I have been stuck in a living hell for the last six months. Not to over dramatise the situation but it has been really awful.
The trauma that I suffered because of mum’s death is more complicated than I want to go into but it left me with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). This meant that my brain was broken. For a long time I couldn’t close my eyes or look at my hands without replaying the traumatic images in my head. Smells would leave me being unable to breathe. I couldn’t sleep and if I did I would wake gasping for air and gripping my upper arms hard enough to bruise them. I lost my appetite and felt permanently nauseous. I was terrified of seeing people just in case they said anything that caused the images to replay. I couldn’t watch television or cope with loud noises. My brain felt like it was constantly fizzing. As time went on, I felt depressed and defeated by the situation and wondered how I could go on.
People were sympathetic but because I couldn’t explain what was really happening for fear of replaying the images, their sympathy only isolated me further. When people said that it was understandable because both parents had died so close to each other I felt like a fraud. You see I’m a bit hard. I don’t cry. I don’t have an issue with death.
Instead of normal but extreme grief I have been dealing with a constant video playing behind my eyes that left me feeling useless, out of control and not safe.
Some people would give up, drink, take drugs and pull the duvet over their head. I used to fight giants so I walked, drank water, did yoga, swam, ate three meals a day whether I fancied them or not and practised mindfulness.
It is only available privately, so I found wonderful Helen at the Silver Street Clinic. I’ve had eight sessions with her, with only three of them being EMDR. In the first we talked about what had happened and how I was feeling. The second gave me strategies for dealing with the anxiety symptoms. The third and fourth were EMDR sessions, after which I felt able to go back to work. The images were mostly under control and we locked them in a box. In the fifth we talked about my difficult return to work but decided that it was alright to stop treatment.Then I cleaned my mum’s kitchen cupboards and the videos started to play in my head again along with a return to bruising myself in my sleep. Those images refused to stay in the box. Session six was to assess what had happened and a few more coping strategies. On the seventh visit we got distracted talking about death in general and things that can’t be changed. On Tuesday I had the EMDR session that fixed me. The images came out of the box, we turned them black and white and dealt with the difficult emotions in a safe way.
Everyone has heard of PTSD in terms of soldiers coming back from war. We know that it’s an anxiety disorder caused by witnessing traumatic events. It's not so common in every day life. Mostly, us humans are very efficient at dealing with seeing an isolated trauma. Our brains have mechanisms which allow us to file the event away in a safe way. Much of this work is done while we are asleep. We dream and our brains relieve the trauma in different ways. Usually, while we sleep the amount of nor-adrenaline released is reduced and so relieving the trauma in REM sleep is safe. In patients with PTSD this mechanism of the brain in broken and instead even more of this anxiety inducing chemical is released.
I referred to the time from Mum's diagnosis to her death as the Great Elephant Wars of 2018. The whole thing was like fighting the proverbial elephant in the corner. Something that you shouldn't really mention but had to constantly fight. It wasn't a real war, though and I was furious at myself for being so weak to have been this troubled by the situation. Helen explained that your brain is like a filing clerk and because of how busy I was (still fitting in concerts, clubs and pupil exams alongside wanting to care for Mum and grieving Dad) my filling clerk was overwhelmed. It had an over full in-tray and was really beginning to panic about ever getting on top of the job. Then the traumatic death occurred generating a black sack full of paperwork but there was no room in the in-tray so my brain and it's desk got buried in papers to file. It broke.
EMDR (Eye Movement De-sensitisation and Reprocessing) therapy works by simulating what your brain does during dream sleep. Your eyes are moved from side to side while you visualise the trauma. You can follow a light, be tapped on the knees or have beeps played into alternating ears (which worked best for me). A skilled therapist takes you through the visualisations and asks you what you are feeling and where. They use techniques like turning the image black and white which help to keep you feeling safe. You can stop at any time you want. It is like some sort of voodoo magic.
I came out of the last session and knew I was fixed. I felt hungry for the first time in six months and realised that I didn't feel sick anymore. I could go into Marks and Spencers without my heart pounding in my chest (I bought myself a pain au chocolate because I fancied it). There was a spring in my step and I noticed that I felt happy. Since then I have been able to watch TV and sit in the staff room. My head feels lighter and the Long Suffering Husband has commented that I have lost the 'haunted' look. I can feel that my smile reaches my eyes. I'm sleeping properly (except for Thursday night when I was like a kid at Christmas and couldn't wait to wake up and start the next day). I have been bouncing all over the place and decided to write this blog and over-share just in case you hadn't noticed.
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