Photo by Timothy Eberly on Unsplash

💟 #9

In praise of………. learning resilience

This morning I received a text that shocked me to me core, with its content sending me right back to being 11 years old; the text concerned my own 11 year old son being mean & unkind to one of his friends to the point where I knew his friend was feeling bullied. Whilst I advised my what he’d done was unacceptable & needed to put things right, all I could think of was being that child my son had been so unkind to & it brought back the painful memories I thought I’d dealt with.

It all started when I started at senior school & having won a scholarship to attend a private girl’s school outside my area. Having tried hard to fit in to this new environment & make friends, I found it hard since many of the girls seemed to know one another already. As I wasn’t very confident in those days, I began to feel like an outsider very quickly.

Within a few weeks, I had been involved in a fight with another girl who had either said something very unkind or taunted me about something which made me see red. In seconds, I found myself punching & kicking her to the ground with such force she quickly conceded. Although I felt pleased that I’d seen off this challenge, the bullying didn’t stop, it merely was delivered in a different form. Indeed it was clear to me that from that moment on, my card was now "marked". I found myself the subject of verbal abuse as well as finding that things would mysteriously go missing from my desk or my bag which I then couldn’t explain.

In the days, weeks & months that followed, I tried to keep my head down & hoped nothing else would happen. Thankfully we didn’t have mobile phones in those days so at least I had some respite until the next day. Fortunately I did manage to make some friends who made the days bearable, but they too were ostracised at times for whatever attribute the bullies felt was unacceptable or different.

Each & every day was a challenge for me, primarily because I kept it to myself, I never told anyone about it, because I felt I had no one to turn to; my Dad was ill with Crohn’s disease & had almost died several times during my life & my Mum was anxious & depressed. In addition, they’d worked hard & sacrificed much to send me to this school to get a good education, how could I possibly tell them how miserable it was for me ?

Recently I heard a presentation given at a TEDx event by a lady Claire Wilson1 who explained that the big question children ask themselves continually without realising it is “am I safe ?” If not, they will go into flight or flight mode as a means of survival which is a  process is known as “neuroception”. When I heard Claire describe it, I felt the tears form & roll down my face as finally it explained why I felt like I couldn’t confide in anyone when being bullied; in essence, I felt that my parents were unavailable & “unsafe” to confide in no matter how much they might have reasoned otherwise ?

Although many years have passed since I attended school I wonder if you can imagine how I felt when I was invited to a school reunion by a friend who as it turned out didn’t go ? Having left school, I swore I’d never go back & give anyone the opportunity to humiliate me like they had all those years ago & yet here I was feeling the tension & apprehension rise within me.

In the end I summoned my courage & decided to go because I was now a different person. I went & had a good time as well as feeling pleased with myself I’d finally conquered my demons & moved on…… that was until I received a message this week of plans for another reunion.

I was shocked, but perhaps not surprised that the same anxious feelings resurfaced with the message & the text that I received this morning. I now know that time does not heal our old wounds, our bodies just supress our painful emotions & our minds look for something to distract ourselves to make ourselves feel better. 

The Grief Recovery Method2 has taught me that such strategies are only ever a short term as the painful feelings don’t go away, they just lay dormant until such times when they re-surface like today. Fortunately for me, I’m now very much aware of this & I count myself lucky to have the tools & the strength to address my fears, but most importantly take the necessary positive action……

Whilst my story may make some people feel uncomfortable, it is not my intention to make anyone feel bad or seek to blame or shame anyone for what happened in the past. I fully accept that those involved may not even know how their actions made me feel & the isolation I felt. This sadly influenced my thoughts to the point where I never felt never good enough which in turn undermined my overall mental health & wellbeing.

For many years my mantra has been “what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger”

I still believe this to a certain extent having suffered a nervous breakdown after my mother’s failed suicide attempt & the feelings of Imposter Syndrome, the perfectionism, etc. However all of these things make me the person I am today. I now not only “own” these feelings, I’ve decided to talk about them as unless we do, we will still regard difference as being negative & to my mind it is a gift that should be celebrated.

In conclusion, its taken a long time to become emotionally resilient & through the Grief Recovery Method I’m now able to let the pain of my emotions go. Indeed I can at last “feel the fear & do it anyway” as Susan Jeffers book advocates, but in contrast I’m working towards her lesser known book “End the struggle & dance with life”3. I now know that this is where I want to be & the life I want for myself, perhaps you do too ? 💟

References

1. “Grounded: Discovering the Missing Piece in the Puzzle of Children’s Behaviour”, Claire Wilson (2018)

2.“The Grief Recovery Handbook 20^th Anniversary Expanded Edition” John W. James & Russell Friedman (2009) William Morrow; an Imprint of Harper Collins Publisher

3. “End the Struggle & Dance with Life: How to Build Yourself Up when the World Gets you Down” Susan Jeffers (1996) Hodder & Stoughton

 photo by Ian Espinosa www.unsplash

Blog #8

The "Invisibles"

Life after the suicide of someone close to you is one of those things where, perhaps not surprisingly, there seems to be a resistance to accepting what has happened; whilst this may have been labelled by some as “denial”, sadly there is no denying that such an event has taken place & having to live with the consequences of a decision that someone else took.

So what do you do, other than endlessly going around in circles, perhaps trying to fathom out why, as well as what you did or didn’t do, ask yourself the “if only” questions…….. such as if only they’d said something or they’d loved you enough to stay & get through whatever was troubling them ? Sadly you never get answers & so it goes on, day after day with little respite, swirling round inside your head & for me, despite trying to distract myself, it inevitably seeped into my psyche threatening to undermine & define me going forward……  

Trying to break this cycle, & pick up the shattered pieces of your life feels almost impossible especially when there is a huge, person shaped hole left in your life & everywhere you turn there are reminders of that person, a life lost & what could have been. In my case, I just tried to carry on as best I could, quietly struggling inside & suppressing all of my feelings. Despite outwardly giving the impression that all was well, I often felt like I was taking two steps forward three steps back emotionally & eventually the weight of this brought me to an abrupt halt one morning many years later. I broke down unable to carry on & in spite of having suicidal thoughts, I knew that wasn’t the answer. Thankfully I manage to summon up enough courage to ask & get help, although it has been a long road to recovery from the pain of the loss I experienced, I am there albeit there are days when I feel sad, which I now know is normal & natural.

Whilst my experience is no worse than anyone else’s & technically I wasn’t bereaved by suicide, the Mum I knew & loved died in 1986 & never returned, so she died, albeit that I had to then live through her physical departure 25 years later in 2011. The point is that it happened, but officially it didn’t & we as a family were effectively “invisible”, left to our own devices without support even though there wasn’t much of that 30 years ago anyway.

In a world where thankfully we are beginning to talk more about suicide & its prevention, it is not really surprising that no one seems to be aware of or wants to talk about what happens when suicide goes badly wrong. This may be because currently it is difficult to address the current situation of recorded suicides, where on average 17 happen each & every day in England or perhaps because it is so shocking, so distressing, & so difficult to talk about that I would imagine most people want to distance themselves from it as far as possible, me included for a time ! However I now believe it is something we must talk about if we are ever to try to understand & help others who have been affected by suicide, however it touches & affects them, because ultimately it affects everyone in some way.

Consequently I feel compelled to raise & highlight this seemingly “invisible” issue, in the hope that it will help others who may be struggling as well as illustrate that you can learn to not only live, but also be happy, after such a tragic life experience. I have been there & although circumstances will be different for everyone, I imagine the impact to be similarly devastating & I wouldn’t wish that on my worst enemy.