A big enduring and heart felt thanks to all the wonderful people that surround you during recovery!
Recovery ultimately in the end comes down to you and there’s no hiding from that. However it’s also a team effort, who can feel at times more lost and helpless then you. Wanting desperately to change things or take on the burden that only you must endure. The load can be lightened and shifted though so it doesn’t have to bury you in darkness. Asking for help can be confronting but it also can be uplifting when people come above and beyond to help out. Not everyone will react as you hope but then neither will you. Life is different. Sometimes you mightn’t even realise that you were part of another persons weather system.
What if I walked up to you and punched you hard in the stomach then tore you verbally down because you’d scared me and I didn’t want to see you hurt again. Would you think this was extremely odd way of explaining to someone that you challenged my own mortality!
What if instead I smothered you in love and proceed to cover your life in bubble wrap. Taking OH&S to the limits of insanity. Does that show more caring then the punch to the stomach?
What if I was too scared to let you dream again and smashed them with ‘YOUR’ reality sword. Slashing and stabbing it into little tiny pieces before realising that was your light in a very dark tunnel.
Myles my strength and conditioning coach is one of my perfect examples of how during recovery you interact completely differently with those around you. Obviously early on it was through acts of my own stupidity ie the accident that I ended up under his malevolent eye and every session my mind would be in a consistent battle screaming out why oh why am I back here!! Of course there were times when the mind won and I’d use a good excuse to cancel. 60% of the time they were from actual life’s road blocks for what ever reason to not make it there and the other 40% were from things that had happened but I used them to say “Nope can’t possibly make that workout today!” Of the 60% though it was a case of 50-50 relief I couldn’t make it and have to gear up my mind to just get there and 50% regretting not putting myself in the way of progress. So getting there was tough but then being there brought out a whole new tribe of doubts. Now let’s get this out of the way first Myles is wonderfully encouraging/consistent/persistent/thought provoking supportive professional. He took ages to help me get my muscle structure even again and stretch through different regions of my body as the scars healed and then allowed tension to be put through them to break down the tissue structure and get complete movement back. So he is a caring professional and fun to be around. However in that first 18 months when he spoke mostly all I could hear was dread!! Dread of the pain to come and the tiredness/sleeplessness to follow. Then finally I had some glimpses of stamina which meant I could get through warm up with out the mind screaming at me the entire time why why why!!
Fast forward to today and Myles talks me through the program and while I’m not doing cartwheels around the room I’m thinking I can get this done. Don’t back down no giving in. Plus in the car on the way out I could think it’s possible to go and be active where as before if I had a big few days coming up I really had to plan out my energy, requirements and make sure what was possible and what is a bridge too far. I was very aware of the tank of energy and how it drained and the time frame required to get it off empty and to get it back to survivable levels.
Before his words no matter how he delivered them could send an involuntary shutter down my spine. Now I can joke and banter without it being a mask to hide behind as I gather the last sinews of strength to get it done and crawl out out the door.
What I’m trying to say is some people in our lives are actual storms and should be avoided others are storms we need to bear in order to learn from, grow from and strengthen from. Sometimes in your most weakened state your still stronger then you ever were before and then hopefully you’ll rediscover what was once lost or better still grow into something better, far better, what ever shape that is.
Now Myles never did a misstep or caused unknown offence though it is an easy thing to do as it is often the receivers interpretation and mood of their broken mind or body. He did cause pain but that was his job to be honest. Having recently listened to a podcast about burns victims journey through recovery thankfully neither Myles or I had to go through that level of rehab that is truly hard core and I’m glad I wasn’t requiring my brain to gear up to that level of pain noise.
Myles is one of the people who packed my parachute and is most definitely in my weather pattern. As I said I managed mostly to see the growth in the storms he sent my way as I trusted the storm was for my long term benefit even if I was going to get very wet and cold as it passed through. Sometimes even the foreboding scary storms are for your benefit long term.
But what’s it like for those who are your weather pattern? Those that care, Those that have to take an active role and those that can’t or won’t. Not everyone can be involved in your recovery some for reasons of distance or time and others for how confronting it may be, and for a thousand reasons in between. People you thought had your back turn out to be fair weather sailors and others dive into stormy waters without hesitation wearing only a life vest and state what can I do. All these people come with their own beliefs/values/references/experiences and voices/actions. Often their sense of hopelessness and or feeling useless can lead to emotional out bursts or withdrawals. Also as I’ve written before their time marches on which can be very confronting in this social media age where everyone has a perfect life on their social media account. Full of interesting things and amazing places. They are still climbing those mountains and crossing those rivers where as you simply can’t sleep. Trapped in the dark only the light of social media blasting in, time standing still. Dreams and nightmares swirling together nothing making sense nothing seeming fair.
My sister who had suffered the intrusion of many hospital visits and procedures in her formative youth. This underpinned certain beliefs and expectations of hospitals which were totally understandable. I know from a big accident in the early 90’s my view of hospitals was very different to today. She showed more courage then me to visit because she did it out of choice when her turmoil was at times spilling over as I’d do exercises on the floor in obvious sweating pain. Watching a paragliding DVD, saying how beautiful is that valley. I know she wanted to shout “How bloody stupid are you! Wanting a view like that, almost claimed your life. Just how dumb are you??!!” My sister is wonderful but she can be blunt at times. However She understood that was very much my joy and even through it totally disagreed with her beliefs and values she kept that violent tropical storm to herself and held onto it. Later down the track we’ve spoken of her feelings and how hard she found it not to project her own fears onto me and also let my experience help let go of a few of her own. So at most I coped a misty drizzle and not an electrical storm with a 300km per hour gust fronts. Because of the fog of pain and belated brain injury at that stage I was only very vaguely aware of how much discomfort she was in.
Weather like human interactions isn’t a static thing that operates only in isolation and never gets outside it’s own box, it flows and cascades, bursting and creeping into far reaching places some of which may be obvious others can seem like a galaxy away. Those close at hand but not directly involved often take the weight of worry which means with a random phone call or text, you’ve now been transported from earth’s 1:1 gravity to Jupiter’s 2.4 times that of earth gravitational pull, weighing and crushing you down. What can you do? What do you know? Often the smallest things make the biggest difference. Listening, talking, grabbing coffee, food a funny meme. Some days it’s just good to have a gripe and other days it’s surprisedly good to hear a good gripe. One thing to do though which I’ve found useful both ways is after a conversation or visit send a text 24-48hrs afterwards and see how that landed. A funny story can be turned into despair or a sad story can light the fires of challenge you just honestly never know however don’t be afraid by that and tip toe around until you end up with no relationship or friendship at all embrace the change. Not all change is bad it can be just different at different times. Thought provoking can happen from any number of situations depending how it lands and sits. Then talk as it’s impossible not to have a misstep somewhere along the way for the simple reasons of pain tiredness and scared if nothing else.
Who’s reflecting who? Who has positive language, who has doubt. Which clouds have a silver lining no matter how dark they are? It’s important at times to stand back and really see where the weather systems are trending and see if that’s a positive thing over all. Or is everyone consistently getting drowned in cold winter down pours.
People around a person in recovery or involved in any number of life’s challenges have at any one time numbers of weather patterns around them. Some are warm fronts and others are cold fronts with embedded storms that maybe seen from a distance like looking across a vast plain easily seeing storms crossing the expanse creeping or rushing towards you. Other times they are hidden and arrive like a flash flash flood or gust front. No time to seek shelter just bear the brunt as best you can. Some systems are in flux and can be running hot and cold without any warning and definitely don’t appear on any 7 day forecast.
What of your closest carers and loved ones. All too often it’s not as much, how are they coping with the event. But how they are coping with their now conflicting interacting weather patterns. They may need to be the source of information both good, bad and unknown. Their mask may be thicker then yours or ever so brittle as they must relive things with every telling. They can stay in as much or more relived trauma then the cared for. Whilst you have no choice but to be living it they of course do. It’s these people who are the real heroes of any recovery. They don’t have to be perfect or always on, this is real life no-one can possibly be on 24/7 but they can only do their best. Allowing them to be that is in part how they can operate, feeling a valued contributing member of the team. Like the patient though everything catches up at some point and exhaustion sets in. Rest and recovery is required for them and is often overlooked. The common failing we all fall into is getting back to work and returning to what is your new normal. The effort required is enormous to this point, but now people on the outside are back slapping you and your carer how wonderful you all are problem solved/job done. Life moves on as you’re all good to go, back to your new normal. However now the emotion and adrenaline are starting to wash away and either the weather patterns are moving away or like you exhausted from the huge cyclone that moved through your life. So what you think is the storm passing is actually it’s eye rolling in above you and those closest to you. The calmness and sunshine edges you towards exhaustion as you let your guard down. Job’s done. However getting to your feet turns out to be the easy part, remaining standing is the hard part. From the outside this will seem crazy. For friends, family and work colleges, scheduling with a high level of importance an actually holiday every 6 months and a few mini breaks is a must. Because even through to other’s you seem to have been on holiday from work or life but once that eye of the storm moves on and the false sense of calm is disturbed. Then the cold hand of weariness arrives and no matter how strong you or your inner circle have been they need a proper recharge moment. This is all too often over looked as to others you’ve only just returned to life now your going on a holiday. Will thats not fair!
If you take nothing else away from this blog it’s that mini breaks to actually recharge is important for you but even more so for those closest to the recovery storm. Those who have stood in the way of your dark clouds and crazy wind gusts. They have been possibly cocooned from and with you as well as their own circle of friends and family, now an isolated weather pattern trapped in a vortex that will see them looking at the world from afar, nothing serving to restore their ability to break back into a other weather patterns thus generating new life as life is always consistently on the move and in change. A person in isolation either as the survivor or as a carer will slowly whither and this is one of the many hard parts of trauma, anxiety or depression, reconnecting not just to those of your past but to those of your future. Renew and growth is healthy for everyone. Life is different but that doesn’t necessarily mean it’s a bad thing just a vision of growth usually comes with change. You never know what’s around the next corner, further challenges and/or new adventures.
This is where a big switch needs to pop up from the floor so you can understand what’s required moving forward. It’s the time to reconnect in a genuine way with your circle of friends and family; mask’s off and see how everyones actually doing. That circle of people who care about you will fill you with stories and happening that let you leap forward in time if you’d been stuck in your own small bubble. They will let you see life in fast forward.
Not all your weather needs to be kind in fact all to often it helps you pick yourself up when the weather is tough and learn to be resilient.
What lessons do we learn from storms?
I learned to ask for help and importantly allow others to help, some things only you can stand alone; but so many other things can be shared not in a social media way but in a interactive heart felt way through forms of human contact that make a genuine difference. I learnt that other peoples emotions don’t have to become yours. Know when some people’s fears/worries/beliefs can’t give you strength if not directly suppress you. There is always two sides to a coin and on the other side are those that will inspire you by the courage in the face of fear and change; those that laugh and protect, that push you to get back up and hold a hand out when you fall down even when tears are rolling down their cheeks. Courage comes at a price but it’s well worth paying that price in the quest of recovery. No one showed more courage or inspired the will to keep moving forward and not being stuck in the past of what if’s then my partner in life Clare. Mary Seacole (1805-1881) was the true nurse hero of the Crimean War and largely went unnoticed through history and yet she was undoubtedly a National Treasure. This is how your closest helper or helpers will be to you. Definitely don’t get the recognition they deserve but to you they are National Treasures.
The best shelters are both practical as well as artistically pleasing and this is your goal to shape your self for the weather as you choose life and the way you want it to unfold. Good luck and the best medicine is apparently to laugh through the darkest storms because life hasn’t beaten you yet, and plan for that getaway or activity that will make it all worthwhile. Reconnect slowly in every way and live your new life. Good luck.
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Highly recommend the Liegh Sales book so you can see it happens to any one at any time good or bad. Giving voice to values. lets you understand how to more in a practical way not just theoretical journey. Oh course an audio book in the car or commute makes life even easier to seize every moment.
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Giving Voice to Values: How to Speak Your Mind When You Know What’s Right
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