I need regular help.
I was at a recovery meeting last night and realized something: no matter how much you think and study, you need to be with people. You need to hear their stories and listen for what you need that evening. It’s not enough to try and do it alone. You need a tribe.
I need that regular reminder and help. I am not sure what I’m like in terms of change. I think overall, I’m a Slow Learner. It seems I need repeated examples and proddings and teaching on issues or topics before change emerges if at all. I just am forgetful and lazy at times. I don’t change quickly. I’m often blind to what isn’t working well, what is less that desireable. As a result, I’m a child it seems in some areas.
Trauma really stunts your personal growth. It puts you in a freeze pattern, and you hyperdevelop certain areas that don’t really need that much focus. In general, it’s not super helpful in daily life to be hypervigilant, for example. It rarely comes in handy, and makes easy, daily living challenging.
So I need to keep trying. I’m behind. I can tell there are things I should have learned by now, and it seems I’m still catching up.
*****
We started moving our office contents today into our new space. Jay is doing a good job coordinating everything. I feel overwhelmed by it all.
When things happen quickly and I can’t process all the change, I get really stressed. There is so much happening right now. I’m part of it but not really, anymore. I got triggered by being in sort of chaos and not really having a say in how things unfold. I don’t know at all what that says about me other than it seems I’m a control freak.
I had to calm myself down several times: you’re overreacting, none of what you’re stressed about really matters, no babies are dying, etc. I guess if you’re an HSP, all this change is a big deal. I can see everything that’s not perfect or ideal and wonder how it will all get done. Jay moves ahead and just gets things done. I guess I get more paralyzed.
The other thing in play is it’s just hard to still be in this company but not really in it. I do special projects and have a hand in a few things here and there, but I just show up once in a while and do what must look like busy work. Right now, I’m working on outfitting the kitchen with new items.
I told Jay at dinner that I’ve always felt like an elf at work. I did all this magic for years and no one really understood all that I did. Jay said he feels bad he never really acknowledged that. It’s hard to really say how painful this has been, to just do the magic and be invisible.
So that’s what I told him, that I felt invisible for all those years. Sometimes I was publicly invisible, representing the company and not feeling like I even wanted to be there. Most of the time, I just worked at the office and made it all happen, usually across all four major departments. It was insane. I burned about, flamed out in 2016, and here I am, writing about it.
So yeah, cleaning out supply cupboards, cleaning out the kitchen, I’ve been doing all this for months now. Now we just have a few things to box up in terms of room clean-up, largely because I’ve been slowly cleaning out each room just so we wouldn’t have a lot to do right now. No one knows. I mentioned today that I’ve been putting stickers on the rooms I’ve cleaned out. The manager commented that that was a really good idea. One of a thousand. Thanks.
I don’t know. I don’t know how to process all this. I don’t want to be weak and giving into this negativity feels weak. Jay said if I’m going to do it, enjoy it. Otherwise, let someone else do it. No one else can do it like me, and if I’m still an owner, I want it to be done right. I guess my attitude about it all is up to me.
It’s hard to imagine I’ll ever be good enough at something to feel like I’m the best or even, just really good. I like winning. I like pursuing things and getting better. I like the challenge. I like the learning. I like the mastery.
The way our business has run, there hasn’t been much of that experience for me. I told Jay tonight our business for me personally has been more negative than positive.
I tend to not live in the moment. I don’t appreciate what I have until it’s gone. What we have attained now, Jay said we’ve earned this. We worked for this. It’s ours. We have a business with almost 20 employees. We have a new space in the heart of our city which is booming and growing. It’ll be fun. It’ll be different. It’ll definitely be more exciting.
I hope I can enjoy it. I hope I can enjoy moving in. I told Jay I feel threatened by everyone’s ideas about things. I feel confident someone is going to hang a coat rack somewhere and be like, what, it works doesn’t it? Then I’ll have to be the bitch that says no, we don’t do that anymore.
I told Jay tonight I’m tired of that role. I’m tired of trying to explain or defend myself to people who don’t have a clue about what I’ve done or did. My skills of precision and design and operational excellence took us here. I don’t like seeing that change or degraded. That’s what I don’t want to see happen.
We need to go to another level. We need to create a sense of pride in people for this space. We need people to feel ownership, to care about how things look. That might take some training for some of the folks we have. All of us to some degree are scrappers. We’ve all had to work hard and often, that wasn’t enough, and even with working hard, we’ve still had to scrape by.
We don’t have to become lazy and complacent to accept that we don’t have to scrape by like that in terms of how things look at least. We’re going from a slum location to a high-end spot downtown. Maybe I don’t still feel we’ve earned it.
I have a lot of changing to do. I want to enjoy this week and feel positive. I’m willing to change. I don’t want to be defensive. I want to welcome input and help people feel pride in this new space. Part of that probably needs to come from me.
I am tired. I had another PT appointment today and she found an area that has been very tight. It’s great to have this resource. It’s hard to have to have work done on my body all the time.
Tomorrow, I want to be positive and just mainly not triggered. I don’t want Jay to worry about me, and I want to enjoy this.
*****
I came home sort of tired and frustrated still after the day. The back porch light is no longer attached to the patio string lights so Jay could put in a motion detection light. I love the patio lights. I liked being able to flip on the light and they go on. Now that’s disrupted so we have this spotlight on a motion sensor. I don’t know why we have it when the garage doesn’t even have a lock on it.
I guess it just was sort of how the day started, miscommunication and different ways of living. I sort of let him know that it’s tiring for me to have these things just change. I try and set up my life a certain way, and it’s been like this many times. I feel like I’ve had to fight for my own way of being and living when he has such a strong personality and way of living.
When I focus on that, I miss the goodness of our life together. I guess I don’t know when that is appropriate and when I am making excuses. I guess if I felt better about my own life, that would be more clear. He is not the only reason things have gone this way for me. Some of it was my own choices to pursue this business and other things; some I’ve felt confined; some I wasn’t healthy and just got to this place out of habit.
At any rate, I used the lights as a way to sort of lash out at him instead of just being honest with myself or him. I am not honest as much as I should about my feelings. I get distracted and then feel like a victim, because I’m not solving the problem.
I don’t know. People are trying to escape Latin America and head to the US. People in North Korea are oppressed and much of the Middle East, people live in oppression. I think it’s reasonable to ask if these are legitimate concerns. I need to understand myself, what I need and make it happen. I think then things like our living style differences won’t bother me so much. I am projecting my unhappiness with many things onto Jay. I need to save that kind of energy for things that matter.