Self Care 14 of 25

I want to take the same care going through these as the last group of statements, focusing on solutions. I'm not good at self care, but I am learning.

Original link:

https://healingfromcomplextraumaandptsd.wordpress.com/2017/07/16/25-obvious-non-obvious-self-care-issues-complex-trauma-survivors-struggle-with-lilly-hope-lucario/

14. Taking a day off from childcare without worrying constantly or feeling guilty.

My response:

I have no children. I did have furry children, a dog and a horse. The only time I took time off was when I went on weekend trips to California, usually three or four days, once or twice a year.

Okay, when I first adopted my dog I hated going to work and leaving her home. It was years before I could leave her for a weekend. If I could have taken her with me, I would have.

When I went on a week-long vacation with my dog, but had to leave my horse behind, I hired someone to take care of him. I paid her well. I trusted family to take care of my dog and wish I'd paid someone to care for her. I did the best I knew how.

If I had children, what would I do, now? Now that I know more than I did.

I'd prayerful consider the opportunities. I'd do my homework in finding someone to care for my children while I'm away. I'd keep in touch, every day. I'd like to follow the example of one of my traveling companions. She called every day and did homework with the child who needed help. She recognized her need to do something for herself and endeavored to balance it with the needs of her family. Her husband and children were supportive, which I think makes a difference.

Like most things, I think this is another case of needing practice. Start small.

Wordless Wednesday

Self Care 13 of 25

I want to take the same care going through these as the last group of statements, focusing on solutions. I'm not good at self care, but I am learning.

Original link:

https://healingfromcomplextraumaandptsd.wordpress.com/2017/07/16/25-obvious-non-obvious-self-care-issues-complex-trauma-survivors-struggle-with-lilly-hope-lucario/

13. Convincing myself to do the work of self care especially in those moments that it is indeed work.

My response:

I don't know about other survivors, but I learned to put in as little effort as possible in regards to pretty much everything. Not because I'm lazy. I'm not. I used to think I was until I was given a good look at my life. I jumped through hoops, sidestepped, dodged, like nobody's business in an effort to avoid being caught in the meat grinder. Abusers excel at running their victims through the meat grinder, crushing, twisting, mutilating their spirit, all for the sake of control.

Abusers teach their victims they are worthless, except as defined by the abuser. It's an ugly definition. They may use pretty words, but victims quickly learn that words are as worthless as they are. Pretty words cloak painful barbs. Compliments serve one of two purposes: To reel the victim closer in order for the abuser to lash out or to soften up the victim because the abuser wants something they think the victim can give and sugarcoating is determined to be the easiest path to gain what they want.

Rule #1: Stop lying, especially to yourself comes in handy. In fact, it's required.

I could not stick with any plan for taking care of myself until I finally accepted I was worth taking care of. Believing this is a daily and sometimes constant battle.

A day doesn't go by that is personal abuse free all day. I stay up too late. I overeat. I push too hard. I procrastinate finishing one thing or another. I verbally beat myself up over one thing or another.

How do you change this?

Practice. Really. It's the only way. Healthy habits require practice. When you stumble and fall you pick yourself up and start over, day after day after day... moment by moment.

Sometimes, I practiced several things at once, but I found it easier to focus on one thing at a time. However, eating healthier, sleeping healthier, exercising healthier are all things that need to be done every day. Eating is my least successful change, but I am making progress. Sleeping is improving. Funnily enough, exercise has been the most consistent in improvement. I'm really not lazy.

As my sense of my personal worth improves, my efforts to take care of myself have also improved. Habits help me through the times when it's hard work. For example, walking every morning has become a Monday through Saturday routine.

This is not something I've done on my own. I've chosen a number of mentors, through the years. Most of them don't know it. The internet has made it easier to find people who know a whole lot more than I do and have been through horrific experiences and chosen to rise above. If they can do it, so can I.

Monday Quote

Thank you Donna Keevers Driver for all the lovely memes for my books.

Sunday Scripture

Proverbs 20:7

The just man walketh in his integrity: his children are blessed after him.

Saturday Links

Team Never Quit interviewed Captain Charlie Plumb, a Vietnam POW, who survived 2,103 days in the "Hanoi Hotel." As a survivor of abuse, I found wisdom and an unexpected sense of peace with myself. I wish I'd learned some of the things he did sooner. Better late than never.
http://teamneverquit.com/podcast/captain-charlie-plum-vietnam-pow-2103-days-hanoi-hilton-american-hero/

Who knew moss played such a vital role? How often do I ignore the moss that holds my life together?
https://christiansread.wordpress.com/2017/10/30/unnoticed-moss-by-nancy-j-farrier/

Something extra for Thanksgiving:
https://jeanfischer.wordpress.com/2017/11/18/lydia-maria-child-who-was-she-and-what-made-her-famous/

God bless.

Favorite Book Friday

The Tenderness of His Love (Fostered by Love - book 3) by Kimberly Rae Jordan clean contemporary Christian romance. I wish I knew the order in which to read her books. I should have read The Callaghans and McFaddens Book 1 and 2 first. The books are stand alone, but characters from other books show up. I love her books.

Happy Thanksgiving

May it be a blessed day.

 Enjoy the food, the fun, the people... Need to escape? 

Read a book celebrating the holiday. :-)

Wordless Wednesday

Self Care 12 of 25

I want to take the same care going through these as the last group of statements, focusing on solutions. I'm not good at self care, but I am learning.

Original link:

https://healingfromcomplextraumaandptsd.wordpress.com/2017/07/16/25-obvious-non-obvious-self-care-issues-complex-trauma-survivors-struggle-with-lilly-hope-lucario/

12. Healthy eating and sleeping. 

My response:

I discussed in an earlier post about healthy eating:
http://laurelhawkes.blogspot.com/2017/11/self-care-7-of-25.html

Sleeping has been a battle all its own. Laying in bed for eight hours is not sleeping for eight hours. Yes, this had to be explained. Resting is better than not resting, but it still isn't sleep.

Sleep is when your body repairs itself. Learning this helped me understand that sleep wasn't simply a waste of eight hours or torture through nightmares. My body needed the sleep to repair itself.

There was an additional roadblock to sleep. When you go far enough into sleep deprivation, way past cranky, it becomes a tranquilizer. I was too tired to care what anyone did to me. Remembering was foggy. As my sleep improved, the tranquilizer effect wore off, and I hit cranky. Okay, not simply cranky but raging. I noticed how I was treated, and I remembered. Depression was safer than anger.

As I became healthier, I kept using my tranquilizer of little sleep. Unfortunately, as I became healthier, I recognized the problem. I knew I had to change, which meant I had to figure out a way to make sleep a blessing instead of using lack of sleep as an escape.

I read about how to improve my sleep and experimented. Some things worked. Some things didn't. Some sort of worked, but I failed to make them into a habit.

Things that helped:

I need a routine. Everyone needs a routine. Something that tells your body it's time to go to sleep. Mine is brushing and flossing my teeth.

I need a cool room. I like sleeping with a light blanket. If I'm too warm, I fidget and can't settle.

I need to sleep on my left side. That's compliments of a herniated back disc. It also means I need to keep my right leg elevated a bit. It's all about keeping my back comfortable, i.e., positioned so I'm not pinching any nerves. It's been twelve years since the epidural injection that started the healing process.

I need exercise, in order to sleep better at night. I walk every day, two-miles on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, one-mile on Tuesday and Thursday, and two or more miles on Saturday. On Sunday, my walk varies, usually home from church, about a half mile. I also do physical therapy created for me by my physical therapist to rehab my back. I'm married to those exercises for life. They make a difference. They also help with my back, hips, knees, and ankles.

I need a kinder way to wake up than a buzzing alarm clock. My stereo is set to turn on K-LOVE to wake me. I enjoy the gentle waking. I do have a buzzing alarm clock in case I sleep through the radio. It doesn't happen often.

I need more than white noise to go to sleep. I have an air purifier that runs 24/7. It isn't enough. I do need it for improving air quality. However, I needed a different sound. I've used CDs, streams, waves, storms. Unfortunately, they'd end and so would the sound. It wouldn't wake me, but when I woke up in the middle of the night, it would be too quiet. My niece introduced me to Rainy Mood.
https://rainymood.com/ 

 The most recent change I've made to improve my sleep is I take a Benadryl every night. It helps me breathe. I'm allergic to mold, ragweed, and something that blooms between 80 and 90 degrees. A windy day is miserable, no matter what time of year it is. Benadryl makes it better. I've also used Claritin-D, but it's more expensive.

Something I've noticed, when my sleep is doing good to okay my eating is easier to manage. Long ago, I learned to eat to stay awake. So my eating and sleeping are connected. I can pretend they aren't but... Rule #1: Stop lying, especially to yourself.

There's always room for improvement. An important lesson I learned: I cannot do huge changes and have them stick. I need to make little shifts, baby steps, a little here, a little there. A bunch of little changes add up to huge change. I'm improving and will continue to work on doing better.

Monday Quote

Sunday Scripture

Proverbs 20:5

Counsel in the heart of man is like deep water; but a man of understanding will draw it out.

Saturday Links

I enjoyed this amusing reminder from William Emmons to enjoy things that haven't changed:
https://wemmons.wordpress.com/2017/08/23/some-things-should-not-change/

Donna Hatch shares some interesting Regency facts. A fact of my own, learned from my English Uncle and Aunt: The prudishness of the Victorian era were not instigated by Victoria but by Albert. Funnily enough, they're quite proud of it and delighted in Victoria's less prudish ways. Things changed after Albert's passing.
http://donnahatch.blogspot.com/2017/10/5-fun-facts-about-regency-england-that.html

God bless.

Self Care 11 of 25

I want to take the same care going through these as the last group of statements, focusing on solutions. I'm not good at self care, but I am learning.

Original link:

https://healingfromcomplextraumaandptsd.wordpress.com/2017/07/16/25-obvious-non-obvious-self-care-issues-complex-trauma-survivors-struggle-with-lilly-hope-lucario/

11. Being in the present here and now.

My response: 

Life is miserable when you spend it wishing you could erase the past and dreaming of the future, especially when you don't do anything about either.

No, you can't change the past. However, you can learn to see if through different eyes. Instead of the wounded child, still hurting, I had to reach the point where I could say, "Yeah, it happened. So what?" I've worked long and hard to reach that point. It was actually suggested by one of the many books I read about abuse. It was the advice the author gave. I remember little else about the book, not even the title or the name of the author, though I remember the cover had a rainbow on it. I've never forgotten that one sentence (paraphrased): You have to reach the point in your life when people bring up what you went through you can say, "It happened. So what?" It's a part of the past, not the present and not the future.

Yes, what happened changed everything. I would likely be a different person now had I not been abused. However, I have to wonder, "Would I have liked myself?" Would I be sanctimonious? Self-righteous?  Would I be as compassionate? Would I have truly learned the value of honor, integrity, tenacity? Would I have the same friends? Would I be a writer?

Being present in the here in now is not easy. It requires work and effort. I know how to work, and I'm willing to put in the effort. It helps to learn to recognize the value. Living in the here and now means I don't beat myself up over the past. Living in the here and now means I don't fret about the future. Living in the here and now means I allow myself to embrace the present, enjoy each moment.

Does this mean I don't dream about the future? Of course not. In order to know what steps to take in the present, I need to know where I'm going. I admit I'm a bit of a control freak. LOL! Being in control gives me a sense of power. Recognizing that I have little control is a daily lesson. Accepting responsibility for controlling me, no one else, is a hard earned lesson.

An abuse victim is taught that they control their abuser's moods and actions. How did I learn the absurdity of this claim? How in the world did a five-year-old little girl control a teenage boys actions? I didn't hold a gun to his head. How in the world did a little girl control her mother's happiness? I wasn't magical. How had so much power been bestowed on a child who always felt so helpless and powerless? Lies.

Rule #1: Stop Lying, especially to yourself.

I was not powerful. I did not control my abusers. The only power I held in my hands was the ability to learn to control myself. My counselors guided those lessons, and I learned.

I still mess up. A lot. I'm learning. Practice. Every day. I won't give up, and I won't give in. Living in the here and now I'm happy.

Self Care 10 of 25

I want to take the same care going through these as the last group of statements, focusing on solutions. I'm not good at self care, but I am learning.

Original link:

https://healingfromcomplextraumaandptsd.wordpress.com/2017/07/16/25-obvious-non-obvious-self-care-issues-complex-trauma-survivors-struggle-with-lilly-hope-lucario/

10. Putting myself first.

My response: 

I grew up knowing that putting yourself first was selfish. The teaching was re-enforced from several directions. Everyone else was more important.

If I dared put myself first, I was shamed into rearranging my priorities. Adding to the head games was being treated special. I took me a long time to figure out it wasn't a good thing. Special treatment was a way to reel me in close so I'd be an easier target, let my guard down, soften me up, or it was used because the other person wanted something they thought I could give. I was supposed to be grateful for the compliment that hooked me. My third counselor described it as being chum for sharks. You weren't always eaten, but there was never a way to know if I'd escape or be caught. Even if I escaped, I knew I wouldn't next time. Trying to put myself first only made it worse. The game played more often to ensure I wasn't too full of myself.

It took a long time and a lot of practice to learn the difference between being selfish and putting yourself first. Yes, there's a difference.

Being selfish is putting your needs above everyone else regardless of the cost.

Putting yourself first is recognizing the needs of others and helping as able while ensuring yours are also met.

In more practical terms using dinner as an example:

Selfish is serving yourself as much as you want, sometimes going back for seconds and thirds, regardless of who hasn't eaten yet. Isn't enough for everyone else? Too bad. They should have arrived sooner. Pity someone else went hungry. I feel bad for them, but I'm still going to make sure I have as much as I want.

Putting yourself first is making sure you don't go hungry, which doesn't mean eating as much as you want. In fact, you recognize the need to take care of yourself and going back for thirds isn't a good idea anyway, unless you're burning the calories. In which case, you bring something extra for yourself so you don't feel like you're starving because you made sure everyone had something. In fact, bring something to share.

Perspective changes everything.

Wordless Wednesday

Self Care 9 of 25

I want to take the same care going through these as the last group of statements, focusing on solutions. I'm not good at self care, but I am learning.

Original link:

https://healingfromcomplextraumaandptsd.wordpress.com/2017/07/16/25-obvious-non-obvious-self-care-issues-complex-trauma-survivors-struggle-with-lilly-hope-lucario/

9. I struggle with making healthy relationship choices. I always go for people that I know are going to re traumatise me, even when there are “better choices” right in front of me. It’s like I can’t break that cycle.

My response: 

Story of my life, until my third counselor. I told him I felt like I had a tattoo on my forehead that said: ABUSE ME. He arched an eyebrow... maybe he didn't. He was pretty good about treating me kindly, but the vibes coming off him communicated a "duh" sensation. I stared at him as it dawned. I did! Not a real tattoo but a way of interacting with people that attracted abusers and users. Why? Because that's the way I knew how to interact with people. I'd gone in to my third round of counseling to figure out why I was still stuck. I'd worked through so much. It wasn't until that moment that I realized I had to not simply accept the past but I had to change me in fundamental ways.

During my recent adventure, I realized I'd finally successfully applied what my counselor had worked so hard to help me learn. I had healthy boundaries. I expected them to be respected, and they were. I didn't have to be nasty or cold or angry or any of the other unpleasant methods I used to use in order to keep people at a distance.

How did I finally step onto the path to change? I embraced Rule #1: Stop Lying, especially to yourself. I'm thinking of writing a book by that title. It's a tough rule. It sounds so easy, and it so isn't, especially for those who were trained to lie from a young age. "Everything's fine." "Nothing happened." "It doesn't matter."

Nothing was find. Too much had happened. And it mattered.

Changing is hard work and worth it.

Monday Quote

Sunday Scripture

Proverbs 20:3

It is an honour for a man to cease from strife: but every fool will be meddling.

Veteran's Day

Thank you to all who've served.