been a while

i haven't posted in a while. partly it's because i've been having bad fibro, and i still don't have a good desk chair, so i get tired pretty fast when i sit at my desk. partly, it's because the parts who have been out lately haven't been as interested in writing, or if one part wants to write something, someone else has another idea of what to write about and then there's conflict, so nothing gets written.

or maybe it's that the parts who have mainly been out aren't ones who have been on the blog much so they don't feel as comfortable writing? not sure.

i miss the things i used to do, and by that i mean things i was doing just a few months ago.

in terms of an update, we wound up thinking about the reasons s. had for not taking our insurance any more, and they made sense. and also, we figured that if she's willing to see us for a copay that is less than half what she was getting from the insurance company, odds are she isn't actually trying to get rid of us. so on the up side, we'll still be seeing her for therapy. on the down side, that's $200 a month we have to spend now that we didn't have to spend before. but there is another positive: i applied for food stamps, and they are giving me... $200 a month. so it works out even, pretty much. so that's good.

one thing happening is that parts have been struggling with memories and being triggered. one thing we've realized is that the triggers from present stuff are especially powerful because we don't actually remember the stuff that made it triggering. not sure if that makes sense. i explained it to w like this: let's say i went to the circus, watched a bunch of clowns, and then got stepped on by an elephant. but i blocked out being stepped on by the elephant, and just remembered how painful it was. so now, every time i see clowns, i'm afraid of the pain of being stepped on by an elephant. so clowns are what's scary. but really, the problem was the elephant.

so i kind of think if i can get to the point where i remember the elephant, then the clowns won't be nearly as upsetting.

the problem is, it's hard to stop blocking out memories. it's one of those things i have done for so long, and it's such a habit to keep myself from remembering things. and i have a lot of fears about remembering things, too. and i used to get such positive responses from NOT remembering, and it's hard to let go of that. plus, there's the fear that i'm making it up.

i guess that's something to think about. intellectually, i don't really believe the false memory people are right. they just come across as people who are trying to keep things hidden, and who are trying to keep people from finding out about bad things.

but at the same time, i can think of a bunch of things that i used to think were just nightmares i had, and then someone in my family will describe something that happened, and it's like... oh. that wasn't a nightmare. that really *happened* pretty much exactly as it did in the recurring nightmare.

so it seems like i would then be more willing to believe the *other* "nightmares" i have that are like those are also true. but in a lot of ways, i don't want them to be true. but at the same time, maybe realizing they are true is the only way to reduce their power. on the OTHER hand, realizing the things i now know are true are true hasn't reduced their power. those things are still upsetting for me.

so that's part of what's going on, at least right now.