Working through it

I had planned for my next post to be something that J requested me to write. Truthfully, I have tried to put that post together, but I am very distracted by what is going on with me and I haven't been able to concentrate enough to comply with His request. I truly appreciated the responses to my last post and those comments (along with Gillette's post) have given me some sense of my current feelings. I am still struggling with putting my thoughts into words, but I am just going to forge ahead and ramble through this. I hope the following makes sense.

I realize the emotional nature of my being lately has a lot to do with the hormonal fluctuations going on inside of me. I also know that this is not abnormal, but it is quite disconcerting. In Gillette's post, she says...

The most exciting piece I discovered is how hormones affect the brain. All the hormones that are dominant in the reproductive period of life are geared toward creating a chemical proclivity for balance and peace. Opioids are released, literally covering up the paths to our memories. These affect the "primitive" brain- the temporal lobe, the amygdyla, the hippocampus...all places of our deep unconscious stuff. We literally put not only our lives, but also our feelings, on hold to create a safe and secure hearth and home for our progeny....even if we don't have any.

When we start our hormonal shifts (whether during PMS, postpartum depression or perimenopause), those hormones are no longer dominant.. Others that trigger the unconscious areas of the brain increase. Fewer opioids mean memories and the subconscious stuff not dealt with in the past are no longer buried. When we are stressed in life, whether from outer shaiza in our lives or simply because we respond intensely to life, a feedback loop ensues: We get stressed...which affects our hormones...which brings us more stress...which affects us even more.

This describes exactly what I am experiencing. I am feeling and having to work through all the trauma from my past that I had buried in my subconscious for so long. For the past three years, J has helped me face unresolved issues from my past. He slowly dismantled the walls I had put in place to protect me. Their protective value had been questionable, but they had allowed me to avoid any intimacy and pain for a long time. I suppose the only thing they had protected me from was myself. Even as my walls came down, the memories of those experiences were pretty muted. I acknowledged what had happened in the past, but specific memories and the emotions surrounding them were fuzzy. More and more memories have surfaced, especially over this past year. Those memories were painful, but it still was as if they had happened to someone else. I could usually think about them objectively and I spent little time reflecting on the actual experience or exploring how I had felt at the time.

Little by little those experiences and those feelings are seeping back into my consciousness. Snippets of recall pop into my mind, flashbacks of moments, specific minutia, mere minutes of a memory. Sometimes there is a trigger, other times a snapshot just appears like a flash from a camera. I have witnessed the progression of my emotions from that time long ago. The hurt, the fear, the betrayal, the anger, the confusion that all culminated in nothingness. I became nothing, I felt nothing. I retreated within myself, if I just condescended it would be over soon. I was numb and compliant. Lay there and let it happen, don't fight, be quiet and he'll be done with you and leave you alone for now. That disassociation outlived the walls I had built. I remembered, but I was still numb. That novocaine is wearing off and I am left feeling prickly and stingy as the pain seeps back in slowly...

I will write more as I am able. This is all I can express for now, it is a difficult process. I am working through it.