Own your story, but don't resign to it.
The journey from hiding every tear to not at all being ashamed of crying in the most public of places and letting everyone know exactly where I am weakest was not a short one; and it came with its fair amount of detriments and failures along the way. Thinking back, I have been sharing parts of my journey and trying to be 'open' for years, but it is only in the past year or so that sharing has become a holistically healing path. I was first interviewed for an educational TV program back in 2014, and my instagram dates back to before that with what can seem to be openness and truth. Which it was, I hid nothing and was not scared to share the depths of what I was going through, but the motivation for that sharing and the effect it had on me were very different to my motivation and the resulting effects today.
Motivation vs Determination
The reason I made this distinction is that I realised motivation is a fickle thing. We applaud people for being motivated, saying they are go-getters and high achievers because they have high levels of 'motivation'. But over a year, month, week, day, or even a single workout, motivation waxes and wanes. If we always relied on motivation to get things done, what happens when you don't sleep well, feel a little sick, an easier offer pops up, and motivation for something that is usually high has bottomed out? This is where if the task is high priority, determination steps in.
A day in the life of PTSD.
With my heart pumping hard and muscles unable to let go, I am incapable of doing anything yet. I know this will pass if I let myself feel it, but the act of lying here, in such pain, stuck in my mind with no one able to help; it's torture. I have spent all night reliving the memories I have been trying to push back into the dark recesses of my mind for years. After a trigger, night time is where they come back out. When my conscious guard is down and my subconscious reminds me just how much trauma I still have to work through. In the early hours of this morning, my mind brought forth another new one. Another memory from my past that up until now had been locked away and forgotten. A memory that had me waking up with a scream in my throat; but these screams are almost always stifled by the dry heaving they provoke.
A day in the life of a carer.
Some of the best advice I got was to speak of my child and the illness separately. Her illness didn’t define her, and it was the illness, not her, who was wreaking havoc with our lives. Our beautiful daughter Simone was still here. Our job was to love and care for her while we battled this illness together. It is a long journey and definitely a dirt road with many pot poles and dead ends. My hope and prayer that sustained me was that each day we battled through with Simone was another day with her still here, and another day closer to beating this damn thing!