Emotionalregulation

Recently, as I've become more skilled at riding intense emotional waves, I've begun to notice patterns around those waves and the ways that I care for them. I'm certain other people will have different patterns, but I wanted to share what I discovered in case someone can relate.

For me, I can view my emotional capacity as a sort of bucket. This bucket has a finite amount of space, but it fluctuates over time. When I am not practicing my skills, my emotional bucket becomes full at about two emotions, any emotions, pleasant or upsetting. When I am actively using my skills, my emotional capacity is much larger, but there is always a limit.

When my emotional bucket is full, additional emotions cause it to overflow. The overflow of emotions spills into another vessel, a depression bucket. My first stage after an emotional overflow is depression, complete overwhelm, and helplessness. If I am unable to take the time and space to care for the overwhelming emotions, the depression bucket will fill as well, until it too spills over the edge.

My second stage of emotional overflow is anxiety. If there's not time to be depressed, or care for the depression rather, then the depression bucket overflows into a vast anxiety bucket. This semi-functional state allows me to meet a minimum of expectations, but causes extensive suffering, even long term physical damage.

The third stage is dissociation, which in this case presents as a similar state to anxiety, but with a disconnection to the suffering being experienced, as well as to the people and environment around me. This stage can be confusing, even convincing me that everything is fine and I was overreacting. But the underlying issues haven't been addressed or resolved.

If I continue to ignore my emotional overflow and overload, it will spill into the largest vessel, anger. It is a state of unpredictability and intensity, where every emotion is filtered through a lens of frustration and unmet need. By this stage, it is very apparent to me that I need a break, some space for self care, and possibly outside supports.

If I continue to let the emotions spill out of the anger vessel, that is a crisis point. I've been there before, but I haven't been there since I started recognizing pieces of this pattern. And now that I see the pattern clearly, I can be even more effective in preventing emotional overload and its effects on both myself and others.

#CPTSD #BorderlinePersonalityDisorder #Depression #Anxiety #Dissociation #anger #Emotionalregulation

I wrote a poem this evening. It’s been another struggle today. Between depression exhaustion and physical exhaustion and emotional overwhelm getting out of bed was hard. I did take my daughter to work, try to clean up the kitchen some and fed my youngest. But the rest of the day was in bed. I had to make a difficult decision regarding one of my adult kids today and another one has decided to no longer speak to me. There were other things too that I won’t get into here. But I’m hanging on, just tired of all of it. I want peace. Here’s my poem too....

I’m tired, worn down and weary.
Everyday is a new battle, a fight to stay strong.
All around is darkness, heaviness, all so dreary.
Nothing feels safe, no one to trust, I don’t belong.
I remember a time where I found joy each day.
A time when the good outweighed the bad.
The days didn’t feel so long, so hard, it was so easy to pray.
Love didn’t cause pain, and struggle wasn’t all I had.
I want it back, the light, the peace, the strength, my life.
I know there will always be hardships to go with the good.
I just want to be able to face each burden without so much strife.
I’m yearning to come out on the other side of this darkness renewed.
I’m trying, learning and unlearning but I still see a mountain yet to climb.
I still can’t see me the way my Jesus does, I see broken where I should see beauty.
I see my struggles and hold a confidence that is less than sublime.
I feel like I’m failing, unable to fulfill all my duty.
Still I hold on to a hope, ever so small, a spark barely seen amongst the ashes.
One day my heart will come back to life, my eyes once again will see the light.
I’ll no longer yearn for death, or upon my skin leave gashes.
One day, hopefully soon, I’ll once again have wings and take flight.

I've been highly dysregulated lately and today I was asked into the bosses office about my attitude. The short of it was if I did not change my behavior than I was going to be let go.
Strick another one up for BPD.
I told her I would but after leaving her office realized that I couldn't.
Before leaving for the day I asked for a leave of absence and apologized for my behavior.
Not before breaking down and crying in front of her, again.
I can't afford 2 weeks off but if I didn't take some time to focus on me than I would of surely lost my job.
My DBT skills may not have been up to par in controlling my emotional hurricane but because of them I didn't give up.
I feel aweful and all I want to do is hide and numb all the pain with alcohol. But, I'm stronger than that.
I do feel that an indulgence in cookies and Cheetos is ok though, right? #strongerthanbpd

The person who is supposed to keep me going, is the same person who makes me want to die. The person who’s responsible for caring for me, and making sure I’m safe and healthy, is the one preventing me from being so. This person tries so hard to stay in control, but when they get very triggered, occasionally they lose control and take it out on me (maybe 1-2 times a year). It’s happened at home, at the store, at the bank, and even at church. The last time was 6 days ago. I’m still dealing with the effects of the concussion I got from it, and my kids have been asking about the long scratch on my arm, and I don’t have an answer for them.

If I heard this from anyone else, I would say, “You have to get away from them, and get you and your children to a safe place! We’ll even let you stay with us, until you can get things settled!”

But, it’s not my husband who’s the assailant. It’s not my children, and they aren’t in any danger, nor have they witnessed any of it personally.

I’m both the perpetrator and the victim. On both sides of the equation, I’m terrified.

I don’t want to do this. I’ve worked for years to overcome my regular self-harm tendencies, and have made incredible progress. I even went a full year without any sort of self-harm whatsoever.

I’m on 2 anxiety/depression medications, and one for ADHD, and scared to change, again, because it has controlled my back pain so well. It’s probably easier for me to list the antidepressants I *haven’t* tried than those that I have.

I’ve tried therapy: CBT, and EMDR. EMDR made a huge difference in my PTSD, but got to the point we didn’t know how to proceed to benefit most, and my church could no longer continue to pay for it.

I tried working part-time to afford additional therapies for both myself and my family, and ended up so suicidal that I had to have someone drive me home one night, because all I could think about was how to get myself killed on the way home, and how much it would hurt my family if I did so, so I had just sat in my car crying and scared to move.

It’s terrifying to have my own brain and body betraying me. I *don’t* want to die! I want to be the mom and wife my family needs me to be! My self-abuse episodes are frightening, painful, heartbreaking, and humiliating. When my husband has tried to intervene, I’ve screamed hateful things at him, that I don’t mean and would never say in my right mind. “Don’t touch me!” “I hate you!” “I’ll kill myself!” When deep inside all I really want is for him to hold me as tightly as a straight jacket, so that I can’t do any more harm, until the terrible feeling that consumes me has dissipated, reminding me the whole time that he loves me and won’t let me go.

This last time was by far the most frightening, because I truly thought I had gotten my emotions under control, and was about to let my 3 year old into our room, when I just snapped, completely out of my control. It’s the first time I’ve actually done serious damage. Terrifying.

Imagine you're a car driving down a highway.

Everything is going smoothly, and you're staying in your lane. All of the sudden, you must swerve to miss hitting an obstacle in the middle of the road. You swerve too sharply and your car starts spinning across the highway.

Finally the spinning stops and you are able to resume driving, but you're in a different lane all the way across the road now. This lane is not smooth. It's bumpy and poorly maintained. However, after all that spinning, you are disoriented and can't remember how to get back over to the smooth lane.

How do you use the blinker? How do you know when it's safe to move over? You can't remember how to change lanes; you can barely even remember what driving in that smooth lane was like. So your only option is to keep going down this bumpy one.

A panic attack is like the situation above. It not only means that something distressing has intruded into our awareness. It also means we have lost control of regulating our emotions while facing it. When we can't regulate -- soothe ourselves back to a state of composure -- it feels like driving fast down a bumpy lane.

Emotional regulation is a cornerstone of mental health. Since distressing situations are an unavoidable part of life, it is important to be able to return to a space where you feel safe and balanced, even if what's going on around you feels unmanageable.

*Full disclosure: This piece was first submitted to 7cups and published on Nov. 14, 2019. I made slight edits.*

I have been mulling through old writings of mine. This piece is representative of a time when my PTSD symptoms were much worse than they are today and I had panic attacks regularly, sometimes on a daily basis. Over time since then, I am happy to say my emotional self-regulation have strengthened, and I feel much less "toppled over" by hard circumstances (:

m.youtube.com/watch #Trauma #complextrauma #Schizophrenia #Emotionalregulation #Impulsivity

Hi all-it’s just been suggested I start taking Lamotrigine to help with mood balancing. It’s to be in addition to the Sertraline I’ve been on for years. Has anyone any info on their experiences with this? #BorderlinePersonalityDisorder #Lamotrigine #Sertraline #Emotionalregulation