Posted on by histrionicabutterfly · 1 Comment

I Am Amazing

And isn’t it amazing?
Oh
Life can be amazing
Oh
I feel my heartbeat racing
I fly
Soaring ever higher I can light my inner fire
And then we’ll see what happens now, what happens now
~ Pink Zebra, Amazing

I’m hitting a good stride with living day-to-day. I don’t know how long it’ll last, but i’m trying not to think about that, as i know that can be all it takes to trip me up – fear and doubt lead quickly to obsession. I have many years of experience that tell me i will occasionally fall down a hole, or get lost in the weeds. Living with multiple-diagnosis, serious mental illness, makes it fairly likely, i think. I’m almost reconciled to it, and i’ve turned my attention to getting as skilled as i can at picking myself back up, learning what i can from the fall, and getting back to the business of being as functional and helpful of a human being as i’m able.

I’ve explained why i call myself Histrionica – in short, because i’m dramatic. My emotions have been hard for me to handle. In the past i felt them intensely when i felt them at all, and tended to discharge them in a hyperbolic (histrionic) fashion. Even though i’ve learned a lot and am moving away from that, i’m keeping the name. Part of my personality that i may have been born with, or might have developed out of my mutant imagination/multiplicity, is that i’m a hell of an actor. So it still fits, just in a slightly different, and much healthier way.

Now let me share why my last name is Butterfly. Sure, it’s obvious, but my therapist wants me to celebrate what makes me awesome, so i’m writing about it. One can easily equate my life with that of a caterpillar, wingless, but with many different sets of feet, all working together to get me where i needed to go. When i finally got there, i could at last rest, the worst was behind me (fingers crossed, let’s employ some optimism here), and so i built a dream room around me and went to sleep. I did so much work there, in my dreaming room, on my soft and safe bed. Transforming myself into what i should have been. A transmutation from sleep into wakefulness, from death to life.
Now, i am emerging and preparing to fly.
I wave my wings back and forth to help them dry, and i admire their intricate and unique beauty.

I say it often, but it will always bear repeating, for me if no one else: I am not who i was born to be. I was brought into this world to serve the needs and whims of my mother, and through my utter subservience to her, i should have become a thing easily used by anyone who wished after her complete ownership of me had passed.
And while it happened on a smaller scale here and there, mostly through my friendships with (some) other women, it didn’t happen with men, which was an unexpected and good thing.

While i identify as queer, i’ve mostly dated and had relationships with men. Perhaps my first relationship, which was deeply obsessive, incredibly immature, and painfully toxic –and with a woman– left me gun-shy towards women for anything but an occasional bed partner. And now, with a much more experienced and knowledgeable eye i can look back on my involvement in the LGBTQ community and see that all manner of presentations of genders and sexual identities were open to me. It doesn’t change anything on the outside, as i’m in a committed, monogamous, hetero relationship, but it does add something more to the mosaic of colours and patterns of these glorious wings of mine.

And despite the fact that my mother was the first to sexually abuse me, she was viciously homophobic. She knew i was with a woman when she died. At the time i was still very much under her control, so i was ashamed. Now, i know it must have twisted her up and filled her with angry hate, and i’m glad.

Another way i am not who i was raised to be is that i’ve mostly managed to avoid sexual entanglements with controlling people.
I should have been easy prey for such a one. I should have hooked up with another sociopath like my mother, who would have seen me as a possession, a vessel to hold their emotional garbage, a font ever-flowing with love and acceptance, a resource to be used up and emptied out until nothing remained. A few abusers tried, but i was either oblivious, or danced blithely away from their overtures.
Amazing that i did that, but i did.

Cue my choice in partner. My husband is not controlling, nor is he controllable, and to my shame, i have tried very hard to do so. Falling in love with him brought out all my fear-based and rejection-avoidant bad behaviours. He’s borne it all with patience, forgiveness, and more generosity and kindness than i have ever known. I knew i wanted him, but more than that, i was able to see that he was a quality human being. I gravitated toward good and kind, which is quite amazing – both being able to identify those characteristics, and in wanting them from the person i was in a relationship with.

Eventually, through the tumult and upheaval of our first decade of marriage, i found a therapist to whom i could actually speak. Actually my husband found her. I’d seen dozens of mental health professionals over the years and had almost given up finding someone who could help me. In desperation he called our local women’s shelter for advice, and they just happened to have a trauma informed therapist on staff who specialised in… multiples. I still chuckle every time i think of it.

And here comes the reeeeally awesome stuff.

I got down to work right away, and i’ve never stopped since i started working with her. It did take some time to establish trust and to build rapport, but once we had that foundation, i’ve tried everything she’s suggested (eventually, heh). I’ve turned an unflinching eye inward and looked at my past. I’ve picked it apart and i’ve poked at the wounds. I’ve felt absolute terror at the prospect, and yet i stopped lying and hiding, both from the truth of my abuse and from the way my brain works now as a result of it all. I tore down the altar that my mother’d built inside me for me to worship her, and i’ve burned that bitch in effigy, over and over, until all of her lies were ash inside me, and i spat them on her grave.

I’ve lost dear friendships to this work. Some i’ve let go of, and some have walked away. Some did so without a word, others had to hurt me before they left. I’ve cut off contact with all family, because they live in a world that i cannot and will not. I was either the scapegoat or the emotional dumping ground for them – usually both. Considering that my #1 job since birth was to absorb other people’s toxicity, the absolute priority being my mother’s, and then my Daddy’s, then my stepfather’s, then my siblings, then my extended family’s, this is an amazing accomplishment. More amazing still is that i no longer regret a single loss.

When my therapy moved from the initial big crisis, that being when my dissociative behaviours were completely out of my control, and we were able to move into much deeper stuff, i had more housecleaning to do. My manias and social anxiety had put my lifestyle in an unhealthy place. I was engaging in high risk activities with people whose lives revolved around these activities. I couldn’t wrap my mind around the concepts my dear Ms T was presenting to me in our sessions, nor could i turn my brain to the work. I was too frequently altered (that’s an unintentional DID joke, and i just snorted loudly, almost waking my husband, who’s sleeping beside me as i type), by any combination of drugs, alcohol, and social interactions.
So the next amazing thing i did was i left it all behind, and cut off almost all contact with the world outside my Little Crooked House. I let go of my addictive approval-seeking and need for validation. I set about learning how to get all the things that i so badly sought, from myself, and only myself.

Even when i thought i was done with therapy (i SO was not), i continued working on me. I had learned enough to know how to keep moving forward. Small, sustainable tweaks to my lifestyle, my relationships, and my thought patterns. Baby-stepping, with patience and forgiveness when i’d fall or fail – as i did regularly.
I learned how to live a functional life as a multiple – amazing.
I began losing weight and gaining fitness – amazing.
I was discovering what i wanted in life and was heading in that direction – amazing.
I found my voice to ask for what i wanted and state what i didn’t want from others –the ability to say No– amazing.

The next thing was venturing back out into the world to figure out who i wanted in it and who i didn’t. To test where i fit and felt good and where i didn’t or no longer wanted to. I socialised and participated in regular, day-to-day life stuffs, and as i bounced myself off the people and situations i encountered, extraneous chunks of personality that i’d carved into myself were chipped away. I began to see what was and wasn’t me. Amazing.

I felt a shifting inside my system, a reshuffling of the deck. I felt the gravity of what was happening and knew i needed to return to therapy. I didn’t dawdle or procrastinate – i sat my ass back down in a chair across from Ms T and started talking. And listening, and following her suggestions. More work, deeper work, more difficult and painful and constantly tiring than it had been before, but i waded into the fray and began resolutely baby-stepping my way through it. Amazing.

I’m still in it, still slogging through this particularly muddy trench, more psychically tired than i have ever been as an adult, but i remain true to myself, unswayed, unbowed, and less broken. I am gathering my shards and fragments to me and puzzling it all back together.
Gold fills the cracks.
I am Kintsugi.
I am not who i was intended to be.
I have fought my way out of a place where few who go are able to escape.
I am HistrionicaButterfly, and i am amazing.
I know that one day soon i’ll fly.

I believe that the gold to fill our cracks is inside us.
I believe there is light in the world to help us see it.
I believe there are tools in the world to help us mine it.

Times are scary and hard right now, but i’m hanging on. I keep company with those that are lights, and i use all the tools at my disposal. In spite of the chaos and uncertainty that surrounds me, i am baby-stepping still. And that includes doggedly pushing through this bit of therapy homework that Ms T calls “celebrating self”. She looks at me with proud, wet eyes and calls me “miraculous” and “superhero”. It doesn’t make my skin crawl half as much as it used to, and i believe there’ll come a day when it won’t at all.

Do what you can, and try to cut yourself a break for what you cannot.
Love and Peace in This Current Madness,
~H~

Posted on by histrionicabutterfly · 2 Comments

To Be a Real Girl

WARNING: This piece contains discussion of suicidal ideation and a description of an attempt. However, this is a positive piece and i am not currently suicidal, nor am i experiencing ideations.

**********

More on Tuesday’s therapy sesh with the lovely and talented Ms T.
I shared with her that i’d fallen so low that i was experiencing some serious suicidal ideation, and i was deeply disappointed in myself for it. I haven’t dealt with those thoughts and feelings in any serious way for a solid number of years. Sure, there had been some brief moments, sometimes intense, but i saw them for what they were as they were happening. They held no power over me. I could see that they were a direct response to something i was going through at the time, or something that had triggered me. I knew how to weather it, and that it would likely pass quickly. It always did.

This time the thoughts and feelings persisted. It’s been a shadow in my head casting a pall over my heart. I’ve been thinking that my loved ones would be better off without me. That i take up too much space and use up too much of their time and energy. I’ve been feeling unworthy of their love and support and concern. I see how much of our family business is in fact, my business. When i’m manic, or my system is in a panic, i stir everyone up. When i’m depressed and drowning in sadness and remembered pain, i clutch at them to save me, but it seems like i just pull them down with me.
I used to be angry about that – thinking it was because as the keeper of the home and hearth, i set the tone. I would think, Dammit! Stay out of my process, you make me feel guilty for being where i’m at – go be where YOU’RE at. This spot here is mine and these feelings are mine and just… Just stop copying me!
(That’s my Littles talking there; i’m not generally that immature. Heh.)

Now i see it differently. I see my responsibility in it –i did before, too– but it’s got a sour taste to it. Before, the conclusion i came to was that it was only natural, that as the carer and nurturer of the family unit, i would set the tone for the household. It made perfect sense that my other family members would feel low when i was down, would be brittle when i was anxious, warm and smiley when i was happy, snarky and snappish when i was angry. We love each other and we’re deeply connected. I’m the life-bringer, the nourishment provider, the space-maintainer. It is only the way it could be, considering the way our family is structured. That perspective felt right and good. But the way i see it now was working through me like slow poison.

I see how i’m hurting the people i love most and it’s dragging me down into an abyss. And i’m currently fighting a mania. One might think there is no darkness in mania, but oh, there can be for me. When i’ve gone dark during a mania i’ve displayed the riskiest behaviours, put myself in the most danger. I’m like a hurricane at night. It’s a terrible place, where some of my parts are swallowed whole, and the automatic death puppets in me come out and begin eating everything in sight.
I’m disappointed in myself, sad and low, and that empty pit inside has opened back up. I tell her i’m ashamed that i’m at this place again, after all these years and all this work.

I’m reminded first that shame is my body’s signal that i’m wanting connection with another human. And it is so, as i learned from her a few months ago, anytime i’ve felt shame i’ve been able to easily trace it to that desire. I’ve been able to ask for connection from safe people, like my husband and children, and a friend or 2, and shame has disappeared as the connection is responded to and made.
But then she casually says that she’s not at all surprised that i’m struggling afresh with suicidal thoughts and feelings. I don’t understand, but i am paying close attention. And then she says, “This work you’re doing – you are giving the same attention and care to your body as you have to your brain, and the split off bits of you that live there.”

I almost lean into the phone. Yes. Tick, tick, tick…

“How do you think your body felt when all those terrible things were being done to it?”

I can hear my own sharp intake of breath. Yessss. CLICK.

I wanted to die. I felt so covered in filth i wished i could stop existing. I wished it so hard in fact, that i created a Land of the Dead inside my own brain, where i went and hid for the majority of my upbringing. When the worst of the abuse was finally over, one of the first things i did was take an overdose of the medication i took for epilepsy. When my Daddy was finally out of my life, and my mother moved to a little town where no one knew i’d once been for sale, i had some relief for the first time i could remember. I poked my head out from my safe graveyard, and i simply could not deal with any of it. My first impulse was to match my outside with my inside. To be dead. I remember swallowing dozens of those little white pills. I see myself like an automaton, hand to mouth, zombielike. Dead, but breathing. I was completely numb. I couldn’t feel my hands or my legs or my face, or anything else. The air around me was foggy and filled with invisible bees.
And then i see myself putting the glass in the sink, and the bottle back in the cupboard, and going to my room to read.

My mother had suspected i wasn’t taking my meds and had counted them the night before. She counted them again, not long after i’d taken them. She yelled at me while taking me to emergency, where they pumped my stomach and then filled me full of ipecac, just to be sure. It was the nicest thing she ever did for me, besides dying.*

I’ve been listening to my body for months and months now. The intention is to hear its story through physical sensations, and through that mend the broken connections between my brain and my body. The end goal is to be alive. To live my life conscious: thinking my thoughts and being aware of them in the moment, feeling my emotions and experiencing my physical sensations in real time, as they happen. I’ve always taken them all and stuffed them away in a box, to take them out and look upon them from a distance, disenchanted and uninvolved, completely divorced from any kinship, any simpatico.

It has been through thinking my thoughts and listening to the people that live in my brain that i’ve been able to begin to take my place as the head of my system and gather them all closer to me. To function as a more cohesive unit and bring some calm, quiet, and success to my day-to-day life.
It is now through experiencing my physical sensations that i hope to rejoin my body to my brain, and finally become a real, living girl!**

My body has been communicating some awful things to me. I’m reliving my abuse in a physical way. The things i became a multiple to escape, i’ve now invited back in to tell their stories. My jaw aches, my girl parts hurt, my legs twitch with the need to run, and so much more. But there’s yet more than i’ve felt and here it is now, and i see/feel so clearly. It’s sharp, this knowledge i have suddenly, my hands gripping the phone so tight it’s a wonder i didn’t push a wrong button and lose her. It makes my heart twinge in sympathy for myself –that poor child i was– all alone and in unbearable pain mentally, emotionally, physically.
My body wanted to die.

I don’t want to die today! I know and trust in the love and support of my husband and my sons. I believe them when they look deeply into me and tell me they understand, they love me and it’s all right. Shh, it’s okay. You’re doing great, you’ve come so far, you’re so much better.
This is my body telling me its story.
And suddenly i am free of it. I’m lighter, but not the floatiness of dissociation. It’s a burden that i’m laying down. I’ve unwound another ream of the bandages that have mummified me. I am being reborn, coming alive. Breathing out death and breathing in life, LIFE!

I tell Ms T of the revelation inside that her words have brought me. We share the wonder and beauty of the moment and then it’s time to end the call for another 2wks. Before she hangs up (i’m old, we used to hang up our phones, okay?) she tells me how proud she is of how hard i’ve worked and all i’ve accomplished. She reminds me that not a lot of people who’ve been through things like i’ve been through ever make it this far.
Without excuse or qualification i tell her Thank you.

And then she says, “For this next 2wks i’d like you to celebrate, really celebrate, what you’ve been able to do and how awesome you are.”

I barely rolled my eyes.

May Love and Peace Be Yours In Some Measure Today,
~H~

*Sorry for the brutality of that statement, but it is a true one.

**I use the word “girl” without any cutesiness – i am not being coy. I may be in my 50s and technically a woman, but on the inside i’m a girl who is only now on the cusp of adulthood. It’s an accurate description, to my mind.

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Me, Myself, and the Mirror

I was more shocked than anyone when it began to seem as if i might be an introvert.

I was born to be in service to my mother. I have no way to know just how intentional my birth was. My educated guess is that my conception was accidental, but her decision to keep me was made consciously, and with purpose. It was her second pregnancy with no husband, and in the 60s, in her tiny and uber religious community, that was a huge deal. The first time she was sent to the US to have and surrender the child for adoption, which she did, and so even though she no longer lived with her parents, for whatever reason she went again. At their behest? Mm, doubtful. More like it was her best option, because she had nothing, and they were of some means and would pay for it. I think Grandpa had sold the ranch by then, and he and Grandma had moved to the big city. All their family and most of their friends still resided in little towns dotted around the south of the province, where 1 faith rules most, and even though my grandparents eschewed the Latter Day Saints for the United Church, everyone else they knew were adherents. I imagine the home for wayward young ladies accepted her without a blink, and besides, a non-believer is merely an opportunity for conversion, is it not?

I heard a number of stories around the adventures she had, and the events leading up to her leaving the States and me being born in another province, but i’ve been unable to find much supporting information. Yes, the home existed then (and still today). They wouldn’t confirm she’d stayed there, which is only as it should be, i was merely doing my due diligence to inquire. I have a birth certificate that confirms when and where i was born, and was able to speak to the hospital archivist, but they don’t keep records of any of the details of my birth beyond height and weight, and that it was uneventful. I don’t know if she knew the man i called “Daddy” before she conceived, but i suppose it doesn’t matter; somewhere along the way she decided that it served her to serve me up to him for his purposes. Before, during, and after her association with him, she was my 1 true god, anyway. I always knew it, and she knew that i did too, although she still reinforced it regularly.

I was adept at dissociation, and abuse was ubiquitous. It was nothing for her to pick me up from a “visit” and immediately place me in a social situation. I’m not entirely certain if i knew what had happened prior or not, but being as well acquainted with my system as i am now, i strongly suspect not. I might have been molested an hour or 2 before, but there i’d be, shining as brightly as my mother wished, for whatever audience she’d placed me in front of.*

I was always somewhat conscious of how important it was that i behave in a friendly and outgoing fashion; i must leave a favourable impression wherever i went. To do anything else my mother would see as reflecting poorly on her. Not only did she feed on the admiration of others (psychically and monetarily), it helped blind them to what was festering inside her, underneath the facade. To that end, i was her centerpiece of subterfuge. I was bubbly, animated, sweet, and yes, precocious. I spent most of my time with adults, a lot of whom were highly educated. My grandmother was a school teacher who had me reading fluently by 4yrs old. How could i not be?

By the time she and “Daddy” parted ways, my personality was set. At least, it seemed to be and that’s what i’d’ve said had you asked me. My belief now is that what i displayed was more psychological affect than personality. Some of it was me, but some of it was the mask that had been given me to wear. After a time, i forgot to take it off. No, it’s more accurate to say that i’d worn it so long i didn’t know it was a mask. I looked in the mirror and assumed what i saw was me.
It’s taken years to pry that sucker off, so i could get a gander at what lies underneath.

I first noticed something a few months back. A loved one commented, as they all seem to eventually, on my lack of desire for vengeance, or even justice, against those that harmed me. I’ve never wished death, torture, pain of any kind, on any abuser. I wanted to hit my mother one time, when i was prepubescent – and that’s the extent of it. My son brought it up the last time, and when he expressed his lack of understanding, i shrugged and said, That’s just me. That’s who i am.

I’ve been puzzling over that ever since.

I’ve been an automaton wearing a mask for most of my life, long after the danger had passed, and well into being a mother and a wife and someone’s best friend. I’ve been that way for so long that, as i’ve stated – i thought how i was, WAS me.
Then the safety of a loving relationship came and gently held my head up, as therapy held the mirror, and i saw myself. I saw my costuming. And i wanted to take it all off.
When i responded to my son that day, i got a looksee.
There was a heretofore absent surety in what i said to him.
See, i’m always questioning myself: what i think, how i feel, what i say, how i act… ALL OF IT, ALL THE TIME.
When i said, That’s just me; that’s who i am, there was no question. No obsession, no angst, no elipses. There was a period at the end. I knew what i knew.

I’ve been chewing on that, and i can see it in my recent postings. I know the sun is rising on me as a functioning human being. I know i’ve shucked my funeral clothes. I know i’m naked and new. I step from the shower and stand before the mirror, and the foggy coating covering it is fading. I’m trepidatious, but my ache to see myself is greater. My hunger to know myself is stronger. Blurred lines are sharpening, colours are intensifying, and i’m coming into view. I’m tremulous, but my feet are planted shoulder-width and i am set. To see. To know.

I’ve been joking for a few years about being a hermit. When i moved out of the big city in 2007, i remembered the comfort and peace that i’d felt as a farm girl. My home life was hell then, and school was a misery. The only safety i could find was in the endless chores and quiet beauty of farm life and livestock. The wind and the smell of grain and cow poop made me feel happy and calm.  So when mania threatened to break me, i retreated to my Little Crooked House on my quiet farm at the end of a No Exit road. I realised that i shifted into automatic around people, and if i really wanted to deal with my shit, i had to remove the stimuli that triggered the reflex.
I’ve done my best work here, alone.

After that i noticed that whenever i’d go into town for socialising or to run errands, it wasn’t long before i wanted to go home. And then i began marking how quickly my energy drained when i was out and about, and how i could feel my depleted stores filling back up as soon as we turned onto our road to come home.
The entire time though, i was wondering if i was hiding. I thought maybe i might be kidding myself, that i was retreating to avoid, to ignore. I worried my behaviour was unhealthy.

Over the years i’ve tried to be a part of many different groups. I kept looking for a place where i belonged. I’d ken the group dynamic, their values and aesthetics Then i’d shrug on a new coat, and walk amongst them for a while. See if i fit the group; if the jacket fit. It never did, or at least not for very long. My chameleon colours never lasted. I’d be identified for the imposter i was and be cast out, or i’d feel claustrophobic and need to GTFO ASAP.

While standing in front of that psychic mirror recently, i saw that i was wearing a spiked leather jacket. It’s a i’m-tough-stay-away-from-me thing. I thought it was an introvert costume. I looked into the mirror, who is me of course, and i saw that i don’t need it. I’m an introvert.
That’s just me. That’s who i am.
This is not so much a process of figuring out or learning who i am.
I’ve created a safe space, and now the bits of myself that i hid away so that i might survive what i could not have otherwise, are coming out to claim their place.
They know exactly what spot at the table is theirs.
I sit at the head and wait.
The banquet will be lavish.

Love and Peace,
~H~

*I refuse to mangle the flow of a sentence to avoid ending one in a preposition. If this offends your delicate grammarly sensibilities, i do apologise. Be advised that i regularly, and in a multitude of ways, play with and pervert this language, that i think is a bit of a mutt to begin with. Heh. See what i did there?

Posted on by histrionicabutterfly · 2 Comments

No Knot of No Note

I learned years ago, that if i wanted to avoid depression (or deeper depression), to absolutely not, under any circumstances, read old journals.
What happened –every dang time– was i’d be confronted with the same problems, the same situations repeating, the same emotions shared in the same words, the same pain bleeding all over the page, and the same whywhyWHYs… No answers, no resolution, no apparent movement forward. No progress, and so, no relief. It would fill me with a panicky sort of hopelessness – like a bird beating its wings against its cage. I was trapped and unable to break free. It solidified my belief that i was a failure, and invariably cranked the volume way up on all those ohsowelcome (/s) voices that sit in judgment inside my skull.

Some parts of my system are only conscious when they’re in the face (meaning, the one currently presenting, and in control of my body). I can feel them inside if i focus, but i don’t hear any commentary or thoughts that i’d identify as coming from them. Other parts, although many are capable of facetime, never do so. They seem to need/prefer to keep to the safety of my space-soup of thoughts. And some are so poorly developed that they lack any awareness or will to do anything other than the tiny, specific thing that they do, e.g. the one that just screams. When i first began actively dealing with the people that live in my brain, there were only a few parts that could be both in the face, and maintain their own sort of consciousness when they weren’t.

As i’ve grown in knowledge and competency (as the one in charge {hopefully}), that is changing. I see and experience, that as i heal, my Bits N’ Pieces are also; we are all morphing into something else. There are new voices (they aren’t new themselves, they merely didn’t participate in the chatter before), some voices have different tones, and the odd collection of folks and freaks feels different. And now, there are some voices i used to hear that i don’t hear at all anymore. It was the terror i felt at that which brought me back to therapy, after a hiatus of some years.
I didn’t know it was a hiatus, but my therapist sure did. Well, she hoped so, i suppose, but one of the things that makes her the best, is that she’s never tried to tell me how my life should look. I thought i was done – as fixed as i was gonna get. These last 2yrs have taught me that there’s so much more i want and am capable of achieving.

So yeah, i had a peekaboo at my old journal.

YIKES.

I debated including a sample, because it makes me cringe hard enough to crack a rib or two, but in for a penny, as they say…
Aaaand nope.
I noped it.
I slept on it, and in the morning it was clear to me that that would be self-destructive.
Also, i’ve seen enough, too. It’s locked down and shall remain so for the foreseeable future. There’s doing a forensic examination, and then there’s returning to sniff my own leavings.
Ew. No thank you.

While it was hard to read, the results have been very positive.
Not, Phew, i made it through that and didn’t die!
For the very first time, i looked back at old writings and saw with bold clarity, that i am absolutely, unequivocally, a healthier and happier person.

I’m no longer twisted up in various enraged and hyper-alarmed knots. I still feel that way sometimes, but i’ve untied the big ones, and have found mobility, and even some flexibility of movement. I no longer eke out a meager existence as a knot of no note. (Ooh, i think i’ve found my title!) I’ve only got a couple more of those tiny, tight suckers that require long and patient picking, before a bow is within my reach.
A BOW, for Maude’s sake!
I’m THIS close to being tied up in a bow!
Have i ever felt this upbeat on a Monday morning? Hell no. And i’m not even gassed up on espresso, merely an egg sammy and a cuppa tea.

I in no way regret my old journal entries, cringe-worthy though they may be. I started it innocuously, meaning all my friends were doing it. We were doing fun questionnaires and making random, silly observations about life, the universe and, you know… everythink. This is the music i’m listening to and this is my current mood and OMG, the last season of Angel is KILLING MEEEE!!
I had friends on the blogsite that used it for other, deeper things, though. Very thinky thoughts, tough feelings, and inner struggles. Since i was in and out of The Bin, struggling with mania, and looking for someone/anyone that could help me, i quickly fell in with them.

Except i took it to a whole. nutha. level.
As tends to be my way, especially while manic. Heh.

My blog became my therapist. And when i finally (and the angels sang Hallelujah!), finally found someone i could work with, my online journal became my dumping ground. My proving ground, too. I was dealing with the reality of being multiple for the first time, and working with someone who specialised in my unique brand of crazy. She came to my home, and to the hospital when necessary, and helped me look at my brain. She taught me to listen to what it was trying to tell me. I figured out that i needed to talk about what’d happened to me growing up. So i told my husband my story, and then Ms T would sit on my loveseat 10ft away from me (that was as close as she could get for a couple of years), and help me deal with the fallout. And i spilled a great deal of it with my small, tight circle of friends on the journalling platform i used.

It’s all so fucking frantic. I’m alternately furious and terrified – back then there was no angry and scared. Back then i was the embodiment of Histrionica. Emotions running amok. Memories, dreams, and are they memories or dreams, all vomited out onto the page/screen. Delivered with hot teenage angst, too. Like hiding-in-my-room-writing-bad-poetry angst.
I still write bad poetry. Heh.

The overarching and undergirding emotion that i see now though, is hurt. I didn’t write much about it, because the big 1-2 punch of the others took all my time and energy.
And i wasn’t ready or prepared to feel that much pain.
I’m glad and grateful that i didn’t, because i know, as much as one can know anything that didn’t happen, that it would likely have ended me. I’ve been preparing myself for it, sort of unbeknownst to myself, for nearly 15yrs now, and i’m barely keeping my head above water.

The pain has been like being gutted with a knife made of ice. My insides splash out of me, hot and bitterly pungent, my pain bursting from its integuments. I gather it all into my arms, and carefully place it all back in, stitching myself back together with knowledge and love… Only to gasp as the knife slices again. I’ve barely time to breathe between, and this has been my life for a year or more (it’s hard to track when i’m in the thick of it).

As i’m writing this, i’ve suddenly seen that i’ve returned a bit to that fear-stricken girl. I am being quite dramatic. Interesting. Not surprising and certainly understandable, but interesting. I’m getting both mercy and grace for me then – and now. This has been intense work, and its job is to connect me to all the parts of myself that have broken or split off over the years, while trying to survive the unsurvivable. I guess it’s working.
Yay?
I see my then-self as a daughter, of some stripe. She tried very hard. She did the work and pushed through with much wailing and gnashing of teeth. There was vitriol, but it was her due. She never got to be a child, or teenager – not really.
So what if my teenage years were in my late 30s to mid-40s?

If you ask me about the child part, i’ll tell you the truth of it:
In some ways, i’ve only now begun to NOT be a child.
I read those old posts, and armed with new knowledge about a human’s need for connection, and what happens to a child when that need isn’t met; i see a starving child in those words i typed over a decade ago.
I read those old posts, and buoyed by new experiences as a connected human, and how it feels to no longer be alone; i reach out to my then-self and gather her close to me.

I think she is mostly part of me now, and i’ll hold her tight until i’m done breathing.
And i’m not just Histrionica anymore.
I am HistrionicaButterfly.

Be as well and stay as safe as you can.
Love and Peace,
~H~

Posted on by histrionicabutterfly

A Love Song

I remember when we were first dating
No touch yet,
But eddies were drawing us together
Churning between our bodies
Sweet and warm,
A gentle pulling under our feet
Ooooh

We stopped on the sidewalk
You looked at me,
I don’t remember which one of us was talking
Other bodies around us in the sunshine
The smell of green,
Life was suddenly so bright and pretty
Ooooh

Your face spread into a smile
Your pupils opening,
You were a ray of the sun burning my skin
Searing, blistering, burning, setting me on fire
I am ashes,
Rare wind from the south blows me into your pocket
Ooooh

Posted on by histrionicabutterfly · 1 Comment

Fragile and Fierce

Fell down a hole again, and LO! there was a bottle at the bottom. I slipped into it for about a week. I’m embarrassed and depressed about it, like always, but the detoxing is mostly over, and now it’s time for the picking up and the dusting off and the starting all over again. Well, i’m not starting all over again, but i’m sucker for musicals.
Come at me.

I felt like one of those super fancy champagne glasses from the 40s and 50s. Not the flutes, but the widemouth ones – oh so delicate and fragile. I felt like a piano wire, stretched until it’s about to sproing. My brain was filled to capacity, my thoughts racing and obsessive. The simmer had come to a full rolling boil, and i knew that i was on the brink of overflowing the pot.
So yeah, i guess i swandived purposely down that hole.
Don’t come at me.

The positives:
– it didn’t last long;
– there was switching behaviour, but i wasn’t angry or destructive;
– my son who is off work took care of the house, so no shambles;
– i didn’t push my husband to his limits.

The negatives:
– i drank a LOT;
– the detoxing was the most brutal i’ve endured, i probably should have been hospitalised;
– unless i’m bleeding out my eyeballs, there isn’t a mosquito’s chance on a frog’s tongue i’m going there;
– i added to an already stressful situation for my loved ones.

These are just true things. The trick is to look at it all, acknowledge it, feel the feels, and then get on with it. Get back to the work.
I’ve said this many times before, but i might always restate it because i think it’s so important…
My track record, along with the way my brain works, has shown me in a neon-freaking-sign way that i cannot rush things. They’re like the lights in Vegas at night.
OMFGJFCH, SLOW DOWN!!
(I used an all-caps acronym, because that’s the kind of swearing that makes church ladies faint, and truckers and sailors say, Hey, tone it down a little, will ya?!)

This is all i’ve got in me today, but i’ve got the itch to write.
And i assure you that it will NOT be poetry.

Love to All and May Some Peace Be Yours Today,
~H~

Posted on by histrionicabutterfly · 2 Comments

Updates From the Back 40

Totally random.
Some’re gonna be ranty, and some of ’em mushy, maybe. I’m just gonna start typing, and see where my fingers take me.
Off i go, then.

**********

So much selfishness and stupidity around me. I’ve made some hard decisions about who and what i’ll tolerate, and it ain’t many or much anymore. As my partner’s and my life might be riding on the choices and decisions i make, i’m finding the capacity for cold calculation and the ability to act swiftly, and even brutally. As all my children are grown, my priority is simple – me and my man. I have a small circle around me that is my next priority, as in, my children, grandchildren, and a few dear friends. I’m also a secular humanist, so i’m fully invested in being the best human i can be, and want the best for the earth and all its inhabitants.

I don’t have any leftover energy to have conversations with those with a history of doubling down or fondness for conspiracy theories. Even if i love you, you’re over there, far away from me, at least until there’s a vaccine, and i’ll probably wait until certain organisations declare the pandemic over.

—

I’m learning how to be the parent of grown children. I’ve never been meddlesome in their adult lives, but when 2 of them are still at home it can be hard to suss what’s my business and what’s not. Where do i still have authority and what’s simply not my call? I think i’m doing remarkably well. There are times when i’ve got to let them go, even when it might mean they fall, and land, HARD. They get to decide how much involvement they want from me, if any. I’ve made terrible mistakes with my boys, and they get to think what they think about it. They get to have their feelings and they get to react to it how they will. They can shut me out, they can shut down over it all, they can call me out. I’m here for their processes –far away and not talking about it if that’s what they want– but i’ll always be on the periphery. I’m as prepared as i can be for whatever they’d care to throw at me, to accept the responsibility where it’s appropriate, to shut up and listen when required. For now i wait, my amends currently come in the form of working towards being as functional and mentally/emotionally stable as i can get. To show them that no matter what crap your parents visited upon you, there is hope of getting out from under it and having the life you want.

—

After over 20yrs, i can feel myself finally, finally, finally settling into my marriage. I’ve tested it, i’ve tested him, and i’ve run away. I’ve pulled him close and then pushed him away, over and over. I’ve wrestled with physical and emotional intimacy. We’ve had some dicey years, but they feel over, at least for now. I don’t feel the need to protect myself so much anymore. There’s a deep and abiding trust that’s grown into a level of comfort i haven’t experienced before. I still have a wall, but i’ve built a door into it, and he has a key. When something bad happens, when my emotions or my brain start spiraling, i go to him for connection. He’s my soft place to fall, my water when my well has run dry. I think i’m moving from want/wish/hope to actually believing he won’t purposely cause me harm or leave me. That’s kinda big, for me.

—

I’m also becoming more and more accepting of how my brain works. Instead of trying to force myself into some form of person that i think i should be, i’m doing the work to figure out who i am underneath all the fear and anger and pain that i’ve carried throughout my life. I live with serious, multiple mental illness diagnoses on top of any nature and nurture regarding my personality and personhood. A lot of the common wisdom doesn’t fit me and doesn’t sit well with me. As i reach inward with love, as i experience forgiveness and acceptance from me to me, i let go of the urge to be who i think others want and/or expect me to be. This is me and this is how my brain works and this is how i feel about stuff and this is my life and no one else’s.

—

I’m creating the life i want around me because at last i’m able to name what it is and what it’s not. I’m not trying to force myself into another person’s vision of a good life. As i forge a relationship with myself i’m able to connect to my own unique and specific desires, hopes, and yes, dreams. Mending the broken connections between my brain and my body has given me insight and strength. For many years i’ve moved at a snail’s pace. I’ve stopped, gone backwards, tried to rush forward and fallen flat on my face. I’ve tripped and fallen down countless rabbit holes. I’ve been in the weeds and in the shit. And all of that still happens, but i get on to the next thing so much more quickly. My step is getting lighter, but firmer and faster, too. As one who has suffered some long and intense manias, i’ll likely always have to monitor and occasionally rein in the rate at which i progress, but relatively speaking, i see a day when i’m crushing it on the regular.

—

Defining myself is enabling me to ask for more of what i want from appropriate sources. I’m also growing my ability to say No to whomever i wish and whatever i choose. This doesn’t make me unreasonable nor has it turned me into a diva. This makes my life more productive and brings depth and authenticity to my relationships. My words are fewer but carry more weight. My actions are intentional and add value. I don’t hide my flaws and foibles, but neither do i  wallow in them or present them as an excuse or a get-out-of-jail-free card. I acknowledge, make amends where necessary, pick my ass up and get back to business.

—

I don’t hate my body anymore.
I’m gonna type that again, because it is a MASSIVE, AMAZING accomplishment.
I don’t hate my body anymore.
I’ve always known my face is pretty, but i’ve always been at loggerheads with my body. I saw it as a traitor. I gained weight when i was around 7 or 8, and i’ve never lost it, completely. As i’ve shared many times before, i became morbidly obese after my marriage, and eventually had weight loss surgery. I got to within 15 or 20lbs of my goal, but unfortunately between my marriage and the male gaze i was triggered and experiencing my first intense and extreme mania. That caused a significant amount of weight gain – about a third of what i’d lost. That was in 2007 and i’ve been struggling to get it back off ever since. Turns out therapy was the missing piece of my lifestyle puzzle where my relationship with food and body image were concerned. Over the last couple of years particularly, i’ve hit my stride. I let go of time and goal-setting. I changed one small thing about the way that i ate, and did that thing until it became a part of my life, and then i changed another. The progress was slow, but it didn’t bother me, because my focus was on a lifestyle change and my physical health – my lifelong experience taught me that the other would come along with it, naturally.
And it has.

That’s incredible already, but the truly tremendous, fantastically freeing thing is i don’t despise my body anymore. I’ve lost and gained, and i’m in my 50s, so frankly, there’s some damage, some wear and tear, you know? But i know why i look the way i do, and i’ve apportioned the responsibility for it. It sits squarely on the ashes of my dead mother, and rests on the heads of every stinking asshole in my childhood who ever laid their hands on me. I’ve spent a lifetime trying to manage, to fix, to hide, to figure it out. It just took time, some healing in my emotions and thoughts, and the right information. I can look at myself naked, and not even think a mean thing. I can wear clothes and not constantly pick at them and smooth things out and pull them down. I wear what i want. I look how i like me to look.
I like fashion, but only as an art form. I’ve discarded the hate machine that surrounds it. I’m slowly developing my own sense of style. It becomes more defined and recognisable as i recognise and define myself.

And i no longer seek  or accept sexual attention from all and any sources.
As i heal what was broken sexually inside me i know where to go and where not to.
I can ask for what i want.
I can say No.
I don’t flirt with anything that’s breathing.
I’m no longer inappropriately sexual or bawdy – i know the proper times and places and people. I don’t place myself in dangerous situations with dangerous people, all for validation and approval.
I see what i bring to the table. I know where and when and to whom i’ll serve it.
That’s some freaking alchemy, lemme tell ya.

—

So there it is, today’s blog offering. A strange kind of positivity, and not as mushy as i thought i might get. I see myself in this, standing with my feet set firmly and wide apart. My fists are planted on my hips and i’m laughing, deep in my belly, toothily, like the star of a lumberjack musical.

A smart, sexy one.

No, no one in my dressing room after the show, thanks.

More soon.

Love and Peace to All,
~H~

Posted on by histrionicabutterfly · 5 Comments

Making My House A Home

When you can’t take it anymore
Why not forget the past
And off you run
Baby, run
No more tears, no more mistakes
Why don’t you just check out your bags and run?
Baby, run
~ Run Baby Run, Amanda Lear

I’m hard-wired to run.

My mother would move us every year or 2, without fail – sooner if folks started becoming suspicious, or the authorities came poking around home or school. The abusers that surrounded me also programmed me to return home at the first sign of danger. /irony
Paedophiles love a multiple, but that’s a different story, and one too dark for me to tell today. Once i left home, i never stayed in one place for very long, maybe, 3-6mos, tops. I never thought anything of it, it was just the way i lived. I’d get antsy and the urge to go somewhere else was never far from me. Memory fades some with age of course, but even now i can think of 32 places i’ve lived in my 53yrs.

I had some decent therapy under my belt when i had my first child, and so i had the insight to promise myself that i’d stay in one place for 1yr minimum for his sake. And one year was the best i could manage. That is, until i moved in with the man who’d become my husband. We lived in our city’s ‘Hood in the same house for 10yrs, and we’ve been out here on our beloved Little Crooked House on the Prairie for 12, now.
But still… I deal with the urge to run on a regular basis.
The therapy i’m in, coupled with our current pandemic, has kicked it up to daily, and sometimes many times a day.

My childhood taught me that some shit is always gonna come down the pike where you gotta skedaddle. You smell trouble brewing, you GTFO ASAP. We always left things behind, too. When we moved we generally had to move fast, say, to evade creditors or avoid Social Services. Other times it was due to local gossip – whispers about the huge woman with the husband that looked like a teenager (he was), or the children that didn’t seem to be properly cared for (we weren’t). There were also occasions when my mother would tank a friendship so badly, that she’d move us out of anger, shame, owed money or apologies… She was the queen of the geographical cure.

I learned not to get attached to things, e.g. clothing, stuffies, pictures, various knickknacks and tchotchkes (isn’t that a wonderful word?), bedding, dishes. Even books could be left behind. (Yes, i’m as aghast as you.) Even some lovely things of my grandparents’ that she inherited upon their deaths. That carried into my adulthood. Although i didn’t leave things behind when i moved out –i left places empty and clean– i manifested my mother’s example in a particular way.*

I didn’t decorate my space.
I didn’t put up pictures or paint or have a decorating style. Bric-à-brac was minimal. And i lived frugally, so i’d take whatever furniture, dishes, bedding, and suchlike that i could get. I’m one of those people that has trouble resisting something if it’s free. Number one, i keep my money for something else. The #2 (hahaha – yes i still laugh at poop jokes) that was quietly hovering in the background, was that if i needed to run, i wouldn’t feel as guilty for leaving things behind because i hadn’t spent money on them.

When we lived in the city and were expecting our third child, i tried to decorate. I watched HGTV all day, every day, and became obsessed with painting techniques and decorating. I started, but i couldn’t finish. I seriously couldn’t. I painted the room, did a cool texture thingy with plastic bags and primer, and started putting up a teddybear border close to the ceiling. I thought i stopped because i was pregnant and tired, which i was, but also negative crap like i was fat and useless and talentless. (Honestly, those teddybears were rather awful. Heh.)
I believe now that it’s tied directly to my reticence to set down roots.
Lest they be torn mercilessly from the ground, you know?
No, says my mind.
No, you never know.
What’s HOME, Precioussss?
I didn’t know, and i distrusted the concept, though i saw it modeled well many times outside of my childhood hellhouse.

My husband and i moved  me and our 2 younger boys out of our blue-grey house with the red metal roof, on a relatively quiet street, smack in the middle of the ‘Hood. I was at the peak of my first big mania, working in the entertainment industry. I was partying 5 days a week, engaging in high risk behaviours, and day-drinking while neglecting my children. It would take some time to sell the house and deal with our furious 15yr old who refused to move with us who was trying to figure out how to emancipate himself (and understandably, rightly so). He stayed in the city and we went to live with Mum on the farm. (His mom, but she took me on as her own. She was the sweetest person i’ve ever known.)

It was the right thing to do. I calmed down measurably. I kept my drinking to the weekends when hubs would come and visit. I spent quiet days eating toast and drinking tea with Mum, sleeping, and… And what, i don’t actually don’t know. I was a cavalcade of people taking their place in my face and having their way with my thoughts and body. She accepted it all with gentleness and grace. She mothered my Bits N’ Pieces, and never spoke of it. When i brought it up to her years later, she told me she hardly noticed and every part of me was nice to her and she liked them all.
(Pardon me, friends, while i have a wee cry that she’s gone now, and i miss her so much in this moment.)

That’s a little better. Sister Jeannine was correct when she told me, over-and-goddamn-over, that tears are cleansing and healing. I would roll my eyes at her and she would laugh at me were she still with us.
Ah me, loss is such a bitch.
Sec. Gotta blow my nose.

Anyhoo, the man-thingy made it out to us 6mos later and we moved into the Little Crooked House across the road from Mum. The day my mania hit its apex i had been drinking (i’d returned to it once out of my mother-in-law’s house). I’ve written about what happened at length, and am happy to leave it done. I bring it up to say on that day i tore up our house. I broke things and threw things and did a significant amount of damage.

I’ve been crawling my way out of chaos and dysfunction since then.
Mr. Man works 12-14hrs a day, 6 days a week to support our family.
I turned my attention to raising my children while figuring out my brain and my past, as best i could.

Our house sat damaged; clean but unadorned. We took some of the money we made on the sale of the house and bought new furniture for the first time. I thought i was a post-modernist, minimalist. Ha. Turns out my taste runs to the somewhat masculine, my-living-room-looks-like-a-study, style. Huh. Okie doke. I found myself eyeing a large picture at the local hardware store. It was damaged, and i looked at it every time we went. For months it sat there, not selling, and finally offered the manager a price below what they were asking and he said Sold! We took it home and placed it above our fireplace.
It was my first picture.

Over my years of therapy with my best and current Ms T, i’ve picked up a wall clock and a few tchotchkes. Friends have kindly given me some of that LiveLoveLaugh kinda stuff that i see in other people’s homes. My boys made things at school that i proudly displayed on tables and shelves, and clinging to my refrigerator with magnets. I was almost like a normal, regular mommy. I’ve picked up a lot of mirrors over the years, and Mr. Man has hung a few here and there. (HGTV taught me it makes small spaces look bigger. They were right.)

About a year ago i was shopping at Ikea with my bestie. I’d been back in therapy for a while and was feeling better but worse, as one tends to do when one is doing the therapy thing, i think. Then i saw it. A large, unframed print of a Klimt painting. I love Klimt. No, i adore Klimt. It was one of my favourites, it was on sale. I thought about buying it, walked away, then made myself go back and grab it. I bought it quickly, with as little thought as possible, because i knew that’s what it would take for me to get it home. I also had my husband hang it that evening for the same reason. Progress, w00t!

Still and all, the damage i’d done all those years ago, stayed. The divots and scrapes and holes hung like stark pictures of my pain and failure; coloured in violence and shame. He works so hard i hadn’t the heart to ask him to help me fix it. Plus, i felt i deserved to be reminded of how horrible i can be, how sick and out of control. Bad H. A finger pointed and waggling, poking me hard in the chest. My reaping.

Cue pandemic.
He’s still working enough (so grateful), but his hours are cut and he’s getting some weekends off. Entire weekends, holy crap. He turns to me and asks if i’d like to fix up the bathroom. My eyes well up and i’m nodding as he’s talking about plaster and drywall and paint. He brings home an epic whack of swatches (he works in construction) and i get to choose! He fixes the massive chunk he cut out of the wall when we had a leak, and when i come back to see how things are progressing, i see he’s been patching and sanding outside the bathroom. He’s erasing the damage of my past actions.

Well, i’m a bit of a crybaby today.
Cleeeeansing, heeeealing, H.
Oh look, tears can act as lube for my eyerolling. There’s no click as i look at the back of my brain. Heh.

Work like this has taken me a long, loooong time, but i’m here, i’m doing it, and i’m HOME. We have plans for more paint, and yes, more pictures on the walls. If this madness continues, there may even be curtains, folks!

I’m on my way
Just set me free
Home sweet home…
~ Motley Crue, Home Sweet Home

Y’all hang in there now, y’hear?
Love and Peace,
~H~

*My mother also left things behind because she was slovenly and lazy, and hadn’t a shred of gratitude for anything she had, ever.

IMAGE: The Kiss, Gustav Klimt (1907/08)

 

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Mindful Dreaming

The interpretation of dreams is the royal road to a knowledge of the unconscious activities of the mind.
~ Sigmund Freud

What? Not everything he said was shite. Even a broken clock and all that, amirite?

I’ve written about my dreams a number of times (nice and vague, cuz i can’t be arsed to check), and the time has come ’round again. My dreaming life has generally been full and often intense. I was treated for night terrors when i was around 5/6, and i still remember the worst of them in stark detail. Knowing what i know now, it’s easy to see what my brain was trying to puzzle out, as my sexual abuse began before i could speak, and was frequent until i was around 6. Then it slowed down some until my mother’s on-and-off relationship with the man i called Daddy fell apart for good when i was around 8, at which point it became sporadic.

Once the regular sexual abuse stopped, my switching behaviour also slowed down dramatically, and my dreams toned down, too. I started puberty far later than average, but when i did, i was once again dealing with sexual abuse, and it’s my belief that the dual stress is what led to a return of brutal and disturbing dreams. The dreams persisted until i left home at 18, returning as i came back home briefly, and again faced sexual and physical assault. They’d come and go as i was triggered, or trying some new therapy. To this day they occasionally plague me; a red flag for which i’ve become grateful.

When i finally entertained the possibility that i was a multiple, and began the long journey of figuring out the who, what, where, and whens of my childhood, studying my dreams extensively, helped. It was there that i realised that i needn’t recover any memories – they were all there every night in my dreams. Their subject matter, the way they played out as i slept, how i felt the next morning looking back on them… I couldn’t know these things and survive my environment, so my brain disguised them as dreams; keeping them safe until i was able to process their content.
Home movies i’d hidden in my attic.
Confirmation that i wasn’t crazy without cause.
Once i knew what they truly were, they became a part of my daily experience of myself as a person, and the dreaming of these memories stopped.

I kept dreaming, though. My brain is marvelous, and takes as good care of me as it can. It still communicates to me as i sleep, dancing and singing for me, lovely and terrible. My dreams reflect where i’m at mentally and emotionally. They can alert me to the stuff that’s going on behind the scenes that may require my attention. Dreams are a great processing tool for my brain to help me figure my shit out. It keeps on grinding away at various problems while i’m recharging my body’s batteries.

I don’t hold with anyone else analysing my dreams for me. I can usually figure out my own dreams, thanks. (This is one of the places where Dr. Freud needs to back TF up.) I’ve done enough inner work to know myself, and so it’s usually obvious what my dreams are saying to me. On the rare occasion that i wake up nonplussed, i have a method for interpretation that works well. A nun taught it to me years ago when i was in a halfway house run by the RCC. I write out the dream in first person, then i read through it and underline any words that jump out at me. I then take the underlined words and give them a personal definition, one by one. Once that’s done i’ve usually found some clarity.

Over the course of my life my dreams have been highly thematic. When i was very young i dreamed of a house filled with death, being pursued by a faceless evil thing, and being covered in bugs. The bug dreams were so terrifying that bugs became a lifelong phobia, so intensely so that even thinking i might have seen a bug could trigger a petit mal seizure (now commonly referred to as an absence seizure).* My dreams during adolescence and young adulthood were mostly about getting lost, and becoming separated from loved ones. The worst though, were the ones that mixed sex and death. Those were guaranteed to be followed by 1 or more sleepless nights, depending on severity.**

The last 15yrs or so, my dreams are generally about 1 of 2 things: It’s either the getting lost/losing loved ones dreams, or cleaning house/taking care of children. That second one might sound innocuous, but i assure you that it’s not. They’re the most emotionally draining dreams i’ve ever had (which, admittedly, could be due in part to the fact that i’m not as dissociative as i used to be). I’m in someone else’s house –before my happy estrangement from my parents’  families– and it’s messy, so i start tidying up. Instead of things getting better, i keep discovering more and more clutter, and eventually there’s filth everywhere i look and nothing i do seems to lessen it. Anyone else in the house with me is either oblivious or uncaring. These dreams can involve children. I start out caring for babies and toddlers, and am quickly bogged down with cleaning them and cleaning the house.

I’m not much for kids, to be frank. I love mine, i love my grandchildren. It’s not that i don’t like kids, although i used to think that’s what it was. It’s that being around children is one big triggerfest for me; i spend my time with them bracing for the next unintentional potshot. When i’m actively working with my system to improve my life and level of daily functionality, it’s worse.
In my dreams though, i love all of them. I’m happy to take care of them, even when they’re crying or covered in crap and needing a bath or generally running wild and misbehaving. I’m filled with love and i can feel how invested i am in their care. If there are other people in the house, they never help with the kids – i’m on my own. Sometimes i lose track of them and i’m running around the house frantically, trying to find them. In my dreams, once i lose someone i never find them again. Sometimes they grow bigger as i’m caring for them, which is fine, but other times they morph into something not quite human, and those are the worst dreams. No matter what the children are doing, anyone around me that’s adult gives precisely zero fux.

These dreams may not be nightmarish, but they’re exhausting. I wake from these feeling like i haven’t slept at all. I’m wrung out emotionally, mentally, physically.
And knowing myself like i do, it wasn’t hard to understand why i was having such dreams, and why they’d affect me in such a way.

The doctor who treated my Night Terrors as a child taught me a skill that instantly became invaluable, one that’s saved me countless times since. He taught me all about lucid dreaming. He told me how to figure out if i was dreaming or awake, which is what led to my realisation that some of my dreams were actually memories. He showed me how to wake myself up. Ms T (my therapist) says that a multiple’s mutant superpower is her imagination, and i think she’s correct. Everything that doctor taught me i understood with little to no explanation. When he told me i could fly away from the bad things in my dreams, i did it the very next time a night terror gripped me; i flew away and woke myself up. The ability to recognise that i’m dreaming ebbs and flows according to how i’m doing mental health wise, but once i know i’m in a dream, at the very least i can pull myself out of it. Sometimes the best i can do is pull myself into another dream, but at least i got out of the one i was trying to get away from.

And lately my ability has drastically increased.
I’ve been doing and saying things that i never have before, and some of it isn’t even a lucid choice i’m making. I see it as confirmation that this work i’m doing is taking root, it’s becoming a part of me and how my brain works.
I AM HEALING.

**********

Some cool dream stuff i’ve been doing lately:

I’ve stood up for myself to people who were treating me badly.

I’ve told my mom NO, and even told her off a few times. My mom! /mouth agape

I found my way back when i got lost in a mall. (Once i’m lost i’ve always stayed lost, wandering in maze-like places, never getting back to the place i wanted to be.)

And the children… I’m not losing them, they’re not getting dirtier or changing into something scary/gross. They stay with me and we have a good time. I’m suffused with love for them. Knowing i’m dreaming changes it not a whit.

Estranged/dead family members still pop into my dreams, but they don’t ruin me. Nothing they do goes unanswered. (I’ve always just taken it – in real life and in dreams.)

**********

I know this piece is a bit off the beaten path, even for me, but the way i see things, this is a big deal. My dream life has always been a huge part of who i am, and i find this change significant. It makes me feel good about the work i’ve done, and emboldens me to continue.
My dreams steadfastly refuse to forget what happened to me.
My dreams assure me that i’m not crazy for no reason.
My dreams keep telling me when there’s something terribly wrong, and t’isn’t me or my fault.

My precious, precious, marvelous, fantastical brain. I love it so.
Yes, it’s weird how i treat it like it’s my best friend and not quite me.
It’s weird and accurate.
Maybe one day i’ll be able to explain that, but for now, my brain art (dreams) is telling me i’m helping and all of me is feeling better.

Fanfreakingtastic.

They say that dreams are only real as long as they last. Couldn’t you say the same thing about life?
~ Waking Life (2001)

This freaky, overthinking weirdo wishes you the best of everything.
Hang in there.
Love and Peace,
~H~

*I was epileptic as a child; it’s now considered dormant.

**I’m not including the memories that came to me as dreams.

PICTURED: “Having a moment” in the movie, Waking Life.

Posted on by histrionicabutterfly

Bird In Hand

I take the day in my hands and hold it like a little bird,
Sing baby, sing to me
Its heart beats staccato against my palm,
The sky fills with clouds at its trembling feathers
I set it free

I take my love in my hands and hold him with warm thunder,
Come closer, love me more
He expands to meet me, and his skin tears at the thin spots,
My heart comes down like a gavel
I set him free

I take my life in my hand and hold it like a filthy rag,
Leave me, i’m so tired
I see the paint, the spots worn through
My blood is umber stains on faded cloth
I tuck it back in my pocket

The world takes me in its hands and holds me like a little bird,
Hushabye, dear one, shhh
I see your pain and rage and promise, your terrible beauty
My heart explodes, my mouth opens in song
I am set free