2022 is the Year of Weird Christmas Socks
2022: Year of the Weird Christmas Socks
I start this year in conscious reflection that I really like who and what I am right now. I’ve been living intentionally, succeeding at being who I want to be. I’m a place where I want to enjoy this peace for awhile instead of knocking myself out over incremental improvements; the relative modesty of my year’ ( Read more... )
Therapy: I have 2 goals in mind, 1 short-term "first aid," and 1 longer-term reconciliation.
I'm sure you saw on Facebook that my mother moved in with me during the last few weeks of her life in November. I posted some stories about that on Facebook - but there were more events around that which I didn't feel were appropriate to share in that forum. Just hard times caring for someone who's dying. Despite that I tried hard to arrange circumstances to avoid triggering influences, they made it through. Some were easy like throwing out the air fresheners with the scent that then became "Dying Mom" and installing new ones, or having our carpets professionally cleaned - but there's other triggers like waking up before dawn, seeing dim nightlights down the hall, and recalling her calling out, or the morning she fell. That sort of thing. I am hopeful these won't be long term Messed Up things, but I think I could benefit from some "first aid" from a therapist to work through memories of those tough moments. It will be good for me.
The longer-term stuff is finally unpacking the events of childhood trauma. I went through a lot of it in a really tumultuous upbringing. I thought I made it through "okay," and in fact I take a lot of pride in what a shiny adult I turned out to be! Social progress has opened up a lot of just general discussion around topics like how people deal with trauma. I've heard a lot in the past couple of years about how "trauma lives in the body, not in the mind," and how it can affect out fight / flight / fawn / freeze responses later in life. Now I can see those patterns in my response to great fear, abandonment, anger. I see that it's not particularly "normal" or healthy to have screaming matches with loved ones. That's how I was raised, though - and after 50 years, maybe it's time I examine that with a professional and learn to crawl out of it? (Thus, with Covid, I'm not especially in a hurry. This can wait out Omicron.)
T.
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