I Am

[Hope67]

Bach, I really thought how lucky your parrot is that you take such concern and care about her well-being, and even though she was a bit ruffled when you went to check on her, it was really caring and kind to do that.   

[Desert Flower]

Hi Bach, I can totally relate to the way you were worrying about the parrot and just having to go check up on her. It's just impossible to let go of an urge like that. I think you are taking good care of her too.

[sanmagic7]

i agree w/ the others, bach.  the idea that you worried so much about if your parrot was ok was a very nurturing thing to do - and then you became bothered enough to check on it.  whether you liked doing it or not, you did it, and i believe that counts for a lot.  lucky parrot.

as blueberry mentioned, i believe c-ptsd has a lot more range of motion over our lives, how we think, what we do, than we can come to terms with.  our traumas, layers and layers of them, can't help but push thru time and time again, even w/o us realizing it.  until we can resolve issues, they simply grab at us from the past and impact our present.  it sucks.  love and hugs

[Bach]

I've realised that I'm currently in the midst of the longest and most encompassing emotional flashback that I've had in a very long time. I don't know when it started or what triggered it, but over the last few months I've been reacting against it in ways that have perpetuated,  complicated and deepened it. This combined with some objective real worlds struggles (difficult low-paying work, though thankful there's work at all, broken boiler, now fixed but at greater cost than originally anticipated, and last night's horror, a plumbing problem that made the kitchen sink overflow, about which I'm white-knuckling the wait for a callback from a plumber to come look at it) have resulted in me being a total unmitigated MESS, scared miserable helpless little B wondering if the terror and pain will ever stop, wondering why she has to be here at all.

[Blueberry]

Sitting with you Bach. At least you recognise you're in an EF.

I'm sorry about all that additional stuff like broken boiler, kitchen sink overflow... and difficult low-paying work.

[NarcKiddo]

I hope the plumber has now been able to sort the kitchen sink problem and that the bill was not too terrible. These domestic problems are trying enough for anyone to deal with, but coupled with an EF they can feel intolerable. Poor little B. 

[sanmagic7]

i echo the others, bach.  it's horrible to go thru all this and i get those dark thoughts that creep in - i get them, too.  know you're not alone, you are cared about, and i wish there was something more  i could do.  sending love and a hug filled w/ support and strength for both big B and little B. 

[Hope67]

I would also like to send a hug of love and support to you and to Little B as well.    

[Chart]

Hey Bach, I hear you and your inner child. It's so hard sometimes. Such valid questions that don't seem to have an answer.
 

[Papa Coco]

Bach, and Little Bach,

I'm so sorry to hear of the long EF. (I just made a connection: We call periods of emotional flashbacks EF, and that's also how NOAA measures tornadoes, as EF 1 through 5). That's one of those anomalous coincidences that I think are helpful, because of what you said, that you don't know what brought this EF on, nor why it's hanging around. I've always thought of these EFs as weather fronts, which helps me a lot to not take responsibility for them as if I wanted them. After a lifetime of people telling me to "just get over it" and asking "Why do you keep letting it bug you?" I now see these EFs as storms that I didn't decide to have. I don't always understand where they come from, I don't know how long they'll stay, and all I can do is hang on until they subside and I can assess the damages. To me, EFs are storms, and we don't always know what causes them.

I'm very sorry to read that you're in one of those storms now. I hope you continue to lean on the forum for comfort. By the comments I'm seeing, you have a lot of friends here on the forum who care about you. I care about you also. I hope knowing that helps ease the frustration of the storm.

PC

[Bach]

Friends, all of you, thank you for the support.  I love you all 

I wrote elsewhere that I'm feeling my body in a new way.  Something I learned recently is exactly where in my body the worst of the crazy lives.  By "the worst of the crazy", I mean the obsessive thoughts of death and suicide and not being worth the resources that keep me alive.  And by "where it lives", I mean, as in, there's my body keeping the score for little/Middle B.  I pinpointed exactly which physical symptoms correspond with those unbearable thoughts, and have identified some practical physical things I can do to alleviate them at least somewhat.  This is  a major breakthrough for me, especially in light of all the frustration I've felt lately with knowing all the WHY I'M LIKE THIS without being able to figure out WHAT TO DO ABOUT IT.  I finally have something of a weapon against my trauma.  The tricky part will be not overusing it, because that's exactly the kind of thing I do.

[Blueberry]

  for your major breakthrough Bach!