My PTSD from childhood came roaring into my life when I was 28. It was crazy. I felt like I was literally losing my mind, and I practically did at moments. I didn't have a single clue PTSD could be a result of childhood trauma to be honest. I knew it was very real for people who have been to war or badly tortured, but I don't think I was aware enough at the time to realize that's what was happening to me. I hadn't considered my own story to be traumatizing. I was just basically confused and angry, wandering around trying to help myself with no clue where to begin. Then I discovered this awesome counsellor that found the way to break it down for me in a way that made sense in my brain. She was very real with me and I appreciated that. She allowed my "light bulb" moment to happen.
It was such a loooong, grueling 4 years before I finally got a 95% handle on the anxiety this last summer. It took needing to lose everything that was ridiculously important to me, for me to start healing myself. To actually be selfish and take time to ride my horses and meditate until my mind believed I was worthy of the love and belonging I had been pushing away when PTSD slammed into me. To accept acceptance. Because horses and hippy stuff was what I needed to heal. Took me awhile to figure out that if horses and hippity dippity stuff were what reset my soul, I HAD to dedicate time to it, to heal and move on. I had to stop fighting the idea that my healing should look something like "just keep busy”, “get over it", "a couple counselling sessions and just relax is what you need" or my personal favourite the idea of "giving it time, and time will heal".
I think that time creates a space for growth. And growth heals. But you have got to allow yourself the time to grow. For me, that took Four. Freaking. Years. I had to completely lose my mind, lose everything to me, and then breathe.
I completely lost my mind because I met a boy, who I wanted to be with forever, and I knew that meant facing my past. I was finally doing the counselling and the courses and the self help crap "they" talk about. Let me tell you, that crap works. Truth! But what they don't stress enough is that it's going to be ass kicking, gut punched, teeth knocked out- kinda hard. It'll be a street fight, especially if you lack grace like myself. You'll suffer the loss of important people. But the right people will stick through all that losing the mind bit, to make it to the breathing part. When you have to spend a half a decade holding your breath, and just slugging your way through the emotions of pain, anger, frustration, anxiety, depression, and on and on. But you march on, and continue to improve until one day you realize you're breathing on your own again and that's when it's time to honour the soul and just DO what "healing" looks like to YOU.
I think that time creates a space for growth. And growth heals. But you have got to allow yourself the time to grow. For me, that took Four. Freaking. Years. I had to completely lose my mind, lose everything to me, and then breathe.
I completely lost my mind because I met a boy, who I wanted to be with forever, and I knew that meant facing my past. I was finally doing the counselling and the courses and the self help crap "they" talk about. Let me tell you, that crap works. Truth! But what they don't stress enough is that it's going to be ass kicking, gut punched, teeth knocked out- kinda hard. It'll be a street fight, especially if you lack grace like myself. You'll suffer the loss of important people. But the right people will stick through all that losing the mind bit, to make it to the breathing part. When you have to spend a half a decade holding your breath, and just slugging your way through the emotions of pain, anger, frustration, anxiety, depression, and on and on. But you march on, and continue to improve until one day you realize you're breathing on your own again and that's when it's time to honour the soul and just DO what "healing" looks like to YOU.
That breathing, "finally through the mess part", just happened for me this summer and that's when I decided to take a victory vacation and just rode horses and practised hippity stuff for about 6 months. Now I'm ready to be back in the real world, and why I reopened the dog daycare. Because I can handle my shit now. I've come full circle back to what I used to love before my PTSD came crashing through the wall like the damn kool-aid man.
Anxiety and depression, PTSD and trauma...they're ass-holes. The whole lot of them. And they force you to shut down, or get tough. I feel like both happened to me. I shut down, and then got tough. I took responsibility for my emotions, and my life. And in the end, I also got happy. I got to start over. I absolutely wish I could start over with a certain few still in my life, but it is...what it is. I can't change those people. Nor can I take back what I said, did, or how I made them feel. I can only send out love and apologies, and then hope that they understand some day. It wasn't them. It was 100% me, battling a demon with any tools I could grab on my way down.
For me, the struggle was always with anxiety. Abandonment was what I would say "we" agreed was likely the core issue, as I felt betrayed and left behind by some key people pretty young in my life. I battled with this the most, followed by guilt. Extreme guilt about being a burden, created my becoming a burden. And I always, always felt guilty the most after I had hurt someone with my anxious malfunctions and angry flashes. It was a total loss of control. And it wasn't fun. Not even in like an, ok that felt kinda good to get that off my chest, kinda way. It hurt people's feelings, emotions and souls. Trust me, malfunction doesn't begin to describe it.
And so I believe now that anxiety controls what you allow it to control. And sometimes it is a bitch to get back on the road. Emotional distress, scares me. It scares me because it took over me. And now that I have myself back, my own control...I'm better able to have a normal relationship with a man. Able to retain relationships with close friends again. And there's a few I would not have made it through that storm without. Because they knew me before the storm. They saw through the garbage my storm was tossing around, and they believed in me. Who I was at my core. So, they held onto whatever stability they could, and rode out the chaos with me. Until I was me again.
Regrettably, I lost that man this all started for, to a forceful piece of debris I couldn't redirect. But I found myself. I found the person that I wanted to become, for him. Now it's for me.
And all I had to do was get serious with nature. All along, I just had to face the storm and learn how to take the tools and skills in front of me and shield myself from the storm until it passed, and then be able to calmly within myself know that I truly deserved the love and kindness shown by others. I just needed to pass that love and kindness on.
And with that, I decided that how I wanted to continue to serve others, was through the connection to animals and self. It's always been nature for me.
So.
Here's my offer.
An anxiety and dogs, breathing and meditation, arts and crafts, let's get calm and creative type course. A "Do it for You" kinda day.
Free.
That's it, no catches. I want to donate my time as a trainer, and bring in my friend who is a yogi, to help us all catch a little zen.
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This can only accommodate around 8 individuals. So please, please be patient if we can't get everyone in the first course. We really are excited to see how this course plays out, so we can see about moving forward with it in the future as a regular thing. Please call, email, message or drop in to sign up for this course or express interest. We will announce a date once we determine the interest level. Thank you all.
Here's my offer.
An anxiety and dogs, breathing and meditation, arts and crafts, let's get calm and creative type course. A "Do it for You" kinda day.
Free.
That's it, no catches. I want to donate my time as a trainer, and bring in my friend who is a yogi, to help us all catch a little zen.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
This can only accommodate around 8 individuals. So please, please be patient if we can't get everyone in the first course. We really are excited to see how this course plays out, so we can see about moving forward with it in the future as a regular thing. Please call, email, message or drop in to sign up for this course or express interest. We will announce a date once we determine the interest level. Thank you all.
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