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I've recently, painfully, discovered that stress increases anxiety to interminable levels. Stress, of course, worsens one's mental health in many ways, but the way that I'm primarily feeling it is through anxiety (and probably depression; anxiety and depression being knitted together as they are). Previously, I didn't have the anxiety problems I do today, and I didn't realize just how bad anxiety could feel until this latest bought of stress increasing my anxiety.
A couple of weeks ago I volunteered to distribute sanitary products and a hot meal to the unhoused community of Washington D.C. through the impactful and committed organization, The Distant Relatives Project. The experience produced a mix of emotions. I felt heartbroken to see so many individuals in need, the worst of it was learning that a large number of unhoused individuals who struggle with mental health issues do not have access to professional help. It is a crisis.
For many verbal abuse victims, like myself, one of the most challenging aspects of moving forward is accepting the reality of the situation. I had an extremely difficult time in my healing journey until I realized that I would never have the relationship with my abuser that I wanted.
It's not uncommon for those who self-injure to use self-harm to regulate emotions that may be overwhelming or difficult to cope with. But it's a temporary solution, one that does more harm than good—there are better ways to process and manage your feelings.
Over the years, I have learned so much about my anxiety, not only through formal education, but also simply through taking the time to analyze what I am going through. Some might say that that is just a part of dealing with anxiety – the overthinking, the constant overanalyzing of what you feel, think, and do. But I think it has also been helpful because it has helped me recognize my triggers and symptoms. It has also helped me figure out things I can do that are helpful for me. One of those things is leaning into my anxiety instead of running away from it.
As I’ve discussed in previous posts, a little over two years ago, I survived a catastrophic apartment fire. Among other things, the experience left me with the fear that something bad will happen to me in the future. I have not been able to shake that feeling. In this post, I want to briefly discuss that.
I recently had a reader reach out to me asking what steps I've taken to stop putting so much pressure on myself. I've been reflecting on that question for a couple of days now and would like to expand on it in today's post.
Staying consistent can be a challenge for anyone. However, staying consistent can be especially difficult for those affected by attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).
Learning to validate yourself is a powerful tool, especially for those of us with the ever-intense borderline personality disorder (BPD) emotions. I knew that the temptation to engage in maladaptive behaviors would still exist on my road to recovery. I did not, however, expect the extent to which I would learn to invalidate and essentially gaslight myself.
A little while ago I wrote about my experience with eye movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR) therapy. I had never heard of EMDR until my therapist, who specializes in trauma therapy, introduced it to me as a way to treat the panic and anxiety I experience associated with a trauma I recently suffered. Now, I'd like to share how I feel immediately following an EMDR session.
Love gets twisted and distorted. Relationships, without therapy and intervention get twisted too. If your parents and siblings could do these things to you, how on earth can one trust friends and new acquaintances. Some of us drown ourselves in addictions to sex, food, drugs and drama. Drama is what our brains recall more often than good memories, those are the PTSD triggers that come with a car backfiring to a gentle breeze scented with something that triggers a memory. Good turns bad and bad feels worse.
Me, i finally went no contact with my family. It was too impossible for me to even grab hold of therapeutic options while engaged with an abusive dismissive family. I too was abusive defending myself constantly, someone had to "give" , it had to be me. I had to give myself a break, I had to take a lot of time redefining myself. I never had a clue who i was or could be. Although I was a crisis counselor, surprise surprise, I went into the help field but not for me back then but to understand and fix my family. That did not work. I had to finally do it for me, and I and you deserve to be heard, understood, valued and parented.
Now I work on re parenting myself, redefining my desired self, taking some of the good I recall and mingling it with hope for the future. I write a lot of political editorials, now I am working on a website to help people find super affordable ways to have a home environment look and feel like their "Home" not our parents or siblings or some famous person's pristine decoration . My life is not on a path to decorate my home but to make it feel homey for my body and my interests. I don't want or have tons of cash so i find creative ways to refinish thrown away furniture, (I might consider it is myself that is being refinished symbolically) .
My suggestion, take your time, if people are not supportive or helpful and are in fact destructive to how you wish to feel and be, cut them loose. You don't need to serve them Turkey and Pie on Thanksgiving day as a reward for abusing you. I am inviting some older women to my holidays this year, I m calling it orphan holdiay, to everyone in my area who is orphaned by death or by necessity to save your sanity. I read about it in an article recently so am going to take a leap of faith it will be a good idea and have a reasonable outcome.
To everyone suffering from Complex PTSD or PTSD. You never deserved the trauma in the first place and you still don't. Be kind to yourself, I mean extra extra kind. It is brutal this road to healing but with it comes lots of wins, lots of progress and those who diminish your burdens of pain, don't really deserve you. You deserve so much more. Don't we all?
P.S. love the article!
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5260135/
A couple years later, she offered to pay for a plane ticket for me to visit her. Needless to say, I never visited her again! [Later on "Family Feud," they had a question: What DOG commands, when given to a PERSON, would make you MOST ANGRY? I got 2 of them right!!!]
Have you ever heard of a mother doing something this crummy to an adult daughter, when she knows she has an audience? At the time, I was 52 and she was 77. She died last year at age 93, without ever having dementia, so there was literally NO EXCUSE for this behavior.