Sadness has settled on me like a cold, mid-winter snowfall.
A chill quivers in my bones, as hypothermia threatens my heart.
Somewhere, the sun is blazing. This I know to be true.
But for this moment, winter has come calling,
again.
Winter Is Calling
Tag: avoidance
Is Surviving A Testament Of Strength?
I ventured outside today. Not because I wanted to though. The last thing I wanted to do was put a coat and boots on to go walk around in the snow. I went out because I needed to. I’ve barely moved from the couch in 3 days. This year is not off to a good start.
First, we had the first-ever earthquake here in Central Newfoundland. Very minor. But there has never been an earthquake here. Then we had a major 3-day storm. Our driveway was washed out and our roof had some damage. Thankfully it was minor. Then I ended up spending 9 hours in the ER, for dehydration.
Through all of that, I’ve been struggling just to keep breathing. CPTSD has been kicking my ass. Between the paralyzing panic attacks, nightmares, disordered eating (restricting, binging, purging), chronic pain, and insomnia every breath I take requires effort. Putting in effort takes energy, and energy is something I have very little of. Or maybe it’s just a lack of drive or willpower. Either way, I don’t have much of anything right now.
But today I managed to tap into something inside of me that gave me a little boost. I was wiping away tears as I was putting my boots on. The dogs were so excited to have mom play ball with them. They’ve really been feeling the effects of what I’m going through and that has created such a massive amount of guilt for me. I try and tell myself that I really am doing the best that I can right now but it feels so fake.
The fresh air was amazing though. The sound of the waves along the shore was incredibly comforting. I miss walking there with the dogs. Another reason I dislike winter so much. When I get cold it triggers my CRPS and sometimes I’m in pain for several days after. It’s frustrating. Especially when more than half of the year is cold here in Newfoundland. So outdoor activity is quite limited. It’s a big factor in the decline of my mental health once the fall months are upon us.
Today the cool air was welcomed. It wasn’t windy, which made it much more manageable. It was as if by breathing it in I was bringing back a little glimmer of life. It even energized me enough to later vacuum, sweep, and mop through the house.
It was discouraging though to find myself standing in the middle of the room, on 3 separate occasions, completely dissociated, and I had to check my phone to see what time it was. Everything has just been so surreal. Over the last year, 40 years of trauma decided to all come flooding back at once, at times leaving me completely incapacitated. It’s been one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to go through. I’ve shed more tears these past few months than I have my entire life.
So yeah. It’s been tough. But I guess surviving all of this is a testament to my strength? Maybe. I dunno. But I do know that growth doesn’t always look like success. Sometimes growth involves holding on when everything just feels so damn heavy. At least for me, it does.
The old me would have given up long ago.
I Don’t Feel The Same Way You Do
Identifying how I’m feeling has always been difficult for me. Although I must admit, I have come a long way in that area in recent years. In the past if you had asked me at any given point how I was feeling I wouldn’t have been able to answer you. I lacked not only the vocabulary necessary to describe the feelings but also the introspection. I had no concept whatsoever of emotions, what they were, or how they felt. I also had no idea that emotions also come with bodily sensations and could actually be felt in the body.
I have a much better understanding these days of feelings, though it’s not something that comes naturally. My first response to how I’m feeling is still the usual “I don’t know”, but I am learning how to pause and go inward. I take a moment to investigate and I can usually come up with something that somewhat describes my current emotional state.
Something else I also struggle with is identifying emotions and facial expressions in other people. I misinterpret a lot and it has led to many misunderstandings. I get insecure about not being able to pick up on emotions in other people so I observe, and I use what I see to figure out what the other person is feeling. The problem with that is that more often than not, I’m wrong. That slight shift in a facial expression does not always mean what I think it does. A raised eyebrow may make me think that the other person disapproves of something I said but that might not be the case at all. The other person may in fact be impressed, surprised, or even intrigued by what I had said.
For a long time I didn’t even know I struggled with emotions. I just thought I didn’t have very many. I’m almost always “OK” if you were to ask. It seems like that’s all I ever knew how to be. I couldn’t identify sadness, joy, excitement, contentment, and certainly not anger. I’ve spent my life so detached from myself that I had no idea these things even existed in me. Growing up I experienced a lot of unwanted emotions and as I got older they seemed to have just flattened out. I stopped feeling the varying intensities and the window of what I could actually feel grew extremely small.
So here I am, at the age of 42, realizing that I don’t know what it actually means to feel a certain way. And I have a very low tolerance for anything that takes me away from “OK”. Sitting with a feeling is a fairly new concept in my world and it’s turning out to be one of the most excruciating things I’ve ever experienced. My system jumps into high alert whenever I sense any sort of emotion inside of me. Whether my heart rate begins to speed up from excitement, fear, anticipation, lust, pain, joy, or whatever else may come up, my brain reacts in a way that propels me towards behaviors that shut it all down. I am working on this though.
A few weeks ago my therapist used the word alexithymia to describe one’s inability to identify and describe emotions. It is a word I had never heard before. I had no idea that my difficulties with emotions were something that other people out there experience as well. I thought it was just another thing I was bad at. One more thing on my never-ending list of character flaws. Something else that other people do with zero effort but requires so much work on my part. Another complexity. Another failure. Another fault.
But I’m beginning to realize that’s not the case at all! Alexithymia is a real thing that is not a character flaw! It’s not because I’m too stupid to understand emotions. It’s not because I’m an air-head, or that I’m dumb, or careless. It’s not because I’m a cold-blooded person who has no heart. It’s something that’s actually more common than I realized. So much so that it has warranted a label of its own.
So I just want to say that if you’re reading this and you find yourself relating to my experience in any way, I encourage you to do a little reading about alexithymia. It might very well help you understand why you feel (or don’t feel) the way that you do. There are a few websites in particular that I found really great at explaining it. I don’t usually post outside links here but if you are interested, feel free to ask and I will gladly share. It could open up a door to a completely new way of seeing things! Please be gentle with yourselves today. You all deserve it!
🦋
Avoidance Will Never Allow You To Experience Freedom
A life lesson that I’ve learned much too late is that avoidance creates a lot more suffering than what would occur if I had faced the issue at the beginning. It is making me sick.
Avoiding those wounds, the trauma, the lies, or even the belief systems inside of us can lead to physical, psychological, emotional, and/or spiritual damage.
There’s a spectrum, of course.
Avoidance might look like constantly being glued to your phone, or binge-watching shows because it provides you an escape.
Or avoidance might have turned into full blown addiction that started all because you needed something to numb the pain inside.
It might be that you are distracted enough to ignore what’s trying to grab your attention inside of you.
It all makes sense. I know the pain some of us feel is so intense, we’re afraid that if we feel it, it could swallow us whole and we’d never be able to breathe again.
Unfortunately, the avoiding behaviors can end up being more destructive and painful than the actual wound itself.
So we avoid. And then we avoid some more.
If anyone reads this, I don’t know what you are avoiding, or what you are shoving deep down, but I bet if you stopped for a minute to notice it, you would know right away what it is.
I don’t know what you need. Maybe you need to go to a professional to work through it. Maybe you need to pray about it or say it out loud to a trusted friend.
Maybe you can start by simply admitting to yourself that it’s there … and start to imagine the time, energy, and space you’d get back if you didn’t need to spend it on avoidance.
If there’s something in you that says, “it was too long ago – I should be over it”, or “I could never say that out loud”, or “Acknowledging what’s inside isn’t going to help me”, please consider that these thoughts are coming from a part of you who wants, desperately, for you to never think about these things. In the darkness is where it will spread and grow and continue to wreak havoc.
Avoidance will never lead us to freedom. But acknowledging our pain will. May all that’s hidden come to light so that we can just be well, and experience life in a way that we no longer need to avoid, but can actually experience.
🦋
What Spills Out Of You?
I read this analogy and it certainly hit home for me.
So, you’re holding a cup of coffee and someone accidentally bumps into you, causing it to spill everywhere. Why did you spill the coffee?
“Because someone bumped into me.”
Wrong answer.
You spilled the coffee because there was coffee in your cup. If there had been tea in the cup, you would have spilled tea. Whatever is inside the cup is what will spill out.
So, when life shakes you up, whatever is inside you will come out. It’s easy to pretend everything’s fine until you’re shook.
So, we need to ask ourselves, “What’s in my cup?”
When life gets tough, what spills over? Joy? Gratitude? Peace? Humility? Anger? Bitterness? Avoidance? A tendency to quit?
Remember, LIFE gives you the cup;
YOU choose what to fill it with.
🦋
I’m Sorry …
I didn't call you back.
I was buried under a pile of blankets
Counting my breaths
Attempting to drown out all the noise
Trying to slow down my racing thoughts
Praying to hold on
Fighting the darkness
Willing myself to get up
Practicing positive self-talk
Bargaining with the universe
Begging the pain to just
Stop.
I'm sorry I didn't call you back.
🦋
Say Goodbye To The Robot
Dear Robot Self: You have permission to be human!
That means you get to make mistakes, to learn, to grow, to make more mistakes, and learn from those too! This is how you gain wisdom!
I’ve been thinking about why some ppl change throughout their lives while others remain stuck. Why can 2 ppl both be in therapy for years and one grows, matures and heals while the other one spends their life stuck in their story?
I’ve been reading some studies on this very topic and they say that those of us who stay stuck stay in our heads, and we can re-traumatize ourselves by telling the same story over and over again. This keeps us surrounded by our shame. Not one person has ever healed through shame. This is so incredibly true for myself! I keep over intellectualizing my pain and trauma. I’ve been in therapy FOR YEARS and have learned so many facts about trauma. I’ve picked apart countless things that have happened to me. While this has made me much more aware of why things are the way they are in my life, it hasn’t helped me fix it.
My problem is that I’ve never allowed myself to feel the pain in my body. It has remained trapped, rolling around in my head. I can talk about things and stay just dissociated enough, to be able to think about it without feeling it. I can write in brutal detail about traumatic moments of my life but have no emotion. I can also accurately describe something in nature, beautiful scenes and breathtaking sunsets but I struggle to feel it in my body.
My journey towards coming into my body has been brutally slow and frustrating, often feeling as if I’m moving backwards. Baby steps, they say. Small steps, one at a time, letting things trickle as opposed to flooding, is easier for my nervous system to maintain. Emotions are hard for me, and even the positive ones require small doses. It gets overwhelming quite quickly and then I shut down. But I do believe I am able to do this, step by step. Seeing further than the very next moment isn’t easy without becoming overwhelmed, but the next moment is the only thing I need to worry about right now.
I’m not giving up. I deserve to feel in awe at the morning sunrise and joy when I hold a friend’s baby. It’s also OK for me to feel angry when I see someone bullying another person and to feel sad if someone hurts my feelings. It’s all part of being human.
And I’m giving myself permission to be human! I don’t want to be a cold, mechanical robot anymore!
Word Of The Year
Have you ever heard of ppl choosing a word of the year? It’s like a way to keep yourself on course. Sort of a guiding star. Or the title to a chapter in the book of your life. Picking a word of the year is less stringent than making a new year’s resolution and it helps you go with the flow without feeling like a failure because you aren’t keeping the resolutions you said you were going to.
It gives you the opportunity to check in during the year and ask yourself if the path you’re on is bringing you closer or further away than where you want to be in your life. It also gives you a chance to DO THE THINGS that put that word at the front of your life. Invite the good things in!
I’ve never picked a word of the year before. I realize upfront that I might not always embody it to the extent that I want to – I admit that. But I will make sure it always teaches me something.
I am grateful for all of the lessons that 2023 taught me but I am more than ready to say goodbye to it. There are some parts of my soul and my self that feel a bit torn, worn out, ragged. At times it was a rough year. Healing always is. Now I find myself needing … something. When I was thinking about what could be my word, ACCEPTANCE came to mind. It encompasses exactly the kind of vibe I need to be in right now.
So, my word for 2024 is:
I need to make room for the person I am right now. Not dwell on the girl I wish I was or feel sorry for the girl I used to be. But the girl I am right now, in this very moment. I want to make the best of what happens this year and not constantly think about what my life would be like if things were different.
I want to accept my body as it is. I’ve spent a lot of time trying to change it, never feeling pretty/strong/skinny/capable/flexible/healthy/attractive/innocent/spicy/good … enough. This year I want to accept and appreciate my ageing body for what it can do and what it has to offer me.
I want to be more accepting of ppl – all ppl. My family, my friends, medical professionals, spiritual leaders, cashiers, etc Especially those who have ideas that are different than mine, different beliefs and those in different levels of power. This year I want to use my voice and talk with those people, even a simple hello is often progress for me.
I want to accept offers to try new things and not let my own doubts or anxieties prevent me from stepping forward.
I want to accept that not all days need to be productive. That especially during times of sickness, fatigue and chronic pain some days I need to just be and not worry about checking off things on my ‘to do’ list.
This will be my first time choosing a word of the year and I feel really good about this. I believe that this particular word, ACCEPT, is exactly where my focus needs to be right now. I need to shift myself from avoidance and move into embracing acceptance in all areas.
Did you choose a word or make any resolutions this year? Do tell! Feel free to comment below and tell me what direction you want to go in this year? Happy New Year everyone!
Challenges Don’t Always Have To Be Setbacks
Embrace each and every challenge that you face as opposed to running for dear life in the opposite direction. Be curious. Take a step back and observe. Then proceed to use it as an opportunity to gain valuable insight and skills. Challenges don’t always have to be setbacks.
Danielle Broomfield
I’ve been home from the hospital for a while now. Things are going ok. I’ve learned some things over the past 2 months and I’m trying to incorporate so&me new ways of coping throughout the day. For example, drinking water is a problem for me. Dehydration is a common occurrence and it causes me to feel so dragged out and just blahh overall. But in the hospital I was given meds multiple times a day and of course, I had to drink water. So I’ve been using that as an opportunity to drink now that I’m home as well. Spreading my medications out over the PROPER times, setting alarms on my phone to remind me and then drinking as much as I can tolerate when I take the meds. Sometimes it’s just a few sips while other times I’ve been able to get down a full glass. Its a simple thing for most ppl – to drink water. But as a person who struggles immensely with drinking any type of fluids, and considering its a necessity for life, its something I have to put work into. So I have been. I want to be well. I want to feel well.
Living inside my head is just downright exhausting sometimes. Small things turn into major hurdles. Its rare for me to have a moment of silence. I mean, who else actually stands, holding a bottle of water, and cries because you know your body is screaming out for it but your mind is just screaming right back, yelling obscenities. I have recently found myself yearning for stillness though, for silence. With the constant 24/7 chatter when I was in the hospital and then all the things that came with the holidays, I find it hard to even think sometimes. So I am trying to take a few minutes here and there to just be still. It has actually been good for my anxiety. Anything that helps reduce the anxiousness I often feel is definitely a tool worth holding on to.
Challenges don’t always have to turn into setbacks. I have a tendency to trip up very easily. Even the smallest challenges have the potential to bring about a full blown relapse. That’s why I’m trying to really hard to stay on top of everything right now. Its a really stressful time of year, for everyone, and less than 2 months ago I almost died. Every tool I think of is being used to pull myself through this christmas. Yep. It’s definitely challenging. But its not going to set me back!
Holiday Blues
Christmas was … different … this year. I usually enjoy the overall feeling of the season but its like that christmassy feeling was non-existent this year. I don’t know if its because I was in the hospital or maybe its because my pain level has been so high, but December month brought a lot of sadness.
A different kind of sadness though. The kind where it felt as if my heart was literally aching. I found myself frequently holding back tears. There’s been such a deep yearning in my soul. A longing for things I dont have and can’t do. Its the kind of sadness that comes with grieving for a lost loved one, wishing you could have just 5 more minutes with them. Except no one has died. It’s a sadness that reaches right down to my core.
All the hype about the holidays portrays big, happy families gathered around each other, enjoying lots of food and presents, baking cookies, decorating trees together, small children full of excitement, couples building snowmen and having snowball fights, shopping and buying all sorts of things, and so on. All the images say we should be happy. But what about those who have no family near them and they have very small social circles? Or those who are unemployed and can’t afford to buy things for anyone outside of their immediate family? What about couples going through a divorce? Or those in abusive relationships and live in fear of saying the wrong thing? And, what about those who are not able to have children of their own?
David and I went to this one particular event together. A community dinner served by the Evangel Pentecostal Church that was followed by a selection of musical performances. There was another family at our table with their 5 year old little girl and she became the highlight of our night. The joy just emanated from her. She was wearing an adorable red dress, her hair in pig tails, complete with red bows. She was so happy, so excited, so … innocent.
I had a lump in my throat the whole evening, making it very hard to swallow my meal. Santa came and called the kids up front and she was just vibrating with excitement. We watched her as she went up and as she looked over at her mom, waving as they took her picture, I couldn’t hold back the tears any longer. It felt like my heart was just shattering inside my chest. I had to excuse myself and blindly made my way to the bathroom, where I covered my mouth and spent a good 5 minutes sobbing, silently. After touching up my make up I went back to the table and sipped coffee as if nothing had ever happened.
Sometimes infertility hits ppl at the most random times and this christmas was one of those times for me. I feel like I have to keep it to myself because I know David deals with a lot of guilt about not being able to give me a child of our own. If he was to see me during these moments it would just make it much worse for him and I don’t want that. Except I also don’t like how isolating this is. I wish I knew how to turn this into something we could go through together. I wish I could let myself be vulnerable and let my own husband see those hurting parts of me. Except I retreat into my shell and hide … the only thing I’m actually good at.
Reset and Recharge
You must understand that sometimes there will be days that you’re not in the mood to talk to anyone, even if it’s your family and your closest friends.
You will want to ignore talking in person, on phone calls, on text msgs, even on social media.
Not because you don’t care and not because you’re in a bad mood either but because sometimes your mind and body will just crave silence.
Sometimes, your soul will need silence for you to figure things out.
I want you to know that if you find yourself spacing out and distancing yourself from everyone it doesn’t mean that you’re a bad or mean person. You’re a human and it’s okay if you have a meltdown. Life can be a lot and sometimes it just becomes too much. You don’t owe anyone any explanations for choosing to prioritize what your soul needs and deserves.
Do what you have to do to reset and recharge then get back up and go again.
We got this!
Her Complex Musings 
You must be logged in to post a comment.