Scattered pieces

Note:  I have removed commenting from this post, as it was written from one perspective only.  While I need to honour that perspective by leaving it up here; it doesn’t fully indicate where I am, or how the year has gone.  I’ll have another go at writing something after the medication has kicked in :)

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A few of my fellow bloggers are doing reflections on the past year. I initially balked at doing something similar; because, well, I didn’t think that I had all that much to reflect on, or to be positive about. But then I got to thinking, and actually came up with a few… here they are, my random reflections, in all their crazy gloriousness…

I ended some extremely negative relationships:

• Kriss – who was psychologically abusive through his manipulation and inconsistency.
• Matthew – who the day before I attempted suicide, told me that we were all worthless in the big scheme of things, and that I would not be missed.  This was not the reason for the suicide, but I think it acted as a final straw.
• My divorce became final.  I am no longer tied in any way to that man.
• The last relationship was possibly the most important, as it was with someone who knew how to use my dissociation for his own gain.  He shall remain nameless and faceless, but I’m glad I stood up to him and took steps to ensure my safety.

I meet some incredible people through the blogosphere, and even made some friends – despite reverting to “pompous mode” (otherwise known as insecure mode), on occasion.  I’ve learned, laughed, got angry on your behalf and even occasionally shed a tear because of you all – thank you!

I attempted suicide, and survived.  I meant to die.  I wanted to die.  But I didn’t.  Some wizardry of the medical kind, protected my liver; while in the aftermath, the nurses treated me with professionalism.  The suicidal ideation and intent hasn’t vanished, but it’s back to a level that is manageable in my daily life.

I said No to physical touch for the first time in my life EVER.  Allison was saying that when she feels upset for her clients, she often wants to put her arm around them and give comfort through physical touch.  As soon as she said this, I stamped both feet on the ground, like I was getting ready to sprint out the door, and firmly said No.  Ok, so I said the word in a therapists office, where I have established that she will never touch me without consent, but still… I said the word.  Loudly.

I started working with Allison.  It’s been rough, and I still don’t understand her.  But there’s a consistency in staring at her coffee table, feet, bookshelves or her rather sad pot plant.  We talk.  She forces me to slow down, to notice when I have reactions, to accept that I do react, and that it’s ok to do so.

I had brief contact with some of the ones within my system that I didn’t previously know about, but feared.  All I knew was that there was something “bad” in The Basement of my internal house; but that “bad” turned out to be ones which are very hurt.  I know my work with what they hold is by no means complete, but it was started.

I was reminded that I can’t work on one part of the system, to the exclusion of other parts; instead, I must think of my being in it’s totality.  I still struggle with this, but if I wandered too far into a particular coping mechanism, or way of being; there would be a reaction or incident that would remind me that I’m not dealing with one aspect of my life at a time anymore.

At work, I received mixed messages about my performance.  I was given an excellent performance review, asked to act as team leader and manager during absences; but was not given a pay rise.  The high performer within me wants to know how to be perfect, and therefore be worthy of a pay rise; while the realist in me knows that the pay issue is tied to the economic and political times, more than my performance.  It’s a good reminder, that I still need to work on gaining satisfaction from my job that is independent of others.  I still rely on others to prove my worth and validate my existence.  I need to shift that, so that I can gain job satisfaction without needing others approval.

I did my little bit to fight the changes brought about by the new ACC clinical pathway.  I wrote a couple of posts, got into some verbal exchanges on some forums, and even ventured into other peoples blogs to discuss the issues.  Sometimes, I didn’t cope well… but sometimes, I was proud of what I was doing.  I may not have made any impact on the policies, but there were big changes in my healing as a result.  I stood up for myself, and that caused a positive flow-on effect.  On a personal level, my struggles with obtaining ongoing ACC coverage aren’t over, but that’s another story.

I worked on creative expression.  I found that although I can rarely “look inside” and get a direct answer, I can do a Polyvore set or write a poem, and find an answer.  I often get scared of what is communicated, or don’t understand it.  But, I’m a work in progress, and I can learn.  There is more trust from the system because of my willingness to work in this way.

I’ve learned an awful lot this past year.  I think that’s possibly why I fear 2011 so much… the stakes are so much higher.

I wish you all the best for the coming year.  Take care out there…

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Now playing: Pink – Trouble
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Two weeks ago, I was convinced that I had this Christmas thing sorted. I was feeling excited.  I was thinking of putting up a Christmas tree and decorations, there was even talk of presents!  When I consider the place I was in, at this time last year, that felt like a huge improvement.  But then, the stirrings of Christmas past started to come back to haunt me.  I have few memories of Christmas as I was growing up; but what I do remember, is full of pain, contradictions, unmet expectations and false hope.

What do you see when you look at the typical Christmas imagery?  Happy families, snow, Christmas trees, presents, togetherness, joy, peace, and so on.  These all help to build up expectations of what Christmas should be.  There is a huge pressure from society to meet these expectations; and it’s almost impossible for a regular family to meet them, let alone a dysfunctional family like the one I grew up a part of.

I remember Christmas as being a burden for the family… there was so much money needed for presents, food and alcohol.  The mother would save throughout the year in order to be able to fulfil the work and family commitments that were expected of us… we must keep up the illusion of the perfect family after all, mustn’t we!  Those commitments involved hosting parties where the Summer heat, alcohol and music lead to a lowering of inhibitions and an increasing level of raucousness.  I still have nightmares about the laughter from the parties.

Thinking about the presents we received, it was odd.  As there were two boys and two girls in the family, we often got the same presents, but different colours – my brothers would both get the same plane, but from different countries; the sister and I would get the same doll, but hers would be brunette and mine would be blonde.  I find that a little odd, especially as the sister is five years older than me.  Did she get inappropriately younger gifts, or did I get inappropriately older gifts?  I’m not sure why, but I get a sense that the gifts were another way different ones in the system felt that they “owed” the parents, and that we were disposable, or easily exchanged with the sister.  It seems like we weren’t encouraged to feel a sense of individuality or separateness from each other.

Don’t get me wrong, I am grateful to have received gifts, especially when I know that so many go without. I’m only trying to show how easily children can pick-up on undercurrents and implied messages.  I doubt that the mother was purposefully trying to invalidate any of us with the gifts, but that is what happened.  I have a feeling she did it in the interests of treating us equally, and it’s only with my now distorted hindsight, that I see it in this way.

Presents have always been a triggering and negative thing for me.  The act of someone giving me a gift immediately raises questions about the persons motivations… What do they expect in return?  What have I done that is worthy of receiving a gift?  What do I get the person in return?  What is appropriate to give?  What do I have to do to keep their respect, or is it all a game and they’re teasing me?

I’m getting better at accepting gifts as they were intended, but it’s still a struggle.  Part of me continues to go back to the old days where getting a present was a reward for being a “good girl”.  This is possibly why Christmas was always so difficult… different people would give me presents, and I couldn’t figure out what was needed to pay them back.  It’s for this reason that I like the change in focus away from gifts… which reminds me of an argument that I continually had with Matthew.  He was always worried about not being able to compete with his now ex-wife because she could afford to give the boys gifts.  I would always argue that his place within his boys life was secure as long as he provided them with love and safety.  But I don’t know if that’s true, I’d like to think it is, but peer pressure and societal expectations can be a great influence.

Sometimes I hate society.  Then, I’m reminded of the good it can do as well – Geek girls ACTIVATE! I know the first action was one of bullying, but the response was what mattered.  It reminds me that there is good out there too.

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Now playing: Falling Slowly – Glen Hansard and Markéta Irglová
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This is my spoiled rotten, gorgeous cat…

This photo was taken on Wednesday night, after I’d taken her to the vet.  She doesn’t like the vet, let alone a vet with broken air conditioning on a hot Summer’s night.  So, on top of the usual indignities that accompany visiting a vet, she was heat stressed as well.  This wouldn’t have bothered many cats, but my gorgeous cat is now 16 years old.  She’s also starting to experience kidney failure.

The one constant in my life for the last 16 years, is dying.

To put her into my life context, I got Winnie one cold Winter’s night when I was living in Wellington.  She had been caught in a humane cat-trap, in an effort to ease the number of stray cats in the area.  She was worm ridden and tiny.  She purred as soon as I picked her up and cuddled her on my lap.  She was so tiny, but determined.  She had a stubborn streak in her a mile wide.  She had decided that I would make an acceptable feeder, but she wasn’t so sure about my partner.  Winnie never did like any of the people that I was involved with… considering who they were, she has proven to be a better judge of character than I.

Winnie accompanied me when I went to university.  She sat with me through late night studying.  Threw up in the car during my travels between my home town and where I went to university.  She traveled in my car through rough ferry crossings, and my loud off-key singing.  Sometimes she’d come and curl up on my lap, sleeping the whole trip; sometimes she’d stand on my lap and peer over the steering wheel, almost like she was trying to drive us home quicker.

She proved time and time again, that cats were smarter than dogs.  Well, at least smarter than a previous flatmates Great Dane.  Winnie would sit on the couch with quiet dignity, watching the Great Dane run in faster and faster circles around the house – until a human happened to get in her way.  You could almost hear Winnie tsking at the stupid antics of a dog with more energy than brains.  I do like dogs too, but this Great Dane happened to be the dumbest dog I’ve ever met.

When I moved back to my home town, Winnie was a cat in heaven… a fire which produced good heat. But, it was soon after moving back, that I moved in with my now ex-husband.  Winnie never liked him, but tolerated him with a disdain which fluctuated depending on whether he was offering her chicken or not – her weakness is cooked chicken.  I was with him for approximately nine years, and she was my constant companion.  She would come into the study with me when I was woken with the nightmares, or recovering from the abuse he inflicted.  She would follow a young part who was scared and wandering the house.  She would tolerate me picking her up and cuddling her – for a short time anyway.  She seemed to know when I needed her companionship.

More recently, she comes with me whenever I venture outside into the garden.  It makes both of us feel safer to know the other is nearby.  When I go out driving at night, she is always waiting in the doorway to the lounge when I get home – almost like she’s checking that I’ve found my way back.

She’s often used as an excuse by parts of the system why we can’t complete suicide.  In a world that had seemed out of control and full of pain, she’s been the one consistent positive factor.  Now she’s dying.  I know that she could have been taken at any point through accident or illness, but kidney failure can be awful.  In the factsheet the vet gave me, I read the list of symptoms and freaked.  I can’t let Winnie go through that.  No way.

I’m not sure what I’m going to do.  But there’s been chaos in the system ever since we knew we had to take her to the vets.  We were half expecting not to bring her home on Wednesday.  But, the vet said that we were to come back in three months for more blood tests, so they’re expecting her to still be alive then.

I’ve always valued her more than myself.  When I was too poor to buy food, her food was always purchased first.  But I can’t fix this.  I can’t fix her and it’s causing chaos.  I don’t know how I’m going to get through this.

One moment at a time…

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Now playing: Sarah McLachlan – Angel
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Recently Paul from Mind Parts, posted about an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation called The Inner Light.  When I tracked down the episode, I was stunned.  This episode of a science fiction television series resonated with me; more so, than any of the shows about DID.

Shows depicting DID generally include varying degrees of sensationalism about how a dissociative lives and the etiology.  They often concentrate on a slice of the dissociatives life, rather than the totality.  One of the key things that I’ve found to be missing in many of these media portrayals, is hope.  Hope that dissociatives can heal and navigate this world successfully.  Even if there is a hopeful message, it is often a brief note at the end, rather than an overall theme.

When I’m curled up in a ball, hurting from self-injury or memories, I need hope.

So, how does this episode offer hope?  First, there’s the basis of the storyline… Morgan Gendel (writer), named the episode after a song written by George Harrison, which was in turn, based on the 47th chapter of Tao Te Ching:

Without going outside his door, one understands (all that takes place) under the sky; without looking out from his window, one sees the Tao of Heaven. The farther that one goes out (from himself), the less he knows. Therefore the sages got their knowledge without traveling; gave their (right) names to things without seeing them; and accomplished their ends without any purpose of doing so.

I understand this as meaning that we have the resources within ourselves to heal.  Yes, we may need outside assistance along the way, but this is as a guide and anchor, rather than them doing the difficult work for us.

I admit to struggling with this concept greatly.  At times, it encourages despondency… if I have all of the resources, why haven’t I “healed” already?  I’m motivated to change, and have been told that I’m doing the work from people I trust, so why am I still struggling?  Then, I remember that having the resources, doesn’t necessarily mean that I know how to utilise them.  This is where guidance from people such as therapists come in, they help us find ways to access and use our internal resources in positive ways.

Within Inner Light, hope is represented through a tree planted within the community courtyard during Picard’s time on Kataan.  Despite the water shortage, each community member voluntarily gives up some of their water to ensure that the tree survives.  The tree is described as a symbol of survival and an affirmation of life, because “hope is a powerful weapon against anything” (Batai).  As time goes by on Kataan, the tree flourishes, despite the drought around them.  To some within the system, this was a powerful message… for others, it’s an affirmation of their work.

The idea behind the community tree, taps into the idea of working together for a common goal.  I’m going through some difficult memories at the moment, which is causing a great deal of confusion and divisiveness amongst the system.  Pulling together and working towards a common goal is what I’m aiming for, no matter how out of reach it feels at the moment.

One scene in particular was quite emotional for me… near the end of Picard’s time on Kataan, a time capsule is launched by the people on Kataan.  At the launching, there is a gathering of the different people who have interacted with Picard during his time as Kamin… people who have supposedly long since passed on.  It is then revealed that the time capsule being launched is carrying the hopes, dreams and memories of this long lost civilisation.

Batai – “We hoped our … [time capsule] … would encounter someone in the future – someone who could be a teacher, someone who could tell the others about us.”
Eline – “Now we live in you. Tell them of us…”

I’m not quite sure how to describe it, but this is how they see my role as host of the system.  To tell others of what happened, not to recount their experiences as such, but to validate their existence and feelings.  This isn’t easy, as we navigate through layers of denial, flashbacks and old coping mechanisms.  But then, I have the knowledge that I survived those experiences, and I had the resources to cope in a creative way… that means I have the strength and ability to heal as well.

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As a note: I’ve looked at a few things within the episode that resonated strongly for me; but there are others that are relevant for my experiences with DID and trauma… issues around memories, several realities co-existing and an empathy for children who won’t get to experience a rich, full life.  As with anything, this episode may resonate with you, or it may not.  The main thing it offered me, was hope.  I need some of that right now.

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Now playing: R.E.M. – Stand
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Last night, through wizardry of the programming kind, this blog was moved to a new domain – scatteredpieces.org I am assured by said wielder of wizardry, that you will still get this update through your RSS feeds.  But it will mean that those of you still interested in reading my ramblings, may have to update your RSS feeds, and your email address book to castorgirl@scatteredpieces.org

I am still in the process of testing all the links etc to see if any are broken, so please be patient, and feel free to report any issue you find to the email address above.

There  has been a great deal happening over the last two weeks, much of it lost in a haze of too much work and not enough sleep.  In addition, last week Cloudie passed away.  Cloudie was my neighbour during my childhood, she would work in her garden and not reject my attempts to join her.  Her funeral is tomorrow in my home town, I won’t be going down for it, as it will be too triggering and is a private funeral.  Instead, I’m hoping to take the afternoon off work and go take photos in the local gardens.

On the good news front, I have confirmation from ACC that are going to continue to support my therapy.  When I see the people around New Zealand that have struggled, and failed to get continued assistance, this places me in a position of gratitude and guilt.

At the end of the week, my team leader arrives back from her holiday.  Hopefully then, I can breathe and catch-up on life.

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Now playing: Osmo Vänskä & Minnesota Orchestra – Symphony No. 3 in E Flat Major, Op. 55, “Eroica”: I. Allegro con Brio
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Last week I posted about Felicity Goodyear-Smith’s involvement in ACC Sensitive Claims research.  The articles which prompted that post (ACC advisor silent on links to sex abusers (Sunday Star Times, 29 August, 2010), and here), have created debate amongst interested parties about whether Goodyear-Smith should have been involved in the research. There are two clear camps – those who believe she is the best person to carry out the research, and those who think she has potential conflicts of interest which should have excluded her from any involvement in ACC SCU.  There have been numerous blogs and websites advocating both sides of the issue, but rarely have the two camps directly conversed – mainly because it is obvious that two such opposing viewpoints will never come to any sort of agreement.

I got a hint of the emotions the topic stirred when I entered a Google Groups thread over the weekend.  I thought that as all participants were adults, it would be a reasoned debate.  Unfortunately, that proved not to be the case.  Insults were thrown and behaviour which could, at best, be described as creepy, at worst threatening, ensued.

As I had joined the discussion under my usual Google username, the people involved had the name “castorgirl”; and they used it.  They found this blog and used information about my suicide attempts to question my character and credibility.  I understand that all information on the Internet is fair game, but the use of this information scared the younger ones in the system.  All they saw, were aggressive men finding, and potentially hurting them.

This may seem like it caused havoc, and it did for awhile.  But from this event, some major shifts have occurred.

Firstly, I was able to maintain a sense of adult self, and was rarely reactionary on the forum.  I could see the behaviour of the people involved for what it was – diversionary and bullying.

Despite getting scared about the blog being found, I realised that by hiding the blog (I re-directed traffic to Google for a day), I was acting as if I was ashamed of what is contained here.  If I was ashamed of what is contained here, then I was ashamed of me.  This proved to be a tipping point in my thinking.  I began to question whether the shame belonged to me, or those who hurt me.  While I sometimes cringe at what is written here, it’s my place of safety.  By hiding it, I was questioning my healing and learning… not a good message to send to the rest of the system.  So, I removed the re-direct.

In addition to the drama on the forum, yesterday was both Father’s Day and the mothers birthday.  I managed to make it through the day by distracting.  But, as midnight rolled around, I became more fragmented and derealised.  By 1am a young one was actively keeping us awake through their hypervigilence.  There was enough awareness, that I was able to soothe this young one - repeating over and over that we’d stayed safe during the day and that the father was no longer going to hurt us.  That he lived far away and it was a different time and place to the one they remembered.

We eventually calmed, but this internal communication continued.  An unknown young one came forward and shared some of her experiences.  At first she gave distractions, but then revealed part of what had happened to her.  In what is a first for me, I identified this young one as part of me, and as needing empathy, love and caring.  I again realised that the shame was not hers/mine, but that of the father who hurt her/us/me.  We tried to see if she would go with Sophie to be cared for, but instead, she melted back into the shadows to be taken care of by One.

The pain of this young one, was what we took into therapy today.

Allison, to put it bluntly, was brilliant.  She encouraged us to pause in our telling of what happened, and to check the emotional response.  This allowing and acceptance, meant that another young one came forward to tell of her experiences with the father.

I was left shaking, yet in a place of acceptance.  There was still denial to try and counter what had been said, but it was not the overwhelming denial that there has been in the past.  It felt as if the denial belonged to the different parts of the system, rather than to me as a whole.

Oddly as it seems, I have the bullying behaviour of a group of men to thank for this shift.  Young ones realised that I was willing and able to protect them.  They didn’t see me as weak and unable to handle what they held.  They equated these men with the image of the father, and they saw the adult me standing up to them.  This is what many of them had been waiting for, some sign that I was strong and capable of protecting them.

So, I have Goodyear-Smith supporters to thank for helping me gain huge ground in my healing.  There’s an irony in that, which I find amusing.

The forum discussion reached an uneasy conclusion yesterday, with the publication of the latest article by Tim Hume (Sex abuse cuts ‘all about cost-cutting’) which indicates that ACC did know of the potential conflicts of interest regarding Goodyear-Smith, but commissioned her for the research anyway.

All in all, a very odd weekend.

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Now playing: Louis Lortie – Piano Sonata No. 14 in C-Sharp Minor, Op. 27, No. 2, “Moonlight”: I. Adagio Sostenuto
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Note: This entry may trigger due to issues around suicide being discussed.

I’ve been fairly open about my levels of suicidal ideation on this blog over time. But the last week or so, I’ve been dancing around the subject. The reason why… on the 2nd and 3rd of August I tried to commit suicide.

I’m still trying to make sense of the attempts, and the triggers which precipitated them.

The main things I remember about Monday, are that I didn’t work my usual late shift, and that I was very tired… very, very tired. So tired, that it made perfect sense to come home, empty a pill bottle into my hand and swallow them down with a caffeine drink.

I vividly remember looking at the pile of pills in my hand, and thinking… “This will help me sleep”.

This terminology is significant… “This will help me sleep”. Usually, my suicidal ideation and intent is termed “running away”, so I wonder if the change in phrasing was an indication that different ones were driving the attempt, or whether I was just really tired?

In the past, whenever there has been even a suicidal gesture, a protector has come forward and immediately called for help. But not this time. This time, I climbed into bed and waited for sleep. That was at about 6pm. The next thing I remember, is waking in a panic at 2.45. I wasn’t panicking about the pills that were now well absorbed into my system…  Oh no, I was panicking because I wasn’t sure if it was morning or night, and I was worried about missing work!

The details are fuzzy, but somehow we ended up in ER. ER’s always seem so bright… so well lit… super bright… I know this is a medical necessity, but it’s also about our fears. We hate hospitals. We feel ourselves get smaller, younger and more tongue-tied in hospitals… It’s hard to hear what people are asking of us, and we become more robotic.

As an indication that there was still come cognitive thinking happening, we’d remembered to bring our iPhone with us. Hours of playing Boost 3D, Euchre, Hell’s Kitchen… Anything to try to keep calm! Then the unspeakable happened, the iPhone battery ran out… This tipped the scales back to crazy.

• We removed the lure ourselves and went to the nurses station, asking to leave. They took us through to the observation lounge instead. Yay… power points for recharging the iPhone :)
• WPT came and visited us in the ER, and we brushed him off… told him we were fine and not to worry about us…
• When we were assessed by the psychiatric team… I say “assessed”, but to the system, it felt like a grilling.  They asked about family relationships, abuse history etc.
• By the end of the assessment, angry protectors were up front and they ripped up the discharge papers as we walked away from the nurses station.

Yes, we were released with no follow-up or safety options mentioned.

When we got home, there was still the need to sleep. I think one of us called the crisis team, but gave a fake name… I remember the crisis person yelling at us that they were sending the Police around. This was the wrong threat to make, as it gave the protectors hope that help was on the way. They became less vigilant…

We sat down at the table with enough pills for a fatal overdose. It was very mechanical and quick. Again, there was a need to have enough pills to “get some sleep”. Once these were consumed, we went to bed. Again, a panicked waking a few hours later and a ride in an ambulance.

This time it was serious… I knew that because of the number of nurses around. I remember looking over when they took my blood pressure, and saying how good it was (53/45). Usually my blood pressure goes through the roof in hospitals due to anxiety (the next day it was 195/146). I asked if I could go home, because my blood pressure was so good, and it was all just a silly mistake…

I remember the nurses being nice.
I remember them wheeling me down corridors to a ward.
I remember a nurse sitting in a chair at the end of my bed all night.

We called the mother, asking her to come up because we needed help. Our cat needed food…

We were kept in for a couple of days, and again had a psychiatric assessment, this one was much more gentle. They asked about safety and stressors. They gave us options – they suggested hospitalisation, or respite. But the psychiatric ward was fairly full, and the respite place would be different to the one I’ve been to previously. Instead, we were released to the mother (a former nurse) at home.

The thing that blew me away about the medical ward, was their compassion and understanding. I was there for an overdose, but they didn’t judge. They had almost no knowledge of mental health issues (I had to tell them how to spell “dissociative”), but they were respectful of me as an individual…

It’s now over a week since the attempts, and I’m still on shaky ground. Last night, R was very present. I know it was him, because I could clearly see what he wanted – to be wearing just jeans, standing in the middle of the road, in the pouring rain, arms up, yelling (in pain, release, anger???).

I’m very aware that I’m still walking along the cliff edge. One little push will send me over.

It’s times like this that I realise how amazing the people around me can be… WPT came to see me in hospital (twice); while my blog friends have been a steady, calm voice of reason when I needed it desperately… thank you!

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Now playing: The Freshman – The Verve Pipe
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The activity for this months Expressive Arts Carnival is to:

Use any visual means (e.g., drawing, painting, photography) to represent, in an abstract way, your experience of all or part of your internal world. The key to the activity is to focus on an abstract representation. The reason for this focus is that it helps us to describe our experiences in a way that is not so familiar to us.

First off, I’m not good with abstract thinking or art, let alone putting the two together; so this activity has proven to be a bit of a challenge.

Saying that, here are our  attempts to represent what our internal world looks like…

Internal World: Part I

This one was heavily influenced by M.  It’s a very structured view, and I think comes from her place of being a little apart from the rest of us.  I think it’s possibly more of an abstract system map, rather than a representation of our inner world.

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Internal World: Part II

Well, our internal world according to Aimee and K (with help from Sophie)… They like the baby moose playing, and the mother moose always watching to make sure nothing will hurt them :)

I’m not sure if this is really a representation of our internal world for a majority of us, but I think it’s accurate for these two young ones… or how they’d like it to be???  They also love the clip, so wanted an excuse to put it on the blog…

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Internal World: Part III

In the shadows, waiting.

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Internal World: Part IV

Which leads to the final representation… the one that all of us agree to some extent represents our internal world, or a very important part of it…

Shadows…  The lower left corner represents areas which are in total darkness, while the upper right corner represents areas which are flooded with light. These two extremes are linked by varying degrees of shadow intensity.

This was an interesting exercise to do… Thank you Paul for providing the prompts.

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Now playing: Five For Fighting – 100 Years
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One of the hardest things that I’ve been asked to do in therapy, is imagine what my world would look like in the future when I’m “healed”… that magical point where I feel as if I determine how run my life is run. When you’re a survivor used to living moment to moment; have lived with abuse in one form or another nearly all your life; where chaos is the norm; and you find your mental health issues driving your every action… imagining a life of self-determination is difficult.  I’ve had few positive role models around me, so I have no real terms of reference for what “healthy” looks like.

So, when this months Carnival Against Childhood Abuse came out with the theme of Independence, I thought I’d challenge myself to think about what freedom (or independence) may look like.  As I’m making this challenge up, I’ve decided to go for a list of 5 things I’d like to see in a life of self-determination…

1. Free from abuse
This may sound obvious, but I have a proven history of being attracted to people who are abusive, either as friends or as partners.  So, establishing healthy relationships is a key aspect to my well-being.  This is tied to boundary, attachment and a whole raft of other issues; so I know it will take time and testing.  I’m taking baby steps with this through my online interactions…

Free from abuse, also means being free from self-injury in all of it’s forms…

2. Like who I am
I know that this should say “love” rather than “like”, but one step at a time :)
I’d like to feel comfortable in myself – my skills, abilities and who I am as a person.  To work through the shame, guilt, disgust, etc., to a point where I can look in a mirror or walk down the street with my head held high.  To not make unfair comparisons about myself, but instead, notice differences without judgement.  To value those differences in myself as much as I value them in others.

3. Trust
Trust in myself and those around me.  I realise that trust is heavily linked to points 1 and 2 above, but it’s such a big issue, I think it needs to be separated out.

I currently have little trust in my decision making… I can make decisions, but second guess myself all the time.  I’d like to get to a point where I can listen to the internal messages without fear, and act on those messages appropriately.  Usually my internal compass about people is fairly accurate, but I tend to drown it out with self-doubt.

I know that not everyone in this world can be trusted, but I’d like to be open to the possibility that some of them can be.

4. Enjoy life
I’d like to wake up in the morning, feeling positive about the day.  I realise that life will always have the natural flow of ups and downs; but I want to reach a point where I have the skills to help me ride out the negatives without it causing a downward spiral.

5. Be creative
More importantly, be creative without fear!

I think this is my main goal in life… to work towards a place where I’m not living in fear.

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