On one hand, we have a movement going around Mental Health Awareness.
A lot of innovation is happening, dialogues around emotional health are coming to the main stage, tech play especially with the use of chatbots is happening.
And yet, from time to time - I have seen the struggle, the discomfort with which we approach conversations around self-harm, suicide, depression and other mental health ailments.
Being on the neurodivergent spectrum does not mean that you are weak or anything less than anyone else, it's just makes your strengths and weaknesses different from others.
It makes you, you.
And if we cannot have honest conversations about "you", about ourselves - what the hell are we even doing?
Throughout my life, I have been trying to find answers to the gravity like claws I feel within my body - what is their origin? why does it feel that way in my body?
And through more than a decade long journey of self-discovery, I have tried to find my own answers.
Writing ofcourse, have been one primary way of indulging in dialogues about self. Meditation, travelling, music, therapy are few other tools which have helped me find my own narrative, meaning of these feelings I live with.
I will turn twenty-seven in two months and I want to start living the life I constantly dream of and that starts from doing the little things I can for myself and people around me.
Been inside the therapy room for the past three years almost - I have learnt a name too for all the questions I have been asking - CPTSD.
CPTSD = complex post traumatic stress disorder and I have been living with it since childhood. Now, I am not a fan of labels but I do find them functional in allowing to create some structure and meaning around the metaphorical dimensions of my life.
What is it like to live with CPTSD?
It's like living with a gun pointed at your head at every breathing moment of your existence, constantly feeling scared that someone might pull the trigger and you'll die. The end of you is constantly sitting next to you.
So you do make friends with pain eventually and you learn to be more empathetic towards those around you. You become tenacious and more and more resilient.
That's one side of it, on the other side - there is constant dread of living with your stripped dignity, of the constant helplessness.
Origins of CPTSD in my life
Well, there are many, not just one. For now, I will share the one gruesome origin which I would never want anyone in this world to go through. Never.
I was in high school, in ninth standard and growing up with a different value system. A lot of what I was learning was through books and at that point, Gandhi's memoir piqued a lot of curiosity for me.
So I made it my personal mission to work and solve all social evils around me. That was a very heavy mission for a thirteen year old boy. Nevertheless Gandhian philosophy could spark that light in me and I let it go on.
And one day, I had an argument with one of the school bullies and it turned out to be
a painful memory which continues to live in a my body as a constant trigger for my panic attacks
I was locked up in an empty room, ten other boys surrounded me - I still felt strong in the initial moments, before the kicks and punches started throwing in and I was lying on the floor, helpless, crying - tears dint show up infront of him because I dint want to let him know that he has successfully stripped me off all my shreds of dignity, even while lying on the floor - helpless, I dint want him to win.
None from the ten boys came forward to help, I dint even know how to ask for help - I just wanted to save whatever little of my self worth I could after lying on the floor, kicked mercilessly.
I just wanted to save myself. Only I could.
It still takes a toll to go back to that memory and relive it. My brain pauses. A lot of pieces get blurred or blank.
I have never really felt angry towards him because I don't believe inflicting pain can let your own pain go.
But I do have wanted to feel strong, I do have wanted to figure out a better self-defence than Gandhian methods. They don't work in today's world. I am not sure if they worked then too.
Coping with the internal pain
As I said that was just one vortex, one origin from the many which have left my body in the state of trauma.
And healing is a life long process. I would not say I have come out on the other side of trauma because now these origins too are an important part of my identity.
And yes, it's a constant struggle.
I have yet figured a few coping mechanisms which help me go on - one of them is constantly listening to my body because a lot of these memories live within a body as subconscious signals and sometimes completely unrelated things trigger these.
I try to untangle the past and present, it's very difficult but I try. The imprints of past trauma last long.
That'd be my rant for today. Thank you for reading.
Book Recommendation: Body Keeps The Score
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