Healing

When experiences occur earlier in life and are not felt and processed, they sit there in the subconscious (an untreated, unhealed wound) until something or someone triggers them. At this point, the person who has experienced and carries a wound from the past has a reaction. It may even be that they are, in a sense, transported back to the event or events of the past. 

Personally, I have had a few experiences with my husband where I felt that he didn't know that it was me with him. I felt that he was talking to someone else; talking to someone who had hurt him long ago. This was a very disturbing situation and I didn't feel I knew what to do. I stayed completely quiet and after the eruption, so did he.

In general, when my husband is triggered by something I have said, I tend to stop talking. This is a technique I decided to use after I realized that it didn't matter what I said, my words were not going to help the situation.

Aware of the trauma that sits in my husband's subconscious, wholly untreated, I have learned to take it into account.

Recently, a member of the extended family to which one of our children married into, was strident, outspoken and inappropriate with my husband when the subject veered onto politics. This was at a children's birthday party and my husband chose to close the conversation down, which the woman in question did not want to do. She was in for the kill and angry he wouldn't fight.

 My husband had no way of knowing, and I didn't know either, that the young couple were supporters of Trump and his politics right across the board. They don't believe the Earth is warming, for example.

Recognizing the quicksand he had landed into (and I have since raised it with a senior member of the family who admitted it is a difficulty being carried in their family), he made the fastest exit he could. But, it was too late. The woman in question, and now her husband, don't engage with my husband at family celebrations.

This is, of course, upsetting. After listening to my husband again recently explain to me what happened, I suggested that he simply engage one or both of them in a totally safe conversation - the weather, the children, football (we support the same team so that's safe, right?).

But, due to this trauma that sits in his subconscious, maybe him feeling that he made a mistake in some way, my making a suggestion wasn't a good idea. I know this but sometimes I see growth and healing in him that suggests we can go a little deeper in our relationship and that I can talk authentically.

It can be useful to make a note of what happens and what is said in these situations between us. In the past, I have been too blindsided by the verbal attack to remember (or even take in) what is said. The value of writing it down is to evaluate how the situation ensued and what the trigger might have been. It may never be helpful to him if we can't discuss it, but it is helpful to me to understand where the trauma sits.

It went like this in a broad brush way:

- He explained the initial event in detail.

- I acknowledged what happened but reminded him this was in the past, couldn't be undone, but maybe engaging one or both of them in a simple, harmless conversation might break the ice.

- He said to me, at least I remember distinctly these particular words, "Don't make things up?"

- I repeated the words 'Don't make things up' in an effort for him to see where his mind had gone - blaming me.

-He then said, 'I don't need your advice' and said between one to two minutes more of which I don't remember anything.

I stayed silent. After he was silent I picked up my phone to check the weather (a signal from me that I was going to start my day) and he got out of bed.

Event over.

I think a great many people understand now that marriage can be about a relatively safe arena in which trauma from the past is played out. I  know that I am married to a man whose soul/heart/Spirit (whatever you want to call it) is good and pure, but who has suffered trauma that he can't necessarily heal without help, which he refuses to access.

At the same time, I also know that I carry trauma from my past, emotional needs unmet. Thankfully, I have a brother and we are each other's witness. Just talking truthfully, whilst keeping it in context of two parents who were doing their best and were also carrying trauma, has helped us both a great deal.

I do also need to acknowledge that my trauma is not entirely in the past. I continue to experience difficulties living with someone who is carrying trauma. It's a juggling act trying to be my authentic self at the same time as I do my best to have my own needs met and to keep myself emotionally safe.

I do not run from the truth. I know that I am capable of being hurt and I know that I am strong. I have much to be grateful for at the same time as I have had much to endure.

I could have run away many times. I could have ended it and found refuge in aloneness; maybe in the arms of a man who felt entirely safe. I would be lying if I said the thought hadn't crossed my mind.

But, even in the darkest of moments, it's the Buddha's words that I hear. They keep me in the game.

'Hatred never ceases by hatred but by love alone is healed.'

Protector

 It was Friday night. I remember specifically because it was our Australian Football Grand Final the next day. 

I had a nightmare. 

With the benefit of hindsight I can see what happened. I had read recently that people pleasers (like me) were generally attached to some form of guilt.

Guilt!? That surprised me. I pondered. What did I have to be guilty about? What kind of guilt would lead me to a life of wanting to please people?

It's so interesting and mysterious how the mind works. My mind had dreamed up a scenario where all would be revealed.

In this terrible dream I found my father crouched by his car parked on the street. He told me that there were criminals looking to kill him and I said to him that we couldn't stay where we were. He was too exposed and we needed to find shelter.

Right across the road was an apartment, several apartments that he owned and rented out. Since he had the key I said we needed to go into one of them and hope the tenants weren't home. They were home and so we made an excuse that we were checking something. 

We couldn't stay there, eventually had to leave. My father was ahead of me just enough that when I turned around to say goodbye to the tenants he was already out on the street and making his way to the car.

Incidentally, my dream had used a whole lot of truths. My father did go to collect rent from tenants in his earlier life. And he did tend to skip ahead across roads, quite proud of his ability to speedily get out of the way of a moving car or perhaps an incident.

As soon as I saw him on the other side of the road I realized his vulnerability and I ran towards him. But it was too late. The bad guys had been hiding around the car, threw a sheet over him and pulled him into the mob. In spite of my efforts to get to him I didn't stand a chance and he was gone from me; out of my life.

In my efforts to get to him and save him, I had to wrestle with one of them; a strong, well built man painted up like a clown. (There's context from his life around that too.) He had me horizontally on the floor although we were moving quite fast, as if on an electric cord. I was slapping him in the face, trying to get him off me but he was far too strong and simply laughed in my face.

I became aware of police officers, American police officers standing in a huddle, either oblivious or disinterested in what was going on right before their eyes. I tried to scream but no words or even sounds came out. 

It was at this point that my husband very gently shook me, 'cindi, cindi, you are having a bad dream'.

I couldn't shake the dream in that I was haunted by it but sort of awake now and I lay there quietly, weeping.

Eventually I got up to pee and then went back to bed and enveloped myself in my husband's arms, told him about the dream and I remember I said that all my life I tried to protect my father in a myriad of ways.

I am not sure quite when but some time soon thereafter, after a little more sleep, I had an epiphany.

This was grief; 31 year old grief that hadn't found expression before.

My father was diagnosed with an inoperable brain tumor when I was living in the USA and bringing up my young family. His diagnosis had been held back from me until they could hold it back no more. 

To my mind, though I could never have expressed this before, I wasn't given the opportunity to protect him; to save him, as I would my mother a few years later. And this had played on my mind all that time without my having consciousness of it. 

(Well, not quite. I have many times replayed the feelings of being told and being upset; of calling the surgeon; of coming home to see him; of speaking to him for the last time on the telephone when he was in the hospice; of deeply regretting that no-one was with him when he died.)

Even more poignantly, I came to understand that under the sadness I was feeling after the dream, I felt something else - a fierce love for him. And that was a very good thing; to get in touch with that feeling, elusive to me for many, many years.

Over the years, I have come to understand that rather negative titles can be directed towards me, quite legitimately; people pleaser, codependent; caretaker.

But what if we could look at it another way?

Today, I did look at it another way.

I'm a protector. A fierce protector of those I love. 

Today, I am proud of myself for that.

The passing of the Queen

 Although we knew the Queen was clearly very unwell, her death seemed to be sudden. When I went to bed, I noted that the family were gathering to be with her and that the end of her life was approaching. Maybe at 4 am I woke and checked only to see the article renew and to disclose that the Queen had died.

It's my intention to note my feelings, as part of an overall plan to simply be aware of my internal experience, rather than gloss over it. So, I noted the sadness and sat with it. Very quickly I began to softly weep and eventually I got up and washed my face and blew my nose before I settled back to sleep.

I think seeing her so frail 48 hours ago, still working, still caring, still trying to do her best, and then passing away from this world last night really exposed my heart; certainly not a perfect human, a thing that doesn't exist, but someone who tried and never stopped trying.

As it is for so many thousands of people, the Queen has been a constant in my life. My grandmother was very keen on her and took me to stand amongst the crowds when she came to Melbourne in 1963, and of course magazines had her on the cover regularly throughout my life.

So many families have their share of conflict, and the Queen's family was no exception, and yet there was something particularly poignant about a daughter-in-law creating the most awful rift in the Queen's family at the end of her life. As people who put their duty to country first, all those podcasts and interviews airing dirty laundry, expressing only one side of the discord,  must have felt so ugly and alienating.

I noted too that I kept my sadness this day to myself; came here to express it rather to a person. I noted it as odd that I did that and looked up a book that I use often to see what it said. People who 'caretake' someone do this; keep their emotions to themselves because those who they 'look after' don't like emotional displays. They are the ones who do emotional displays and caretakers are the ones who stay calm.

Still, I am not made of stone but rather a vast cacophony of emotions many of which are experienced privately. This is the training.

As I lay in bed in the middle of the night absorbing the Queen's death, not just as a sense of sadness in my mind but in a somatic way, as a bodily experience, I came across this sense that nothing else truly survives but love. We can feel it, not that hard to do for most of us, but can we be love?

I believe with all my heart that the vast majority of us are doing the best we can - that there are wounds that prevent us quite often from being our best - but given the wounds, doing the best we can.

It's that thought, that acknowledgment of the human experience, that allows the heart to open deeper and tap into an unconditional love - not expecting more of someone than they are capable of being, but loving them anyway.

I wonder, perhaps if only momentarily, the Queen's passing may tenderize our hearts.

Validation

 In small or large ways, we have all experienced trauma. Some traumatic experiences seem to settle in the body, take residence in there and won't shift. It's as if they lodge. This doesn't necessarily effect every minute of the day or even every day. Some days are fine. Some days aren't so fine.

I think, when we have an issue, we look for the solution, as if there is a solution; some miracle cure that will exterminate the trauma.

In my experience, it doesn't work like that but rather there  has to be a fairly consistent approach to working with the trauma; small but consistent baby steps; without some sort of expectation that one day you will wake up and it will all be gone for good.

I think acknowledging yourself as a person living with trauma is a good start on the road to recovery; to feeling better. I don't say this lightly or flippantly. It's no small thing, for me anyway, to be able to write these words.

I find myself here sitting at my laptop writing into my online journal, aware that unless I say something deeply truthful there is no use writing here at all. The truth is that I feel quite emotional saying this, that I am someone that lives with a sense of trauma. It was probably perfectly evident to you the reader for years, but even so, it's quite the revelation for me.

If I can be helpful to the reader here, perhaps I can offer something that has helped me quite a bit lately. I take my hands to my chest, one hand crossed over the other and I hold them there. I close my eyes and I am more aware of the feelings of this sensation. If you try it now you may well become aware of a deep quiet not just inside yourself but outside of yourself too, like a protective shell. There is something deeply affirming about this action.

You might say quietly to yourself, even out loud, "You're okay." It might not feel right, right away, but maybe you can add another time, "I approve of you." or "You're a good person."

Sometimes in life, when we aren't given something we very much wanted as a child, there's a sense that even if someone were to give it to us, we allow it, perversely, to slide off us like jelly. We just don't let it land.

I am suggesting that maybe you, and maybe I do receive validation at times but maybe the validation we need is our own validation. Maybe the love we need most is to love ourselves.

So, maybe when you cross your hands over each other and hold them on your chest (I personally do this high on the chest close to the collarbones) you might say to yourself, "I love you". See how this feels.

I don't offer this as a remedy for the trauma. If the trauma lodged, it may not be ready to depart so easily. And yet, it's quite something to note after offering oneself this little act of kindness repeatedly that acceptance softens the trauma.

It's almost as if, when one stops being 'brave' and denying the trauma; when one acknowledges and offers compassion to the being that has experienced trauma, the trauma settles down. There is a quiet whisper...'finally, you've welcomed me'.

Worthy

It's interesting to maintain a dialog with oneself, and I think very beneficial to a person. You find yourself noting changes in mood, patterns of thought, feelings and triggers.

I think the most obvious trigger for me is anger. If I become angry I am curious about that. Since it's an experience I loathe, I want to know what instigated that feeling in my body. The answer is that I was triggered - that the thing that was said or done or seen or experienced somehow stepped on a trigger point - a wound - that still sits there deep inside and out of sight.

To put a name to this trigger point, it would be 'unworthiness'. It could be a feeling that I am unworthy of love, or unworthy of attention, or affection, or care.

It's simply not the case that any old person could touch this trigger point. I am not expecting care, or affection from someone I meet casually in the street. Although, I offer that when someone in the street is caring that's a particularly lovely experience.

So, the experience of a difficult emotion such as anger comes hand in hand with expectation, I think. There's an expectation that a few chosen people in your life will take the time and make the effort to provide a sense of attention, affection, care and love.

It's this expectation, or perhaps hope, that one will be cared for by another person that can make some romantic liaisons so sticky. If things started out so beautifully, and then drift into only random moments of care, or words of affection, the memories of the beautiful experiences can lodge into the brain and body and not allow someone to see that the landscape has changed for the good. 

Even then, the body does throw up signals that all is not as it should be - that these are painful experiences that are remarkably like those already experienced in one's youth. Unworthy of love. Unworthy of care. Unworthy of affection. Unworthy of attention.

I used to think that I should fight against these triggers - be the better person, you know? I used to think that if I tried hard enough those triggers would evaporate.

But, I found a thought coming up lately...that maybe those triggers, the anger, was there for a reason, alerting me to the fact that whatever had brought up that trigger need not be tolerated; that the emotion need not be vanquished. Maybe there were just some experiences that should be sidestepped.

So, as an experiment, I tried this side stepping of a situation that led to trigger points for me; a lot of unworthiness; a lot of wishing it was different; a lot of longing involved for something that was out of range. In summary, I took a reality check of what I could control and what I could not control, and I decided to control that which I could - to avoid the triggers.

The result has been, so far anyway, a greater sense of quiet in the body and in the mind, which I like very much.

And...an acknowledgement lodged deep in my mind...that, aside from these trigger points from childhood, there isn't really anything wrong with me at all. 

I am worthy. 

I'm just going to sit and let that thought soak in.

Thoughts on the Depp/Heard case

 Like millions of other people, I got swept up in the Depp:Heard legal case where Depp sued Heard for defamation in an newspaper article she co-wrote saying that she was a victim of domestic abuse. I very much wanted to believe her. Even now, I don't know and I don't think the court case made especially clear what actually took place in their relationship.

For sure, they said mean and ugly things to each other. For sure, they both found the union to be sufficiently disturbing that, ultimately, there was no alternative but to split.

Whether he caused those bruises on her face, kicked her, slapped her in the face over and over, (as a witness testified), I don't know. 

What we can know is that the jury and the world, generally speaking, was of the opinion, that none of these things happened, because if even one of those things happened on any given day, the jury was obliged to find for Heard. 

If she suffered not physically but emotionally, then that too would count as an acknowledgement of Heard's vindication for writing the article. The jury determined that she was not emotionally abused.

Or, maybe the jury felt that they were both emotionally abused by one another and so it sort of amounted to a cancellation of abuse.

There was very troubling testimony and had I been on the jury, I would have wanted to explore that fully. A young man who became close to Johnny testified that right after their wedding ceremony he made a statement that went something like, 'Now I can legally knock her around.' I found that chilling.

I also would have wanted to explore the fact that victims of domestic abuse often want to protect their abuser and that this was in line with Heard not wanting to talk to the police after they were called, and I think they were called after a friend heard a very troubling encounter between Depp and Heard on the telephone. (I didn't see the whole trial so that may not be entirely accurate)

My point is that there was evidence that domestic abuse of one kind or another appears to have taken place and has been corroborated by other people. Maybe the jury thought these people were lying too.

It's strange, because I am of the understanding that it is a crime to give false testimony and it seems odd that so many people who gave testimony have been accused of lying on both sides. It throws into  question the judicial system and the willingness of people to lie.

I was a young woman in the days of the trial of Lindy Chamberlain who woke one night whilst on a family camping trip in the Northern Territory of Australia to find her baby gone. It was a similar situation to the Depp:Heard case from the point of view that the judicial system and people at large got involved, with nearly everyone having an opinion one way or the other. (You may recall that Streep played Lindy.) Most people, and the courts, came down on the side that Lindy must have killed her baby.

I found that proposition absolutely ludicrous from the moment I heard about it. I held onto that position for years until that joyous day when baby Azaria's jacket was found, corroborating the fact that a dingo had taken her baby.

In the meantime, Lindy's life was destroyed. The (innocent) woman was in jail when she had her second baby. Can you imagine how devastating it could be for a human who loved her baby dearly to be accused and convicted of killing her? A witch hunt, indeed.

So, I wanted to believe Amber. If those awful things happened, and she made it out of there in one whole piece, then I wanted to support that strength.

But, things niggled me. For one, I would never write a public article that would destroy the life of the man I proclaim to still love. She supported him, she says, by not wanting to talk to the police, and yet she wrote the article. There's a problem there.

The 'malicious intent' that the jury believed in was a surprise. Really? She maliciously intended to hurt him? Well, yes, thinking more on this, I suppose she did write it with either the intent to inflict harm on him or else she was naive as to the repercussions of the article. 

One article I read shed some light on the power dynamic of the couple. Sure, Depp was richer and more famous, but Depp came across as a codependent who couldn't navigate such deep (narcissistic) waters.

Who knows?

I do know that this trial in some way struck a cord with the world at large much like the Chamberlain tragedy which took place long before social media was a thing.

When a relationship begins wonderfully; when a person is provided with much affection that they so sorely need, and then things start to become a bit emotionally abusive - intermittent validation/affection; tactics that confuse the other person but keep them enmeshed in a relationship that is troubling - it's hard for the brain to figure out what has happened. Wasn't it once a great relationship? Wasn't he or she once so loving? Maybe, if he or she tries hard enough, they can get back to that?

I don't know what happened in that relationship exactly and I am not sure if the participants fully understand the dynamic themselves. To be sure, they were both right to go their separate ways.  Unfortunately, that was not done quietly.

Honesty

 It occurred to me earlier today that we are almost forced in life to be actors in a play. There is the student hat and the teacher hat, the therapist hat and the client hat; one person being in a hierarchy higher than the other. I noted twice earlier today mention of seeking wisdom, from one person further along the path of life or of growth than the other. It's all normal; all good.

But, what happens when we are forced to hold in thoughts just because the other doesn't want to hear them; or gets mad about hearing them?

It's all done for best practice a lot of the time - we don't want to offend or to pry or to overstep the mark. So, we keep our thoughts to ourselves.

Our thoughts, of course, aren't necessarily right or wrong. They are just thoughts and some aren't worthy of being shared. 

Some thoughts need to be corrected; modified; adapted. We are just learning. I think we try on thoughts to learn; to learn what is in our head.

Some people are like a wack a mole game; remember that? You say something and they wack you down without a thought. If you are lucky , they politely explain that that's a tender subject and they are a bit precious about it right now. Of course, you back off immediately.

I have spent a lifetime holding onto the vast number of my thoughts. You probably have too. We have thousands of thoughts every day and we couldn't express them all if we tried.

The problem for me is that my internal definition of intimacy is that I would be able to express nearly all my thoughts. I am not necessarily referring to a sexual relationship but rather to a relationship where we are safe enough with one another to share practically any thought.

Sometimes in my marriage we do share a thought where it gets close to the bone - could, in another moment, cause some upset - but it's said and shared and we respectfully register an intimacy of the mind and heart. We've tread close to a landmine and neither of us blew up.

We are not always so lucky.

So, here I sit with a trillion thoughts that I have held onto; unshared thoughts.

At times, I come into contact with people who work in odd spaces - past lives, for example. They say that that's my story, my lives - my keeping my thoughts to myself. If it was history, some period of time even more gender defined than now, chances are I had no choice.

I kept a lot of thoughts away from my parents too, especially my mother. 

As soon as you know it is not safe to share your thoughts, well, naturally enough, you safeguard them in a spot that is safe - deep inside.

I shared with someone recently that I sometimes write down my thoughts. I don't read them back. I tear them up and throw them away.

Why? Because, they aren't  sometimes that nice and not meant for the consumption of others. I might be registering anger; contempt; frustration. I could sit in meditation and let them pass through. That would be fine. But sometimes, writing them down very fast and furiously is very freeing.

Once upon a time, if I had these not nice feelings about my husband, on occasion I expressed them. It seemed honest. And, it seemed fair because it was his behaviour that led to those thoughts.

But I came to see that he saw them for what they were: passing through. It didn't alter him or make him do something at all. He dances to his own drum whether I speak my truth or not. So, often I don't bother. I don't need the whole 'fight or flight' circumstance for my body that would ensue.

The man in prison that I write to...I came to see that he is happy to speak his truth and I am a safe place (as safe as you can be knowing someone probably reads all our letters). That's a great honour to me; to be able to be that person for him.

When death might come knocking on your door by way of a court ruling, it really does focus the mind. There's so much less allowing one part of the mind to cover over another part of the mind, so that so many thoughts can't be thought, felt, shared, or heard. I love the honesty of the exchange.

I noticed in the last letter I wrote which I am about to walk up to the Post Office that I responded to his thoughts and at the last moment noted that all was well on my end. I can't imagine anyone really buys such a broad statement but in comparison, of course, of course I am fine. My job is to be fine: to be the vessel in which he pours his thoughts. At least, that's the way I see it.

Here on the blog? Well, I do monitor myself, yes, it's true. You know I have been at times that person who said of someone on the street, 'She would be so much prettier if she were a little thinner.' It's a true thought but one that my family felt I shouldn't say. So, I stopped sharing those thoughts.

In the Johnny Depp trial it was claimed that certain tests can pick up when someone is adjusting answers to make themselves look good. I wouldn't be surprised. Isn't that what we do on a daily basis ourselves?

Personally speaking, I find, more and more, complete honesty so refreshing. Maybe one day, it will be a thing.