Journal – Page 15 – This is Another Story

Avoidance

Published on August 24, 2022August 24, 2022 by Yinglan13 Comments

I thought I would be okay now that the nightmares have subsided. I thought I would be okay to drive to my doctor appointment on Friday (two days from now).

Maybe not because I find myself stressing out just to step into the garage. I can’t even go into the garage to retrieve some insect powder for the garage. For some reason, every time I put the thought of “go to the garage” in my head, my brain would automatically override the thought with another like “walk 1000 steps” or “watch TV”.

I have already reschedule the appointment for next Thursday and part of me want so much to reschedule Friday’s appointment. You can’t, a voice says firmly. Friday’s appointment is a dietitian/counseling appointment and I need to talk to somebody who understands what I’m going through. Maybe then I can have the strength to get back on the road.

Curiously, I googled “Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder Symptoms” and one of the symptom that came up was “avoidance” and it includes:

Trying to avoid thinking or talking about the traumatic event
Avoiding places, activities or people that remind you of the traumatic event
https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/post-traumatic-stress-disorder/symptoms-causes/syc-20355967

I remember when I went grocery shopping with mom on Sunday. It took all my strength to hurl myself into the garage and into my mom’s car. The house key was in my pocket and when we returned, I entered the house through the front door instead of the garage.

My mom didn’t understand this. She doesn’t understand I can’t stand to look at my car – the missing fender, the hole in the door, all of it. She doesn’t understand about PTSD.

I have been in accidents before, none was my fault, but I couldn’t recall having such a strong reaction as this time. I was able to step into the garage. I was able to get in the car and get back on the road. Why is it so hard this time?

Meanwhile, mom isn’t making this easy. Not only does she keeps talking about it, she’s saying it’s my fault that I got into an accident which prevented us from taking a trip to Cheyenne, Wyoming last weekend and possibly any trip in the future because of the deficit I’ve spent on getting the car fixed.

She also wants me to call the auto body shop and ask them to give me a quote to add blind spot detection to my mirrors. I don’t see why I need it. It was never a problem and I don’t want it to be another crutch for me to rely on. To be honest, I hate all the gadgets cars have these days and I’m glad my car doesn’t have features like lane departure and blind spot detection because it makes us more distracted and reliant on these feature instead of focusing on the road and drive.

I emailed the person who did the quote for my repairs but he hasn’t gotten back to me yet and I doubt he will. His business card is in my car and given my current dilemma, I don’t know how I can retrieve it.

#WeekendCoffeeShare – My Brain won’t shut up about it.

Published on August 20, 2022August 20, 2022 by Yinglan15 Comments

Continue reading “#WeekendCoffeeShare – My Brain won’t shut up about it.” →

This will take a while…

Published on August 19, 2022August 18, 2022 by Yinglan17 Comments

Please note that this is quite a long post. I won’t be offended if you skip this one.

Physically, I’m fine but mentally, I feel like I’m once again at a breaking point. It will certainly be a while until I’m truly comfortable driving again…

Yesterday was supposed to be a day of fun, a day which I head into the forest once again to seek solitude, a little time to myself, and to enjoy nature but it looked like someone had another agenda for me.

This week has been a series of unfortunate events with the biggest one of them all on Thursday.

Continue reading →

Monday Thoughts

Published on August 15, 2022August 14, 2022 by Yinglan2 Comments

For some reason, I’m feeling anxious about this Monday.

It’s my final counseling session with my therapist and as I ponder on what to discuss, all I can think was yesterday, Sunday. So much about yesterday peeved me. The only parts that didn’t peeve me were the solo walk along the forest trail and all the wonderful photos I took on my walk.

It was actually mom’s idea to go to the forest yesterday. “I need to go breathe in some fresh air.”

She didn’t want to drive her car though and she didn’t want me to drive, so she dragged her sister and brother-in-law (BIL) along, assigning him the role of the driver for the trip. As usual, I was the navigator, which is the most annoying task ever since mom was doing the navigating from the backseat while telling her BIL to ignore everything I said.

The forest was wonderful – so cool (temperature-wise) and lush with greenery. I had a suspicion that it rained the night because the ground was wet and there were water droplets on the plants. I hurriedly abandoned the adults while I hunted for a location to practice long-exposure photography.

After taking all the long exposure photographs I had wanted, I began wandering down the forest trail while paying attention at my surrounding to find interesting photo compositions. After a while, I caught up with them as they were returning to the parking lot.

The next activity on mom’s agenda was food and her BIL suggested the only restaurant he knew – Burger King – and that was what mom wanted as well. In fact, it’s just about the only restaurant mom will eat at these days. Unfortunately, there was no Burger King nearby, which was odd considering all the other chain restaurants were nearby. I tried to search for the next best thing but they don’t like any other fast food restaurant. So I suggested Texas-style barbecue.

Her BIL agreed. However, when we arrived at the restaurant, she refused to order anything, and in the oddest fashion, she asked for a coffee. Um, coffee in a barbecue joint on a Sunday afternoon? The guy looked at her and then replied apologetically, “Sorry, we don’t have coffee.”

As the food arrived, after taking a bite of the beef brisket I ordered, she said, “The meat is overcooked. It’s terrible.”

Then she started reflecting on the barbecue joint we once gone to just outside of Austin, Texas. “The line was out the door and round the corner,” mom said and as she said, my anger level ticked up ever so slightly.

Why can’t she keep her opinion to herself? I thought and before I could stop myself, I said, “I ordered the brisket for me. If you don’t like it, order whatever you want for yourself.”

“I don’t want anything.” She pouted. The only reason you don’t want anything is because this isn’t Burger King, I thought.

As we got up to leave, while mom and her BIL went to dispose the trays, my aunt whispered to me, “Just do what she says,” which was the other thing that peeved me about yesterday’s outing.

Um, excuse me, I wanted to say, I’m not a yes-woman or a robot or a dog. I am entitled to my own emotions and opinions, but that’s when mom returned, ushering us to leave.

Wow, it looks like I have quite a bit to discuss with my therapist.