Traumatic Experiences Community Daily CheckIn - Monday 5th June 2017
Good Morning All!!!
Well its 7.47am where I am and the sun is already out, so perhaps today will be a good day. I hope you all have as good a day as possible this fine Monday.
I have quote of the day for you from the wise man himself the Dalai Lama
Old friends pass away, new friends appear. It is just like the days. An old day passes, a new day arrives. The important thing is to make it meaningful: a meaningful friend – or a meaningful day.
So my question to you too today is, how are you doing to have a meaningful day? What would make the day meaningful for you, and what makes a meaningful friend for you? Would be great to hear what you think and what you plan to do to make things meaningful for you!!!
This space is yours to share whats happening in your world, in you day, whether good, bad or inbetween. Its a safe and supportive space to share whats on your mind, share any achievements, positive things happening for you, any troubles you may feel today. Healing from Trauma is hard work, so be gentle with yourselves and show some kindness to you!!!
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@caterpillargirl
@dancingRainbow45
Im still here struggling but made it into work for what thats worth. Maybe this will give some meaning to today when nothing else seems to matter.
Isolating hasnt made this easier to deal with but hope it is for others around me. At least they dont have to deal with me anymore.
Just have to not think or feel and keep going. Pretend its ok for therapist and gynae surgeon follow up tomorrow.
Hope everyone here finds meaning in their day.
@inventiveOrange1 Hey orange, good to hear from you and have you here. You are important and valued and cared about. I hear your struggles just from the words you have posted and want you to know if it helps at all, your not alone, and you are very much being thought about right now. Its tough, it hurts and it can feel really lonely 
You made it into work, huge huge accomplishment and massive achievement, when you feel as you do :) It doesn't make everything feel okay right now, but its one step, and sometimes thats all we can do sometimes, is keep putting one foot infront of the other until the clouds begin to part and show the sunlight more. I hope your day is okay for you Orange and that you can find some comfort in it.
@dancingRainbow45
I feel kinda like ruin good work ... Weel haven't slept also... Idk what to say and just don't want to focus on negative...My mind keep telling me I am doll... Wish like to be normal. Someone from other chat may come here and disturb me...Weel now is new day and new opertuneties.Kinda wish got amnezia.
@conscientiousPineapple1782 hey Pineapple, good to have you here with us. What makes you feel you may ruin good work, if I have understood correctly what you wrote, and what makes you feel someone may bother you here? Its hard to find the positives when perhaps tired or not feeling so good, and lack of sleep sometimes can really make us worn down but a positive is you posted here today to let us know how you feel and whats going on I hope your day improves for you
@dancingRainbow45
Someone came to bother me from other site here... not completele sure is realy that person ... I am just repeating same bad habits and gets worse. Feel lately like always may say here a bit more and miss somth.
@conscientiousPineapple1782 Hey Pineapple if someone has come from another site and is the same person you feel bothered by there is always the option I believe of blocking them if you need to. You say your not sure its the same person in your second post but you dont have to talk or chat to anyone you dont wish to, and if someone bothers you, just ask them to please leave you be. what do you feel about saying this?
@conscientiousPineapple1782
I already saed don't want to talk and block that person.
@conscientiousPineapple1782 Am glad for you Pineapple that you felt able to do this for your own wellbeing, thats a really good thing for you
I'm making it a meaningful day by driving into the city with friends and conducting a teacher training for my teachers in a small puebla. I'm totally prepared and feel really good about it.
I do have a very busy day, so I will most likely not be checking in here today, but i wish you all well and I'll chat tomorrow.
Mary
@MKJart Sounds wonderful, Mary -- hope you enjoy yourself!
@melliotm
Thanks Melli, it was a great day and I feel good this morning too. I'm hoping the feeling carries on.
@MKJart I hope your day remains a good one MK and it sounds as if you have done a lot of prep work for this so I wish you all the best for the day and hope that it goes really well for you . Take good care of you today and perhaps after the teacher training, you could go out and spend a little time with your friends?? Good luck
@dancingRainbow45
I got the opportunity to hang out with a friend and teacher afterwards and it was awesome- all in all a great day AND I slept well last night too.
@MKJart Really pleased for you that you had a great day and hope you have many more of these to come :)
Poor sleep last night, thus tightly wound-up and anxious today. Focus is quite hard to come by, so please bear with me. ATM the quest for meaning takes a backseat to establishing a foundational sense of safety to stave off unwarranted panic sensations.
Trying to deflect (or embrace, depending on how you wish to look at it) some awful feelings --and a looming tension headache -- after starting the day with some intrusive, entirely unwelcome flashbacks from childhood (likely triggered after mom decided to take a walk down memory lane yesterday during our playdate with my daughter -- of course, mom's rose-coloured perspective of my decidedly less than ideal upbringing sharply digresses from my first-hand vantage point). Everything seems like it is too much to handle today, even the very notion of facing the world outside my bedroom door. Wholly unsettled in my own skin, so it's not like things are much better within this supposed sanctuary.
I should get groceries today; the world won't end if I don't, but my meal and snack options will be severely limited (a half hearted CBT attempt, that). Feel completely stuck by the notion of even making a list, much less going out to the shop. Such a rudimentary decision-making process.
And yet even thinking about doing it overwhelms.
@melliotm Poor sleep is such a factor in managing day to day things mellio and Im sorry that you are having such a rough day today. I hope as the day goes on, it will feel a little easier for you.
You said the quest for meaning takes a backseat whilst you try to establish a foundational sense of safety to stave off unwarranted panic sensations and its good you can recognise what you need to do for you. Having a sense of safety is important absolutely. What do you feel would enable you to feel that?
It can be hard when relatives have a view of things as being all rosy and fine when we perhaps dont recall things the way they do. Sometimes people hang onto those rose tinted glasses because its more comfortable for them, it means perhaps they dont have to think or deal with the things you do, or perhaps out of guilt, I dont know. But someone having a view different to yours, doesn't change your reality. But it can feel quite hurtful when this happens, almost like a snub perhaps causing resentment, confusion, anger. What does it feel like for you Mellio when you are having to cope with someone who perhaps cant or wont take those rose coloured glasses off?
Regarding food shopping, your health and your nutrition is important but I hear the huge struggle you face right now with being able to go out and get what you need for yourself. Lack of nutrition just like lack of sleep as Im sure you know, can affect the way we view things, how we feel, even if we may not notice it or even realise it. Have you thought of online shopping or getting food delivered to you, or do you feel you need to challenge yourself to go out in order to keep moving forward?
@dancingRainbow45 "Having a sense of safety is important absolutely. What do you feel would enable you to feel that?"
i honestly wish i knew. Maybe feeling like i had a better understanding or sense of control over trauma responses (without resorting to prior negative coping strategies, eg, substance abuse -- so much easier to feign false bravado when your senses are thoroughly blunted). Am still learning, practicing, trying to do this. Made it out for groceries though, so score one for the good guys. 😎
@melliotm Hey mellio, we all cope in ways that we think at the time will help us, and even the most negative coping mechanisms serve their purpose, but usually its very short term and usually end up causing more problems in the long term. But everyone copes the best they can and it sounds like at least you know that some of the more negative ways of coping perhaps are not serving you long term to feel better about things. Sometimes change happens slowly and over time and thats okay because in the end you still get to a better place where you end up coping in more positive ways that no longer hurt you perhaps?
@dancingRainbow45 "What does it feel like for you Mellio when you are having to cope with someone who perhaps cant or wont take those rose coloured glasses off?"
it feels like my perspective and experience is totally invalid. That i have no right to struggle with these symptoms. That I'm making excuses for my own character flaws.
Especially in the case of my mother's perspective.
A few months ago, I told her I had found a one time walk in subsidized therapy session to be really helpful. Her response:
"I hope you didn't blame everything on me?"
This is due to me finally opening up to her last year about how my early childhood immersion in extreme fundamentalist Christianity (and some decidedly cult-like orgs) had for various reasons been and still was traumatic to me. She took that as a personal attack on her as a parent, didn't speak to me for 6 weeks afterwards. Cut me off completely.
And yet as she remembers it, *I* was the one who subsequently refused to speak with her, even though I have the IM convo saved -- anything that deviates from how she sees things is simply wrong, and since I see things differently, I'm merely "exaggerating" or "delusional"...sigh. Anyways, nothing good comes from dredging that pond. So yeah. I think I need to breathe deeply before I melt down lololsiiiiigh...
@melliotm
I know that pond. It's an awful pond. My mother rewrites everything. And she's a clinical psychologist, so she diagnoses me with things I don't have to explain my reactions to her behavior. It makes it hard sometimes to remember that I'm the sane one.
So just remember that you're the sane one. You have facts. She can say whatever she wants about them. She can choose to ignore them. But she can't change them.
@coraline23 Thank you.
Just...thank you. So, so much.
@coraline23 Well said Coraline Other people can say, do and think all kinds of things but it doesn't make them right or you or anyone else wrong or insane. Sometimes people need to do what they do for their own purposes whatever those may be, but you know your reality, you know how things were or are and thats whats important. Sometimes people can say things which makes us question ourselves, even making us doubt our own feelings, responses and reality because the other peron perhaps needs to make themselves feel better, hurting others in the process. Sometimes people need to try and make out things were different, or you are wrong because of their own guilt or responsibility in a given situation. They can do that all they like, but it still doesnt change how things were for you, or what you feel. Hope this makes sense
@dancingRainbow45
Guess it's in the air today. I also awoke anxious. Last night I listened to an hour's worth of meditation (bells, bianural sounds) and I still didn't sleep until after 5:30a. Woke about 9:30a.
Hoping to turn the day around but a bit nervous to see my counselor. Haven't seen her since she was in the hospital. I'm thinking she's going to push the emdr therapy again. I've decided to embrace it no matter my hesitations. She won't be pleased to find out we've been drinking so much.
I'm not real pleased with it myself. Old patterns are resurfacing with my spouse drinking nightly. I just don't see the point in ruining our future. Worried about my health and then there's the never ending guilt.
Have to make it to that appointment and then try some grocery shopping. I should be grateful - it's an easy life.
@themainjane
I'm worried. About my marriage, my spouse's decisions, my decisions, our future, My future and my health.
Stopped taking my antidepressant recently when I found a link between it and a possible increase in breast cancer. Recently found a lump.
I hate that I'm giving up something I thought was helping the quality of my life. I question my judgement since I don't eat healthily or exercise and since I smoke. Is the risk from the Rx really my biggest issue?
We don't have insurance and even if we did there is no way I'd go to the doctor.
Then there's the drinking. Old patterns resurfacing with spouse. I'm worried for things to go poorly again. I'd really like for us to stay married and be happy. I hope he's not careless or set on self-destruct.
I don't look forward to nightly drinking and all the things that entails.
@themainjane Hey Jane sounds as though you have a lot of worries going on right now and this is probably contributing to your difficulty in sleeping, do you think? Regarding the anti-depressant medication, do you feel this was helping you? I guess all medications have their risks and side effects but perhaps it may be worth talking to someone medical about alternatives that perhaps have less side effects or risks associated with them. You mentioned you have found a lump recently. Have you had this checked out? Its important where you are able to take care of your physical health because you are important.
No one needs to tell you that drinking is a short term solution or fix but in the long term when perhaps its out of control or where its become an unhealthy coping mechanism it can cause problems all kinds from relationship issues, to affecting friendships, work, health and so on. It sounds though from your post as if you have reached a point where you are looking to try and change things for you, for your future and for your health?
What do you feel would help you to begin to make those changes? Have you thought about talking with your partner about how your feeling and what you have been thinking about? Sometimes being able to communicate concerns and worries and trying to find a way to resolve these together can be really empowering.
@dancingRainbow45
You're right, I'm sure the over-worrying doesn't help my sleep pattern. I'm nocturnal by nature (which I feel guilty about).
I do feel the antidepressant was helping. I worry about dropping it. Will speak with my PA about this tomorrow.
No, I haven't had it checked. I don't do dr exams. I'll talk to one all day but that's my limit. I can't handle it and it causes much anxiety.
The drinking - - well he and I both darn well know the possible consequences but there's no talking to that man.
Went to counseling and grocery shopping. Home now. Tired and sad.
Thank you for always talking to me and asking thought-provoking questions.
@themainjane Your most welcome :)
I was driving home from my counseling session. I got pulled over for not yielding on green. Another moving violation. I am ant to scream or cry.
@raychascotch hey rayca, how did your counselling go? And it sux when you get pulled for a violation as you mentioned. Im pretty sure there are many here who probably have found themselves in a situation such as this. Try not letting it get to you too much or ruin your day to much. Its happened and as irritating as it is, try not letting it wind you up or spoil the rest of your day
I've been having a rough day. I messed my back up last week tossing and twisting up in my sleep, and I've been in pain all day. It's frustrating because it keeps me from doing the things I want to do (working on my car, a plumbing project), which are also the things that keep me sane/out of my head. And it keeps me from contributing to the household (making dinner) so I feel like a jerk on top of it. I hate that my husband has to pick up my slack. And I know it's my own stupid fault for not being able to manage my anxiety better. But I'm about to get into some difficult things in therapy, and I've been having problems with flashbacks this past week. So I'm frustrated and discouraged today.
Used to pass an antique shop on walks that featured an opium bed. I'd be in on that type of fort (just sayin) - minus the opioids, of course.
I seriously wanted to have one of those things during my "psychedelic" phase.
