“There's just too much that time cannot erase...” (font issues addressed)

I have discussed my issues with strong emotions before. I was told, like so many people, that I could go to my room until I was fit to be with people. I never learned how to deal with really strong emotions other than to stuff them away and pretend that they didn’t exist.

I know that isn’t terribly healthy.

This is what my therapist and I have been working on recently. I am working on the idea that there is no such thing as inappropriate emotions. There is no such thing as emotions that are too strong. What I am supposed to do is the following:

·      Look at the emotions I am feeling

o   (Hello emotions).

·      I am supposed to examine why I might be feeling said strong emotions.

o   (“Fear is the path to the dark side. Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering.”  - Yoda)

·      And then I am supposed to check with another person involved in the situation about how I am feeling.

o   (Hey friend-of-mine, I am feeling forgotten and marginalized, here’s why. Thoughts?)

This process has not as easy as writing it out is. I am pretty good at noting I have emotions. I am fairly good at knowing why I am feeling an emotion. I can’t detach from it and talk about it. At least I was unable to do so today.

Hmmm, let me think of a good example. There was something that came up this morning that made me do some thinking.

A number of years ago I was part of a Dickens’ group. I believe I have discussed it before. I feel like I poured my heart and soul into this group. I tried to make myself useful, so I wasn’t just a member of the cast. I fed people and trucked in water. After three years of providing food and water, I found out, at the close of day cast party, that my ex-husband’s current spouse was going to be moving into a larger role in the group. Because of the way I was told and the way I felt treated, I made the assumption that I would not be welcome the following year.

A number of personal issues happened in the year following that cast party, so I never directly asked. I did not participate at Dickens’ fair for the next three years and when I did return, I joined a different group. I am going into my tenth year with them. While it hasn’t been all smooth sailing, I can’t imagine a better cast for me.

However I realized that I have a great deal of anger and frustration left over from things I think happened thirteen years ago. Because of those feelings, I have made number of choices and decisions based on suppositions.

A couple of years ago I had some problems in my current group and I simply assumed that they would want me to leave, that they wouldn’t want my drama. (I failed to take into account that I wasn’t the sole cause of the issues, I didn’t examine what was causing my fear and while I did discuss it with other people if I was checking perceptions, I wasn’t listening when they told me that they didn’t want me to leave.

I hadn’t really thought about this process until this morning. A friend and I were talking about another friend who we think may be feeling marginalized . I don’t know what is going on or if they are really feeling that way, but it made me think about how easy it is for one’s personal baggage to take a neutral situation and make it feel like something negative.

This came up for me again later this morning. There was a situation that came up (about which I will be deliberately vague) where I have some very bad associations. I reacted with cold anger. I just don’t want to deal with my anger any more. I know that I might be taking a neutral situation and allowing it to be very negative. However I know why I’m feeling the way I do and while it would be very nice to check how I am feeling with someone, I have the feeling the overall opinion of people would be that I am better off just walking away from a situation where I feel such anger.

At the moment, I am sitting down and thinking. I spent the morning in a cold burn and frustrated. I was unable to get my day started on time. Thankfully my tardiness was not a problem (it normally would have been).

My therapist, the one who talked to me about dealing with my emotions, suggested that I don’t make any decisions for the next few weeks. There is a lot of change and motion going on in my life and so this isn’t a time to make final choices.

I understand her point, but today hurt. It is so much easier to stuff my emotions and walk away than to process through the bad associations and work this out with the others involved. There is a lot of stress in my life and dealing with these emotions today was crap. Dealing with it while I am trying to deal with other stresses is not how I wanted to spend my day.

I don’t know what to do anymore. I am worried that I am making an assumption like I did back with that Dickens’ group, that because I’m in a negative space I am taking a neutral situation and making it much worse than it is. On the other hand, I think that leaving that Dickens group was probably for the better, as much as I miss being a part of it.