unexpected PTSD

Some of my current PTSD stems from the early years living under the thumb of a gaslighting family. If you are not familiar with that term.... Gaslighting is a form of manipulation that often occurs in abusive relationships. It is a covert type of emotional abuse where the bully or abuser misleads the target, creating a false narrative and making them question their judgments and reality.  Ultimately, the victim of gaslighting starts to feel unsure about their perceptions of the world and even wonder if they are losing their sanity. 

My childhood right there. I have been in therapy for decades, for that and numerous sexual assaults.  Since it is still National Mental Health Month as I write this on May 29th, I am blogging about this.

In the past few days, my PTSD, influenced by gaslighting, has reared its ugly head again. Two incidents triggered it. The first was when I made specific arrangements to have a phone call at 7 pm on a certain evening, about a small job. 7 came and went with no call from the person hiring. I phoned THEM at 7:15, thinking that maybe I was the one who was to initiate the call (I was not, my first hint of gaslighting memories) and they answered curtly, asking what could I possibly want to discuss at this hour, when they were  'trying to get dinner ready.'

It really threw me. We had scheduled this discussion. She was supposed to know this. And here she was, not only questioning the timing and the reason, but also chucking in an admonition for interrupting her meal prep. My body reacted. My heart rate went sky high. I began to sweat. My voice faltered. My hands shook. I have recently made such wonderful progress with my mental health healing, that I was unnerved at what was happening. I thought I should be able to handle what seemed like a simple misunderstanding. Lately, I would have calmly stood up for myself, but this gaslighting type of behavior landed me right back in the throes of PTSD. I doubted my reality. It felt horrible and frightening.

The next day, I was still mulling over that discomfort. With this state of mind, I again doubted my reality when a friend who arranges local gatherings used the wrong description of where we were supposed to meet. Instead of saying ' Oak Street' she said 'Beech Street' which is understandable, since they are both tree names. But she went on to describe where I lived as being in another town altogether, due to local landmarks being similarly named. I suspect that she has brain issues so I did not wish to push for a correction. When my Lyme disease was at its worst, there were times I could not recall my own daughter's name, so I really was sympathetic. But her misnomers threw me for the second time that week. The feelings of confusion and doubt were very uncomfortable. The fact that she said these things with such conviction in her voice was just like the old gaslighting from my childhood.

I took some time to gather my thoughts, to have a conversation with myself about my current safety, and then confided in a friend. After supper one night, I actually said aloud, the correct names of what that person had erroneously submitted. I am better now, but still a bit shaken. Perhaps it is preparing me for a larger issue and I will then be stronger and ready to face whatever it may be......

-GG

 

a minute here, a minute there....

 I am in the beginning chapters, reading Mayflower by Nathaniel Philbrick. It is an audiobook so I cannot look back to find specific quotes easily. But one stood out (which I will get inaccurate if I try) so I will just paraphrase.

The Pilgrims gained that name due to their constant movement/travels in search of their ideal home of freedom. America was not their first journey seeking this. The constant hardships, the frequent persecutions, their very lives threatened, led them to accept suffering. That, and the physical hardships, the lack of basic necessities, the reality of diseases. I wish I could directly quote the wonderful phrase that Philbrick used.... I identified with it immediately.

I have been in pain 24/7 for decades. I have come to accept this 'hardship' and its constant presence. So when I get a minute here, a minute there, of relief, it is an amazing and beautiful thing. Like walking through a storm for days and suddenly coming upon a glorious rainbow.

My pain relief comes when I am lying in bed, just before falling asleep. I am in a certain position, my muscles are mostly relaxed. I have all of my pillow props in place, in the places where my body needs them. My cats surround me, purring, and my earplugs are in, against the noise of the outside world. I am not hungry or thirsty. It feels miraculous, this brief respite from unrelenting discomfort. 

I absolutely wallow in it. Focus on it. Give great thanks for it. The rarity of being totally comfortable for a few minutes makes the event very precious. 

Sometimes I am amazed that I can be so happy in those moments, that I am not complaining or wailing about not having this more often. I feel very lucky that I can just enjoy the treat. 

-GG

Magic happens during IC meetings

 

I see something wonderful at so many Inclusion Center Zoom meetings. Mostly, we do show our faces during a meeting. Some participants will tell us that they have very little energy that day and it is easily recognizable by the rest of us....eyes aren't so focused, mouths are not smiling, shoulders are slumped.  Often I am one of them, predicting that my brain will be uncooperative and my interest in the topics will quickly wane. I can almost feel my eyes telling me they'd rather be closed. Yet, after just a few minutes of either conversation or play (during Friday Games and Silliness,) I have seemingly forgotten that I am fatigued. 

I so often hear myself or others say, at the start of a meeting, phrases like, "I might have to leave after ten minutes" or "I know I'm not gonna make it through this whole hour." But more often than not, the folks who said those things are, a third of the way through the gathering,  coming up with brilliant ideas, laughing, and engaging in a way they simply did not expect to be able to do.  

I absolutely love this part of Inclusion Center. We really do fuel each other. We infect each other with energy. When I have experienced this momentary transformation, I am amazed. I feel as if I were given an actual iv drip of happiness or energy. For this unexpected result, I am so grateful.

It does not happen every single time.Sometimes I do nearly fall asleep during a meeting. And I have seen others leave to just 'go lie down.' But when I am in other online groups, I never see the opposite. Only at Inclusion Center have I seen the 'magic' of reenergization.  Our time together seems to fly by.  I have, by some miracle, experienced smiles, laughter, and clear thinking. Things I never predicted when I signed into Zoom, wondering if I could make it through the hour.

The people that make up Inclusion Center are marvelous. The very definition of marvel..... a wonderful or astonishing person or thing.

-GG

Mental Health Month!

 

May is mental health awareness month. Pretty much all of us have been greatly affected mentally with the current pandemic.  If you are one of the millions who have lived with mental illness before Covid arrived, you are dealing with a double-whammy! And this nasty disease is still very much around.

How have you been caring for yourself? Gently, I hope. Give yourself plenty of leeway. This is no time for perfectionism. Let the house be messier if it is too much for you. On the other hand, I find my depression greatly increases when my trailer is a wreck. It is difficult to decide how much to do, to save my strength, or to have a neat home where I am not tripping over stuff, and cannot find important things. I tend to clean or organize 5 minutes at a time so as not to be overwhelmed. And during the interim, I give myself greater rewards than ever before. I am watching episodes of a favorite 1970s show that lifts my spirit. In other years, I would feel guilty about this 'waste of time' but now I understand it to be essential. My 'treats' take up way more hours than in the past.

I am practicing gratitude like never before. It helps to focus on all of the good things in my day. When I add them all up, I feel truly lucky. I put things on an imaginary old-fashioned balance scale. The lousy feelings and experiences go on one side, the blessings on the other. If I am truthful, the good always outweighs the bad. The image of that unbalanced scale is one of the most potent tools I have for looking at life in a better way.

On really bad days, I will think, " I have a roof over my head and heat and running water," but right away, my response is, "oh, sure, the pipes freeze in the winter and it is 90 degrees in the bedroom in summer." I understand that my scale tool is not a magic wand. I must work at it daily and forgive myself when I develop a bad attitude. I have a choice. I can be miserable and focus on the negatives, or not. I have that power. No matter how many things are going wrong, I do have the power to reframe anything.  

My OCD has gone through the roof since the pandemic began. It is exasperating and makes me feel so helpless. After 2 years of fighting it, I am now telling myself, "this is a part of you at this time. Do not berate yourself for its development. You do not need to assume it will haunt you for the whole rest of your life." Just the acceptance of it is making me more comfortable. I still have it, but the misery has greatly diminished.

nami.org, the site of the National Alliance on Mental Illness, has an abundance of excellent coping skills.  Please consider taking some time each day to care for your mental health. And remember how closely mental and physical health are aligned. 

-GG

why is imagination so important?

 

"Imagination is more important than knowledge. Knowledge is limited. Imagination encircles the world."  - Albert Einstein.

I have a bit of a hard time with this quote because I keep assuming that Einstein is putting knowledge at a solid second place, waaaaaay below imagination. I do not think this was his intention. Writing this blog entry might help dispel my feelings about this.

When I think about the world of disabilities and the way in which so-called abled folk often see us, what comes to mind is that they simply DO NOT KNOW or DO NOT UNDERSTAND what we go through, minute to minute. Here is where imagination comes into play as a possible/probable potent antidote.  

When someone offers condolences about something and says, "I know how you feel," it is a rarity for this to actually be true. But with some imagination, we can get an idea of what it is like to be in someone else's world. This is what is so lacking these days. Those whose troubles are nothing like ours do not have a realistic view of our daily challenges. If a person took just five minutes, closed their eyes, and imagined in detail what another person encounters, I am sure it would be a revealing and educational experience.  They could, for instance, get an inkling of what it is like to go on a basic grocery run, something so many take for granted as an 'average' outing. 

Walk a Mile in my Shoes is a song that came out in 1968. It teaches us both compassion and not to criticize before we judge what that other person is doing or saying. We could rephrase it to Roll a Mile in my Chair,   Breathe Awhile with my Lungs, or Spend an Hour Inside my Brain. 

Of COURSE this would open up people's eyes! The real challenge is to persuade them to do such a thing.  The situation reminds me so much of my conversations with those whose diet is radically different than mine. When I speak of being a vegan, they tend to nervously giggle or sometimes become outright angry. I describe (not in detail, as I would collapse in tears) the horrors of what animals go through before they land on our dinner tables. Very few people grow their own food and thus do not have a clue as to what goes on in the process. If good, caring people, imagined what the animals felt and feared, I think the consumption of meat and dairy would plummet. But it is just as much of a challenge to find those willing to think about this. 

How DO we reach out and ask others to imagine what a life with disabilities is like? Ted Talks  is a wonderful source and can be found on the internet. YouTube also has opportunities. Many people find it 'safer' to go this route before having such a conversation with a real person, a neighbor, a classmate, even family who lives with disabilities. Other reputable sites exist if we look.

We can learn all about what it is like, factually, but the imagination is the key tool, I believe, in a true understanding and compassion that will lead to change for the better in our society.

-GG

 

Addressing nightmares

 

So many medications have nasty side effects. Two that I am on deliver some powerful nightmares into my brain a couple of nights each week.

Every time I experience another of these upsetting episodes, I once again weigh the benefits and side effects of these meds. So far, I remain on them but have recently attempted to address the nightmares in a healthy and proactive way.

An old friend used to advise me to just 'be grateful that the dream is not real' and to let it go the moment I realize that. He'd be telling me this as if it were a crumb in the bed that could simply be swept out so I could get back to sleep. It simply does not work that way for everyone. Many of us with mental illnesses tend to hold on to those feelings that feel like threats. As if by holding on, we could continue to prepare ourselves for the next threat.  I certainly was frustrated by my friends' seemingly flippant advice.

I tried his method, as I will indeed try anything to help my mind and body recover. I took it one step further, with not only gratitude for the fact that I was safe in bed at the moment of waking, but also listing every other blessing I have. My shelter, plentiful water, heat, food, companion pets, supportive friends, the experiences I have with Inclusion Center.  It helped. But was not quite enough.

Then I rewrote the dream, coming up with the way I wanted it to flow. After the frightening event happened, I imagined how I wanted to conquer it. I let the dream play out in my head again, but with MY direction. This took some effort. My brain kept telling me, "this is not possible. You do not have the power to alter the 'reality' of the story." I kept on, no matter what logic tried to dictate.

Then, I became nervous that this was a form of denial, and that I will continue to have nightmares if I don't directly address the issue. So I went deeper. I looked only at how I felt during the nightmare.  Helpless? Afraid for my life? Shamed? Rejected? Despairing? Then I examined how those feelings were in my life at the present, and addressed THOSE true waking situations. This gave me a marvelous feeling of power. As if I were brave enough to look something right in the face and say, "my examination of you proves my courage... I am looking, instead of running away or hiding, terrified, in the corner."  This method proved to be the best one. It did not dispel the nasty images that tend to remain after a nightmare, but it DID change my inner feelings. I felt powerful, as if the energy of the dream was reined in. 

I no longer fear going to sleep, knowing I may have a nightmare. I now look upon the dreams as a way to grow, to strengthen myself. And this is always a good thing, as we, as disabled people, need all the strength we can acquire.

-GG