Feel ALL The Feels!

I'm back! I'm going back to school next week after a two year get-your-shit-together hiatus! I'm painting and drawing again! I sometimes even eat things that aren't cereal for supper! I'm winning!

And yet, I'm not. Not fully, anyway.

I feel like my brain is haunted. That's what PTSD feels like. I am so thankful for all of the progress I've made and for the people who supported me -

And yet:
I still feel frozen anytime I am looked at or spoken to by a stranger; I find it paralyzing to leave my house to walk my dog or buy groceries or do anything, really; I avoid people like the plague and hate crowds because my ideal personal space bubble is the size of a football field; the sound of people partying will guarantee the fetal position because my tentative hold on a sense of safety has been obliterated; if I could be completely invisible that would be ok with me; when told I could be escorted to my car on campus if I was nervous walking alone, it only made me panic more - because nothing puts me at ease more than a big dude walking beside me...; I've actually injured myself fighting off nightmares (and the people in those nightmares); talking about any of this makes my intestines shrivel up.
This list is incomplete but the emotions they evoke are not. They are whole. They are ever-present. And they demand a voice.

Things currently rolling around in my haunted brain at nearly 3 a.m.: yay school! Oh my god I have to be around people when I'm at school! I can't believe I didn't call the cops during the home invasion. Why was I so dumb?! I should paint. Why didn't anyone else call the cops once they found out? Maybe I should eat something. How come the guy gets to go home and forget and be consequence-free and I get to be traumatized by it with no end in sight? I need to clean something. What should I wear tomorrow? Oh my god the injustice! I need to lose weight. I'm probably totally overreacting and I need to just calm down. Or maybe I have every right to be angry? I don't know. Why can't I talk about this? I should sweep. Yeah, the floor definitely looks iffy to me. I don't feel whole. I'm afraid of what my brain is blocking out. I think I need to throw up. I hope it's not too hot tomorrow. Under-boob sweat is the worst. Also I hope I don't run into anyone tomorrow. I CAN'T BELIEVE I DIDN'T CALL THE COPS!

Apparently I Did a Lot of Work Last Year. Who Knew?

Holy crap. I wish I had filled in more of 2012. It's been a momentous year...and yet it seems like I've actually done very little. I haven't worked since last January, nor have I been taking classes - a sentence I never thought would leave my lips. I may not have done a whole lot, but I feel a lot different than I did this time last year.

I've slowly started picking up those blasted breadcrumbs and have been trying to piece things together to form some semblance of understanding about my life. This has been both successful and unsuccessful. I've learned that family will not disown me if I come to them with information that could hurt. They may not understand but they won't hate me for trying to figure things out. I can (sometimes) be okay with taking up space and I won't actually die from doing so. I am in fact the biggest hindrance to progress - I would have figured this out years ago but I was unable to get the hell out of my own way. I still tend to block the road often, but at least now I'm aware of it. Also: awareness sucks. I have a Mary Poppins bag full of wisdom - but it sucks when turned on the self. Regardless, it needs to be done, and in the end I am better for it. Indeed, it makes sense that I'd want to have the answers.

For my own personal reference, this is kind of where I'm at:
I'm still uncertain as to what to make of things as far as my history goes. There are a million signs pointing in one direction - and while I do indeed want to follow the trail/pick up the breadcrumbs/find out whether what I think is a duck is actually a duck - I still don't know. I think it's worse not knowing. I have tons of snippets, but nothing that I can point to and say, "Aha! Something sketchy DID happen and this is who did it!" I hate having incomplete data. I would love to tie it all up in a pretty little bow and present it to myself so I could find some peace, but I don't think it's ever that clear for anyone.
At this point, here's what I know for sure (I think): I have tons of nightmares about...uh...men...doing stuff. And Manitoba. And being panicked in Manitoba. And being hunted down. Among other things. I never have a sense of being safe (which is definitely due in part to the home invasion and things that happened at other points in my life). I have strong body reactions to stuff that most people don't blink an eye at, including but by no means limited to: physical contact of any kind, being looked at by anyone male, being spoken to by anyone male, having to be in public spaces and in close proximity to others. I have major issues around feeling contaminated which lead to destructive behaviors in a frantic effort to feel clean. I want to avoid or rid myself of things that feel disgusting, not because I think I'm going to die from exposure to some toxic bacteria. I don't think that makes sense to anyone but me, but that's alright. I often have to clean after nightmares or some other triggering event simply so that I can feel clean. I don't think that's normal. As depressing as this all sounds, this is substantially improved from last year; I constantly fought everything so that I could continue to ignore...myself? I know that my decade-long tango with food and sharp objects, my ever-present OCD, and anxiety, are just symptoms of a bigger problem. I'm workin' on it. I feel like I'm leaving out a lot of stuff, but writing this was, honestly, just an attempt to write my way out of a panic attack. Result: mixed.  

I feel like this whole post is incredibly self-indulgent and I should just get my shit together. That being said, maybe writing this incredible pitiful post is part of that. I would not have been able to write any of this down a year ago, so I'm going to shut up and try to focus on the improvements.

Sorry, Mom!

I'm such an asshole. Making your mom cry over the phone the day before your birthday really makes you feel good about life. I'm really really sorry I'm such a fuck up. Seriously. I'm really sorry I don't make sense right now, and that I will probably continue not to make sense for quite some time. I'm sorry I can't eat without spending time with the porcelain god. I'm sorry I couldn't tell you about it until now. I'm so sorry that you're sad/angry/scared. You should know that telling you was not easy, and in effect a form of sabotage against my coping strategy, so at least you can be proud of that...?

Everything is too big, too wide, too expansive, and so is my mind. I can't concentrate or hear anything over the cacophony in my head or the incredibly loud kind of quiet that floods my ears lately. There are too many contradictions right now. I need/I do not need; I'm ready to do the work/I'm scared shitless at what could come of that; I need to be around someone when I eat so I refrain from being a dumb-ass/I don't want to eat around someone so that I CAN be a dumb-ass. I can't believe I'm back here again - it is utterly unoriginal...but I don't know how else to cope.

Shit. Shit. Shit.

I'm stuck. I don't really want to connect the dots, follow the (gluten-free) bread crumbs, or put together the proverbial puzzle pieces. There are a lot of fucking puzzle pieces. They tell me things will get worse if I don't deal with whatever is rolling around in my head. I don't know what I'm dealing with, but perhaps it's more accurate to say I don't want to know what I'm dealing with. Realistically I don't have a choice to stay in the dark, seeing as every time I go to sleep some new and unpleasant tidbit pops up and refuses to let me be. I am tired and would just like to sleep. I would like my body to stop reacting. I would like my body to stop remembering things I don't.

I'm supposed to be rabidly consuming alternative therapies at this point, in an effort to figure things out. However, I'm slowly circling with indecision, unable to make a move because I have a feeling things will just get messier.

I don't like messes.

Thanks!

Sigh. It would be really great if people could maybe possibly sort of do their job. Especially when all that's required of them is making a single phone call. While other things in life are looking up - school's almost done for the semester, I'm moving in a month - my body's still in the dumps. Seriously, it's not working; it's making it hard to get anything done. It's fucking with my head, which must be fun for it, but not fun for me. I feel like I'm watching it from far away but still having to feel everything. It's shitty. I'd like it fixed. Thanks to a deficit in giving a shit, I'll have to wait even longer before I can see anyone who can help. It's only been 6 months of hell. No biggie, what's 4 more?

Also, it's getting expensive, all this upkeep for the worst tenant in the world. Therapy, acupuncture, constantly buying new pants because I'm dropping a pants size every month - all of this adds up rather quickly. If I weren't broke and sick, I'd take pleasure in this shrinking, but as it stands I've had no hand in this, I have no money, and I'm tired of toast. Also, because my head's fucked, I don't actually see any difference in my body - just the increasing gaps in waist bands. Sigh.

Lesson Learned

Wanting to move out of Dalmeny: good idea
Moving into a house you didn't realize was a hovel because you were desperate to move out of Dalmeny: bad idea
What I should have done: when going to check out the house and meet the people, I should have brought flashcards with cleaning products on them. If they didn't know what each one was used for, how to use it, or answered too slowly, I should have walked away. Lesson learned.

For the first time in a long time, I feel like I'll be able to breathe. I just have to get through the next month and then I'll have a new place and a new roommate (note: singular roommate, not 4) who likes things to be as clean as I do. We also have "other" similarities, so this will be the first time ever where I cannot bullshit my way out of the kitchen, and neither can she. This scares the shit out of me, but I think that's a good thing. Forced honesty is still honesty, and it's kind of comforting to know you CAN be honest without being judged. On one hand, you feel exposed and vulnerable, on the other, it's liberating to run around naked (figuratively, of course).

While things are up in the air on the somatic front and I'm still sorting out things in my head,
other aspects are looking up :) Is it strange I suddenly have the urge to use an excessive amount of exclamation marks?! I'm just so relieved to be moving! Moving to a clean place! To a clean place with a reeeeeally nice, considerate, caring roommate!

Sigh of relief and impatience...

Soon my year-long experiment in immersion therapy will be done, and I will have survived!

Try This at Home, Kids!

Try this at home, kids:
Take a deep breath.
Hold it for a week.
Record observations if still alive.

What happens when you try stopping an unconscious habit for a week? One tends to lose their shit, that's what.

They say that stopping will let you in on why you do it in the first place; you can't know why you need it unless you stop. What they don't say is that the noise in your head will get a lot louder, that you won't be able to hear anything else, and that other habits will play understudy, contaminating your supposedly purely scientific experiment in abstinence.

The other kicker is that while you're conducting said experiment and losing your shit, you can't actually tell anyone you're climbing the walls because you're supposed to be done with this crap. You feel like screaming when your family says "you're doing so well!" because what they really mean is "we haven't had to commit you in years!" So you see, you can't tell them diddly squat. So you don't.