My Support Forums - View Single Post

Kiya · Feb 09, 2009, 09:17 PM

Peaches, I totally hear you. Like everyone's saying, you spelled this out loud and clear. I could have written this (had I such clear words as you). I just went through this. And instead of "numbness", or rather berfore it, I self injured. No one was there, like you said. I was abandoned and lost, panic was overwhelming me.... no one answered their phone, dr's had already gone home.... there was nothing left. In fact, with your permission, I'd like to print out the whittled down version (below) and take it to t because it clearly defines what I went through.

In the meantime, sending you LOTS and LOTS of hugs (full well knowing nothing can replace T).

Quote:

Originally Posted by peaches100

somebody might understand. Or at least I can share it and know somebody will hear.

For awhile after t leaves, I get along fine. Keep myself very busy. Not let myself ruminate. Do life. But eventually, a certain spiral begins. there's no emotion yet. Just that empty, aching, pulling sensation. It is so uncomfortable. It's a physical hurting.
But once I become aware of the aching pulling feeling, I can't seem to block it out. At some point, I realize that the painful physical feeling must have something to do with my t being away. It feels like a "missing" or "going without." I tell myself that I'm fine and she'll be back soon, that I am an adult, and there is no reason to feel this way.

But as time goes on, feeling rises into a sort of panicked feeling. Like I need rescue but nobody is coming. The realization that neither t, nor anyone else, can rescue me from this feeling. At some point, it sinks in that this feels so bad, it can't just be about my t going on vacation. It has to be more. It has to be all the times in my life I've felt left behind, left alone invisible. I don't want to remember those times! I don't want to remember that feeling. By now, the pain is trying to push it's way out, and I am running from it. But eventually, the disappointment sinks in. The "I screamed for help and nobody came" feeling. A part of me knows that I'm overreacting, that t hasn't abandoned me. That I'm not that little girl facing a crisis all alone. But it feels that way. Every bit that way. In every cell of my body, every fiber of my being. I feel devastated and utterly abandoned. And then finally . . .I feel angry. Angry at t for not being there. Angry at myself for becoming attached and having to feel this way. The tough, armored me arrives, cynical and swaggering, with her heart slammed shut and announcing that "I don't care anyway, I don't need t, I don't need anyone!"

And then. . .just. . .numbness.

By the time t gets back in town, and I arrive at my session, I feel numb and all closed down. I don't want to look at her face. I don't want to connect. Even though nothing terrible happened during her absence, it was the being triggered that was terrible. It was the abandonment feelings that were the crisis. All the child part of me knows is that she suffered and hurt and t wasn't there, nobody was. I felt abandoned me in my time of need. I hate this. I hate PTSD. I hate BPD.