Constructive Destruction

Gabrielle's worried stressed eyes

Hello! Your friendly neighbourhood psychotic here :0). I am still feeling the aftershock of last Sunday's PE. In this case, I mean feeling psychologically and emotionally, more than feeling physically.

What am I feeling? Quite a powerful mixture:

  • Shame: I still feel shame, even if my brain tells me that I have nothing to feel ashamed of. PEs aren't my fault and I haven't done anything awful as a result of experiencing them. So what am I ashamed of? Losing control? Yes, a bit, but much more than that - I feel ugly inside and I am ashamed of my internal ugliness. PEs are my 'Boogey Man'. They are the dark spot in my light, the black witch's den in my forest. They are the Big Bad Wolf to my Little Red Riding Hood. I feel ashamed because they are the antithesis of all that I am, all that I stand for. They are a destructive force and I am a constructive person: I build - I don't destroy. I build confidence, bridges, support systems, access, hope, understanding, love. I say this not because I think I am Mother Teresa but simply because that's what I live for. Construction is my raison d'etre (which is why becoming a Master Builder is so significant for me). So I feel ashamed of my destructiveness.
  • Fear: I am so afraid of losing my mind, of going totally crazy, of crossing that invisible line from beyond which it is impossible to return. I am scared of insanity.

Whereas, in pure body physical terms, I tend to operate as an 'over-thinker' and an 'under-feeler', where PEs are concerned I am so overwhelmed by my emotions of shame and fear that I stop thinking. This is a classic case of emotion overcoming rationality.

However, as a result of my conversation with a member of my Healing Team today, I became aware of a few things that needed to be thought about:

  • There is a case for me to 'study' my PEs and contribute my learning to support the other poor sods who experience them. Today, I was reminded that my self-awareness and my coaching self-evaluation skills, as well as my natural facility with language, could be of great value to others. This is always the best button to push with me: if I can help someone else, then things feel worthwhile. I guess my psychotherapist knows that by now and she was just being clever :0). Nevertheless, her encouragement to document exactly what happens for me before, during and after a PE helped me look at them as an intellectual exercise and that really succeeded in de-'boogeying' them. I can be very constructive in the way I deal with a destructive urge. As a result, PEs no longer feel quite so scary or so ugly.
  • As we say in the coaching world, emotion is E-Motion: Energy in Motion. PEs are a massive release of energy, a bit like a volcanic eruption is a release of built up larva. What emotion(s) could I have been releasing last Sunday? Our conversation was nearing its end when my psychotherapist mentioned the fact that I had wanted to bang my head against the wall. As she said that, the word 'violated' flared up in my mind and I suddenly FELT the little baby inside of me banging her little head against the sides of her cot in a desperate attempt to 'beat' the pain in her ears (the baby whose ordeal I described in Shocked back to Life). I cried tears of deep sorrow for the little baby I was. I now understand that part of the 'intellectual PE exercise' is for me to find a better way of dealing with my pain or anguish, to gently take myself to a place where I no longer need to bang my head.

There is a school of thought which states that mental illness originates in the body. As a trauma occurs, particularly at a very young age because the underdeveloped frontal cortex in the brain means that nothing can be thought but everything is felt, the trauma gets 'printed' in each cell. As cells regenerate, they pass their genetic coding and their in-printed trauma to the next generation of cells. In this medical model, healing is all about creating a new generation of cells that do not inherit the traumatic memory alongside the genetic information. That's a profound interpretation of healing.

Today, I was also reminded that profound healing is always uncomfortable if not damned right painful.

If that is truly the case, considering the way I have been feeling all this week, I must be doing one hell of a healing job!! :0)

I'm feeling scared too. I

I'm feeling scared too. I felt for the first time this week like my depression was haunting me again. I've not told anyone yet, but it's there, I know it is. I take comfort in reading your posts.

I don't often cry on my meds, but I've cried this week, I'm ratty, and miserable all without explanation, I can't explain why I busrting into tears for no reason whatsoever. I wonder if it's the weather - being grey, or the move to somewhere i don't know, the fact I've stopped taking the pill and it's messing with my emotions or just that the depression is back again, a blip in my on-going battle. I don't know.

Feeling scared....

 J, I am just across the road - PLEASE come and share your fear.  PLEASE also make sure you speak to your new GP's surgery about it. Just knowing that somebody else is aware, and is not judging, can make such a huge difference.  Your life has just been turned upside down - how could you not feel your own 'after-shocks'....  G xxxxxxxxxxxx