sadness, hurting, and also body stuff

we are having a really hard time.  there’s just no energy and no ability to get anything done and yet we are surrounded with so many things we need to do.  there’s even some pressure (mostly pressure we put on ourselves but not necessarily so far off of reality that the pressure is there in other forms outside us) to get some things done around the house and stuff.  it’s just so damn hard  lately.

i think it’s cuz we’ve been working so very hard in therapy and it is taking its toll on us.  i guess we’re supposed to expect or at least be able to cope with the after effects of therapy but it is so so hard and painful and so exhausting.  we are wondering if we need to pull back some and slow down some of the stuff but we think others inside are just focused on pushing harder and pushing forward on things and that we can cope with it.  well some of us think not!  the sadness entrenches us.  how do we get rid of it? i mean besides making it go away but really it doesn’t go away just somewhere buried inside.

we think too all this therapy and crap is just too much for the other Julies as they just get so worn out easily by lots of stuff and especially since they are kind of working through some of this with us, well ya know, vicariously working through the stuff they know about and are aware of.  it doesn’t take too much emotions and therapy stuff to totally wipe out the Julies if they can’t stay far enough away from it.

we are wondering if we need to do a forced dissociation in order to get stuff done but not sure how long it would really last.  but like in therapy when things are too much or have hit a strong triggering point where the ones pushing to do the talking and telling and emotions and stuff have pushed as far as they can against the ones trying to keep everything silent and nothing happened its not true and all that stuff, well, a weird kind of jolt and snap and jerk of the head and boom we are totally fine and nothing happened, it’s not true, no feelings, nothing, just utter and totally fine and okay and perfectly normal with no problems and no issues.  so like maybe we need to try and use that as sort of a forced thing when we’re like this.  not sure if we can but maybe we could try and see.   and we have no idea if we can control it like that but guess it is worth trying.  but doing any of that by itself takes energy too.  and we have so little of it.  so little physical and so very little emotionally at this point too.

it really sucks being anemic too and we need to schedule an appt with our regular dr. because looking online it talks about how it is important to find out the cause of it.  maybe then we can actually get our vit b12 and folic acid and vit d and whatever else needs to be checked as possible causes of anemia.  we’ve been wanting our vit b12 and vit d checked for so long but always afraid to just ask outright and afraid if the dr. says no b/c for whatever reason it isn’t “medically necessary” or they don’t want to b/c we didn’t convince them enough that it is merited then we are screwed in the future and will have to prove so much harder that it is medically necessary to have evaluated.  we are pretty sure they are totally low and we need vit b12 shots and special vit d pills.  we just suspect it is also contributing to our problems.  our sleep dr. tested and found the anemia and we’re taking supplements but we’re still exhausted and we know it’s going to take time and we’re also looking at upping the double dosage he is already prescribing to us.  we are thinking of taking a different brand and type of iron supplement in addition to the kind and mg he prescribed.

and for all this time, for many years, we’ve thought that our fatigue was associated with our depression and just being a fuck up and stuff.  now we’re wondering if we’ve been anemic for years now.  our regular dr. checked our iron when we went in to see her awhile back but she didn’t do the extensive testing.  the sleep dr did and he found it that way.  she just diagnosed us with chronic fatigue syndrome and maybe we have that but maybe we don’t.  i don’t know.  we just hate being tired all the time.  and this has been our life for years now.  having no energy to do crap and any small thing (taking shower, emptying dishwasher) wears us out and puts us back to bed to lay down which often leads to several hours of sleep.

so whine, whine, whine.  we’re having a hard time.  we hurt emotionally and sometimes physically but i think we still dissociate a lot of our body pain.  we get weird ass pains in various places in our body but we just cope with it and deal with it.  we’re emotionally exhausted and physically exhausted and the depression is just doing its damndest to suck us up and really, we think with the therapy stuff we’re doing lately, we think we’re experiencing a lot of grief even though we’re not sure what exactly it is we’re experiencing other than deep sadness and just our system is struggling.

we can’t put into words yet quite what is going on.  sorry this is so stupid.  just we hate things right now.  it’s so crazy how we can plummet so far and so fast and we forget sometimes how very easy and very close we always are to this place.  we’ve been struggling but getting through and we’re used to that… things being hard with varying moments of coping ok and varying crappy times, but now things are not just hard and barely getting through, they just fucking suck and we feel like we’re falling with nothing to hold onto to stop.

stupid us.

julies, and others we think

Forging Ahead In Memory Work

We need to write about stuff. We keep thinking about it and we know a few things we should be writing about and know that we need to do so and yet the exhaustion and overwhelming sleep urges keep us away. I think we’re only able to write this much because we are simply not saying anything really at all.

Someone/s inside started telling about a memory in a story format and 3rd person format and information was revealed that way when we laid down one night and started searching within and thinking about a particular memory we’ve had for a long time now and trying to find the truth about what really happened amongst tiny pieces of stuff. Basically we were trying to find out if we were a willing participant in a memory involving what we believed to be abuse and whether we wanted these things or was agreeable or something. Like to what degree are we responsible for this and do we really have the right to feel and think and believe it is abuse because maybe it wasn’t and we just had a reaction to it and need to believe it was abuse because it is safer to believe it was abusive than face the reality that we were some fucked up little kid at 7 and 8 years old that was willing and instigating and wanting intercourse and anal sex and oral sex and everything else adult oriented sex wise with some other kid a little bit older than us. Except in doing the 3rd person and someone inside recounting a narrative of what this part or that part saw and observed and was thinking and feeling, etc., we’ve learned (thus far) that we weren’t willing but we were definitely reacting in a trained manner of giving him what he wanted because “that’s what you do.”  (sarcastically) Why thank you father for all those previous years of training.  Why thank you to the others who were and had been abusing us, if ya know, we’re not making up that SRA and other crap. (end sarcasm) So we are coming to the realization that even though (thus far) we don’t recall specifically saying, “no” in this particular memory, the thoughts, feelings, worries, anxiety, and other things we recall thus far do indicate that we didn’t really want to do these things, err…sex acts.  Yet we also knew that he wanted these things and there was some sort of inner knowledge or belief or something that we didn’t think we could say no or that it would do us any good, or there were other reasons we felt we had to do this stuff, although we tried in other ways to get it to not happen. We were actually more focused on other things and the mother and our fears, anxiety, and so forth of some other stuff than over what we had to do with him. We’re not really being specific here. All of this is still hard to fucking write, which is so frustrating to some of us, because some of us want it to be no big deal, but it is a big deal.

So the sadness we’ve been feeling is deeper than before. Perhaps it isn’t so much sadness as it is grieving or perhaps grief stricken sadness.

So okay, we’ve said this much.  We’re hoping we’ll be able to at least write a narrative or 3rd person viewpoint of sharing the memory and then after that, to write it more from the first point of view from others inside.  We’re doing all that we can to steadily keep working on these memories that we’ve had for many years but never gave them the attention they needed and deserved, and certainly minimized them greatly… until now that is.  Well, not minimizing them like we’ve done in the past.  We’re seeing now more than ever before that these “basic” and “bits of memories we’ve had for many years and thought since we’ve known about them for so long they don’t really matter that much and aren’t that critical to work on in therapy,” really do need our attention and there is tons of healing and issues surrounding them.  OMG, we totally realize the depth of issues and shame and things and deeply regret not having dealt with them on this level ever before this and barely dealt with them period the past 16-17 years of therapy, but we are dealing with them now.  We’re finally ready.  The negative repercussions of never having dealt with them and not being ready and not giving them the attention that these memories and this hurt and pain has deserved all these years is just really hard to take.  A lot of regret and a lot of negative feelings and thoughts to self/ves for having waited this damn long to finally look at this stuff and realize it needs a shit load of healing and that this is where we need to start with in regards to doing memory work.

So well anyway, this stuff sucks and is damn hard to do and to keep looking at and working through.  We’ve never kept our attention and focus on any one healing subject matter for so long like we’ve had lately over this.  It is never far from our mind or heart and even when we’re dealing with something else that comes up in therapy or life, we still keep returning back to this subject matter and that is a first for us.  We’ve always had such competing agendas in therapy and yes, that stuff is still happening in therapy and thus we keep jumping from topic to topic to issue to issue to blah blah blah in therapy and in life and what we’re focusing on, but the difference is that there is one overall riding issue that continues to remain in the near background or right upfront and that is the memories and issues surrounding the neighbor boy that abused us.  We haven’t even gotten into the stuff regarding his older brother.  There is one memory by one insider who has a sadistic memory of his older brother abusing him (insider) with the neighbor boy watching and there.  Uggh.  Not sure what, if any, other memories lie with the older brother of the neighbor boy.

We’ve got to get the courage to say first names.  Fuck it.  Why protect them? Why be afraid of this? Why does it matter so much? Why not just say the names?

So anyway, yah, whoopee, in some ways our system is agreeing (for the most part) and working hard to cooperate and to keep focused (more or less) on the memories and issues surrounding the neighbor boy.  We are trying really hard to work through these things and have healing over it so that we can let it go and move past it and for it to not have its horrific grip on us and for the shame, the utter and deep shame and badness that stems from his abuse and what we did, for it to be healed and for it to not have its tragic hold on us and on our life.

I heard inside someone say, “The End.”  Not sure what that is about but anyway, we’ve got to go.  We’ve said way way wayyyyy tooo much.

Us, US, Julies, others

where we’ve been

it’s been a long, long, long month. since october 3rd through the 15th, we’ve been at the mother’s house almost every single day and night–only 1-3 nights when we weren’t there. she needed help cleaning her house before her 2 sisters came from out of town for bryan’s wedding this saturday. her house hasn’t been dusted in who knows how long and everything was dusty and dirty. the non main areas of the house were ultra cluttered and disorganized and just a mess. the main areas needed general pick up and deep cleaning because the bare minimum has been done for a long time. furniture needed to be moved and rearranged because it had been on the list for years and it needed to be done in order for there to be room for guests and for things to “look nice” and in a way “perfect” for her sisters…. as if things have always been this way and she isn’t as ill and out of sorts as she is.

one of the bigger Julies finally told the mother, “I’m disabled for a reason,” when referencing to the mother that we needed a break away from her and not going to her house when we said we would and that this was taking a huge toll on us and we were burnt out by everything. it took us so long simply because we can only manage so much concentration and energy to do anything and so what might have taken ordinary people a weekend for the amount of work that needed to be done and we did, it took us basically 2 weeks… and we still didn’t accomplish everything. there is a lot left to do and Sean came over several times to help and Loretta came over towards the end to help put things in order and get the basics done on things we just couldn’t get to because we were running out of time and our OCD couldn’t let go of certain things to ignore all the dust and dirt and crap of things that needed to be done and since we were doing it, it needed to be done right and while it took time, it took less time to do it right than to go back and do it over at some point and we had no interest in doing it over at any time in the near future and so we needed to do it then. even if it pissed off the mother because we weren’t getting everything done and it wasn’t getting done in the way she wanted or in the time she wanted and we weren’t listening to her towards the end to ignore the cleaning and just make it done and ready somehow. well fuck it, it’s fucking family coming to visit and if they can’t cope with it and realize the situation and that we did the best we could, then fuck it. damn it, some of us felt like if she still needed shit done, her sisters could help, because they are sisters after all. fucking hell she is ill.

we did let the mother know clearly again that we had no intentions on taking care of her when her health gets even worse. she’ll be going to a home or some place and other people will care for her, thank you very fucking much. we’ve cared for her as a child and as an adult and still to some degree do a lot of shit for her, and fuck it, we just aren’t doing it for her when she is totally in need of 24/7 care. fuck that. i don’t care if she is my mother. she fucking doesn’t deserve it from us. maybe if she cared for us as a child and cared for herself throughout our adulthood, then just fucking maybe we wouldn’t mind the idea of helping her when she gets older and more ill, but fucking hell, she isn’t coming to our home and we aren’t going to hers. and amazingly the mother seems to understand that and says she doesn’t want to do that to me or bryan. guilt i suppose or maybe she’s just saying that, but she seems to be sincere about it.

it seems hard to believe that so much time has passed and we were at the mother’s for so long. in coming out of the fog or whatever state we were in, the realization that we put our entire life, our entire personal to do list, our entire well being, our entire sanity, our entire everything on hold, and put away and pushed aside, all for her and her sake. we tried to tell ourselves it was for our aunts sake as well because they needed a nice enough place to stay, but really, it wouldn’t have been the end of the world if they saw how things normally are. it’s like in the moment while it was happening we just didn’t seem to “get it” how much time was passing and how much we were putting aside all for the mother. on one level we knew it, but on many more greater levels, it wasn’t connecting. i guess it was just a dissociation and denial of the reality and truth of what was happening.

Sean said that he doesn’t want this to happen like this ever again. that he will pay for half of the cleaning the mother needs and call professionals in– that he doesn’t want to see us go through this again and what it did to us, etc. i think he saw more of the depth of the stress and toil and problems that this caused for us and our system and functioning than we did or do. he did see the mother as we knew her to be growing up and in our adult years for many years… he saw the mother we knew… the one who takes her stress out on us, simply because that’s what she does and who she targets…generally. the mother who was rude and snarky and bitchy to us when she wasn’t getting her way or what she wanted exactly or how she wanted it exactly… when her control wasn’t there over us and we were doing things the way we wanted to, when, how, and on our time schedule and not hers. he saw our anxiety when we didn’t realize we were anxious. the only thing we noticed was that we were irritated with the mother and couldn’t stand her and angry and hating that we were doing anything for her. i thought it was just that others inside who have mother issues had come forward closer to the front suddenly, as i’ve experienced this sudden “okay or no feelings or nothing or fine” to this sudden out of the blue intense internal feelings and issues and stuff that we’re fighting to keep under control and not show it to the mother that we can’t stand to be around her and don’t want to be there and certainly don’t want to be helping her or doing anything that pleases her, etc. apparently the mother irritated Sean too by what she said to us and around us, that interestingly, I didn’t hear or notice at all… but I’m guessing others inside did since they suddenly were triggered close by. The amnesia and separation was there for that.

There’s more… so much more to say and write about and get out in the open, but we are running out of time for that today.

We have therapy today with Cec… the first time since the beginning of September. And the stupid fucking thing about all of it is that my Medicaid was back dated which means we could have been seeing Cec all this time, but the fucking agency are assholes and idiots and really not for profit as much as they say they are cuz they fucking don’t work with people in our situation (we always get our Medicaid back dated but they seem to think we can afford $200 a month to pay them to see Cec regularly and then of course, oh geez, we will have a credit with them or they will owe us when our medical comes through as always). There’s more about this topic, but it’s what it is and we are bitchy and wanting and asking too much and spoiled. Spoiled because we had a reasonable therapist (Wendy) who worked with us all those years in our financial situation and still accepts a small monthly payment until someday our situation changes and we can pay her more and pay her off fully. We expect things to change and to be able to pay her fully off at some point in the next 5 years.

We are bringing Sean with us to therapy and he will be going in there with us as support. Cec didn’t want to meet him or anything anytime soon. This was several months ago. We gave her a heads up voice mail message and Billie is prepared to tell her to deal with it and that it is our fucking therapy and not Cec’s and Billie will royally be pissed if Cec takes issue with it. We clearly don’t have the best close connection or care too much and won’t concede to whatever Cec wants just because she wants it this way or that. We’re not in the mood for it and it’s our therapy and not Cec’s. There’s so much crap that Cec can’t and won’t give that we need and this one thing in addition to everything else is just one that we aren’t dealing with because we refuse to let Cec have her way on this. And if she throws a big tizzy about it, it only pushes us further away to get another therapist, which we are working on as it is. For many different reasons. Cec is still a good therapist, but there are things we need that she can’t or won’t give for any number of reasons and there are things that just don’t work in the long term for us with her or with the agency. It really doesn’t help that every 3 months (and less when all is taken into account) that we have a disruption of therapy for 3-6 weeks or so, simply because of the medical issue that always takes care of itself in the long run but the agency is all about money and less about working out a payment arrangement, etc. Whatever. And it is really less than 3 months because beginning Dec. 1st, we’ll be in this situation again and chances are it will be mid-late December before everything is taken care of and by then the holidays and whatnot will be around and well, whatever, in a month and a half we’ll have another unnecessary disruption of therapy. So yah, that really doesn’t bode well for conducive therapeutic relationship crap.

After therapy tonight, we go to the dress rehearsal and afterwards to the dinner. The father will be there at both. That brings up a shit load of emotions and thoughts and system confusion and disruption and uggh, it’s a mess, and conveniently we are sidestepping it because we’ve got to go and take care of a few things and then get dressed and ready for it and head to therapy and then all of that.

The father has been in town since Wednesday and tonight will be the first time we see him and first time we speak to him. We feel stupid and so babyish for being so anxious about it and worried and stressed and uggh. There’s been a lot of intense emotional pain as others come forward. They even cried for a brief few minutes, but really cried, which we haven’t been able to do for so long. It happened when we took Zoey outside to go to the bathroom. It was definitely young ones crying. It’s just so weird. And validating and works on any denial by me or others inside. I haven’t been consciously trying to focus on the whole father shit and the abuse shit and all that stuff. And yet sudden emotional pain and stress and freak out will come, seemingly from nowhere, unexpected and just definitely not contrived or created or instigated or nothing…. and this makes the reality of the abuse more real and true and less made up somehow, like somehow we are screwed up and we must be this awful daughter and person to falsely accuse him of such a thing. It’s hard to explain, but it just makes things harder to slip into the direction of denying and invalidating when we really want to do that because it is so much easier than standing strong and saying he abused us, it is real, he is a child rapist, etc. That is really hard to do, especially around family that is invested in denial and people who don’t want to hear or know that sort of thing anyways.

we’ve got to go. we feel so all over the place. we’re a wreck and utterly exhausted. and it’s october of all fucking months.

and there are quite a number of us that wish the father would fucking admit that he abused us. and we know we shouldn’t wish that and want that from him and we wish that it wouldn’t matter, but somehow it matters right now to quite a lot of us. but he didn’t when we confronted him 8 years ago and he’s extremely unlikely to do so now.

julies, Julies, others, and whomever around