"Lifting the lid off a boiling pot" - that is how my therapist described my situation after I became honest about everything going on in my life and in my head. Like really really honest. Honestly, I feel like therapy online has helped me become more vulnerable and honest, thanks COVID. It is always difficult for me to convey myself in a face to face interaction, social media, text messages though, I feel like I can describe how I feel so accurately. I am not sure why that is. The unfortunate thing about that is, how do you know that someone truly understand what you are saying.
During my session, my therapist used this analogy and it made perfect sense to me and described the last couple of years of my life. She said, "you want to know and so you lift the lid to look but then it gets too difficult and so you close it". And she was right on. I have done this now for some years. Difference is, now there is a little tiny human that I want to give the best of everything to. And although I know I cannot control everything negative affecting him, I figure I can try to figure my shit out so he does not get this part of me. The part that continues to be unresolved.
A big issue for me is that, as someone who has worked in the mental health and substance use field, I refuse to accept my diagnosis. Literally this is the thought in my head - I have seen people go through the most terrible of situations: rape, domestic violence, tragedies etc, what I have been through does not compare so therefore it is not trauma. Enter my therapist, your diagnosis is PTSD. Naturally I ran and did not see her again because I thought she clearly did not know what she was talking about. I closed that lid real quick the first time around.
Although I did not see her, I took her advice and journaled and wrote down everything that happened during my 29 years of life that have negatively affected me. From my time in Egypt, a father who left early on because he was addicted to drugs, a male figure in my life that exploited my innocence, a step dad who after promising a family - violated everything about our family. To my time in the US, learning English at the age of 10, coming to the US on 9/10/2001 and waking up to the most confusing and tragic day of my life, being called a terrorist in middle school, being dragged along all four years of high school in a pretend relationship. Failed relationship after failed relationship with men who all either suffered from mental illness or substance use or both. You see any commonalities here?
I had all these events time lined in my journal and let me tell you, I stared at that page for what seemed like forever. Tears streaming down my face and my thought was - yeah but I am married now, pregnant (at the time), I own my own house and my own car. I do not have trauma. After weeks, I returned to therapy and learned more about my diagnosis - Delayed Onset PTSD. In a nutshell, it is PTSD, you meet all the criteria and have all the symptoms but the traumatic event/ events happened some time ago - 6 months to be exact according to the DSM-5.
Here is what I learned/ am learning and continue to struggle with. When we experience trauma, we do whatever we can to lessen the pain. Our bodies and our minds are so good at shielding us in order to continue to survive. But our bodies and minds are so amazing that it allows all the trauma to resurface once you are safe in order to address it. It is pretty amazing to think about that concept. My body/ mind protected me from a young age in order to survive and only allowed me to remember all my trauma once I was an adult, feeling safe and secure. What kind of bullshit is that mind/ body!?
How we deal with the thoughts in our head and feelings in our heart says a lot about our trauma. For example, I literally shut the door on most thoughts and most feelings that are uncomfortable and I now know that is because I have been let down quite a lot so for me, it is a waste of time to begin thinking about things that happened long ago.
So with that, I leave you with this. If your pot is boiling and you have not lifted the lid to see what is going on, maybe with the help of someone, you can slowly remove that lid. If you are like me, and you lift the lid, wait for water to spill then cover the pot back up because it is simply too much to bear then I encourage to leave the lid off for a little longer each time you remove it.
As always mamas, you have got this
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