"Such is the way of the world
You can never know
Just where to put all your faith
And how will it grow?
Gonna rise up
Burning black holes in dark memories
Gonna rise up
Turning mistakes into gold"
["Rise", Eddie Vedder]
When I was younger, I never really understood trauma, because I never had a great understanding of where the human will begins and ends. I have always been a fairly strong-willed individual with a great deal of self control. I can count on one hand the number of times I can recall really losing my temper, for instance. My words are carefully measured, near always. When movies depict people screaming and panicking during a bank robbery while a gun is being waved in their face with shouts of "shut up", I can't relate. It always strikes me as stupid. They're waving a gun in your face. Shut up. Idiot.
I have often struggled with the idea of addiction as a disease, because a part of me still believes that I could divest myself of any addiction if I wanted to, through that sheer force of will. I make careful choices about what I do and don't allow myself to become addicted to, and I frequently exercise a force of will to push back against those things to reassess my ability to do so. (e.g. I've not played a video game in about seven weeks at this point, because I won't let myself.)
For years I never understood people sticking with shitty relationships, because I had decidedly ended bad relationships when I became dissatisfied with them, despite any fears I had about the loneliness of being single for those extended periods between.
So I never understood trauma. Or feeling trapped. Or being truly addicted.
Then I found myself in a relationship I allowed to persist for much longer than was healthy (for reasons I won't get into here), and understood, at last, that the world is a little more nuanced than these clear lines I used to draw around things.
And as I got older, I also came to realize the limits of my supposedly-indomitable human will. Sure, I know I should eat healthier and lose weight. But I don't do those things now do I? I have faced addictions I couldn't so readily "will away" at the drop of a hat, but struggled with instead. Is it a matter of "not sufficiently motivated", or is it indeed a case of "couldn't if I tried"?
I certainly can't will myself to be as dexterous as I once was. Or as strong. Or to have the constitution I once did. I fall asleep watching TV shows. I walk around rather than jumping up over the half-wall alongside the lawn. I have had to humbly accept these realities as I've gotten older, as much as it pained me.
In my infatuation with the clean, the clear, the precise, I have always been annoyed that rooms in houses aren't perfectly square, and that floors aren't perfectly level. I get annoyed with finding typos in things I've read and re-read a dozen times both before and after publishing.
But my mind... My mind was always my last bastion of hope. Even when I accept that there's dust on that shelf over there, and a hitch in the carpet, and something past due in the fridge, my mind and the idea of that indomitable, precisely-functioning and well-controlled will was always the sort of fall back. It was the thing that gave me comfort in this messy, messy world: the notion that my mind was clear and clean and would remain so.
Forgetfulness was always a part of the equation, sure, but I was willing to overlook that. "It's the sign of a busy mind," I would tell myself.
But trauma, I never understood. Most particularly, I've never understood lasting trauma until recent years, when I began to come face-to-face with some of my own. It's nothing big, no. There's nothing major there. There aren't horrific near-death experiences or stories of witnessing anything equally unsettling. But there are a thousand little cuts that cause a thousand errant thoughts that surface without fail in each of their specific circumstances. They are uncontrollable. They are irresistible. They just happen.
They are tiny fragments of a childhood of being bullied that see my hair rise on the back of my neck at the slightest recognition of possible violence. They are any attempt to enter water deeper than my neck without flotation device, no matter how controlled the scenario. They see a gut-wrenching fear rise in my mind I can't even describe. It's not even a thought exactly. It's not 'oh, I might drown...'. It's just 'NO!'
I was rear-ended in an intersection a year (?) ago and the car was damaged. I wasn't frightened at the time. I suffered no injuries. Within a few days the car was sorted and we weren't any money out of pocket. It was just an inconvenience, really. But now I cringe taking that particular turn in that particular intersection. And when I do I think to myself 'really?!', because in my mind it doesn't deserve to haunt me, it's too insignificant.
If I'm going to have ghosts in my closet, shouldn't there at least be stricter entry requirements?
I have often struggled with the idea of addiction as a disease, because a part of me still believes that I could divest myself of any addiction if I wanted to, through that sheer force of will. I make careful choices about what I do and don't allow myself to become addicted to, and I frequently exercise a force of will to push back against those things to reassess my ability to do so. (e.g. I've not played a video game in about seven weeks at this point, because I won't let myself.)
For years I never understood people sticking with shitty relationships, because I had decidedly ended bad relationships when I became dissatisfied with them, despite any fears I had about the loneliness of being single for those extended periods between.
So I never understood trauma. Or feeling trapped. Or being truly addicted.
Then I found myself in a relationship I allowed to persist for much longer than was healthy (for reasons I won't get into here), and understood, at last, that the world is a little more nuanced than these clear lines I used to draw around things.
And as I got older, I also came to realize the limits of my supposedly-indomitable human will. Sure, I know I should eat healthier and lose weight. But I don't do those things now do I? I have faced addictions I couldn't so readily "will away" at the drop of a hat, but struggled with instead. Is it a matter of "not sufficiently motivated", or is it indeed a case of "couldn't if I tried"?
I certainly can't will myself to be as dexterous as I once was. Or as strong. Or to have the constitution I once did. I fall asleep watching TV shows. I walk around rather than jumping up over the half-wall alongside the lawn. I have had to humbly accept these realities as I've gotten older, as much as it pained me.
In my infatuation with the clean, the clear, the precise, I have always been annoyed that rooms in houses aren't perfectly square, and that floors aren't perfectly level. I get annoyed with finding typos in things I've read and re-read a dozen times both before and after publishing.
But my mind... My mind was always my last bastion of hope. Even when I accept that there's dust on that shelf over there, and a hitch in the carpet, and something past due in the fridge, my mind and the idea of that indomitable, precisely-functioning and well-controlled will was always the sort of fall back. It was the thing that gave me comfort in this messy, messy world: the notion that my mind was clear and clean and would remain so.
Forgetfulness was always a part of the equation, sure, but I was willing to overlook that. "It's the sign of a busy mind," I would tell myself.
But trauma, I never understood. Most particularly, I've never understood lasting trauma until recent years, when I began to come face-to-face with some of my own. It's nothing big, no. There's nothing major there. There aren't horrific near-death experiences or stories of witnessing anything equally unsettling. But there are a thousand little cuts that cause a thousand errant thoughts that surface without fail in each of their specific circumstances. They are uncontrollable. They are irresistible. They just happen.
They are tiny fragments of a childhood of being bullied that see my hair rise on the back of my neck at the slightest recognition of possible violence. They are any attempt to enter water deeper than my neck without flotation device, no matter how controlled the scenario. They see a gut-wrenching fear rise in my mind I can't even describe. It's not even a thought exactly. It's not 'oh, I might drown...'. It's just 'NO!'
I was rear-ended in an intersection a year (?) ago and the car was damaged. I wasn't frightened at the time. I suffered no injuries. Within a few days the car was sorted and we weren't any money out of pocket. It was just an inconvenience, really. But now I cringe taking that particular turn in that particular intersection. And when I do I think to myself 'really?!', because in my mind it doesn't deserve to haunt me, it's too insignificant.
If I'm going to have ghosts in my closet, shouldn't there at least be stricter entry requirements?
