Dear Cali Chica:

“The roar of the child..”- what roar? The cub doesn’t roar at her mother the lioness, never !

You were scared when she roared, you whimpered in return, you didn’t roar. But you forgot that because over the years, as a teenager perhaps, you started getting feisty. You roared back some. But the fear and whimper of the early years, when you had no roar, this is the fear of every day now.

It is difficult, when we think of our childhood, to see the beginning of it, the early years, the years before you had a roar.

anita

Dear Cali Chica:

An important day, yesterday. Here are quotes from all our exchanges yesterday (I added the bold, italicized in parentheses are my added words today. I suggest you edit/ reform the following to your liking and print it for yourself):

CC: C-PTSD, fear detached from its origin... we can not truly “feel” the weight of our entire trauma, our bodies and minds protect us from it…I woke up with a text from S asking how my London trip was.  Instant dread I had. Woke up to remembering my sister texted me last night (nothing important) more dread.…If I am to relinquish the social butterfly role it is the in-the-moment fear that is key…Voice says this: .. Oh my sister hope she is doing well, sometimes I think she is a ticking time bomb.  No wait, its been months since she has been this way – in fact I AM the one who has had much more distress recently and she has been supportive.  Change the narrative….(assertive action, text sent:) “Sister – glad you had a great night.  Logging off today going to spend the day with my husband in BK.” Done… In the shower at first…dread – what will they say.  (ex. of how the healing relationship in your life works:) My husband was washing his face…He asks what’s wrong.  I tell him about the texts. He says great – what’s the problem?.. He said, c’mon this is your closest friend from college, you and her go way back, she is so supportive.  I said yes you’re right.. (ex. of mindfulness in everything:) I take the rest of my shower deliberately.. I washed my hair slowly.. deliberate change must be enforced.  In speech and in physical movement. I didn’t go check my phone abruptly right after, as I always would…I now look at my phone.  No responses.  Feeling the physical discomfort.  The shoulders tensing.  Then reminding myself that I got myself a nice massage the day before to combat this, to enjoy the results of it a little longer. We headed to Brooklyn.. I say stop. I physically stop.  I shake my head (physically) and say.  Lets not talk about this today.  Lets enjoy this view… You taught me last week that I am not assertive.  I am not assertive at all.  I can become aggressive yes, but assertive no… Since I have not been doing this, I end up with severe frustration, annoyance, and rage.  It takes a higher level ability to speak your truth in an effective way.. in a way that is safe and gentle – non attacking.

anita: Excellent mindfulness practice and three perfectly worded assertive emails… the big mother is throwing a tantrum.  What does a child do? Can’t possibly conceive being assertive with the mother, or aggressive…Instead, we are traumatized, fear takes hold of us, that dread you mentioned in your mindful recent post. We are afraid of this big, out of control mother.

CC: Yes, instead we are traumatized fear takes hold of us. Yes, and it is this fear that is detached from its primary source… Any ounce of fear in a scenario that warrants none – must be examined… So of course these friends reply in a way that is NOT my mother.  They did not respond in the way that my mother did.

anita:… You use “ROAR” sometimes. Think of .. the lioness, towering over the cub, powerful jaws, throwing a temper tantrum in front of her cub, what does the cub feel? Answer: scared she’ll kill him with those powerful jaws. The roar of the cub is small. The ROAR of his mother, well, that is scary!

CC:… The ROAR of the child is a lot less powerful than the mother… My mother made it seem that she was a child.. How quickly I still forget that she was in fact a MOTHER, and I was the cub/child!

anita:“The roar of the child..”- what roar? The cub doesn’t roar at her mother the lioness, never! You were scared when she roared, you whimpered in return, you didn’t roar. But you forgot that because over the years, as a teenager perhaps, you started getting feisty. You roared back some. But the fear and whimper of the early years, when you had no roar, this is the fear of every day now.

CC: I see the roar of others as the roar of my mother.  A fear inducing roar that can paralyze me and change my entire day, week, etc.  Feeling no power over this roar.

anita: this is it, the fear of the early years, when the mother roars at her cub: paralyzing.. After that first ROAR, that trauma of the first roar, nothing feels the same anymore, it is like time stops and … this is when disassociation happens and indeed, the emotional experience changes drastically… this is why and how nothing feels the same anymore, the day, the week, the years and decades that follow the trauma are experienced differently.

CC: Wow, what roar? Exactly right, remember my “feisty” years, teenage and on when I would talk back, “roar back.” What a misrepresentation of the roar story (lol – had to say it as it made me chuckle) What a misinterpretation of the cause and effect scenario, the hierarchy of the lioness and cub – what a mind f*** Clearly Cali Chica is not just distressed, she is confused. She is smart, and she is “knowing” of many things, but she is utterly confused.  Of who and what.Of people’s roles, priorities. What comes first? What comes second? How would she know? How should she know? By starting fresh – my assuming nothing – by going back to the beginnings…

anita: I think that your recent post is the most advanced writing you have ever done on this healing path of yours. Where you are today is a place you haven’t been before. You are understanding what it is. I am awed of you.

CC:.. There is a humbling necessary to grow, a lack of know it all. A lack of understanding. If an individual wants to start anew, needs to start fresh – it is surrendering to not knowing. To starting primitively at basics… Cali Chia is confused. She isn’t confused because she’s an idiot. She’s confused because her “guider” was cruel. Cali Chica has been misinformed and misled… She is fearful… the roar of her mother has traumatized her so deeply that she expects this roar from Many corners. She still believes her mother exists – lurking in the corners in the background – ready to attack, mock, or ridicule. So take both confusion and fear together. Both together and it’s a miracle she even moves forward. Confusion and fear together sounds to me like a lost child.. But the thing is Cali Chica is not a child. She is an adult, a hardened one. So instead of this sweet innocent child, CC is RESISTANT to change. She is a lost child yet she is resistant to being open to finding a new way…In order for her to find her way or the right path for her, she must start fresh. It is imperative she start from scratch – be fresh.”

anita

Dear/ Dearest Cali Chica:

“straight to anger and rage”- because fear is the most uncomfortable emotion there is, no emotion, no experience is more difficult to endure, more undesirable than fear.

Two patients were added to your schedule, “I fist felt anger, clenching of the jaw, tension building up in my neck and shoulders”- the muscles tense as if you are about to feel pain (this is why people tense when seeing a needle, knowing they are soon to feel that needle pierce through). The pain your brain perceived at the moment you found out about the added two patients is Fear.

Fear itself is pain. The muscles contract so to push the fear away. We go straight to anger, not noticing fear is there first. Fear of being stuck in an undesirable schedule, fear of being stuck. And then, the fear expands maybe, fear of being infertile, of having to go through a treatment, fear maybe of pregnancy itself, fear like fire, igniting available fuel.

Straight to anger, better stated: quickly to anger is a way to not experience fear.

anita