Pay Attention to Tiny Things

Another doctor's appointment. We talked some about body memory, an how I feel that it's flooding out. Tomorrow, a physical therapist for more of the same. It feels like it's body memory and pain. But also, my awareness of that and balance is sharper. Chips (crisps to the rest of the world) and salsa every night? No thanks. Too acidic. I'm really trying to pay attention to p/h balance.

Protect yourself.

Trying to Focus

Nightmares still happen. This means waking up around 3 a.m., and then eating breakfast. After that, you try to go back to sleep. But the nightmares are still there.

You try to wake up, and battle to not dissociate all day long. Exhaustion is always there. You can't just sit and do nothing. You have to fight back to try and keep some sense of balance.

What's real and what isn't? You have to feel your way thru a lot of space to not feel many times like you're under threat. You never get a break.

You don't have a choice.
You have to protect yourself.

You just want to feel safe.

Focus 24 Hours a Day

How's your day? Here, it's like many parts of the world. Endless heat, concerns, and problems. In our case, no break ever in dealing with symptoms.

It's a struggle to check the I-can-save-the-world-all-by-myself pattern that's easy to fall into. Convince millions of people not to vote for Trump or Hillary? It's not my responsibility to make sure that each of them does their homework before they go to bed. Instead, you try to protect your well being.

Every day it's an exhausting battle to focus and not dissociate. In the past you thought it would help you to escape pain. Instead, it just makes things worse. At times you turn off all noise, sit on the floor and rock back and forth. You don't want to be bombarded with pain. You just want to feel safe in your own home and not literally fall apart. You don't know where you are or what time it is. You don't want to feel trapped.

You have nothing to hide behind. Dissociating, alcoholism or the rest of it. But the pain is still there. You still feel paralyzed and have to fight hard to not slip into a death wish. I have no desire to hurt myself or anybody else. But you still have to fight that "what if I wasn't here" thought. Would anybody care?

Would anybody pay attention?
Can I trust anybody? Or, is everybody lying to me?

You can't control other horrible people. But you can protect yourself. You have to.

Screen Everything

What's real and what isn't? It's an ongoing battle to try and not dissociate and then fall apart. You have to focus really hard, and then you're exhausted. But you don't have a choice.

Screen everything. Protect yourself and try to focus on things around you. It's still a struggle.

Some Ways to Deal With Trauma

Time to break our "no progressive content" rule to make some points.

The aftermath of the Treyvon Martin case continues. This means that more recycled comments about race will continue (along with the "pundit" comments, books, documentaries, cable news comments, lectures, films and any other profit making venture you can think of). We already know that racism sucks, is horrible, deadly, and needs to be stopped.

Yet, the mostly white owned corporate MSM won't allow all of the truth to be told. This means that everyone from Jesse Jackson to Al Sharpton, Tavis Smiley and others can only go so far. If you go beyond that, you're considered (fill in the blank with various racist terms), and cut off. None of these people are that brave. Which means you keep putting out the obvious, and you keep your job.

For everyone who's surviving trauma in some way, how do you cope? Here are some ideas.

It's not your fault (whether you're a survivor, or someone was sadly killed).
Nobody asked for this.
Why does the system treat survivors and victims so horribly? In many cases, racism, money and power. Maintain the status quo.
Despite all the horrible stuff that others may say and do, keep this in mind. As long as you're telling the truth, that's all that matters.