When Triggered, we MUST Keep On Keepin’ On.

I don’t say that lightly. I know how hard it is. Two hours ago I was sobbing my eyeballs out, and an hour ago I was still sure that chucking my sites and everything that I have going on (or should I say, what little I have going on) was the only viable way to move forward.

It took a little time, and it took a lot of chewing and asking questions — of myself and of God. But way deep down, I knew that no matter how upset I got, I wasn’t in charge. What happens to me, and the direction I am supposed to go, is all up to GOD, not me. I can try to engineer everything and everybody, and yet God is still the Master In Command, and He will get me where I’m supposed to be, one way or another. (Kicking and screaming, or willingly — it’s up to me!)

Even as I bawled, I had to concede (begrudgingly at first) that this situation was a matter of faith, and harder still, I had to allow my faith to go to God in search of the answer. Oh man, was that hard! … because what if I didn’t like the answer???

God nudged me through the "coincidental" appearance of an email in my inbox just then.

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The Nightmares are back.

My nightly nightmares/night terrors ended September 20, 2008. There was a major life event in my family that occurred, and it was like someone flipped a switch in my head: Nightly Horrow Show = OFF.

It was not fixed by a pill, a ritual, therapy, controlled breathing, visualization, none of that. One of my major external influences changed, and apparently that made the ol’ amygdala calm down a little bit. Or something.

But tonight was night #4 of Nightmares & Disturbing Crap, and dammit, I’ve had enough of it. Nobody’s getting burned up or blown up, but it’s just shy of that. I wake up totally worn out and upset. I sit on the side of my bed trying to manually process them, "it was just a dream, it was just a dream, it isn’t real."

The "not real" part is a tough sell. My brain reallllly thinks…

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We went to The Big City yesterday (a 90-odd mile trek from Boonieville) to meet some internet friends for the first time. They, too, had driven to The Big City – from Boonieburgh :) – and were doing their Big City shopping (Super-Walmart, Sam’s Club, Menards, Home Depot, Fleet Farm, etc.; all the stores we don’t have in the sticks). We needed to do some Big City shopping too, so we met them at a mall.

They were soooo nice. :)

We met in the food court actually (isn’t that where you meet all your internet friends for the first time?! LOL) where I got a pile of Chinese food for $5.46 … I mean like, a mountain of food. It was obscene. And incredibly beautiful. Mom and I picked at the doggone thing for over an hour — and there was still food left over!!

(There are times I seriously miss living in the city — and that was one of those moments… we have zero variety up here. It’s boring little grocery store fare, or "fancy" grocery store fare for $45 + your first-born, or it sucks to be you.)

I then struggled through 2+ hours of shoe shopping. This is the eternal ritual: finding a pair of shoes that fits right. It’s always been like climbing Mt. Rushmore in a straight-jacket. My feet are picky as hell. Now that I have these excellent arch supports from the Good Feet Store, life is better …….. but I soon discovered you can’t just chuck your arch supports in any old shoe and be able to wear it. Some were too wide, some too narrow, some too tight, one rolled outward really badly, several rolled inward really badly … and WTF is with Reebok gluing their insoles in their damn shoes anyway?! Hello?? Dear Reebok: you’ve lost a longtime loyal customer (20+ years!), because you glue in your insoles! Stupid, stupid, stupid. Nobody else glues their insoles in. Just Reebok. Apparently they’re special. *roll eyes* Yeah … special enough to be left on the shelf!

So, given that I lost my hiking boots a few months ago (I think while changing out of my fire gear on the highway ……….. but I don’t know for sure??), I did at least find a pair of mens’ athletic shoes that will sufficiently substitute as hiking shoes. Didn’t find a single pair of womens’ shoes that were workable *roll eyes* but the mens’ shoes were a hit-it-out-of-the-park home run.

So the hunt for everyday shoes continues. *sigh*

I then screwed together all the bits of courage I had as we went to pick up our kitty at the vet. Our dead kitty, who’d been cremated. I was okay ’til we pulled in the parking lot. As we pulled up to the place, exactly 1 hour before the time we’d walked out when he died that night in September, those God-awful feelings all came flooding back. That horrible weekend, that horrible night. The worry, anxiousness, desperation, concern, love for my baby, frustration … and utter suffocating helplessness. The helplessness, that’s what really ripped me up. There wasn’t a single thing we could do to fix him, he just looked up at me with those sweet soul-filled eyes, trusting and loving me, looking to me for answers and security, clinging to me desperately as I held him as close as I could… broken. And I couldn’t fix him. It broke my heart. What do you do with that???? He could not be fixed. He was broken forever. As was my heart.

We had him put to sleep. It was the right thing to do, but an absolutely horrible thing to do. Even though we saved him from massive pain and suffering, I still wrestle with the simple act of taking a life — and a life I loved with all my heart, no less. I know he is happier now (I mean, I know this) but there is something in my soul that rages and reels at taking a life. Taking a life! There is no greater, purer Power that we can see with our own eyes, than life. To kill that life … that core part of me *rebukes* it. Who am I to take such a thing from someone else??? Yes, even an animal. To me, it means no less, it is no less, if it has four legs or two.

He was tucked in a little black-and-white kitty-shaped tin, in a paper bag with ribbons tied to the handle. The bag had been carefully labeled with his name. And tucked inside was a pawprint. A little print of his sweet little paw … a paw I couldn’t have back. A little paw I would never kiss again, or play with, or tickle, or gently touch. A paw that would never reach out to touch my hand again, nor cling to my shoulder for dear life as his eyes implored me to protect and love him forever. Seeing that, that’s when I really came unglued.

It all flooded back so vividly, so wholly, the emotion of it just swallowing me up. We climbed back in the car and I just sat there and cried.

But I held on. Because something I’ve learned the last few weeks, is that I can feel pain, but it won’t kill me. I can hang on and endure it, ride the wave, and push through, and it will in the very least dump me washed-up on some sh*tty abandoned shore somewhere. But it won’t carry me away forever, and it won’t kill me. It does end (or at least ebb), and I then I can crawl up to higher ground and brush myself off.

Sitting in the dark car, the parking lot illuminated by the yellowed glow of a magnesium streetlight, the same scene of that fateful night swirling and awash in my tears, I knew that I had to feel the pain and ride its wave, in order to deal with it. This part of the ride had to be ridden in order to process it and put it to rest. The rational side of me recognized that this was a normal way to feel, and so it was okay to ride it out and feel it for what it was. I didn’t die on the trail. This wouldn’t kill, or even mortally maim me, here in the car. I would be okay.

And I was. It took awhile. We shed our tears, we voiced our regrets, we mopped up our faces with paper towels, took a deep breath and pulled out of the parking lot. We had our boy back. And we brought him home where he belonged. Our baby is back home by his Mamas.

##

Diet, shmiet … I know.*snork*

A month ago my Dad had a heart attack and spent about a week in the hospital. He actually died 3 times. Died. Flat-ass coded. Luckily his mistress was there the one time to do CPR, otherwise he would have been found really dead some unknown time later in the bathroom. (Nice. *roll eyes*)

The best place to sort this unexpected turn of events out was on a trail.

And somewhere out in the woods, sitting on a rock, beneath the bluff, watching the sunshine glitter and sparkle between the green leaves on the trees, I realized … I’m letting life pass me on by. And even worse yet, I’m letting life pass me by WHILE I’M UGLY.

No, no, no, no, no …….. that is not okay with me. It’s bad enough to be mentally semi-broken. But I realized I am putting things in my mouth that are making (or keeping) me fat, and that when I look in the mirror, the girl who looks back at me is UGLY. And I hate that. I HATE that.

So I decided, I was thin and pretty once upon a time. In fact, I don’t even recognize myself in pictures from college *blush* that girl looks nothing like I look today. And I want to be the pretty girl again. I want to be a Trophy Wife! And to become a Trophy Wife ………. I must lose weight.

(Never mind the getting married part. I have a feeling once I fix the things that are broken inside of me, the rest of the outside stuff will fall into place.)

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Today I was following a car with interesting plates, “AK CRAB” … as I am the nation’s absolute #1 fan of Deadliest Catch :) I thought, gosh, maybe it’s Sig! (OK, I knew it wasn’t Sig, but maybe it was someone else? You never know.)

The car turned off in Ellison Bay. Wanting to get a good look at the (crab-fisherman-looking) driver, I knew I would have to go around the block so that our vehicles would meet driver-to-driver, and then I could get a good look at the fellow and see if it was anybody I knew.

This required I drive down The Road past the (now rebuilt) exploded duplex. However, at the chance to see Sig (LOL) or another crab fisherman that I dearly admire, I decided it was worth it. This could be a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Not everybody has “AK CRAB” license plates, you know.

So I turned in at the next road, then turned left on The Road, and approached The Place where the buildings Blew Up. Every time I go through there, I view it through the lens of that night … I see trees standing in the same place they stood That Night …. I see the outdoor fireplace standing where it stood That Night … the road curves exactly like it did That Night … everything is seen through the sights burned in my brain from That Night. I don’t see it free-standing as today; I see it in comparison to That Night.

Anyway.

First I drove past the blown-up building, but I looked at the water and the boats in the harbor instead.

Next came the building next door, the one that the siding melted off of. On the far half of the duplex, a middle-aged man laid out on one of the front porch benches. He was bald, tanned, wearing just swim trunks. And he was just laying there, out on the bench.

My breath caught in my throat. Oh my God! I thought. My eyes were big and I was gaping at this guy. Doesn’t he know the danger? Doesn’t he know how he could get hurt there???

I was floored. Absolutely boggled. How could he just lay there out in the open, in the blast zone? Like nothing was going on? *blink*

Of course, the beach towels and flip-flops on all four front porches suggested that nothing was going on. People were “around” these buildings and apparently they were all blissfully unaware. But I knew what they didn’t know. I knew the danger was real, because I had seen the evidence — I had seen it exploded. For real.

* * *

Still reeling at people just milling around unprotected in the blast zone (un-freakin’-real) I rounded the corner to find Alaska crab fisherman car, and a 30-ish man had gotten out, with a cute little boy in tow. On the other side his very pretty wife was walking with an adorable little girl. I did not recognize the man as anybody from Deadliest Catch. I even tried to envision the fellow in full-length rain gear… still no dice.

Later, at home, it finally dawned on me that that man sunbathing on the porch was so relaxed and unprotected because now, today, in 2008, there is no danger there. It is safe. Nothing is exploded and nothing is going to explode. He could lay out on that bench nearly buck-naked and not worry about getting hit by flying debris, because there is no debris.

However, I have a complete and total disconnect with that concept.

I still feel acute danger — tangible, present, run-for-cover danger. I see the blast zone. I know how building parts can fly and where people would get hit (depending on where they were standing). And I get the hell out of there anytime I am anywhere near it. I’m not stupid. It blew once, I know it could blow again, at any time. With no warning. Just like last time. When it did happen.

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With reasonable trepidation, I started Wellbutrin XL 150 mg daily per my Doc’s instructions to treat depression, which in turn will, of course, lessen some of my PTSD symptoms as well (as they do seem to go hand-in-hand, especially in terms of thought processes).

I’m already taking Paxil 20 mg/day and Metoprolol 25 mg/day. The metoprolol is probably going to be increased to 50 mg/day due to my increased weight… and hopefully will be decreased again as I lose weight. But that’s another topic entirely. ;)

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