Biting my tongue

I woke up on Tuesday morning from another weird dream/nightmare and thought "oh that's pretty interesting... I should write it down." And then I fell asleep again and forgot the dream. However, I found that I had somehow managed to bite my tongue in my sleep. It's still really sore a day later so who knows what I was up to.

I logged onto twitter and people were bitching about some no bra day thing. Yes, I agree that no bras and pink shit doesn't help cancer but adding your voice just adds more noise sometimes. Maybe I'm super passive aggressive and not a fan of conflict, but I believe my silence says more than a verbal protest. Either way, I decided to ignore the drama and focus on the beautiful morning and forge ahead with a busy work day.

And then timehop gently reminded me that it was Yvette's birthday. I wish she (and her family) knew how much I still think of her. I still dont quite feel right having purple hair because that was her colour. And I wish I could plaster "please wear sunscreen" everywhere at outdoor parties. We haven't had too much sun yet but it's coming. Please please.... cover up and take care of your skin.

Anyhoo.. it made me a little sad to remember her, but such is the price of love. So on we keep moving with the day.

And then Facebook. It was pretty funny that in an informal twitter poll, I was one of the few people that chose Facebook as my favourite social media place. Look, it's full of conservative and/or racist friends and family.... but it's easy to hide those kind of things. Generally, the people that I follow are pretty interesting and entertaining. I guess I'm lucky in that way.

But then there are Facebook groups. ARGH. It can sometimes be a minefield to navigate the mini dramas that enfold. I am super grateful that I got my training in the old StumbleUpon groups on trolls and group moderation. Generally, it's a good idea to ignore the trolls. Let them have their say until they tire themselves out. And then you can update with the facts and leave them to carry on or lock the threads.

So I had a situation arise yesterday in one of my FB groups that made me super super angry. I remained calm when I was online and answered the necessary questions without responding to any personal attacks (aka "argumentam ad hominem", a much loved phrase). But damn was I angry offline. I was more angry that this was going on and on. Eventually I had to remove the thread from the public group because it was getting out of hand and I dealt with the issues in private message.

And then I went home and had a life.

I had actually almost forgot about it and was about to blog about it in anger last night when I got two apologies. Huh? I really didn't expect that. I generally avoid all conflict as I believe it never ends well. Granted, this was not really a personal issue so it was easier for me to stick to the facts and not feel too personally attacked. I guess I was just irritated that it was so public and embarrassing.

There're some lessons in here about keeping my tongue when I'm angry but also about learning when to speak up when I know something is wrong. There was a lot of stuff that I wanted to say, but it wasn't really appropriate or relevant to the particular discussion. So I'm glad I didn't say things that I would regret now.

In the end, it feels pretty fricking awesome to be validated and I think I did the right thing in this situation. I'm definitely not perfect though and I do make errors in judegment but I am always willing to learn from them. There're a few people that I trust that I will seek advise from tonight.... so we'll see what happens out of that.

Overall... twas a good day.
My tongue is still sore though.

xx

Unpacking the house

I have only a few close friends that I discuss my therapy sessions with. It's not something that I share easily because the things I discuss in those sessions are things that I hide very well... evenfrom myself. I dont really love the sessions because it's such hard work emotionally. But I'm doing it because I have to. For me.

So, while discussing a particular hard sessions with said close friends, I was told that I dont really need to deal with all of my issues at once. My dear friend gave me the advice that sometimes it's good to put your issues in a box and pack it away to deal with later.

I laughed and quipped: "I hear you but... I have so many boxes that have been put away, I cant move anymore without tripping over them." My therapist thought it was a good analogy and, so, we continue unpacking the issues.

The interesting thing is, this image has seeped into my unconscious and now I'm having recurring dreams/nightmares of my house filled with boxes and me trying to unpack them. My therapist happens to have an interest in dream analysis so I've been intrigued by his opinions. And I really do appreciate someone that takes my rather interesting imagination seriously. :)

So the first dream I had, I was excitedly telling my close friends about how I was getting rid of all these boxes. Someone was going to take them away and I was excited about all the things I was going to put into my new house. Of course, I didnt actually do any of the unpacking and moving out of the boxes. 

The next dream was on the anniversary of my dad's birthday... which, in the conscious world, I didnt really want to acknowledge. In my dream, I was in a car getting ready to go somewhere. I turned around and saw my dad. I was a bit shocked but he seemed so nonchalant about being there so I calmed down and thought that maybe I had imagined his death and everything.... *sigh*

And then I'm in my house and it is stacked to the roof with stuff.. some in boxes, most not.  And now I'm getting desperate to get rid of them. I have all this stuff from everyone else that I need to get out but I'm not sure how. I remember about four or five stacked mattresses and telling someone to please just take it all away. 

And, while I'm panicking about this.... I retreat back to my aunt's place which is empty and warm and a happy place for me. But I'm not happy because I know I'm just running away from what I have to do.

And that's when I woke up at 4am and managed to spill boiling hot water all over myself and now have a burn wound all across my stomach. Lesson learned eh?

Yeah, yeah.
We'll see.

xx

~anib