by Band Back Together | Jul 6, 2016 | Fear, Grandparent Loss, Grief, Loss |
I feel like I’m losing everyone I ever loved.
Who could be next?
My mother and I don’t understand.
Now, it’s my grandmother.
Nana.
I’m 10, and in New York.
My grandmother (on my mom’s side), lived in Florida. She lived a long life. I don’t know how old Nana was, but my mom is almost 50.
My mom is a nurse, and she would always check on Nana, over the phone.
One day, she received a phone call – a bad one. Nana had been sent to the Emergency Room, and was sick. My mom was stressing out the entire day, trying to find out what happened.
That night, my grandmother passed away.
My grandfather (on my mom’s side) had already passed away years ago.
In the morning, my mom told me Nana was dead, so I didn’t go to school. She later explained how she had died.
I don’t get life. Everything is falling from my feet. I want her back. I want everything back. I’m scared of what will come next.
By-WeWillBand
by Band Back Together | Jun 17, 2016 | Adult Children of Mentally Ill Parents, Fear, Grief, Loneliness, Self Loathing, Therapy, Trauma, Trust |
Reading other’s posts has been full of horror for me. I remember, I remember. I was a teenager feeling the full despair and desperation, of loneliness and self-loathing. I feel it still sometimes, and I have patched myself together as best I can.
My parents still say things they don’t realize are so hurtful, but I am gradually learning to see it. I know I don’t have to react or justify my actions to them, because I am finally accepting that it is their sad way of getting attention. The hysterical thing is, if I can stop from responding, stop saying, “But that isn’t true!” arguing my point, it stops. I change the subject or say nothing – telling myself I know what the truth is, and that is all that is important. I feel sorry they don’t see this, but it is not my job to be their therapist. It is not my job to make them over into what I want them to be – because that is an impossible task.
I have accepted that they will never be the nurturing, trustworthy parents I wanted them to be. They have never been, and looking hard at the evidence, there appears to be zero evidence that they ever will. My expectations and dreams of what “could have been” have created such misery in my life. What a liberation to see it! And so terribly sad – I grieved a lot about that. But letting that mirage go has brought a lot of peace, too.
I can enjoy many good things about them. And, if they ever become what I dreamed of, it will be a surprise and a gift, not a constant let down that they don’t. It is only my job to set boundaries on how much I will let happen before I leave or end the conversation. And, I have more and more friends who sometimes teach me about life – like a good mother or father would, and that’s what I so need.
My inner critic will always be there, repeating awful messages. But I can add good ones, screaming them out if necessary in the bad times, and I can teach myself to recognize those evil words for what they are. My parents loved me as best they could, but their love was twisted and mixed with their own blindness. Maybe their parents’ blindness as well – as they say in Al-anon, it’s the gift that keeps on giving. I know now, the awful things they do to me, were done to them, and they likely do to themselves as well.
Lately those nights I call the screams and knives (figuratively) where I cannot see how I am worthy for anything, I am starting to ask myself if the story line isn’t a bit seductive. Is it a grand play and I am the star? Oh, the horror of my self-loathing and awfulness. In this, I see I am getting the rapt attention I so want. The drama! The tears being ripped from the bottom of my soul! But really, do I need attention in this form? When I’m in the pit, I’m learning to ask, how is today so different from yesterday, when I had hope or felt good? The answer is always outside events that have given the critic in my mind more ammunition to say, “See you did it again, you will never be able to change.” Nothing about my inner me has changed otherwise. I might feel like life is not worth living and things will never change, but reality is that everything else in the universe changes. I am still the tender soul that lived in this body yesterday, and will be tomorrow.
Though at times I might feel hopeless, I will never take my life now because I am starting to trust that I am not alone. I am not the base and evil things my mind sucks me into thinking. I can step back from the story and know that no matter how awful I feel, it isn’t real. It’s like having a bad cold. It will pass. I am a good person, I just have to rewrite the tapes – like the playlist where you’ve gotten tired of a certain song. I put in good, and when I’m ready and willing, ask for the old to be taken out, or let it go.
We are already lovable and whole as we are. Perfect if we can only let ourselves see it. I am beginning to see how that might be possible; we can change how we act, but it’s about training the self-critic, not doing things to be more worthy.
by Band Back Together | Jun 15, 2016 | Anger, Breast Cancer, Cancer and Neoplasia, Cancer Survivor, Coping With Cancer, Depression, Faith, Fear, Guilt, Mastectomy, Stress, Trauma |
Have you ever been swimming in the ocean and wondered what was lurking underneath you…eying your body…sizing you up to see if you would make a tasty meal? That’s what I call the breast cancer “shark attack syndrome.”
I liken the physical and psychological impact of a double mastectomy to a shark attack. It happens quickly and violently. In a matter of minutes you are struck hard and parts of your body are carried away into a vast ocean by a predator much bigger than you. It isn’t personal. The attack is random. You are left alive but amputated–stunned and with a life long fear of the water.
People who know about my diagnosis gawked at my chest like an accident scene on the freeway. Family, friends…they can’t help themselves from looking. I chose not to have reconstruction due to the lengthy recovery…an infant and a toddler don’t lend themselves to extensive plastic surgery. My daughter was 8 months old and my son was 3 years when I had the surgery, not exactly the age where I could be out of commission.
I don’t wear the prosthetics I bought…they constantly remind me I am amputated, and the first time I took yoga one of them fell out! My beloved yoga teacher said, “Just take them out, honey.” I never looked back.
Rough Waters
The journey through a breast cancer diagnosis with two small children was so very hard. I searched for the words to tell my son…
”The Doctor found a lump in mommy’s breast that isn’t good for her body and he has to take it out.”
Thanks to my son’s school and my amazing husband, we got him through it…but he STILL talks about it and recently asked, “Mommy, why don’t you have boobies?” At that point I realized my beautiful daughter would grow up never knowing her mother’s body to look “normal.” She only knows the scars. That is the day my heart broke forever. As if depression didn’t make me feel inadequate enough, now I felt like a carnie act. Come on down and meet the lady who was attacked by sharks!
I will never truly recover from knowing what I look like and what I represent to my children. But I am here to be their mom and truly thankful. Thank god I had it checked. The mammogram showed no abnormalities! If I had just had the mammogram I would have faced a diagnosis of invasive cancer and perhaps required chemotherapy or radiation. As of now, they tell me I am “cured.”
And I found it myself.
Not a minute in the day goes by that I don’t worry that it will return and take me from my children. Every woman who has had breast cancer knows exactly what I’m talking about. Every cold, every headache, every stiff muscle, still scares me into thinking I am still out there in that ocean—defenseless to another shark attack. What part of my body will they take next time?
I saw my mother lose her breast early in life. The same month I was diagnosed, she was diagnosed with Stage IV colo-rectal cancer. I watched the sharks circle her for six years, taking feet of colon, and eventually her life.
But it isn’t a pity party. I am glad I got cancer. It was a hell of a lot easier to deal with than postpartum depression, than life-long depression, than the cancer that is depression. And it got me immediately in touch with impermanence, and subsequently, my spiritual practice.
If I were thrown back into the dark ocean again and a recurrence reared it’s ugly head, I have my faith to thank for curing me of my fear of sharks.
by Band Back Together | Jun 14, 2016 | Coping With Depression, Depression, Fear, Mental Health, Self Loathing, Shame, Therapy |
Well, Bandmates, this is the day. I have an appointment with my general practitioner. I will refuse to leave until I have a path forward and an appointment with a psychiatrist or counselor.
This is it.
If I don’t do anything, I know the outcome will be tragic.
It’s not a matter of willpower any more. I’ve used all that up. The only thing that’s keeping me even slightly together lately is the thought of how much my kiddos would hurt if I killed myself. I am exhausted and at the last shreds of my willpower. This pain I have carried for my whole damned life is destroying me.
I must say that I’m very nervous. I don’t know what is going to happen, but I’m going to spill my guts. I feel shame at the prospect of sharing this pain I have in a non-anonymous setting. I feel shame that this disease has wrecked my life. I am scared to death that I will wreck my kids if I don’t get this shit handled. I am horrified at the state of my life, the feeling that I am capable of so much, yet do so little with my time.
I’m fucking smart. I’m handsome in a kinda scruffy way. I have a decent enough job. But I feel that I am unworthy of anything enjoyable. I’m done ignoring the phone calls from my friends. They’re coming fewer and further between. I’m done procrastinating. I’ve sat here for more than five months, losing more and more of what I have come to cherish. Time with my kids, friends, art and music. I haven’t touched my bass guitar in months. It’s got to the point that I don’t even like to hear music any more, and I have been a musician/singer for most of my life.
I can only write a few paragraphs at a time before these damned hopeless feelings overcome me and cloud my imagination. Even my favorite time-sink of video games has become something I simply don’t enjoy anymore. My only friends are my pets, workmates, my computer, and Netflix. The first thought in my head whenever I wake, be it at a normal time, or at some odd hour of the night, is I hate my life, I hate myself.
Today is the day that enough is enough.
Please, if you feel like I do, get help now! Don’t wait until your life is left in ruin because of a disease. Don’t let your mind tell you that your problems are due to your own failures, that somehow you’re a weak person. That is the disease talking. Every lie this disease tells you has a grain of truth in it. That’s how you come to believe all the negative nonsense. We don’t try hard enough because the disease keeps us from doing so, but the disease doesn’t ever take the blame for keeping our reserves of willpower so low. If you’re at the end of your rope, there’s nothing left but to either give up or try to get the help you need. This disease is going to tell you so many half-truths that you really don’t know what the truth is anymore. That’s why you need to get a helping hand. Please, don’t let the disease hold you back.
by Band Back Together | Jun 8, 2016 | Fear, Help With Relationships, Love |
I know he loves me. He’s told me that plenty of times. But this past winter, when he was having a really hard time in his life, I pushed him too hard. I asked him for too much. He wasn’t ready for it then.
I wasn’t in the best place either, and I pressured much more than I should have because of it. I wanted him, like he’d wanted me all those years I had him firmly stuck in the Friend Zone. I wasn’t shy about telling him what I wanted for us. I thought it would make him feel better.
Instead, it made it all worse.
First, he unfriended me on facebook.
Then he sent me that horrible email, telling me that we’re never going to be together.
And then he got himself a new girlfriend.
I’ve come to realize that for all of my pushing, I’m really not ready for us to be more than just friends right now. I want to date other people and play and explore my new area. I think he should date, too. It’s good for him. In a year or two, maybe we can be more – like we’ve both wanted for a long time.
But I’m going to see him, in just a few weeks. I’m traveling hundreds of miles to go home for a week. We always used to surprise each other – showing up without warning, just to make each other smile. I’m going to attempt it.
Part of me is really confident that he’s going to be thrilled to see me. He’s had a few months to cool off. I’ve quit pushing. I tell myself, “He loved me for more than 20 years, he’s not going to just stop. He still loves me. He still wants me.”
However…
I’m terrified that he really meant it when he said we’ll never be a couple. I’m scared to death that when I see him, he’ll still be so mad at me that he’ll laugh in my face. What if I’m wrong, and he really has written me out of his life for good?
The thing is, with him? It’s worth trying to find out. He’s worth everything. I love him more than anyone else in the world.
I just wish I’d seen it sooner.
by Band Back Together | Jun 3, 2016 | Date/Acquaintance Rape, Fear, Guilt, Healing From A Rape or Sexual Asault, Rape/Sexual Assault |
I was date raped by two men eighteen years ago, while visiting a friend at college. I never thought of it as rape since I was drunk. I didn’t say no or resist. I was in and out of consciousness, until I finally passed out. I finally woke up to it still going on. I was very sexual after that and slept with anyone who wanted it, even if I didn’t.
A few years after that I was coerced into sex by a friend of a friend. I was alone with him at my apartment. I think he had driven me home from my friend’s house, but I don’t remember. I wasn’t drinking, and it was the afternoon. He was pressuring me to have sex and would not take no for an answer. I was afraid he would be violent if I kept resisting, so I eventually asked him if he would leave if I had sex with him. He said yes. I just laid there like I was dead, while he had sex with me.
I never considered myself a victim, or thought of either of these events as rape.
I always blamed myself and thought of them as my own fault for being stupid and easy. I am married and much older now, and in the past few weeks these incidents came back in my memory. I am now thinking of them as rape and starting to be very upset. How can this be affecting me eighteen years later?
