Managing the internal self.

As I wait for the flight home, I'm using my "mindfulness" to monitor the processes going on.  On the surface I am enjoying the Bali experience .... but deep down the "little boy" is screaming with panic and anxiety. ..... I just want to be home.

The adult me coaxes the child me .... the step by step process .... what needs to be done next.  ..... go to the airport .... go through immigration ..... boarding ..... 

Breaking the whole thing down so I can cope.

And all the time the adult me is relishing the outside experience..... and on another level I get so tired of the battle.

Early morning muse

Why do I isolate myself?  I manufacture circumstances that make it easy to avoid attention,   to "fit into the cracks", to hide.  Why?

It all stems from that four year period of year 7 and the first 3 years of high school.  The never ceasing torment .... the constant fear .... looking back with adult eyes I can see that it wasn't really that bad .... but for a lonely young boy, it was an unrelenting nightmare ..... and the effects reverberate through all my adult behaviors moment by moment.

Another one bites the dust ....

I am writing this account here since I am not allowed to permitted to defend myself in real life ... so I can only defend myself in my private blog.

Out of 17 people we have had living with us as an au pair, only 2 till now had not lasted the distance .... one we had to ask to leave and the second arrived and didn't even start!  Now another is leaving ... by choice.  Apparently I am a terrible, rude person!   The situation arose because I was asked to fix the office vacuum cleaner.   Now there's a story here because I am continually asked to fix the vacuum cleaner by many people .... and in 99.9% of the cases  .... one was actually an electrical fault ... in 99.9% of the cases, the problem is that the bag has not been emptied!  So of course, it won't work.  Duh!

So this time I asked .... "Have you emptied the bag?" ..... response ....   "I don't know how."

Now this machine is one that is grey plastic .... and it has a BIG orange button on top.  So I think I was fairly justified in explaining my annoyance ....  that if the cleaner won't work then try to work out why not!  .... and to suggest that she try to empty it first.  The machine is pretty simple and a quick look will suggest what button to try pushing.

Apparently in expressing my frustration with all the past people .... I have been seen as a rude man.  Sheesh!

The penny drops

Yesterday I was explaining to someone the reasons for my habit of challenging unthinking motivations ..... that is - why do we act the way we do.  I explained how for much of my adult life I have been plagued by fear ... .and I gave the example that until recent times, I could not sleep without hiding under sheets and blanket in bed.  I explained that I reached a point where I rejected my slavery to fear and sought to delve down and examine why I acted the way I did.  If the reason was fear ... then I rejected that fear and decided on a rational action.

..... however, in that example of hiding under the bed-covers, I had never connected the fear with the cause of the fear .... why did the fear exist? 

As I explained, the penny dropped!  When I was a boy and the bullying was going on at the hostel,  I would burrow down into the bed and try to protect myself by being deep in the bed.  It never worked ... but habits die hard .... and the fear remained with me for the next 40 years.

Second impressions

Six weeks later and one of the biggest things I've noticed is that the nightmares are largely gone.  I still can have "bad dreams" but they're not nightmares ..... I don't wake Naomi with the result.

It's possible that this is due to the lowering of anxiety levels ..... the claim money has removed most of our money worries and so that anxiety trigger is gone.  That would indicate that much of my anxiety was related to money worries ... it's probably that the lifelong issues have reduced my capacity to deal with the short term issues.

Regardless of the explanation, the result is very welcome.

So far I haven't been able to bring myself to seek further counselling ... I can't visualise any benefit so I don't want to waste money on "hand holding".

First impressions

After five days, some of the effects of the claim are beginning to gel.

First is a sense of relief .... that I haven't been imagining it all this time ... it has been verified by external parties and the "system" has said to me that what I went through was not normal or acceptable .... that a child should not have been treated in that way.

Second ..... I feel as though my life is now "pre" and "post" claim .... last Wednesday was a defining moment in some ways. 

Claim!

When (last year) an inquiry was held into the abuses at the hostels I told my story. Subsequently the government made funds available for compensation claims for victims .... I put in a claim late last year and on Wednesday I was advised that I had been assessed as being in the most severe category ... and eligible for the maximum compensation!

The money can't give me my life back again ... but at present it gives me the option of seeking help.  Lately things are getting really bad.  In some ways it's almost funny.  A Melbourne uni is conducting courses to help people to deal with depression etc .... I inquired .... and was told that I was too bad ... they couldn't help me!

I really don't think that any one can help ... I just have to hold it all together till the end of the story.