I told my mother I didn’t want to be a poet because the life of a poet always ends in tragedy.
I didn’t make a weighted blanket because I didn’t want another project. I just went ahead and weighted a large teddy bear I have. I opened the stitches on the side, removed the stuffing from the belly then added the appropriate amount of weight. I also removed some of the stuffing from the limbs. This particular bear has a small pocket where a little music box use to be. In place of the music box I put in a lavender pouch which can be removed to heat. The weighted bear with aromatherapy pouch works wonderfully.
Continue reading ‘Garbage In Garbage Out’
Published on
February 8, 2010 in
Anger, Anxiety, Art Therapy, Borderline Personality Disorder, Dissociative Identity Disorder, Emotions, Grief Sadness Loss, Mental Health, PTSD, Therapy and Trust.
Tags: crayon and marker, mixed media.
There’s too much in these paintings to try and explain everything. I think the 
overall theme is anxiety, rage and grief.
When Dr. D saw this one here he didn’t notice at firs that it’s a human head vomiting up flowers. The head is tilted back and is strangled by a golden rope as flowers “grow” from it’s open, strained mouth. He said it’s disturbing but very well describes how hard it can be to manage what I feel. He said to keep writing, keep drawing what’s in my head and dreams because the work will pay off in healing. God, I hope so. I’d like to try and do a digital version of Flower Pot. I like that it expresses the feeling of being overwhelmed in an accurate but grotesque way. Grotesque is important since there’s nothing comfortable at all about how I’m feeling.
My therapist and I discussed the hanging people. I tried to explain to him that they aren’t suicide gestures but an illustration of how overwhelming emotion can be sometimes. My thoughts and emotions sometimes feel so powerful that it feels as if they could kill me. This is not me hanging but emotions strangling me. One of the things we talked about too is how the figure has evolved from a simple dress-like figure to one with hands and feet to one with distinctive clothing. I commented that perhaps the emotions are getting a little clearer and less generalized. I hope that’s the case. I hope things get clearer in my head.
Continue reading ‘Flowering’
Dr. D said my unconscious mind is process a lot right now. Right now my dreams are shorter and to the point. A few of them are long and twisting which is normal for me but those have been few and far between. Recently the main theme of my dreams has been vindication and self protection. On one level I’m pleased to see my dreams aren’t always about me being hurt in some way but on the other hand I’m still exhausted when I wake. I still feel as if I’ve run a marathon but didn’t cross the finish line. If feels as if when I go back to sleep I’ll start at the beginning and exhaust myself, the next night I’ll do the same thing, on and on an on never reaching the finish line of rest and rejuvenation which sleep is supposed to bring. Whether it’s nightmares of “positive” processing I still feel worn out!
Note: In this dream I lived in the house form the 4th grade, however, like in most of my dreams I was an adult. My mother stays the same age in my dreams as does my brother. The brother stays 3 years old and the mother stays around 35 years old. My sister ages as do I which means in this dream I was thirty-eight.
Continue reading ‘Processing Dreams and Running Marathons’
As much as I trust my boy I’ve had difficulties with allowing him to stand behind me or lay behind my chair. I can’t see him and it drives me batty. This is the same dog I sleep beside and have no issues with turning my back to but when I’m not in bed it drives me crazy for him to be behind me. In therapy today we talked about how instead of me feeling afraid because someone is behind me I end up feeling angry. Dr. D suggested that sometimes anger makes a person feel less vulnerable and powerless than when they feel afraid. I get that but I can think of a situation that may have changed this all from fear to anger.
Continue reading ‘Anxiety and Anger in Color’
This drawing was started while waiting in the doctor’s office. The appointment didn’t’ go that well and I found myself way back in times past.
Drawing details: The woman’s face is split right down the middle. She’s divided in time and space. One part of her holds 2 houses and a giant tree which springs from her hair (her glory). The other side of the face is scared and red. Purple sky spills over into her bruises as well as the house on top of her head. I explained to my therapist that the houses I draw have to do with me attempting to process my past in today’s terms. It’s hard to make sense of. The house holds past experiences and new tapes. Somehow I’m suppose to thrive with them both, make a safe and calm place inside my mind with both there. I struggle to do that.
I’m uncertain how to grow tall when my shoulders feel so heavy and my mind is bogged down by unwanted visitors. I don’t know how to do it.
Continue reading ‘At Home, In My Head’
Concrete city, dark, chaotic, unwelcoming. On paper it looks pretty but would you really want to walk in it alone?
My head has its own community, its own chaotic, lost community. Sometimes we appear to be just fine but that’s only from people who have never walked alone, down the streets of my mind.
Medium: Oil pastel, ink on paper
I don’t expect to ever be free of nightmares. And I don’t expect to ever be free of anxiety or fear or even depression. I think they may be my forever companions and that would be just fine if it weren’t for the fact that I believe in monogamy. If one of these emotions or emotional responses partnered up with me while the others left me alone I just might survive this whole ordeal. But it seems emotional bigamy with a sadistic twist is more the order of the day.
I’d like be free. I’d like to be single….singular.
Art details: The middle image represents me. I’m choked by my past and caught up in swirls of questions and high emotion. There are 3 primary faces in the painting while several others are hidden in color or texture. The three faces have very different expressions, calm, fearful and sad. The main figure in white is faceless.
The blue and white sketch is where this painting began.
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