Dudes! This is what a person with their nervous system in overdrive looks like. Yesterday’s picture was that too.

So… How the fuck did I get here?

Remember my yesterday’s little ole blog about silence? As they say in the healing world??? It was the perfect container for all my long held terror and trauma to unleash after I wrote “Monster?” And even though I’m back to Montana’s Biggest city of Billings? It’s still alive and well in my system. This makes sense since I’ve been long stockpiling that shit well more than we all did toilet paper during the lockdowns.

I was honestly so beside myself with these intense emotions that sleeping was next to impossible where I was housesitting. It didn’t help that the make dog in my care was anxious about the girl dogs in heat nearby. He also missed his mama like hell. It was like the perfect storm meets a big flaming dumpster fire.

And even though some paranoia has started to show up in the mix? I’m grateful to let my body simple feel what it’s been keeping in check for so long. And of course? I found the solution to help with my sleep the last night there. Sure. I had done some dancing to discharge energy. But I didn’t want to walk too far cuz I didn’t want to get lost in the middle of nowhere.

I digress.

After a little baked chicken? I did Mama Gena suggests in her book Puss: I cupped it and slowed my breathing. Nothing performative. Simply just grounding. As a sexual assault survivor, I felt safe doing that cuz it grounded me in the present. Yup. I was able to feel my body instead of go to where my mind wanted to go. My body soon relaxed. Some sleep followed after. I felt completely energized upon waking up.

This is sort of a girl power version of EDMR. If you’ve never heard this term, it’s a type of therapy that works with eye movement while people revisit old trauma memories. It allows folks to be aware of their present instead of letting their mind have them time travel to the past.

An even simpler trauma tool? Look for all the doors in the room when you enter it. This lets you know that you can leave whenever you want. Total gamechanger when I learned that tool.

Cuz it comes down to this very important thing? As much as your mind thinks it’s protecting you when it hijacks you away from your body sensations, it’s letting fear win the day. That fear also makes it that much harder to go back into your whole body until you wander around like what I saw at the store today:

Yes. I quote my ex-husband Richard cuz his observation is accurate: People were walking around like they don’t have a job. It’s like folks are so checked out that they’re numb. Absolutely. Folks running like maniacs can also be triggered like hell too. But that’s not as prevalent as the checked out.

Yes. Sister Heidi. I’m going to talk about a plan for a minute except it makes sense here…

You know that I’ve been talking about my soon to be microbudget 3 WISHES about a woman gets a fairy godmother grant her three wishes in the psych ward? Well? This experience with silence is a game changer for that story. How so? I’m digging into Montana mental health issues. See… A psychiatrist in Missoula didn’t know if he should out medical malpractice insurance when he retired. Why? There was no one to take over his 400 patient workload. A local psychiatrist killed himself a while ago. We also have hundreds of miles if not more of where they have no mental health services. That’s a wonderful thing about things like Zoom: you can reach people in the middle of nowhere.

And now with my lived experience of deafening silence in Podunk USA? I can give so much humanity to my characters. It’s such a blessing. Yes. That’s honestly how I feel about all my experiences of every stripe. Sure. You may think that’s strange about the horrible and hard. Dude! They helped me build my spine one piece at a time. And for that? I’ll forever be grateful.

And like I said to Heidi this morning in our conversation:

Why yes! I was even cheerful in Hell.

Cuz folks may slow me even for longer than a moment…

Gotta get some rest too.

But ultimately?

I let all those tough times break open my heart to let it keep growing bigger and bigger.

Okay. Enough with the cheese.

I gotta walk before the sun goes down.

And yup. That four mile walk hit the spot. Sleep will be good tonight.

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