Moving & a quick update
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
via FoxyTunes
PDF The “S” word…
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
via FoxyTunes
Whose driving?
The last two days have been kind of rough.
Heading into Thursday, I was feeling good and had managed to pull myself onto some sort of steady ground. That all fell apart late Thursday afternoon, when I got an email from the other team leader, calling into question the quality of my work. That email sent me plunging back into self-doubt, self-hatred and all the other associated negative thinking. My cynical friend told me to forget it; but it was such a back-stabbing insult that I couldn’t brush it off. To make it worse, my own team leader wasn’t around to reality check the content of the email, and I didn’t want to run to the manager about it. This spun me out to the point where I knew I wasn’t safe to drive home. I stayed on at work for a couple of hours, before driving home and losing most of the evening to the dissociation.
Then, on Friday morning during my drive to work, we went past a “hurt” cat in the middle of the road. I always dread this sort of thing; not only does it stir up the system because an innocent animal has been hurt, but it’s a trigger for some of the younger ones. Like a deer caught in headlights, we can never look away… we started reciting “it’s just a jumper that fell out of a car”, hoping that this will change how we see the cat… it doesn’t. This means we now have adult parts smarting from the insult to our work, and young ones upset that an innocent cat has been hurt.
So we’re now driving down the road reciting out loud “it’s just hurt, it’s ok, it’ll get up soon and the people who love it will come get it and take care of it”. There was also a promise that we wouldn’t drive home that way, just in case it hadn’t been moved.
Work on Friday is mostly a blank… I know we had a morning tea for the two new people, and that the manager made a triple layer banana and pineapple cake (which did a rather spectacular topple over during the cutting process). I also know I played around with the iPhone app kooaba, as we’re looking at new ways to try to deliver information through technology such as QR codes and visual recognition apps. This was fun because we were going around the library, taking random photos of books, CDs and DVDs to see what information kooaba would return.
Then it came to the drive home… all the way up the street where we should have turned off to avoid going by the stretch of road where the cat had been hurt, we were consciously thinking of turning. Then there was this little mind fit, and we were suddenly past the turn off. I could hear the panic, but there was also this firm voice telling me to stop being so silly, that there will be nothing there, and it will all be fine.
Thankfully the cat was no longer there, but that didn’t matter, the panic had set in. We were switching all over the place and I could feel our throat closing up. Little Michelle came forward full force, meaning that we couldn’t really drive, talk and only barely functioned enough to get home in one piece. Because we live in a high fenced section, no one saw us getting out of the car shaking like a leaf and stuttering about it hurting.
We got inside, fed Winnie, turned on all the lights, curled up in the corner of the lounge and tried to ease the shaking. I had no real sense of what was happening, but there were obviously body memories. The throat was closed off, and no matter how hard I tried, I could barely stutter. I managed to take some anxiety medication and send the following email to Allison…
turn all the lights on an hide
turn all the lights on an hide
turn all the lights on an hide
turn all the lights on an hide
turn all the lights on an hide
turn all the lights on an hide
turn all the lights on an hidehide got to hide
he’ll find us
I think we finally went to bed at about 8am (it was naturally light by then) and slept for a couple of hours.
Saturday had been good… we’d talked to a friend and took some pictures of the stuffed toy we got for the young ones as their reward for going through the divorce proceedings…
This made me think that tonight was going to be easier… the fear seemed to have eased. But it’s now 1am Sunday and all the lights are on again. Little Michelle is ok as long as all the lights are on. We’re also ok as long as we don’t even think about going to bed.
One of the big problems with this scenario, is that it opens us up to further dissociation and self injury. We’re so switchy and shaky…
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Now playing: Missy Higgins – Where I Stood
via FoxyTunes
Losing control
Yesterday during lunch at work, I had no idea who I was. I had no idea what my name was, how old I was or where in the world I was. There was a sense of detached wonder about being able to use the computer… “wow, I can use this thing”. I had no memory of learning how to type, or even how to use my body to do basic things such as pick up my cup. Everything seemed so big, scary, and yet wondrous at the same time. It also seemed really bright… the artificial light in the office felt like I was looking directly into the Sun.
This is yet another sign that the dissociation is out of control… this was a young one from our internal Basement, in charge of the body, while at work. That can’t happen again. It’s not fair to the young one, or to the ones who usually attend work.
The problem is, what to do in order to get some sense of control back? We’re actively doing all the coping mechanisms we can think of – breathing, taking breaks at work, distracting, grounding etc. But I’m still a mess. I’m constantly getting flashbacks of some sort… I’m seeing things out of the corner of my eye (psychosis or a lack of sleep?)… It feels as if I’m constantly on the edge of switching – that spacey, free-falling feeling…
There’s also dread… I don’t WANT to know why I keep on seeing flashbacks of the changing rooms at the rugby club; I don’t WANT to know why L&P is suddenly a trigger; and I don’t WANT to know why I keep hearing certain phrases over and over in my head… I’ve had enough… Surely there can’t be more.
But, I also know that I need to listen and try to understand what’s happening internally. I know this is the way to healing… listening, understanding and easing the pain. But, I don’t think I have the strength to do this anymore…
Below is a something that was created while at work earlier in the week. I’m not good at art – I got a D for it in school. So I’m unable to translate what is in my head into something that is recognisable in practice. I keep trying to tell myself that art within a healing context is more about the feelings, than the technique… but I still can’t get past how bad it looks in comparison to what was wanted. It’s so frustrating when I can’t find a way to express what is going on in my head…
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Now playing: Cat Stevens – Moonshadow
via FoxyTunes
Perfect daughter – where are you?
While growing up, I tried very hard to be the perfect daughter. I was polite, quiet, obedient, a good student, tidy, shy and seemingly happy. This is the daughter my mother knows and loves. She doesn’t know the daughter she is now faced with. She doesn’t recognise the woman who can’t go outside unless it’s for work; the woman who will stand in the middle of the kitchen and start scratching her hand while staring into space; the woman who says that she can’t serve up dinner because the food has suddenly become dirty and disgusting; the woman who sits on the Internet until 2am because the idea of sleep is too scary for her and she needs the distraction.
This week, the mother has been faced more and more with the daughter she doesn’t know or recognise. The session on Monday with Liz stirred up all sorts of issues internally and I’ve been struggling to cope with the reaction. It got to the point on Tuesday night that there was going to be some fairly serious self-destructive behaviour occur if there wasn’t some intervention. That intervention came in the form of someone coming forward to take photos. They realised we were too unsafe to drive anywhere, so the usual routine of driving somewhere to take photos was out. Instead they decided to use some props from around the house to see what they could do. The mother could tell we weren’t well, so she ended up helping by having a look for different props to photograph and holding the torch we used as a light source. This is one of the results…
Apple
Because the mother helped us with all of this, she could monitor us more closely. She said that it wasn’t until after the photos had all been taken and we were putting them onto the computer for processing that we sort of “came back”.
Awhile ago, Sophie tried to apologise for the not being that perfect daughter the mother remembered. The mother said that we were probably never that perfect daughter, but she didn’t see it. She didn’t see what that perfection was hiding. I think she really does want to help sometimes. But her own dysfunctional thinking and lack of healing, mean that she will never really be able to help us. I don’t resent her inability to help us, but I do wish that she would seriously look at her own need to heal. She went to therapy for a couple of sessions, but then stopped as she thought it wasn’t going anywhere.
I’m aware this makes us sad or uncomfortable or something. I’m not good at naming or understand emotions, but I noticed that the body was feeling very cold and I need to do up the jersey we wore to work.
Time to go back to being the perfect working daughter…
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Now playing: U2 – Running to Stand Still
via FoxyTunes
Time to take a deep breath
The last few weeks have been difficult. The prospect of ACC mediation on Tuesday (21st) had us going off on all sorts of tangents. Then last Thursday (16th), ACC made a decision which meant that the mediation was no longer needed, although they have yet to look at our corrections which will odds are require another round of negotiation. Despite this apparent cancellation of the meeting, the potential sat within the system. Some of us considered it to be like the tricks played on us when younger. At any moment we were going to get a phone call on Tuesday telling us to get to the meeting. Thankfully that phone call never happened, instead we got to spend the two days we had arranged to have off to recover from the meeting as time to breathe.
On Monday night we chatted with a friend who’d been on holiday for what seemed like a very long time. He helped us smile, laugh and shed a tear. Through a photo slide show he took us on a tour of where he lived – it was fascinating. I’m always awed by the historic nature of where most of the people I talk to live. To put this into context, New Zealand has had only been a British colony since 1840. We don’t have the old buildings that are present elsewhere around the world. To show him a little of where we live, we went out taking photos (at midnight)…
This mural is in a car-parking area in the middle of town.
This was the only photo that turned out viewable – we have an essential tremor which doesn’t mix well with night photography and the long exposure times needed. We might have another go at doing a tour of where we live on a fine day.
On Tuesday we needed to get out of the house – possibly the fear that they’d call and we’d have to go to the meeting. So we went around the gardens and took more photos. Photography is fast becoming our main means of distracting, focusing and self-soothing. Part of the soothing, is to take photos of plants. I know that many people consider this type of photography boring, but for us it’s about finding peace for a short time. It’s something that each one of us can enjoy on some level – I’ll get a message to take a photo of the purple flowers…
Lilac viola
Purple viola
Sometimes, the camera feels very cumbersome in my hands and I’ve taken to wrapping the strap around my right hand several times, I’m not sure if this is a switching issue, or me being a klutz. I also know that not all of us are happy with this new interest – I’ve been told that the camera is going to be thrown into the lake or smashed into the pavement. I know that these threats are about us not being entitled to any form of enjoyment. It’s awful to hear, let alone realise that part of this brain is wired to ensuring that we don’t enjoy life.
On Tuesday night we ended up talking to another friend. I mention this because it was the first time in over a week where S didn’t come forward to self-injure, which had become more severe as the week went on. Again, there was laughter and a sharing of knowledge. It always amazes me that those who are going through difficult times can put that aside to help someone else. To those friends, I say thank you. I hope we can reciprocate what you both did for us one day.
This reminds me of Faith Allen’s entry over at Blooming Lotus about how we can Make a difference. You don’t have to be rich, pretty or popular to make a difference, it’s all about being willing to learn and share that knowledge for the social good. I stumble badly with this sometimes, the fear and anxieties put up barriers to my learning. But I can’t use this as an excuse to give up. When teaching information literacy to cynical and usually technophobic students, I tell them it takes practice. Information literacy is all about lifelong learning – being curious about new things. It would be hypocritical of me not to gently work on those barriers in the same way that I get my students to question every scrap of information they find.
Hospitals – the psychiatric type
In the town where we grew up, there was a psychiatric hospital. It was spoken about in hushed whispers as a scary place where crazy people were fenced in and tortured. In reality, the hospital catered predominantly for those who were institutionalised during a time in our history when those with even minor problems were often hidden away. We were told as part of our abuse, that if we told the secrets we would be sent to prison or this hospital forever. So our early contact with psychiatric hospitals was negative.
If you place these experiences within the context of our rather traumatic experiences with the medical profession, you get a picture of someone who has deep seeded issues and fears about all things medical. The young ones especially react with terror even when driving by a hospital. We avoid dentists, doctors and nurses where at all possible. In many ways this fear enabled us to appear high functioning for many years – if there was a threat of having to ask for help through therapy or medication, well that just wasn’t acceptable. Time to stamp it all back down into The Basement and carry on being invisible.
Then arrives the dissociative train wreck we experienced when about 34. Our coping mechanisms fell apart. Then there was the final straw – we were teaching a group of 40 students when something about the interactive whiteboard markers caused Angel to come forward. So there you have a 5 year old drawing pictures of flowers on the whiteboard while a group of adult students look on. M comes back to find half the board covered…
So back to therapy we went. We were in the throes of an abusive marriage and suddenly facing a childhood that wasn’t as perfect as we’d convinced ourselves it was. These factors led to constant suicidal ideation and intent, which in turn resulted in us needing to find some support to keep safe.
In New Zealand there are a few support lines for suicide help – Lifeline, Samaritans, Youthline, the emergency number or the local mental health hotline. Lifeline, Samaritans and Youthline are confidential – unless they feel you are in danger, in which case they will try to get your details and send around the Police. Emergency services transfer you through to the mental health hotline, unless you are already need emergency care. Once you’re in the mental health system, you are told to call the mental health hotline. Usually you wait for 5-10 minutes on hold before the phone is answered – ever been suicidal during the Christmas season and had to listen to Christmas carols for 20 minutes while waiting to see if someone can help you stop killing yourself? You can at least double the waiting time if you call after midnight, as that’s when they go down to one or two operators.
If you do manage to get through to a human, you’re asked for your details – name, phone, address, caseworker and then why you’ve called. If they consider you to be at risk, they will send around the local mental health workers to assess you. If they consider that you aren’t at risk, they will discuss grounding skills you can use before sending you on your way. The problem with this is that at any one time we can have up to 5 suicide plans – apparently that means we don’t really mean to die as we’re not focused on one plan (we consider it covering our bases in case one doesn’t work). We can also begin the phone call with one who wants to reach out for help; but by the time we get to actually talk to someone, we’ve switched to one who either won’t talk or says that everything is fine. So in many ways the service doesn’t suit us (and a majority of the population).
If you are considered at risk, you get the joyful experience of being escorted up to the psychiatric ward of the local hospital. Where you begin the wait for some poor registrar who has been working for at least 10 hours and is surviving on a combination of adrenaline, coffee and sugar. This person then has to assess your level of danger. Most registrars haven’t dealt with anyone with a dissociative disorder, let alone tried to understand if there really is a risk. They have a thankless job of walking a tightrope – is the patient telling the truth? To make this job more complicated, during our experiences with registrars they’ve encountered -
- Aimee (9 yrs old and carefree) who smilingly told the nice young registrar that she was too young to drink. Quite forgetting that the body she shares is in it’s mid 30′s and sitting cross-legged on a hospital bed while drips are hanging from each arm to pump us full of drugs to counter the drugs we’d OD’d on.
- Sophie (16 yrs old) who is our safest bet for these assessments – no one would section Sophie. The main problem is getting close enough to hear her as she talks very quietly when scared or worried.
- M who is the other safe bet. She’s confident and knows how to work the mental health system to ensure that we are released. Release is always her goal as the young ones she protects are violently triggered by hospitals.
- Ellie who won’t be sectioned as long as she can keep her swearing and scorn for the medical profession under control.
- Frank who is the worst one to front for an assessment. He doesn’t get suicidal, but doesn’t understand what constitutes aggressive behaviour as seen in the eyes of a psychiatrist. He doesn’t actually get aggressive, but his anger at being in a hospital is seen as aggression.
It’s at this point where we’ve usually been sent home. But on two occasions we’ve been admitted or sectioned under the Mental Health Act.
Event 1: Sectioning with two nights in hospital.
- Night of admission, put into art therapy room with triggering artwork around the walls.
- Given a single room across from an alcoholic man in his 40′s (the father is an alcoholic).
- As punishment for being admitted W used all of her strength to try and break the arms by bashing them against the storage unit in the room.
- A miracle was there in the form of a part-time night nurse. She realised we wouldn’t sleep so asked if we wanted art supplies and then she sat and talked to us. She didn’t care who she talked to, she just sat on the floor and let us talk and draw. She got us Arnica cream for the bruised, swollen mess that was now our arms without a fuss.
- Then there was the daytime registrar. We had asked to be released as the hospital was too triggering. He went through the whole assessment again. He asked why our symptoms made us special. We tried to explain that we weren’t special, just sometimes experienced dissociation. He dismissed the dissociation saying it wasn’t important. Then when returning after talking to the consultant, said that the dissociation made us too unpredictable to release. Yes, the one symptom that he totally dismissed, became the thing he used to keep us in.
- That night the same part-time nurse told us how to get out – say the words “I have no intent”.
- The following day a different registrar got the consultant to come in and talk to us. He was going to let us out for the day, but M came forward and dazzled him with a veil of sanity. We were outta there.
Event 2: Admitted to the secure unit with one night stay.
- Saturday afternoon attempted suicide through an overdose and was taken to ER by the husband.
- Put on a drip and was overwhelmed by the dissociation.
- Overheard the nurses say that we hadn’t really overdosed, but were just attention seeking – our bed was right beside the nurses station and strangely enough the curtains aren’t sound proof.
- As soon as we were coherant, we asked to leave.
- After a 5 hour wait, we were assessed by the same psychiatrist who once picked up the phone while we were in the room and told the DBT specialist that “the borderline actually turned up, do you want to come meet her?”
- Because of all the triggers, Ellie and Frank weren’t able to control the anger very well. We were escorted to the secure unit by the Police. We didn’t threaten anyone or even raise our voice, but we were considered to be irrational and dangerous because of the barely contained rage.
- We were released the next morning.
If we are ever sectioned again, we’ll request to go to the secure unit. It was comparatively peaceful and safe. If any of the half a dozen patients even raise their voice, they are immediately surrounded by about four staff and taken away to be calmed down. The only downside was that the cups of tea were lukewarm – hot water being a dangerous weapon.
This is a very light hearted look at our experiences. In reality, during the sectioning Sophie was nearly destroyed when her twin came from The Basement to tell her why they were created. The day after we were released from the secure unit, the ex-husband tried to kill us. Other incidents have occurred while we’ve been waiting to be assessed, including one I’d like to forget where a patient masturbated while looking through the window at us.
We sit in wonder when people say that they voluntarily go to hospital. It’s a concept that we don’t understand – why would you volunteer for torture, ridicule and scorn? We know our perception is warped and that hospitals help people every day. But it’s not something we identify with. It was once recommended that we go to Ashburn Hospital for a minimum of six months to try and break our cycle of destructive thinking. Just the thought of that was terrifying. I wonder if part of the reason is that in New Zealand the focus within the psychiatric ward seems to be on holding you in a safe place until the suicidal intent goes, rather than helping you in a long term way. It’s reactive rather than proactive.
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Now playing: Dixie Chicks – Wide open spaces
via FoxyTunes
Why you shouldn't read newspapers
Today has been one of those last straw days. It started out fairly normally, the traffic on the way to work was light because the university students are in the middle of exams. Our cynical friend at work was in a good mood and it was all looking positive. Then…
Blow 1: Our cynical friend didn’t come out to morning tea with us all – which is unusual. When we were walking back to our desk we saw the graphic surgical procedure pictures she was looking at. They had found a cyst which they are going to operate on. As if she hasn’t got enough on her plate.
Blow 2: We’ve been nominated as the union representative for the workplace. Considering how we don’t like arguments or confrontation, I’ve no idea why they elected us – especially as we refused to volunteer.
Blow 3: Each website we visited today that had an Ad banner, was advertising the “Death Quiz”. It invited you to fill in the quiz to find out when you would die. Considering how suicidal we are at the moment, those subtle messages are not helpful.
Blow 4: One of the most vivid abuse memories we have is an event that occurred on the grounds of the local kindergarten. Today in the newspaper feeds, a headline jumped out – that kindergarten had been set on fire. It started on the couch they kept on the porch. How the kindergarten is used on the weekend at night as a gathering place for teens was mentioned. SO and W are triggered so badly. We were already unsteady, but this has pushed us over.
Blow 5: We were 3 minutes late for our desk shift because we got caught up in a conversation about a major system upgrade that is happening next week. Another team leader came up and yelled at us for being late in front of other team members.
It’s now 1am and we’re terrified of trying to sleep. We know the nightmares will be there. It’s just one bad day right? We can do this……….
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Now playing: Christina Aguilera – The Voice
via FoxyTunes
Reflections and realisations
Today we were doing some work on our old blog when we realised something which tells us a great deal about our coping mechanisms and psychology. Reading through the December entries it is obvious that we were struggling with what Bob was asking us to do – evicting one of us from our internal house. But what is also obvious is that we were fighting! We were arguing, trying to learn, working it through. There was humour obvious in our entries despite the confusion – for example Today’s lesson on how to bang your head against a brick wall… When we compare these entries with the entries over the last few months, it appears obvious to us that our fighting spirit has gone. Things are no worse than they were then. In many ways they’re better. What has changed is our reaction to the things around us.
Potential reasons for this -
- We’ve been trialled on several different anti-anxiety medications, none of which have been effective and have often caused very nasty side effects.
- We haven’t heard from Ellie (affectionately known as the “Irish Bitch” by Carrie) since before Christmas. Ellie takes on many of the characteristics (and accent) of an amazing Irish uncle who told brilliant stories about his times as a policeman in Rhodesia and running black market flights in and out of Africa.
- Management has been around only sparingly since that time as well.
- The restructuring at work was badly handled and our job was changed to one that we don’t get any satisfaction from.
- Our levels of exhaustion caused by chronic insomnia have not been able to be relieved by any catch-up weekend sleeps.
- We took the risk of caring for Kriss and it proved to be a disaster.
- People around us who knew about “us” mentioned that they wanted to talk to the “real T” and that they didn’t want different ones coming forward to perform their roles. This told some of us that they weren’t wanted and were being rejected.
- We don’t have anything concrete in front of us to fight. We don’t have the husband to get rid of, Liz doesn’t generate the anger that Bob did and we don’t care about our job.
What we’re going to do about it… kick ourselves in the butt. Remind our collective selves that the reason we survived that kindergarten fort, rugby clubrooms, parties etc is because we are stubborn fighters! It’s about time we remembered that.
At the moment we need to poke and prod at ourselves to get that fighting spirit back. We need Management, Ellie, S, Sophie and every one of us to fight back against this apathy.
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Now playing: Iggy pop – Lust for life
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Trio meet Liz
Up until today’s session Liz has predominantly talked to Sophie. Today, Liz got B acting as a filter for M and One. This group present quite differently to Sophie. Sophie is gentle, shy and talks very softly; while the trio are observers, direct and carefully consider all responses. As an example, if Liz asked who was present, Sophie would immediately respond with her name; while the trio would want to respond with “it’s none of your business”, but would mull it over and then say “mainly B”.
This trio is what Carol used to call the no-affective response powerhouse. It can be quite intimidating and definitely throws an inexperienced therapist. But for the trio, there were questions and issues that needed addressing – informing Liz of what happened at the support group appointment and questioning the whole “who have you become” statement. It also made the observations of Liz easier, as the softness of Sophie was eliminated from the equation.
It became obvious that Liz has decided that father abuse is the main issue – despite the fact that there is no mention of this abuse on our records and us not having mentioned it within session. We’re losing approximately half to three quarter of the sessions to stress and dissociative related memory loss, so it’s possible it has been mentioned and we’re not aware of it. Liz is looking at the family dynamics and trying to understand them – we wish her luck. I thought that’s why they invented ambiguous labels like “dysfunctional”, so that you didn’t need to poke at some things.
We made our discomfort with the “who have you become now” phrase known. Liz clarified that she wasn’t meaning anything about us acting different roles when there was a switch. It will be interesting to see if she uses it again.
I’ve often thought we must be an awful client for any therapist. We don’t attach in any sort of way to anyone and because of the compartmentalisation we appear to contradict ourselves so often it must be hard for the therapist to keep any sort of event straight.
In other news, it’s all over with Kriss and the young ones have just started a blog of their own to help increase communication and participation – worked a little too well last night with us being woken up by a young one who wanted to write that they liked the header image that was used :)
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Now playing: Audioslave – Cochise
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