Sunday, September 26, 2010

you don't know what you've got til it's gone

so you know that phrase "you don't know what you've got til it's gone"? oh boy am i loving that phrase right now! i've always looked at that phrase in a negative way, observing the good pass away. well until now. see, i've dealt with bouts of insomnia since college - ranging from intense sleeplessness in general to simply having problems staying asleep or problems initially getting to sleep. we are closing in on 2 1/2 months of taking the celexa and baby, i didn't know what i had until it was gone! i realize now that even my previous "good" seasons with sleep were not normal/what they should have been. normal to me was a totally dark room, ear plugs, fan providing white noise, 1 hour to fall asleep, waking 1-2 times. seriously, that was a good season! the biggest difference now is that when/if i wake up i am able to go back to sleep immediately. it was such a pain in the tuckus waking up at the smallest sound and the result would be that i couldn't fall back asleep for an hour. i didn't realize how exhausted i felt until i wasn't! the difference almost makes me angry that i suffered with horrible sleep for over 10 yrs. my therapist has made me realize how much my anxiety has not only controlled my life but manifested in physical ways that i thought were unrelated. when a persons emotional life is in turmoil, even if it has been suppressed as in my case, your body WILL show signs of it. whether that be fatigue, depression, hair loss, insomnia, chronic pain, acne, etc the pain will not be hidden, period. i also have noticed that, now that i am more balanced and working through my trauma, my energy level is incredibly higher and there is an absence of physical pain which, again now that it's gone, i realized was almost constantly present in my body. i thought i just had a bad back or hips or what have you but now i realize, almost with a laugh because you've kind of got to laugh about the situation or else it will make it worse, that it was mostly a product of my inner life wanting to be heard. i thought i had a grasp on the relationship between mind and body but to see real evidence of it is rather cool. i used to get weekly adjustments from my dad (and those certainly helped but did not resolve the pain, how could it!?) to my full spine to help with the hip and mid back pain and headaches. my dad has been out of commission recouping from his open heart surgery and thus i haven't had an adjustment in over 6 weeks. guess what, nearly no pain!

2 comments:

amy said...

celebrating w/ you in spirit--healing is always a miracle.

robina said...

My insomnia has always, always been tied to emotional issues. I'm so glad this process is uncovering so much GOOD for you!! ilu lady.