Triggers

Originally posted January 31, 2020

Content Warning: Death, Sexual Assault

Triggered, I am not okay (Oh)
You need to stay out my way – Jhené Aiko

Even before the news broke, my heart had been heavy. I’m not entirely sure why. Empath things. Something in the atmosphere had been ramping up my anxiety. Anxiety kept me up at night. Irregular sleep led to migraines. Migraines led to depression. Depression led to withdrawal and an inability to complete work. Incomplete work led to more anxiety and the vicious cycle continued. I tried lavender oil. Catnip tea. The sauna. After a few nights of insomnia and a few days of migraines, I started to feel a little better. The figurative fog lifted from me while literal fog caused a tragedy. A celebrity death.

If you read this blog, you’re aware that I don’t deal with death well. Especially sudden, unexpected death. And not just the death of people I love. I mourn characters in novels. There are TV and movie deaths that I haven’t fully recovered from. I am eternally grateful for internet spoilers and Wikipedia plot synopses. I now have the ability to save myself the heartache of unexpected cinematic deaths. Certain news stories, however, are difficult to avoid.

I first heard the news while at the grocery store. My heart skipped a beat and my breathing turned shallow. It felt unreal. Disbelief is part of the first stage of grief. Why would I be grieving? I didn’t know him personally. I wasn’t even a fan. Why was my heart racing like my own father was on that helicopter? Why was I feeling the pain of my father’s death now as if it hadn’t been 25 years ago? I guess this is what they call a triggering event. I was not OK.

When I got home I should have stayed off the internet. But sometimes I’m a glutton for punishment. The Twitter tributes were heartfelt while the videos of athletes crying were heartbreaking. So much collective admiration and anguish. I ached for the athlete’s family as I ached from my own decades-old loss. And I ached for this athlete’s accuser as if we were one and the same.

I’m not going to get into the particulars of the 2003 incident. Google and forming your own opinions are free. I will note, though, as a survivor, watching others praise a person who has harmed you is a burden I am familiar with. I don’t think about it often. But Sunday it hit me hard. Same event. Different trigger.

One of the hardest things about being a survivor is the (sometimes forced) awareness that the person who did monstrous things to you is not one dimensional. That the person is loved and capable of love cuts deep. That a person who used abusive touch with you is gentle to others is maddening. As is the fact that a person with some toxic tendencies can also, seemingly, not be a toxic parent.

A man who was well respected by my community and family initiated inappropriate contact with me when I was in high school. The feel of his lips, while sickening, was brief. The shattered trust and emotional impact has been long lasting. Years later, this man died from cancer and the community mourned. My family mourned. I mourned for an entirely different reason. A silent one. And, since we can’t speak ill of the dead, I remained silent.

A couple of days after this recent tragedy, the hashtag #girldad was trending. Fathers and daughters posted their plentiful pictures of their precious moments together. Moments I wished I had more of. My heart and head ached. I used Twitter’s mute function and logged off of social media. I couldn’t deal with another trigger.

I really didn’t want to write this post. But I had to process some things and writing is how I do it. This isn’t even about the person being memorialized this week. It’s about coming to terms with the impact that my experiences and memories have on my life. I have a hard time stating that I have experienced trauma. After all, people have endure much more traumatic incidents than I have. But I must admit that I have been traumatized. Lexio.com defines traumatize as “Subject to lasting shock as a result of an emotionally disturbing experience or physical injury.” This week I have become aware that I’m still experiencing lasting shock. There isn’t a succinct or deep conclusion to this post or week . Just awareness. And, yet another thing to work through in therapy.

Categories: : Wellness