I'm done with the Homeless Shelter.  My HUD came through yesterday so I no longer need transitional housing, and I needed to be homeless to qualify for transitional.  Mom can hold out with me until I find a place with Section 8. 

I hope.  If not, I think I can hold out with her.  My Daughter and I are in the same boat here.  We're both here wishing we weren't.  And we're both really close to finding another place. 

So, I'm back in the "Frying Pan". 

My Daughter came with me to Exit last night, so I didn't feel all the feelings that I would have otherwise.  Part of me wanted to wait until I was vindicated there before exiting, because what they were doing to me was so messed up.  They had me scrambling for documentation for this that and the other thing when they hadn't really communicated to me that it was necessary or waited until it was too late before bringing it up at all.  They were harassing me.  So, I asked for a copy of my file.  They are having a hard time getting around to that.  So, last night as I carried out the last of my crates of stuff (a total of 5, which is nothing compared to most) I told them all that I still wanted a copy of my file or to see my file, whichever they are authorized to do.  The supervisor said that was fine, but the two drones behind the desk sat silently without making eye contact. 

Its raining now.  There is a waiting list for beds in the Women's Dorm.  I said, "Goodbye" to one of my best friends there, and gave her a gift as I left.  I hope she's gonna be okay.  There were people there making her miserable, but I think that blew over.  The other two of my best friends there left themselves the other day, so it was a different place than when I got there.  There's a huge clan of women who are taking up 11 beds with their children and all and they have slowly changed the tone of the place.  I suspect they are using the place to save money or something. 

So, last night I drank 3 beers and stayed up late.  As 6:00 rolled around, my anxiety got pretty intense.  My Daughter and I talked for hours.  It was freakin' beautiful.  I can go shopping after 6.  I can go out to dinner until after 6.  I can go out for Halloween until after 6.  I can work or go to my Meditation Meeting until after 6 without being threatened to be kicked out on the street as punishment for calling at the wrong time or not having proper documentation.  LOL  I can take a half of a Vicodin for cramps without having to have a hand-signed note from my Dr. saying so.  LOL  Jesus!  Don't they have anything more important to attend to than crap like that?  How about watching and listening to see how some of those women talk to their children or each other?  How about things that really matter like connecting people up with the service agencies and help they need for their problems?  How about creating a safe atmosphere for Highly Sensitive People to get away from the insanity?  How about making some reasonable accommodations for people to work or be productive, instead of lowering the standard of behavior down to the lowest possible level for everyone?

Okay, I'm done ranting about that.  Drama recognized.  I most definitely will do something about those problems when I am in a position to do so.  Meanwhile I have to find a landlord who will rent to me before December 10th.  I'm in Section 8 and I have a cat.  There are very few places who will do that.  Someone told me I can get my Dr. to make a prescription for a "Therapeutic Animal" so that they have to let me keep her.  The trick is I have to withhold the information until after they agree to rent to me.  I'm not good at guile, so I don't know if I'll be able to do it. 

I gotta go get ready for work. 

I've done really well.  I endured one of the scariest experiences in life and came out of it with my dignity intact.  That's what the fight with Staff was really about; the right to retain my dignity.  I managed to retain my dignity while still surrendering some entitlement.  What a psychic minefield!  Now, I'm on to get securely housed and then follow through with my SSI. 

Here's to me!

I miss them already.

I miss my friends and my Favorite Staff Member and the people that I wanted to love and help but couldn't and I miss the sense of freedom to reinvent myself.  I miss the fascinating jail-house politics.  I felt so safe there, most of the time. 

Tomorrow night the Church who's building I work in is feeding them and I think I'm gonna go with them.  I would love to do that.  I'm gonna stop by tonight and drop off something that I forgot to drop off last night.  It's important. 

I'm working tonight, and I just emptied my bin full of files and other things so it's all going back to Mom's. 

A Client/Friend asked me today if I've really thought this through.  Did I run a Worst Case Scenario on this?  Not really.  So, tonight I had to think about it again - whether or not I would have a strategy in case Mom started abusing me again.  I don't have one.  Some Peer-Counselor I am!  But that's how it works.  Sometimes we need to receive as well as give. 

I have to say, that since I've been keeping this blog, I'm really glad I'm crazy.  I love the freedom it gives to be able to own some pretty embarassing things without the usual shame and disillusion.  It's really beautiful.  And I love that I can be so conflicted and "ambivalent" without having to make excuses.  It feels more genuinely human and humane.

Even though I told myself I wouldn't.  I guess I see it being temporary. 

I joined the Labyrinth Pod.  There's a really good reason.  It just so happens that I've been working on this idea of building a Labyrinth at a Grave site here in town for the California Memorial Project.  You can read my thread and find out more about it.  I think it's a pretty cool idea, even though some people may get squeemish about walking on graves.

I have so little time to spare for stuff like that, but I guess this feels really important.  Hopefully my boss will agree and see that there is support for the project.  It's part of my work.  I'm gonna try and put a drawing of it online in the pod.  I designed in so that it looks alot like a brain with a little stone bench in the center shaped like a pill.  Heh-heh.  I love that.  We have a new guy at work who says he has "gallows humor" and not too many people dig that.  I really do.  I hope it goes over well, but if not, it can be altered to suit. 

I included the seed design for you so you can see how I altered the ordinary "Cretan".  The little oval in the middle is a bench that can be formed to look like a giant pill. 

That's the only way I can describe this experience.  I'm going to try and name the cars on this train starting with the caboose:

• Impulse to kill
• Feelings of blinding rage
• Thoughts of how my boundaries have been violated (this is a very constant and long-standing violation, not just recent, hence the PTSD type reaction)
  
• Laying a boundary around my space and time
• Wanting to get away from people who feel entitled to having me revolve around them constantly
• Unconscious sense of entitlement to choose my own center
• My Parent wanted me to revolve around her since infancy and rejected me if I didn't
  

There.  I think that's it.  Maybe that will be refined later, after Meditation tonight. 

I found a very interesting website this morning.  I'm embarassed to say that I got the link from MySpace.  But that just goes to show you - advertizing to target audiences only is not always the smart move.  It's hokey and uses way too many cliches, but that's part of the reason why it works.  The New Paradigm Revolution. 

I skimmed through the little questions and answers.  The wording is different than most of what I've seen til now.  It has an interesting LACK of charge around certain ideas.  It still has the usual charge around Western Religion, but not around the ego.  It treats the ego with the respect it deserves instead of hatred or ridicule.  Fascinating.  This way, it will be easier to transcend.  Hatred comes from the ego.  You can't have your cake and eat it too. 

I need to try and maintain an awareness of my sense of entitlement today.  It feels like that's where I hook up to the engine.  The engine seems to be my Parent's inappropriate behavior.  But I suspect that it is only riding the same track I'm on and is just as unable to derail itself as I am.  My identity is still in the cars dragged behind the engine.  As I learn to put my identity in the engine, and then the track, the problem will begin to resolve.

I hope...

I'm actually in danger now.  It's such a long story that I don't have time to tell it all.  But the thing I have to do now is figure out how to keep someone away from me.  A Restraining Order may not work.  I can't go into a Battered Women's Shelter because there has been no current physical violence nor threats of physical violence and they will only try and brainwash me into accepting their cookie cutter version of "Recovery" which doesn't fit me.  It ends up being a version of "Blame the Victim" that only triggers me worse.  I will go to The Bad Place if they try and force that down my throat. 

Last night I was looking at Amma's website.  She embraces all.  And that is the goal of my recovery.  But I have to figure out how to get there from here without becoming a blood sacrifice first.  Little practical matter getting in the way there...

But that's really the kind of Recovery I want.  I don't want anyone robbing me of my freedom to Love.  My freedom to be Good.  It's amazing how much pressure there is on me to give up that ideal.  Amazing.  I feel that if someone forces me to hate them, then they win.  That's why it seems like I'm really co-dependent to many.  They confuse that with the sickness. 

But that wouldn't be a problem if I myself didn't also confuse it somewhat.  And that's exactly what my recovery is all about: learning how those two are NOT the same and how I can achieve the one and leave the other behind.  If I can't find the way, then I will most likely be drawn back into the vortex of extremes and sickness.  And that's right where my Attachment Disorder wants me; painting myself as the Victim and someone else as the Perpetrator and trying to "be strong" so I don't pick up the phone or open the door or other shit like that.  Amma doesn't have that problem.  There are no boundaries.  And she is 100% Authentic.  She is not stupid.  And she Loves absolutely.  At least that is my hope...  It could be projection on my part...  the part of me that is all those things wishing there was a safe place to come out and be...  looking at myself in her mirror...

But the problem is that I cannot find anyone who gets what I'm trying to do and will help me go forward.  Everyone wants to push me back to the Extreme of absolute separation.  While I agree with the need for that physically right now (the one thing no one is willing to give me...) I am not willing to look upon him as separate and other and evil and all that.  That really screws me up.  So, I am trying to recover alone.  "Alone".

This is why it sucks being mentally ill.  Everything that is simple about Enlightenment and Recovery becomes way more complicated.  And some of the things that are difficult for some are strangely easy for me.  So if there is anyone out there who gets what I'm trying to accomplish and is not going to give me a bunch of simplistic, cliche crap about it, please drop me a message.

"Life Coaches" need not apply.

...I know it is.  I can smell it.

I have drowned in the deepest ocean of suffering.  I'm crushed under the weight of 45 years, being pickled by the heavy chemicals of betrayal and yet not decomposing because there is no oxygen or light of hope.

Yet, even here, complete freedom exists.  It's right here...   somewhere...

Did you know that while everyone knows what it is and when it happens to them, it has been very difficult to find a good way to define or measure betrayal?  I'm pretty sure that this is because it causes such a profound trauma that it is immediately driven beneath the level of awareness where we have words and memory.  It violates our power to Trust, which is the first great power that we develop in life besides existing.  It's pre-verbal.  And regardless of whether or not we are entitled to the honoring of such social contracts in adulthood, the breaking of them ruptures a trust that we actually were entitled to as infants, and our incredulity takes the form of infantile, mute paralysis.  Absolute powerlessness.  The playground of psychopaths.  When they get you there, they can just walk up to you and draw a mustache on your face and stick straws up your nose and you can't move or defend yourself. 

I've been held in that catatonic place by several people in my life.  Manipulated and played with like a lifeless rag-doll.  Exploited by the greedy, power-hungry or ignorant.  That is the end result of suffering in this life.  It comes right before suicide.  Or murder. 

Retaliation happens.  And it often takes the form of...  betrayal.  And on and on it goes.  That is why it's not a good idea to try and figure out how to seek miracle cures or extend the human life-span until we figure out a way to rip up the tracks of this ancient railroad.

And who is it that knows all this?  Who is it that sees the track and the entire train and the agenda going on in each car?  And how is this Person not completely paralized by the horror?  Because even though it is Person, it is also more than Person.  Person cannot fully grasp it, but can only be grasped. 

And when "I" cannot identify with "it", I can only aprehend through Faith.  And this Faith is not in a Person, but in One which has been Person and which can identify with me.  That is why I am a Christian.  Because when I can't hold and contain the Identity, I can at the least believe that it is there and holding me - until I can. 

And so "I" break in and out of the Identity so I know it is there.  It is all around me.  I even know that it identifies with me even now....  whether I realize it or not.  And along side of me, it identifies with my betrayors as well.  As well as the deep sea we are all submerged in.  But my most primal betrayor is in the room with me now, and my Personal mind is jammed into alert status and flooding my brain with cortisol and catecholamines and all sorts of other crap that turn up the volume on the Victim Identity.  So, I'm stuck... for now.

From a site by Jennifer J. Freyd on Betrayal Trauma:

"From that talk: "I propose that the core issue is betrayal -- a betrayal of trust that produces conflict between external reality and a necessary system of social dependence. Of course, a particular event may be simultaneously a betrayal trauma and life threatening. Rape is such an event. Perhaps most childhood traumas are such events." Betrayal trauma theory was introduced: "The psychic pain involved in detecting betrayal, as in detecting a cheater, is an evolved, adaptive, motivator for changing social alliances. In general it is not to our survival or reproductive advantage to go back for further interaction to those who have betrayed us. However, if the person who has betrayed us is someone we need to continue interacting with despite the betrayal, then it is not to our advantage to respond to the betrayal in the normal way. Instead we essentially need to ignore the betrayal....If the betrayed person is a child and the betrayer is a parent, it is especially essential the child does not stop behaving in such a way that will inspire attachment. For the child to withdraw from a caregiver he is dependent on would further threaten his life, both physically and mentally. Thus the trauma of child abuse by the very nature of it requires that information about the abuse be blocked from mental mechanisms that control attachment and attachment behavior. One does not need to posit any particular avoidance of psychic pain per se here -- instead what is of functional significance is the control of social behavior. ""

So there ya have it.

I'm completely decompensated right now.  But I still have awareness. 

Betrayal totally undoes me.  The small me.  The personal me.  I have successfully achieved what Tyler Durden calls "pre-enlightenment" or am aproaching what Tillich calls the despair of "non-being".  I can achieve this quicker than most because I cannot compartmentalize.  I can only be on (present) or off (dissociated).  If I can stay on, I maintain my will to live and I'm present.  If I'm being hurt, then I lose my will to live and I dissociate.  I am always trying to make life worth living.  But it never will be.  Not for a person who cannot compartmentalize.  My only alternative is the Transpersonal which is beyond and includes both the will to live and it's absense. 

My brain is completely overcome by the danger-avoidance system.  I'm numb, nauseous, weepy and caught in a dependence on the certainty of betrayal.  I prefer death.  But I'm unable to achieve full unawareness at this time.  The pain is more than bearable. 

I am 3 years old and in nursery school and after being betrayed, am left alone in a room full of dangerous animals known as children.  I cannot protect myself.  I have no power to stay alive and no certainty that anyone else will keep me alive either.  The universe will attack and kill me at any moment.  I eat, sleep and bathe in fear.