Disassociating From My Disassociation

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When I was first diagnosed with General Anxiety Disorder (GAD) and Depression, it felt more akin to a physical blow than anything. I remember sitting there listening to the doctor and feeling not only insulted, but attacked.

I even argued with her a bit about it. There was no way I had anxiety or depression. I was thirty years old - sure, I had a less than stellar upbringing, but I'd dealt with all that and was fine now! If I was going to walk away from that period with a mental illness than it would have happened a long time ago, not now!

My doctor is one of those- the mind, body, and everything between is connected- type of doctors. Looking back on it now I am so appreciative that she took the time to really help me, but in the moment, I felt she was prying into a part of my life that had already been put to rest.

After my doctor prescribed me medication, and had me set up an appointment with a therapist the proverbial fun began.

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I went into that those first couple session armed up like I was about to do battle. I schooled my features into an impassive look of confidence, and put on an attitude of disregard. Like, as if everything that had happened in my life up until that point was of little consequence to me.

After a few sessions, my therapist stopped and asked me to do something that tripped me up. A request that left me speechless. She asked me to answer the question she'd just asked me again, but this time to answer it from how I was feeling at the time, not from the perspective of what I saw happening around me as I disassociated from it.

Disassociation was not a term I was familiar when applied to mental health. Seeing the confused look on my face, my therapist took pity on me and explained. She told me when I spoke about my life, I spoke about it in a matter of fact and logical way. I spoke about it not in terms of how I felt, but as an observer viewing it from the outside.

She wanted me to feel them? Why in hell would I want to go back and relive things I'd already dealt with - especially painful things! Her response- did you deal with them, or accept them as the way it was and just try to make the best out of it?

Well then, there's no need to attack me!

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Children from abusive homes have a way of separating their minds from what is happening around them. Because they can't physically escape what they are going through, the brain protects itself by walling up the emotions to make it more bearable.

It is a form of self-preservation.

If life was like the game shoots and ladders, I definitely hit the square that slid you back almost to the beginning. My therapist said we were going to start working our way through events that stood out the most and work through them again - this time with feeling. All the feelings were there, I just needed to sort through them, and most importantly, I needed to allow myself to feel them.

She told me to think of how I'd processed my feelings as having an internal rain barrel and my feelings as rain. Every time a new feeling came over me I'd instinctually let it fall into the barrel. The barrel was now full because I never took the time to go back and drain it. My anxiety and depression - was the barrel overflowing. And re-examining these events and how they'd made me felt was going to be like draining the water out of that barrel. Yes, we were going to make a mess, water was bound to splash out as we drained some of the bucket, but it was OK. That like the spilled water would eventually evaporate, the feelings I hadn't dealt with properly before would start to be less heavy.

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Learning to live in my life- to live as a part of it, not apart from it - was possibly the most gut wrenching and agonizing thing I'd ever put myself through. But, I found this weird part of me craved that acknowledgment too! I, both hated going back in time, but I felt validated when I did. I could finally cry, not for that little girl I saw in my memories, I could cry for myself because that little girl was me.

I learned to be present, I learned how to use writing and photography as a creative outlet to deal with my anxiety and my depression. I learned how to advocate for myself. I've learned how to sit in my discomfort, without letting my brain create that escape world for me to hide in.

I still struggle some days. It's easy to fall backwards. Once you learn the skill of disassociating, you tend to revert back into it easily. But, now I can recognize when I'm doing it, I am more gentle with myself when it happens. I recognize that when it happens it means I'm overwhelmed and need a break from whatever situation is causing me to feel the need to flee.

Basically I've learned to respect myself, and to set boundaries. Boundaries both with others but even more importantly with myself. Yes, I had a traumatic childhood full of abuse, but as an adult I continued that abuse of myself- to myself- on their behalf.

Having been given both an understanding and the tools to see these patterns in myself, and in the way I think, process and disassociate has helped me learn to manage my anxiety, and depression. Some days it's easy, some days it's a battle. But every day that I respect my limitations I count as a win, because little me deserved to be protected, and respected, and now as an adult, I do everything I can to make sure that she is!