Eliza's favourite love songs

In a way these selections tell a story of my love life, so I don't think I need to add any commentary. I thought this would be a useful distraction, to reflect on what love has meant to me (in song). These aren't all of the songs about love that I've loved, but they are especially meaningful even today.

So needless to say I'm odds and ends
But that's me, stumbling away
Slowly learning that life is O.K.
Say after me:
It's no better to be safe than sorry.


Take on me
Take me on



Take on me by A-ha

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In open fields of wild flowers
She breathes the air and flies away
She thanks her Jesus for the daisies and the roses in no simple language
Someday she'll understand the meaning of it all

He's more than the laughter
Or the stars in the heavens
As close as a heartbeat
Or a song on her lips
Someday she'll trust him
And learn how to see him
Someday he'll call her
And she will come running
Fall in his arms, the tears will fall down
And she'll pray

I want to fall in love with you



Love song for a saviour sung by Jars of Clay

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No one told me
I was going to find you,
Unexpected
what you did to my heart,

When I lost hope
you were there to remind me
this is the start.



At the beginning sung by Richard Marx and Donna Lewis (from the movie Anastasia)

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How much longer will it take to cure this
Just to cure it 'cause I can't ignore it if it's love (love)
Makes me wanna turn around and face me, but I don't know nothing 'bout love

...

I'm In Love, I'm in Love,
I'm in Love, I'm in Love,
I'm in Love, I'm in Love,
Accidentally



Accidentally in love, sung by Counting Crows (from the movie Shrek)

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Your eyes shine through me
You are so divine to me
Your heart has a home in mine
We won't have to say a word
With a touch all shall be heard
When I search my heart it's you I find

My beloved one, my beloved one, my beloved one



Beloved one sung by Ben Harper

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I melt every time you look at me that way
It never fails, any time any place
This burn in me is the coolest thing that i've ever felt
i melt



I melt sung by Rascal Flatts

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Skipping beats, flushing cheeks, I am struggling
Daydreaming bed scenes in the corner cafe
And I'm left in bits, recovering techtonic tremblings
You get me every time

Why'd you have to be so cute?
It's impossible to ignore you.
Must you make me laugh so much?
It's bad enough we get along so well.
Say good night and go.



Goodnight and go sung by Imogen Heap

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My mind it kind of goes fast
I'll try to slow it down for you
I think I'd love to take a drive
I want to give you something
I've been wanting to give to you for years
My heart



Congratulations sung by Blue October

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I'll be giving it my bestest
And nothing's going to stop me but divine intervention
I reckon it's again my turn to win some or learn some

I won't hesitate no more, no more
It cannot wait, I'm yours

Well open up your mind and see like me
Open up your plans and damn you're free
Look into your heart and you'll find love love love love
Listen to the music of the moment, people dance and sing
We're just one big family
And It's our God-forsaken right to be loved love loved love loved

So I won't hesitate no more, no more
It cannot wait, I'm sure
There's no need to complicate
Our time is short
This is our fate, I'm yours



I'm yours by Jason Mraz

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And my own personal theme song, which is also a love song:

Do I have to tell the story of a thousand rainy days since we first met?
It's a big enough umbrella, but it's always me that ends up getting wet.

Every little thing she does is magic.
Everything she does just turns me on.
Even though my life before was tragic,
Now I know my love for her goes on.



Every little thing she does is magic sung by the Police

Birch or Oak?

I am a birch!

I love birch trees!

Letting go is not running away

People end marriages all the time. It isn’t easy for any of them. Emotions are nearly always complicated and messy, sending you mixed messages that you have no hope of interpreting. If it were just that, perhaps I would feel more capable of making a decision, but for someone with a dissociative disorder it is much more complex.

The feelings of love and attachment for my husband refuse to live with the feelings of resentment and distaste. And before I knew I was dissociating, I thought I was simply crazy. I couldn’t understand why some days I loved him and some days I didn’t. As for the resentment, I wasn’t able to access those feelings until last month.

In a ‘normal’ body, I would be able to feel those emotions and process them, but thanks to dissociation, feelings that are too overwhelming (which includes love) are bottled away. I float through the rest of the days, trusting that somewhere in one of these bottles inside me are those feelings that are keeping me here, with him.

It wasn’t always so easy to float. Sometimes, when depersonalised, I’ve been pushed. We have a conflict, and because I’m not emotionally attached, I find it easy to reject and leave. The next morning I wake up in horror at what I’ve done. The bottle, now open, is overflowing with love, and I feel betrayed by myself.

It’s a horrible feeling.

When I started with my second psychotherapist, I had very little trust left in myself. Every morning came with it a possibility that a new part of me, with different emotions and desires and needs, might appear. How am I supposed to negotiate the world when I can’t even rely on knowing myself?

Looking back, the work I did to get to today is incredibly complicated. I still struggle with accepting how dissociation f*cks up my life. It is no more obvious than in my relationship with Drew. Which am I:

the part that doesn’t love my husband OR the part that does?

Who do I listen to? Who do I make choices for? They are worlds apart. I can’t begin to bring them together, so I concentrated on just being me (sometimes in love, sometimes not) and made plans for the future I wanted (as a mother). When facing the reality of being an adoptive parent, Drew finally admitted he was unhappy in our relationship. He could no longer live with ‘sometimes a wife’. He finally was able to make a decision. I teetered over the wall.

It’s easier for me: letting go. Grieving is built into my system. What is different this time is that I’m not running. Letting go is not running. I’m letting go of Drew, of our relationship, our future. I’m holding on to me and everything else I have left today.

I know I will get through this.
I feel like dying would be kinder.

But I am patient. I am strong. I am comfortable swimming in the river of loneliness. This is a chance to do things differently. My future is wide open. I am freeing myself to grow up in a more organic way, to discover myself, to make mistakes, and to learn from them. To become an Individual. To be me and to see what sort of impact I can have on the world.

My heart is broken, but I’d rather have the pieces of a broken heart than no heart at all. And for so many days of the last five years, my heart has been in hiding.

Add to The List

My marriage is ending.

I don't want to be rescued. I don't want help or advice or guidance. This is my responsibility. This is our choice. I know I will get through this. I know my life will be dramatically changed. I know eventually it will be better.

What I don't know is whether I should go back to my life pre-Drew or to go forward from here.

Either way, it's hard.

Like it or not, I split when I moved to the UK. My life here is built around him. It will take time to unpick all of that, and more time to choose what I want to keep. There is not a single person who knows all of me. There are only parts, faces, personas, bits, pieces. People have room for pieces, but not all of me. I am too spread out.

No matter where I go, there will always be part of me somewhere else.

Things I've made

Candy asked about what I make. I don't really share things, because I habitually avoid praise. It makes me feel uncomfortable. I know that needs to change.

Here is a selection of things I make. I make things when I feel like it (and I make whatever I feel like making). A good proportion is food because we are eating constantly. I also sew quite a bit, because I can sit and listen to the TV (I rarely actually watch TV) and sew. Or sit in company and sew.

I would have made a productive and useful medieval housewife.

If I had a woodworking studio, I'd cut wood and build furniture. If I had a painting studio, I'd do more painting. But I'm afraid all I have is a kitchen, a dining table and a couch, so the world is stuck with experimental baked goods and stuffed animals for now. And photographs.

Man, I feel awkward.

A gift for Carrie's baby boy.

I am 'no good' at frosting cakes and felt quite bad about this one at the time. In hindsight, it's really not so bad.

I also love decorating tables and making favours. It doesn't do anything for the social anxiety, though, and when I look at this photograph all I remember is feeling terribly insecure after the evening was over.

When bored, I tend to sew up small ornaments and decorations using scrap fabric and ribbons.

I wanted hot cross buns without raisins, so I made my own. They were super yummy, especially in making bread & butter pudding afterwards.

I don't spend a lot of time carving my pumpkins, but I do spend a lot of time enjoying them.

Snowmen deserve personalities too.

I didn't build these, but I did get them for free, strip them, paint them, and put new knobs on them.

I also paint, in all mediums.

And make jewelry.

And carve wood.



Just a selection, and really most of my spare time I spend thinking, reading and writing. I make things sporadically not regularly.

Managing a Narcissistic Manager

I work in a great team full of smart, caring and interesting people. But unfortunately, the department is led by a man more broken than my parents. For seven years, my old manager was the buffer, protecting me and my colleagues from the stress of the boss’s immature defenses. My manager shouldn’t have stayed so long in such an unsafe situation, but nevermind. Now I have a new manager, and now it’s my turn to be in the firing line.

When I described the culture at work, my therapists (both of them) visibly winced. Having a narcissistic, childlike boss might seem like self-abuse. Why would I stay in a situation that is such a repeat of my childhood, with a narcissistic father?

Well the first reason is because, until now, the boss ignored me. I made it very clear from the beginning that I was not an easy source for his narcissism. I treat everyone with respect and kindness, but I am not an object to control and subjugate. So he left me alone and meddled in my colleague’s projects. This worked for me.

When my manager left, she was replaced by someone far less confident and secure. Suddenly I found myself supporting my own manager, containing his fears, and guiding his work. I’ve done my best to give him confidence in leading the team and in negotiating with the boss (his manager), but he hasn’t yet developed any autonomy. Given that he is managed by a narcissist, that is an incredibly risky place to be.

Not my responsibility, right?

Boss is realising what an asset I am to the team and he wants 'in' on the grandeur of success. Unfortunately, he is also realising that I will not blindly accept (with cloying gratitude) his direction and/or advice. This resistance is hard for a narcissist to digest. He sees any disagreement as an attack on him and responds the best way he knows how: attacking others.

I’m the only one to disagree with the boss actively and regularly, to my new manager’s chagrin. I do this because I know my boss cannot hurt me without hurting himself more. He can and does try regularly. Just yesterday, he demanded to see my work and despite my excellent reflective listening skills, disintegrated into criticising me (as a person). His agitation and defensiveness grew and then (out of nowhere) he said I don’t listen to people, and that is why he is having this talk with me.

I know better than to directly challenge a narcissist who is in defensive mode, so I sat observantly and continued to redirect the conversation to its goal: that is, my work. At the end, I explained to him that the work was complex and I’m preparing him for the likelihood that he will be unhappy with the final work as it cannot be simplified as much as he wishes.

“Make me happy, Eliza.” Suddenly, he betrayed his own narcissism, leaning towards me as though he was giving me the secret to life. “I shouldn’t be unhappy.”

He smiled, winked and chuckled, but I could tell he was uncomfortable. Who wouldn’t be uncomfortable with an unexpectedly desperate admission of one’s needs? I clearly cause him considerable stress, in the same way my first therapist caused me distress, challenging my defenses so directly. I’m glad he was able to admit his core need (to be made happy) but he will just be disappointed by me.

I don’t exist to make him happy.

When he resorts to attacking me to protect against his own insecurities, I only see his pain. Not mine. I refuse to take responsibility for his pain, and that is why I have no problem establishing firm, healthy boundaries with my narcissistic boss.

Today the conversation continued. I was even more prepared and made special effort to pay attention to my reflective listening and calm presence. The more room I gave my boss to talk and express himself, the more he became agitated and defensive.

"I'm frustrated." He waved his hands in the air, frowning at me, as though his agitation was my fault, my responsibility to fix. He ranted on. I listened, reflected, and listened some more.

"I'm not stupid." His vulnerability began to show through, and despite his aggressive language and stance, I gave him a patient and reassuring smile.

"I don't think you are stupid, Boss." I couldn't say much, because he clearly had more to say, but I do feel we turned a corner. At the end I summarised his points and how I would act on them, which is what I do in every work-related conversation with my managers. I made the changes and sent them through. He, considerably calmer, thanked me.

Will I be the first person in my boss’s life to offer him the continuity of a safe, healthy relationship based on authenticity and respect? He can’t fire me for disagreeing with him (because I am always respectful) nor for ignoring his advice (he’s not my line manager and my contract is very clear on my responsibilities). He’s stuck with me in ways I’m not stuck with him, as I can resign at any time. No wonder he gets so agitated with me!

I certainly challenge how my boss sees the world. When I disagree, he gets defensive and then finds ways to control or punish me. His paranoia extends to others, as he projects his fears that I will try to control or punish him. But in reality, I reject the unsafe behaviour, not him, as I continue to give him opportunities to be a part of a healthy working relationship with me. I reinforce the positive behaviours with praise, much as a parent would, but I certainly don’t seek opportunities to challenge or parent my boss.

Given that I experienced years of abuse from my narcissistic father, how is it even possible that I can cope with this situation?

My ability to dissociate means I’m able to stay calm in extreme stress, which (especially) includes being triggered by a narcissist. And I do get triggered! But my confidence has grown so much; I dissociate far less than I used to. I very nearly dissociated today, as my boss became excessively aggressive towards me.

Perhaps a year ago, I would have broken down in an existential crisis when someone invalidated my work, ignored my comments, and then attacked me as a person. But today all I see is a scared man whose entire Self is built into his role of being the Smart Perfect One in Charge. I wish I was able to show him how to be smart and in charge without needing to be perfect, but I know it’s not my responsibility to heal the world.

The best I can do for myself is build stronger boundaries, and really I’m grateful to my boss for helping to expedite that process for me. Nothing convinces me more that I should be a psychoanalyst than when I’m with my boss. I’m learning a lot about relinquishing control, responding to abuse, respecting others, and being kind. I’m also becoming (even more) patient.

That said, I do resent having to contain my boss's emotions and I do sympathise with my colleagues who are less equipped to cope. They don’t see my boss as a scared man but as a manipulative, aggressive, childish person. They regularly get angry at his behaviours but constantly invalidate themselves by not reflecting on why they feel angry. “Because of him” they say, except the blame ends with the person rather than the behaviour.

They feel helpless, but in reality their inability to be authentic and defend against these regular boundary crossings means that their anger comes out in passive aggression just like our boss’s anger. So of course the boss treats the world as though it is always rejecting and punishing him. BECAUSE IT IS, no matter how smart or perfect or in charge he is.

That is precisely why I freely disagree when I have a different opinion. It’s why I tell him when he has crossed a boundary (and how it makes me feel and how I want to be treated in the future). It’s what I remind myself when he becomes grossly agitated and aggressive while talking to me and when he is criticizing me as a person rather than my work.

He’s scared. And he’ll continue to be scared of me, because he cannot control me like he can control the others. I will respond as a person. I will be authentic and kind. I will be proud of myself. I will go to sleep at night knowing I’ve done my best in a situation that is not under my control.

Moreover, I will continue to show him (and my colleagues) what safe and healthy boundaries are.

And that is why having a narcissistic boss is a sense of achievement.

Do you want to dance?

Click to watch Barbie & the Rockers sing Do You Want To Dance.
Obsessively watching this video as a child is why my fashion sense is stuck in the 50s...

I've always loved music. There are home videos of me, 3 years old, with huge padded headphones clamped to my head, bouncing around the living room. My parents got me a Fisher Price record player which I played so often and so loud, it was moved to the basement. I would play the same songs over and over, spinning around in the dark. Eventually, I graduated to a Fisher Price stereo. Then a portable Walkman. Then a karaoke machine.

I loved music.

I taught myself to play songs on a small Casio keyboard by listening and matching tones. And for a brief year, I had lessons in saxophone and piano. But then we moved from SuperCity and no music lessons were arranged in our new town.

I still have a deep desire to make music. When I'm near a piano, I quickly remember the songs I taught myself. When we turn on Rock Band, I'm the only one willing to take the microphone.

I participated regularly in a women's choir in high school and joined an all-female acapella group in university. I don't have a distinctive or strong or interesting voice. What I do have, however, is a virtually perfect pitch. I am a parrot, thanks to years of endless listening and singing. Strictly speaking, I cannot read sheet music, but if you give me a starting note I can follow the changes to it with increasing accuracy.

This of course makes me an expert Rock Band soloist. ;-)

The thing about music, however, is that it is fantastic. Quite literally. I would escape into the emotions of the song as though I were escaping into a book or a movie. For a few brief, potent minutes, I would be the song. Lyrics didn't matter. The emotions were real, and the older I got, the easier it became to call on those feelings.

This sort of concentration and intensity is a hallmark of giftedness. I know and understand that now, but for most of my life I thought I was crazy. No one else in my life became swept away by a song. Stories, maybe. Movies, of course. But songs?

I felt like an addict, falling into music for my emotional fix. It was safer than life. It compensated for the pathological emptiness which categorised my childhood.

But at first, it was simply me. I was simply born with a heightened emotional response to the world around me: sound, sight, taste... A massage-therapist boyfriend marvelled how the lightest of touch was all it took to turn me on. I hated food until I discovered spices and herbs. I have to make my office seem like home: surrounded by friendly, reassuring colours and objects.

I was born wanting to respond to the world, being excited about everything, and in love with the connections between it all. (Weren't you?) I became deeply attached to SuperCity as a result, and that is why leaving it was so traumatic.

My mum is gifted. I presume she felt the same. But where this depth of feeling has left her broken, I am learning to contain it with something other than avoidance, dissociation, denial, obsessions, compulsions or anxiety. That is the point of this blog. That is why I sought therapy. That is why I am processing the trauma, reflecting on my choices, and practicing mindfulness.

My authentic self is buried under, filtered by, and distorted through this mess. It is easy to get lost, especially when I don't really know what I'm looking for. How will I know when I find her? How will I know what is and isn't me? What to keep, what to throw away?

As my therapist said, it all comes down to emotions. Thoughts can be learned. Behaviours can be changed. But emotions? They need opportunities to provoke them. So I suppose the best I can do is keep listening and keep responding. Processing the trauma is only a part, a small but necessary part, of recovery. The rest involves living.

The Pros and Cons of 3000 Miles

My parents, especially my Dad, were always adamant that our life is better having left SuperCity. People in SuperCity stayed in Supercity and never did anything with their lives.

"But Aunt Julie lives in PreppyTown and is a great artist!" I claimed.

"We left SuperCity for you, so you would have more opportunities." You ungrateful little bitch. Look at the big fancy house we bought for you. The sailing lessons. The summer camp. Life is better here. "Your life is better here."

I didn't understand. I couldn't accept it. Even at 10, I resented the idea that money and opportunities were the answer. I resented being told that I wouldn't have amounted to anything had I stayed in SuperCity. I resented being told they moved for me, because I was so deeply unhappy.

I fought to move back to SuperCity every day until I graduated and left for university. Begging became bartering which became well-evidenced cost proposals, as I grew from 10 to 16. And in the last two years of high school, I gave up. I threw myself to into the future, that is: escaping the emotional jail of my parent's home.

It's easy to see the cons of 3000 miles: just read The List, read Diagnosis, read the Timeline. To resolve the grief of moving would be an enormous milestone, but unfortunately simply writing about it in a blog isn't enough. The rest of my life hangs on that peg, and there are a lot of dominos scattered around this floor.

To move forward, I need to see opportunity and achievement in my experiences, even if I couldn't then. I can now.

Because of withdrawing so deeply, my personality changed dramatically. Rather than a leader, I became an observer. I watched people. The more I dissociated my own painful feelings, the more I filled myself with the emotions of others. My empathy grew. My intuition refined. I learned to endure suffering. I became INFJ.

I can't say I'm unhappy with the personality changes, though it is difficult to manage the needs of two very different Selves: the original extroverted Leader and the over-sensitive Protector. This has resulted in an unhealthy pattern of contact and withdrawal, as I draw energy from social situations but panic.

Having spent so much time observing people but so little time socialising meant that I could see quite clearly what people needed, and I had a deep desire to connect with them, but no idea how to do it.

Psychotherapy helped me cope with this extraordinarily imbalanced emotional intelligence. I'm still learning how to translate the depth of my knowledge and feelings into mature and appropriate behaviours.

Moving 3000 miles carved out a huge ravine in me. People in my life joined in the chiseling with every taunt, label, and rejection. I faced that ravine everyday growing up so alone. Some days it was filled with despair. But not every day.

It's important to reflect on that, as I work through these painful experiences. Remembering does increase my insecurity and anxiety. It does make me feel even more alone. It does make it difficult to pay attention to and enjoy today. The emotions are real. Holding on to them so privately for so long is real.

I need to make 'letting go' real, too, but in practice, 'letting go' feels more like choosing what to keep. In that case, I've put the pain in the post, Return to Sender.

I choose to keep my ravine.

I will keep pushing through The List, but the value of integration is not in the emotions but in the container. The emotions will go. The container remains. And the more I accept my experiences as mine, the more I become capable of.

Moving 3000 miles

Insecure attachments aside, I had a good childhood in SuperCity. We often visited with relatives who were kind and friendly. I had lots of friends and several best friends. I played a number of sports. I attended Sunday School regularly. I was years ahead of my peers at school in reading and maths. And I was given the freedom/responsibility to roam, explore, and play on my own.

I was a leader: extroverted, confident, attentive, imaginative. I had ideas, loads of them, and kids older and younger than me gathered around to play my role-playing games. The yard transformed to a medieval jousting ground. The woods became a dinosaur hunt.

I smiled and laughed often. My desire to know and understand was relentless. I was a gifted child. I liked to try everything. I didn't care about being good at anything; I wasn't afraid of being bad. I just wanted to try.

And within the confines of intellectual and social development, I blossomed. This fabulously exciting, successful, social world was my identity, my sense of containment.

My dad called me and my brother into the bedroom. I perched on the edge of the bed, wary of this sudden attention. He had the white board and markers in his hand. My brother was restless.

"We are moving to AnotherCity."

Shock.

He asked for pros and cons. I don't remember any of the pros. I left in the middle of the cons, running upset into the bathroom and locking myself in, sobbing.

My parents were strangers to me, and I was not a part of that decision to move. My feelings were never put on that white board. It was never intended to be anything but an attempt to intellectually persuade two children that a move was a good idea. It was ridiculous. It was inappropriate. It was inconsiderate.

I was left to sob in the bathroom. We never discussed how I felt ever again.

The irony is, we never moved to AnotherCity. My dad was transferred again before the summer was over. We packed the van and drove cross-country to our new home, a slightly nicer version of the same house we left, but 3000 miles away.

Reviewing these memories makes me feel woozy. This one event changed my life. It changed me. I became, quite literally, a different child. I cut off all my hair. I changed my name. I became deeply depressed. I withdrew from other children. I lost my temper often. I cried every night. I thought about SuperCity, my friends there, my life, and the person I was... until it became an obsession. I thought of nothing else but what would have been, had I not left. What I would be doing, if I was there. Who I would be.

I rejected my new life and everything in it. I refused to talk. I refused to listen. I refused to do my schoolwork.

It only took a couple months for my new teacher to became frustrated with my vacant mutism. She lost her composure in front of the whole class. "I don't know what's wrong with you, Eliza." All the little heads turned to look at me.

"Sally has been here a month, and she's fitting in just fine."

I looked at Sally, a fuzzy blob of long brown hair. Sally looked at me. Everyone looked nervously excited. I felt numb. She continued: "It's your fault. You aren't trying very hard."

I felt very far away. It was the yellow painted walls, yellow lights, orange desks, orange tiles, and orange curtains that soaked up my shame. I love colours. I hate yellow-orange. Yellow brings me back into that room, back to being blamed for something I didn't know how to contain or control. Being blamed for being in pain. Yellow = unfair. Orange = pain.

Because of the move, my mum was extremely depressed. She didn't want to leave her family but she couldn't say no to my dad earning more money and wanting desperately to build a better life for himself.

To ease her loneliness, she got a puppy. I hated that puppy. I refused to take care of it. I'm still angry at my parents for getting this puppy. I had extensive allergy treatments in SuperCity. They knew I was allergic to dogs. They got him anyway. My mum's loneliness trumped my allergy.

It did help her. So much, she began to call me and my brother by the dog's name. She still calls us by her dogs' names and laughs about it. I never laughed.

I remember driving back from the breeder with the puppy's tiny head in my lap, finding it impossible to hate an innocent puppy. So I hated my parents instead. I have the same angry question in my mind today: what about me? What do I get for my loneliness?

It didn't take very long after that for me to become completely depersonalised. I didn't exist. I moved 3000 miles and was no longer in anyone's mind but my own.

I was 10 years old. My childhood was gone. My identity was gone. I was gone.

It wasn't moving 3000 miles that broke me. Everyone thought I would get over it. Kids are resilient. She'll make friends. She's brilliant; she just needs a new hobby.

Except I never got over it.

She'll make friends. She's just like her mum. All teenagers act like that. She'll outgrow it. Of course they tease her, she doesn't take care of herself. I've done all I can to help. She won't talk to me.

She won't talk to anyone.

Everything's fine.

My Foundations

The thing about The List is that it starts when I moved from SuperCity around 10 years old, but I learned this summer that the real cause of my mental ill-health was my mum's inability to bond with me from birth. Here is the evidence:

I wasn't planned.

My mum's birth control failed. My dad was still finishing community college. My mum had only just started her first real job post-university. They couldn't afford me.

After I got married, she had the 'sex talk' with me. It consisted of warning me that birth control isn't 100% and I should take other measures to avoid having children. In case you can't tell yet...


My mum doesn't even like children.

She told me and my brother many times, often in the context of making sure we didn't have sex because we could get pregnant. She was anxious about us getting pregnant, because she didn't want grandchildren. She told us this. She still tells us this.

She's not good around children, either. She doesn't know how to talk to them. In fact, just last week she was raving about how much she liked Cousin Y because she could have an adult conversation with her, whereas Cousin Z still acts like a baby. They are the same age. She always did prefer me and my brother to act like adults.


I have few memories of my mum.

Until I integrated EP-Happy with EP-Sad, all of the memories I had of my parents pre-Move were negative. Now that I have access to the positive memories, they still can be counted in my two hands. It's not a lack of memories. I remember way, way more than a normal adult should due to the OCD I developed post-Move. There are simply very few memories because I rarely spent time with my parents. My dad was away at school and then in his job.

I was taken care of by my gram because my mum had to work. And then when my brother was born 2.5 years later, we had a variety of local childminders and nursery placements.


I rarely cried or complained.

I was the "best baby." I kept myself occupied. Not like my brother, who always complained, who would often make faces and bawl. My mother reminded us of this often, so often the script describes me and my brother even as adults. If we were told to do something we didn't want to do, my brother would grudgingly do it, complaining all the while, while I would silently refuse to lift a finger. No tantrums and rarely any arguing. I became a slippy little fish, fleeing demands, or a marble sculpture, freezing on the spot.


My mum had an anxiety disorder.

She worried about us. Constantly. She had to know where we were, what we were doing, and we couldn't go out (even with permission) without her waiting up to make sure we returned safely. You'd think with that sort of vigilance she would have managed to protect us from abuse, but the worry wasn't meant to protect us so much as protect herself from loss.


My mum was abused by my dad.

He lost his temper a lot. More often with her than with me. As I grew older, he would redirect his anger from me to her. She just took it. And took it. And took it.

My brother and I sat silently in our respective rooms, hiding from him, shouting at her. Helpless. Unsure if this was right. Unsure if how we felt was right. Unsafe. Angry at him for being a monster. Angry at her for letting him. Angry at them both for staying in a relationship they were so unhappy with. That we were so unhappy with.

My mum had no confidence at all, because...


My mum was neglected by her mum.

Gram was the centre of our massive family until her recent death. My mum was the youngest of four girls. Her sisters were considerably older than her, and the gap was filled with several miscarriages. I can only speculate about Gram's own anxiety about having my mum after all of those losses, but the lineage of anxiety in those circumstances is fairly clear. All I know is that my mum was spoiled as a baby and then, when her dad left with another woman, my mum was spoiled as a teenager too. (As an aside, you might recognise this defensive pattern in me because she treated me the same way.)

My mum resented her sisters because they had a relationship with Gram that she didn't. What my mum doesn't realise that having a sisterly relationship with one's mum isn't normal either. Gram wasn't capable of being a mum to her daughters, and unlike her sisters my mum didn't even have the benefit of being her friend. Sad.


Essentially, my mum had no idea how to be a mum.

And because she had no idea, she didn't know I needed more from her than milk and nappy changes. I didn't attach, because my mum couldn't show me how. She's not capable of a healthy attachment.

As a result, neither was I.

If these foundations were different, The List would be a lot shorter. But the truth is I grew up on shifting sands, and it is a miracle I made it as far as I have, on my own steam.

For the sake of the pain I've inherited from my mum and my dad, I've made a lot of sacrifices. I bear the weight of a lot of heavy losses. I contained my dad's abuse. I contained my mother's anxiety. I contained the relentless bullying of my peers. I contained my growing insecurity. I contained my grief. I contained my depression. I contained rejection after rejection.

I did that.

I did all of that. As a child. And I've never known anything else, so how could I have possibly known my own strength? I've spent all my life containing this pain and never once stepping back and seeing that as an achievement. But that is exactly what it is.

We are all in this together

I have too much on my mind and not enough confidence to share it. As Sandy said, it's all about riding with this flow. In this case, I mean it literally: pre-menstrual dysphoric disorder. Forget what it says on the wiki. The best description is that my emotional parts are on a boat floating at sea but for a few days before menstruation when that boat gets pulled back to shore. Every feeling is immediately, unavoidably present. Tears on demand. Anxiety on tap. All access passes to grief.

"They" say they do not know the cause, but it didn't take me very many cycles of studious observation to notice that the drop in estrogen correlates to anxiety and the drop in progesterone correlates to depression. Hence, as progesterone drops in the latter half of the luteal phase, I become sad. And when estrogen drops, the anxiety builds until the headache comes. Stress can bring on this same pattern, so I could probably chart my serotonin changes with reasonable accuracy.

For me, my reproductive cycle is clockwork. I can usually tell, with unnerving accuracy, what day in the cycle I am. So perhaps 'being a few days late' meant more to me than your average woman trying to conceive. After the fourth month of noticing another ultra-super-early-loss-that-really-wouldn't-ever-have-been-noticed-by-anyone-but-me, I had no more strength to keep trying. Something was preventing our fertilised embryos from implanting, and though the timing pointed to the quality of my husband's sperm, there really is no convincing a female body that the blame belongs to any body but her own.

It was around this time my last therapist suggested that I wouldn't really have been a good parent, anyway. That gentle criticism makes a lot more sense, knowing what I know now about how she felt about my prognosis then. But it still deeply hurt, about as deeply as I wanted to be a mother.

Rejecting her pessimism and standing up for my own desire was just one step in the process of re-gaining my confidence. She wasn't wrong, just like my old boss wasn't wrong in her criticism of transplant surgery. But sometimes there is more than one way to be right.

My intense desire to be a mother was enough motivation to move me rapidly up the steps to recovery, just like my husband's love for his sister was enough to motivate him to donate a kidney. It is a risky, painful, foolish thing to do. But it is also worth the risk, worth the pain, worth the tests, and worth the change, because it is brave, beautiful, and, moreover, something he wanted to do. He has a right to want that, and medicine has the ability to let him, with all of the screening and support they can give.

Something he wanted to do.

A year ago, would that have been enough, for me? Could I have made a decision for myself simply because it was something I deeply wanted, even against all best evidence and advice? At what threshold do my emotional parts overpower my intellectual control?

I feel lonely. It's that sort of loneliness one feels staring over a vast landscape, having just spent hours with rocks underfoot. A heavy climb. And then sky.

The river of thoughts runs quickly at this time of the month, but I'm holding on to today. I can feel that familiar restlessness tugging inside. Whenever my emotional parts get this close to shore, someone loud begs to cut them free.

That is a metaphor, of course. I appreciate that some of my readers do hear actual voices, but the only endless voice in my head is my own. My fragmented sense of self has more to do with chronically dissociating my emotions. Sometimes I wish these parts had names, voices, and identities, so that it would be easier to understand them as something more discrete than extensive and nebulous networks of dissociated emotional experiences.

Perhaps if, like Tara, I donned different outfits and identities, it would be easier for me and Drew to recognise when I've switched to my pre-adolescent or teenage self. Maybe then I would stop trying to make sense of why I suddenly am married to a stranger who doesn't know me, who can't possibly love me. Normal people don't have constant emotion. But normal people should at least have a continuity of emotional experiences. And I suppose that's what I find so difficult to accept about having a dissociative disorder. It gets me every time I switch. I assume that everything I feel now, every feeling I can recall now, I will be able to recall anytime I like.

But that isn't true. Some days they will be locked in an invisible tower. And I will be dependent on my cognitive memory to remind myself that, yes, my husband does know and love me. Yes, I do know and love him, and if we just wait, that tower will appear and we can find our way in again.

Admitting how much dissociation has affected my life is hard. As I go through The List, I'll show you. I remember a lot, but let's not pretend that memory is enough. In re-telling me, I will be weaving my emotions back into that story -- back into myself. I will be sharing stories with myself, even though my parts don't have names or voices, because my parts still have their own stories to share.

My therapist is no longer available to listen, but I am.

It's Thursday again.

I've been avoiding this (writing, reflecting, sharing) so maybe I should keep it short.

Just one low-grade migraine triggered by hormone changes and stress. I have a number of huge life-changing decisions weighing on me, all inter-dependent, and it's impossible to make a decision. Instead of letting the stress escalate, I remembered the last time I felt like this. The only way out was to recognise that I couldn't make a decision and I didn't have to make a decision. Rather than become obsessed with an array of potential futures, I changed my focus to today.

Today I have physiotherapy instead of psychotherapy, and it's been very helpful in decreasing the chronic migraines. I've been mindfully relaxing rather than ignoring my body and pushing through the tension, and by the time I met with the physio for the first appointment I had already noticed a significant difference in the number of migraines per week. By the second appointment, even the physio was impressed with the difference. Will he feel the same this week?

I've experienced more stress than ever.

My parents are on holiday, but the day before they left I told them I booked a flight to visit at the end of this month. My friend Carrie wants to visit PopularCity near where they live, so I jumped at the chance to have a chaperone. She leaves after 5 days, I stay for the full week.

And yes, I've been avoiding how I feel about this as well.

Part of me is very excited. I do miss it. I do miss my parents. It's more complicated than just missing someone I've not seen for a year. I've missing a healthy child-parent attachment all my life. I see that hole, I've named that hole, and I know precisely how to patch it. It is the responsible, adult thing to do to go to my parents now, when I am feeling so lonely and scared and in need of their support and love. For the sake of this part of me, I have to trust that (1) I am able to communicate what I need, (2) they are able to provide it, and (3) I am able to accept it.

Part of me is terrified. It's the same part, loosely knitted yes, but the same part, which makes it more difficult to manage not less. Splitting my emotions into two (or more) parts made it easy to reject my parents as monsters incapable of seeing or loving me. But that also rejected the part of me that wanted to accept my parents' love, regardless of how sporadic or unfulfilling it was.

No matter how painful it is to contain such complex and often overwhelming feelings, rejecting part of my self is not a long-term solution.

I knew I was avoiding my child parts again, because I let the stress build until I was triggered and all I could do was back into my chair in an empty office and cry.

It felt good to simply cry and it wasn't simply taking a step back, because the pre-therapy me would have had a Bully Monster stomping all over my tears or a Control Freak shutting off the tap. There was no Bully Monster in sight. It was eerily quiet. Bizarrely peaceful.

I sat in my chair, not feeling sorry for myself, but just letting myself grieve. I knew it wasn't about my colleagues forgetting to include me in their transport plans. It was about my mum forgetting to pick me up after school for several hours.

It was about being bullied by my peers into missing a school performance and no teacher looking for me until several hours later.

It was about nobody following me, after running into the woods rather than endure being bullied at the children's table over thanksgiving dinner.

You might ask, why didn't I tell on them? Why didn't I once, why didn't I ever, ask for help?

My dad wasn't my protector. He was never home. He hit me, and when my peers got tired of bullying me, he didn't.

My mom wasn't my protector. She was scared of her own feelings, scared of my dad, and incapable of taking responsibility of being a parent.

I missed the school performance. I missed thanksgiving dinner. I was punished severely both times.

So when my colleagues forget to include me, even just a simple unthinking oversight, the hurt runs through a deep ravine, and I find it hard to see a world that won't punish me for feeling like that.

For a long time, I punished myself.

As the Bully Monster is no longer around, perhaps it is time to start processing some of the trauma. I like to think that I've introjected enough of my therapist to be able to do this on my own. In reality, even in psychotherapy I processed most of my emotions between appointments and reported back on my results. It is extremely difficult for me not to remain controlled/dissociated to some degree in front of other people. Rather than fight that, I searched for other ways I felt safe in expressing my emotions.

One of those ways is here. So let's begin.

Because I knew you (Part 2)

During my last day of therapy, I was filled with positive emotions, most of all pride. I smiled a lot, especially when reading my 'speech' to my therapist. I smiled when I gave my gift to her future clients (a handmade window decoration of ribbon and glass and a crystal prism). I smiled when I gave her the card (made using this photo):

She said that when I do express my authentic self, I express myself beautifully. I thanked her and smiled. I smiled when I gave her my book. I smiled when she gave me this poem (and a short hand-written letter on the back):

After a while you learn the subtle difference
Between holding a hand and chaining a soul,

And you learn that love doesn’t mean leaning
And company doesn’t mean security,

And you begin to learn that kisses aren’t contracts
And presents aren’t promises,

And you begin to accept your defeats
With your head up and your eyes open

With the grace of a woman, not the grief of a child,
And you learn to build all your roads on today,

Because tomorrow’s ground is too uncertain for plans,
And futures have a way of falling down in mid-flight.

After a while you learn
That even sunshine burns if you get too much.

So you plant your own garden and decorate your own soul,
Instead of waiting for someone to bring you flowers.

And you learn that you really can endure...
That you really are strong,

And you really do have worth.
And you learn and learn...

With every goodbye you learn.

I smiled because I was filled with gratitude.

"And what will you do when you are sad?"

I glanced at the prism, at my hands, at her, and shrugged. "Be sad?" It was a silly question now. I'd do the same thing I'd do with any emotion: be present.

"Let myself experience the day."

My therapist paused. Her eyelids fluttered. She looked at her hands, at the desk, at the flowers, at me. She said quietly: "Great answer."

Fin.

Because I knew you (Part 1)

For my graduation party from therapy today, I prepared a card for my therapist (designed by me), a wrapped gift for my therapist's clients (handmade by me), and also a book for the waiting room (put together by me and a friend). I also made peanut butter fudge and cookies but if the fudge hasn't set, we'll be bagging that detail. ;-)

Chances are my therapist will keep the book since she kept the printed photograph I gave her earlier in therapy. And she may take the other gift home as I'm unsure she will be able to put it up in the office for clients to enjoy (it may be too distracting?). I also don't know if she likes peanut butter, but I do (yum).

Finally, I'm also bringing my 'speech' to read.

I feel nervous -- physically anxious -- but doing my best to relax and be present. I won't post this entry until I'm ready to leave, because of a small irrational belief that it may ruin the 'surprise'. Writing this is just another way of distracting me until it's time to go.

Having (offline and online) people who know what today means to me is a huge help. I appreciate your comments, emails and tweets. Being cared about/for is not something I'm used to, so I apologise if I don't really know how to respond (not immediately, anyway). I do appreciate it, and I'm learning how.

After therapy, I plan to cry and when I'm done crying (and if the sky stops crying too) I'll go for a walk. If it's still raining, I'll play a game. And then when my husband gets home, I'll hug him and cry. Then we'll smile, laugh and make homemade mac & cheese which is full of yummy vegetables. And then I'll go on the computer, read this post, think about therapy and cry again.

Tomorrow I'll tidy and baby-proof the downstairs because this weekend we are having people over to eat a meal and watch a movie. And by the end of Sunday I'll have written about the end of therapy and updated the design of my blog. =)

This was surprisingly calming. Here we go.

Pre-Post-Therapy Eliza

It's been a roller-coaster weekend. It wasn't helped by me forgetting everything I've learned aka that overwhelming emotions --> overwhelming stress --> dissociation --> depersonalisation --> migraine --> anxiety.

I am getting "mighty tired" of trying to break it off with my husband. You'd think *knowing* you have a dissociative disorder is simply enough, but the thing about dissociation is that it's really hard to measure yourself by the lack of something. The lack of emotions, as much as I hate to admit it, is way too familiar.

I think the reason that the dissociation is tricking me more now is because I'm not dissociating all of my emotions anymore. Just the ones I can't seem to handle. Except my brain is saying I can handle them. So why do I still dissociate?

Bad, bad habits.

I should have known better. Ending therapy -- these are some huge emotions. Writing "I will remember it all as love" took a lot out of me, and everytime I read it, I can feel the weight of the emotions pushing out of me. There is a certain level of control keeping them inside and out of mind.

F-ing dissociation.

I want to be able to sit there and read that to my therapist and feel it. :-(

I should probably mention that I'm not divorcing my husband. That was "Heartless Eliza" as I will call her from now on. I said a lot of things I absolutely believe and want, but I also did not have access to any emotion. If I had, perhaps the way I talked would have been kinder. Perhaps I would not have felt so empty and defeated, because emotions are motivating. And I had no motivation left.

The morning after the migraine is usually when the previously dissociated emotions all hit me, and I panic. My husband has the patience of a saint, but no wonder he's so traumatised by me, when I keep switching like this.

From my perspective, it's like I've learned to dissociate my attachment system. When the body/brain decides it's in the best interest to GET OUT OF HERE NOW, gone is the desire to cling to my loved ones. Everything becomes 'not mine' and all I can do to make sense of my life is change it. Change jobs. Change partners. Change my name. Change everything until that feeling of emptiness goes away.

For now, though, I'll have to keep reminding myself to watch out for the signals {strong emotion, poor sleep, fatigue, desire to leave, and of course the resulting migraine) and hope I don't make any important decisions without consulting my emotional parts.

I'm going to crack this nut, just you wait. Leading psychoanalyst on dissociative disorders? Hold that seat for me.

Emails with Mum

My therapist cried because I read her the email I sent my mum:

Dear Mum,

I need to say something. It's hard for me. I'm sorry I cannot be there to say it in person.

When we moved from SuperCity, I felt like I lost everything. I felt like I lost you. I didn't know how to say it then, or any of the other times, but I missed you, mum. I miss you.

I know you tried your best. I tried my best, too. I want you to know me. I need to know you. I need my mum.

It's okay if you don't know what to say. I know it is hard for you to express yourself too. I just need you to accept me and give me a chance to accept you.

These years have been so hard, but I have learned so much. I want to share it with you. I don't really know how. Can we figure it out together?

Love,

Eliza

My therapist said, before I read out the rest of the emails, that it was a beautiful letter and that there was no mistaking it: I would know by my mum's response whether it was possible to have the sort of relationship with her that I so deeply need.

"That's why I wrote it."

I need to draw a line under this. I need to know I've done everything I could do.

So I read out my mum's reply:

I love you Eliza.
And I love the woman you have become. I am very proud of you. I love our skype sessions, because I get to see you when I talk to you.
I miss you.
Let's figure it out together. what next?

And we talked about how the reply made me felt. Disappointed. Strangely unassured.

"How can she love the woman I've become? She doesn't know me." My hands clenched.

My reply:

Thanks for your reply, mum. It's still very difficult for me to take all of that in, and I'm not sure what to say. It scares me to hear you say that you love the woman I've become, because the woman I've become is, yes, independent and successful, but also incredibly isolated, unhappy, unhealthy and hurt.

I am glad you like video-chatting, but I don't like doing the videos because I feel under scrutiny, like an animal at the zoo. It is difficult for me to relax and be myself.

I do want to get to know you better, and I do want to open up more to you. But it's scary! I can't think of anything else in the world I'm more terrified of. It will take time. If you want to better understand what I experience, this FAQ is a good start:

http://www.isst-d.org/education/faq-dissociation.htm

I understand if reading it makes you anxious or upset or confused or ____. I'm not scared of your feelings and my only expectation from you is that you make an effort to share them with me, as I will try my best to share mine with yours (no matter how scary they are). I want to focus on the present and will try to include you more in my current and future experiences.

Today is Drew's birthday. He opened the presents earlier this morning and was very excited with all of them. I'm sure he'll thank you himself later. Tell my cousin we said hi and that we miss them and hope they will enjoy the fair for us this year and please send us pictures. I don't feel up to video-chatting with anyone today but look forward to video chatting in the future.

love,

Eliza

Her reply:

I'm sorry you feel that the video chatting puts you in a cage. I like it because I feel like more of a connection with you. Probably like how you used to feel when you video chatted with Drew when you were dating. It' hard for me to understand why you can't relax and be yourself, probably because I don't worry about what I'm wearing or how I look when I call you.

I read the FAQ. It was pretty comprehensive. I'm trying to put together what I read with what you are experiencing. Or, what part of what I read is what you are experiencing, is a better question.

Are you seeing someone on a regular basis - a professional someone? Or are you researching and trying to work through your own treatment regimen?
What can I do to help you?

My reply:

Thanks for your message. Actually, I felt a bit like a performing animal in a circus/zoo with Drew, too. I think many insecure people feel that way when they are dating, whether it is on video or not. People just want to be seen and accepted, and this causes a lot of anxiety. It's not always about how they look, but about who they are. I'm glad you don't feel insecure around me.

I'm just about to finish up a year of psychotherapy. Next week is my last week. It has helped me enormously. I still have a lot more to work on to be the person I want to be; that is my responsibility and I'm confident in my ability to continue without my therapist. I sent you that link because I wanted you to have some perspective on why this is hard for me. Not to label it or get help in managing it.

The best thing you can do to help me is to be authentic (be yourself) and responsive and kind. It will take time build the relationship that we both want. I don't need a therapist or a friend or a daughter; I need my mom. I don't want to dig up the past but I'm not afraid to talk about it. I simply want you to have a bigger part in my present and future.

Yesterday Carrie and I used the ice cream maker to make oreo ice cream (it fits into her freezer). It was super-creamy and fresh. Now that I know how much cream is in it, I have been eating a lot less ice cream. That's probably a good thing! I'm going to make raspberry sorbet next or a frozen yoghurt. I miss the chubby hubby flavour which has peanut butter and pretzels in it.

I'm sad about psychotherapy ending because my therapist and I have a really good relationship. I'll miss her and I know she'll miss me too. I had a less positive experience with a therapist before her, so I know a good connection isn't guaranteed. I'm grateful for her help.

BW,

Eliza

And her reply:

Well, I certainly hope we can become closer. It still bothers me that I feel like Gram had all these meaningful conversations with everyone else before she died and not with me.
I suppose avoiding conflict can flow into conversations, too.

I'm glad you had a good therapist.That can make all the difference with what you get out of your time.

Just let me know what you need.

I love you,
Mum

And my reply:

I don't understand what you mean about avoiding conflict flowing into conversations. Does this have to do with Gram? After she died, I could sense your loss and it seemed to be about much more than just her passing. Did you find it hard to talk to Gram about meaningful things?

You keep asking how you can help or what I need, but I keep saying: I just want to know you and for you to know me. Is that confusing to you? Do you feel like you know me already?

As you can probably tell, I've reverted into the Parent again. It only took a couple emails to fall completely back into that routine. What I'm trying to figure out now is how I got there...and why I still feel like she's missed the point (again) and failed to respond to me.

Putting the chain all together and reading the first email again, I tried to think about it as my therapist saw it (and how she would react, if she were my Real Mom). Or maybe how I'd react, if I were my Real Mom. It's hard to tell the difference now, as I've introjected so much of my therapist.

What stands out now is what my mum didn't respond to: that is, my feelings. Your daughter says she felt like she lost everything, including her mum, and what do you say? "I love you" -- as though the words are enough. They were never enough. I never doubted she loved me. I just doubt her ability to love. Her ability to see me, to be my mother, and respond to me as a person (a whole Person with her own feelings and ideas).

This is why I stand in front of my husband and he says "I love you" and I say "I need more" and we both feel empty inside. Because the feelings you bury inside DO NOT MATTER unless you do something about them. Unless you make yourself vulnerable and exposed... and unless you reach out and try.

Can I attach to my mum and my husband?
Do I even want to?

They both stood by in silent love while I suffered the lack of them. And now I know how much that hurts. My heart aches for real love, now that I know what it is. I want to be seen, now that I see myself.

I need more.

This week has a triple layer of grief over it, as my relationship with Drew draws closer to ending, my hope in my mum trickles out, and I say good-bye to my therapist. At least I'm not scared or lost or confused or angry. I used to be all of those as well as sad, but today I erased them off my blackboard of adjectives.

All I'm left with is an increasing concern about the fact that I have no idea how to get divorced or where I'd even live. What would my life look like? Would my mother-in-law still care about me? Will Drew's sister still let me volunteer on Saturdays? Will Drew's friends block me on facebook? Will we sell the house? Will I be able to live on my own and still afford school and student loans?

Where is home?

I feel like I've got all the pieces now, but it's going to take a while to put them together.

Under the Weather

'Cause I'm under the weather, just like the world
So sorry for being so bold

When I turn out the light, you're out of sight
Although I know that I'm not alone
Feels like home

You say you feel like a natural person
You haven't got nothing to hide
So why do you feel imperfection cut like a sword in your side?

I will remember it all as love.

I made my therapist cry today, and I'm grateful for her authentic emotional reaction. It wasn't an appeal for care-giving (thank you, "Attachment Theory and Research in Clinical Work with Adults") but an expression of empathy to match the magnitude of the news I told her. It was appropriate. She could have been a blank slate, but she wasn't. And I'm grateful, because never in my life had I ever made someone express such pride in me.

It was exactly what I needed.

And I'm cradling some intense emotions in return. I know approximately three things about my therapist, but I still love her. I wish she was my Real Mom, because I trust and admire her so much. It's easy to love her and need her now, because I've spent a year opening myself up to it, and because she's spent 17 years learning how to facilitate that.

Life isn't about easy.

My therapist comes with a whole Personhood, a whole life, a whole past, present and future, that I'm not a part of or connected to, beyond this therapeutic relationship to which we've committed ourselves. And I, I am a Person too, with a whole life, a whole past, present and future, that she's not a part of, beyond what I share, and after next week I won't be there to share anymore.

I still love her, because I know it's okay to feel that way. She's cared about me in a way no one else has. She showed me how to care about myself in the same way. She showed me how to care about others. And she showed me how to let others care for me. I will always love her for that, even if I never see her again.

I love her more for our relationship being so limited and one-sided. It takes a special strength to be able to sit with someone in such complex pain and to see them struggle and change and grow. It takes a special person to let yourself attach to so many, to have such a big part in their lives, and to let go again and again.

I only know three things, and none of those three things matter, because I see more. I see what she's done for me; I see how hard it has been. I've seen her share my pain. I've seen her desire to take my pain away. I've seen her hope. I've seen her pride. I've made her laugh. We connected. And I will remember it all as love.

I will remember it so I know how to find it again: in my mum, in my husband, in my dad, in my brother, and in my friends.

I will remember it so I can find it in myself.

And next week, I will tell her every last word of this, because I want her to know it. I want her to have that piece of me. And that's attachment, isn't it? I won't see her again after next week. She has dozens of other clients. She has colleagues, family and friends. And I still want her to know me. Until the very last moment.

The price of denial is you.

Ways to Wellbeing

I've made enormous progress since my last therapy session. Really, quite huge stuff. I'm continuously humbled and amazed at how I continue to improve. It is possible to cope better, to learn more, and to become the person you want to be in the world.

Ironically, that starts with accepting who you are, what you cannot cope with, and what you are struggling to learn.

Paying attention.
Accepting.
Letting go.
Holding on.
Acting authentically.
Being kind.
Reflecting.
Connecting.

It reminds me of the five ways to well-being that NEF produced:

Connect.
Be Active.
Take Notice.
Keep Learning.
Give.

When I started psychotherapy, I was completely withdrawn from everyone. I worked and went home to the couch. I pathologically avoided myself and how I experienced the world in favour of 'going through the motions'. I felt I had nothing to give.

My progress hung completely on my desire and ability to learn.

She taught me how to take notice (pay attention) and I learned that no matter how afraid I was, the world didn't fall down around me. I didn't die or disappear. It didn't last forever. I didn't go psychotic. People didn't take away my things. Nobody ran away. I felt awful. I felt terrified. But I learned; it was okay. I was okay.

Through shared experiences, I connected with my therapist. She showed me how much richer and more secure relationships were when both people were authentic. I learned how to connect to myself. I opened myself to connecting with others. I learned to value in them what my therapist valued in me. I gained two real friends. My existing friendships became richer. My relationship has been stripped of inauthenticity; it is incredibly bare and vulnerable, but much stronger foundations.

As I continued to build healthy boundaries and feel more secure, I was able to give to others without losing myself. I'm still learning, still moving the walls, still exploring what I'm capable of. I am capable of being kind.

In the spirit of authenticity, despite my intense fears, I applied for a masters programme. My brain thrives in education. I need to keep it active. I desire to learn.

I also desire to climb mountains, play football, sail (and capsize) a boat. I desire to run, to fall, to get up and run again.

This period of intense introspection was necessary. And I won't lose any what I've learned as I continue to reach out. It will always be about finding that balance, using my experience, my feelings, as a guide.

I will be discovering the world. I will be discovering me.

That's my bowl. That's how I contain myself.

Sweet Lemons

Dr Clare Gerada, chair of the Royal College of General Practitioners, said doctors were right to prescribe more antidepressants to patients, in higher doses and for longer.

“Antidepressants make patients better,” she said. “Depression is a biological disorder caused by a deficiency of chemicals in the brain.”

From ‘GPs prescribe soaring numbers of drugs for depression’

Hunger is also a biological disorder caused by a deficiency of chemicals in the brain/body, but most of the time it is ‘cured’ by this fantastically simple and normal activity called eating.

My point is that our body naturally strives for biochemical homeostasis in a changing world. We have experienced thousands and thousands of years of evolution to be able to adapt to most things this world can throw at us. Everyone has a right to access all of the resources possible to recover his or her balance in the world and that includes anti-depressants. I’ll say that louder: I am NOT anti-medication!

Unless there is adequate training and support in the ‘other stuff’ (self-management, ‘good enough’ parenting, physical and mental well-being)… what is the point of prescribing anti-depressants? There are considerable risks, not all of them biochemical, when taking medications. And in the end, relying on anti-depressants alone means you are putting off the inevitable: that is, the (often complex) assessment of and interventions for one’s individual risk factors for mental illness.

The truth is, Type 2 Diabetes also requires incredibly complex management, and there are billions of pounds poured into improving the prevention and management of diabetes. No doctor would ever say that diabetes is merely a biological disorder, implying that it can and should be managed entirely by a range of medications (including insulin). Why is the chair of RCGP making such a comment about depression, then?

I appreciate GPs often feel helpless in providing appropriate care to patients who present with depression or anxiety (up to a staggering 1/3 of their caseload). There are problems with accessing psychological therapies that are not under their control. So, many often resort to prescribing medications in lieu of any other intervention, despite conflicting with NICE guidance. It may be all that they can do, and they have to do something. They are doctors, and their patients are suffering. It’s a difficult situation for everyone, and I empathise with the RCGP for having to manage it.

But really, anyone with minimal training in psychology could call out Dr Clare Gerada’s comments as the “sweet lemon” rationalisation it actually is: a post-hoc justification that this over-prescribing of anti-depressants is actually the right thing to do. I hope it has worked to reduce Dr Gerada’s cognitive dissonance, but I’m left with a sour taste in my mouth.

A lemon is still a lemon, even with sugar poured on it.