From my journal for January 8, 1996<\/p>\n
What\u2019s being most discouraging at the present moment is having no positive feelings \u2014 I can\u2019t remember what it was like to feel love.\u00a0 <\/span>There\u2019s not even a clear pain, like grief or sorrow, there\u2019s just discomfort, vague fear, isolation.<\/p>\n
I tried to tell myself that this is just a stage I\u2019m moving through.\u00a0 <\/span>But it\u2019s hard to accept when it feels so forever.\u00a0 <\/span>And I see that again I\u2019m up against the belief that if I don\u2019t know what to do to make it change, nothing will change.<\/p>\n
The only things I can think of that I know would help if I could do them more are more exercise outdoors (though I\u2019m often too sick) and more yoga.\u00a0 <\/span>I think if I could do an hour of yoga a day it would make a big difference.\u00a0 <\/span>But I find that just too hard emotionally, too hard to spend that much time with my body without the moral support of other people.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
At this point I have no idea that I’m dealing with clinical depression and trauma. My difficulty with trying to do yoga without a class for support is because I can’t regulate my nervous system by myself and need other people around.<\/p>\n
From my journal for January 9<\/p>\n
Dog woke me at 3:30, Dana got up to let her out, I had to take Nuprin to be able to sleep again.\u00a0 <\/span>This morning I feel physically uncomfortable, mentally despairing, and completely without any redeeming emotions, I have no sense of a heart or a soul.\u00a0 <\/span>What would a \u201credeeming emotion\u201d be?\u00a0 <\/span>Some sense of love, for myself or another or a cause, some sense of grief, for the losses that have left me in this place of despair.\u00a0 <\/span>Anger would bring warmth, possibly hope \u2014 anger would mean there was something in here worth fighting for?\u00a0 <\/span>I suppose there is fear \u2014 not a redeeming emotion \u2014 the cold fear that this will never change.\u00a0 <\/span>That seems to be where I am at the moment.<\/p>\n
I remind myself that this is\/must be a stage that I\u2019m passing through.\u00a0 <\/span>I say to myself Karen\u2019s phrase \u201cthat\u2019s the fear.\u201d\u00a0 <\/span>Nothing changes the discomfort in my body, the cold isolation in my mind, the emotional emptiness.\u00a0 <\/span>There\u2019s that horrible sense of having gotten down to the \u201creal truth\u201d which is the decay of the body and the isolation of the psyche.\u00a0 <\/span>All those notions that give meaning to life: that I\u2019m here for a purpose, that I\u2019m connected to other human beings, that there is a spiritual realm that I participate in \u2014 these all seem like the wispiest of foolish fantasies.\u00a0 <\/span>Well, I see that this place is a pretty good equivalent of hell \u2014 that frozen place where there is no meaning and no hope for the future. \u00a0 <\/span>Paradoxically, this makes me feel better. \u00a0 <\/span>This place has a name, it\u2019s part of the Buddhist cosmology, just one of the \u201csix worlds\u201d that we cycle through.\u00a0 <\/span>It has a familiarity, it reminds me of the cold despair of February 1971.\u00a0 <\/span>I got out of that one, perhaps I\u2019ll come out of this one.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
I think part of recognizing the Buddhist concept of “Hell” as helpful is knowing that other people have felt like I do, I’m not completely alone. Given that I was traumatized by being left alone, being able to feel connected with other people who feel like I do is a big help.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
From my journal for January 8, 1996 What\u2019s being most discouraging at the present moment is having no positive feelings \u2014 I can\u2019t remember what it was like to feel love.\u00a0 There\u2019s not even a clear pain, like grief or … Continue reading