On the Road to Recovery: Trying Something New

Last month I did something new. 

Not exactly exciting but new – to me.  

More like frightening to be sure.  Way outside of my comfort zone.  Way outside of my little safe place.  The room where I live probably 80-90% of my waking life.  The room where I write, where I knit, where I watch DVDs.  Where my life is safe.  Predictable. Where I am in control.

I started writing this blog posting in a small café in my hometown.  I was sitting in a room in a small cafe with other writers who are writing.  Some chatting, but mostly writing.  Most strangers to each other.

My first meet up meeting ever.

The first meeting for this writers meet up.

All of us were getting our feet wet so to speak.  All of us united together to find a place to write. A few hours without other distractions or disruptions.

For me, the motivation was multiple:  (a) to start writing again; (b) to write without the seductive siren call of the yarn (as mentioned before I can't knit and write at the same time.  Ironically, I wanted to bring my current knitting project with me. That's how hooked I am on creating with my hands); and (c) to start going into the outside world again, to socialize with others.  To socialize with others with whom I (hopefully) have something in common.  In this case writing.

It went well.  Our gathering spot is a local cafe which has a side room with a long table.  Some of us met in this room which proved to be a quiet spot; some met in the main room where there was more noise and activity.

Me ... I found a quiet corner in the side room.

I wasn't ready emotionally to meet people, to fraternize, to socialize, to talk.  I just wanted to be there, to write, to observe.

I just wanted to dip my little toes into the waters of the outside world and see how they reacted.

First I was scared.  Okay, terrified is a better word.  I was going to back out but I told one friend and that one friend encouraged me to go.  She said: "If you don't go, you'll always wonder what you missed."  She was right about that.  What she didn't realize was that if I didn't go to the first ever meeting, I would probably never go.  I would remain scared.  I would prefer to stay in my safe world.  My safe room.

So I got up and went.

Originally, I was frustrated.  As in really frustrated.  I couldn't get on the net.  So yes, I could write using Word but I couldn't write on the net, directly onto my blog - which is what I wanted to do.  Having my laptop with me, I didn't bring pen and paper so the old fashioned way was out.  That was another frustration.

On top of the above, people scare me.  Okay, scare is another understatement.  After my experience in the workplace, people terrify me.  I didn't understand then what people were capable of and I definitely don't want to repeat the experience.

So right away, I had two strong emotions vying for my attention: terror and frustration.  Not a good combo.

But I stayed.

Eventually, I settled down enough to find another way.  To write on Word and then upload what I wanted to onto my computer at home.  It worked.

I got home and had a headache for the next few days.  But mixed with the physical pain, probably caused by the stress of going out on my own, was another feeling:  pride.  I had faced one of my demons, starred it down and had survived.

I. Had. Done. This.

And if I had done this, this one small thing, I know I can do more.  Little by little.  Step by step.  Piece by piece.

I haven't written since that afternoon in that little cafe, yet I think I made real progress on the road to recovery that day.

I. Went. Out.

I. Left. My.  House.

I voluntarily walked into a situation that was scary and stayed.

Today is again the third Thursday in the month.  The day designated for the writers meet up.

Today, I am here again in this quiet room at this big table with other writers. We're a very quiet group.  Yet, there is comfort in quietness.  There is safety in quietness.

It's not so scary at all.

YAY!

Post Workplace Abuse - The role of passions, interests and photography in recovery

I don't know about you, dear reader, but I enjoyed writing the last two blogs although they both took quite a bit of time - and mental energy - to create.  Why? ... you might ask ...  Why did they take so much time to create and why did you enjoy writing them so much?

The answer for both questions is the same:  the photographs.  They took a lot of time because I had to search through hundreds, perhaps thousands, of photos on my computer to find the ones I was looking for.  I knew they were in there ... somewhere.  I knew exactly what I was looking for.  I just didn't know where I was looking for them ... exactly.  For the first post about the tornado, I ended up doing a Google search for the news article to get a date so I could more easily sort through things.  (It does help if you are at least searching in the correct year.)

Writing these last two posts was also enjoyable because of the search through the photo files for the right set of pictures.  I went back through different experiences pictorially.  Good experiences.  Experiences which I relive through my pictures.  Experiences which had slipped from my conscious mind.

The last two posts also took me back a step from processing all the events, all the thoughts, both during and post workplace abuse.

Recovery is hard work.  Hard work indeed.

It consumes most of my waking hours.  It is exhausting.

I seem to use everything I can to work through and process what happened to me and come out of the past into the present learning to look at things in different ways.  Learning new perspectives.  New ways of handling things.

Recovery is hard work and my photography allows me the chance to take a step back and simply enjoy and experience life through the lens of my camera.  It allows me a respite in hard times to go back through the pictures, the various files and re-enjoy those good times.  It reminds me that life is not always about workplace abuse and my former co-workers in that abusive situation.

It reminds me that life is still good.  Life is still worth living.  There are tons of experiences out there waiting to be lived, to be photographed, to be shared ... and - perhaps - to be written about.

It reminds me that my life, my personality, my value is not defined by what a small group of others in one situation thought about me.  My life, my personality and especially my value are determined by WHO. I. Am.  My strengths, even my weaknesses, my talents, my passions and how I live and express them.

So today, although this was not planned when I first opened Blogger today and put fingers to keyboard, I will round out this week with a last picture blog.  These pictures were taken in 2010 on our Canadian Civic holiday weekend - which coincidentally is this weekend - when we walked across the Rainbow Bridge at Niagara Falls for the first time.  We'd always enjoyed the falls from our side - the Canadian side.  The photos start as we walk across the bridge and end at the precipice between Niagara Falls, the main falls on the left below) and Bridal Veil falls (the little tiny sliver of falls on the far right).

A close up focussing on the American Falls

In the middle of the bridge, a full-on view of the Horseshoe Falls.

Almost across the bridge.  Crossing on foot allows people the chance to stop and take pictures - or just gawk at the magnificence of the scene.

A large pot of flowers marks the beginning of the State Park

Little birds - are they sparrows? or perhaps starlings? whatever, flitting on the planter.

The mighty Niagara River rushing towards the Falls

The Niagara River just before it goes over the drop off

The jagged lip of the Falls as seen from the viewing space between the main falls and Bridle Veil Falls

Words cannot describe the majesty, the power, the juxtaposition of this scene from roaring unbridled power to flowers to rainbow.

Looking down at people emerging from the Cave of the Winds

A second view of the same scene - just from a slightly different perspective

The rainbow.  It's there every day.

Again, same view, different perspective

*******

With these pictures, I end my blogging week and head into the weekend to refresh myself - and to continue on the recovery process.

Sometimes it's hard for me to write these posts as I get little to no feedback from my readers - and I know I do have readers.

So today, I'm asking you for feedback.  What do you like?  What do you not like?  What would you like to see more of?

A publisher I met at the writers' conference advised me to make my story "everyone's" story.  I'm not the only one who has struggled with an abusive workplace situation.  We all have our own stories.  The problem is that most of us have swallowed the lies hook, line and sinker and believe that we were the cause, the instigator of our own hurt and subsequent damage.  Therefore, we tend to hide, licking our wounds as best we can.

Yet, I've discovered through my openness that survivors of workplace abuse are all around me.  The woman in the small town in Ontario who opened her own bead store.  The server at a local restaurant who is much happier working two or three days a week as a server than she was in her own profession.  The singer, songwriter, writer who reinvented her life post workplace abuse.  The woman beside me at lunch at the writers' conference.  My next door neighbour.

We're all over the place.  Isolated.  Alone.

Who are you, dear reader?  What is your story?  I'd like to know.

Until Monday ... have a good weekend.

Post Workplace Abuse: Working through and processing events

My safe room.  It may not look like much, but it's a place where I feel comfortable, where I have all the "comforts of life" (more or less), where creativity happens and, mostly importantly, where healing happens.

Needless to say I was not only in a world of hurt when this staff member from my church left my home that day, but also badly in need of processing what had just transpired in my safe room.

Processing for me is where recovery begins.  I've been accused of being over-analytical and analyzing things to death, but at the same time this ability to analyze and process things has been one of the major strengths my therapist has discerned in her walk - and work - with me.  I analyze and process things so that I can pull back and look at the event(s) from a distance.  To distance myself.  To get a better grip on it.  To diffuse the incredible hurt and emotion involved.

*******

Processing doesn't always occur in any order.  It just is.  So here are some of the thoughts I've processed since that visit:

One of the most important things I've learned throughout the post-recovery from workplace abuse and post-aftermath of loss of a loved one journey(s) combined, is that people don't always stay in one category i.e. "safe" or "unsafe".  They can change categories at any given time based on their own circumstances.  A person who was once safe and supportive cannot be expected to stay at that level when they themselves are going through their own traumas, their own issues i.e. a sibling who is also going through the loss of the same loved one, etc. 

People have their own assumptions and perceptions which they are most likely totally unaware of.  Because assumptions and perceptions simply are.  They're part of us.  Most people have not had their assumptions and perceptions thrust at them as something bad so that they haven't had to really look at what assumptions and perceptions are in order to break free from lies.  In short, most people are not me and are not working through all the lies, the hurts, the misperceptions, etc. that I am. 

People are not mind readers. I thought that because my thoughts were so loud, almost screaming inside my mind, that they were so loud others could "hear" them, i.e. pick up on them.  I have had to learn that that is not so and that I have to use my words even with those closest to me like hubby.

Most importantly, I analyzed that day that the staff member who came into my home had no knowledge of trauma.  What it is.  How it affects others.  She was looking at me and my behaviour from what she and others who have not been wounded by trauma would assume and perceive.

I internalized that day that although this person had badly wounded me, she had done so through ignorance of a major issue in my life.  She was not a "bad" person.  She probably didn't intend to do as much damage as she did.   In fact, to this day, she still may not understand the incredible hurt and damage she did.  She simply didn't understand the basics.  In short, she was the wrong person to come into my home that day.  She didn't have the tools she needed to build a foundation with me.

I also realized that she had no idea of what my background in the church had been.  That when I had started attending six years prior, I was totally a basket case due to what had happened in the church prior.

How I started out trying to be a shadow.  I didn't want to draw any attention to myself.  I didn't want people to notice me or talk to me.

I had done all the "right" things in my former church.  Attending faithfully.  Volunteering.  Going to small groups.  Praying.  Giving. At the time, the lead pastor came to our door furious with me, I was even almost single-handedly feeding a family of five.

In the end, none of that mattered.  The only thing that mattered was that I had thrown my Bible on the floor in the church library in front of someone whose classification still remains a mystery.  The lead pastor originally classified her as a visitor but since she was in the library to "job shadow" me that day in order to volunteer, I would wonder about that.  When I voiced my concerns about that classification to the lead pastor, he quickly amended it to being new, very new. Whatever.  *shrugs shoulders*

I had worked hard for six years regarding trauma, PTSD, etc.  I had had significant recovery in those six years by working hard with my new therapist, by being consistent, by researching, reading.  It cost me time and money.  Money for gas.  Money for continued therapy.  None of which was covered under any existing health or benefit plans.  I did it because it was important to me.  Because I didn't want to stay stuck.

You name it, I probably did it.  As regarding this particular issue with my former church, eventually I forgave all those involved which was a long process.  As regarding the issue of feeling comfortable in a different church, I had eventually liased with the then interin pastor who has since go on to the mission field and is still in contact with me to this day.  He and his wife were invaluable in the process of being able to call our new church a church "home".  When he left for the mission field, another staff member took over.  We both saw his role as giving me the Biblical perspective.  He was not there as my therapist.  His role in my life was also invaluable.  He attended a session with my therapist and myself about trauma and we could both see how he was trying to wrap his mind around concepts that were foreign to him.  He too left the church after a few short months.  His replacement was supposed to take over that support role.  A role he never embraced which led us to this meeting in my home with a staff member who had no clue.

In the aftermath of that meeting in my home, my safe room, that day, I realized that all that knowledge was gone.  None of it had been passed on.

In the six years I had been in that church up to that time, I had joined a small group.  I came in afraid of my own shadow and slowly began to feel safe and build up relationships.  The group ended.  I guess I assumed that when the former leaders of the group found another small group, they would invite us in.  That didn't happen.  I discovered inadvertently one day that there was another small group which met on weekends and had included the former leaders of our small group in their small group.  Maybe I had at long last found another small group home.  I verbalized as much - and I saw the mask come down over the eyes.  It turns out that this group was by invitation only.  They had to know you.  They didn't know us.  Discussion closed.

These were all things this staff member who came into my home with her own judgements, perceptions and assumptions had no way of knowing.  She had no way of knowing where we had started off from.  She had no way of knowing that we had indeed been affiliated with a small group which had stopped and had never been reconnected to another one.  She had no way of knowing that I had regularly attended the women's meetings nor the seniors' luncheons.  She had no way of knowing about trauma.  She had no way of knowing anything that transpired after the one minister left.

She had no way of knowing.

*******

And this is where I end for today.  I am emotionally and physically exhausted with the effort of writing this post.  Every part of me has been screaming to leave it.  To stop typing.  To stop thinking.  To lie down.  To do something else, like watch a DVD, pick up some knitting.  Whatever.

Yet, I know that if I do that I may not start again tomorrow, or the next day, or the next.

At the writer's conference in June, one nugget I learned was to be consistent in my blog.  Since I've started writing five days a week to continue that way.  Also, to be consistent in the time I publish my blog - which since I write it after waking up in the morning and have been sleeping in lately has not been consistent.

I ask you to bear with me as I both walk the path and write about the journey at the same time.

Here is a pictorial view of what my path looks like at the moment.

Grab your hiking boots and come with me.

Until tomorrow ....

Road construction in my "hood"

Post Workplace Abuse: My "Stratford" days

Today we take a wee break from the theme of perceptions, assumptions, and their role in workplace abuse.  Today is what I call my "Stratford" day.  It used to be a bi-weekly occurrence.  Now it is every four weeks.  Soon, if recovery continues as well as it has been lately, it will be every six weeks as we gradually taper off - much like a mother weans her child.  

Until about three years ago, my counselling day used to be my "Milverton" day.  (I wrote a post about Milverton back in the very early days of this blog.)  Back then, every two weeks like clockwork.  I was still working then - afternoons.  I would book a morning appointment, drive in leaving extra time to walk around a bit.  Put my own personal touch on this journey.  Make it my own adventure.  I got to know the thrift store there, the little convenience store which had a great, though somewhat unreliable, coffee machine with English Toffee.  Wonderful staff who got to know me and welcome me on my bi-weekly visits.

A town with a strong Old Order Mennonite presence, the thrift store reflected the community in which it was located.  Yarns, crafts, buttons, etc.  Christian CDs.  I loved to go in, walk around and browse a bit. Sometimes buy.  I got some of my favorite CDs from that store.

After my appointment, I would boot it back into town, have a hurried lunch somewhere and go straight into work for the next eight hours.  That is why I began to call it my "Milverton" day in the beginning as when I had a counselling appointment, it basically wiped out the entire day.

Mama swan and babies in the Avon River in Stratford a few weeks ago.

But time passes on and things change.  My job ended.  My therapist felt a pull to move.  She located approximately 45 km from my house.  There was basically no difference in my driving time.  Just a different direction.  That change in location - and direction - makes a huge difference in scenery and experience though.  Gone now is the Old Order presence I enjoyed in my previous trips.  Passing buggies on my drive in.  Gone now, my visits to the tiny town with just a few shops.

Stratford is also a small town located in southwestern Ontario.  Just not as small as Milverton.  Stratford is where the Stratford Shakespeare Festival is held.  A small town, yet it has a strong tourist pull. The streets crusted with touristy shops and places to eat most with a Shakespearian theme.  The Shakespeare theme runs through the town with the river that runs through it being called the Avon.

I still meet with my counsellor in the mornings, even though I'm no longer working and haven't been for more than three years.  I guess old habits die hard.  We now meet in a large church on the outskirts of town.  If I'm well enough, I drive into the town proper, park the car and walk around.  Maybe even enjoy a gourmet poutine at Boomers - a very tiny eatery known for it's poutine varieties.

Sometimes, we really make it an adventure when my daughter comes with me.  During the time of the broken wrist when I could not drive, she became my chauffeur.  It was during this period that we discovered Boomers.

Although I am usually well enough to drive myself these days, it is still a treat when my daughter - and sometimes even the grands - come with me.  They explore the town with it's one-of-a-kind toy store (Friends & Co.), cheese shop (The Milky Whey), etc. while I continue working on the road to recovery with my counsellor.  Smoothing out the wrinkles life has thrown at me during the time period between appointments.

As with Milverton, if energy permits which it does more often these days, I try to make the day "my" day.  A special treat for me to congratulate myself on all the work I've done on the road to recovery.

Gone now too as the days when I left my former counsellor's office in tears, more confused than when I began the appointment.  Feeling like I needed an appointment to discuss the appointment.

"Dessert" is located right next door to Boomer's

We may have done some tough work in the session, but I come out knowing that I am valued.  Knowing that despite my challenges, I'm still an OK person.  Instead of being angry with me, my counsellor keeps reaffirming that I'm amazing.  Because she contends that most people would have given up after the first counselling situation and never tried again.

Why did I try again?  Why did I choose someone so far away from my home town when I absolutely hated to drive long distances?

Perhaps the answer is simple.  At that time, I had nowhere to go but up.  I felt I had nothing left to lose.   I simply had to find someone who would reach out a hand and help me get my feet unstuck from all the muck they were mired in.  I needed someone who believed in me.

That is what I found.  First in the tiny, sleepy town of Milverton and now in Stratford.  Unconditional acceptance.  A place to safely explore the boundaries.  A place to grow.  A place I feel comfortable in.

Both in my counselling relationship and in the larger environment of the town itself.

I feel safe.

Stratford town hall

Someday, maybe someday in the near future, these visits will be winding down to a close as recovery occurs, and I'm more and more able to stand on my own two feet - both physically and emotionally.

Until then, I will continue to make my Stratford days an adventure.

Until then, I will continue to enjoy these outings.

See you tomorrow as we continue on the road to recovery post workplace abuse.

Surviving Workplace Abuse: The danger of suicide

Note:  This is a hard post for me to write and a hard post for people, especially those close to me, to read.  Yet, I feel it is necessary at some point to address in any blog dealing with workplace abuse the ugly spectre of suicide.  It happens.  It is a real consequence of the heavy duty abuse I, and many others, have suffered in the workplace or in other places such as school.

We saw this sign at Lake Casa Blanca International Park in Laredo Texas in 2010.  My husband asked the clerk in the hotel if there were snakes in the park.  The worker said "no" it was too early in the season for them.  While we were in the park, we met people who told us to be careful and watch out for snakes as they had seen some just the other day.  Upon leaving the park, we saw this sign.  Yes, there were snakes.  The clerk just hadn't wanted to let us know for whatever reason.

I've often heard it said that prostitution is not a victimless crime.  The same goes with workplace abuse.  Because we leave, one way or another, on our own steam or not, workplace abuse is considered to be victimless.  Partially because once we're gone, we're gone in the eyes of HR, management, the union, the co-workers.  In fact, the word "victim" is actively disapproved.  By HR.  By management.  Even by those of us who are experiencing it.  For whatever reason, either external or internal, we feel compelled to use the softer word "target" instead.

However, workplace abuse is not victimless.  At least, not to the target.

Someone asked me the other day upon reading my blog, did those who did this to me know what they did?  Do they know the severe impact they've had on my life?

The answer is no.  Probably not.

Yet the real question to me is:  Do they, i.e. the bullies, care?

Again, the answer is going to be:  No, probably not.

Because workplace abuse is NOT about the target.  My perception on this having experienced it and seen their faces when confronted - or even when they thought they were confronted - is that it's not about the target.  It's about the bullies.  Their feelings.  Their perceptions.  Their lives.  Their hurts.

I just happened to be in the way.

I was too naive to realize that there were snakes in my workplace.  Not the slithering, rattling kind.  The human kind.

Personally, I would rather deal with a snake, a real one, because I know instinctively what they are and what they are capable of.  Not so with humans.

As I said earlier, I was incredibly naive.  I lived in a world where good triumphed over bad.  Where knights on white horses showed up just in time to rescue the damsel in distress.

Doesn't happen in the real world of the workplace.  At least not for me.  After all was said and done, I lived in a world of hurt for a very long time.  Even with consistent counselling, there were times when it was all I could do to get up in the morning.  Sometimes even that didn't happen.

Coming close to suicide during a very difficult period in the journey, I decided to access the net and google sure ways to commit suicide.  I didn't want to do a half-assed job and I felt it was pointless to continue going on.

At that point, I was giving up the struggle, the battle, the on-going walk through all the junk left behind in the aftermath of workplace abuse.

Many people say that suicide is a "choice" with the implication that the person who commits it rationally chooses to kill themselves.

But that has not been my experience.  My experience has been that I feel like a tsunami or tidal wave has washed over me, pulled me into its grips and is pulling me down, down, down.  To a place where there is no means of escape.

To a place where there are no more options.

To a place of total devastation.

The times that I've come within a hair's breath of committing the ultimate act, have not been choices.  They've been reactions to a seemingly endless tidal wave of abuse, recriminations, secondary wounding, people not understanding what I'm going through.

One of those times, which I feel ready to reveal at this time, was the last time I left my former counsellor's office.  The counsellor I later realized was abusive.  I was devastated.  Crying.  Unable to drive.  Unable to do anything but cry.  The session had been brutal.  My daughter was driving that day - which was a good thing.  When we got home, I crawled onto the bed and just laid there crying, crying, crying.

I was ready to give up then.  After all, if this counsellor who I'd been seeing for years turned on me like this, I must be hopeless.

Helpless.  As in beyond help.

As I waited for my daughter, just a block off a main artery in our town, I felt a pull to go to that road and walk in front of a car - or truck.  It was almost irresistible.  It took everything I had in me not to move.  To wait for my daughter.  To this day, I don't know what would have happened if she had not had to have the car that day.

That was not the only time I came that close.  It happened several times after that especially in the first one to two years after I left - or rather was pushed out of - the workplace.

At one time, I was so close that I decided to seek out ways via the net to do it.  Ways that did not involve guns, which I don't have access to, hanging since even though I was a girl scout I never learned how to tie a good knot.  Pills?  Which ones and how many?

I accessed a forum.

One post in particular spoke to me.

I can't remember who posted it or all that was in the post but the gist was that suicide is a permanent solution for a temporary problem.  The writer then went on to use scripture verses from the Bible.  I don't remember which ones he (or was it a she?) used.  I only remember that this post spoke to me where I was at that moment.  And caused me to back down.  To stop.  To think.

Because after all, suicide i.e. death is permanent.

Whatever contributions I could have made would never happen.  The prayers for others.  The knitted gifts.  The writings.  The blog that is happening now.  None of that would ever again be possible IF....

That post made such an impact in my life that the tsunami washing over me, pulling me down, receded.  In its wake there was a glimmer of hope.  Much like the emerging dawn

Not quite so dramatic but there.

As you can see, I lived to see another dawn.

And so I am continuing to survive.  To live another day.  To walk another pathway.  To experience another victory.  To write another post.  To experience more on the road to recovery.

Join me again tomorrow. 

You never know where this blog is going to take you as we travel the path together.