Flashback hell

Here I am, in flashback hell.

T and I have been dancing around something that happened to me at age 8. I have an 8 year old part who doesn't speak. I can't open my grown-up mouth to talk about it. It's just LOOMING there. We've talked about how hard it is to talk about it. T does know bits and pieces of it - over the course of therapy, I've managed to write a bit, tell a bit, and he's guessed the rest. But we haven't really WORKED on it. It's been looming there since early in therapy. It terrifies me.

T says he gets that I feel like I will just die if I talk about it. And I do feel like that. He says I won't, and I know that's true. Logical me knows that. But how do I get the rest of me to understand that?

I am supposed to be dissecting crayfish with my kids and another boy I do science with on Mondays (I homeschool). But I am like frozen with fear. And being frozen is making the flashbacks continue. It's a horrible spiraly cycle I can get out of.

I DO NOT WANT TO TALK ABOUT THIS IN THERAPY. And I don't want to be stuck with it. What I want is for it to never have happened I was stuck in that place for a LONG LONG LONG time with the stuff that happened to me when I was 4 and 5...but we managed to work through it. I was sick for two months - really really physically sick - while we did it.

I know I have to process this and let it go. I don't know how. I don't even know how to get through the day today - to make myself be brave and strong enough to stand up and get out these crayfish and get to work. I feel so small and helpless.

(((treehouse)))

Treehouse - I hope you can process this part of you in therapy - your therapist sounds really good and you clearly trust what he is doing. As for getting through the day, well, I guess trying to not think of the whole day stretching ahead of you but look at small chunks of time and what you are going to do in the next 10 minutes - I'm sure you know all this.

Yuck - dissecting crayfish - don't envy you that one! But it will hopefully keep you occupied and keep the kids' attention. I admire you for homeschooling - not something I could do, I don't think - not enough patience and too selfish.

Take care

You have to learn to stop those thoughts and continue without them. My t told me to literally say, "STOP". Then to focus on concrete things around me. Working on the crayfish should be a great way to keep those thoughts in check. Make yourself get started. Distraction will help. It really will. It will get you out of your head for awhile. Do exactly what you think you can't do. Get out those crayfish and dissect away. You have to actively make yourself do something else. Don't say you can't. You can. Get up and move. Get today going.

I really don't know if I CAN. This hasn't happened to me in so long. I'm afraid to stand up I don't know what will happen.

Yes you CAN. Stand up. Look around you. Take inventory of every solid object in the room. (chair, desk, pillow, clock). Look at them. Focus on the concrete. Go grab a crawfish. Set up and get ready to teach. You will get out of your head that way. You are ruminating over this. The only way to stop is to make yourself stop. Distract yourself right now. Get away from the computer. Move around. Make up the beds. Mop the floor. DO something. You CAN do this.

i wrote them down and e-mailedthem to t. i don'twant them, he can have them.

i'm scared to stand up. i'll try.

(((((((Treehouse))))))
Please do what you need to take care of yourself. Can you call T? Leave him a message if he doesn't answer and let him know you need him to call back?
I hope this doesn't last.

pdoc says to lift your chin and point it at the ceiling if standing up is too much.
it's enough to break the spiral for me.
the first time he had to do it himself because i felt too silly to do it. but he did it and then i did it and it was enough to ground me.

There you go. You gave them away. Now stand up and grab that crawfish (I doubt you can think of much else but a crawfish when you have it in your hands. Yuck!).

treehouse: I care about you. You'll get through this, I know.

I talked to T. There was a moment in the phone call when *snap* I was present. I could all of a sudden taste the sour gum in my mouth, feel the carpet I was laying on, see the colors of the sweaters hanging next to me (I was in my closet on the phone).

Now I'm scared I'm in trouble. But I'm trying not to spiral out about it. Just get through one moment at a time.

tree That all sounds unbelievably hard and painful.

You have come through so much, I know you'll come through this. Still, that probably doesn't comfort you much right now as you're in the midst of this.

I'm so glad you talked to T and felt a moment of being present. I hope you feel better as the day goes on!!

((((treehouse))))

That moment when you found yourself present...try to remember that moment. If you feel yourself getting pulled into a flashback, stop and try to notice how the chair feels against your legs, or how the gum tastes in your mouth. Pick one little thing and just 'notice' it.

Take a big, cleansing breath, and drink some extra water. Whenever we are processing a lot of emotions, we need extra fluid to flush those extra hormones out of our system. Also, it can be helpful to eat something a little sweet, or something 'comforting'.

I know you can do this.
Even if you don't feel like it right now, I have faith in you.

Many peaceful and present thoughts for you.

((((Tree))))

I sure hope I didn't trigger this for you after all the stuff we talked about. I am really worried about you and hope you are are safe. When do you see T?

I homeschool my kids too and sometimes you just have to change the subject. But I imagine it would harder since you work with kids who are not your own and if you have already told them. My daughter wants to be a vet and I know there is lots of dissection you have to do for that, but she will be going to public HS in a year and she can take that there. lol I am just too sensitive about animals, I cried in class when the teacher scrambled the frogs brain in order to dissect it alive and that was in the 9th grade.

(((((Tree)))) I hope you are sleeping at this point. It seems almost impossible to go to those places where we DONT want to go.

Im so glad you got to talk to T. I know you can come out of this without getting sick and spiriling downward.

Have a peaceful nights sleep. Maybe try not to do so much with the kids tomorrow. Think of all of the soothing things you have said to me and all of us here when we felt like we were in trouble.

Be gentle with Tree in the morning.....I love you, dear friend

oh tree, I know how hard this is. You have so much love & support here. We are sitting with you, walking through this with you. You can do this because you ARE doing it.

((((((((((((((((((((((Everyone))))))))))))))))))))))))))

I can not begin to tell you how much the support here means to me. It really helps to have people to talk to who understand.

I e-mailed T yesterday after our conversation (and called to tell him I e-mailed) and told him that I was afraid I was in trouble (and I was, and am, because of something he said in our phone call). I asked him to reply in my e-mail, using the SPECIFIC words that he tells me to use. And HE NEVER REPLIED. He always replies if I ask him to. So, AM I in trouble??

I seriously, seriously, seriously HATE therapy sometimes. I can't figure out if it's me or T. And we've talked about this before. It's like I get to this place of feeling loved, and comfortable, and safe, and then yucky flashbacky stuff happens (probably because I feel safe enough to deal with stuff) and then there is a rupture with T. This has happened over and over and over again in my therapy. I literally don't know if it's me or if it's him. It feels like it's both of us. And T said that he probably does play a part. My part makes sense to me...It would make sense that I would rather pull away than talk about this hard stuff. But what about T? He's admitted in the past that it's hard for him to hear the CSA stuff because he cares about me so much, and because his daughter is the same age I was when a lot of this stuff happened, and there's all kinds of transference (or countertransference or whatever).

Did I mention I HATE THERAPY? I see T at 5. I don't want to spend the session hashing out this e-mail thing.

I really just want to know if I'm in trouble.

Tree

I'm so confused how you would think that you're in trouble with your T?

I am so right there with you on this - it's happened a few times now, where I've felt so connected to T, so safe and loved, and then T says or does something that pushes me back! Like telling me that she's going to let me down, or telling me she already has let me down and that I should be upset with her. I don't understand it. Maybe it is counter-transference on T's part, does she not want to be connected to me? I keep wondering if it's me, and if it's worth feeling so connected to her and being more and more open and vulnerable with her, if this is what's going to happen every single time, because it's freakin' painful!

I wish you the best in your session with T later today. I hope you're not in trouble! And I hope that you and T have a good talk about this latest rupture - that's what I'll be doing in session tomorrow evening!

I don't understand why you think you are in trouble. Can you elaborate?

I really don't want to. I'm sorry I'm sure I'm taking something he said and either hearing it wrong or blowing it out of proportion. That's what the LOGICAL part of me thinks. The rest of me? Terrified.

I seriously just wish he would respond to my e-mail.

Listen to the logical part of you. It's probably right.

It sounds like you are making a lot of progress. When I used to have flashbacks I wasn't able to write about them during, like you are here, and I had only a vague memory of it afterwards. So it sounds like you weren't dissociated which is good! My T has wanted me to call her during a flashback but I never can actually do that because of being dissociated.
Why would you think you are in trouble? You said you talked to T on the phone and then also emailed him and asked for a reply. It is perfectly okay to ask for what you want or need, but T may be really busy and cannot respond as quickly as you would like. I'm sure he will respond though if you asked him to.

Thanks, TayQuincy

I was *here*, which WAS good. And I was able to recognize what was happening - and that's good too. You're right.

But I wasn't able to shake the terror of it, and I wasn't able to avoid it turning into a potential rupture Those parts are bad.

Good and bad, both.

i also feel like i've commited some cardinal sin when i'm in an emotinal flahback...its not that theres pictures and sounds to go with it, its just an overall feeling of aloness and abandoment and the not feeling entitled to seek out some warmth from someone that we feel can feel for us and so any response I get I cant relax with it....feels like perhaps i could have just got through it alone...i prOberly could but why? Its ok to want to have someone there in those lost moments.