Tag Archives: Therapy

Sabbatical

Day One

I’ve never taken a trip by myself before. While I was in re:generation, I stayed one night in a hotel to do my inventory. I made the mistake of booking close to home, and as soon as I was finished with my work, I went straight there. This time I found a cabin 3 hours from home and booked a 3 night stay.

The Drive

I knew before I hit Rockwall (meaning, within 30 minutes of driving away from my family) that this was going to be difficult. I cried before I left the house, then again when I turned down the first unfamiliar road.

All I could think about was doing this incredibly selfish thing–leaving my family for 4 whole days of rest. Would they eat well while I was gone? Would Gabe get to his classes on time? Noah likes to be alone, so I worried less about him. But Phill. Trying to work and drive Gabe places and feed everyone. Maybe even himself?

I’ve been married since I was 19, a mother since I was 21. Somewhere along the way, I lost who I am. I’ve been trying so hard to find her. So far, I haven’t located her in Oklahoma. It’s beautiful here, but like I told my husband this morning, it’s also beautiful at home.

Slow Start

I’m feeling a little panicky, because I’m still me here. I came all this way, but no magical unlocking of my block has occurred. Episode 131 of Carousel is still open on my computer, still not getting written.

No one is interrupting me. If I can’t write here, I can only blame myself. Maybe that’s what I came here to learn.

I kind of hope so.

EMDR

In my first EMDR session, I learned that I don’t know what I’m talking about. Not that I didn’t know. That I still don’t.

It’s not a terrible place to be, because I like to learn. Also, the less I know, the less I’m afraid I’m forcing things to happen. It felt a bit that way, anyway. I’m tap-tap-tapping, letting my mind do its thing, and when it stalls, I try to make it move. I want to get something out of this, and going blank feels unproductive.

How can I reprocess a memory if no memory comes to me?

The process felt a bit like playing with an Ouija board. (Yes, I did that when I was a kid. No, my Baptist preacher father wouldn’t approve.) Looking back, I know someone was moving the triangle thingy, and I’m pretty sure I know who it was. Sometimes it was me. It was funny, and I’m not sorry.

But grownup Rach tried very hard not to force anything during therapy.

The sessions went like this:

  1. Install a safe place
  2. Choose a memory to reprocess
  3. Reprocess chosen memory

Last time I blogged, I thought I would be going from session 1 to session 3, so that’s why it’s been two weeks instead of one since I shared anything. And actually, we didn’t even do the memory we said we were going to at session 2. He started me on a lower anxiety one, a memory I’ve told many times and thought was just a funny (though scary) thing that happened to me once.

The Bull

This memory popped up unexpectedly, and though I always laugh when I tell it, it made me cry during the session. Could be my hormones–they make me cry over everything–but I got stuck pretty hard. And that’s kinda the point.

Remembering it made me feel stuck. Constricted throat, heart pounding, frozen with fear.

When I was around 7 years old, I was staying with my Sunday school teacher at her house in the country. She had a bull. I saw her go in its pen to feed it and decided it must be tame since it didn’t charge her. We had bulls at our house, too. We rode them, didn’t fear them.

This bull didn’t know me and didn’t want me in its pen. It lowered its head and thundered toward me. I had only just stepped inside, and it had a long way to run. I could have stepped out and closed the gate, but instead, I just stood there. Stuck. Frozen with fear.

Reprocessing

We started with the way I felt as the bull charged me, and then my mind took over. This is where I get iffy. Am I correlating things on purpose, or is my brain working on my behalf? What’s the difference? My therapist said not to resist, so I tried to let it happen. And it went all over the place.

Laughing memories, terrified memories, stuff I can’t explain, and stuff I can. I get why my mind jumped to a time when I was in college. A guy bullied me, and my roommate stood up for me. (Thanks, Meg!) Then she told me I needed to learn to stand up for myself.

Next I jumped to a time when I was very young, toes curled around the end of a high board, too scared to dive. Then I was at my desk, scared to hit publish. Then with my brother, fleeing an angry turtle. (Did you know they can hiss?) He threw a rock on its back and cracked its shell, because I was too stupid to back away from it. From a turtle!

I revisited a trauma that occurred when I was 18, when freezing took something from me I can never get back.

Then I jumped to a fun game my brother and I played on rainy days. Reading books by flashlight under a mattress tilted against the wall. No idea how or if that correlates.

Finally, I went back to the original memory, where we assigned it a negative idea I believe about myself. By we, I mean me. I chose the phrase that correctly expressed my thoughts in that moment. When applied to all the other memories, especially the one when I was 18, it shattered me. And it felt utterly true.

I Can’t Protect Myself

This surprised me. Not so much that I felt that way as the bull charged me, though I could have protected myself simply by stepping out of the pen. It makes sense to feel helpless when you’re 35 pounds, too scared to move, about to be speared or launched by a raging hunk of beef.

But that it’s affecting me today? That it’s not just a funny memory I tell to explain to people that I’ve never handled fear appropriately. I’m a freezer. I get stuck. And apparently, I have a core belief that I can’t protect myself. Anyone who knows me is unlikely to think I feel this way.

I’m a beast. Don’t mess with me, because I DO WHAT I WANT! I actually wrote I do what I want on my name tag at re:generation instead of my name. That’s how sure I was that I’m in control. I even drew a little crown on it.

But guess what I picked as my new message to myself. Tearfully, I might add.

I’m In Control Now

I can’t say for sure that I accomplished anything. We reprocessed the memory, changing “I can’t protect myself” to “I’m in control now.” I definitely felt different the last couple times we visited the memory. It makes me laugh to recall myself standing there like a dummy while murder came rushing toward me. But then, it always did. Hopefully, the tone of my laughter has changed.

My therapist said the processing will continue after the session, and he wasn’t wrong. Memories keep popping up, adding to the list of times I’ve frozen. Physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually. I don’t know yet if it’s helping me, but I definitely know more about myself than I did before starting EMDR.

Next week, we’ll tackle a new memory. I won’t even bother to predict how that’s going to go.

Radical Rest

Not a Napper

Someone commented to me several weeks ago that they’d never seen me do anything halfway. I assured them there were things, and when they asked for an example, one word came out.

“Rest.”

I do that halfway, if at all.

I’ve been working on myself, following themes that I believe come from God. Trust was a big one. Coming out of my cave, wanting to live again. Pride is ongoing. Pretty sure that one will be around until I die. But rest is the first one I’ve bucked at.

God told me to rest, and I had one question for Him.

“But what do I do while I rest?”

Spiritually, I might as well be five years old, drumming my heels on my kindergarten mat. Because I hate this. I don’t want to do it. I want to be busy. Thinking about resting makes my tummy tense up. Can’t breathe!

I have a new therapist, acquired in similar fashion to my previous one. Someone else’s doing. Because I’m not going to seek help. But if it’s thrown at me, I tend to allow it. So here we go, back into the swamp of my thoughts.

EMDR

We started EMDR last week. By started, I mean we installed my safe place. I already had one from doing a couple sessions with my previous therapist.

Granny’s Porch.

If you’ve read my book, Summer, According to Sam, then you’ve already visited Granny’s porch. It seemed to me like the perfect place to call safe, because I have only happy memories there. Sitting in her swing, shelling purple hulls, watching the sunrise while sipping my coffee flavored sugar-milk. Granny’s there, too, watering her plants from a re-purposed milk jug.

But after testing it out, my therapist said I needed a new safe place. Why? Because when he asked me how I felt on Granny’s porch, I gave him a non-restful answer.

“Eager.”

That’s how I feel. Not at peace. Itching for adventure. That sounded right to me, because eagerness sounds safe. Being still doesn’t.

I loved sitting with Granny, loved the peas and the coffee and the sounds of whip-poor-wills. But my feet can’t wait to hit the ground. I was supposed to be trying to stay on the porch, but every time he paused to ask what was going on in my head, I was somewhere else.

On my motorcycle, playing hide-and-seek in the woods. On the trails down to Lake Texoma. Busting rocks to find the ones with sparkles in them. Running, cartwheeling, climbing trees. Granny’s porch isn’t a safe place. It’s a launchpad.

The Boat

He asked me to choose a new safe place, one that didn’t propel me into adventure. I deflated, rebelling on the inside, but not telling him that, because even my therapist doesn’t get to see the really, really, really, real me.

I know me, though, how desperately I want to be anywhere but with myself. So I knew this had to be a place I couldn’t escape. I didn’t think my therapist would approve of a cell with no door, so I went the other way.

Unfathomable space.

The boat is simple, more like a raft, really. No motor, no oars … it can only drift. The sky is clear, the sun doesn’t hurt my eyes, and the water is so still it barely licks my floating platform. I can’t google anything, answer any texts, clean up any messes, learn a new craft. No one can ask me for anything. I can’t win or lose any games. Can’t entertain anyone. I just lie there on my back, not even imagining the next scene I’m going to write, because I can’t type it out anyway. Everything gets really quiet. I take a deep breath. And it comes out quivering.

Ahh, this is what rest feels like?

At first I tense up, because I need to swim ashore and do all the things. Someone needs to clean the kitchen. Make sure Phill eats, because he doesn’t take care of himself either. Wash Gabe’s karate uniform. Get Noah to work.

My terrariums aren’t gonna water themselves!

Actually, they do. That’s kinda the point. But I won’t let them, because I can’t leave the lid on. Gotta tweak, gotta replace a plant, gotta move a rock or a shell. I can’t rest. I can’t stop working, even when it’s all done and I’m just creating work for the sake of staying busy.

But on the boat I have to stop. There’s literally nothing I can do there. It’s not just rest. It’s radical rest. And I had no idea how much I hungered for it. When we test it out, I don’t leave the boat. I’m breathing differently there, and it feels so good, even the lure of adventure can’t budge me.

Tomorrow we’ll use my freshly installed safe place to start a journey. We’ll seek–and hopefully destroy–the voice that tells me I’m not good enough. The voice I’m trying to silence by staying busy. By publishing the best episodes, having the cleanest house, taming a terrarium so ferociously it might as well have plastic plants in it.

And after I confront that voice, I’ll rest.

Chaos

I happened upon a little boy, sitting on the ground beside a hole filled with baby snakes. He was stirring it with a stick, watching them writhe. When he noticed me, he accidentally flicked the stick. Out popped one baby snake, which slithered away.

Dozens remained inside, but his eyes followed the escaped one, and then he looked up at me, mouth sagging, and uttered one pitiful, shame-filled word.


“Chaos.”

I woke up laughing. I’m not big on dream interpretation, but this one felt like a slap. That little boy was me, and though I don’t love having my work compared to a pit of snakes, the way I treat my books sometimes makes the comparison hit.

My Chaos

That baby snake could be a questionable comma or an uncomfortable plot. Or something vulnerable about me that shows through my writing. It could be my focus on attention for myself instead of a heart for the work. And when it gets flicked out, it’s all I can see. Everything else is in order, but I cry, “Chaos!”

So dramatic.

I got sick over the holidays–so sick I missed church and Journey Groups. It went on for weeks, making me skip Christmas gatherings. I even got off schedule with my writing and publishing, though you would think I could do those things while stuck on the couch. But my brain was mush.

I had finished Sam, (book coming soon!) but I came to a dead stop on The Misadventures of Mia Gibbs and barely stayed above water on Carousel. And as for promoting? Nope. I went from dreaming of readers to hoping everyone was too busy to read. I felt like a failure, with a pit too stuffed to stir.

Reset

Being knocked down was the best thing that could have happened to me. All the pointless baby snakes slithered away, leaving my pit less crowded. I confronted my fear of getting behind … by getting behind.

Then I made a new plan. Not to plan. To lean into who I am. Not just a Vella writer, or even just a writer. I don’t mind letting the wind take me where it will, because my Father makes the wind.

I’m back! Writing, editing, publishing, and loving it. Until the wind takes me somewhere else ….

A Time for Everything

No Time Like the Present?

Or no time BUT the present? I live in a constant state of frantic hurry, chasing moving targets, burning myself out. I take pictures so I can look back, forgetting to look around in the moment. I nearly did that today, even after my son counseled me last night to slow down.

Take deep breaths. Clean out the clutter in my mind.

Time to Celebrate!

I published the final episode of Summer, According to Sam today. The book was finished years ago, accepted for publication, and run through the entire editing process. So I could just shrug and not make a thing of this.

But it is a thing. A thing that made me weep with joy today … and I nearly didn’t tell anyone. I nearly didn’t write about it. If you’ve read the story, especially the final episode, the reason for this post will be obvious to you.

I’ve been doing some thinking, the same way Sam did.

Time to Make Amends

It’s easy to forget that people love me and that it hurts them to watch me struggling. I’ve made no secret of my fight to find joy again, to even want to be here at all. I’m not sorry for that, because I believe people need to know they’re not alone. I believe in being truthful. The part I regret is how rarely I share my good days. Days like this one.

Writing is therapy to me, so naturally, I do it more when I’m low. Even now, I’d rather get up and do something else. The house is half-decorated for Christmas, there are dishes in the sink, and I still have two stories to update on Vella.

But here I pause. And I say thank you. Thank you to my readers, to my family, to my herd, to my Father. Thank you for good days and second and third and fourth chances.

Flat on My Back

Last week was rough. I feel less like I’m on a roller coaster now and more like I’m on a seesaw. Still up and down, but not nearly as exciting.

Re:generation is hard. Inventory is hard. I thought I had knocked it out. On the first week of inventory, I got a hotel room and plowed through it. I even wrote insightful little summaries about each category. Then I found out I had skipped an important step. I had to face some hard stuff–stuff I didn’t even want to think about, let alone share with my group.

I hadn’t knocked it out. It had knocked me out.

Back to Start

Inventory again. Not where I wanted to be. Instead of getting another hotel room, I visited my childhood church, intending to approach my new problem using an old, trusted method.

There used to be these huge cement tables behind the building. Once when I was young, I spent hours lying on my back on one of those tables, asking God for help. I had nowhere to live and no idea what I was going to do. I think back to that day when I’m at my lowest, and I remember feeling like God met me there. So it seemed a great place to visit.

After packing up all my re:gen stuff, I drove to Providence, Texas. I needed a date with God, lying flat on my back. I brought a plastic table cloth, because the last time I had seen the tables, they were covered in weird fungi and droppings from the trees. Nothing was going to stop me climbing up there.

And this is where the tables used to be.

Rerouting …

Now I’d driven more than an hour to lie on a table that didn’t exist anymore. I stood there and cried about it for a minute, feeling rejected. The same way I felt the last time I was there. I showed up for my date, but where was God?

Not knowing what else to do, I went around the building, searching for a place to sit that might mean something to me. But I’m allergic to wasps, and they seemed to be in all the cozy places. Alone, no EpiPen, hardly a signal on my phone, I wasn’t risking getting stung.

I took a few pictures as I wandered.

I love taking pictures, but it wasn’t what I came for. So I kept walking, eventually into the cemetery. Providence is a small community, so I knew a lot of the names on the headstones. It was nice, and a little sad, to think of them. I loved this broken headstone that used to say GONE HOME.

Reading Into Things

I wondered if God was telling me to go home. I couldn’t do what I came for. I wasn’t really trying to accomplish anything specific anymore. Just reminiscing, trying to make some use of what felt like a pointless trip.

And then I came across this, and it brought me to my knees. I knew Carolyn and Buddy were there, because I had been to their funerals. But this was the first time I saw their headstone.

They were the answer to that prayer I prayed the day I was on the table. Carolyn came and got me and took me home with her.

A New Perspective

Maybe not completely new. I’ve come to the conclusion many times that my story isn’t one of abandonment, but one of rescue. It’s easy to lose perspective when you’re listing every horrible thing that ever happened to you.

This was the reminder I needed. I’m not doing this alone. I can’t see the full plan yet, but there is one. God showed up for our date, just not where I thought He would. His plan was better than mine, as usual.

I wasn’t supposed to lie on a crusty table, focusing on feeling lost and alone. He wanted me to remember that when I’m flat on my back, I should be on my knees. Still looking up, but also forward, because there’s something good on the way.

I made a little wildflower bouquet for Carolyn and Buddy, and then I spent some time right there, thanking them both for what they did for me. And I’m still processing why I also felt like I needed to apologize to them. I’ll be working on feeling like a burden for a while yet, I’m afraid. But at least I know I need to work on it.

Leaving it Behind

The last picture I took is a reminder to myself to put the past where it belongs. I have to dig some stuff up in my recovery process, but I don’t have to dwell on it. I certainly don’t have to relive it. It’s time to let it go.

Glitter Pen Girl

I’ve always been a pencil person. I have a power sharpener by my desk, and I zip a pencil in it every time I so much as jot down an item on my grocery list. Then back into the pencil cup it goes, tip upward, one yellow beast in a bouquet of wrist stabbers.

The Point?

Mistakes get erased. No dull-tipped pencils, and certainly no pens, ever cross my desk. My eraser dies before I run out of graphite, so I keep a pack of extra erasers handy. Because what good is a pencil if you can’t erase mistakes? What good is any writing utensil if it betrays you by revealing your imperfections?

This is, of course, why I have 15 novels sitting here unpublished. When I was in therapy, I told my therapist what I felt my headstone should say.

Here lies Rachel.

She nearly did so many things.

On Valentine’s Day, my friend gave me a gift. A journal and a pack of glitter gel pens. I’ve had some of these babies before. I doodled with them, admiring the slick way they lay down ink, turning the page to watch the sparkles. But I’ve never really written anything with them. Especially not in a wonderful new journal! It’s even my favorite color!

So what was I to do? Every pretty pen I’ve ever owned has dried out, wasted, owned by the wrong girl. A pencil person, unable to shine. Girls like me don’t deserve shimmery ink. Do we?

Trying Something New

Deep breath. It’s just a pen and a journal. The pages can be torn out. I worried that I would have bad penmanship or get behind trying to record a scripture while the pastor was talking. I worried that the ink would bleed through the page. I hate that. I might misspell a word. The horror.

But, wielding a glitter pen, I committed words to the page. And I made a mistake. I knew it! No eraser. I needed to start over, maybe tear it out and rewrite all my notes later. Then it occurred to me that I could take notes in an ugly notebook, in pencil of course, and then transcribe carefully, slowly, into the journal. That’s when I realized that my perfectionism was rearing its ugly head, not only making me feel horrible, but causing me to miss the sermon.

So I stopped. And I wrote this verse, because it was from my re:generation book, and it had hit me just right.

“For freedom Christ has set us free. Stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery.”

I wrote it in green glitter and then added some red, which made it look like a bad attempt at making it 3D. But I didn’t care. I’m free. Flawed, but loved. I went back to my sermon notes and scribbled out my error, and it made a nice little glittery blob on the page. Man, you could really see the sparkles in a blob! Beauty from ashes.

Glitter Pen Girl

I’m officially a glitter pen girl now. I still try to turn my mistakes into perfect round spots, or even better, hearts or flowers. But I’m not so worried about erasing everything now.

Inventory

The re:gen book asked for my first impression of the inventory process. Usually, I find narrowing down my response difficult. I can write thousands of words in minutes, but summaries slay me. Today, not so much. In a word:

NO

In a few more words:

NO NO NO NO NO

I don’t want to leave it there. Someday, some unsuspecting person might fall onto my blog. Maybe they’ll find it because they’re starting re:gen and want to get an idea what it’s like. Maybe they’ll find me when the group starts whispering about inventory. And I don’t want to scare anyone away. Heck, I’ll probably be the one who sent them here. Having survived, I’ll look back at this post and chuckle wisely. So let me clarify.

Just kidding. But seriously, I’m not looking forward to this. And to make matters worse, a storm came through last night and caused us to shut down the church on the very evening we were supposed to be trained to do inventory. Trained and encouraged, which I NEEDED.

If you’re an enneagram person, let me explain by giving you my number.

1

If you’re not an enneagram person, let me explain what it means to be a one. I need order. I need to know how to do a thing correctly before I can do the thing. I’m driven by a need to make things better. Straighter. Cleaner. PERFECT. Hence, the re:gen journey. I’m doing re:gen to work on perfectionism. And now I’m supposed to start the one part of the experience that kept me from signing up long ago … without training?

I’ve never felt so connected to Bill Murray in my life.

If you haven’t seen Groundhog Day, I judge you. Don’t worry, I’ll beat myself up for it in my inventory.

Change – The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

Some things never change. Depending on circumstance, I may see that as a good thing or a bad one. Today I feel torn.

The Good

This week, I’ve been filled with joy. People have commented on it. I radiate joy, they say. And it’s true. I’m in a much better place now, relying on God. I’ve released so many things into more capable hands.

I earned my first bonus on Kindle Vella. A tiny paycheck, but a victory for me. It isn’t the journey I once dreamed of, but it’s sufficient for me. More than sufficient if my behavior is any indication. I ran through the house celebrating.

The Bad

My lesson today forced me to look at my patterns. It was good timing, because I was in a funk last night. After gushing with excitement in group Thursday night, proclaiming that I had unlocked the secret to being joyful in all circumstances, I found myself slumped on the couch, my arms crossed, refusing to laugh at my favorite sitcom the very next night. Actually resisting feeling good.

The Ugly

So have I changed? I need to, because the person whose attitude toward me keeps bringing me down isn’t going to. I’m so close to getting past the thing that’s holding me back. How one person sees me. This person’s view of me is neither good, nor bad, nor ugly.

It is indifferent.

One person, who doesn’t hear me or see me, no matter what I say or do, has the power to steal my joy.

That has to change.