of all sorts. Reading books and watching video's about it can become it's own problem in a way, when there's nobody you can discuss it with. Thank you for being here and expressing yourself.
 

For me it has been a very long journey to find out what on earth I was struggling with. Precisely because I could not point towards obvious trauma that covers the emotional gravity, so to say. With this condition, and without real support or an accurate diagnosis, it has made me question my own sanity more than once. When you have the tendency to seek fault in yourself first, that's not a happy cocktail. That itself becomes fuel for the internalized invalidation, for toxic shame. The stealthy nature gives an already formidable force even more power. It's a master underminer, parasitising on your own life force.

I've been blended with the ICR for so long, that it still can be a big challenge to see what belongs to me and what has been smeared onto me. Especially when strong emotions hit. The default groove is very deep, and I can't always look over the edge of it, or even imagine a world outside of it. Reading your and others' journals is also validating for me in that regard. I recognize similar struggles, which makes me aware of them, while not feeling so utterly alone in it.

"This is how my trauma feels" is a powerful realization. You are making complete sense to me. It's not about what's wrong with us, but about what happened to us. That ugliness isn't, and never was part of us. We were not born believing that about ourselves. So for me this is not as much about getting rid of the ugliness, as it is about getting in touch with who I am on a more fundamental level than that. Lovable. Just as every infant is.

sanmagic7
Thank you for your kind words.

Hope67

What a relief it must be that the night terror issue has improved!
Being able to read the book and stay present speaks volumes about your emotion regulation ability. Your mindful navigation of triggers and defense mechanisms is an impressive achievement, especially in regards to the context. Next level stuff!

sanmagic7
Thank you! 

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Still recovering from an injury, I couldn't stay yet another extra night in the albergue. So the next morning my journey continued. I made it to the next village, which was situated on a hill. The view of the path with pilgrims disappearing into the distance was magnificent. I sat there under a tree, appreciating the moment. A food truck channeled a soundtrack from another dimension. It hit me in a place only music can. I had to ask. The owner was more than happy to share his track list. I saved a note, determined to track down the musicians later on. That time is now. Mourning the ongoing loss of my parents as a child, and all that resulted from it, I feel a tender kind of sadness. There's no fighting with it. There's a being with the little one. There is pain. And nothing needs to be different. I am home.

I slept in my living room, since it got very hot in my bedroom in the past days. I woke up very early in the morning, because the self inflating mattress lost a lot of air during the night. Grumpy and very sleepy, I stumbled to my bedroom and fell asleep right away. Some time later I shut down the alarm on my phone and added another hour and a half of sleep.

My mood wasn't very good this morning. Still affected by the recent triggers, I still had one foot in the EF. It took me about eight hours to activate myself. I once again tapped into the anger that got stirred up by the triggers, and used it to get to work in my front yard. I'm totally visible there. Being visible often is a big thing for me. Especially when I'm doing something unconventional [which often is the case]. This time I measured, staked out, and drilled holes. It was a fiddly task, since the whole garden is full of vegetables I didn't want to mess up. It was in the back of my mind that I'd get remarks/questions if anyone would see me. Nobody does this here. Drilling holes by hand in your front yard, and messing around with a measuring tape and some string. So I rallied my anger against my ICR. Successfully. I managed to shut it up enough to not have it smother me under a thick blanket of shame. I occupied the real estate in my mind with ME to the degree there were instances I forgot about others entirely and just acted like I would have when invisible. I took on a couple of other related tasks while in this flow. It feels really good to win this internal battle. The battle to take up space authentically, unapologetically. I'm getting glimpses of freedom. I'll get there, or I'll die trying.

Listening to Walker's book is helping. I'm nowhere near triggered as much by it as I was when I started it. It's more validating and empowering than it's taxing my system. In fact, I can listen to it now like I listen to other non-fiction books. A part of me is a lot more interested in picking up where I left off when the triggers hit. I still haven't made up my mind about what to do now. Sinking all my focus and energy into angering over what has been done to me doesn't feel quite right, nor does continuing as if nothing happened. At least a part of my new found emancipatory anger should be used to pave a nicer path for myself. It's a powerful force for good when used mindfully. Glad to get in touch with it again.

sanmagic7
Wow, those people added insult after injury, probably with the best of intentions. There are a gazillion ways to tell someone to shut up and those sound a lot like it. There is no way to skip to acceptance or forgiveness. Those are hard earned in the case of C-PTSD, or may never emerge from the ashes at all. It is the cherry on top of the healing journey.

Thanks a lot for your support. 

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Toxic shame: someone else's projections absorbed into your sense of self.

Thank you for being here sanmagic7 

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The incident has triggered the whole gamma of emotions that are tied to the abuse. I have felt more indirect layers of it throughout my life. Depression and anxiety are so abstract, that they themselves function as an obscuration of the devastating reality they hint at. How it really feels to be abused by your own parent(s) as an innocent child is more raw. I'm more in touch with that boy than I ever was. I'm more on his side than I ever was. I'm more clear on what has been done to him than I ever was.

And it's fragile. His experience was effectively denied, his truth effectively invalidated, his voice effectively silenced. Little is needed to switch back to that default. Put on the spot, I can't communicate the actual horror. Not even a watered down version of it. It's stored in me as something that is not allowed to exist. Let alone be voiced. I don't even need people to have a fawn response. My experience was pushed back so aggressively and systematically, that existing as a sovereign individual itself is hard. I'm trained to respond to the needs and opinions of others first and foremost. My own come second at best. The world barges in and I respond.

This isn't strictly a psychological issue, which could be fixed with enough willpower and awareness. More like the polyvagal kind of thing. Safety overrules all else. Voicing my own experience and advocating for myself are tied to danger. Not that I can't and won't, but it takes a lot of effort. The more overwhelm I experienced over the years, the more effort that took. And the closer I get to the raw experience of the little boy, the harder it gets to find the words to express what he feels.

I can take the time for it, and write down pages of what I've been through, and be reduced to nothing by just one invalidation if I'd literally voice it to my mother. This is why I used to perfect my story to the most effective and concise message if I needed to get something across. Engaging long enough with the material beforehand, gave me just enough focus to not be obliterated before I made my point.

I feel like I need to speak my mind. In detail. To validate the little boy and to do him justice. I've started listening to Pete Walker's book again to help me find my voice [which is easy with all that resonates so clearly]. It's really hard to listen to, just like last time. There's a real risk of it plunging me into an EF. So I need to dose that too. Besides you guys, I have no friend who really gets C-PTSD. I feel vulnerable because of that. I do not want to have to explain C-PTSD to anyone. Especially not while struggling so hard to speak my mind already. Because having to explain such a complex affliction also evokes the above response. The same goes for the intelligence gap between me and my mother. She used to ridicule me for my intellect and I am still burdened with the task of dumbing down how I think in order to be understood. There are layers of obstacles in place to get heard. Or rather, to be able to stick with the little boy and voice his experience. That should be my main objective here, I think.

I'm supposed to help my mother move stuff out of her house in a month. Right now I'm flooded with emotions, which are pretty * far from wanting to help her out. Things are not black and white though. In recent years my mother has been doing her best to treat me respectfully and she has helped me a lot. I see that and appreciate that. It's the reason we are still in touch. Even though discussing the elephant in the room has not been possible. I feel torn. On a bigger scale by the whole family that has fallen apart. At the core, the biggest driver for that was my mother not facing her own shadow. There can not be any conversation about any of the family issues without addressing that. And there's a big, narcissistic defense around that too.

My mom texted me and I only vaguely saw it was about moving the stuff out of the house. I didn't read it. I don't know how to respond. Tomorrow I'll see my shrink. I'm at least going to speak to him first.

 

[myself]

Hi dollyvee, good to see you again! Thanks for your support. Yes, my mom did respond well. She apologized for disclosing the info. I didn't discuss the content of the cascade that followed for me. Yet. Not a good moment for it. That's a conversation that needs to happen later, which will be a lot more challenging.

sanmagic7
Thanks for your encouragement. Your question is deeper than I can possibly answer here. I remember feeling like my mother had killed me when I was a suicidal teen while I cried every day for years on end. I couldn't pinpoint it, but my heart knew and I grieved endlessly. Basically for decades. I gradually figured out what happened while drowning in heavy emotions. What came up recently isn't really new. Over the years, it seems to edge closer to the pure version of what I have felt as a kid. During triggers like these, I'm suddenly flooded with things I wanted to say as a kid but couldn't because I fawned, imploded, and didn't know what was being done to me. I still have a hard time verbalizing it, especially when I'm not in touch with the raw fury. So the trigger temporarily lifts the dissociation and I get a peek under the hood again.

Years ago I made a little drawing with a sad face with arrows pointing towards him, and a smiling face with arrows pointing away from him. The theme of expressing myself rather than only responding to stuff bombarding me is old and incredibly difficult for me to manifest. This is also about the neurological reality of C-PTSD. Overwhelm is a big factor in my life. It only got worse over the years. There's sensitivities I probably inherited, maximally exacerbated up by the circumstances I started life in. The ramifications are devastating. I grieved all of that and eventually found a lot of peace in being with what is after a complete collapse and some experiences with psychedelics.

For lack of a better word, eventually an encounter with the absolute made it easier to embrace the messy humanness of this existence more fully. I've welcomed horrific experiences, even on the brink of insanity. And I think expressing anger is even more difficult for me. I've worked with anger off and on for a long time, but never as close to what my inner child could never express as recently. Looking back, I think what's deepening is the aspect of not abandoning my inner child myself. So my my care for him becomes stronger than my fawning tendency in the moment I can allow myself to be furious. It's still very fragile, but all things considered this a very good sign. I've been out of the EF today and I feel good about me.