Nightmares have begun

Trigger Warning: Nightmares

Oh. Well this is awesome. (Not.)

So my sleeping patterns are screwed to hell, thanks insomnia, thanks PTSD. For most of the week I couldn’t sleep. I managed a couple hours each night, but that’s it.

2 nights ago I had a series of nightmares and woke up having a panic attack. Wonderful. I was a shaken up wreck all morning, it literally took me hours to feel somewhat ‘normal’ again.

One of them involved me living with my grandmother who is undiagnosed Narcissistic/Borderline. I think in the dream I was younger- yet I was aware that I was being emotionally abused and was trying to escape, but I kept getting caught and in trouble. Obviously not much to this dream, though it was odd that it was about my grandmother rather than my mother.

Then I had a dream where I was in a house that I think we were moving out of. I look out the window and notice a grizzly bear. I freeze up, panicking, and then it notices and looks back at me. It proceeds to charge the window and I run. I think my brother was there, or someone who was supposed to be my brother, and at one point we escape out the window and go to another house. The bear finds us and follows, and gets inside the next house. Escape again, to a third house where there were other people. I don’t remember much after that point, just being terrified of the bear chasing me, and that’s around when I woke up.

Sort of interesting, and I figured this had some symbolism to it, so I decide to do some dream dictionary/interpretation research.

To see a bear in your dream represents independence, strength, death and renewal, and/or resurrection. […]

To dream that you are being pursued or attacked by a bear denotes anger and your uncontrolled aggression. You are feeling trapped.Perhaps you are in an threatening situation, some overwhelming obstacle or domineering and possessive relationship.

from: http://www.dreammoods.com

We may therefore associate the bear with feelings about living alone or surviving by our own strength; it can refer to the confrontation with feelings we have about independence,

from: dream-hawk.com

Well. In hindsight, that seems like really freaking obvious symbolism considering the circumstances. Particularly the bit about feelings we have about independence. I mean, come on. I just moved across the country and am being independent for the first time in my life, after being raised by my crazy Borderline mother who wanted me to be dependent on her and her caretaker, and then my overprotective dad who is convinced that I’m going to fail or fuck up my life or something.

To dream that you are looking out the window signifies your outlook on life, your consciousness and your point of view. It also refers to your intuition and awareness. You may be reflecting on a decision. Or you need to go out into the larger world and experience life.

To see shut windows in your dream signify desertion and abandonment.

Again, obvious symbolism seems obvious. I guess all the anxieties and fears I’m still having over this move manifested themselves in this nightmare.

Then today, I took a short nap. Awful nightmare occurs. This one actually involving BPDm. For some reason I was back in my old home, visiting or something, and BPDm shows up to rage at me for moving.

It sucks.

I’m sure the insomnia is going to get worse now because I won’t want to sleep for fear of more nightmares. Fuck.

The title of my first post should be more creative than this…

So this is my first post. Obviously. I’ve been nervous about posting anything on here. Even though the internet is anonymous.

I came up with this blog name out of the blue in the car a few weeks ago, and it was so fitting. It combined my personal motto/theme song with my disorder.

Defying Gravity comes from the Broadway musical Wicked. I’ve been a huge fan of this musical since I was 18, but in the last year it’s come to mean so much more to me. So, so much more.

It all started with this line:

Too long I’ve been afraid of losing love I guess I’ve lost.

Well, if that’s love it comes at much too high a cost.

So, here’s why.

A year ago I was diagnosed with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, as well as a panic disorder.

The past year I’ve been going through my ‘breakthrough crisis’ as it’s sometimes called- realizing and coming to terms with the fact that I was abused as a child.

My abuse was emotional and psychological- with a couple of few and far between moments of what would be considered physical abuse (this is something I don’t think I’ve quite faced yet… as I have a hard time saying this even in writing)

I was raised by my mother; she has Borderline Personality Disorder, with some narcissistic traits. Her mother, my grandmother, was also a huge presence in my life and I believe she has Narcissistic Personality Disorder, however she is undiagnosed.

My father wasn’t around much- my parents “legally divorced” when I was young, but they are for the most part practically still married, they do not act at all like a couple who has been divorced nearly 20 years. My father is a functioning alcoholic, and for all I know may have other issues. He is also still completely enmeshed with my mother, and very enabling. He has no boundaries with her.

Before I began seeing a therapist, I thought my father was to blame for most of my issues. Because he left when I was little, and I didn’t see him alone, and he’s an alcoholic.

While I have issues with him, sure, through therapy I began to see just how badly my mom’s behaviors and illness effected me. She’s the reason I have PTSD, not my dad.

Part of the reason I blamed (and at times, hated) my father was because my mom often split him black.

People with BPD see the world in black and white, all or nothing. Things are either “all good” or “all bad”. People with BPD think in extremes. It is difficult for them to hold opposing thoughts about themselves or others. When someone is seen as “all good” it’s referred to as being split or painted white. When someone is seen as “all bad” it’s referred to as being split or painted black. Obviously this comes from the cliche of white representing light/good/heaven etc, and black representing darkness/evil/hell etc.

An example, when my mom was trying to get back together with my dad she would often defend him, and go on about what a good father/person he is, and point out all the positive aspects of him. Then when things inevitably went wrong, she’d immediately call him awful names, that he’s a drunk, a terrible father who doesn’t even care about his children or her, that he’s a cruel evil man.

She just cannot grasp the concept that my dad in some ways is a good person, but he has his flaws too.

So, yes, when she split him black, these are the kinds of things she’d tell me. Over and over. She basically brainwashed me against my dad. Thus, I thought my dad leaving was to blame for my anxiety.

I never realized the role my mom played until I began therapy, and she was diagnosed with BPD.

I suppose I’ll leave the rest of this story for my next post.