High and Uncomfortable

 

The Korean Demilitarized Zone (DMZ), is a strip of land that runs along the border of both North and South Korea. It’s the “buffer zone” according to Wikipedia, that was agreed on when they ended the Korean War. 

“The DMZ is also littered with landmines planted over the decades - as many as 970,000 in the southern part alone, according to Landmine and Cluster Munition Monitor, a Geneva-based civic group.” https://www.reuters.com/article/us-northkorea-usa-southkorea-dmz-factbox/factbox-some-facts-about-the-dmz-separating-the-two-koreas-idUSKCN1TV071

There are soldiers on both sides, and this is the only way they were able to come to any sort of peace after a horrible war. 

What is even crazier is that where there have not been soldiers, bombs, and tanks the wild life has taken over in the DMZ. Korea is a beautiful country. But because it’s leaders couldn’t agree on governance the entire country was split into two and has experienced a great deal of trauma.

The war was awful and there are Veteran’s that are still working through what they did and what they saw.

Trauma is like that. When something terrible happens, like war, it affects so many things big and small. I think that the DMZ is a great analogy of what a trigger is like for a person that is dealing with complex trauma.

So, I live in a condo, and generally I feel safe but the last few nights I have been woken up by a neighbor. Screaming and yelling, slamming doors, at all hours of the night. The first night this happened we called the police to do a “Well Check” and asked to be anonymous. 

Then it happened again and I did call the police but they were too busy and I hung up. ( I know, I know, I know!) My actions are deplorable. 

Over those two days I would drift to sleep only to be woken again by doors slamming. They have a six month old in their home. As I am writing this down it’s hard to write down my experiences because I realize they are shadowed by what is going on in the home next to mine…

I don’t want to take away from their or anyone's personal experiences, but I don’t live there. I can only reach out to the authorities or give my neighbor resources that I know about. (I am gonna do it, this is convincing me, because I could live with myself otherwise).

Even if I hadn’t been through my own stuff as a child. I think it would be inhuman not to be affected by this. 

Where I work, and again I can’t believe how slow I am at putting two and two together. We talk about energy, I have been talking about my energy and wanting to bring it up so that I can feel uplifted and fulfilled and maybe motivated to be healthier. I didn’t think about when that energy is too high. When I get triggered, (when anyone gets triggered #notspecial) there are three way I react, (again scientifically ALL people do this, ha, ha I am normalizing here give me a sec) 

1. Flight- this is where I want to just escape my problems, I feel like this is my “victim” stage (this is just my opinion I have no science for this one). Basically, I feel like something sucks and I am stuck, I want to get away, and when I can’t I pull inwards and don’t engage. I think about this with parenting, and it looks like a kid holding up a picture and not looking at it (I actually did that yesterday) It could mean feeling like a new hair cut or apartment, or even a relationship. I am thinking that maybe this is where people think escaping life through death by suidide is less painful (again why that makes sense but I never put the two together #Iamalotofslow). 

I think this is where people get into substances (I could be wrong) or in my case you play a stupid phone game with baby dragons (they are so cute though) instead of making dinner of cleaning a messy house (yep). Wow, I realise I do this a lot, ugh.

2. Freeze- #deerinheadlights, yeah this one is rough. I think of when I would watch something scary and I would be too afraid to get off the couch to go to the bathroom. (I had to go so bad!) I think freeze is when, for me, my anxiety is so high that I have an anxiety brain freeze (spiritual brain freeze). My brain needs a reset button or something idk. It sucks. Is it horrible and I hope no one goes through this one because afterwards you just ask yourself, “Why did I just let (x) happen to me.”  I think of Elizabeth Smart and a story she shared after all her abuse and suffering, she was cornered in a bathroom by some strangers, and they were aggressively talking to her about something, and she was lucky because nothing happen, she just froze and her sister came and helped her (or her sister was with her). After that Elizabeth told herself she would never let something happen to her. Freeze is awful and anyone that has experienced abuse has been in freeze mode, like I said your brain and body freeze up and doesn’t work, and it sucks.

3. Fight- so that brings me to the last reaction to stress and back to the beginning of my story. Back to Elizabeth Smart after her incident in the bathroom, she was so angry that she let someone attack her, again. She decided that it would never happen again and that she would fight anyone that attacked her from now on. 

Well, I understand that but I have also learned that years after trauma, there are ripple effects that the land in the DMZ might heal in places be there are still bombs all over the place and soldiers everywhere! Even if on the outside the land looks like this… there are other parts that don’t. 

So when I woke up in the middle of the night to my neighbor’s domestic disputes, I jumped up and snuck downstairs, and checked my locks were secure. Then I called the cops. I was scared, and triggered in the moment. I was not in a place of empathy but had my own  to worry about. 

The worst part is that if this was the end of this story I could easily fix that. I could call Child protective services and let them know that happened, and pass some information to my neighbor. (I think I will work on that) 

I was triggered by this and it led me to lash out. My Dad, my husband, my kids and my dog and cat.

I was angry all day yesterday and wanted to hit something. So, I did with my words. I was in full fight mode and until about an hour ago had no idea why I was so angry.

That’s the other thing, there is no metal detector for personal triggers. Yelling is a trigger of mine. I hate hearing it, yet I personally yell when I lose control and am angry. I wish there were some ways I could “detect” these triggers, and my Therapy friends probably have lots of tools for that. But, sometimes you have “crazy” drunk neighbors that scream in the middle of the night. 

Sometimes, a facial expression reminds you of an argument or whatever. I think that as important as raising my energy is. I think energy need balance and I also need to work on what to do when I have become “High and Uncomfortable” 

So, I think that I would like to work on balancing my energy, and knowing that it will rise and then once I am done with all the amped up adrenaline it will fall below normal.

I think therapy talks about all this (okay I know it does) but this is my journey and if I want to improve my life and win, I have to be honest, this is one of those things that will happen for the rest of my life, maybe the dips will get less extreme, but even if I don’t have neighbors on the other wall, I will only have to look at facebook news and see that there is a lot of stuff that can trigger negative reactions, and that my work on myself will only help me as a person, as a wife and mother and as a friend. 

So, on we go.