As I am delegating my grocery shopping and doing even more online pharmaceutical purchases to avoid exposure to people who might be infected, I find myself not only missing those rare social encounters that used to lift me up a bit before Covid-19 struck, but I also am missing - on a more urgent and deeply level - the professional physiotherapy and the trauma therapy.
What to do when the body starts failing even more despite daily yoga routines, and the mind will not be silenced by soothing meditations? I am trying to stay positive but I can tell you: this is not an easy task. It takes up a lot of the energy I need to get through the day pain-wise. My collection of spoons is very low by the start of any given day, but lately I need almost 20 minutes to even try and get out of bed. It takes up to an hour to be able to walk decently, instead of like a grandmother robbed of her rollator. The hot shower, right after giving Tiger his medicine and NHV, followed by the Patches NHV ordeal, and the general cat breakfast, has become a necessity instead of a luxury - without it, my lower back, pelvic girdle, hips and neck cannot loosen properly. The yoga session, following the shower, is a very, very painful one. Acute headaches, growing into monstrous migraines, as well as nauseous spells are unwelcome guests to that party.
My days now are spent in isolation with my cats. Used as they are to me being around, they ignore me quite a lot of the time, unless they need filled bellies or bring a mouse, or swat bees. I get up in the morning with many plans to do, but after the painful yoga, and the using up of over 7 spoons, I can only carefully sit down on the couch, heat pad in my back, and read the latest news on my phone. I get restless of doing nothing worthwhile. I feel bad and guilty for not creating any art. On Instagram there are several posts on how to flow in the moment, to cut yourself some slack. But I have been cutting myself slack for over a month now, and the pain is only increasing, embedding itself in the core of my system. I worry. I worry a lot about the future. In the midst of the past quarantine, I got a letter from my Health Benefits Office: Are you still entitled to being disabled from work?
I am trying to grin through all that, whilst finding ways to lighten the fog and overload in my mind. One of my (new) friends on Instagram recently posted a picture of the audiobook she was listening to, The Highly Sensitive Child, by Elaine N. Aron. As both my son and I belong to the Highly Sensitive People group, I got intrigued: I often doubt the way I am handling my child, having my intuition guiding me, searching for ways that would help me battle through the sensory overload, the pressure of shoulds and have tos. Before he left to stay with his father, he told me in a warm, gentle and actually little surprised voice, how happy he is that we are so often on the same page, sensing each other's feelings and moods and even thoughts, finishing each other's sentences. And we have the same sense of humour too, a huge asset in these quarantine times. Sadly, my Audible does not have that book in their library, BUT I found another by Elaine N. Aron, The Highly Sensitive Parent. And that book, my friends, is such an eye-opener in many ways. It has left me with quite some AHA-moments, as well as some good cries - as I finally start to understand that what I believed about me to be true, is just me being highly sensitive, to my own deeper self, but also to others, to moods and tones of voice, to worry and doubting, to weigh each possible choice and nearly drown in the chaos of possibilities. It explains why in a bookshop, back in the day, I will grab every copy I like, then start contemplating "should I?", followed by putting them back one after one. It explains why when buying online, I will often empty my cart, only to return a few days later, having given the purchase many hours of thought (and guilt and headaches) and deeming myself allowed to buy them.
On parenting level, this book supports me in my parenting style. I have often discussed parenting trouble with non HSP's and been told I need to be firm and not give s much freedom as I tend to do. Things is, with my boy, now 10, one is able to negotiate. he is both blessed and cursed with a high intelligence, a high and deep sensing of others' moods and expectations. It makes things hard, in that he will reply with answers he thinks you desire of him, and it makes things easy when I sense he worries and he finally gives in and talks to me, because he knows I only want him to be happy. In that way, my parenting seems to be of an emphatic kind, understanding, yet with boundaries (which often proves the hardest still, as I look beyond the wants and desires, I look at needs, I look at his full head, and decide then to loosen a boundary or not). And I follow my intuition a lot: I mean, a LOT. Seems to be an HSP thing. And it means also that I am not weak, or fragile, or living in an imaginary world, or dominant, or arrogant. It means, like so many others, I am just trying to be me, in a world that forces me to be someone else, even now, in quarantine times.
Stay safe. Hang in there. Read. Listen. Get to know yourself better.
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