In the week and days leading up to the surgery, although it was pretty minor, out-patient surgery, a familiar anxiety came over me. Perhaps it is unique to how I "tick," but I've often noticed that if I really look deeper than the surface-level anxiety, first I find a thin layer of just good ol' fashioned fear, which is quickly penetrated down to the underlying foundation of unprocessed grief or sadness. This was the case once again.
I do know that I've not yet processed- and maybe it will never really be done?- the general feeling of loss, the regret and the sadness of having "done this to myself"- injured myself that is. Which reveals the fact that on many levels- most levels, actually- I blame myself.
Many people in my life who love me have been over this with me. Why blame yourself? You're human. Why just create more suffering by beating up on yourself? Why not just forgive yourself?
Mentally and conceptually, I know they're right. I agree. But in my heart, the part of my heart that is still grieving, I'm not entirely done blaming myself.
I blame myself because a portion of me believes that I wouldn't have fallen that day if I hadn't gotten so lost to myself. I had continually lost more and more of myself in the previous year and four months, partly for my own reasons but largely because of an unhealthy relationship. Little by little, I had allowed myself to be diminished, to get smaller and smaller until I was so deferential and so unable to make decisions on my behalf, so able to be talked into things I wouldn't normally be talked into, that I found myself in a situation that perhaps, "normally", my gut, my intuition or just my sense of self would have saved me from.
Of course, there's no real way of knowing this for sure.
But I was certainly in a place of complete and total emotional exhaustion, total defeat, judging against myself right and left, blaming myself anything and everything that wasn't going well either in my life or in the relationship. I'd taken up smoking cigarettes (big red flag for me), was so anxious and unsettled that I'd gotten to a point of throwing up just about every morning, if not every other morning. I'd lost about 15 pounds from being so anxious I couldn't eat. And when you're not eating, your brain chemistry just keeps spiraling down. I was depressed as well as anxious. I don't think I had more than a pitiful shred of self love at that point.
Yet somewhere, I do remember a faint, burning sensation deep in my gut- the sensation of anger. That anger was my survival instinct, the last bit of self love that would not stand for this anymore. It was determined as hell. And it was slowly, ever so slowly, growing.
Ten days before I fell, the relationship ended. That little flame was beginning to burn brighter... and then my hope came crashing down again (pun intended).
As if I wasn't feeling lousy enough as it was, I blamed myself for "letting this happen" to me because I'd always considered myself a pretty smart person when it came to managing my life, following my dreams and choosing my friends wisely (as well as lovers). Although I'm intensely loyal, stubborn and have a hard time, "giving up" I should have given up on that relationship at least 6 months previous. But I didn't. I kept at it, banging my head against the wall, throwing myself up against a wall over and over, getting increasingly depressed. So as much as I know that my dedication and loyalty and love is very much why I stayed, I must recognize that at that point, I did not recognize the limits. If loyalty and dedication and love takes you to such a destructive place, than something is desperately wrong.
What I needed was to have more loyalty and dedication and love for myself, first. I needed to insist on myself. And in not doing so, I paid a dear price for it. I'm still paying that price. And somehow, I can't quite let myself off the hook for that yet.
So, to bring this back to the third surgery, these emotional layers started surfacing. Here I am, undergoing *another* surgery, reminding me of the fact, once again, that I have a bum arm. Reminding me of the day of the fall, of everything I went through since then, of the miserable place I was in previous to it. Being cut open again, put under anaesthesia again- it took me back.
"But it's such a minor surgery, why are you so upset?" a voice might say.
This event does not stand on its own. It's yet another reminder, another thing to endure- although I'll endure it just fine- claiming a part of me, taking me back to twists and turns of the roller coaster that was most of 2007...
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