Sometimes the power of simply being present may give us more than a thousand words or attempts to ‘help’ that are really just frantic ways of running. It does not seem easy for many of us to be truly present with each other a lot of the time, let alone with ourselves and in PTSD when the fear/flight/fight system is activated the last thing we think to do is attend to the breath.. At such times for many of us who nearly did it can feel like we are truly dying…..
Being present with myself and my own breath is taking time.. Being present with my sister just for a couple of hours a week works better when there is not a lot said…and when I am not running around trying to fix something unfixable. Lately I feel even more love available in moments of presence and even gentle activity in nature.. I am noticing lately as I become more mindful that I tend to get more stressed when I am trying to clean or control my environment.. doing that and panicking comes as second nature as it is what I witnessed in childhood. Letting that pattern go and easing up on myself with the punishing self talk is taking time, seeing when the perfectionism overruns me and makes it hard to breathe even longer but it is happening thankfully.
My breath was arrested so many times (especially following the head trauma and taking on so much by going overseas alone in the aftermath of that fight with my Mum and sister) I got to the point I was paralysed nearly every day (and I chose to react that way. the didn’t force me to go, just made it uncomfortable for me to be grieving when all that emerged 11 years into sobriety)….Gaining effective insight and applying it diligently in action in regards to my breath and pacing myself sure takes time.
Emerging From The Dark Night 