Complex PTSD. There's some letters and acronyms to describe it. A nice box to put things in. A result of prolonged repeated trauma.
The thing is, the label doesn't help, much, sometimes. It doesn't make October less awful. I can't actually tell you why October is so awful for me - it's not that I don't know, it's that it's not really that believable. I can't think of a sentence to sum it up with. I can't think of a single thing to say to make it crystal clear what happened to me, on a long ago October, or Octobers. I met a psych nurse once, a student in a class I was teaching, who knew I had DID (Dissociative Identity Disorder) before I told her, and then she said something that has stuck with me: "You can't even write about that kind of sh*t." And you can't.
But I can write about October, and why it's 1 am and I have an essay due less than 12 hours from now that I just started 5 hours ago. I'm not going to get an A on it, because it's 400 words too short, but it's all I've got. And it's all I've got because it's October, and October haunts me.
Bessel van der Kolk (look him up, if you like) wrote a book called "The Body Keeps The Score", but even before I read it, I knew - the body remembers things you don't consciously remember. My body does not like October either. I'm sore and stiff and I can't breathe, and I'm in fight-or-flight every minute that I let up the vigilance against it. So when I try to lie down to go to sleep. Or when I try to study for that exam I had this afternoon, that I skipped my first class to study for - or when I try to look at a blank page and write an essay. (And I am a WRITER.)
I got through the exam studying by going through review sheets one painful question at a time, stopping to walk or deep breathe or take a good long cold drink every time the panic started to overwhelm me. It took a really long time. I got through the exam because I had lavender on my fingerless mitts and because I will not allow myself to quit. I will deep breathe and I will send up desperate pleas for help and I will stay the course because October 1967 or October 1975 doesn't get to WIN. That was then, this is now. I finished the exam and checked it over and did not wait for someone else to leave first because I had a vicious stomachache and I could not wait one more second. I probably got a really good mark because I knew most of everything, My stomach didn't care. My body was in fight or flight and none of my careful, kindly worded logic did anything to change that.
And then I had an essay to write, to hand in tomorrow. But it's still October, and my left leg wants to have a vicious muscle cramp when I sit down, in class, to write, to eat with my family, because the body keeps the score. But I sat down, because that is what I do. I do not, I will not, quit. There is a vast array of marks between 0 (no essay handed in) and perfect, and I'll get one of those marks, because my essay is 400 words too short.
But this isn't really about complex PTSD or DID or October. It's about how answering desperate prayers for help is God's strong suit, and how when I picked up my computer, trying to sit so my leg didn't hurt, I saw a tiny bookmark in the middle of all my bookmarked sites that said "hymns" and when I clicked on it, I remembered I had this hours-long play list of so many of my favourite hymns and so I started the music and I started to write, and my whole body exhaled, listening to hymns, to Him, and this - THIS - is HOW I don't quit. I ask, beg, plead God for help, and He shows up.
