Wednesday- before and after

Wednesdays are my scheduled day off, which are typically occupied by appointments of differing natures. This Wednesday I was due to see my trauma therapist. I went shopping for a couple of hours before hand and felt great! Bought some new products at Lush to try (for myself!), spent some money on the girls at Smiggle, and a large wall planner at Kikki-K to position right in front of my treadmill. I went in to my session feeling pretty good after the crisis i'd had over the previous week or so, rested, recovered, and ready to go back to work and carry on. For the most part my time spent in session was fine, nothing overly triggering, more of just a catch-up session filling Veronika in on what had transpired over the last couple of weeks since last seeing her- how I went from distressed crisis mode, to dissociated shut down mode, to making some firm commitments in regard to e.d. behaviours again, taking a couple of days off work to regroup mentally before really crashing and burning. And all went well. But the moment I walked out the door I was confronted with immense sadness, tears, and a general overwhelming mass of emotion. I panicked, as I do when having to experience or contend with any emotion, called my husband and asked if he could pick the girls up from daycare as I was unable to, and then text him telling him I wasn't coping and needed some time to process whatever it was that was going on (insight is not my forte), but that I was going home. He text back and said okay, but we needed to talk about all of this tonight. The mere thought of having to articulate anything, and particularly with my husband, of whom I do not communicate with in regard to any of my "mental health" issues had me near retching. On the one hand I wanted to take this "opportunity" where my emotions were right here on the surface and therefore reachable to start the process of working through them/enduring them/discovering what was at the root of them, and then dealing with that, but fear and anxiety cripple this ability within me, and have me run from them time and time again, hence why I continue to return to the same damn dysfunctional and maladaptive coping strategies year after year. I desperately wanted this time to be different- here was my opportunity to move beyond this static place I find myself and progress. Yet, I failed. I got home, I busied myself, the girls arrived home, family life continued, dinner, bath, bed.. and then bed and my kindle for me to escape the horrors of the last couple of hours. My husband tried to talk about what was going on, I was unable to give him any answers, everything was numb and unavailable. He left me to go do a workout, of which I was grateful.

Thursday morning rolls around, and i'm ready to go back to work and get on with life. Come 2pm and my vision starts to roll with holographic images, I can't focus on any single one thing, I get all hot and flushed and start sweating, and feel like i'm about to burst into tears as if in shock. This lasts about 20mins at which time a headache and nausea take it's place- welcome to a migraine. I walk through to the office and am greeted with comments on how pale/green/awful/unwell I look, and admit that I don't feel well. I push through until 4pm and then relent and say I need to go home. I have co-workers offering to drive me, but feel guilty for their concern and do not want to put anybody out. I come home, arrange for my inlaws to collect the girls from daycare, and go straight to bed, and sleep for 2 hours. I felt better (and hungry) upon waking, so go downstairs and join in with family happenings. I put my youngest to bed and go back to bed myself, leaving my husband to deal with my 4yr old for the remainder of the evening.

And here I find myself, Friday morning, my inlaws have taken the girls back to daycare, and i'm having another day at home, resting, and trying to recover from whatever I have going on at the moment. My therapist suggests I start reading some books on trauma and what people have done to overcome their pasts, but upon searching Amazon there were none that really stood out for me and took my interest. She wants me to start desensitizing to things, by reading about them, talking about them, blah blah, but what really is there to say? I'm so detached from everything that took place in my childhood, and have built such tremendous walls around everything that accessing that 'little girl' is near-impossible. I say near, as there have been moments where I've been able to trust in somebody enough to feel the appropriate things and make headway in this area, but that was 9 years ago while in residential treatment, and probably not until 9 months into my stay! I finally came to a place where I felt safe on all accounts- physically, psychologically, and emotionally, and could afford a little vulnerability and authenticity. I experienced perhaps for the first time what it meant to feel unconditional love and acceptance.

Now I read today that as an adult you can offer this to yourself, that you need no longer be that child looking and longing for somebody else to fill this role for you. I need to read more, for as things stand, I am not convinced that this is the case. It is an interesting view point, and one in which I will research in depth, for if it indeed can support its' claim then maybe the end of my recovery journey is nearer than currently perceived. I shall keep you informed.