Baggage

Baggage

I’ve left it a while haven’t I? A good two months without writing anything remotely blog-like.

My houseplants get similar treatment, droughts and monsoon seasons. I’m sure a lot of people would say that says a lot about my character. But let’s not go there.

I feel like I should give a little update on life and where we are.

Someone made a comment to me after my last blog, saying that I come across feisty with a large chip on my shoulder. That I have a “bee in my bonnet.”

Firstly, it’s more like “hornet’s nest in my hat” rather than a bee. (Just to clarify.)

But I don’t have a chip on my shoulder, not since the last time I checked anyway.

Human nature and our society is making us feel that we have to apologize or make everyone aware that we are only writing from “our own experience” and “I’m not trying to speak for anyone other than myself”, in the worry that we might offend or piss someone off.

If you find me too feisty (I like to call it passionate) or you think I’ve got a chip on my shoulder, you really don’t have to read my ramblings.

Anyway, let’s talk about Niamh.

A big update is in order.

Niamh has moved up to nursery two. She has spent the last couple of school years in nursery one. She didn’t move up with her peers at the start of this year, as there were concerns that she might not cope very well with the change – a new teacher, new room, new routine, all exceptionally understandable reasons.

I also needed to make sure that we had a TA in place for the transition.

Instead the transition was gradual, over the space of a term.

The results? Niamh loves it!

To be honest I was expecting some teething problems, heightened anxiety, tears when I left her, increased breath holding, hair pulling and melt downs. (Just to name a few).

But it’s been breezy.

A lot of the things we all had concerns about have actually been huge positives.

There’s more space, so she’s able to move around easier. It’s quieter and more structured. All the things that are implemented to start easing children into what Reception will be like.

Because of these changes, her walking is getting stronger; she is even practicing her running in the playground (one of her most favorite things to do). She’s also using her eye gaze more in class.

I’m so thrilled for her I could self-combust.

I’ve wanted to discuss another part of this journey that isn’t so much about Niamh, but about me. I’ve been unsure as whether I should be so bold as to speak about it, but actually, with the amount of struggles we have emotionally as humans I think its important to be honest.

In previous posts I’ve written about the last five years and the journey I have undertaken. I’ve spoken about staying positive and finding the light even when everything seems so dark. 

The other side to that though is the dark. Just because we choose to turn our heads to the sun, and seek out the light, doesn’t mean the dark side isn’t there.

Part of me absolutely refused to look at it. To survive emotionally, I completely ignored that dark, the ever so sad, angry side of my journey.

And it had repercussions.

I have a pretty incredible support network that, it would seem, had noticed that below my hugely over enthusiastic, smiley, obnoxiously positive exterior, I wasn’t ok.

I had Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. (PTSD)

Now I’ve got to be honest, I’ve had several dalliances with therapy in my life and all have been helpful-ish in there own ways, but I’ve always felt that actually its all hugely self-absorbent. You can talk about something until the cows come home but it’s never going to change what happened. And I really don’t find it helpful to sit down and explain something and for someone to respond with “and how did that make you feel?”

“How the fuck do you think it made me feel?”

Anyway, lets just say that kind of therapy is not my jam.

Of course therapy is what everyone was trying to subtly or not so subtly suggest I needed.

But to sit and talk to someone about the tragedy I’d endured, wasn’t ever going to fix it, and quite frankly I didn’t want to tell the story over again and discuss it all because it wasn’t going to change it.

The fact of the matter is my son has died and my daughter is disabled. No amount of talking changes those things.

But what I hadn’t realised is that all the sadness that comes with those things I’d buried away. And my body had absorbed it. I was holding it all in my cells.

I won’t go in to the details of how my PTSD was rearing its ugly head but what I will say is that it was having an effect on everything that was important to me.  Anything I used to be remotely good at, my passions and hobbies were slowly being eaten up by it.

As I said before, talking it out is not my thing. But I was introduced to another form of therapy, renowned for being the go to for PTSD sufferers. It is called EMDR therapy. 

Quite frankly this is the best thing I have ever done.

There is a huge amount of science around it but to give you the bare bones version of what you do…

You sit down and hold a scenario/thought or sentence in you head whilst your therapist taps yours knees/moves their hand in front of your eyes. (You choose which one.)

The outcome? All the emotion, trauma and negative feelings that come with stress and tragedy leave. You ever so slowly but surely unpack your rucksack of baggage and trauma and are left with a very light handbag full of “normal” day to day bits.

I’m not exaggerating.

Ok, so I’ve made it sound like it’s something you do in a day. It’s not. I’ve been doing it for a few months. You can’t unpack your whole rucksack in a day, it’s not practical. It’s a slowly but surely process. Take out a piece at a time, fold it up neatly and put it in a black bin liner for burning type thing.

And yes, there is some talking involved, it’s inevitable. But there’s none of this feeling sorry for one’s self crap. (If you don’t want it.)

We all experience trauma in our life. Little traumas and big traumas. It all affects us in someway, and we adapt to cope with it.

But to understand what it’s done and let it go?

FUCKING BRILLIANT.

There is a saying by Lao Tzu, “If you are depressed you are living in the past, if you are anxious you are living in the future, if you are at peace you are living in the present.”

We have a tendency to live in past and worry about the future.

Gosh, I’m sure we can all agree we’d do some things differently had we known the outcomes? And if we look into the future there is so much unknown! But to let that go and just live in the moment?

That’s what this therapy has enabled me to start to do. And boy does it feel good.

So to anyone out there who has a rucksack of emotions they’d like to unpack, I couldn’t recommend it enough.