Back to Basics by Susan L.

  I've missed doing art therapy so yesterday I had my own little session at the centre. It helped tremendously in diffusing the emotional remnants from Wednesday's intense trigger. It helped that a friend was there to debrief with after I'd finished the collage. She both validated and gently pointed out that things aren't as dark as they felt or as they appeared in the image I'd produced. (Which I knew in the back of my mind). In saying that, she also recognized the truth of how I was feeling. More importantly, she honoured the place I was in and respected my right to be where I was.
  That was the biggest part of the trigger on Wednesday, my feelings were dismissed and subtly condemned as "wrong". A life long story being played out once again. It's also a lie of a lesson I have struggled very hard to break free from.
  It felt good to have someone affirm my take on the situation. It felt good to have that take acknowledged as real, not just some unimportant whimsy. There had been a lot of second guessing going on, a mental battle, as I had carefully torn the pieces from a variety of magazines. The "I should" was awfully loud.
 I am sure part of this piece was simply getting the shock of my emotional reaction down on paper. My heart ached and broke once again to that point where it felt like I was having a heart attack. That familiar pain alone transported my mind to a few different horrible memories.
  Part of the grief too was the source of the trigger. It had happened in a place I had hoped to feel safe in.
  Honestly? I had gone into Wednesday's meeting already anxious, raw and vulnerable. It had taken one of my just-in-case-of-emergency pills for me to stay. I don't want to run from challenging situations. That only compounds social anxiety and would lead to an unhealthy, fear based isolation.
  Well, I took it all to the Lord in a form of pictorial prayer and am already on the upside of the great sadness that threatened to overwhelm me. It's all good.
  "For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord." Rom 8:38-39