Personal Update

I wanted to share this with you guys. It is something I do for myself in therapy to periodically mark where I am in my own healing.

I hope by posting it that others might be inspired to mark their own journey :-)

At some points there is a need to evaluate how things are going. In the beginning this measurement came more from our psychologist than internally, as just 'holding on' was all one could do.

Accomplishments:

1) Daily work life is noticeably less stressful internally.

a. Anxiety attacks when walking into the office in the AM are down from every day to only 1-2 days a week.

b. Communication with manager and team members has resulted in less stress over daily work loads.

c. End of work day is now more peaceful. I no longer sit in the car and cry at the end of most days.

Yes, us too! Accolades to you and to all of us!

2) Internal Hope has been activated.

a. First time that I can remember, I have a sense of believing that I can have a life I want to live.

b. Since HOPE stone, I have not had many SU/SI thoughts. Any that do come up are easy to toss away by touching HOPE.

Cheers to this too! We just re-found the lost Hope Stone and with it the meaning.

3) Internal communication has been markedly improved.

a. Alters in the system are now actively willing to communicate with me in a peaceful and respectful manner.

b. Our system has established nightly family meetings which provide all members in our house the chance to bring up any concerns or problems.

c. Members of the family are supporting each other a little more now rather than just interacting with me alone. This allows healing to take place between blocked sections.

d. All members feel safer in telling me the truth when I ask about an emotion or memory.

Support, communication, willingness all ring true! Thanks for the reminder and putting it succinctly. Trying it and liking it but not at first. Just seemed bizarre at first.

4) Trauma Healing is taking place.

a. Flashbacks have been intense. I was not sure I could make it through some of them. But my own strength has impressed me. The support of my therapist and friends has been vital for me.

b. Once the memory is processed through, I am finding that the next flashback of the same event is shorter in duration and carries less emotional charge.

c. The amount of time it takes me to recover from new memory flashbacks / new information from alters who hold memories is getting shorter. This means I am learning internally how to process correctly those memories.

Oh, yes, very much! Trauma flashbacks tore us up early but thanks to our kind psychologist and friends we made it through and now repeatedly going through one and then the next one the intensity seems more able to get through.



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