Free

Every morning since my second head injury I relive in my body what it was to nearly drown in my own phlegm when my punctured lung bled fluid at 17….after years of dental reconstructions and tooth removal I struggle with breathing, with digestion, with waking, with falling asleep, a reality I could never communicate to someone who has not lived through trauma… My oldest nephew called me a ‘vortex’ when he cut me out of his life last year.. was it my fault? Such is the pain we go through in PTSD faced with a world that doesn’t have a clue.

Most mornings I relive the entrapment but today something powerful happened, I felt the rush of energy that came as they liberated my body from the wreckage. I was overcome with feelings and relivings and triggers this mornings.. I could see the paramedics hovering over me trying to get an oxygen mask on me, I felt the pain and terror and then I saw my Mum next to me or felt her holding my hand. Miraculously when I crashed in September 1979 a family friend was travelling along the same road and he was able to call my mother to come to the scene of the crash. I talked to my Mum about a lot of things after I finally got sober in 1993 but not at all about how this was for her, although prior to the second injury I sustained overseas on the back of a healing session about the first I experienced how it was for my father who waited at the hospital and didn’t recognise the girl screaming and crying as she was wheeled past him in the hospital corridor…

Coming out of that session in June 2005 I crashed again and split my head open on an iron foundry.. I came to in the ambulance saturated in pain, disorientation and a terrible nausea, but the difference that was that I was all alone, I had taken myself away again after Jonathan left me even though everything in me needed and wanted to be with my Mum.. my avoidance and difficulty expressing and having feelings validated by her pushed me away. My therapist always reminds me of this when I blame myself…

On the back of the head injury many of you know I ended up in Glastonbury for some months before deciding to come home… I just felt I could not survive that far away but coming back was even more problematic as I one sister going into breakdown, one in high level care and a mother who had ongoing health issues due to her own trauma and complicated, unresolved grief..

My older sister died 3 years after I moved back home in 2011 and the anniversary of her passing is in 5 days time… my other sister has been hospitalised all up about 8 times since then.. The latest time out of care has been the longest and she seems to be doing better but I sense she really needs inner child work. I sensed this yesterday when she stood a long way back from her granddaughter when we went to drop of her presents and after as we wandered the abandoned shopping centre with a take away coffee both of us at a loose end.. My sister said to me quietly “I think I need to find a hobby to fill my days” I felt the sadness in her after we left her sons’ place.. there is a lot that has gone on and it made me more aware of my sister in the early hours of today too. In a few days she is moving into Mum’s unit and I cannot help but worry but probably she will be okay, together there is a binding back that is happening…after so many generations splintered and disconnected.. I just don’t know if my sister has separated psychologically from Mum, but maybe she has, just in a different way.

Today actually felt for the first time how it was for my mother to see me torn apart at 17, she could not support me in the following years.. when she found out about my first two terminations a short time after my father died by sneaking a look at my journals she only confronted me with a sense of deep shame… It was shortly after this she encouraged me to go overseas all alone…I only have memories of my Mum pushing me away and my therapist believes I experience this push pull dynamic in all of my relationships…Mum encouraged us to be independent but longed for her girls as surrogate siblings too, since she had none.

I have been aware over past days I am carrying so much sadness and anger over a past I found it so hard to move on from…my therapist says she believes she is seeing movement in me and changes and attempts to move forward.. being able to go and see my grandniece yesterday meant a lot but it worried me because not having my own children I don’t want to steal the limelight from my sister. I worry a lot about other’s feelings at times…so much grief burst out of me as soon as I dropped her off for my unborn babies…and life of struggle in relationships and with sustaining healthy attachments.

I see more and more these days that for me happiness comes from being emotionally connected and engaged.. I had beautiful friend from school I recently reconnected with at our 40th reunion reach out to me yesterday to see how I was after I was brave enough to share on Facebook that I was struggling.. Today when I was in the PTSD vortex her lovely face came to me and gave me help, it was a positive touch stone in what is often a dark spiral that can engage me, living all alone, battling to be close with my family who don’t understand the full ramifications of what I go through..

I am grateful today for these blessings.. Having someone care enough to reach out helps me so much as is, as I see it, one of the gifts that is coming out of this time of social distancing and isolation….I listened to a lovely programme on using art and creativity today to stay connected to self on the radio that I will share the link to later. The guy who was interviewed is a Purlitzer Prize winning author and art critic and in the interview he spoke of how moving through embarrassment is very essential to any artistic or creative process.. He said facing our demons of fear in creating is a very important thing, as is trying to recognise the grains of truth in some criticism….

Today there is a sense of freedom.. I have a free day today with no commitments.. yesterday was busy catching up with a friend and family.. I like having both dualities in my life.. time with others and time to breathe and connect inward alone.. there could be no more perfect time to do that than at this time of Covid 19 lockdown and crisis.. Hope everyone else is finding things to sustain their souls at this time and able to count their blessings.. A healthy dose of gratitude goes a long way towards making a day more full of peace and serenity.