Between a rock and a hard place

I am in a situation where I get very little physical contact.  I get 2 hugs from Y 3 times a week, I get a hug from C from time to time, M a couple of time a year, and the odd friend when I see them.  I don’t feel safe with most of the people i know.  Because our experiences in life are so different, I can’t relate to things they say, and they can’t relate to things I say.  They also don’t have the same insight (for whatever reason), and a lot of their pain comes out in blaming others.  I have the insight, but because of my upbringing, I have little to no control of my emotions and my window of tolerance is only a slit.  This means I don’t have support of an insightful environment, and it means that I am constantly triggered by the people I know.

The only people who I feel, at least consciously, that I can really be honest with are my therapists who I only see on Skype.  I see them between 3 and 4 hours a week.  I have one student support worker for 2 hours a week, and have just begun having someone come in and clean for another 2 hours a week.  The majority of the rest of the time I spend by myself.

When I’m alone, most of the time all I can do is watch TV, watch things on the computer, some times listen to the radio, sometimes talk on the phone.  I am unable to maintain a sense of my relationship to anyone once they are out of my presence.    

Because I am so split inside, I’m unable to carry out activities that my conscious self wants to do: to play music, to write, to study, to communicate to others. This creates horrendous frustration and hopelessness.

Because my window of tolerance is so small, I am constantly getting triggered, even when alone.  The mess in my apt triggers me, things on tv trigger me, things I read or hear trigger me, silence triggers me, and the nightmares virtually every night terrorize me.  The core of me is terrorr; in fact, the last three days has been filled with my heart pounding, so hard that at times it was moving the computer tray that rested on my chest.

I’m in this situation because the situation I lived in as a child created a view of the world and of myself that made me unable to create a life for myself. My world view is that the world is a powerful, critical power that hates me to the point of blocking all my attempts to accomplish something or create any good in my life.  My view of myself is that I am a despised ‘other’ who has no rights, no power, and nothing that would bring a smile to anyone’s face.  I am not welcome.  I must never act harshly, never be angry, and always bow to other people: I am beholden to others.

I despair that  anyone could heal when living in this situation, much less someone who is as damaged as I am.