Multi-tasking

G

This morning I tried to brush my teeth at the kitchen sink whilst waiting for spotify to download and pick cabbage out the plug hole from last night's dinner. One voice was shouting "do one thing at at time", another "no she won't" and another "you must be more efficient!" and yet another " leave her alone" "give up give up"everyone was arguing and trying to get their point over as the winner of the situation.

Then like a blinding moment I travel back to boarding school and it was Wednesday. On Wednesday we had to change our sheets on our beds. We all panicked on a Wednesday morning 5:30am rushing to add an extra job into our already tight schedules.

Each dormitory had about thirty iron beds in it. In the mornings we used to take a quick walk to the toilets and back again (running forbidden and toilets being outside at the end of the dormitory blocks) then we would quickly march back to make beds with perfect hospital corners (exact floor to top of counter pain height). The fold under our pillows a certain depth and our pillows evenly plum flat on the lumpy mattresses. After that we had to dress perfectly in our uniforms. Socks were folded three times down our legs to create the perfect ankle and  shoes had to be shining collars folded at the right height at our necks. Our legs and arms had to be creamed to stop dry skin and our hair brushed so as to not let any touch our collars. After that our lockers and foot chests had to be pristine and neat. We would all then stand at the foot of the bed and wait for inspections. 

Now the hard thing about inspection was two fold. One was the ability to hear he matrons working there way through the other dormitories dolling out the daily punishments and ridiculing those who had not met expectation or had wet the bed. The other was the absolute panic to have your own dormitory ready. Did you risk helping those that were slower or unable to get the sheets flat and folded and be found away from your area. Did you try and help someone who clearly had hair loose, after all we did not have individual mirrors we only had a small 12x10inch mirror situated at the furthest end of the long rectangular room.

Then there were Wednesday when not only did you have to cope with all the above but you also had

to strip the bed and change the sheet. As  I have said before the majority of us struggled with Wednesdays. This morning however as I tried to be an octopus, getting cross with the toothpaste I had swallowed and the sliminess of the cabbage making (its so hard to grip), I realised what drove so much of the panic. I realised that although our whole day at boarding school relied on time; being on time, doing things in time, waiting for time to be over or a new part of the timed day to start. Nowhere do I ever remember seeing a clock except in the prep room and school hall, everything else was communicated by bell. I realised how much power that lack of clocks gave the teachers and matrons. After all what better way to put the fear of God into several hundred 5-11 year olds than to hold them accountable to something that they have no ability to manage. It meant that we never stopped working towards the aimed piece of everyday and if you did take a breath or had a little day dream it could come back and mean horrible consequences.

So back to the present day I say to myself it's now ok to do one thing at a time. Brush your teeth then get the cabbage out the sink and then download the album you want to hear. Nothing is chasing you anymore. You are now aloud to know time, manage time and plan in time.

Frog Face

1991 aged 14 and 'frog face' started to follow me. I did not get away until 1997 then aged 20.

Frog face would wait for my school bus and lurk in the roads opposite. Frog face would watch me through the door to the sweet shop I worked in. Frog face would call, send letters and sit on the other side of the road watching our house. Frog face could appear at any point, at any time of day. I could not shake Frog face.

You may think that Frog face was a figment of my imagination, unfortunately that was not the case. For almost 6 years I was stalked.

As previously discussed I have a complex history. Frog face was just part of what has made that thick strong 'C' in the word complex.

Already fairly damaged in my world view, I found myself having to learn to live being disempowered daily. By the 'fear' of the 'ifs, maybes' by the potential of Frog face appearing without my control. I would stand on one side of my front door not knowing, would there be another note on the other-side. I jumped if ever the letter box clanged, or the phone rang.

For reasons I cant go into in this blog, I was unable to tell any one about my situation. All I will say is that Frog face was an adult who held a secret over me. To endure those days at the time, I believed outweighed the shame of anyone finding out. (As I said my perspective was already damaged).

So why write this? if I don't want to write about what happened and why?

Well I love brains, I love how they cope and how they protect themselves. During those years I found my brain doing just that. Protecting me in the best and most honest way it could. You see my brain was my greatest friend. We argued, we fought, we had stand offs! we did all the things together that BFFs do. But it has only been in the last three years that my best friend 'brain' has aloud me/us to share our friendships with others.

Over those long years my identity went from singular to plural. It still remains that way today, I am not an 'I' I am 'we'. At first I split myself in half. The day belonged to Frog face but the night was mine. During the day hyper vigilant, my whole focus was on avoiding and planning ways of out witting Frog face. At night I sewed a hidden pocket into my jeans. In it I tucked a protective knife 'we/I' would go out walking with the families fat springer spaniel. I'd walk in freedom owning my world and revelling in the sense of safety.

Pretty quickly I realised another split was needed if I was going to avoid anyone  knowing what was happening.  At school I created another split in another world as although bullied, it was at least 'seen'.

This splitting carried on until I was nine different people / personalities.  I jumped between these personalities daily depending on the environments encountered.

Soon we were all defined enough to speak for ourselves. We made an internal community. We had all our answers, we did not need anyone. Having lived through this process quite naturally and at the time logically. I have nothing but respect for grey matter.

I met Zippy and so started the great clamp down on the now completely dysfunctional set of people living in my head.  The greater the safety I could trust, the greater the need to want to quiet everything down into something less confusing. As Zippy says 'Carwen nothing directly bad has happened to you now for 13 years'. Today my personalities have been whittled down to bare shadows. Only their voices remain with me. I have learnt to accept them and accept us all living and chatting in my cortex. On good days we are friends, on bad days we are enemies  (especially when I'm tired), there is sometimes just complete overwhelm. But as my strap line says. I am Colourful Carwen, a crowded brain learing to be at peace with itself and its inhabitants!.

Looping

One of the common things I tend to be talking about with people at the moment is this terrible business of what my sister and I have nick named 'Looping'.

Looping from our perspective is defined as 'something- be it  a physical action, internal thought or external that dis-empowers you by your inability to control or choose to have its company'. 

Now I tend to mostly have only 'internal thought' and 'speech' looping

So I will write from that aspect.  My aim is to communicate some of the things I have identified.

My 'loops,' as I posted previously, are repeating suggestive voices, unfinished lines of music and external speech rules which must be completed in order for speech to move forward to another subject. I am never without noise in my head because of my tinnitus, so I see that as my base level on a 'good' relaxed day.  However I am learning now to be able to map the relationship between life stressors and the other 'loops'.

But another strange common denominator seems to be appearing in the patterns, and that is the frustration of being unable to complete.

 I'm staring to learn that you either give in to 'looping' and it rules you or, as I am trying at the moment, you try to embrace part of what drives the loop to start again and that for me is a great fear of finishing.

I'm not going to say that I understand this because I don't, I just know that when say a song line is repeating 'she sailed away, she sailed away, she sailed away'; I might as well be wading through setting concrete to get my brain to go 'she sailed away on a lovely summers day on the back of a crocodile'.  If by some miracle I manage it, it will quickly be replaced by another line from  another song.

So I have to ask myself is it worth the fight and the frustration, or do I just pack it away with the ringing/ banging and 'get on' with my day?

It's a catch twenty-two because mentally you then must find something equal to or above in intensity to be able to ignore all the other 'looping'. Achieving this will often mean rapid thinking, rapid speech or strenuous physical or repetitive movement.

It's hard to write this blog as I don't have any set solutions, I just know that I journey along a road of ups and downs. Days of coping, and some days of hiding. Maybe I just now accept the journey for what it is unknown. 

I have found comforts though that make a level of peace achievable and I share with you two of my best helpers. 

1. TV
Watching a few episode of a series back to back on a bad day can be like manner from heaven. This does unfortunately means that nothing else gets done however as I'm sure other 'loopers' will agree, piles of washing and 'must do's' can take  second place if you are actually in a position to get calmer for a day.

2. Music

This is my gem. I am often seen wearing headphones and what I do is choose a song that I can cope with and set my phone to repeat that song. It has been known for me to listen to a repeating song all day and all the next day until things calm done. What I find is that, where as my 'loops' don't end, the song does end and then it starts again and finishes again. This gives me such relief  and a sense of 'winning' as I  know I am not going to get stuck, the phone in a way takes control, guarantees to carry me over  into wonderful endings.

It's all a wobbly wobbly world, we all have our quirks. I'm aware I've not finished this blog, as I have not written about speech patterns or put a proper ending to anything but, ironically I need to go and fold some books now to calm down. Thank you for reading and thank you for journeying with me.

.........

Body brain and bed! (A short poem)

Energy, physical energy!

It would be lovely to have enough spark
to go from morning to night.

To not give up half way through a day
and SHOUT "turn out the light".

But what we must realise is our head
is never severed from our body's form.

Our beautiful nerves and sinew are intrinsically linked
and this can make the whole mass forlorn.

It's just like a headache
measles or stress. 

head and nervous system intertwine
but sometimes end up in a relational mess!

So spare a thought for hurting heads
that can't stand straight on toes. 

It's not that they are lazy and can't get out of bed,
like everyone thinks they know.

Fact is they are physically exhausted
trying to move in a tied up rope. 

Takes a lot to keep a perspective
Energetic... Light... Hope.

Next time you take ill
please take note of it's effect on your whole mass.

Spare an understanding thought for those
who feel they keep coming mentally physically last.

Carwen

A simple mess.

Sometimes things build up and get overwhelming; the flat crusts up as if it were a piece of metal rusting in the rain (wet cold and unyielding).

The ability to deal with the rusty crust and to know how much effort it's going to take to sand it back to to metal stops me in my tracks (fear creeps in I gulp it down and look again). I know what it needs. 

You need to fill the dents and prime it up. Give it a first thin coat so it doesn't show a drip and then a second (possibly a final third coat) so it ends finished  in a lustrous deep colour of white.

Ah yes! when the flat creeps into a concentrated mess of layers and sub layers. The easy thing to do would be to sit paralysed  and unable to take your finger out of the dyke for fear of drowning. 

Boldly I learned one day from a friend the following: Go into the mess and pick one thing up. Ask yourself "were does this belong?" Take the item and put it away, if it had no 'home' then make it one. 

Small things

Small things can sometimes mean the world! They are sometimes the greatest of unseen achievement. They encourage you to make a smile in the private everyday.

Today after living in our flat for almost ten years, after carrying four plastic key recognition covers for months, I have finally colour coordinated mine and Zippy's front door keys.

This means on a daily basis we will no longer get confused (our keys are all the same silver colour) between our main door and front door key. Wooo hoo!! I HAVE ACHIEVED!!!!! Sooooo HAPPY!!