recovery

i wanted to share with you what i battle with on a near daily basis.

there reason i want to share this with you is so that you lose a little of the fear of what people will think of you. i have lost a little of that fear, but even so the other day someone i have known for years deleted me from Facebook , but i am learning to say fuck it more, even though this is a concept quite alien to me and i always think i shall get told off for swearing.

 

So I am sitting in Waitrose. There is so much I cld write, but I feel like I am going to cry. I try to stay in the present moment, sitting in the corner. I, unlike Baby, like being in the corner. From here I can see it all and no one can be watching me from behind. I feel safe in the corner.

 

I listen to a couple of old dears talking about how they have to pick up their sushi from the sushi bar. I write things in my diary to help me feel like I am busy. I have put a line through all Tuesday afternoons whilst Zaria is at nursery to try get jenuine.co.uk going more. I can’t hear any other conversations to distract myself from the fact I do want to cry. Fresh back from Brighton yesterday, proud of myself for managing to feel anxiety free to do the trip, to do the drive (5 hours), to have managed a night without hurting my skin, my eyes (thank you mirtzapine) But I want to cry.

 

Writing that now has made wanting to cry even worse. There is now a tear on my left eye. I can’t cry here in the corner, in Waitrose. And what normally happens is by the time I get home, safe to cry, I won’t cry. I know that the lifelong harming of my eyes is something I started instead of crying. Don’t cry. Don’t be sad. What have you got to be sad about. It’s all about you. Don’t cry or I will give you something to cry about. And then when that something has happened, still don’t cry. Tears can make you confused. Tears can make you angry. you’re too sensitive. you’re too weak.

So here in Waitrose, listen to the chatter, to the laughter, to the coffee machine doing its thing, listen to life. Try to see some colours… play the Game of Fives. Bring my back to the present moment.

Five things I can hear… the man collecting the trays with the China chinging, the near and distant chatter, the coffee machine gurgling, The air conditioning unit rumbling, chairs being dragged over the floor.

Five things I can smell… the chemical spray as the tables are cleaned. My coffee. Fresh air through the open door. The wanting of wine. Imaginary cigarette smoke.

Five colours I can see… black outfits, there is a distinct lack of colour in here, grey chairs, off white tables, a yellow beware of wet floor sign, a green escape sign on the ceiling.

I would like to escape. The man in the sign is running. I would like to run and cry. I would like to run and breathe out this pain. Writing that makes me want to cry more. I would like to run, run and scream, run away from the tears. Out run the flow. Run away from myself.

Some days, most days, it is like there is this sadness trapped deep inside me, somewhere, possibly it is the heart area. A darkness, something that makes it hard to breathe, a sludge like mud you can wade through, or get stuck in and sink and drown. Nothing I do ever makes it go away: but maybe if I run. I am trying to get to know the sludge more and more. I feel there may be something precious hidden deep down there. Buried treasure. Gems. A gift.

Why am I sad? It is a year since he left. The trauma of that, the broken dream. The dream I folded up and tucked away in my last journal. without a choice, a new chapter started.

I dab my eyes with my top. I am not going to swallow this sadness down with wine and I am not going to put up a smoke screen with cigarettes. I want to know these tears. I want to know this sadness. I want to understand how it has left me covered in scars. I want to be able to cry, these eyes that are so damaged from me rubbing them away since the age of 6 or 7.

The medication helps. I sleep. I sleep so so well, sometimes I feel too well. The other night I slept through the biggest storm I have known Exeter has had. I would have liked to have experienced that energy. But the sleep is so good. I still have the odd dream, a dream that will speak to me, like I have written here. It is so good to have a break from my head, safe in my bed. Head hits pillow, sleep, wake up in sensible morning.

This safety thing is big for me. I want to feel safe. I do not think I have ever ever felt it in any relationship, family friends and partners. So yes safe with my girls, definitely safe with my daughters so that is something. So here is what happened a year ago, a year and 3 days… if I write it and publish it maybe it will lose its power over me… if they ever make a film of my life this will be an important scene. but the pain, the ptsd, was there before he came along.

It is a year and four days since he left in the cruel way he did.

We were in town, he was going to pay me the last bit of money he owed from what he had stolen from me. I was so happy. i loved that man. i had my little family dream. he left me with a kiss, he said that he wld go to bank to get that money and also deposit for amazing holiday to Jamaica we had booked. He was saying about getting married there. He said he wld be 5 minutes. He said make sure my phone was on loud. I smiled and said ok.

And I went to shop to buy some holiday things. I waited for the phone to ring. I waited in the same place he left me. I got worried he wld be angry if I was not in the right place if I moved too far from where I was. I waited and waited with our little girl in her buggy.

I was so so happy that morning. I felt like all the pain and lies and abandoning were over. That we had finally made it to the end and the start of a proper life. I waited and waited. I waited.

I started to feel sick. no, i told myself, no he won’t have done that. no, it’s ok. but I started to feel like I was going to cry. The city centre was busy and hot and people were smiling and laughing… summer holidays, as my world fell apart. the cracks started to form and i had to sit down, i sat outside Pret a mange, a band played. the band started to play a song… the song was called cocaine… cocaine… cocaine… and I thought it was some cruel joke. I thought I was in the truman show. i could not breathe. Being filmed for a real reaction of when your world falls apart. I shattered. I unravelled. Yes, to that song I realised he had gone off with his one true love, Charlie, the one he spend all his money on. The one that wld make him smile. The one who he wld abandon us for. I would be lucky if I ever got bought a coffee. He wld sniff her up like she was the best thing he had ever smelt… cocaine. we have not seen him since. Next day he left for Birmingham. Drug Debts made him run. charlie made him run away with her. 

 

the worst day of my life, maybe. I never saw it coming at all, blindsided, even with all the lies before. He has not seen his daughter for a year. Part of the ptsd work I have been doing at exeter university mood disorders clinic is to tell the story without it having such emotional power of me. So here it is. Still can’t believe the band played that song. sometimes i am happy the band played that song, it makes me feel as though there is some synchronicity in it all, like god may be watching over me.

 

I walk home, not run. i count blue things that i see. there are many blue things. stay in today. just keep breathing. be true to you. today i have also started a course, a “30 day Empath Starter Programme”, from Carla Gadyt at http://ajourneybacktoself.com

and i hope it helps me reclaim my broken pieces with gold and rejoice in my sensitivity.

#complexposttraumaticstressdisorder #ptsd #surviving #days #crying #tryingtocry #innerchild #mindfulness #breathe #presentmoment #recovery #cocaine #addiction #al-anon #NAfamilygroup #stayintoday