Sometimes I believe I can take on the world single-handedly and come off victorious. Sometimes I believe I have inner strength enough to walk through fire in ice soled shoes and will my feet to keep moving one cube at a time. I think this. It keeps me going but then the thing that knocks me on my butt turns out to be physical pain not emotional pain. I can will it differently but I can’t walk or talk or see without it first being filtered through my own private prescription lenses that let me see pain with 20/20 vision.
I think part of the reason I lose it so much and start thinking of killing myself at such high levels of pain is because of my issues with pain growing up. No matter how bad it got at home, no matter what instrument she hurt me with I still moved about day to day as if things were fine. I pushed that pain so far back I could no longer feel it once she stopped. As a matter of fact I even got up and danced one time when she was done. Boy was she angry! She came back for a second round. I never danced after again. I just created my own little inside orchestra that played music while she hurt me. She couldn’t turn that volume down for the world. They played louder than her voice. They played so loud they drowned out everything. I wish the same orchestra would play me a song today.
When I hurt now I see myself as a child and I remember the pain of then. When I hurt now I panic and have a difficult time keeping track of where I am and who I am, how old I am and if I’m safe. All I can feel is pain. I can’t reason. I can’t process or conclude that I’m an adult and this is a different kind of pain. All I know is my body hurts from head to toe and there is nothing at all I can do about it. I feel as helpless as I did when under my mother’s thumb.
Back then I ran away or planned different things to change the outcome of volatile situations. I thought ahead and had plan A and plan B. When I know I’m going to get sick I do the same thing which for me is triggering. I’m about to do the same survival stuff I did as a kid. I’m about to try and live through more trauma with a loss of control. During times like this I cook meals in advance so I can at least have something to eat and don’t have to order in. I make sure I have clean clothing so I don’t have to worry about laundry or any other basic needs. And just like when I was a kid I rarely stop and ask myself, “If things get really bad is there someone I can call for help?” Nope, I don’t ask that question because I’m vacillating between adult and child, victim and survivor. It is so hard to see things are different when it feels the same. The planning, the pain, the lack of choices and the final survival of it all only to have to do it again and again and again one hundred times over. I’m sorry but I thought I was done with that. It gets so confusing when I have flair ups like this. Sometimes though I have a moment of clarity and I realize I’m an adult and what I feel has nothing at all to do with what was done to me from age three to age twenty. I still throw up when the pain gets to be too much. I still chant “Oh God, Oh God, Oh God” when it gets too much to handle. And I still move about as if nothing at all is wrong. I have old coping skills for a new situation. But sometimes I can gather myself enough to remember I’m not a little girl anymore and this is different. Sometimes I can see that…sometimes.
I think about those shoes made of ice staying in tact as I walk through fire. My eyes stay straight ahead concentrating on the task at hand. I can see me with my baseball cap to the back trudging through mile high flames. Just thinking about it gives me a sense of pride and courage. Perhaps one day I can see myself walking beside someone hand in hand supporting my steps and encouraging me to continue the journey. For now I’m okay with the thought that as an able minded adult I can live with Lupus. I can do this. I can make it through this. I can walk through fire if I will it.
Make It So - Wednesday, November 05, 2008-11:17PM EST
This entry makes me think of the words in Isaiah about walking through the fire, and not being consumed….you do have someone with you, He is as close as your own breath. Maybe now, as your adult self, instead of willing yourself to walk through the fire you can simply lean on Him.
There is every reason in the world that your present pain is triggering, it makes total sense. I get incredibly emotional at the first twinge of any kind of pain. In my case it’s not because I had physical pain inflicted upon me (except for rape of course) but when I was sick or in some kind of pain there wasn’t a loving parent to comfort me.
I know there is nothing I can say that is going to make your pain magically disappear–if there were I’d chant it day and night! My thoughts and well wishes and prayers are with you . . . and please do call if you need to talk, ok?
Austin,
I am so very sorry that you are going through this. I understand what you are saying. My mom was the same way in that I was not going to give her the satisfaction of knowing she hurt me. But, she was going to escalate the pain until I had no choice but to give in. It is hell and horrible and so very, very wrong.
I have the added issue with lupus and fibro that I wished myself so sick that no one would hurt me ever again. My little child brain thought that if I was seriously ill that they would feel too guilty to hurt me. Not so, of course. They would hurt me no matter what. However, I spent years hating myself because I believed I brought the illness on myself. Now, I don’t. If anything, I believe that the severe stress set up the right conditions for my body to break down into illness.
I know that the pain can be confusing and triggering. It also can feel like you have to endure it alone because you did have to endure your childhood pain alone. But, you don’t. You can ask for help and there are many, many people that would be there for you. Certainly any of your blog friends. I wish I lived closer. I can’t offer face to face assistance but I am here for email support and email me anytime and I will gladly send you my phone number. We can talk because I have lived with lupus and fibro (and other physical ailments) for 25 years. I have been on prednisone, chemo, pain pills, plaquenil, NSAID’s and others that I cannot even remember right now.
You are not alone. You do not deserve to hurt.
Warm thoughts,
Tamara