I saw my massage therapist on Sunday.
I went because I needed comfort, my body felt adrift. I wondered if my medication was lagging, as the sensation felt a little like a depression spike.
I wasn't entirely shocked. I expected that the laser beam focus that got me through the dissertation would crumble and the exhaustion and fear would sweep over me; a tidal wave that had been straining to breach my levies. I was prepared for that.
Yet, it stretched on past week two, into week three. I was snarling and snappish needing no excuse to open my jaws and clamp down on the nearest throat.
I felt lost. Alone on a sea on which I was repeatedly throwing my tow rope into the vast dark water, hoping for it to catch on anything. Exhausting my arms with pulling the rope back, only to futilely cast it out again.
As Sandra put her hands on me, she found the spot deep in my lower back. There was another at the bottom of my shoulder blade, equally sore.
"So tight, my god Dawn. What is this?"
I knew what it was. I always know what it is.
"I don't want to move. Which isn't really true. These years have not been happy ones. I don't Love the place, but I set down roots and then resist pulling them up, even when the roots are in toxic soil. I resist so fiercely that I hurt myself, even as I logically know that it is for the best, that moving is better..."
I trail off, the pain is brutal as my body refuses to release.
"I guard the castle even as it falls down. Even after everyone else leaves, I still remain."
I don't love this personality trait. It has never served me well and I end up brutalized at the end of any transition, even good transitions....long overdue transitions.
Two weeks later, I was back on her table...working through the anger that I had locked in my lower back after another brutal argument with Terrance.
The routine is the same; her hands find the sore and tender spots and I tell her what it is that resides in that part of my body. Anger. Powerlessness. Fear. She pushes and kneads until my muscles give up the energy of those emotions.
I need to build a new home. I need a home where I am safe. I need a place in which I do not fear constant anger and disappointment radiating from a partner. This house is toxic and it is killing me.
Slowly but surely.
I went because I needed comfort, my body felt adrift. I wondered if my medication was lagging, as the sensation felt a little like a depression spike.
I wasn't entirely shocked. I expected that the laser beam focus that got me through the dissertation would crumble and the exhaustion and fear would sweep over me; a tidal wave that had been straining to breach my levies. I was prepared for that.
Yet, it stretched on past week two, into week three. I was snarling and snappish needing no excuse to open my jaws and clamp down on the nearest throat.
I felt lost. Alone on a sea on which I was repeatedly throwing my tow rope into the vast dark water, hoping for it to catch on anything. Exhausting my arms with pulling the rope back, only to futilely cast it out again.
As Sandra put her hands on me, she found the spot deep in my lower back. There was another at the bottom of my shoulder blade, equally sore.
"So tight, my god Dawn. What is this?"
I knew what it was. I always know what it is.
"I don't want to move. Which isn't really true. These years have not been happy ones. I don't Love the place, but I set down roots and then resist pulling them up, even when the roots are in toxic soil. I resist so fiercely that I hurt myself, even as I logically know that it is for the best, that moving is better..."
I trail off, the pain is brutal as my body refuses to release.
"I guard the castle even as it falls down. Even after everyone else leaves, I still remain."
I don't love this personality trait. It has never served me well and I end up brutalized at the end of any transition, even good transitions....long overdue transitions.
Two weeks later, I was back on her table...working through the anger that I had locked in my lower back after another brutal argument with Terrance.
The routine is the same; her hands find the sore and tender spots and I tell her what it is that resides in that part of my body. Anger. Powerlessness. Fear. She pushes and kneads until my muscles give up the energy of those emotions.
I need to build a new home. I need a home where I am safe. I need a place in which I do not fear constant anger and disappointment radiating from a partner. This house is toxic and it is killing me.
Slowly but surely.
1 Baleful Regards:
Everyone deserves a house, a home, where they are safe from ridicule and fear. I hope you can build yourself that home, gently.
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