Bring it on world 2

April 13, 2010

I mentioned feeling invincible, it happened.

I went on living, kept breathing. I didn’t crack up and quit. With that came a sense of wonder, a sense of boundlessness.

It wasn’t like having super-powers but I did have an unusual sense of safe.

I was working in Tampa, Florida as hurricane Charley approached. There were warnings and mounting concern, the almost 400,00 people in the area were advised to evacuate. I decided to stay. I envisioned standing by the quay, leaning towards the sky, lashed by wind and rain. Defiant.

First the office closed and everyone was required to go home. I thought I could ride out the storm in my hotel. The hotel closed, I had to check out. By the time I arrived at the airport there were actions afoot to close that too. So much for pitting my self against the elements.

I made arrangements and brought my flight across the country to Portland forward a few days. The airport was crowded and filled with nervous energy. I was bemused, feeling cosseted from the building threat. It was odd to feel so removed.

I think that facing down the wind would have been and expression of the anger I hadn’t felt thus far. Good old stage 2 of grieving full of anger and resentment could have manifested, except that I had to leave town.

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Bring it on world…

April 10, 2010

There is a phenomena when you go through something big, traumatic, or devastating that as things start to normalise, in the aftermath, you feel invincible.

Well, to be honest, it is not quite a phenomena, I have a sample population of one; me.

In the early days of grieving Suz, a friend and colleague, came to visit. Suz was a welcome visitor, she didn’t look to me for direction or conversation. She told me stories of the office and the things I hadn’t missed. She made us a cup of tea. She broke my teapot.

She was horrified, she had come to make things a little better not break something.

I assured her it was just a teapot, things were easy for me to put into perspective. A teapot would hardly be missed. She eventually laughed at the situation and told me that with what I had been through, nothing else would ever be as bad.

Suz suggested I could shake my fists at the sky and defy the world to bring it on…

I loved the idea, I identified with the brazenness of daring the world to hit me again. I did feel invincible, or at least audacious. That’s when I first knew I was going to get through. My own realisation, my own phenomena.

Bring it on world…

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Third time lucky

April 5, 2010

Goldilocks found something just right on her third attempts, the porridge, the chair, the bed. For Goldilocks, and in general, it’s good practice to try, try again and not give up.

My first two experiences with counselling were setbacks that served to make me more determined to find a counsellor I could work with. Perseverance paid off, and thanks to the recommendation of a friend of a friend, I went to see Hardt. A psychologist.

Her dark office offered refuge, and I sheltered there, weathering the storm of emotion the tide of tears. Talking and listening, being allowed to be normal, whatever shade of normal I chose to wear on any particular day.

Counselling allowed me rebuild a relationship with Mottsu and with myself.

I don’t know how often I saw Hardt, many, many, times until things felt sort of wrapped up and settled. Well not done exactly, but the sessions stopped when I felt we had travelled as far as there was to go together, a natural close.

Hardt was fabulous, counsellor-like, and supportive, she helped me to normalise my grief experiences. There was more for me to do, more to discover, more therapy to come. I had yet to encounter Process Work and the process work community.

I was third time lucky, whole but still incomplete. The fourth time around was discovering process oriented psychology , a framework for finding and aligning to your deepest nature. Process work is described as an awareness practice and it did expand my awareness in many ways and particularly about myself. Personal development, I guess.

While I highly recommend counselling I doubly, quadrupley, recommend Process Work counsellors and practitioners to locate solutions for psychological challenges, for understanding your deepest nature, and helping you to appreciate yourself as you are, and for just who you are.

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Counselling – strike two

April 3, 2010

Baz rang me a week after our session to recommend another counsellor in his practice. I had asked him to recommend an alternative, I’m glad he followed through.

I follow through myself and make an appointment. On the day I take a deep breath as I enter the office, hoping that this experience will be good for me.

It starts well when this counsellor, Abby, gets my name right. That feeling doesn’t last long and Abby asks me if there is anything I would like to know about her. I am surprised by the question, isn’t this supposed to be about me? I feel unprepared for counselling, I’m not in the flow and feeling edgy. No questions for her come to mind and I feel there should be questions to ask. I wonder if I am too self centred.

I don’t have to worry for long as Abby begins telling me her background and qualification, detailing her employment history.

I am surprised into silence, unsure of what to say and feeling it might be irrelevant to run through my own CV.

Abby leads the conversation explaining how grief come in waves and how it can be triggered, almost inexplicably, by unexpected things. I nod, dumbfounded, I already know this. It is not new information.

Abby rabbits on about grief experiences and I listen not knowing what else to do. Finally, and thankfully, she wraps up the session telling me I am numb. Apparently I am too numb for counselling and she suggests I contact her in a few weeks when I am feeling ‘better’. Numb I may be, but her advice makes little sense. Wouldn’t numb be something a counsellor could help with. I decide on the spot that I won’t be contacting Abby again, I thank her and leave.

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First try at counselling

April 1, 2010

With some trepidation I turned up for my appointment for grief counselling. Our meeting didn’t go well from the outset.

Baz had been counselling people in Mottsu’s workplace, since Mottsu’s death, he is familiar with the case. When we meet Baz gets my name wrong and can’t recall Mottsu’s name. He puts me off-side in the first two minutes, from there it gets steadily worse.

Baz reads a poem aloud, it is one I chose to include in the funeral service, I can’t help but wonder where this is leading. I find myself holding back, defensive, waiting to see what he’ll do next, the ensuing silence seems to make him nervous so he starts talking.

He explains the conscious and subconscious mind, inexplicably, writing those terms on a white-board. I watch…

Baz related the story of a young girl on a family picnic, she chased a ball into some low grass where she saw a snake. He said that she picked up the ball and carried it to the car. After putting the ball into the car her arm was caught in the door, which (as Baz told it) left her scared of snakes. Even today I am unsure of the point of the story, because he didn’t say.

It sounded like a stupid story with no relevance to my situation. I did try to mull over possible links as he rambled on.

Next, in my counselling session, Baz related the story of a man working in a manufacturing plant who lost his arm in an accident involving industrial machinery. On the anniversary of the dismemberment, apparently, the man would experience the sensation of a whole arm. Again, the connection to my own situation was not obvious to discern and being unsure of what to say I just nodded and stayed silent.

Baz hurried on to another story, this time about a man who was mugged at a Melbourne train station car park. The man was so shaken by the experience of being beaten and robbed he was unable to return to the car park. Baz had helped him by slowly bringing the man closer and closer to the site of the crime. First a few blocks away then, the next week, a little closer until they stood together, somehow triumphant, at having returned to the site.

Irreverently, I wondered if the consultation wan’t working, as I wanted to laugh. It wasn’t mirth, it would have been an expression of disbelief and despair. If this was professional care I might never recover.

After about an hour there was a temporary lull in Baz’s dissertation, but not before he informed me that expressing my grief would be important.

If only I could get a word in…

I had been expressing my grief at home and in the streets, my pillow wet with expressions of tears. This might have been the first dry eyed hour I’d lived through since Mottsu’s death.

I had to tell Baz how I was feeling and let him gently know that I wouldn’t be returning. I told him that he may have made some assumptions or drawn some conclusions about how articulate I was, or wasn’t, based on the little I had said during the session.

I informed Baz that I had failed to establish a rapport with him and that it might be better for me to see another counsellor. Strike one.

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The real me

March 22, 2010

An email I received today from an executive coach was signed with a quote at the bottom:

“Seek out that particular mental attribute which makes you feel most deeply and vitally alive, along with which comes the inner voice which says, ‘This is the real me,’ and when you have found that attitude, follow it.” William James

Its in the the same vein as Joseph Campbell’s questions about finding what works for us as individuals.

Easier said than done and its worth searching for those things that allow you to be really you – I mean allow me to be as much really me as I can be. You do need to find you first. I’m working on that part: I am finding me, so far so good… (admittedly I am a little lost at times).

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What would lead you to not crack up and quit?

March 21, 2010

It was 21 May 2006, I was returning to Melbourne after the City to Casino run, flight QF1012 and sitting in 4C. I still have the boarding pass it has been preserved between the pages of the book I read on that flight.

Joseph Campbell’s Pathways to Bliss: Mythology and Personal Transformation.

“You might ask yourself the question: if I were confronted with a situation of total disaster, if everything I loved and thought I lived for were devastated, what would I live for? If I were to come home and find my family murdered, my house burned up, or my career wiped out by some disaster or another, what would sustain me? We read about these thing every day and we think, well that only happens to other people. But what if it happened to me? What would lead me to know that I could go on living and not just crack up and quit?

…In our day, however, there is great confusion. We’re thrown back on ourselves and we have to find that thing which, in truth, works for us as individuals. Now how does one do this?” (p. 88)

There are some big questions asked in that passage. I was finding my feet, clad in running shoes. I was up and running, my direction was not so clear, but becoming clearer. There was no set destination. Importantly/amazingly/defiantly I had gone on living, I hadn’t cracked up and quit, it had almost happened while on auto-pilot, without thinking about what next…

I did sit around for a while hoping to be wakened from a nightmare, or to be rescued. That evening Campbell’s words resonated, I realised the importance of finding what worked for me as an individual. It was two years and two months since Mottsu’s death, that’s how long it took before starting to emerge from mourning.

That was me, it will be different for you.

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Crossing the line

March 18, 2010

I did the run, finished and crossed the line. The course has a slight downhill gradient for most of the way, fabulous. The feelings that crossed the line with me were extraordinary, I was exultant with achievement and enjoyment, and at the same time depleted by loneliness. The person I wanted to tell was Mottsu, he would hardly have believed I had started running, let alone this achievement. I missed him and his support. I cried, tears didn’t show against the sweat.

I was doing better than surviving, but each mini-triumph made me as sad as I was joyous. Each was a reminder of my changed status.

I recall my friend Hero asking what running meant to me. I had to think, running sort of evolved, almost unintentionally. Running gave me strength, it gave me confidence that could escape should I ever need to. Running helped me to feel physically fabulous, coping and advancing.

Running, or physical exercise in general, is recommend for people with depression or anxiety.

BeyondBlue is one of many sites that report: “Research shows that regular physical activity significantly reduces the risk of people developing depression. People who do not take part in physical activity are more likely to have depressive symptoms compared to people who exercised regularly.”

Running is one way you can look after yourself. Running can lift my mood with surges of feeling able and exceptional. The other welcome side effect is sound sleep.

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