Posted by leeran on April 17, 2003, at 1:01:58
In reply to Re: A very long answer » leeran, posted by Dinah on April 16, 2003, at 16:04:20
Dinah: I see things no one else notices, but it's bad in that - well, you know why it's bad.
Lee: Yes. I know exactly what you mean. And it doesn't just start/end with picking up on the preamble from the next barfing buffoon. It's the way the dust gets in the seams in the upholstery of the car. Or the fact that a wall isn't exactly straight.
I need a thick layer of anesthetic for my frustrating (and endless) pursuit of the aesthetic in EVERYTHING that falls between the peripheral vision of either eye at any given moment.
Dinah: I don't watch The Sopranos, but ER gets to me on occasion. Shudder.Lee: Yes, the poor fellow at the start of the season (on ER) lost his arm but I was too busy obsessing about the fact that he threw up after it happened!
Dinah: Dogs don't bother me. But they did at one time. Travelling with my carsick-prone dog was a nightmare, a private hell really since we would go on long trips with her. I guess I finally got accustomed to it, because it doesn't bother me.Lee: I suppose we can count our blessings on this one reprieve.
Dinah: Getting "over" the phobia was actually one of the conditions my husband put on getting married because of the impact on kids.
Lee: My first husband mentioned this whenever we discussed starting a family. Usually, it was enough for me to stay on the pill or have my IUD adjusted.
Dinah: Fortunately, I can go on auto pilot if need be and take care of what I need to, even if I'm in shock inside.
Lee: Where my son is concerned, I can do this as well - but you've described it so perfectly - "shock inside." Fortunately, my ex-husband was good about this as well. I could tell you about the convergance of two of my fears (flying/throwing up) where my son is concerned but at the moment I'm feeling too world weary to do so. Besides, I just had a lovely and very fattening dessert and I need to skirt this subject for the time being :) at the risk of ruining the memory of a perfectly good bowl of coffee ice cream mixed with chocolate chips from Coldstone Creamery.
Dinah: And I pop a klonopin immediately.
Lee: I suppose I should look up this medication immediately! I have a feeling that if it helps you, it might help me.
Dinah: And my husband is a sweetie about it.
Lee: If nothing else, this ("and my husband is a sweetie about it") can be the mark of true love.
Dinah: He takes the major role in caretaking those circumstances while I play a support role, if he's home. And he takes off from work if it's pretty certain there will be vomiting. So far I've managed, if not beautifully, then adequately at least. Fortunately (again) my son has a hardy stomach like his parents and rarely throws up and baby spit-up didn't seem to bother me.
Lee: Baby spit-up was fine on this front as well.
Dinah: It is completely different. How do you manage with your son?
Lee: Well, I'm fortunate, I suppose, that he's a lot like your son (knock on wood, which I just actually did - as quietly as I could so my husband wouldn't think I've gone totally mad today. As an aside, I went off Wellbutrin about 23 days ago in favor of Lexapro and we are now seeing the error in my ways . . . my husband even called in the prescription tonight and insisted we go get it before 9:00).
Dinah: For me at least, a sibling was no help. Of course my phobia took full form at age eleven when my newly adopted brother threw up almost on me at a restaurant. I promptly had my first ever full blown panic attack in the corner of the restaurant, while everyone took care of my brother. I didn't know what a panic attack was, and thought I was dying. :(
Lee: I can sympathize COMPLETELY. I guess my first grade reaction to the kid throwing up on the quadrant of desks was probably one of my first panic attacks as well. I remember going home and sitting on the sofa with my fingers in my ears and my eyes closed while my parents tried to question me about what in the world was the matter (everything!).
So, essentially, you were an only child for eleven years of your life . . .
I have to tell you, Dinah, that if a second child had shown up when I was eleven I would have probably had a nervous breakdown (as they were referred to back then).
I remember my father telling me that if he and my mother had another child my grandmother would drop me like a hot skillet! His words EXACTLY. I've never forgotten them! Can you believe the things parents say to children??? Of course you can - what your mother said to you - "the son my mom always told me they wanted and I was supposed to be" - is in that same league. Similar, as well, to my mother saying she never wanted additional children because she really never wanted to be bothered - one was enough "trouble." (Trouble from the child who should have been pigeon toed from trying to walk the straight and narrow for so many years).
Dinah - Turns out my brother had a verrrrry sensitive stomach and threw up all the time, especially after he figured out that it drove me literally nuts.
Lee: Oh, Dinah, my heart nearly broke when I read this. This is one reason it took me so many hours to respond. I can so easily put myself in your place and imagine what this must have been like for you. Anyone that isn't a "barf-a-phobe" is undoubtedly shaking their head and saying "huh?" but I understand COMPLETELY. I also understand how hard it is for "non-barf-a-phobes" to understand because the few people I've ever admitted this to have really had a difficult time wrapping their minds around the concept.
Dinah: My bedroom was next to the bathroom, and I would always think I heard him being sick in the middle of the night. I had a hard time figuring out how much was real, and how much was imagination. I had my mother sleep with me for a while. When I got a stereo in the room, I found out that if I put the speakers on that wall at loud volume, I could mask any sounds or possible sounds from the bathroom. Later I turned both TV and speakers on at very high volume. I guess my parents thought it was a teen thing, although my tastes ran to easy listening, gregorian chants, madrigals, etc. Hardly your typical rattle the roof fare. At those times he really was sick, I would turn them on and then go to my walk in closet and sit or sleep there with the door closed. The bathroom there was permanently contaminated and I treated it like the worst sort of public toilet, hovering over it. And those were the relatively normal things I did over the combination of my brother and my phobia. There are some things only my therapist will ever know.
Lee: Part of my own phobia was probably due to my father. He didn't drink all the time but when he did it apparently made him quite ill. This must be where a lot of this phobia is rooted because typing this is difficult! I'll make it fast and exit this paragraph - he was very loud about it. Horrendously so. I have no doubt I need therapy on this . . . lots of it.
Dinah: So many things were going wrong at the time. We had just adopted my brother (the son my mom always told me they wanted and I was supposed to be), I was the appointed picked on kid at my new middle school and torment was my daily lot, my best friend didn't want to be thisclose any more and wanted to hang out with others (and then she moved), my mom shifted overnight from my mamma to my mother as she reacted to my no longer being her sweet compliant daughter due to my emotional problems. It was all too much for an eleven year old. It was a whole lot easier to focus all my fear and anger into this obsession with vomit that consumed my days and nights, and distracted me from the rest.Lee: I simply can't believe how similar our lives have been. Middle school was dreadful (I don't do "transitions" well). My friendships faltered at this time, too. Friends from grade school seemed much more socially adept at blending in (and meeting) all the new kids from other grade schools. I ended up feeling isolated/deserted (I'm really lousy at small talk - but give me a message board box to type in and I'll spill my guts - no pun intended).
Funny thing is, I was always shy with other kids my age - and lousy at integrating myself into any group, but then I ended up in advertising sales for twenty years! More self-torture! As for the mama to mother thing, my mother was always battling her depression (who knew that was what it was called back then? I just thought she hated me) so I was always waiting for the other shoe to drop. She would accuse me of giving her "hate" looks and I wouldn't even think I had looked in her direction!
Dinah: And it was all so lonely, because I couldn't tell anyone the truth of why I did any of those things. No one really understood or believed me. I think I may have tried to tell my psychiatrist at the time once, but he obviously didn't get it and I never tried again. I was alone with my terror, and with figuring out ways to appear as normal as possible.
Lee: I'm just flabbergasted at the similarities between our experiences - or our reactions to our experiences. How in the world does one tell other people about this fear??? For me, it's like adding more fear on top of the primary fear because someone might CAPITALIZE on it (like your brother did with you). I've always felt it was a phobia that somehow translated into this terrible weakness or freakiness that has its roots somewhere at the very core of my being! There has been such vulnerability that has gone along with it. Every rock concert, vacation (cruises in particular), airline flight, etc. has been tainted with this gnawing anxiety.
Well, I see I've run out of "Dinah" comments to edit in and out with my own. I suppose now it's time to go upstairs and cross my fingers in the hopes I won't dream about this ;)
You are such a sweetheart to share your feelings with this "board" virgin! I can't tell you how much I appreciate your openness!
I suppose I will finish this post with the earth shattering, epiphanic post that I saved to my hard drive last Friday (the one I found when I was looking through the archives, posted by Trouble over a year ago), but tonight I'll direct it to you:
"Wow. Where were you when I was a kid? Do you ever wonder about that? How come there were no other insane families around except your own? No reference point, no one to comisserate with? What a difference it would have made to have had one friend who was going thru something similar!" -posted by Trouble to Anna Laura, February 13, 2002
poster:leeran
thread:219511
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/social/20030414/msgs/219967.html