A Little Meltdown – Still Cleansing 31
First, I want to apologize for my sporadic postings. I’m afraid it may be like this from now on. As I grow through this situation and continue to manage Not to eat sugar, I will tell you about it.
Most likely every-other week.
Last posting I spoke of the intense emotions I am working with.
So, a week ago Saturday I went to dinner with a friend. Usually people ask how I'm doing, which is "Well, you know. I’m up and down and all around, but underneath it all, I’m okay."
But she asked me a different question entirely. She asked me what was going on, not how I was doing.
Her question elicited a different response.
Out of my mouth comes, “I’m disappointed. I’m hurt. I feel betrayed. I realize that every (fill in the type of relationship) in my life has disappointed me.” Nope, no drama here.
She asked me if my expectations were too high.
I responded that I didn’t think being treated well and honesty were more than one should expect from a personal relationship. She agreed with me.
Not that it’s all about the other person. I, of course, have my part too, so I went on.
I went on to tell her I’m disappointed in myself. I think I should have been able to do better, see more, effect more, something.
One of the bummers about life is once it’s done, it’s done.
Long story short, bringing up these emotions I had not yet dealt with led to a chair melt-down.
I’ll give you a brief background on my issue with chairs.
I belong to a large organization that people can be a part of for a long time. I had experiences when I was younger that I would show up early, sit down and somebody would say, “that’s so and so’s chair,” so I would move.
I learned over the years that there are no saved chairs. That is an ego proposition and our ego works against us.
As I got older, I started to refuse to move and what I found was that the people sitting in the chairs didn’t usually mind. They would laugh and say something like they could get a different perspective today.
I worked out that I think usually, it’s a form of respect from the other “chairs.”
As a result, chairs as they relate to this organization can be a bit of a trigger for me.
Back to the chair melt-down.
After our dinner my friend and I went to this organization's Saturday night event that was packed. We got there early, socialized a little and then went in to find a seat. There were many “saved chairs” with coats, etc., and we stood around for a few minutes watching people take their chairs – seats filling up and coats disappearing.
Then there was a coat across four (4) chairs in the second row. I went down and asked who was saving them and nobody seemed to know who was saving three (3) of the four (4). So, I moved the coat over and gestured my friend (much newer than I and clearly embarrassed by my behavior) down to sit next to me.
She said that they probably arrived late and had put their coats over chairs. I responded that if you arrive late, you don’t get to save yourself a second-row seat. What were we, who got there on time, chopped liver?
Of course, a friend of mine with a guest showed up and she said, laughing, we were saving three chairs. I retorted that there are no saved chairs. Nowhere in our text does it say you get a saved seat. The only way you get to save yourself a seat, and that is not an assigned seat, is to do the work.
We laughed, my friend was again turning red (she is so sweet, how do I get such sweet friends?) and the new arrivals squeezed into two chairs. It turns out they had to add seats everywhere and folks were standing in the back. If the Fire Marshall had showed up, we would probably have been cited.
I make this sound so sedate when I was using my big voice and telling anybody who would listen to me there are no saved chairs!
The next few days were the same.
I was loud, uncouth and couldn’t seem to control myself. I was grumpy, emotional and all messed up.
Wednesday afternoon I finally called a friend and she helped me work it out. Here is the gist.
The feelings that I described during that Saturday evening conversation had come up with a whole bunch of old garbage messages attached (you’re not good enough, you don’t deserve…yada yada yada) while the healthy part of my mind was insisting that I am good enough, etc.
I said to somebody the other day that it was really something that I could have such opposing, intense emotions going on at the same time. I have experienced this with day-to-day things like I’m happy inside and this (fill in the blank) has made me mad. I have both emotions going on and both are correct.
I have learned it is also possible to be mad at both “them” and me.
After an hour on the phone (bless my friend) and a complete melt-down I felt a ton better. I felt like my “old self” instead of this intense, messed up individual who couldn’t stop shouting everything. That would be my Way Old Self.
I am much better since. I am more focused on my priorities and feeling better overall.
I'm sharing this story to recognize that when something comes up, like chairs, that I wouldn’t usually act out on, I do my best to address the underlying whatever.
It is difficult for me to get the tears out after years of not shedding them out of fear or habit and right now, especially, I need those tears to wash away the gunk.
I do have a visualization I use when I can’t cry.
In the quiet I close my eyes and visualize the emotions softly breaking over me, like a wave, and flowing through me pulling all the gunk out to sea. This usually works well, but apparently not when I’m in melt-down mode.
Today I am 90 days sugar-free.
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