Thank you Jack! You accepting your imperfect self; I accepting my imperfect self is what you/ I can do in our individual healing paths and then there is all that nature can do that we don’t have to interfere with. Good thing it is not ALL up to us. Just as we don’t have to plan our next breath, inhalation and micro manage our blood sugar and temperature, so we do not have to micro manage every single aspect of our healing.

anita

Dear Reader:

There is this floating anxiety in my brain (energetic, chemical activity) that is not attached to any particular event in the present. There it is, an anxious neural activity in my brain, fear, unattached.

And so my brain scans for a home for the anxiety to reside, an event to be placed before it, only after.

In a healthy brain, one that hasn’t been injured this way, first there is perceived danger, then there is the fear.

In my brain, first there is the fear, then the brain scans for an event to … retroactively attach itself to it.

It scans: if I feel bloated, there is the event, being bloated. If I ate too much, or maybe ate too much, there is the event, and danger is attached to these two events. Otherwise, maybe I said the wrong thing to someone, maybe I did the wrong thing, or worse… maybe I thought the wrong thing, or felt the wrong thing or looked the wrong way, to someone. And that is the danger. And maybe, if none of those events is available, well, there is all of my past to look at, all the wrong choices, all the mistakes I made.

Then I proceed to beat myself up for the wrong choices, whip! Whip! Whip!

And it feels bad.And I analyze, trying to talk myself out of beating myself up by applying reason. And I fail.

While all along, first there it is: the floating anxiety without a home in the present, looking for a home.

anita

Dear Seaisland:

Of course it is okay to post your poem, your writing in here. I like the idea, that this forum may be a safe, nonjudgmental place for people. Never thought of it. I like it very much, would like to do my part in creating this.

About your poem: freedom from my mother, is what I personally always dreamed about, your poem brings it back to me. I wanted to be wild and free, like you wrote. I felt like a caged animal, imprisoned. There were people who told me how lucky I was to have my mother, and they did overlook a missing necessity, time and time again, so I was alone with my jailer and tormentor. I had a dream one time that I flew up in the sky, in and out of clouds, nothing to stop me, in endless space. Imaginary wings. The dream seemed so real that I still have a difficulty believing it was only a dream. I seemed so very REAL.

For years, decades, i searched for a home, the old prison was not. I love your poem, it brought all this that I wrote back to me, right now. I forgot seeking freedom. I forgot the dream I had, the imaginary wings that brought me here, tonight, as free as I ever was, from her, from my jailer and tormentor.

Thank you!!!
anita

You are welcome, Seaisland. I like you.
anita

Never thought I could be anyone’s strong shoulder. What a concept! Me, a strong shoulder. Strong anything. Thank you for that!
anita