The flumpy part is back.
There’s a storm coming and my right shoulder is all pinched up. My neck is stiff. A bunch of clients called out last-minute. I spent too long looking at screens. I know better, but sometimes dissociation and hyperfocus make a great team.
Now I feel like a human crab. When I close my eyes, she is so cranky that it’s close to funny, a caricature. Arms crossed high, mouth and forehead pointing towards one another. She just doesn’t feel GOOD. Might as well stomp her foot.
For as much as I professionally have to talk about tolerating discomfort, it is still an ongoing practice for me. I still struggle to give her space, and I still struggle to like her. If she’s at the surface too long, I’ll start to drown. But if I drag her back down in an effort to resurface, she’ll just make some other part of my body hurt, or make me short with my housemates, or worse.
So I wash my face, flump onto the bed, and let her breathe for a little while. She’s tired, and she hurts, and she misses the parts of her old life that felt easy and safe, and there are so many things to always have to do, and if we forget them, we’ll fuck something up, and we can’t be trusted, and what if we’re being an inconvenience, and if we could just stay in this low-pressure storm system forever, we wouldn’t have to face the intensity of reality and we wouldn’t have to disappoint anybody.
Whew. I take a long, slow breath. She is having some big feelings. I notice how wildly uncomfortable I am with them. I notice the sensation that feels like buzzing but also not at all like buzzing pressing up against the top of my ribcage. I notice and remind myself that I can tolerate it, and then I pay closer attention to it, and then it starts to shiver away. I squeeze her shoulder. It’s okay to feel all those ways. You have a lot of worries. You feel scared and alone. You’re in pain and worn out; let’s drink some water and put a movie on.
I’m right here with you and it’s going to be okay.
And then, just like that, a softening opens my chest. This is all she needs. This is all I once needed, but did not receive.
We’re both in the boat, and no one has to fight to breathe.