Still

It still crops up. Usually when I least expect it. Memory pain. Last night and this morning I had that recurring pain in my leg. I haven't struggled with it in a while, so I immediately began wondering. Trying to figure out a cause. Fussing at myself for hurting again.

It still comes. Pain and memories. I don't seek them out, and sometimes I can't figure out the trigger. And maybe there is no trigger. Maybe it's just part of the reality of surviving the abuse. It becomes a mind race of sorts. Don't let the pain throw me back into old coping mechanisms. Don't start berating myself for things that aren't (never were) my fault.

So I am reminded again of that phrase that my counselor has used and that I have read too many times to count. Be still and sit with the pain. Don't panic. Don't run from it. Accept it. And in my stillness the pain may not subside, but it doesn't increase. Deep breathing. Being still. Accepting. These are all good things. Things I can do. Reminders it is not my fault. Not then and not now.

linking up with Five Minute Friday

Approving of Myself

So it's been a rough week. A flashback that led to a hard therapy session, that led to another flashback, that led to lots of memory pain and assorted issues that stem from the abuse. 

And now it's Monday morning, and emily is exhorting me to Dare to Love Yourself. I do love myself, don't I? I just have trouble approving of myself. Not judging myself. Not criticizing myself.

I know the abuse wasn't my fault. I know it as well as I can at this point. But there is that little voice in my head that says, each time something new comes up or something old comes around again, "You're just an attention whore. You just want to be the center of the universe and have everyone's undivided attention."

I stop and have that conversation with myself, again, about why would I make up stories? What's the point to it? What's the benefit to me of being in such pain that I spend a day curled up in bed trying to ward off the memory of pain inflicted on my body 45 years ago? Why can't I just let it go and move on? 

I asked my husband how I can be who I am today -- a college graduate with a Master's degree, the mother of 2 children, a wife, a cook, a homemaker, a friend, a writer(?), an encourager -- when all those awful things happened to me, and they keep floating around in my head hindering what I want to be doing? Doesn't my ability to function negate the likelihood that all those awful things really happened? And he put it in perspective for me, again. My assumption is anyone who is functional has never suffered. He reminds me that everyone has trouble and struggles. That we are all trudging along doing the best we can with whatever baggage we carry. And it helps all of us to help each other carry those loads.

So, do I love myself? Yes, but I need to work on it. I need to learn to love me as much as I love you. And while I'm at it, I need to cut everybody a little slack for bad days.

Peace.

linking up with a love dare

Memory Pain and Reminders of Hope

The last day or two have been a little rough.
The return of memory pain -- in spades this morning, led my husband to remind me of this portion from The Voyage of the "Dawn Treader" by C.S. Lewis.

The water was a clear as anything and I thought if I could get in there and bathe it would ease the pain in my leg. But the lion told me I must undress first. Mind you, I don't know if he said any words out loud of not.

"I was just going to say that I couldn't undress because I hadn't any clothes on when I suddenly thought that dragons are snaky sort of things and snakes can cast their skins. 

. . . So I started scratching a little deeper and, instead of just scales coming off here and there, my whole skin started peeling off beautifully, like it does after an illness, or as if I was a banana. In a minute or two I just stepped out of it. I could see it lying there beside me, looking rather nasty. It was a most lovely feeling. So I started to go down into the well for my bathe.

"But just as I was going to put my foot into the water I looked down and saw that it was all hard and rough and wrinkled and scaly just as it had been before. Oh, that's all right, said I, it only means I had a smaller suit on underneath the first one, and I'll have to get out of it too. So I scratched and tore again and this under skin peeled off beautifully and I stepped and left it lying beside the other one and went down to the well for my bathe.

"Well exactly the same thing happened again. . . 

"Then the lion said -- . . . you will have to let me undress you. I was afraid of his claw, I can tell you, but I was pretty nearly desperate now. So I just lay flat down on my back and let him do it.

"The very first tear he made was so deep that I thought it had gone right into my heart. And when he began pulling the skin off, it hurt worse than anything I've ever felt. The only that made me able to bear it was just the pleasure of feeling the stuff peel off. You know -- if you've ever picked the scab of a sore place. It hurts like billy-oh but it is such fun to see it coming away."

"Well he peeled that beastly stuff right off . . . and there it was lying on the grass: only ever so much thicker, and darker, and more knobbly looking that the others had been. And there was I as smooth and soft as a peeled switch and smaller than I had been. Then he caught hold of me -- I didn't like that much for I was very tender underneath now that I'd skin on -- and threw me into the water. It smarted like anything but only for a moment. After that it became perfectly delicious and as soon as I started swimming and splashing I found that all the pain had gone from my arm. And the I saw why. I'd turned into a boy again."

And so I remember that God is stripping all that old, useless protective skin, so that I can be as He intended all along. And yes it hurts, but this pain is worth it.

Day 22 of 31

Well, I missed Day 21. No excuses, but maybe a few explanations. It was Sunday and I don't normally post on Sundays. I wasn't feeling great. Ds was home (unexpectedly) from college. I had leftover errands from Saturday. The Tennessee Titans actually won their game (we're 3-4).

But that was yesterday. Today is Day 22 and I'm back in the saddle.

Memory pain. This may not be a term you are familiar with, but let me assure you it's real. According to the IASP, pain is defined as "'an unpleasant sensory and emotional experience associated with actual or potential tissue damage, or described in terms of such damage'. 
This definition does not mention memory. It is clear, however, that the memory of pain often overshadows its primary experience in its impact upon pathophysiology and human suffering. Clinical interventions to blunt both the experience and persistence of pain or to lessen its memory are now applied worldwide." 

So I have memory pain. Pain that recurs in the places I was harmed as a child and an adult. The pain is real and sometimes staggering in its intensity. I deal with it using a combination of meditation, yoga, breathing exercises, and medication. I can go for weeks with constant pain, and other times I can go for weeks with no pain at all. It is not something I cause or make happen, but the best method for dealing with for me has been to face it head on -- recognizing that it is just one more form of the abuse I suffered. I don't want to hurt, but I do. Ignoring it doesn't work any better than trying to ignore the memories worked. 
So I write, and I breathe. I stretch and I rest. I say nice things to myself, and I acknowledge that this isn't my fault any more than it was my fault when the abuse actually took place.
But it's difficult. Pain is always difficult, but it's even worse when you have to explain that the pain is caused by a memory of pain and injury. Like the amputee who has pain in the foot that isn't there anymore. It sounds a little crazy. So I don't talk about it much, because I fear it adds fuel to the "crazy fire", and I'm terrified of being labelled that way.