Dear Andromeda:

You are welcome, and thank you for having space in your heart at this time of bereavement to feel empathy for me.

“Today I sat with my sister – my Nephews mother –  I managed to put my own pain aside and tried to comfort her. I told her about my vision of the light, she asked me to describe it, but it was hard to put in to words; it was as though he was the centre and the light radiated from him, like the rays from a beautiful sunrise. She did take comfort in this”-

– reading and imagining your vision comforted me.

“My sister told me the last conversation that she had with her son, it was painful to hear. He was clearly distressed. He talked about growing up, how bad he had felt, not living with  his own family, etc.. he thanked my sister for all that she’d done for him, said he’d loved her. He also mentioned Diazepam”- 

– I took diazepam every day for 18 years before I finally, successfully withdrew from it. It is supposed to be prescribed on a short-term basis, I now understand (a few months at the most), because it is very addictive, but in my case it was prescribed for close to 2 decades. I wonder if he was taking it regularly at the time or was he withdrawing from it. The withdrawal from it was very, very difficult for me, almost impossible, because the anxiety while withdrawing was prolonged and more intense than the anxiety that led to me being prescribed with it to begin with.

He thanked her and said he loved her… heart breaking. I wish he was alive and well.

“It’s usually in the evenings when I go over what happened in my head, I am then overcome with a sense of terror, I’m trapped in a nightmare and I have panic attacks. I never knew that this type of pain and darkness existed – and I’ve suffered depressive episodes and Suicide thoughts, this is far worse. My whole family are devastated and that is also hard to witness.

“I want to be stronger to enable myself to help them. I am angry and ashamed with myself that I wasn’t stronger over these past few years. I could’ve made a difference. I have lost myself, withdrawn from people, suffer social anxiety. I thought I had nothing to give”-

-it is prolonged shame and anger at oneself that saps the strength out of a person, rendering one with nothing to give. I am guessing that this weakening of your strength by shame and anger-at-yourself started happening long ago, causing the depressive episodes and Suicide thoughts that you mentioned…?

No requirement that you answer this question, of course, or any question I ask. I know from my personal experience how much shame and anger at myself took out of me.. it was exhausting. As a teenager I used to lie down most of the time.. too weak or tired to do anything. Most of my life I thought I was lazy.. didn’t know I was exhausted by emotional misery (an exhausting mix of fear, guilt, shame, and anger).

anita

* You are welcome, Judy, looking forward to read from you again.