Sleep is a moody evasive bipolar beast

Sometimes sleep is beautiful, adventurous, and sweet. When you wake from this sleep you feel well rested, energetic, and ready for adventure. 

Other times sleep is dark, frightening, sad, and full of anger. This kind of sleep leaves you exhausted, disconnected, agitated, and tense. 

Tuesday night was riddled with nightmares. Last night a few drinks and some meds got me through the fear of going to sleep. I can't say I had a nightmare free night, (because I remember nothing) but I can say I'm on day 4 of anxiety. What's really frustrating is that I don't know what triggered all of this. 

Frustrating and exhausted. How am I to function?

PTSD Feelings

Terror is being woken from a deep sleep to the sound of footsteps outside your door, the nob slowly turning and being completely paralyzed and unable to move or scream before your perpetrator enters your room.

Helplessness is the feeling that  you can't control your environment to keep your children safe. Danger lurks in the form of grandparents, friends, family members, cars, school, sports, cub scouts... everywhere.

Chaos is feeling like every cell in your body is flying around under your skin like a mass of frenzied hornets. Terror, Helplessness, Anger, Fear, Sadness, and Mourning all scrambling around inside you uncontrollably with no way to make it stop. 

Shame makes you feel like you could unzip your skin and scrub your body with an SOS pad soaked in bleach... over and over and over again for hours and sometimes days.

Relief feels like pain. Physical pain is refreshing compared to mental pain. The pain of excessive weight lifting, running until your lungs feel like they will explode, biting your lip.... anything to make the Terror, Helplessness, Chaos, and Shame stop.

Numbness feels ambiguous. It's neither good or bad, sad or mad, angry or calm. Numbness is that place in the mind where one can go when over whelmed by the above emotions. Numbness is dangerous though, because when you feel nothing. You care for nothing. You hate nothing. You love nothing. Nothing is the black hole of emotions, because emotions are what make us human. 

A Moment of Hell AKA Triggered

Last night I discovered a new trigger. As anyone with PTSD can attest triggers are evil unconscious little buggers that fuck you up and ruin your day.

Last night I came home really late. A friend had been out of town taking care of her dying grandmother. I went grocery shopping for her after work then stayed and talked. When I got home about 9:30 pm everyone was already in bed. I sat next to the fire trying to relax and relieve my headache from hell when Duke the dog sat next to me.

Duke is a border collie and VERY smart. He's also very sensitive. When I cry he sits on me. Duke must have sensed my headache, he licked my left year.

I was instantly set off. The skin on my face crawled. I grabbed my face and rubbed it. The muscles in my face had that stomach dropping roller coaster ride feeling and it moved across my face. I started to claw my face at this point. I welcomed pain at that moment. Except for my hands clawing my face I couldn't move. I couldn't talk. I was frozen in Hell.

Desperate I racked my brain for anything to make it stop. I remembered a technique to help, so I started to alternate patting my shoulders like I had been taught. Eventually I calmed down.

I hate triggers. It's instant Hell combined with a mind fuck. I don't even know all my triggers, which makes it even worse because I can't avoid what I'm unaware of.

At this point I have to wonder... What would life be like without triggers?

I hope to answer that someday.

Riddle Me This....

I had a nightmare last night. I woke up in a pool of sweat two hours after I'd climbed in bed. I've been taking half a Xanax to sleep. I've tried over the counter stuff and the hangover is too much. So I tried not to take any sleeping aids, when I finally got to sleep I slid right back into the lucid dreams.

I'm weary of drugs. It seems to me doctors hand them out in shopping bags. I have a long family history of addiction. I have a fear of becoming addicted, but I need to function too. I feel like taking meds is a weakness when I want to be strong.

I'm frustrated because there is no one qualified to treat PTSD in my area.... Unless I'm a Veteran, which I'm not.

I keep hearing, "Get over it." "Move on." Oh, how I'd love to people. I really would, but riddle me this, how to you "Get Over It" when your body and your unconscious will not allow you to move on?

When someone has the answer to THAT then we'll talk. Until then SHUT UP!

Panic Attack on a Tuesday

This morning when I walked into the garage to warm up my car, something caught the corner of my eye. I froze, scanning the garage when I saw what appeared to be a person crouched down looking through a box. Every muscle in my body flexed tight. I stopped breathing. My muscles went numb and vibrated all at the same time.

Then, as if a magician had waved his cloak, the truth was revealed. It wasn't a man, but a brown tarp covering I don't know what.

My heart continued to beat rapidly. My breath ragged, as if I'd been running uphill. My back tingly, because I didn't know who might be behind me.

As I drove down my street, that's when I knew I was in a full blown panic attack. My skin continued to vibrate. My vision was unfocused. I drove to work on muscle memory, my brain had checked out before I even left the house.

I couldn't decide if I wanted to beat something, cry, or both. That's when I felt the last strings of sanity slipping. I pulled over and took a half of Xanax.

Taking Xanax seems like a failure. It feels like I gave up. I know I could have eventually pulled it together, but when? Today? Tomorrow? Next week? I don't have the time to be crazy right now. My desk is full at work, I have to help my Beloved's with school work, and everyday life.

Even though I feel like a failure, I should have seen it coming. My insomnia is back. I've been having lucid dreams compounding my crazy. I've been having a new kind of panic attacks. My therapist isn't sure what to do with me because this isn't her field. That's right, I'm too crazy for my head doctor.

The Xanax has kicked in. My limbs feel heavy. My eyes want to close, but my skin is still crawling annnnd I have 8.5 hours before I can go home.

Awesome.

The Crazies

I have a case of the crazies. I'm not sleeping. When I am I'm not reaching REM sleep, instead I dreaming lucid dreams that are so real I swear they're really happening. For example I fell asleep one Saturday in my recliner. I would swear on a Bible I woke up and my husband made me a tuna fish sandwich..... Only it never happened.
I'm easily startled and my brain bum rushes the crazy train constantly playing through scenarios and tactics of What If....
My counselor swears I'm not crazy, but the anxiety attacks aren't helping. One was so bad, Xanax didn't even stop it.
Why is this happening?
What is the purpose?
All I know for sure is, I'm exhausted, amped up, and tired of feeling crazy.

What Is A Hero?

I read an article the other day that quoted Michael Jordan, before his father was murdered as proclaiming his parents his heroes. What was my first thought?

My parent's aren't my heroes. It is because of their actions or the lack of that I have PTS.

What are the qualities of a hero? Will I ever be my children's hero? I want to be.