Dance Through Trauma

June 17, 2021

My consular and I are finally talking about the lifetime incidents that all make up my PTSD. We're starting to work on the smallest traumatic incident that I can remember. We're going to go from the smallest to my biggest trauma, which was my time in 7th grade. She listed a couple of traumatic incidents that I could remember, so that we could go over each incident and work out my thoughts. We went back to a time when an ex-boyfriend of my mom, Damian's biological father, tried to drive the car off the road while my mother and my brother Jamie were in the car. Damian didn't exist yet, so this was probably in early 2012. My mother and Damian's biological father were arguing in the car, and Damian's biological father, who I will call Alex, got angry and said that he was going to drive the car off the road, which was on a hill on the way to a section of the apartments that we lived in. So, the car was going in zig-zags until Alex decided to drive normally. I was very scared, and feared that my life was going to come to an end. However, we stayed home that day. Alex apologized hours later, but it was still a scary experience. One of those early scary incidents built up a belief inside my head that says that I can not trust anybody in this world. Incidents like that showed me at a young age that people's anger can go that far to the point where it affects other people who have nothing to do with them. It also makes me sympathize with my mom because she never got a chance to experience beautiful love. Anyway, my consular suggested that I should try putting my "Trust no one." belief into an invisible box in front of me. I can acknowledge that the box is there, but what's inside the box won't be inside me. The thought will be outside of me in a box. I will know that it's there, but it will not affect me. She asked me to think about my belief of not trusting anyone. I will try to do that, so I can finally overcome that belief and just be comfortable around people anywhere without hypervigilance. I'm still not going to let anyone get too close to my heart, but I don't want to be afraid of people anymore. I just want to feel safe around people. That's what I mean by not trusting anyone. I don't feel safe near a person that I don't know or barely know because I feel that they will put my life to an end. I'm consciously not afraid of death, but subconsciously I am because it is part of my body's natural response to things. So, my fear of having my life take away by someone is planted somewhere in my subconscious due to trauma. I've been through so many incidents, so my brain has become more protective of itself to the point that it believes that it will meet death when I meet someone one. It's not only about having my life taken away by someone, but it's also about taking my own life away due to a problem that I may have with someone because of trauma. My experiences at school and online with so-called friends made me fear people even more. People like that will never go away, but what I can do is not let it affect me. They will always exist because it's just how their psychology works. I can't make their behavior disappear, but what I can do is make my fears disappear by not letting anyone affect me. I can easily do that with my character Xander, but my PTSD is taking over my brain a lot at the moment. I need to fix everything that's related to my trauma in my subconscious in order to let my true self take over my body. I really want my PTSD gone, so that I can at least get a job and help my mom with the rent and bills. PTSD isn't only a problem; it's also my generalized anxiety disorder. I was recently diagnosed with that, so it explains why I worry so much about my financial future. I don't know if I'll ever get help from social security, but I don't want to depend on them. I want the freedom to depend on myself. I want to work at a place that is easy to understand and do because complex or difficult work can be frustrating for me. Then, there comes my fear of having to work because it's something that I've never done before. However, I'll get used to it when I start going to work because my mom told me that she gets anxiety whenever she enters a new job because she fears that they will have her do something that she doesn't know how to do, but she ends up doing things that she's capable of doing and she ends up learning new things easily. I can live by myself in an apartment with my own money, but I think I will just live with my mom for the next couple of years while my siblings grow up. With both of us working and paying for our apartment, neither of us will end up homeless. I would love for us to stay in this town because people are very kind here. There are so many job openings, and affordable homes! But, we will probably move out of here and go to Georgia because it's certain my mother's boyfriend can find us and end up causing many problems. We can put a restraining order on him, but what I fear is that he will go find us and take the lives of my mother and I, and take the kids with him. Obviously, he will be arrested once he is found, but the lives of my mom and I won't ever be returned. There are many towns like this Missourian town out there, but all of the affordable places that we know of are known by my mom's boyfriend. I don't even know whether to call him her ex-boyfriend or boyfriend, but I'll just call that man whatever name comes to mind. My mom is still thinking about whether we should stay in this town or move out, but I think it's best to move away. We can go to North Carolina and live with my cousin, but my mom said that my cousin only has one small room for all of us, which won't fit all of us. However, my mother's brother is planning to move there, so if he does, then we can move there. I just want everything to be okay. Honestly, it's starting to get hard to babysit my little siblings, so my mom needs to find another babysitter. It stresses me out a lot, but I want to help out. Life is getting hard for me again, which makes me want to leave this world. I don't want my family to suffer, but how can I continue to help when I am just not meant to babysit my siblings? If I stop babysitting, then my family can suffer because my mom will either have to pay a babysitter a lot of money or have trouble with finding a babysitter. I can sacrifice myself for the family, but it's starting to get hard. I'll see how this goes but for now, let me just imagine that it all ends well. Besides, imagination is better than reality, so I will always imagine whenever something does go well in the physical universe.

- June 17, 2021