Flash
A bit earlier last evening, I was still feeling fragile from that whatever it was I’d experienced for much of the last week, but managed to wrestle myself out of bed and make myself presentable and hospitable to a friend of the druid who had come to visit and watch a movie with us.
Somewhere in there, I had to use the bathroom, and upon exiting, the friend was just outside the doorway, and lunged at me. He laughed as I squeaked, and then watched somewhat bemusedly as I dove past him and buried myself in bed, shaking violently. I explained as soon as I had control of higher brain function again, “PTSD, it’s fun!” He was all sorts of whoa and taken aback.
My hateful, abusive ex had a habit of lunging out from behind a wall, a door, or otherwise out of view, yell something while standing less than six inches away, his eyes white and bulging, delighting in my cowering reaction. He’d take my throat, or both shoulders, and slam me up against something, and beat on me.
People over the years have asked why he’s done this and other things to me. I can only shrug and say self-depreciatively, “If I could have figured that out, I would have definitely tried to figure out ways to avoid experiencing that.” You can’t really explain abuse. One cannot get inside the head of someone like that, and I really didn’t care to. I didn’t want to empathize or understand it. I just wanted it to stop, to get away from it, to do whatever I could to avoid it.
At my last place of employment, my supervisor was fond of jumping out from behind aisles, much as the druid’s friend did. She was the mother of three boys and such antics were apparently common in her household. I didn’t find it very professional or amusing. It certainly didn’t endear me to her. Especially when I told her it reminded me of my ex’s abuse and she made a point of doing it often. “I’m trying to teach you to react to it differently,” she’d cackle as I again squeaked, dropped whatever item I was trying to stock, and ran away from her before my flight reaction turned into the adrenaline rush to instead fight. “Oh, grow up!” she’d chide. “I’m helping you!”
The druid’s friend was much more empathetic and apologetic last night, at my unintended, triggered flashback. I’ve taken a zen-like approach to it–it’s bound to come up in my life, when people think they can do that to people they don’t know. I don’t think ill of his friend and I trust he won’t likely try that again.
I just sigh that periodically and without warning, triggered flashbacks like that are going to happen. I’ve come a long way in the past two years with dealing with the repercussions of years of hard, physical abuse. Obviously I have a ways to go to get to a point where I’m reacting to something inane, like being spooked, in a healthy way. I’m apparently still prone to being slammed back into the old way of surviving, namely covering the most vital organs and assuming the most submissive posture possible.
For a half hour after being spooked last night, I held the druid’s hand, my fingers twitching quite beyond my control.
Living with violence for twelve years certainly made a lasting impression on me. :P
