Struggling

by Laura

(Posted this evening on Mosaic Minds.)

We are safe. But we have had a great deal of difficulty lately, especially in dealing with anger. A lifetime of anger that we can't suppress anymore. We need to process this anger so that we can move forward, both in our healing and in our life.

This is affecting our ability to focus at work. Outside people have noticed how irritable we are. We feel hopeless and disempowered, like there's no way out of the choices that we've made.

On Wednesday evenings we go to T. This past Wednesday morning she left us a phone message at work saying that she had to cancel our appointment because her husband had had "a major heart attack." (Is there such a thing as a minor heart attack?)

Having our appointment cancelled really triggered us. We really needed a session, probably two sessions this week. We ended up getting approval to take Thursday and Friday off work (we were already scheduled to take off Friday).

Staying home helped. As much as it could without having the opportunity to go to T. Fast-forward to today (Sunday), and we can barely get out of bed. We're so distraught that we end up going to a walk-in crisis center about a 20-minute drive from our house.

Of course, we don't tell the crisis counselors that we're multiple. We just tell them we're very depressed (though safe), and that we are overwhelmed by a lifetime of repressed anger. We talk for an hour or so. We tell them that we haven't wanted to bother our T, even though she lets us call if we need to, because of the gravity of her husband's medical situation. They suggest that I call her right there, so that if for some reason she's unavailable, we can continue talking to the crisis counselors.

We call our T but have problems with our cell-phone connection. We try again on the crisis center's phone. Our T says that her husband is still in ICU and she basically sits with him during the day. And that we shouldn't worry about disturbing her, because all she can do for him is sit there anyway.

She tells us that given the way we seem to be feeling (overwhelmed, unable to focus), it would be a good idea to stay home from work one more day. We agree to call her back tomorrow (Monday) morning at 10:30.

After we hang up, the two crisis counselors seem to be satisfied that we have a good plan in place, and we say goodbye to them. At home, we spend time on the computer, trying to stay calm....and wondering whether we'll be able to work through all of this.