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LJ Idol: Stick and Stones...
Nov. 15th, 2018 05:45 pmMy phone rang and I glanced at it out of habit. My boss’s name scrawled across the caller ID. I picked up immediately, but casually. I’d just emailed him the answer to a question he’d asked me about 10 minutes before and figured that’s what he wanted to talk about.
“Can you come to my office?”
”Sure.”
“Come to my office.” It wasn’t a question. It was a command, growled through the phone line at me and I simultaneously rolled my eyes and steeled myself. My 25-year-old self knew that whatever was going to happen in the boss’s office had more to do with the fact that he was a fucking lunatic than with whatever transgression I’d supposedly made.
Deep in my belly, though, I felt the panic start to ooze out, slick and oily, tainting my good mood and the sushi I’d just eaten for lunch.
Deep breaths.
“Hey,” I said, forcing myself to be casual. Fake it until you make it. This was the strategy I’d agreed to try with my therapist. Panic on the inside, but smile and remember that it almost certainly wasn’t me. Act confident.
I’d taken a minute before coming down the hall to breathe in -2-3-4, hold-2-3-4-5-6-7-8, breathe out-2-3-4. Strike the Wonder Woman pose. Look up and away. Look around. Nothing harmful happening here and now.
”Sit down.”
I slid into the chair, notebook and pen optimistically in my hand, like this was a legitimate meeting, and not a roasting by a sociopath. He just stared at me and I braced myself. I would not break first.
I.
Will.
Not.
Break.
First.
”Close the door.”
Decades rushed past my ears in the pounding of my heart beat, and I stood back up and stepped back far enough to shut the door. My fingers were clumsy and I had to push it twice. The hand holding the pen and notebook were shaking and I gripped the objects tighter, like a talisman to keep the panic attack at bay.
He kept rubbing his hand over his mouth, and while I was so incredibly proud in retrospect that my outside visage remained calm, my inside quailed, waffling and flailing and gnashing teeth. You’re about to get fired, you fuck up. My inner voice was far more gleeful than it had a right to be, considering that if I starved, it did, too.
“It’s like this…” he said.
”Mmm.”
“Mmm,” is such an innocuous sound. Was something tasty? Was I even listening? Did I agree with the statement just made? Anyone home, Bewize?
I blinked and looked at the lunatic in front of me with care. If I didn’t react with just the right amount of sorrow, he’d snap and yell at me. “I can see why that’s upsetting,” I lied. “I should have sent you a response when I read the email.” Of course, no response was required. It wasn’t a question, a request, or even an order. It was an FYI.
Now it was a CYA.
”Mmm.”
“So, do you think you can handle this new work?” I was already nodding, autopilot having kicked on in defense, but I took the controls back. Breathe out-2-3-4.
“Absolutely. I’ve got this.”
“Great.”
“One can choose to go back toward safety or forward toward growth.
Growth must be chosen again and again; fear must be overcome again and again.” —Abraham Maslow
I’m not sure why my boyfriend called me this afternoon to check on me. That’s not his usual style, but he’s been doing it more lately. (I love it. It makes me feel so cared about.) “How’s it going?” he asked, probably not ready for the onslaught of panicky, giddy, excited, fearful emotions that slid out of my throat and sprayed through the phone.
When he’d put the pieces together, and it had clicked that this was a victory – a panic attack ridden to the non-terrifying end, I could hear his pride.
“Good job,” he said.
I smiled.
”Practice and time,” my therapist had said. “That’s how you get past this type of PTSD. Practice being in similar situations. Times when they don’t end with thrown books, raised voices, shouted insults and thinly veiled threats.”
“I’m so afraid.” I was crying, barely able to finish my thought aloud. “What if I make the same choices and end up that miserable again? I used to pray that I’d be in a car accident on my way to work, so I wouldn’t have to go.”
“No.” She was adamant. “You’ll never be in the same situation again. You’ve done it once. You’ve learned.”
Sometimes, I think I have.
**********
My first boss was a singularly unhinged individual, prone to violence in word and action. I quit a few months after the incident alluded to in this piece. On this particular day, he’d thrown a book at me and called me a fucking idiot. I had stood up for myself at the time, picking up the book and slamming it on his desk with a snarled, “We learned in kindergarten not to throw things at people.” He’d laughed, instantly forgetting his rage at me for not responding to an email that needed no response. He’d liked my “moxie.”
It has taken me more than 10 years to work past some of the fear responses I get when similar triggers happen. “Come into my office,” is a phrase that honestly makes me immediately want to run away, complete with upset stomach and ringing in the ears. It was how he began so many of his tirades that it is forever linked to the stuff of nightmares in my conscious brain.
Anyway, these are both true stories. One happened in 2005. One happened this afternoon. Eight years of therapy later, and I’ve accepted that I may never be free of the memories of the trauma, but I am certainly recovering much faster when triggered and no longer require immediate pharmaceutical assistance.
It’s strange and hard to admit that this is PTSD and it certainly feels presumptuous. But, as the Facebook meme I read yesterday says, “Someone who drowns in 7 feet of water is just as dead as someone who drowns in 20 feet of water. Stop comparing traumas. … This isn’t a competition, we all deserve support and recovery.”
So, if you see yourself reflected in this writing, just know you’re not alone and it’s okay to struggle to let go of some of the worst parts of the past. We don’t all just move on and forget. Sometimes, the past rodeos leave scars, even after the broken bones have healed.
But also know, you don’t have to live locked in fear forever. Find yourself a key.
Godspeed.
Written for LJ Idol prompt: "Not My First Rodeo." I will link the poll if there is voting.
“Can you come to my office?”
“Come to my office.” It wasn’t a question. It was a command, growled through the phone line at me and I simultaneously rolled my eyes and steeled myself. My 25-year-old self knew that whatever was going to happen in the boss’s office had more to do with the fact that he was a fucking lunatic than with whatever transgression I’d supposedly made.
Deep in my belly, though, I felt the panic start to ooze out, slick and oily, tainting my good mood and the sushi I’d just eaten for lunch.
“Hey,” I said, forcing myself to be casual. Fake it until you make it. This was the strategy I’d agreed to try with my therapist. Panic on the inside, but smile and remember that it almost certainly wasn’t me. Act confident.
I’d taken a minute before coming down the hall to breathe in -2-3-4, hold-2-3-4-5-6-7-8, breathe out-2-3-4. Strike the Wonder Woman pose. Look up and away. Look around. Nothing harmful happening here and now.
I slid into the chair, notebook and pen optimistically in my hand, like this was a legitimate meeting, and not a roasting by a sociopath. He just stared at me and I braced myself. I would not break first.
I.
Will.
Not.
Break.
First.
Decades rushed past my ears in the pounding of my heart beat, and I stood back up and stepped back far enough to shut the door. My fingers were clumsy and I had to push it twice. The hand holding the pen and notebook were shaking and I gripped the objects tighter, like a talisman to keep the panic attack at bay.
He kept rubbing his hand over his mouth, and while I was so incredibly proud in retrospect that my outside visage remained calm, my inside quailed, waffling and flailing and gnashing teeth. You’re about to get fired, you fuck up. My inner voice was far more gleeful than it had a right to be, considering that if I starved, it did, too.
“It’s like this…” he said.
“Mmm,” is such an innocuous sound. Was something tasty? Was I even listening? Did I agree with the statement just made? Anyone home, Bewize?
I blinked and looked at the lunatic in front of me with care. If I didn’t react with just the right amount of sorrow, he’d snap and yell at me. “I can see why that’s upsetting,” I lied. “I should have sent you a response when I read the email.” Of course, no response was required. It wasn’t a question, a request, or even an order. It was an FYI.
Now it was a CYA.
“So, do you think you can handle this new work?” I was already nodding, autopilot having kicked on in defense, but I took the controls back. Breathe out-2-3-4.
“Absolutely. I’ve got this.”
“Great.”
Growth must be chosen again and again; fear must be overcome again and again.” —Abraham Maslow
I’m not sure why my boyfriend called me this afternoon to check on me. That’s not his usual style, but he’s been doing it more lately. (I love it. It makes me feel so cared about.) “How’s it going?” he asked, probably not ready for the onslaught of panicky, giddy, excited, fearful emotions that slid out of my throat and sprayed through the phone.
When he’d put the pieces together, and it had clicked that this was a victory – a panic attack ridden to the non-terrifying end, I could hear his pride.
“Good job,” he said.
”Practice and time,” my therapist had said. “That’s how you get past this type of PTSD. Practice being in similar situations. Times when they don’t end with thrown books, raised voices, shouted insults and thinly veiled threats.”
“I’m so afraid.” I was crying, barely able to finish my thought aloud. “What if I make the same choices and end up that miserable again? I used to pray that I’d be in a car accident on my way to work, so I wouldn’t have to go.”
“No.” She was adamant. “You’ll never be in the same situation again. You’ve done it once. You’ve learned.”
**********
My first boss was a singularly unhinged individual, prone to violence in word and action. I quit a few months after the incident alluded to in this piece. On this particular day, he’d thrown a book at me and called me a fucking idiot. I had stood up for myself at the time, picking up the book and slamming it on his desk with a snarled, “We learned in kindergarten not to throw things at people.” He’d laughed, instantly forgetting his rage at me for not responding to an email that needed no response. He’d liked my “moxie.”
It has taken me more than 10 years to work past some of the fear responses I get when similar triggers happen. “Come into my office,” is a phrase that honestly makes me immediately want to run away, complete with upset stomach and ringing in the ears. It was how he began so many of his tirades that it is forever linked to the stuff of nightmares in my conscious brain.
Anyway, these are both true stories. One happened in 2005. One happened this afternoon. Eight years of therapy later, and I’ve accepted that I may never be free of the memories of the trauma, but I am certainly recovering much faster when triggered and no longer require immediate pharmaceutical assistance.
It’s strange and hard to admit that this is PTSD and it certainly feels presumptuous. But, as the Facebook meme I read yesterday says, “Someone who drowns in 7 feet of water is just as dead as someone who drowns in 20 feet of water. Stop comparing traumas. … This isn’t a competition, we all deserve support and recovery.”
So, if you see yourself reflected in this writing, just know you’re not alone and it’s okay to struggle to let go of some of the worst parts of the past. We don’t all just move on and forget. Sometimes, the past rodeos leave scars, even after the broken bones have healed.
But also know, you don’t have to live locked in fear forever. Find yourself a key.
Godspeed.
Written for LJ Idol prompt: "Not My First Rodeo." I will link the poll if there is voting.