Hope

The last 2 weeks have been very hard. I have had a lot of voices in my head and anxiety. I have also dealt with quite a bit of depression. Most days I have had to force myself to get up and moving. I have really felt low and hopeless. My internal system was not happy and I couldn't work out why.

One of the biggest problems I face is lack of sleep. Getting to sleep is always the hard part. Being awake at 2 or 3 in the morning is not uncommon and having to be up at 7am to get the kids off to school makes it all the more difficult to function. I am trying my hardest to not give into the pull to become nocturnal, it doesn't work well with the family and it is not good for long term health. I don't like using medication to help with such things. They have a bad reputation for nasty side affects including drowsiness the next day. I have found a natural alternative though, and it seems to be working a treat. The one I use is apparently only supposed to be available from a health care professional. I got it from my local health food store. There are quite a few out there so I highly recommend heading to the local health store to see what you can find if you suffer with insomnia too.

On Wednesday I saw my Therapist and thankfully we found some answers. Apparently, just because I feel OK with working on reconciling  with someone, doesn't mean everyone inside is OK with it too. Everything is so much more complicated than expected. Now of course my therapist would say it is some part of me that is not ready and that makes sense, but I felt like I was doing the right thing. Hopefully I will be better able to deal with future eppisodes now that I have a heads up on how much we (alters) must truely work together.

We also did something interesting on Wednesday on my session, system mapping. Basically it is writing down who and what we know bout my system (alters) and how they function. Who knows how, who likes who, and what functions they have in the group. It is something I had been working on by myself in the previous week so it was great timing. It was also very interesting. Elaine (my Therapist) had of course been taking notes of who she had met and what I have been telling her over the year. Elaine had quite a comprehensive list. I added to that with other info I had gained and then we put it all up on the white board. Each alter was represented by a circle and where we put them on the board depended on if they knew other alters or were friends with them. I learned a lot about how my system works. By the end I was feeling much better and far more relaxed.
Some days it all just seems too hard to go on. I hate that my life is like this, I hate that I cant live like everyone else. I hate that someone had to power to make my life this way. I hate that so much of my time is spent fighting just to survive. And then I have days like the last 2 days and I can feel the sunshine and laugh with my friends. It all doesn't seem so bad.
When I was 8years old I had had enough of this life and wanted it to end. I went into our cubby house and tried to think about how I could deal with it all. After a long time I came to the conclusion that everyone had to have a good time on their life otherwise what was the point to it all. I decided that I was going to hang on to see my good life. I didn't want to miss out on it. As I got older and life didn't necessarily get better I held on to the that thought. Even now I hang on to the hope that it will all get better and life will be fun. Don't get me wrong I do have a great life now, great husband, great kids, nice house, and great friends, but now I am also dealing with the aftermath of what happened all those years ago.
HOPE, what we need to keep going..