Discarding the plane situation
I wrote earlier about my newfound fear of airplanes and my mom's wise words, that I have made my lack of control material. But planes are not part of my everyday life. Fearing plane crashes does nothing for me in the daily transferring of emotions; it is only useful when I am actively stepping foot onto an airplane and letting it leave the ground. Additionally, I have never been in a plane crash. While I have read every Wikipedia entry on plane crashes as a person with anxiety does, it has no traumatic hold on me. The thought of a plane does not send me into a full-body panic or cause racing, incomprehensible thoughts that lead me to take drastic, unnecessary actions. Luckily, I have been in an abusive relationship and that trauma is the perfect raw material to convert into the stuff of daily anxieties.
Now, instead of waiting for a flight to channel my feelings of a lack of control, I can just assume my boyfriend is going to leave me. This is a very convenient narrative to use because a) it brings up wild memories of abandonment from ages eight through twenty, b) it's a widely accepted fear in the world of monogamy and isn't as dramatized or ridiculed as the fear of flying is, and c) it gives me a person to direct my feelings towards instead of an inanimate object (it is hard to be sassy towards an airplane, but it is easy to be sassy towards your boyfriend in an ill-fated attempt to express your need for validation).
This is a satirical way of trying to explain that I am struggling to cope with my feelings these days. There is trauma brought up by my boyfriend moving to Oregon. I can't really voice it yet, but I can feel that it's there by the irrationality of my responses and the way my insides feel blinded (and blind to what actions result). I also think yesterday when I said I am not depressed, I am probably wrong. Sophomore year of high school I felt like there was the world's hugest quilt draped over the world and it followed me wherever I went. Everything was dampened. I would come home from school and cry unrelentingly on the floor of my mom's house. Now I cry every day and tear up constantly. If someone asks me how I am doing, I will cry. This, I think, should be a signal for me at this point: if the genuine care of others brings me to instant tears, I am probably not feeling very cared for by myself.
Now, instead of waiting for a flight to channel my feelings of a lack of control, I can just assume my boyfriend is going to leave me. This is a very convenient narrative to use because a) it brings up wild memories of abandonment from ages eight through twenty, b) it's a widely accepted fear in the world of monogamy and isn't as dramatized or ridiculed as the fear of flying is, and c) it gives me a person to direct my feelings towards instead of an inanimate object (it is hard to be sassy towards an airplane, but it is easy to be sassy towards your boyfriend in an ill-fated attempt to express your need for validation).
This is a satirical way of trying to explain that I am struggling to cope with my feelings these days. There is trauma brought up by my boyfriend moving to Oregon. I can't really voice it yet, but I can feel that it's there by the irrationality of my responses and the way my insides feel blinded (and blind to what actions result). I also think yesterday when I said I am not depressed, I am probably wrong. Sophomore year of high school I felt like there was the world's hugest quilt draped over the world and it followed me wherever I went. Everything was dampened. I would come home from school and cry unrelentingly on the floor of my mom's house. Now I cry every day and tear up constantly. If someone asks me how I am doing, I will cry. This, I think, should be a signal for me at this point: if the genuine care of others brings me to instant tears, I am probably not feeling very cared for by myself.