Hope66's Journal

[sanmagic7]

here's to a speedy recovery, sweetie.  that kind of stuff is also exhausting on the body's systems.  glad you're sleeping and resting.  love and hugs.

[Hope67]

Hi SanMagic,
I am feeling a lot better today - the extra sleep and resting has done me a power of good, and also ensuring that I ate bland things - my stomach is still a bit gripey, but overall, I am much calmer and also feel as if my appetite is returning - but I will continue to take it easy on the food side of things, and I am so grateful for the love and hugs - thank you. 

Hope 

[Hope67]

Journal entry on 14th April 2018

I have been reading a lot - I felt exhausted from it, but I was glad I did it.  I am going to try to take a break from it for a while though, as I think I need to focus on just taking some time to allow myself to process everything - I think my body has reacted a lot to all of this - and I need to listen to it, and give it some respite.

Was so happy to see that Paperclip is back in the forum - and also read what Memorex had said - and things resonated with me in both of their journals. 

I'm experiencing some quite 'heavy' emotions lately - they feel too heavy to carry - so I guess I'm putting them down for a bit - I have been working on my 'Memory diagrams' and also putting things in terms of themes too - and also trying to look for links and to be honest, it feels quite over-whelming, as I see so many things that look like 'red flags' to me - and I wonder why they feel so scary - but it's due to the fragmented nature of it all - and the missing parts - but I read in Janina Fisher's book about trusting that "triggered states 'tell the story' of the past without the necessity to either recall or avoid recalling specific incidents." - that was reassuring to me.

I don't feel like my writing is making sense right now, but I will leave it as it is.  I am just tired.  I will rest.

Hope 

[Blueberry]

Hope, your writing makes perfect sense! Reading this, I'm impressed at how much therapeutic work you do on your own, without a therapist. Wow!

[DecimalRocket]

Hi Hope, nice to see you. Hope you can get some rest after all that healing work. It must be tough. 

[Libby183]

Hi Hope.

Just wanted to say that I hope very much that you are feeling a bit better after your illness. These things are so hard to get over when you are already dealing with so much, aren't they?

Take care and hugs,

Libby.

[Hope67]

Hi Blueberry, Decimal Rocket and Libby,
Thank you for your replies - I really appreciate them all -  to all of you. 

Journal Entry for 15th April 2018

I have felt really low in mood throughout most of today - but as time went on, I felt calmer about feeling that way - and it became more bearable.  I've just spent some time 'planning' the next few days - and produced a detailed list of things I hope to achieve, and also been specific about when I want to do those things.  I am just hoping that I will actually do them, and not procrastinate.  But there are some deadlines - which means I will most likely manage to do things. 

Instead of reading self-help books - I read some of a fiction book today - and also newspapers.  So took a break from self-help stuff.  My partner wanted me to go out for a walk with him - but I still don't feel as if I have much energy, so I declined.  But hopefully tomorrow I will try to get some air, and that will be good for me.

I found that I was facing many self-critical thoughts today - particularly relating to my FOO - and I was probably grieving my relationship - i.e. wishing it could have been different.  I guess it's hard to feel positive when thinking of those things.  It all feels like a very big mess when I think of it, and previously I felt as if I was keeping things together, but actually the whole thing was just dysfunctional and broken, and the reality of how things were, were completely different to how I perceived them.  My whole being fragmented - I recognise that there are many different parts of me, and I am getting in touch with them and beginning to understand each of their perspectives, and it's over-whelming on the one hand, but also very positive to finally be making sense of things - and putting some sense into things for myself. 

I've got a few challenging things to face this week - and I need some strength to do that.  I had felt really poorly this past few days - in many ways, so fatigued.  But I have rested - and I have slept more, and I do feel a bit better now.  Ready to hopefully go forward into a new week.

Hope 

[Blueberry]

  for all the difficulties you were going through this weekend. I hope you are less plagued by those sorts of thoughts this coming week! I mean I know it's healing in a way when the puzzle pieces start slotting together but it's also exhausting.

[Hope67]

Hi Blueberry,
Thank you.  I really appreciate those hugs   

****
Journal Entry on 16th April 2018

I feel a heightened sense of anxiety at the moment, it's as if I've done the most awful thing - and it's that feeling I would have about impending punishment from FOO for transgressing something - and it's a frightening feeling - but I am thinking that I really want to shake that awful stuff off me - shake it away - leave it somewhere.  I just wrote about some stuff in the SA forum section - and whilst I realise I feel some disgust at myself, I was pleased to also feel some compassion for the part of me that has had to endure things and it felt ok to express the things I said - but now my anxiety levels are back up really high again, so I'm trying to distract myself - and I thought I'd come back and just write about it for a bit - as it does help to get it out there - write it here. 

I've suffered horrible head pains over the weekend, left side of the head - and particularly whilst I read the book by Torey Hayden - but I was absolutely desperate to read it from start to finish and take heed of her words - it meant a lot to me to read the compassionate nature of that person, she cared so much about her clients - and she really worked hard to try to find out what was going on behind their difficulties - look at their families and try to support at a systemic kind of level.  I thought it was amazing.  Little Hope really liked it.

I've been comfort eating again on and off - and I realise that's going back to an old pattern I've had - and I don't want it to take me over, and numb me.  I want to feel my emotions, and I don't want to block them out with food.  But it was hard to stop myself from bingeing, and I did binge - it could have been worse though.

I also realise I feel guilty, as I mentioned that I don't fantasise, but actually I have done - but I feel too embarrassed to admit that to myself - because the content hasn't been 'acceptable' - I can't bring myself to write about it - I'm worried about my FOO somehow finding that I even write anything - they censored my thoughts, my feelings, my everything.  I couldn't write in my diaries without fearing they would read them, so I would censor what I wrote.

I've been very open here - in so many ways, and that is actually cathartic and special and important to me, because I'm sick of hiding all my feelings and my thoughts, but I still am censoring myself, and there is still some control there.  I realise that.  But maybe that's to be protective.

I've seen people talk about doing 'dark side' work - and I think I know what they might mean, as I am realising there are other sides to myself that have been repressed and cut off - and I related to what California Dreaming said in another thread about the Curious Imp that Edgar Allan Poe wrote about - I might have remembered the name wrong there - I'm going from my memory - but it was something like that.  The Perverse Imp?  I'm not sure...

The feelings I have currently are like a tightening of a drum - I feel intense tension.  I wish I had something I could thump, and hit, because I feel like there's pent-up aggression inside - and it wants to get out.  If I was driving alone in a car, then I think I'd scream and scream out loud - I have done that before - it was a good thing for me at the time. 

I think I'm getting in touch with some very strong feelings - feelings that have words like injustice, unfairness, disgust at how I feel I was treated - as if my feelings didn't matter - as if I was the object rather than a child.  Yet I know that if my FOO would be asked about any of this, I feel sure they'd look with open eyes and say 'Nothing to see here' - 'we don't know why she is doing this or saying this'

Feels incredibly frustrating - but maybe that's good - I'm 'feeling' this.

Hope 

[Hope67]

Journal Entry for 17th April 2018

I am glad that today I feel calmer again, because I felt such an 'angst' yesterday - it was unbearable at times - such heightened anxiety and tension, and underlying anger, but at the same time, it still felt as if it 'wasn't real' - like it was under treacle or part of a 'novel' rather than real life.  Yet this is 'my life' and it is 'my feelings'.  I had to negotiate a terrible inner critic telling me I was disgusting - that people would dislike me for writing about things, that they would say "What are you whining on about" "You are so lucky - you have this and that" - but I recognise that's probably the messages that my FOO would say, i.e. "don't be a drama Queen" - "You make a fuss about nothing" - and basically I've not confronted them with the issues of CSA - I'm too scared to confront them about many things - I've been NC for a few years now - but whilst I was VLC I tried to communicate with them about 'safer' topics and met a barage that suggested intensive lack of comprehension.  Actually there was a delusional quality towards some of the communications I received at the time.  Particularly from my NM - and my enabling F - he just seemed shut-off and incomprehending. 

My sister believes they are from the dark side, literally - she thinks they are 'evil' - she totally believes that, and I can understand why she does, from the things she told me - and when I look at my time-line, I see that the worst times for her coincided when I was aged 18 months to 3 years of age, and so I realise that I must have witnessed the incidents she has told me about - and she agreed that I would have heard and seen some of them - and yet, I only have 'flashes of memory' - rather than a comprehensive grasp of what happened, due to being so young.  This makes sense of how traumatised I believe I have been - at a pre-verbal age. 

The other thing that concerns me is the lack of memories I have from the age of 12 to 16 years, and that makes me wonder what I've repressed for that time period - I really believe that was another danger time for me.  I have flashes of things that make me feel very uncomfortable, and my gut instinct tells me somethings very badly wrong about that time period too.

Basically all my childhood is veiled in various ways - there are layers and layers of things - I've avoided many aspects, and I think I've coped by compartmentalizing, as I feel as if I'm along the dissociative spectrum, but not to the degree of losing consciousness of my different dissociated states - but even saying that, I know there are periods of my life when I feel as if I was 'taken over' by other 'alter states' who made me behave in contrasting ways, at different points in my life and in different relationships and situations.

When I had T for a time a few years ago, the T told me that she felt that the only way I was able to safely begin to look at these issues was because I am in a stable relationship at last.  I believe that.  Until my current relationship with my partner, I didn't choose very good partners - I can see the danger flags in past relationships.  I can also see that I avoided looking at the CSA - whereas in the past year to two years I have started to tentatively look at it.

Anyway, it's good to be able to think and express these things, and I'm not going to allow my inner critic to silence me anymore - I can speak and share my thoughts and my feelings, and I am thankful to have people alongside me who understand.

Hope 

[DecimalRocket]

Hi Hope.

Hope, I know about the dark side work they talk about. People call it shadow work, and it's a work that people have multiple misunderstandings about. It's not acting on those dark sites, but simply acknowledging them and accepting them. You can only control what you're aware of, and you can only truly love yourself if you love every part of yourself. To realize these flaws makes it easier to understand what it's like for other people to have these flaws, though still defending yourself if they might go too far with possibly harming you.

It's crazy how we forget memories like this, huh? Part of what makes us us is the life we lived, and to forget essential parts of it is like forgetting essential parts of who we are. Essential inner children. I guess it takes time and effort to realize these parts of us, and I'm not sure these parts of us even want to be seen sometimes, but I hope they can open up one day. They need love and acceptance too.

[Hope67]

Hi Decimal Rocket,
Thank you for everything you wrote here, I really appreciate it, and also the reminder that the work is called 'shadow work' - yes, I am going to look more at that - because I think you're right, it's getting in touch with all parts of ourselves, and I have certainly been doing that this past few days - and it's been tough going.  I have especially found that I've woken a very critical part of myself - which has made me feel it is disgusted with me - but I am actually beginning to resolve that, and there is some compassion coming in, which is easier to bear.

*****
Journal entry for 19th April 2018

I am thinking of trying to 'take a break' from self-help reading over the weekend - and will try to do less demanding things - and just see how that goes - because I felt like I was on a bit of a roller-coaster of emotions this past few weeks, and I realise I probably pushed myself a little too hard - as there were times when I feared that my sanity was being compromised. 

What I have found helpful is watching a couple of u-tube videos by Peter Levine on grounding techniques, where he just showed a couple of things I could do to feel the containment of my body - by physically hugging and 'feeling' the containment and noticing changes within - relating to the vagus nerve etc as well - which I thought was interesting. 

I think I've avoided watching u-tube videos before - and have been focusing more on books - and I'm not sure why that is - because there is so much out there online in that format of videos, and so I could learn a lot that would be helpful.  So, my intention is that once I've taken a bit of a break - I will then re-start looking at information, and that I'm going to focus on pacing myself and hopefully ensuring I take things slowly.

I have also thought about my wish to de-clutter things at home, and finally sort things out - because there's so many things I've put off, or procrastinated about, and I need and want to deal with that.  I read that Blueberry has started doing her process and had put some things into piles - and that sounded positive.  Sounds like a good strategy. 

Anyway, just making some kind of plan feels positive.  So that's a good thing.

Hope 

[Hope67]

Journal Entry for 24th April 2018
So I took a break from self-help reading - I also made a decision to stop doing my voluntary work too - because I've not found it helps me very much at the moment, and there have been things within it that have been too 'triggering' - so I have informed the people who needed to know, and they have been understanding of my decision.  I feel a sense of relief, so I think it was the right decision. 

I am feeling reasonably calm today - I've not had many triggering things happen - the weekend was ok.  So really - I think I am feeling some equilibrium, and a sense of calmer perspective. 

I also had a situation where I had to say 'goodbye' to someone I'd not seen for a while, and that would normally trigger me into an EF - just the thought of saying 'goodbye' - but somehow it was like it didn't impact on me - I'm not sure how to take that - was it that I dissociated and therefore didn't process it at all, or was it that whatever triggered me on previous 'goodbye' occasions just wasn't somehow part of that scenario?  I really don't know.  But it was different.  It was like I coped more normally - how I see other people coping with saying 'goodbye' rather than my usual reaction.

I have been comfort eating more though - this upsets me, because I know it's a way to numb my feelings, and I don't want to rely on that as a way of coping.  I will get over-weight - and I won't feel healthy if I do that.  So I need to find a different way.

I haven't got any further with my attempts to tidy things and get rid of stuff I don't need anymore.  I keep thinking of Blueberry, and knowing she's put some things into piles - that is impressive - I need to take a leaf out of her book, and try to do a similar thing. 

Anyway, the good thing is that the roller-coaster of incredibly strong emotions has calmed and I feel as if I'm coasting along at a station right now - and I can look around, and think about what direction I want to take.  That feels positive.

Hope 

[Blueberry]

I haven't got any further with my attempts to tidy things and get rid of stuff I don't need anymore.  I keep thinking of Blueberry, and knowing she's put some things into piles - that is impressive - I need to take a leaf out of her book, and try to do a similar thing. 

I didn't get much of that done at all! Recently I looked at a bookshelf while waiting for something to upload and within those few minutes, I decided on about 10 books I could get rid of. But then my mind kind of closed down and I couldn't decide on any others to get rid. Though I should. Which reminds me, I need to go to the library before I have to pay fines on late books... 

[Sceal]

I am trying to come up with effective ways to handle emotions other than eating too.
I've thought of two things (although - not yet tried it out): reading a good and enjoyable book just for fun.. Or maybe a cup of tea?  Or a walk in fresh air if possible?  Or a shower/foot bath?
Food is so easy and simple though, and it's hard to resist the temptation once you're already worn out and tired and emotional.

Sounds like a smart thing to pace yourself with self-help. I think you are doing wonderful, you are an inspiration to me to do more of that outside therapy.