Tag: whiplashsyndrome

Fool Me Once

Dec 21st, 2022

It’s the morning after the night before, well actually its almost 3 in the afternoon. The kids have gone out to do ice skating with their dad and Bonne Maman, and the house is quiet. I would like to put on Christmas music but I can’t seem to get through the task. I’ve straightened up the living room so that I can do just this – sit quietly on a perfectly made couch and type out some more of my thoughts. I am undeniably sleepy, still, and empty-headed. I’ve realised – slowly, quietly, and bit-by-bit – that one of the sensations or states that I’ve always sought is to be empty-headed – to be devoid of all of the clatter and chatter that is usually running round in my head. This is not only the function of the substance, but also the hangover, the come down. There is nothing there, there isn’t peace or anything, it’s just an in-between state from being intoxicated to being normal (whatever that is) again.

Part of my wanting to stop drinking was to stop wasting time on the hangover. So many days wasted. But looking back, I see that this was part of the attraction as well, to have these mental vacation days where I couldn’t think about anything. Another form of self-harm, really, as these weren’t enjoyable moments, but additional suffering that could have been avoided had I just not drunk so much. But what would be the fun in that? I seemed to most often want to drink into oblivion. I was always seeking the ultimate state – of oblivion, elevation, joy, enlightenment. Unfortunately, with alcohol, there’s no enlightenment, just destruction and afterwards a lot of pain, depression, and anxiety. Then there’s the two-day hangover that usually starts to appear in your late 30s and is arguably the progression of the disease of alcoholism. The first day of which is just feeling absolutely terrible – headache, hunger, vacancy – and then the second – complete psychological self-doubt, worry, and self-loathing. So why do it in the first place? Because it was there, it tastes good, and it’s acceptable.

We are in the wine trade, and we live in Champagne. I say ‘we’ even though I don’t work in it, because it is a lifestyle, not just a vocation. Most of our friends and almost all of our neighbours are in the trade. Since moving to France in 2015, we’ve lived in winemaking regions. It’s a beautiful life. We are enveloped in nature, with ideal landscapes that have been producing fine wines for generations. The agricultural aspect is wonderful, all of the work is dictated by the seasons, the weather, the sun, the rain. It is a lovely opportunity we have, for ourselves and our children, to be so connected to the earth and its rhythms. But there is a downside, and that is the looming threat of alcoholism.

It is so hard to say how much is too much. I’ve thought about this for many years. Alcoholism has been a part of my life, of my family, for generations. As has suicide, mental illness, military life and its traumas, violence, hardship, sacrifice, immigration, migration and displacement, to name a few nameable things. I am certain this holds true for everyone. No one is spared the basic suffering of the human experience. It’s just now up to this generation, I think, to look at who we are, what shaped us, and how we got here, and to make a choice about how we will go forward with this knowledge of what harms and how we can heal. We must make a choice to change, or to continue to hold up the status quo because it’s always been that way.

It’s hard to know when it’s all too much, when it’s socially acceptable to drink wine, even champagne, at any occasion. It takes being really, harshly honest with oneself, I guess, and that’s where I am now. I think I might have to get myself completely sober to find out what I can and can’t do, to figure out really who I am and how I want to live my life. I could be one of those people that makes sure not to take the painkillers with a touch of codeine because even that makes me check out. No Xanax, no muscle relaxers, no nothing.

I thought I could just quit drinking, quit smoking cigarettes, lay off the pot smoking, and that would be enough. I have to admit, in theory I love cannabis. I think it is a wonderful medicine and should be used as such. But like any drug, there is use and there is abuse. The beautiful thing about cannabis is the perspective it gives you. For me, I have sincere epiphanies about myself while using it. It is a miracle drug and it should be used with reverence and respect. It should be used to connect with others, to open up, to gain insight, unlock creativity, and connect deeply with oneself. It should not be used to get fucked up. This is a waste.

Since returning to France from the US on 28 August of this year, one one occasion, I had a couple of puffs of cannabis. Turns out, it did help the major anxiety and depression I was experiencing but just the act of smoking something made me want to smoke and smoke and smoke. So that was out. I have also, since being back, had edibles twice. Both times were while I was with friends who were drinking. I though that this would be fun. Surprise, it wasn’t, really. I just felt as odd and out of place as ever. It was though I was alone in my silliness, in my perspective, self-awareness, and not being honest with myself or with them. I did try it once, and observed this, but then forgot, and tried it again, only to reinforce my findings. Now those findings can’t be ignored. I feel that at this time, at least, there is no more checking out, no more days off, no more temporary escapes. The last night I had an edible, I remember wanting to go to sleep, and couldn’t. Lately finding sleep is hard due to the incessant ringing in my ears. But this night it was more than that, it was just plain being high, and it wasn’t fun. I just wanted to not be high anymore. So here I am, getting deeper into sobriety, wanting more and more truth in feelings, in presence, in observation. Wanting to feel simple and true joy through gratefulness for what is actually around me, choosing to look at the good of what I have, not living from a place of lack but of abundance.

There is no need to panic, to be stressed, to worry. Is it possible to convince myself of this. Can I retrain my reaction system to live in a calm state? I absolutely know that I can, it will just take practice, tangible, executed actions to retrain everything I know. My body and my mind can slowly and surely change into new patterns, and new schema or physical paradigm through which to function and live. Strangely, I even feel grateful for whatever this is going on in my brain, a result of the whiplash, whatever is causing the ringing, the throbbing, the strange sensations. I am being forced by this malady to stop and restart everything, it seems. So here I am, giving myself up to the experience, to the journey, to the signs along the way to wake up before it’s too late. I have been given the chance to see this, after having struggled for so many years with not feeling whole, with playing catch up to my own life. I am now beginning to feel settled into my own body, but at the same time my body feels foreign, and broken. So very, very strange.

But when I take the time to stop and look around at my life, after living through some very difficult things, I see how much I have to be thankful for. Where I am now is starting to feel natural. Big ideas, big dreams that felt unattainable, grandiose, even delusional, are now unfolding around me, step by step, in a way that feels perfectly natural. Having taken the time to slow down, ironically I no longer feel like I am catching up. What a miracle.
Ascension Pains

Dec 19th, 2022

What kind of lessons have I learned lately? What an apropos question. I am sitting down to write tonight to ruminate on how I’ve been feeling lately. Suddenly,I feel very self-conscious about writing, as it occurs to me that someone else might actually ready it. There are people out there, peeking into the corners of my mind, and my self, right along with me. I guess that’s ok, though. It’s kind of nice, even. A few years, or even just months ago, it might have felt more daunting to think about than it does now. Now, it’s just kind of a passing feeling of fright, even excitement, that someone else is here with me. Now it feels more like having a small alliance of kindred spirits, like how there are always those animal friends in Disney princess movies. If you’re reading this, you might think of yourself as one of those helpful little singing birds in Cinderella, or an inanimate object brought to life like the candlestick with the funny nose in Beauty and the Beast, or Olaf in Frozen.

So here I am, sitting down to write, with a stiff wrist and a dizzy head. This weekend has been tricky. I did a little too much bustling around on Saturday morning and set something off in my head. I felt it come on late morning – overwhelmed, over-stimulated, and then very, very tired. I had to get out though, to run an errand or just get out and get a change of scenery.

It’s that time of year now, a week before Christmas, when I start to realise that all of those ideas I’ve had swimming around in my head for a month actually need to happen now or they will not happen before Christmas. All of a sudden, it’s now or next year. This year though, I think I’m taking it in stride in part because of my sobriety. Trying to have a bit more faith in divine timing, too, because why not. It seems to be working actually, in big and little ways.

Yesterday my reason for going out was to get mulled wine and non-wine at Ikea. Paired that with lunch with the kids and another stop to get some recipe ingredients and suddenly I felt very productive. Husband even took the kids and let me alone to do some shopping, so in my daze-y state, I wandered around the store a bit. I ended up forgetting the mulled wine altogether but I did stumble upon a fully decorated, floor model, 2 meter tree for 5€ and then totally amused my self by carting it home after cramming it into the back of the car. Now, this might seem gratuitous; we already have a fully decorated tree at home. Here’s the thing – since I’ve lived on my own, or perhaps even since I was a little girl, I dreamed about having a kids tree, or a basement tree, when I had a house and a family of my own. Now, because of this timing, this off-day, this forgetting of why I was supposed to be there in the first place and just wandering around, I’ve made this lifelong dream come true, and for only 5€. I didn’t even have to decorate it. It was just all finished, waiting for me to show up and take it home.

Maybe this is the way forward. Maybe I have to accept this new way of functioning. Maybe the dizziness, blankness, ringing is all just telling me to stop, to be in my body, and succumb to a new flow of all of the energy that makes me, me. What if this ringing that I hear in my ears is my body’s alert system that is sounding the alarm that all is just not right. That’s what it feels like when it’s a bad day. On a good day, it’s hard to even remember what the bad days feel like, or maybe I just imagined it. Usually I’m just enjoying feeling more normal, honestly. But on the bad days, the writing helps, as it’s the only way to make sense of my thoughts. Maybe the lesson here is just to keep it simple and lower the bar whenever at all possible – listen to myself, be gentle, do something, even if it’s a small list, and even if I forget something on it.

I have noticed a new symptom, just in the past few days. My hearing is at once getting worse while also getting more sensitive. The other day, I heard the frequency of my laptop. Now, as I sit in my living room by the fireplace, I can hear the cinders singing in the fire, the hot hot heat reaching a humid spot in the wood. For a moment, the ringing in my ears subsides a bit, as my brain tunes into the other sounds, and then it returns. This is also why I’ve taken to listening to classical again while I work, as it takes away the ringing.

So what is this strange sensitivity? I also notice myself different around others, too. I don’t fall into the same patterns of conversation as before. I am more my self, which can sometimes feel awkward, as though I am at once participating and also observing – observing that I am different that before with others, and also participating in a way that feels more true, with that same flinching excitement and fear, which is also accompanied shortly thereafter by a reassuring, self-mothering reaction when I tell myself that actually, it’s ok to feel a little uncomfortable, the ease will come with practice.

My friend Betty and I talk a lot about integration. Well, mostly she reassures me that this is what I’m doing now, that I’ve been doing it, and that I’m doing amazing, sweetie. Before even that, before I even knew what would come after those first few trips back to the US, she lovingly helped me to understand that integration was what I needed to do to feel better in myself. Betty and I met on my first trip back to the US in 10 years, when I went back to see my mother and support her during her first cancer treatment, in July of 2021. She met me during, and helped me through a very intense, transitional time of my life, by being my friend. The idea of hibernation was planted by her in my head, as that was her plan for this winter, as well.

I’m hibernating to allow for the integration of all that I’ve learned in the past year and a half about my self and my relationships with other people, how I interact in the world. This real work takes time, there is no way to rush it. My body is telling me this right now – loud and clear. In the past 18 month I’ve learned more about who I am than in the last 18 years. I have also ironically and painfully learned to accept that I have, in fact, known all along and seemed to have, for most of my life and at least since adolescence, ignored my self to some extent.

Now my task is to integrate all of these parts of my self and to learn to love them, love me, for who I am. I must learn to turn to the outside all of those learned judgements and cruelties I once pulled onto and let into myself. I must push them away, reject them, so that I may just be in my own body, living there with acceptance and love for myself, above all else, because everything else good comes from me being good in and with myself. Does that mean I have to tell all of my secrets? No, but it does mean that I have to be okay with them. I have to look at them in myself and continue to unpack them with the delicacy and love of a best friend. I can also protect my heart, from being broken, like a mother to an innocent child, not yet aware of the world beyond their loving bond.

People say that everything happens for a reason. Do they mean it; do you? Because if this is true, then maybe this is all happening for a reason – to make me slow down and relearn how to be in my body. To be me. Maybe I fell and split my head open right at my third eye, as a few friends have pointed out, so that I would literally split open my consciousness and be forced to see with a spiritual vision. Maybe it’s not just growing but ascension pains. And why not?
Doing Nothing

Dec 3rd, 2022

Oh, what a luxury it seems, to do nothing all day. The flip side of this though, is feeling like there is everything to be done and doing nothing about any of it. Lately I’ve had a throbbing head that is most noticeable when it’s silent, which is only when I lie down to sleep at night, and in the days when I’m home alone. It’s a physical and audial throbbing, accompanied by ringing in my ears as well. In short, it’s maddening. It’s distracting, it’s overwhelming, it’s tiring. It’s at the very front of my awareness and I just want it to go away. I’ve been looking for answers as to why it has come about, seemingly after the accident this past May, when it was first accompanied with terrible pain and headaches so bad that I didn’t really notice the noise. In retrospect, I realised that the throbbing started then, it was simply eclipsed by the urgency and intensity of the pain. Now that the pain has for the most part subsided, this bizarre and relentless symptom has, quite simply, begun to take over my life. It has sucked out of me any remaining motivation to be productive. I realised an unfortunate truth just the other day, which seems obvious now, that even if I figure out what is causing these symptoms, that doesn’t mean that I can do anything that will make them go away. If they are the result of what I suspect, a gradual damage to the audial nerves in my brain caused by the accident in May, there may not be anything to be done about them, or at least no quick fix. I may be looking at adjusting my expectations of how I live my life, with a slight disability even, including hearing loss and thought impairment. What a strange thing to imagine.

I am quite happy to be writing, as it give such clarity to my thoughts. More than ever before, lately I have trouble thinking about things, trouble clarifying my thoughts into action plans, for example. Simple things like what I need to do in the day, a basic sequence of events, seem elusive, and difficult to imagine. I’m forgetting words, names of common things such as a pot, or the name of a good friend. It’s like the words are there, but they are at a distance, through a fog, and I can see it’s there but can’t quite make it out. This is perhaps the best use I can think of for the french word apercevoir… to begin to perceive.

I have finally seen a doctor yesterday for this malady and have at last some reassurance. After being told by so many others that my symptoms cannot be related, that nothing is showing up as damaged, that what I have all makes sense as a whiplash syndrome, as the english-speaking french specialist told me. What a relief. I am not dying, or even worse, losing my mind. This is all a normal response to an unfortunate event. Thank god. Even the feeling of having less tolerance for simple things like loud music, background noise, light, stimulation, this is all normal, and can be treated. It will probably be many months before I am feeling better through therapy, and it will likely take a lot of work on my part, but I welcome this challenge.

I have recently realised that I have spent a lot of time feeling like things have been done to me. This accident is a real example of that, inarguably, someone hit me from behind while I was stopped at a red light. I had my foot on the brake and was tense with my hands on the wheel when someone smashed the bumper right behind me. I then got out of the car, walked towards the vehicule, a small older black SUV with dark windows, maybe an Izuzu, with Oregon plates, and as I was looking down, fidgeting with my phone to get the camera up, he took off and turned right down an alley and disappeared. Honestly, I was initially pretty pissed off as I couldn’t believe that he did that, that he would hurt someone and then just take off, but later I didn’t really care, as my sister pointed out that he probably had more to lose that I did in that accident, so fair enough. Seeing as it was on the street in Eureka, Humboldt County, CA, he could have very well had a truck full of marijuana and no insurance. A simple car accident could have ruined his life.

I ask myself now, is Izuzu even a word? At this point, I’m just working with my strange brain as best I could, maybe it is, maybe it isn’t, but that is the word and the graphic of the word that popped into my head, so I’m going with it.

Back to my recent realisation, when I realised that no matter what the diagnosis of this, or anything else, there was not going to be a magic pill to fix it. I was finally in a situation that was so physically, mentally, and emotionally intolerable that the lesson couldn’t be more clear. If I wanted to get out of this mess, I was going to have to put all of my efforts towards fixing it. And thank god I have the opportunity to do so. It’s not cancer, or a missing limb, or MS, or something else really feeling insurmountable. No matter how hard the bad days are, I’m still doing really OK. On the bad days, I need to sleep. On the good days, I’m fine, I can work, and then sleep. I am very lucky to have work that will allow me to work on my schedule and in bursts of concentrated work. I am so lucky, so blessed, so thankful that this is my chance to learn this lesson. I just have to remember this on the hard days. That’s the tricky bit about depression, about anything that effects your spirit, your soul. It tricks you into thinking about all the bad things. Its inertia wants to drag you down into the darkness, the negativity. This state of doing nothing, can in be enjoyed for what it is? It seems a kind of meditation, can I be alone with myself, with my thoughts, with my body and just enjoy the luxury of doing nothing? Can I be grateful for the opportunity, the privilege, the chance to enjoy being still? Resting, like a giant tree in winter, who knows that spring again will come and that this time must be cold and still and slow, so that in the spring he will have the strength to continue to grow and blossom again. Can I meet this challenge of slowly getting up more and rebuilding a healthy rhythm? I must, this injury, its resulting symptoms, and this diagnosis have shown me that I must, as there is no other way to for me to recover. There is no chemo, no targeted therapy, nothing. No shortcuts, no magic pills, there is only me and my will, and my messy bun and messy brain. No one is coming to save me, no mother, no father, no husband will take care of me the way I want, so desperately, to be taken care of. No this time I must look deep into myself, with love and empathy, and tell myself that I am worthy of the work, love, care, and discipline that it will take to be better. I can do it, I must do it, and I will be ok.

Tag: whiplashsyndrome

Fool Me Once

Ascension Pains

Doing Nothing