Meltdown

It's been a highly charged, emotional week...and it's only Wednesday. Yikes! Monday, chaotic events happened one after another, and I had a meltdown. In my own words: a Meltdown is when the stress level is high, emotions rage and are pretty much out-of-control. In my case, I couldn't stop crying and shaking.
 I rarely meltdown these days...maybe once every three to six months. Thankfully, serendipitously, I had a therapy appointment on meltdown Monday. I was able to vent, blab and weep out all the distress and emerge rather put together and fresh.
  One of the insights I talked about was my dreaded mother. For some reason, I hadn't really realized how much she hurt me, physically and mentally. Mother was profoundly ashamed of the poverty we lived in. She coerced me to lie on a regular basis. As an Aspie, few things are more difficult and morally painful than lying. It's like...I felt I was a bad person for lying all the time...but I only did it because I was a child forced to. I had to lie to bill collectors on the phone, "No, she isn't home now. The checks in the mail. The money was sent last week."

 I had to lie about bruises, scratches and any physical injury on myself or my siblings to coverup the physical abuse...."oh, he fell fown the stairs or tripped on the sidewalk or fought with his sister." My scratches and bruises were not from my mom or dad, they were from the dog or from falling off my bike." I could bore you and on and on, but methinks you get the idea.
 Because of all these untruths...I felt I was a bad person. I finally realized that I had been coerced into deception. I had to forgive myself for feeling so bad about something completely out of my hands. Whew...it was a big load off my psyche.
  Then my car broke down and had to be towed away. Double Yikes! If there is one situation in which I am guaranteed to have moderate to severe distress and panic, it's when I'm without my vehicle. Like some Aspies, my possessions are extensions of myself. I am very attached to things which are mine. The more often I use said possession, object...the more alarm when it is not there.

 My SUV, Lady Abigail, is a beautiful, large part of my life. She's kinda like a verygoodfriend who doesn't talk back. So when I pulled into my garage and saw smoke and smelled burning rubber I was furiously upset. Even worse was witnessing her being cranked onto the flatbed tow truck and seeing her carted away. Like all other times this has happened to my vehicles, I panicked and wept inside. I was lost and without my legs.
 Luckily, I was bestowed with a loaner car from my good buddy, so I could get to therapy for consolation and debriefing:) That was Wonderous. And seeing Therapist definitely helped things calm.

  One other item, she and I touched on...I'm a people pleaser and it's hard for me to even acknowledge that I secretly harbor "negative" emotions like anger, jealousy or envy. See, because I thought them "bad", I just bundled them up and hid them in my personal toxic waste holding tank, lest they leek out and I think myself a bad person...or, worse yet, others on the outside might discover my human side. But...I really do feel or have felt all types of emotion. Instead of continuing to bottle them all up...I started acknowledging and talking about them. :) Somehow this is a good thing.
  I still await a call from the neurosurgeon, I really can't use my arms much anymore. If I lift anything over a couple pounds, I get neck pain and spasms. I've been coming to terms with my diminished functionality in fitful, crabby rages amid subtle acknowledgment of my physical reality. It is what it is. Surgery may very well be in my near future as I really miss doing things with my hands and arms. I'm forced to walk around and remind myself to just keep my hads in my pockets, lest I reach out to pick something up and aggravate my pain.
 Anyway....whooosh, that's a bit of what's been happening in my world.
Be well:)