Posted by terra miller on June 3, 2002, at 14:51:42
In reply to Re: the land of denial » terra miller, posted by judy1 on June 3, 2002, at 0:17:12
> First I'm so sorry you had such a traumatic time with your ex, I hope you're feeling better now.
Thanks. I am doing better and feeling more organized in my thoughts today.
>I do 'trigger' fairly easily, because of some recent medical problems I had to see a new neurologist recently (and I brought a letter with me from my therapist explaining I had PTSD and difficulty with being examined). All he did was bring a female nurse in the room and still had me lay on my stomach and I just 'left'- you probably understand what I mean. Later that night I cut myself pretty badly to the point of several stitches.
I am so sorry that happened to you! Yes, I know what you mean by "left." Sometimes one of the biggest (I know it is for me.) causes of bringing on SI is feeling ignored and taken advantage of and feeling out of control and being frustrated by that... and it all builds up and that's when you end up to the point of where you landed. Once all that frustration builds up inside, it takes heaps of concentration not to SI and to try to cope in other ways. (If I'm feeling so frustrated that I want to beat on my body, I hop on my exercise machine until I am exhausted and watch a video where good triumphs over some large evil... for me that's watching intense stuff like Schindler's List or The Matrix or Apollo 13.)
>I do keep things from my therapist and shrink, if I say I have voices boom I'm on an anti-psychotic but in a sense I think I've always had them-That for me was the biggest obstacle to getting help and telling somebody. Inside there's that strong feeling that if you tell anyone, they will label you psychotic or schizophrenic. I was afraid of that, too, and that I would be put on an anti-psychotic. I got to the point where I could trust my therapist, and he told me over and over that I wasn't psychotic and how my symptoms were way different than schizophrenia. But it was hard to tell him. And it took months for him to gently convince me that he didn't think I was crazy.
>it's just sometimes it's very frightening as is the loss of time. Do you forget a lot of things- like where you left something?Yes! It drives me insane!
>When you feel like you are switching, I assume the 'essential' you doesn't remember anything like you said, but does some part of you remember?
I am assuming there's always memory of what I do in this brain somewhere. Sometimes I remain present ("they" call it co-consciousness.) and am aware of both my thoughts and another part's thoughts. But usually what I feel is a switch coming on, then I switch, then I switch back (a process that I don't feel happen because I'm not out), then I am present... if this happens over minutes, then I might not notice. If this happens over hours, then I notice that I can't account for what I was doing. But lots of times I don't even notice that I've even lost time until somebody asks me a question and I for the life of me have either no idea what they are talking about or what the answer is to their question. Almost every session anymore my therapist will ask me how my weekend went (don't know. don't remember anything.) or refer to our last session together (don't know. don't remember anything.) Most times I can guess so that I am not found out. With other people I guess, hoping they'll keep talking so I can catch on to what they are talking about. In therapy, I've stopped guessing. I say, "I don't know" a lot. But it took a long time before I let down my defenses enough to let my therapist know how very little I remember instead of trying to hide it by guessing.
>Are you able to communicate to the other parts of yourself?I don't know. Sometimes I think yes. Most of the time it feels like a big joke; that there is no way that this is real. When I am frustrated is when it feels the most real... like when I'm getting dressed and somebody is dead set on a certain outfit and I just want to get dressed, you know? And I find that I cannot move because somebody is pitching a fit. That's when I communicate... usually in the form of, "Will you just leave me alone and let me get dressed! I don't want to wear that shirt"... pause... still can't think clearly...."Ok, we'll wear the stupid shirt then. Are you happy now?!"... all of a sudden can think and move again..... it's not like that all the time. Mostly I do a lot of listening and very little talking.
Terra
poster:terra miller
thread:184
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20020516/msgs/202.html