Deep calls to deep.

Deep calls to deep they say. Right now I need to know deepness, I need to be seen. Not on a surface level, not even on a sub 10 levels below. I need the very pit of my soul to be comforted. 

Deep calls to deep they say. It's true. I stand and look around. The noises are to complicated to unravel, it's all to bright to see anything. Encouraging compliments mean nothing there well meaning intent do not even dent the heaviness of the day. Inside I'm shaking and lurching, doorways are to complicated to navigate. In response number nine just stops moving and we all sit frozen. Fireworks shoot and blast around our arms and legs battering us internally. Thoughts bombard and argue with each other. 1 to 8 try to help, try to care but in thier hast they just add to the confusion.

Carwen has that program down loaded?

To answer this requires an impossible amount of cross referancing

I can not explain 

I cannot fine words (I'm writting this to help me find them)

I realise that if I'm not going to ruin and waste today I need something to sooth my deep. I firstly put on my head phones and use music to soak in. Then I tidy and repack remake our room (we are on holiday). I make to beds line up all the patterns on the sheets, make neat piles of the cloths the kids will need for today.

Next I sit turn up my music in my ears drowning all my voices and start to type.

Logic appears as I type. Basically we are moving apartments, tomorrow we move from one part of the Island to another. I inform zippy I have left the planet for today. I haven found a deep yet that can match mine but at least I can understand its presents.

Apologies

An apology to number nine.

I struggle with CPTSD. To survive my experience of the world I split my self up. 1-8 are the voices in my head. They are remnants of when I used to walk in 8 different personality types. Number nine is our body who has had no say for years. 1-8 could not cope with what number nine carries. For all our sake, so we were able to function 1-8 stayed in charge. This year marks the beginning of the journey we are all on to work out if it's possible to lay down swords and join each other.

We are well into body therapy now! (5 months)

Using a combination of psychotherapy exercises and massage. All nine of us are stumbling on our colourful journey. The aim is to integrate on all levels. Body and brain, neuroplasticity comforts our amygdala. Frontal cortex meets real life limbs and frazzled nerves and stays in connection still able to think.

We start by just trying to identify 'feeling / touch'.  1-8 being able to understand and no longer be scared of the trouble number nine may get us into. Number nine not melting down or kicking of our fight flight freeze fawn response.

As we journey number nine is starting to throw out emotion alongside feeling and sensation. We 'all' feel touch in our tummy, jaws, arms and fingers; managing all to stay present. 

1-8 struggle to put identification to these sensations and some of these sensations now come with memories attached to the emotions.

I guess this is where I need your help. I need to write to bring closure. Writing the process down and know it's been heard is really important to me. I'd like to share one of my first integration stories.

It all started about a month into therapy. A sudden convolution in my tummy exploded it literally doubled me in two.  I was in bed at home. I'd  had a couple of glasses of wine, Netflix was on but all I could do was groan as repeatedly our breath was caught. 

The next convulsion would come. Number nine would literally crunch in two. I knew this was coming from my tummy musclesand there was no pain involved. Strangely I did not feel scared.

 Being able to remain thinking allowed 1-8 to consider what was happening. Viewing the experience like medical students in a theatre gallery. 

Like birth contractions it kept happening. Even when I hadn't had wine and over days several unexpected times. We all tried to grapple with what on earth was going on. A conference was called, a body brain meeting.

1-8 pleaded not guilty, each voice presented what they considered to be going on. There seemed only one culprit. We all turned to number nine. 

• What are you doing?
• We can't function if you act like this.
• We need to 'do life'!
• Are you trying to cripple us?
• We are struggling to stay civil.
• If you keep behaving like this we will have no choice but to take over entirely and leave you!
• You are too much trouble!
• We are angry with you!
• Aggghhhhhhhhh?
• Stop it, stop it!

Then and only then after at least a week of squabbling and anger our hippocampus gave us all a pin point.  Number nine was trying to remind us of when we walked in a field.

 At the time we were visiting a neighbours farm to use their pool. The field In question sloped up the side of a hill. We are 10 years old. 

Roaming out on are own in the African bush was a normal pass time. No one knew where we were, but we weren't creating stress so it didn't bother anyone. Scrabbling through some bush scrub we found ourselves behind a group of horses. Not knowing about horses we walked up behind them.

All we can remember next is a dirty great thump in our tummy. The whole world momentarily went black. (One of the horses had kicked us in the stomach). The blackness reseeded, doubled up with no breath and smiling as we recognised this experience as being 'winded' (we knew we would breath again). There's was however an the extra problem of being catapulted down the hill.

The falling and tumbling was not our primary concern, as we knew we could take that. The thing that terrified us was this:_

We no longer had the ability to hide and someone might see!  
This would mean being in trouble!!!

Thankfully no one saw. Swiftly we considered how to make this situation 'not have ever happened'. Getting up we stood straight, blinked  and sucked in the pain. We then neutralised our face and walked back and over to  everyone else by the pool. 

Putting on our swimming costume in the toilet it came as a relief to see the scratches were not to noticeable. The horse shaped welt on our stomach already turning blue would be harder to deal with "No it won't" and we smiled again. "We shall keep it hidden". Occasionally we would have a look. What seemed like years and many colours later it had disappeared.

Numbers 1-8 real back a stare at number nine:

• Out of all the things we have been through your choose that as our first hurdle?
• What on earth are you thinking?
• That is not important!
• Your being ridiculous!
• This is not a game you know!
• We are still angry with you! why make such a fuss?

 Then we looked at number nine and realised it mattered to her. She wanted to tell us it hurt. It hurt physically and it hurt to not be seen. It made her withdraw from us all further as it was quite obvious she didn't matter. 

That it mattered to her should be enough for it to matter to us all. 1-8 took a a sigh. Guilty thoughts that we should be dealing with much bigger and important events will have to wait. If we are going to learn about each other and respect each other then part of the journey is realising that number nine is probably very sensitive and that's OK.

Are you ok Carwen?

My brain whirls into gear. I start to try and cross reference a whole load of information to try and get the correct answer.

Firstly, what context is this question being asked? 

Is it a quick social meeting situation were I'm supposed to say, "yes I'm fine how are you?" 

Then comment on further meaningless statements such as the classic, "so enjoying the sunny weather" (statement followed by a smile). In this situation you are not being asked for anything greater than a positive memory of a 5 minute meeting that enhances your bond of care for the person involved. 

Then there's the mid level, "how are you?"

This is usually someone who knows you and is genuinely interested but only 20cms into your world not the full measure. You have to remember to give what I call 'topic titles' but don't unpack the topic.

Then there's the not equal "how are you?"

This is perhaps one of the easiest as the person usually always works in this pattern every time you see them you just have to identify it. They ask how are you?, I give a quick summary of a few bits of personal information and then ask "how are you?". That the rest of the meeting sorted and you spend a few hours identifying and solving problem patterns in the persons surrounding environment.

Then there's the echo.

This person works by echoing. It's almost a tit for tat "how are you?" "How are you?". How's work? How's your work. This only requires one piece of information replies, any expansion on a one sentence reply will be ignored and another question asked until the prescribed 'set' of questions have been asked and the person is fulfilled.

Then there's those who can get  nerdy, deep, and are what I call fellow pattern thinkers. 

Carwen how are u? Six hours later all subjects covered from both our lives it's 3am and everyone's in bed. You say goodbye knowing you have offloaded up loaded pondered and perceived and are fulfilled, with every topic unpacked repacked cross-referenced and logged. Sleep is deep and content.

Then theres double question bonanza.

"Carwen how are you? Did you see that program last night?"

Wrong wrong wrong, that's two questions, neither of which you are going to answer as by the time you have separated and categorised the information it is to late and the conversation had moved on so I'm left on the back foot trying to work out what is now being said.

Then there's the well intended but can't cope so get cut of with no resolution "how are you?"

Negative situation 

•  " I'm worried about X"
•  "Don't worry it will be alright this time next week?"
• "You've been here before you'll be ok?"

These are the hardest and the quickest to learn not to be vulnerable with as they don't understand that it's really hard to ask for anything. 

Positive situation

• "How are you?"
• "I'm so excited about X"
• "That's lovely"  

They change subject or look away or interrupt you mid sentence with there next observation or comment. In short no time has been given for your reply and you realise your going to have to transition with a cannon full of unexplained excited energy in the next period of time - sooooo hard. This will often result in shut down from me as I desperately try to filter and be interested in what's happening and fail. No closure....

These are just a few of the thoughts racing round my head as I'm asked  "how are you?"  

They are of course all thinking about the other person. There is of course where I'm at.

• Am I busy?
• Do I have time?
• Do I want to risk getting the answer wrong?
• Have I enough energy to get my words in the right order?
• How are my voices behaving?
• Are my voices shouting something different to what I want to say?
• Can I be bothered to talk at all as I'm not alright but know it needs to wait till I see my therapist?
• Should I put all mental stress to one side and blar blar blar????

And don't get me started on the complexity of group conversations!!!!!

"Carwen how are you?"

I stare blankly exhausted, "I'm ok". End of conversation 

1-8+9

Not blogging for a while has been deliberate, we I, have wanted to give number nine room. (See previous post). What has been amazing to discover though, is just how unconnected things really are. Physically and emotionally.  It's been like trying to incorporate two complete unknowns that have always been together. I imagine it's what separated identical twins feel like meeting after years of being apart. Both knowing each other in such a deep way but at the same time not knowing.

It feels sad, overwhelming but also a right path to walk. We have had to work through 1-8 feeling abandoned and jealous of number9. Fights have broken out where 1-8 have flatly refused to cooperate in letting number9 be seen. It's taken a lot of care and reassurance to manage both parties. Number9 still doesn't speak, I'm not sure she ever will, instead given room she jerks and twitches our whole body. She hides and refuses to give 1-8 any word to say. On occasion 1-8 have begged for words (especially in public settings) but as I said I think we are coming to the conclusion that number nine may never speak. It's hard then to try and in corporate her on a daily level as she has so much physical control. We have also discovered that our kneck is no mans land, our kneck belongs to neither  number9 or 1-8, often if an argument is occurring we have found its best to make that space as wide as possible and stare at the ceiling. 

Thankfully I/we live in an accepting place. So weather number9 twitches and jolts us on or 1-8 logically try to plan swirl and articulate there is no sense of shame. Historically I suppose shame was everyone's enemy, but shame has been evicted in place of acceptance. All that is left is to give everyone a chance. You see number9 does hold some ace cards. She is what can move us physically, she is what can bring unshakeable hand eye coordination and space awareness. This has been a blessed relief after years of 1-8 knocking things over and being unable to get through door ways without bruising our arms. It's also been quite amazing her ability to save 1-8 from being stuck in chairs on the wrong sides of rooms or in bed.

Anyway I'm not sure how much sense this will make to many of you, it feels quite vulnerable making all our journeys public. However it also feels right.

number 9

So we the numbers one to eight have given up our place as focus of attention to number nine. Number nine, you may remember, is our body and numbers one to eight are the shadow voices. Shadows of long gone personalities.

For the last 4.5 years numbers one to eight have rightly had the focus. They have needed it. Talk therapy has been the required space for them all to unwind and have space. We have become friends and learn to respect each other for the different qualities everyone has.

About a year ago we came to a quiet dramatic realisation that there was another thing, not a voice but a sense of something being there. Over the months we all realised that we had killed number nine. As therapy went on we all reached out to number nine and we were utterly mortified that she had been eliminated by us.

So out of respect we all agreed to sit back and allow number nine to tell her story. We have started body psychotherapy. Body psychotherapy involves touch. It became apparent pretty quickly that number nine was no easy character.

You see number nine is probably not even the age of nine yet. She is so young she has very little understanding of anything, she is innocent and trusting. When she speaks its with such joy and hope. So why is it so hard. Imagine you had a young child who was all the above and you had to give her to the big and the bad. Imagine how it would feel to leave something so innocent with something that you knew was only going to cause pain and when that pain had passed there would only be more and more pain until there was nothing left. No shadow no nothing. Nine was going to die.

We the eight have been so angry this week and everyone is in upheaval. This being the third session in body therapy, number nine has been seen or at least is being seen but she's being seen before it all goes wrong before we have to abandon her. Its like watching a disaster in slow motion or a horror movie.

• We want to change the script! 
• We want her to live! 
• We are doing this so she can live and feel! 
• We want to not have to leave this time! 
• We want to stay whole and protect her! 

It was impossible before. So starts this new journey. Number nine, we eight make you a promise we couldn't keep all those years ago. We know what is ahead but we will use all we have learnt to help you process. We are older now  and have older skills; and we are so so sorry we couldn't have done this sooner.

Communication and Multi-tasking

As my two kids approach 10 and 12yrs of age it is becoming apparent that I need to learn some new coping skills. As I have discussed, in previous blogs, as babies and young children I communicated by using a language I had made up. It's been quite incredible to witness how much you can communicate by 'babbling' the emotional content and using hand / eye movements to direct a young child.

It has all worked very nicely, my oldest is fully fluent in understanding my language and my youngest can even speak it back to me breathing her emotions into the various sounds she creates.

As you can imagine it's all very simple to understand, it basic life. Often my children know our routines so well that we don't even have to speak to each other. We can just show our enjoyment of being with each other through silent practical ways that give each other joy.  Lining up and organising a bedrooms shelves, producing a still warm soft blanket out of the tumble dryer at TV time,  and counting out 'Snack a Jacks' in a pack even though we know it says 12 on the side. One of my favourites I like to do it is find a new plug in smell that makes the flat feel cuddly or change all their sheets and make the bed beautifully into 'nests' and you can't wait to jump in.

However as I have said this is all fairly basic calm life, it's not lives multi tasking over several levels; it's more of a being together rhythmic stream.

So whats wrong? It all works very well?Well it has done up until now, I acknowledge that now is the time my kids quite rightly want to become less dependent on me and my hubby. They over these next 10yrs will want to grow and grow into their own identities with their own plans and adventures.

In short our home is morphing from a singular to a multiple existence. As my kids voice and act upon their needs and wants our lives intertwine even further with friends staying over, going out, interactions and plan making with other parents etc. You know what I mean, the list goes on...

These other streams of life do not know my language and I in turn struggle to navigate in theirs. They don't 'get it' when I disappear to my room or put my headphones in and wander out into the garden. My kids know to look for the intent behind what I say, not literally interpret my words. 

• That shiny pole = the hat stand
• can you put your clobber in the brown tub = can you bring me ur washing from your room, and put it on the washing pile in the kitchen.
• have you got your pots on = have you got your shoes on.

All my life what has come out of my mouth has never made literal picture sense (unless I'm working my way through a monologue on a subject that I'm passionate about) and the other poor person is just left listening.

Other streams of life they do not know:-

• That,standing to close to me can make me panic
• That, tapping my arm to get my attention is unbelievably hard to deal with for me.
• My inability to unravel an argument over a game, as three 'streams' tell me their point of view at once.
• I learn people don't do what they say eg "I come at 'about' 8pm" and then don't turn up till 9pm, leaving me working through possible solutions and scenarios whilst being frozen in the 'Unknown of what on earth 'about' might mean. 
• Other streams arrive with, socks that are not pulled over their feet properly, causing them to flop around as a Wii game is conquered.  
• They sit were I usually sit (not knowing that having people sit on both sides of my is just to overwhelming). 
• They don't know that phones in our flat are never held to your ear they are only ever talked to on loud speaker, if answered at all.
• Other streams I struggle to use a knife and fork so spoons are often used due to total lack of food to mouth co ordination.
• Also 'other streams ' are often shocked as 'Carwen / mum' always has several micro naps throughout the day leaving the kids always have first dibs on the lounge.

I wish this blog was an amazing poem cause I'd want to end it like this.

against the 'other streams' I have nothing,

Except a want to work out how to love em,

For on this journey I'm bound

 to let my little ones identities be found

And as they swop and wobble

My freak outs I will nobble

Cause I want to stay in the pack

Even if I have a rainbow on my back.

Thank you to all who walk with us in all their beautifully stream uniqueness. 

Updating memories: part 2 - school life.

Today I got a splinter in my foot.  I kept gardening, ignored the little jolt of annoyance and altered how I walked instead. Having  put the kid's clothes away and made dinner, I then went out to carry on gardening.  Splinters and I have a very special relationship whenever I get one, it seems too small to be bothered by.

I tried to ignore it, wipe it off, but this splinter won. I stopped and dug it out. It irritated me the ‘instant’ relief that I felt. How could something so small affect the entire body. Splinters remind me I have processing to do. For me ignoring and storing tensions in my body because of painful memories is a very practical problem. It affects not only how I think, but how I physically  move my body and am able to cope with life.

 If you haven't noticed already, I'm waffling.  As I write now I'm not sure I can process this next set of memories.I want to put them into words. Words to the experience seem a cheap option. As a veteran memory blogger I know that this probably means that it is important to try.

So here goes: Boarding school (school life).

This is my third attempt to write about the subject. I find it incredible that it can still make such an impact (splinters, splinters, and more splinters).  My brain  and body moves rapidly  between different ages. I try to clasp at some point of reference to write about.   

What was robbed from not just me, but those around me in the three years that I and they were there seems beyond meaning. I suppose, if I was to put it in a nut shell, boarding school for me was the place my behaviors and I were broken. 

I once heard of an experiment were they put a rat in a wire box cage. They  gave it electric shocks though the cage. At first the rat is able to do something to stop the shocks by pressing a lever in the cage. Then they take the lever away. The rat is periodically shocked with out rhythm or predictability over a long period of time. At first the rat fights back and runs around trying to escape or find a physical position which would stop the pain of the shocks but in the end the rat gives up. It can't find anywhere to escape.  The door to its cage can then be left open.  The rat won't even move to escape and hope has gone, any thought of rescuing itself  have gone and the rat endures and lay motionless.

At our African boarding school they used stress positions to achieve this same effect with us. The school could brag that they did not beat their pupils. I can't, and probably never will, decide what was more painful. Being put in a stress position for an unspecified amount of time and enduring the burning fire that would rage through your muscles; or being made to watch someone else go through the same experience, mirroring their pain but being unable to save or help them, being unable to predict how long it would go on for.

I'd heard a story of modern terrorism. In order to put fear into a village, militants would take a few people and torture them in a horrific visual way.  Then they would kill them and dump their bodies in the middle of the village.  All the village could see what had happened to those who had been taken. When the soldiers arrived to ‘take’ the village  it would just give itself over without a fight because of the fear that had been induced. What the village saw created such fear the minds of the village were broken before the militants arrived, that is brokenness.

We had every minute of every day ruled by fear.  Our food, our sleep and our bodies, nothing was off limits. After a few months of stress positioning I broke and 'they' felt they had achieved 'their' goal. On top of performing the stress positions I became compliant and would run until they let us stop. I would stand in line until they said move, sit with my back straight and stand with my eyes facing straight ahead. I, like the others, would move to complete what ever task we were given with the efficiency of a well drilled soldier.

Totally hopeless and broken, no one was going to help and I could not help myself, we even broke the thought of being able to help each other. Life became a personal mission of survival.  My parents kept taking me back every Monday morning at 6am and pick me up every Friday at 1:30pm. Being a weekly boarder I had to try and keep switching  between two opposing worlds; two totally different sets of rules. In the end I withdrew and detached myself from either world. This personal isolation and lack of trust or help from anyone only added to the hopeless,and confusion.

I also didn't understand because other families' children on our farm went to a local school. I Couldn't get my head around the fact that my mum would travel to my school on a Monday (to drop us off) and a Wednesday (my mum would come to my school and teach RE). Friday (to pick us up) and  Saturday the we would watch sport in my older sisters boarding school down the road (and pick her up). Sunday we travelled back to my school had church in the school hall. Why couldn't my mum let me be a day scholar it would only mean making two extra trips on Tuesday and Thursday?

Wednesday's were particularly were challenging for me. I could hear my mum's voice down the corridor as she teaches RE, and could see our car in the car park and yet was totally unable to make any contact. It made me very angry.

So what really happened?

Apparently to everyone else I was making wonderful progress and the 'new' way of controlling my behaviors was working well. For me it was like living in a slow painful descent into death.

In the end I did not say when:

- I fell over the banisters down a two story stairwell. I only got found out when I fainted later in the day.

- I did not tell any one when in sick bay I had ants attack my soiled pants, I just got up washed them out, put them back on and got back in bed with the ants.

- I did not say when the matrons made me stand in the kitchen freezer room and threaten to lock my in by playing with the door.

- I did not say when I had not had enough to eat because the prefects did not like me and the head of table handed out small portions to me. There were periods over those three years where I would walk around the day scholars begging them to share their sandwiches and crisps. Sometimes at night I would eat my toothpaste.

- It didn't even cross my mind to complain about anything or tell anyone if I was ill.

- I once had a very bad case of conjunctivitis. Every morning I would make my bed perfectly with my eyes crusted together. Later in the  bathroom I ripped the gunk out of my eye lashes not worried about my eyes but worried about it putting me behind schedule.

Any part of my world that allowed for any expression of individualism gradually became deeply deeply hidden. I secretly hid biscuits from home and sneaked them in,  stole matches and lit rolled up pieces of newspaper behind the out door school toilets. I used to keep a handkerchief  hidden in my sheets and I would suck my thumb at night whilst stroking my nose with it (tracing a specific pattern over and over again). Sometimes I would get my hands on a bit of chewing gum, I would guard it preciously by sticking it in the top of my mouth for most of the week.

I soon realised that the part of the school I inhabited was seen and treated very differently to the majority of the school. (I'm sorry I have not explained earlier the school run on two systems. Red stream: those pupils considered academic and green stream: those who were considered unteachable). Those of us in green stream were by all accounts the lowest of the stupid and the most unruly of the unruly (and we knew it). Everyone else had the power to make our lives miserable, be it through condescending attitude or power like the matron's teacher prefects.

There are other things I would like to mention as I'm not sure I will ever blog about this part of life ever again are these;

- The hospital that sat adjacent to the school on a Thursday evening would burn all its human contaminated waste, the smell was sickly and deathly (hated it). At that time (in African news stories) it was in vogue to put tyres round people's head full of petrol and set them alight. It would be reported and I always got scared of those images mixing with that smell.

Then there were the stories our dorm prefect would tell us to scare us at night.

- Stories of ghosts and babies being flushed down toilets to die and getting stuck in the pipes.

- Of prisoners who had their faces slashed and then were hung upside down with bags of rats tied over their heads.

-      Poor unfortunates who were wrapped in barbed wire and then force fed water through a hose pipe being pushed into they stomachs until they drowned. 

Zimbabwe as a country was fairly young into its independence and I'm sure some of these stories were made up but at the time I believed them all to be true because of the general evidence around me.

Then as I mentioned before there was the horrendous experience of watching other people being ‘broken’ through punishment.

- Winnie who had an incredible fear of heights but was made climb on top of the dormitory cupboard and sing nursery rhymes. 

- Gwen who would wet her bed every night and always smelt of stale urine having to endure matrons calling her dirty and filthy on a daily basis. Tears would silently run down her face even as she heard their footsteps outside.

-     Irene whose two front teeth were literally rotting in her face and who be ridiculed for her bad breath and ugly face.

-    Those who were forced to sit in cupboards with the doors shut.

-    Others would be tied to their beds at night by the prefects (sometimes by their hair so that in the morning they would be watched struggling to part hair from string and laughed at).

- Of the fear of anyone finding out it was your birthday which meant you could be carried and  held in a bath of cold water and your bed ‘Apple pied’.

- Of those that were made to stand on ant's nest and not be allowed to move to flick the creatures off until there was enough for the prefects to laugh at there dancing.

- Of all the times pupils were humiliated by being made to eat alone at piggie's table in the centre of the dinning hall for just dropping some sauce on the table cloth.

- Of all the times we were made to kneel in front of the prefects beds balancing bibles on our up turned hands until your whole bodies would scream with stiffness.

- Of all of those who survived all the above without showing anything or  saying anything but who apparently had done 'very well’.

Wherever you are, I want you to know you were seen! I saw you and it was not right! You are not stupid or born bad! 

I wish I could have stopped it! 

I wish I could have stuck up for you and made difference!

 All these years I have carried you in my stomach. Every time I see anyone dis empowered, or bullied, I remember you all. I have not forgotten. I will never forget that humans can actually enjoy humiliating other humans with no compassion or empathy, and even enjoy the power it gives them. I hope that someway you have managed to break free from the label we were all given. That you have had the the chance to get free of 'boarding school'. Peace be on us all.

So there I did it! I survived boarding school from 9-11.5yrs.  At 11.5I got sent back to England to live with my grandma, after completing an intensive training course in 'morphagraphs' so I would reach England able to read and write.

Thank you for reading and for letting my young me be heard.