Fall Down Seven Times Get Up Eight

When it all becomes too much to deal with.

Falling down and trying to get up can be overwhelming...anyone who says it isn't.  Well I hate to say someone is delusional without meeting them...but I would be tempted.  It can be so hard, so very, very hard.  And hard can feel overwhelming.

If you are alone or feel alone - dealing with the feeling of overwhelm can even be more difficult.  You need to know that feeling overwhelmed is a very normal feeling when facing any loss or trauma...starting over...looking at things differently. 

I think most of us don't talk about it because it makes us seem weak or out of control.  Well I have felt overwhelmed more than once during the past two years and for the first time I can remember...I didn't care what anyone thought because there was nothing I could do but feel what I felt.  And some days were so dark I never thought I would see light again.  But I have and the light is so much brighter than I remembered. ( I saw that ..."the light is so much brighter than I remembered" in a print ad and fell in love with it because for me it is so true.)

It sums up perfectly how you can feel coming out of the dark...as your eyes adjust you can see the light is brighter and not that it makes the road you just traveled any easier but it can help you feel so very grateful for coming back out.  Standing back up. It's a moment none of us should let slip by without at least a pause for gratitude.

The facts are that some people do not recover.  They do not stand back up.  So if you did get back up or are trying to..each step is cause for a celebration and gratitude.

One thing that really helped me get through the most darkest days was a quote I once saw and made into a poster I hung up in my house.  The quote is by Charles Schultz...It's never the end of the world.  It's already tomorrow in Australia. 

I made that my mantra.  I made a promise to myself no matter how bad things got or felt.  I would always wait to do something until tomorrow.  It was a promise that I kept.  No matter what - things do look different tomorrow.  You owe it to yourself to find out.  You owe tomorrow to yourself.

And speaking of tomorrow I will have some more ideas on dealing with the sense of it all being too much.  Tomorrow...see you then.

What are you a huge fan of?

Yesterday I had a simply delightful time with one of my great nieces.  She is 6 years old and just radiates joy when you look at her.

We decided we would go to Target, a local store, to look for a flag for the front of my little house.  As she sat in the backseat in her boaster seat she kept up a running dialog with me.  All of the sudden she said, "Aunt Jeanne I am a huge fan of chocolate."  A bit taken aback by her language I said, "You are?"  She then said, "huge...a huge fan."  And I cracked up...I found out along the way that she's also a huge fan of Spongebob Squarepants (but then who isn't) and jewelry...especially jewelry with big, big jewels.

It got me to thinking about what am I a huge fan of?  For years I would say "work"...now in my new life I am looking for other things to be a huge fan of.  I love cheese but if I get to be too big of a fan I will be huge!

I have had a thing about paper maiche for awhile now.  I don't know why but I want to make things with it.  Big things.  Things you can put in your yard and have people stop their cars as they drive by.  I don't know why...but that appeals to me.  I don't know if I will be a huge fan of what I make...but I am thinking what I make it will be huge...so that is a start!

So what are you a huge fan of?

Today...the rest of the story.

It's more than ironic that yesterday after I posted the first part of my story I was at a craft show with my mom.  A woman recognized me as the former director of the agency I ran for ten years.  She said ..."You burnt out didn't you?"  I said that indeed I had and after working through things for the past two years I was feeling very good again.  She said she thought I would burn out.  She had heard me on the radio many times and saw me in the newspaper and said she thought it was only a matter of time..no one could work like that, put so much of themselves in their work and not burn out!  Yikes...why indeed was I the last to realize that!

I, however, did not simply burn out...burning out where you physically and mentally exhaust yourself is a huge problem for people.  But what happened to me involved not only burn out on that level but also a tremendous dose of post trauma stress.  

I am not going into everything that happened to me.  But I will give you an idea of how truly black it got for me.  There is an expression in sports that to win you have to leave everything on the field...you expend everything you have.  Well that would sum up nicely what I did. 

You have to understand that I am someone who never thought I had an end to my energy.  Never.  That was other people.  Me, I assumed I could always pull something out of my magic hat to meet every challenge and every circumstance.  But here is a major lesson I learned the hard way...if you do not take care of yourself.  If you do not look after your own needs there is an end. It took me a long time to get to the bottom of my magic hat.  But there was a bottom.  And when I reach the bottom I fell hard.  Flat out...on the ground.

Add to that post traumatic stress that resulted from dealing for years with people's issues.  The last ten years simply saturated with people's stories of pain and abuse and violence and fear.  Rarely taking the time to process it because as soon as someone was gone there was another person to take their place.  And my job was to be as present for the next person as I was for the first. 

Here's how I knew I was in trouble.  I was sitting in church just being very meditative when all the sudden I saw faces.  They came at me quickly.  I sat very calm and said to myself, "you can come but you have to come one at a time."  Then for the next several minutes I swear to you on the soul of my dogs that it was like a slide show..face after face after face of people I had worked with.  I have to say I took it all pretty calmly and knew I had work to do.

Now I have a certification in trauma and loss so I knew what was happening.  What symptoms I was having...but knowing what was happening did not stop me from having to work through everything.

So there I was physically and emotionally exhausted, dealing with post traumatic stress with few resources because I had planned to take a few weeks off and then be working again.  I was not financially prepared to not work.  I was feeling lost and confused and very scared about what was happening. 

Here is what I know for sure.  When you are exhausted every problem you have feels magnified.  I am certain that some of the things that happen would have not had the impact they had if I had been well rested.  Sounds simply but how many times have you gone beyond you limit..of sleep and eating right only to find yourself faced with a problem that felt overwhelming that in another space and time you could have dealt with it with a different sense of ease.

I had my great doctor and a very small circle of friends and family who surrounded me and helped me feel safe as I worked through things.  But no matter if you have that circle or not the facts are you have to walk through the process yourself.  No one can make the pain go away.  No one can give you rest.  No one can help you gain your footing again.  You have to do the work.  They can help you find the tools you need.  They can offer you support.  But in the end it's you.  You have to decide to get up yourself.

There are some people who don't recover.  They cannot find their way back.  Sometimes it is simply to painful and people lose hope.  I understand that.  I lost hope several times.  I will tell you as we go along what helped me.  Maybe it will help you.  And maybe something that helped you find hope again will help someone else.

I want this to be a place where people can share what has been helpful and what hasn't been.  As I wrote in my first post...this blog is not about my story is worse than yours.  Or how dare he or she writes that what happened to them was traumatic. It's not traumatic!  And that my dear reader would be your opinion..not a reality for someone else's life.

 What I know from my trauma training is that everyone's sense of trauma is based on the experiences in their life up until that experience.  We are all different and our reactions to experiences will be different too.

If you have fallen no matter what the issue and are looking for helping in getting back back...I believe this is a place you can find some help. I can't do the work for you but I will tell you about what helped me get back up and I will be your loudest cheerleader in saying you can to!

It has taken me two years to work through things and stand back up.  I honestly believe if I can find my way back so can you. 

My latest fall...not the first but certainly the longest lasting.

I said this weekend I would tell you about what happened to me.  I, like you, have fallen more than once in my life...but this time has certainly been the longest I have been down.  And it has been a struggle that took me almost two years to recover from.  And I have recovered.  I am standing and that is a wonderful thing to say and really mean.  Because in all honesty I thought I was down for the count.

I have lived a life that is a bit left or right of center.  My life path has been a winding road of ups and downs that has confused many..many in my family for sure but everything I have done always prepared me for the next adventure.  I have taken leaps of faith, treaded on uneven ground and walked fearlessly into situations because I believed I could be of help.  And I know I have been.

But what I have also done over the years is absorbed untold amounts of people's pain and anguish.  Their fears and their grief.  Their sadness and their stories.  With almost a total disregard for the impact it was having on me.   My doctor (who I love and adore...not in a crazy stalker way :) but in a thank goodness such a kind and wise man is part of my circle of life...) told me years ago that because of the way I do my work...I was like a circuit breaker that continues to have all this energy flow through me.  He said I needed to be careful because some day my fuses would blow. 

Not that I did not believe him, I did.  But I did not know how else to do my work.  I took that poster you may have seen...It's better to wear out than rust out to heart!

A bit about my work.  I have directed 5 non profit agencies. They ranged from disabilities to HIV/AIDS to domestic violence and sexual assault.  I was one of the first 26 case mangers hired in the state of Wisconsin to work with people who were infected with HIV. 

I worked as a communityy services director for Planned Parenthood and in between everything spent four years as the Public Affairs Director at a TV station. ( Since that experience I no longer make fun of folks who host parades..because when it's you and a float breaks down and you have to filled ten minutes of air time...that cease to be funny!)

In two of my last positions I had death threats. And because I thought I was called to go... I also spent almost two weeks doing trauma work in Sri Lanka with people who had survived the tsunami. 

The last work with folks in Sri Lanka came as I was winding up a little over ten year run as the Executive Director of a domestic violence and sexual assault 24 hour shelter service organization. (I might add that in my state the average tenure in that position was two years.)

Again...my wise and wonderful doctor said sometime all this absorbing folks experiences without taking care of myself who come home to roast.  I clearly remembering him saying once I stopped working a zillion hours a week, day and night it would hit me.  I clearly remember it...I just apparently didn't know the full impact of what could happen.  I do now...tomorrow I will finish the story.

Not everyone needs to know your business.

You have a right to keep things private.   It's your life.  Your experiences.

When you take a fall believe me folks want to know everything.  I think some folks want to know out of genuine concern but there are those few (they move around a lot so it feels like they multiply) that want all the details to the last morsel so they can a.) tell everyone about your situation b.) revel in the fact that it has not happened to them and c.) tell you exactly what you should be doing according to their depth of wisdom ... with most times being clueless to the larger issues that may have impacted you.  Ring a bell of anyone in your life?

Just like selecting your cheering section..your support team..you need to know who to confine in and who to say what to.  Remember anyone you share things with may think you want their opinion and advise.  That is not always the case.  Sometimes you just need someone to listen. I have found it helpful to say..."I don't expect you to fix this..I just need you to listen". Sometimes that works and sometimes it doesn't.  Certainly if you are not getting the support you need when you talk to someone then you need to make a mental note not to do it again.

And if you have opened a door to someone...letting them in on what is going on...you also have a right to close that door if it's not useful to you.  Will they like it?  Probably not but this time we are talking about your needs as you work through something.  You need to put other people's needs to the side for awhile. 

Just as you need to clear the clutter around you physically, you need to clear the clutter that may be in your head. 

Thinking clearly is important as you start to sort things out.  Having a cast of thousands giving you input is not a helpful part of that process.  You need to set your boundaries with people and work to keep those boundaries strong.

Tomorrow...my story.

Staking your claim to your piece of earth ...

This weekend I am going to spend some time telling you about the last time I fell down!  It's not the first time but it has been the longest time I have been down.  I have learned a lot in the process and that is what this blog is all about.  If you and I can learn from each other it makes getting up easier and the chances of staying up maybe greater.

Going forward after a disappointment, loss, trauma..whatever stopped you in your tracks...laid you flat... can make you think you have lost your stake ...lost your place in the grand scheme of things.  And while you may have gotten off track a bit.  This is a great time for reflection and deciding indeed what is your place.  How are you going to stake it out differently?  Maybe that job you lost you never liked.  Maybe you knew your relationship wasn't good but it was easier to stay than leave.

I was in one of those once.  I live with a man and after about nine months of living together I left.  I won't get into all the details now but after two years together I left the relationship.  When I told him I was leaving he walked out and never talked to me again...until about a year later when I ran into him on the street.  To be honest...if I had seen him coming I would have gone the other way!  But suddenly he was standing in front of me.  He said he wanted to apologize to me.  He said he knew what we had was no good but he would have never left.  He thanked me for having the courage to be the one to go.

Getting through that experience helped clarify for me what I wanted in a relationshipnext time.  I figuratively staked out my place again...decided how I would decorate my world and move on.  It didn't happen right away...but it did happen.

So as we talk about getting up...moving forward...start thinking about what you want your piece of the earth to look like.  My space...has a lot of joy and laughter in it...what are you thinking about?  Does joy and laughter seem too far away from you right now?  Hang in there...I will lead the way.

Goodbye Ruthie...

I just got back from attending a memorial service for a woman I know...Ruthie.  Ruthie died a few days ago.  Tonight her husband and two brothers along with some of her friends attended a charming service that spoke to and about her life.  It was really one of the nicest memorials I have ever attended.  (And I have attended many as I was one of the first people hired in the 80's by the state of Wisconsin to be an HIV/AIDS case manager.)

What was most wonderful to me was what was said near the end.  The funeral director who was conducting the service said based on what he had heard from Ruthie's husband and her two brothers...if Ruthie had all the money in the world...she would have been doing exactly what she was doing as she lived her life.  She was spending time with her partner and friends.  Loved animals and her art.  She lived her life doing what gave her joy.  What a legacy to leave...what a wonderful thing to have said about you.

What a wonderful chance for us to think about what we want said at our memorial service and then work backwards to put it in place.  (As a side note...I want cupcakes served at my service.  I have made a note of that!)  Maybe it's a benefit of falling down...you get pulled up short...you have a chance to look at things differently.  If you want to get up and do the same thing...it's your choice.  But it may be an opportunity to look at your world differently.  I know I have been.  Joy...it was not on my list years ago...I will tell you now it is front and center.

It has been a process to figure out what does bring me joy.  As we go along I will share how I have discovered what I have.  But first over the weekend I will be talking about where I have been since I fell down ...and how I have found my way back to standing up. 

In the meantime I will be thinking of Ruthie and the stove top hat she crocheted and wore with such grace and just personal style. I am so very glad Ruthie and I crossed paths.  I know I am richer for it.

Gathering your cheering section...

Nobody has to do this alone.  No matter how alone you may feel in what you are dealing with.  There are people who can support you.  But selecting people to confide in..to ask advise from..to share frustrations with can be tricky.  I believe you need to do it with care.

You want people in your corner, in your cheering section who are going to support you yet be honest with you too.  I think you can learn a lot about people when you reach out.  When you are down and need some support.

Years ago I started my own business...a business that I now believe was just years before it's time. ( More about that down the road I am sure...) I did not even have a shoestring to start it..as I like to say I start things with a flip-flop!  I barely had money to survive and a friend who was a school counselor ( whose husband was a therapist at the time) came over to see me and to see how things were going.  For some reason we were in the kitchen and she looked for something to eat.  She opened the cupboard and saw I had very little food. 

Hours later she called me after she went home.  She called to let me know she would not be embarrassed as my friend if I decided to go to a food bank to get some food.  She wanted me to know it was okay with her.  I am telling you now that was EXACTLY the reason I had not done that!!!  NOT!  It did give me a view of her that I had not had before. It also gave me a lesson in sensitivity to other people and where they are at that has never left me.

If you truly do not have people in your life that support you...then you can make up your own dream team of supporters.  I did that years ago when I was feeling rather alone.  I learned about the technique in a great book by Barbara Sher called Wishcraft.  She said if you don't have support in your life think of famous people you would want in your cheering section.  Pick out the people.  Write their names down then close your eyes and imagine what they would say when you walked in the room.  I tell you I had a field day with that!

I love Bette Davis.  I think she was her own woman, smart, sexy and someone who would back you up no matter what.  Needless to say she was in my cheering section.  When I imagined walking in a room with her there I imagined her saying as she saw me, "she is rather little but she has sparkle in her eye and I can tell she's pretty spunky...I need to meet her and have a drink."  I laughed and laughed because I could hear her voicee saying it!  And I embraced it like a cupcake!  I found a picture of her, cut it out and had it on my bulletin board for years with the words "sparkle and spunky".  Only I knew what it meant...but that's the only one who needed to know.

I have a great group of friends and family that support me as I support them.  I could not have gotten through the last two years of my life when I really fell down without them.  I know in my heart of hearts know I would not be here today if they had not been there.  Their support was solid.  And I am grateful every day for them.

I hope you look at this blog as asupport for you.  You are not alone in working through whatever you are working though.  This is not therapy ... this is people reaching out to people saying...life is easier when you have support.  So as you fill out your cheering section..know I am right there with you...as I hope you are there with me.

Look at the whole board Sam...

I love the TV show West Wing.  I like everything about it.  I don't have TV right now so I watch videos and I watch the West Wing.  Yesterday during an episode President Bartlet was playing chess with Sam.  Now President Bartlet, for those you who do not know, is brilliant.  So they are playing chess and Sam is focusing and focusing on what move to make next.  All President Bartlet calmly keeps saying over and over is "Look at the whole board Sam, look at the whole board."

It struck me as very good advise for us as we move forward.  Look at the whole board, look at the whole board.  Not just where we have been...not just at where we are...or even where we want to go.  Look at the whole board. 

 Appreciate where we have been, how far we have come already.  Heh, we recognized that we were down!  That's a big deal!  Truly it is.  Now we are getting up.  Another big deal.  We are getting rid of what has weighed us down.  Another big deal.  We are willing to help someone else as we move forward.  Another big deal. We are looking ahead figuring out where we want to go not where we simply end up by happen stance.  A very big deal.

By looking at the whole board...which to us is our life.  We can get motivation for going forward, a pat on on back for recognizing how far we have already come and gather resources to take us where we want to go.

You simply do not get the whole view if you don't look at the whole board.  So I would challenge you over the next few days to take out some paper and write down where you are, how far you have already come and if you have an idea yet...where do you want to go.  If you don't know where you want to go yet.  Don't worry.  You will be figuring that out as we go long.

Before I go...another exercise to help you put things out to the curb that are holding you back.

Equipment you will need:  books, a bag or a backpack. Paper and something to write with and if you want tape.

This will give you an idea of how much you are carrying around with you.  On each piece a paper write something that is bothering you.  Your partner who left you, your money issues, your job search, your jerk of a boss, the illness you just learned you have, the death of someone that is so hard to bear.  Whatever you are carrying...write it on a piece of paper.  Then tape each piece to the front of a book.  An issue a book...when you are done put them in a bag or a backpack and carry them around the block...go ahead..do it.  If you are like me it's hard to get out of the door!  Carry them for just awhile.  Then come back.  Put them down and walk the same distance without them.  Notice a difference?  I would thing so! 

Recognition is the first step.  Most of us don't even know what we carry.  We cannot move forward with the same grace when we are carrying such a heavy load.  So we are going to work to lighten the load.  That's our goal. 

 Let's look at the whole board.

Look at it, own it and deal with it.  It's ours after all...and we get the next move :)

  

Start to take things to the curb...

A few days ago I was talking about taking out the trash...and said we needed to do that not only with my rotten vegetables that had been long forgotten...but also things that have been weighing us down. 

Today I want to share a very good technique that can help you get some closure if you have been hurt and have not been able to let it go.  Things like that can weigh you down...and if you carry enough of them you may find your self standing up again but not able to move forward by the sheer weight of them.

As a note...I will never recommend you try something that I have not done myself.  This technique is pretty powerful and can really help you let go.  It's called a soul letter.

Equipment needed:  pencil/pen and paper or a computer; metal can (like an old coffee can) and matches or a good shredder.

If you have been hurt by someone or something...you write them a letter.  You can write with pencil or pen and paper or use your computer.  I have done both with equal success.  What is important is that you become quiet and then write to them everything you want to say...everything. What they did, how it made you feel, how it has affected you and what you want to happen to them because of it.  Use the language you want and speak from your heart.  Write until you cannot write any more.  (I used this with a client once and she wrote 15 pages to her father who had abused her.)

The next step is to read it out loud so you hear what you wrote.  You are giving yourself witness to your experience with them.  (There is something very powerful about saying things out loud.  I do not understand the process but I know the impact is great.)

When you are finished...you then burn it..using good safety measures of course...I usually go outside on my driveway and use a coffee can with pitcher of water right next to me...or you can also shred it one page at a time.  I like the drama of burning but you can't beat the sound of a nicee shredder if that's what is available!

Most people feel almost immediate relief...the client I mentioned brought her papers with her to our appointment and we burned them.  They burned the blackest black smoke I have ever seen.  She looked at me and said, "I told you he was evil didn"t I?".  As she watched the smoke rise she said she felt like the weight she had been carrying for years go up with the smoke and she smiled.

If you feel a need to...if you remember a few more things you wanted to say...do it again following the same process.  The key is to write it... which is a release...you get what is in your head and heart out...and then you burn it or shred it.

You do not share it with someone else or send it to the person.   If you wrote something...showed it your best friend and she or he said..."that's not really what happened."  You are then dealing with their interpretation of what has happened to you. And it's not about them...it's about you.  It's about the impact this has had on you.  And only you truly know that.

If you were to send it to the person who hurt you ...you again may not get the result you expect.  Do you expect them to call you and say how sorry they are they hurt you? That probably is not going to happen or it would have happened already.  This is a process for you to let go and move forward.  Let them find their own process!

The process is about you..for you.  You have the control.  And in a world that can feel out of control when you are down...some control is a good thing.

I have used it many times.  I was left by a man I was in love with.  Not once but twice!  Yes those red flags flying the first time apparently were not large enough.  I knew I would never get to say what I wanted and needed to say to him face to face.  So I wrote the letter and burned it in my coffee can.  I felt better...not perfect...but better and that is what this is all about.

I was thinking about lightness and leaving things at the curb this morning and came across this quote:

"When I saw Nelson Mandela walk out of jail

with no hatred and no bitterness,

I realized he had authentic spirit"

                                                                                 -Dick Gregory

As I read that I thought Mr. Mandela's spirit must have been light...he had put down..."put out to the curb" all the feelings...the bitterness and hatred he must have had about what happened to him.  He walked lighter and forward into his life. Leaving what did not suit that new life behind.  It is my wish for all of us.