small victory

Man, I was hit out of the blue with an ancient memory accompanied by a deluge of shame tonight.  Shame that weighs you down and makes you want to hide and want to just die.

I chose to rise above that memory and reject that shame.  I had to really think about how to chose not to live in that shame.  How do I reject this shame and rise above it?  I was able to do it.  I don’t know how, but I was able to do it.

I’m not going to go into that memory now.  I’m going to keep it in the past.  Part of what keeps me down, keeps me trapped in my house, afraid of living is living in the past.

I chose to rise above.  I chose life over death.  This is huge.

crabby

The psychologist seemed nice enough.  Didn’t finish going through my history, therapy goals and such, though.  Telling my DBT/therapy tale brought back a lot of shame.  Today was a bad day.  I was very moody, short tempered.  Couldn’t think of a skill to use, didn’t want to use any damn skill.

I’m freaking out about filing a complaint against old therapist.  I’m afraid that I’ll get in trouble.  Stupid, I know.  But I’m afraid.  For some reason I’ve come to associate him with all the bad authority figures in my life and I’m afraid that he’s going to hurt me, even though the rational part of me knows that it makes no sense, a bigger part of me is a frightened child.  I don’t think that complaint will get filed.

I’m trying to shake that off and look forward.  Next session with the new psych will be about therapy goals.  I need to come up with those, what’s realistic for me.  I need to keep pushing myself to move forward, no matter how small the steps may be I have to move forward.  And I did make progress today, even though I was crabby.  I can still move forward when I’m crabby, and crabbiness didn’t have to define my whole day.

baby steps

I’m seeing a new psychologist tomorrow.

I’m still a bit labile, I hope I don’t cry.  I hope I can  keep the mindset that I’m hiring her to help me.  Emphasis on the HIRING part.  I’ve been perceiving my therapists as authority figures and that’s not healthy.

In thinking about what my expectations of therapy are, I’ve been wondering if my expectations have been very realistic.  I am in my forties.  I’ve been very isolated.  I could probably be diagnosed as agoraphobic. ( I haven’t been formally diagnosed as such).  I am easily overwhelmed.  I have little to no outside support.

What changes can I realistically make?  I tend to look at the finish line and panic.  By that I mean, envision myself in a steady job, competently earning a nice income and navigating my way in the real world with ease.  This is something that I want, this is something that I don’t have the tools to actually make happen at this time and it scares the hell out of me.

So I’m wondering what is realistic?  How many people my age, who have isolated themselves for so many years have been able to crawl out of that hell?  Who have no support or friendships because of that isolation?

But I’m trying so hard not to get bogged down by my past.  I’ve been trying so damn hard not to let that stop me from trying anyway.  I have to start where I am, no matter what my circumstances are.  I am here.  I can’t change that.

I’ve been thinking about college.  I can’t afford classes right now.  Our public library system has an online learning center with free courses in math, business English, adult job skills refresher courses among many other resources.   So I’ve been looking them over and sticking my toe in and testing out the waters, seeing how much I’ve forgotten over the years.  I never went to college.

I read something on a forum, someone mentioned that they had once been very obsessed with themselves, and once they had made the decision to stop being so self obsessed, life became so much easier.  That really hit home.  Hard to hear, but oh, so true.  So I’ve been trying to stop being so damn self obsessed, and I’ve been trying to stop dwelling on the obstacles in my way.  They just tend to bog me down and stop me in my tracks.

All of this scares the hell out of me.