The Perditions of Power

Monday, August 31, 2015


Ten years ago today the world bore witness to the catastrophe of Hurricane Katrina. I recall the horror I felt in the days immediately prior to the storm's landfall as it became increasingly clear that New Orleans lay in the path of the monstrous storm. I can also still recall one of the National Weather Service forecasters describing the storm's imminent arrival as New Orleans having "a date with destiny". But it was a destiny made all the more catastrophic by human error. And of course the hubris of the George Bush administration only compounded the suffering of so many.

Former "President" George W. Bush was recently in the news as coverage of the ten year anniversary of Katrina's destructive landfill in New Orleans. It was difficult for me not to develop a sick stomach as I read some of the media coverage. Rewriting history to suit your own narrative of events is not an unusual tactic employed by those seeking to maintain their power. Put more succinctly: 'History is written by the winners.' Indeed it is.

The passage of ten years' time has undoubtedly softened the memories of some. But the anger and contempt directed at George W. Bush can still be discerned in the comments made on one New York Times article focused on Bush's visit to New Orleans. I remember "news" sources such as Fox News employing their typical conservative lens to essentially blame minorities and poor people for their failure to evacuate the city of New Orleans all the while conveniently forgetting the poverty that made it difficult (if not impossible) to do so. The "blaming the victim" approach can go a long way in conservative circles.

I bring up the anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, the tragic response of the George W. Bush administration and the efforts of Bush's "handlers" to gloss over the horror of that tragedy as but one example of a phenomenon that has long revolted me. When those in power make colossal errors they may enjoy the benefit of others looking past these errors (or even revising events later on when accounts of past history are composed as a means of unjustifiably improving the legacy of such individuals). This "forgiveness" of past appalling malfeasance is a gift more likely to be available to wealthy, old white men who have lived lives of privilege compared to others. They can be easily insulated from the horrible consequences of their errors, stupidity and indifference.

It's the insulation available by those possessing immense power that I find truly revolting. Why? Because insulating people from the consequences of their mistakes, lies and hubris appears to be a very effective way to lead them down the path to making even more colossal mistakes later and even, perhaps, eventually becoming monsters, psychopaths and the like. I sense George W. Bush has little clue how destructive his Presidency was. How could he? With the likes of people such as Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld close to him how could he have an objective view of his destructiveness? Such can be the distortion wrought by wealth and political privilege. When Bush left office in January 2009 our national economy was essentially in a state of chaos and virtual free fall. Way to go Georgie!

Wealth and power may be misused to harm whole groups of people. This theme runs throughout so much of human history. And with income inequality in the United States becoming an increasing concern I can only wonder what coming years in the United States may feature.

I'll write more about this later this week.

The Lives of Armchair Warriors

Saturday, August 29, 2015


Have you ever known an armchair warrior? Let me define that term for you. When I speak of an "armchair warrior" I speak of people who have plenty of energy to criticize the state of affairs in their local community, state or nation but will not lift a finger to actually go out into the world and try to  make the world a better place.

Over the course of the last sixteen months I have had a friend here in Minnesota who has a tendency to heap voluminous amounts of criticism upon the Republican party here in the United States. One way he does this is to post articles and comments on Facebook. I don't disagree with the critiques he has made about that political party. I personally believe that the political culture in the United States has become highly even dangerously dysfunctional. One only need look at the continuing problem of gun violence in the United States as one example of an issue eluding some degree of healthy attention due in part to our dysfunctional politics at the federal level. I further agree with his opinion that the Republican party carries much responsibility for our current state of national dis-ease.

Yet I differ with this person regarding what the appropriate ways of dealing with personal and collective disgust and disenfranchisement are. Sitting in your armchair at home and writing about all that is wrong with the world and yet not doing anything to try to improve the world strikes me as being very satisfying in the short term but completely useless in the long term. This is not unlike sitting and looking at a green wall and blaming it for being green but never being willing to get off your butt, go to the store, pick out a new paint color and repaint the wall. Contemplation and observation alone will not solve our entrenched issues. I tend to believe we need to apply a blend of action and thoughtful contemplation if we are to truly make the world a more just place.

I think it can become easy to fall into the role of an armchair warrior when you pursue writing. It is a hazard inherent to the profession of writing. Observing the world around you and yet refraining from participating in that world can be a very safe way to live. Writing about what we see unfolding around us can certainly be impactful. And I still believe this even in today's America in which quality journalism has become a lost art. But if we don't get up off our butts and actually work to change the world around us I believe we are more likely to be swallowed by the issues that plague our society.

I severed my Facebook connection with my friend recently. I grew so weary of seeing the prolific amount of distress he has about the state of our national politics and watching him simultaneously do nothing substantial (as far as I know) about it. I still consider him a friend. But loyalty has its limits. When a person is in pain and that person refuses to seek a healthy way to relieve the pain there is nothing anyone else can necessarily do to change that person's course of action.

You can't compel people to change. But you can be an example to others by the life you yourself live.

Holding Strong

Friday, August 28, 2015


Today is one of those days when I feel as if I can taste the bad days of 2013 all over again.

I went to the Abbott Hospital campus this morning to get my left knee examined. Those that know me well know that Abbott Hospital and its surroundings are a familiar part of my recent 'psychic geography'. I went to an outpatient treatment program at Abbott Hospital in November 2013. Though that time in my life now feels like ancient history the painful memories of that time in my life sometimes  come to the forefront of my conscious awareness when I visit that part of Minneapolis. It's very easy to remember times like the day from the summer of 2013 when I broke down in tears while going to what at the time seemed like an endless sequence of medical appointments. I had a lot of fear and anxiety coursing through me at the time. I didn't know what was amiss in me. But I did know I did not feel good. And it turned out a lot was off in my life.

Twenty-five months have passed since those trying days. I feel much better now. In fact I am well enough now that I was able to contemplate successfully transitioning off sertraline just last month. In the first weeks after I completely titrated off the medication I had what I considered some minor withdrawal symptoms. I experienced a few episodes of minor dizziness. I also experienced an unfamiliar sensation in my head; it felt as if the space between the cells in my brain was expanding. Does that sound bizarre or impossible? Perhaps it does. But that was the best way I could put words to the sensation.

Yet despite my immense improvement compared to this time two years ago I still have moments when I feel extremely vulnerable. And I experience these moments much more often than I would like to. Yet it seems to me this isn't unusual considering how my life is still (hopefully) arcing in the direction of improvement. But when I read of events in the world at large I feel exasperation and anxiety. Indeed, reading the daily newspaper seems like a virtual act of courage these days. Whether it's news of Republican candidates being called terrorists, George W. Bush having the incredible nerve to make an appearance on the 10th anniversary of the devastation of New Orleans by Hurricane Katrina, the massive refugee problem in Europe or the latest sad gun violence tragedy in America I can't help but wonder what world we are throttling towards. What kind of world are we creating?

I used the word vulnerability because I think it is a word that aptly describes the quality of the intersection of many individual American citizens' lives and our society at large. With issues such as growing income inequality, the issue of persistent gun violence (which I personally believe eludes resolution to the complexity of the problem) and an incredibly unproductive Congress is it any wonder that many Americans would feel anxious about their individual futures as well as the future of this nation?

As for myself I feel a bit inclined to hide for the rest of today. Being required to be perpetually strong in the face of grinding challenges can be debilitating over a long period of time. Knowing this and given my early personal history it no longer surprises me that on a warm June day in 2013 I was given a diagnosis of PTSD. As I noted above I feel much better today as compared to two years ago. But there are many days when I am not encouraged by how I see many of the adults of our world behaving.

Life Imitating Art Imitating Life Imitating Art Imitating...

Wednesday, August 26, 2015


Living in the United States sometimes feels akin to being permanently trapped in a realm like that featured in Alice in Wonderland. Only here in America "wonder" is not something I would use to describe so much of our land. Words such as violence, greed and apathy seem more fitting.

I do think is is a wonder more Americans haven't become expatriates as the issue of gun violence continues to defy a healthy response here in this nation. The latest incredibly sad story of two young lives cut down can be found here. Nicholas Kristof of the New York Times quotes some statistics I am already, sadly, familiar with. While the statistics are compelling I can't help but wonder if many Americans have "statistics fatigue" regarding the issue of gun violence. When does throwing more numbers at the public stop doing any good? It seems we reached that point long ago.

Another person will likely die from gun violence in the time it takes me to complete this posting. It happens basically four times an hour. When you wake up after a restful night of sleeping eight hours approximately thirty-two people will have died. That's something like wiping out one side of an entire street in a residential neighborhood. Sad isn't it?

We Americans all too often "solve" our problems with alienation and anger through the use of violence. And yet such a course of action doesn't solve anything. Instead we are left with more grieving families and more scarred hearts. The pain seems to unnaturally compound something like a bank account accruing interest at some astronomical rate because a bank official input the wrong value in a box in an online account. Such is life in America in 2015.

I don't really know what more can be said about this issue. I feel immense sadness every time I contemplate it.

My own life is quite pleasant as of late. I have settled into my new home and feel comfortable and safe here. Many Americans cannot say that about their home lives. I have sufficient means to live each day free from want. Too many children go hungry each day in this nation billed as "the greatest nation in the world". My health is relatively good now. I am also fortunate in that regard.

I sometimes still feel a bit stuck when I write in my blog. As I have recounted many times already I reached a definitive point of departure some time ago. In shedding the vestiges of a traumatized psyche a person in search of deep personal healing may experience something like a rebirth. I know I have felt that way.

What is next?

That Feeling of Devastation

Monday, August 24, 2015


"Only by facing our feelings do we learn and grow. Pain has a size and a shape, a beginning and an end. It takes over only when not allowed its voice." - Anne Brener


I have become increasingly convinced that many people who attempt to function let alone thrive in American culture face an uphill battle. There are many factors that I believe contribute to this reality. One of those factors is the unreasonable expectations we place upon ourselves and others to live at a virtually breakneck pace. I was reminded of this when reading a recent article in the New York Times. It can be fun to live a fast paced life and push our limits. It can be fun to push ourselves to reach grand visions and possibilities. And yet grief has something to tell us as well. Grief, I think, teaches us to slow down. Grief can become a wall when too long denied.

The article, entitled "A Grief So Deep It Won't Die", explores the difficult issue of people whose grief lingers or is so deep that it may begin to hinder normal daily functioning for a long period of time. As I read through the article I could feel elements of my own life journey writ large in its content. One woman, named Anne Schomaker, took care of her husband for the last eight years of his life. Her experience as documented in the article gives evidence to the idea that appearances are not always indicative of what a person is actually feeling. Indeed, there are many people who appear entirely functional who are nonetheless dealing with immense pain and grief. A person may be active in his local community and social circles and nonetheless feel virtually haunted by loss. And some of these losses may have occurred years ago.

Grief is a natural human experience. The article notes that "the death of someone beloved often brings deep sadness. Usually, however, the intense grief of early mourning begins to ebb as months pass, and people alternate between continuing sorrow and a growing ability to rediscover life's pleasures." This brief sketch of a normal trajectory of grieving seems quite accurate.

I have noticed I myself have reached a stage where joy and pleasure are now, thankfully, a more common experience of my daily life. I have written about this in more recent entries in my blog. And yet the shadow of grief can be long and deep. When grief endures an especially long time some might describe it as complicated grief. It appears that prolonged grief (which may be used interchangeably for complicated grief) is likely to be more common in older individuals. Why? Older people are likely to be experiencing losses that are both more immense and more frequent as compared to younger people. And this makes perfect sense. This is an inherent aspect of becoming older. People become sick and die. Others move away.

The article offers the additional insight that prolonged grief "appears more likely when a death is sudden or violent; when the person who died was one's spouse, romantic partner or child; and when the bereaved person has a history of depression, anxiety or substance abuse." Written in my own words I would rephrase it this way: Some losses are more painful than others. The closer a person is to us the more devastating the loss of that person can be. And it is my opinion (not borne out by any extensive research I have done on the issue...because I haven't) that the earlier a significant loss occurs in the life of a child the more likely that loss will be felt acutely and for a prolonged time. I make that conclusion based on my own personal experience. Nearly losing both of my parents before I turned nine was quite devastating. In some way I am still working through the subtle aftereffects of the first ten years of my life.

The article goes on to discuss the potential implications of pathologizing protracted grief. Yet whether the American Psychiatric Association ultimately chooses to describe complicated grief as a mental disorder is, in one sense, an academic matter. Regardless of what lay people or mental health professionals call it there is an already existing reality that many people out in the world suffer from grief for years at a time. I know because I was one of them.

I may never see my birthmother again. The idea of this pains me. I may never see my father again. And despite the fact that I am not on good terms with him (and do not expect to be in the future) the idea of this pains me as well. Besides older people I think it only natural that children who experience significant loss when they are quite small are more likely to be profoundly impacted by that loss as compared to healthy adults in the prime of their lives. Why? Children are less likely to be able to bring something to bear on their experiences that adults can. Adults can bring perspective to their challenges, frustrations and losses. How can a child of five do that?

I actually found it consoling to read the article I have referenced. I realize prolonged grief isn't such an unusual experience among my fellow humans. Yet just because something is normal or common doesn't mean it is healthy. If you carry intense grief regarding a loss from many years ago it's a wise choice to see your doctor. Sadness is normal. Completely vanishing from the world of other people (family, friends, neighbors) outside the walls of your home for a decade is quite a different matter.

I generally feel encouraged about my life now. Some twenty-six months after the disruptive events of June, 2013 redirected the course of my life I still have days when I feel, well, devastated. Yes, I will use that word. But such depth of pain usually only steals upon me when I allow myself to spend too much time thinking about some of the people who crossed my path in the last three years whom I wish I had never met. I have learned the painful lesson of the value of gradually allowing people to enter your life....by doing quite the opposite. There are some days when that time twenty-six months ago feels like an eternity. And yet other days that time seems like yesterday. I can almost recall how the air smelled the day I found myself crying in Abbott Hospital in the summer of 2013 when I was getting yet another test and all the while feeling frightened by not (yet) knowing what was wrong with me. Pain and time have a strange interrelationship.

Do some people never recover from the losses they endure? The article I have referenced argues in the affirmative. I suppose this must be true. I have encountered strangers on public transportation and in other settings whose faces have such an utter blankness about them that I can only imagine what sad experiences they have endured in their own life histories.

And yet I must believe that healing is possible and can appear as unexpectedly as flowers blooming outside in the midst of a Minnesota winter. Healing can find us if we allow it in. The painful burn of a heart and spirit healing from the darkness of loss (whose contours we will all inevitably come to know) can be agonizing. And yet I have to believe the pain we may feel in reaching out in hope for a brighter tomorrow is preferable to the pain of isolation, fear and daily unquenched yearning for that which has left us.

I believe we have the choice to heal or die, to grow or wither. The journey may be long and arduous but the nectar of joyfully experiencing a beautiful moment can make years of personal effort melt from our minds and hearts and seem a mere instant. Joy, like pain, does an interesting dance with time.

Onward.

The Next Level...of Super Mario Brothers

Friday, August 21, 2015

I have been feeling a bit bored writing my blog lately. It has been obvious for several months now that I reached a new reality in my life earlier this year. With so much time having passed since I began writing this blog it was only a natural part of my own evolution that I should reach what I have previously described as a point of departure.

Earlier today I had a productive discussion with a member of the career services team at what is now known as the Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey. I am finally dedicating time to actively visualizing what I want the next step in my career to be. It's actually an exciting time to be me.

That Moment of Imminent Departure

Wednesday, August 19, 2015


I discovered a website today that allowed me to take many mental excursions to the distant past. By that I mean I found a website that allows me to look up background information on any individual I want to learn more about. All I need is sufficient information (a name and location) and this site can look up any number of aspects of a person's background including information about address and employment history, criminal records and so on. It's actually a bit surreal how much information can now be easily found using a simple website. The days of easily separating your private and public lives are long gone.

I actually managed to (supposedly) find the current address and phone number of a boyfriend I had twenty years ago. Yes...twenty years ago. I am debating calling him just to tell him I harbor no difficult feelings about our history together. Our relationship did not end well. He tried to commit suicide after we had gone our separate ways. He then later attempted to heap blame on me for the state of mind he was in at the time that led him to nearly kill himself. It wasn't a pretty time.

Looking up people who were significant to me in my distant past was a bit of a surreal exercise. It only more firmly convinced me that I need to live in the present moment, leave all the pain behind me and reach for a much more dazzling future that really and truly can (still) be mine...if only I will reach for it.

As the last days of summer arrive and pass by and I contemplate the coming of autumn I feel myself finally feeling really to embrace the amazing possibilities that can still be in my future.

It's time to move on.

Really and truly...it's time to move on.

Tears Of Joy and Sadness

Sunday, August 16, 2015


I have not written as regularly in my blog the last two months as I originally imagined I would do back at the beginning of this year. I have felt a bit overwhelmed the last several weeks. I have experienced so much positive change.

A little earlier I was enjoying the comfort of the living room sofa while listening to the purring of my landlord's cat. I suppose it was the combination of the affection of the cat and my own reminiscing about all the different directions my life could have gone that prompted the floodgates to open. I found myself welling up with tears and needing to cry. As the tears ran down my face I could feel an immense sense of relief.

I still have my moments when I find myself wishing I had discovered the life changing experience of EMDR therapy (and the shamanic journeying I did in 2013) years and years ago. Discovering these gifts after many years of my own adult life have already passed is a bit like steering a ship in one direction only to suddenly be thrown sharply off course. When you have been moving in one direction for a long time the shock of being re-directed can itself almost feel a bit...traumatizing.

Those moments of wistful sadness are growing fewer as time passes. But I still have them. I still feel that immense heaviness of what could have been on occasion. And when those moments do arise I can feel almost suffocated by the heaviness of them. Sometimes I have felt that so much of my life was...a lie. To have not seen and experienced the world in a clear way for so many years as I did was an immense tragedy. Yes, tragedy seems to be the proper word. Tragedy conveys such heavy, life-changing, dark imagery. But I believe it is correct to call what I endured tragic.

What my therapist termed "trauma resolution work" is something that belongs decidedly to my earlier life history. I have done that work. That phase of my journey was replaced by what could be called an adaptation phase. I am now adapting to the full ramifications of the life changing consequences of the treatment I sought out.

Over the last six weeks I have:

• completely titrated off the medication I was using to support what I came to describe as my "healing odyssey"
• left behind a less than optimal living environment for a much better one
• started a new and demanding job

When put together these changes represent an immense shift in my life.

I feel so sad for the person I might have been by this point in my life. But I also feel joy and hope for the person I can still be.

A Seriousness That Didn't Always Serve

Friday, August 14, 2015


So today I was what some might consider a boring, responsible adult. I went to my job and was diligent. I continued preparing my living space to comfortably settle into. I even did my laundry. I suppose I sound like a man who has no social life whatsoever. I'm simply taking a breather and continuing to focus on myself.

My life feels as if it has dramatically accelerated in the last two weeks. I still find myself adjusting to all the change. I come home at the end of a workday and feel quite tired. I know the changes have caused some of my fatigue. But I also know I am tired out by a seriousness I carried throughout my life that didn't always serve me well. I need to be a different person now.

With my birthday coming on this very day of the month next month I find myself imagining what I want the next year of my life to be like. I want to have more fun.

Dancing In A Tornado

Wednesday, August 12, 2015


It's nearly 9 pm now and I don't feel like writing. I am wiped out from another day of putting my best foot forward as I climb that intensely vertical section of the learning curve not uncommon to the first weeks of time in a new job. I am enjoying my work so far. And I feel I ought to be grateful for that. And I am. But I feel exhausted!

I went to see my therapist yesterday. Therapy itself sometimes feels a bit boring now. It's not that I don't  still have challenges to deal with in my life now. I certainly still do. But the time of getting into the heart of what burdened my heart and mind is long past. What stands before me now is the longer term process of creating and living a life that I actually want to awaken to each day.

I went to see my podiatrist today. Of all the things that cause my anxiety level to increase the condition of my feet ranks high among them. My feet still don't feel quite right. I was on a course of prednisone twice in the last nine months. My podiatrist doesn't want to put me back on medication a third time. And I certainly don't want to take that route either. So my podiatrist chose to make a minor alteration to one of my orthotics as a way of testing how much the quality of the orthotics may be affecting my feet. So I get to deal with this issue as it continues to evolve. Oh joy!

It's the height of summer right now. And it certainly feels like it. It's difficult for me to not break into a sweat as I walk the short distance from my train to my place of work each morning. But I know the heat of summer is a very fleeting thing here in Minnesota. In a mere three weeks it will be September. And unlike the American South autumn doesn't hesitate to announce itself here in Minnesota. The leaves will be changing on the trees very soon.


I generally feel good about how my life is evolving now. I feel that I lost more than enough time mired in painful rumination about my early life history. My sadness regarding the estrangement I experienced with my paternal family of origin may never completely disappear. It may simply be something I must learn to live with. And I can do that. I have lived with the sadness for decades. But through the experience of psychotherapy (and more specifically the healing made possible by EMDR therapy and shamanic journeying) I gave myself the gift of conscious release from the burden I had been carrying around.

Life these days sometimes feels something like dancing in a tornado. It's an eventful journey I am on.

Poverty in America

Monday, August 10, 2015

Today was my fourth day working for my AmeriCorps site. My adjustment seems to be going fairly well. There have been moments when I have felt a bit overwhelmed. But such feelings are not at all unusual when a person is beginning a new job. I have the added feature of a new home environment. A lot has changed for me in the last two weeks. Indeed, there have been so many positive developments I have caught myself feeling amazed that all the manifesting changes are really happening!

As I adjust to a living allowance on par with the poverty level as defined by the federal government I have found myself reflecting on ways to define poverty. What exactly does poverty look, sound, smell and feel like? Here are some of my thoughts:

Poverty is...

the experience of having a treatable illness that nonetheless progresses because your health insurance is sufficiently comprehensive or generous enough to cover it. So you get to watch your health decline over the years despite your best efforts to be healthy.

that moment when the last remaining vital industry closes down in your town and is then off-shored to another country (so the wealthy few at the top of the company hierarchy can enjoy wealth unlike anything a vast majority of employees will ever experience).

moving hundreds or even thousands of miles across country in the hope of finding better work...and in the process leaving everything you know behind you.

missing the funeral of a loved one because you can't even afford the plane ticket to go to it.

being really tired at the end of your work day and feeling relieved that you don't have to go grocery shopping that night. And yet you will have to go shopping soon because you are low on food.

repurposing items from your wardrobe because it's been years since you bought new clothes for yourself.

marveling at how some people have enough money for pets when you hardly have enough money for food for yourself.

feeling unappreciated in your community to such a degree that you consider moving to a different place where there is more human capital similar to you.

not wanting to look for work anymore because your efforts over the course of years have not produced the results you want. And you also feel disgusted by the constant insistence that the economy is improving while all the while not seeing any real evidence in your local community.

lacking stable parents when you were a child and thus being unable to remember the joy of genuinely stable relationships in the earliest years of your life.

visiting other cultures, such as Native Americans living on their respective reservations, and seeing what massive unemployment, alcoholism, domestic violence and the like can do to an entire culture.

having enough money to eat for the day but no job, no real prospects of a decent job and feeling confused all the while that the decisions you are making are actually good ones.

watching the infrastructure of your nation disintegrate around you but not having the means to do much about it because you are yourself engaged in a difficult and long process of trying to hold on to what little you have.

fearing the people who make up the influential institutions in your community.

living near poisoned land or water and not having sufficient political clout to change these circumstances.

In short, poverty is a burden all too many people bear.

The Challenge of Poverty

Wednesday, August 5, 2015


Today was my first day serving as a member of the St. Paul AmeriCorps VISTA program. It was probably one of my best first day experiences on a new job. I feel enthusiastic about the coming twelve months and the opportunities that will come with the experience.

I met with my therapist this evening. I plan to continue seeing him over the next year. I have transitioned to what I would call maintenance care. It's time to build true resilience into my life. I will write more about the shift in my focus in the next few days.

Those Chances That Come Around Once...

Sunday, August 2, 2015


So I have moved since I last wrote in my blog. And tomorrow I will begin my first full week with AmeriCorps. I am finally moving in a very positive and new direction. And I have felt that this new direction could not come a moment too soon. As I become more active and once again demand more of myself (both personally and professionally) I sometimes feel the immense weight of all the time that has passed these last two years. It has been over two years since I began chronicling my journey here online.

I find myself pondering opportunities that might never appear (again) in my life. I am so aware of the precious gift of time. There is so much I wish to experience. And yet I am aware that one of the seemingly inevitable consequences of living for a certain amount of time is my heightened awareness of the finitude of human life. There will be only so many sunrises and sunsets for me to enjoy. I might meet people once and then never meet them again. It seems to me the likelihood that a person will radically and consciously change the direction of his life diminishes as the years pass. We can become comfortable in both our good and bad circumstances. Change can be both scary and exhilarating.

It's been three weeks since I stopped taking sertraline. I still continue to feel quite good. My therapist has also been away on summer vacation. I will see him again this coming week. But the edgy quality of my early work with him is long gone now. The gripping grief is also something that has faded away. I suppose we eventually can adapt to painful loss. We inevitably have to because life goes on and carries us forward to witness another sunrise...and sunset.

The birthday I will celebrate in about six weeks' time will be the first one I celebrate in which the issues of my early life history no longer hold such a strong claim on my psyche. This is wondrous. And I feel quite happy I have achieved this milestone. There is still within me the grief that I did not experience this freedom earlier in my life. Indeed, I have caught myself wondering who I could have been had I discovered EMDR treatment ten or even a mere five years ago. My life might be much better than it is now. But then I often counter such needless rumination by allowing myself to remember that I did (eventually) discover this treatment, that I did go to therapy essentially one hundred consecutive weeks and worked with immense determination to remove the yoke of pain from my early life history and that I did do all this work with essentially no support from my family of origin. This is by no means a minor victory.

I am actually looking forward to tomorrow.

I am actually looking forward to Monday.

I am looking forward to the future of my own life.