I don't know why?

I am in one of the happiest places, I'm on holiday. The same hotel complex we have visited for the last six years. We are recognised by the staff and we all in turn know thier names. They have watched my children grow over the years from buggies to the now confident key caring independent selves.

It is a safe place. We all know what we can eat and where, what pool is what temperature and what restaurant plays the football. Yet amazingly there are still incredible things to be discovered, first times that neither I nor Zippy thought would happen.

Example 1.

Zippy and I are sharing a bedroom for the first time, not just sharing a room but we have zipped our single beds together! Zippy and I have swapped places - he has lost three stone and now does not snore and I have started to snore (LOL - I'm getting my own back).

Example 2.
I am wearing 'just a swimming costume!'. For those of you, who have been on holiday with me, will know I usually wear at least one pair of cycling shorts, one costume and a knee length dress.

It all amazing!!! It's all victories and moving forward moments. BUT! I need to be truthful to myself and have a blog rant to get tensions OUT!!!. Also because I can't be bothered to drink to relax as my liver hurts. Yes my liver is protesting or maybe it's my gallbladder (humph) so I need another way to go RAAAAAAAAAAA!!!! SO here goes!

I love swimming and playing catch with the kids. Finding myself switching ages, I get caught in different memories. Wearing Just a swimming costume, something I have not done since childhood, also messes with all my senses. I love it and feel free, the wind hugs you and the sun strokes you (body memories start to fight); Ages switch and flip through my brain and body.  

Back to the present those are my children, I am not a child. I organise everything, fold all the towels, make the bed, and clean the kitchen; my age returns. Then fear creeps around and I realise I have no control over my food but this year there is an abundance in our fridge, thanks to the lovely Mrs P, and we have food vouchers. I switch ages again and talk to all my selves reminding them we are all safe and will not go hungry. Coming back to 2016 I try to remeber what my children have eaten, what they might need to eat, whether thier behaviours are hunger based, over stimulated based or sleep needing. 

It would be lovely to get rid of all this ridiculous worry by having a pint of a large bicardi and coke, as this option is not available I leave you with the following;

What about sun screen?

When did we last all use sunscreen?

Check, check no one is burnt...

How many calories have we consumed?

What's the time?

Where in the day are we?

Who is with me now?

How old are you?

Where did you go?

Is there anything I can do to help you?

Climb back, climb back.... Don't run from each other, if we run we will just keep colliding, Who are you? Where are you from? How can I help you? Would you walk with me? Can I introduce you to my own children? Who are you? Where are you from? ...... Roll over!...... Oh it's just Zippy. That body heat is not a threat. That breathing is not going to kill you. In fact the heat is OK too. It's not going to be something you have to endure and survive... Walk with me my ages... Walk with me.... Let me walk with you in the heat that is to be enjoyed and celebrated and maybe I say thank you to me clever liver for helping us all dance through our panic and fear. All my ages, all my voices - we are safe! Let's rebuild and keep mapping a new memory path whilst respecting and grieving the old.

Connections

I often wonder why I write these blogs?

I wonder what the purpose really is?

Some have asked me "but that's all behind you, why drag it up?". Some consider me to be attention seeking and making trouble. The phrase 'let the past be the past' can leave you feeling weak and stupid.

Originally I wrote because I wanted to learn how to write. A magical thing began, a blessing. I began to learn the peace of connection, explaining and giving meaning.

You see its all well and good if your past is in the past but for me my past was / is very much in my present, I am going to write quickly now in case I end up in a muddle. 

Imagine your a maths professor. Now imagine there was a maths formula you could not understand. You mull it over in your mind and think about it day and night (sometimes even when you don't want to) it haunts you. You seek solution to the formula by chatting with others who may help you read and research similar maths problems. You keep going until you have found the solution and then you have peace because you understand and have meaning for the formula. That formula then gets filed under 'understood'. Occasionally you are even in the position of being able to help another understand the formula in a quicker way than it took you, you enjoy the victory of understanding by connecting to others who have also understood the formula and can talk with you about other maths issues.

Triggered and overwhelmed.

Overwhelm is a funny thing. Everything is exaggerated, every sense on full and above full. 

Sounds hurt, they are to loud. Crisp packets and ice cream wrappers thunder. Metal gates are as loud as shotgun bullets, crunching shoes on pavements can seem as if the very ground they were built on may crack.

Whispering becomes loud talking, talking becomes shouting, and shouting makes you want to curl up in protective ball.(overwhelmed).

Switching regulating emotional states in any appropriate way seem impossible, far to hurried. It's as if you need everything to go into slow motion to understand or comprehen. 

So standing there shaking the world of touch, taste, sound, reaction, vision all in Incredible Hulk mode! What and earth do you do!

Nothing that's what! ABSOLUTLY nothing! There is another element to this crazed sensitive state of overwhelm and that is the world of paranoia. If the world outside your door is dangerous, if your head is telling you that no one is trust worthily, that everyone will try to kill you, that you are separated, that isolation shut down is the only option. That no one will understand and so you must never rely on anything. What do you do?

Now I could give a text book reply here or I could give you the truth. As I have never been one for being fake I'll give you the honest truth. You sleep, lift your heavy body to do the bare minimum and sleep more! Gradually you become hungry, you try to eat well, and you sleep. Slowly each time you have enough courage to push the boundaries of the paranoid voices and heightened senses they become manageable. 

When you feel safe enough you start to re establish contact with the outside. A trip to the shop a text. You then sleep heavy exhausted day and night, a five minute conversation can be a marathon, and you sleep. 

Safety creeps further into all the damaged pain, meaning returns, thoughts return. People in a non threatening perspective return. You test the waters to look for truth. Eventually a wobbly corner is turned,

you carry on.