Hell Hath No Fury

I was 11 years old and in elementary school when my friend’s older brother suggested that we hide behind a tree together during what was supposed to be an innocent game of hide and seek (you can read that whole story here: http://ciracenter.org/2016/06/brock-turner-is-not-problem.html).  I was 11 years old when this boy jammed his tongue down my throat, rammed his hand under my shirt and my bra, grabbed at my breasts and attempted to wedge his fingers inside of me. I was 11 years old when I experienced what I now know as dissociation and the submit response - the final and forgotten phase of the nervous system's fight, flight, freeze response - for the first time in my life. I couldn’t move, I couldn’t speak...I could only cry and stare at the moon for what felt like an eternity because I was so utterly terrified of what was being done to my body without my consent.

I was 11.

Fast forward 26 years.  Brett Kavanaugh has been credibly accused of sexual assault by three different woman and he has just been confirmed as our newest Supreme Court Justice.  Every time I have thought about writing about this, I either start crying and then avoid it or avoid it all together.

What can be said that hasn’t been said already??  

We talk and talk and explain and plead for understanding...to be seen...to be heard...to be validated and none of it matters.  Brett Kavanaugh is still appointed to the Supreme Court. Donald Trump is still President. Women continue to betray their own.  And men will continue to rape, abuse and assault. So what’s the point?? For the last couple of weeks, I’ve pretty much been stuck in this deep, dark place, caught between profound despair and hopelessness and murderous rage.

Because anyone who is a survivor, and many who are not, could’ve told you before it happened that no one would take Dr. Ford seriously.  Because we haven’t been taken seriously either.  

We could’ve told you that even when people pretended to take her seriously, like with a joke of an FBI investigation, that it would end exactly the same.  Because our personal abuse/assault histories were never resolved either.

We already knew this was going to go down the way it did.  Because this is just simply how we treat survivors here - same shit, different day.  But to have it play out on this particular platform at this particular level...despite the fact that we knew it would end this way, it’s also too much.  The entire federal government just made it clear to the entire world that women have no worth other than the sexual gratification of men. They just made it clear that we will never be believed (if a white woman who also has a doctorate isn’t believed, then no one will be believed).  And that if it did happen and we are to be believed, that it’s our fault anyway because insert some rape-culture-victim-blaming statement here.

It’s just too much.

It’s one thing to have our friends and/or our families struggle to say and do the right thing when we disclose our sexual trauma or how it’s affected us.  And as much as we hate it, it’s so normal for us to have no real motivation to report or even disclose what happened to us because...well, we know how that goes.  But to know that at the highest level of our judicial system sits a man so steeped in privilege and power that he was able to get a promotion after having several very credible accusations of sexual assault….well, that can feel like the death blow at times.  That has made me feel like there’s nothing left to fight for. If it’s 2018 and THAT can still happen...we’re doomed.

So if you’re in that place too, I get it.  I’m sobbing as I write this because I feel it so strongly.  If you have moments of feeling like you have no fight left in you, I’m with you.  The world can be such a disturbing, fucked up place and sometimes the energy that is required to just get through the day is all you can muster.  I profoundly get it. So take a minute to rest. Hell, take a week. Get off of Facebook. Stop listening to NPR. Stop watching CNN. Read something light.  Cry with people who get it. Take a bath. Watch something funny. Take a little real-world hiatus. This is deserving of your tears and it’s Ok to take a break.

BUT THEN RISE UP.  Because this shit can’t stand any longer.  

How many times has someone grabbed your ass or your breasts without your permission?

How many times has someone rubbed their body against yours??

How many times has someone continued to touch you and pressure you despite your lack of an enthusiastic “yes”?

How many times have you felt threatened or intimidated by a man’s unwanted attention?

How many times have you been catcalled on the street?

How many times have you felt objectified as a sexual object rather than an actual person?

How many times have you been made to feel like you did something wrong even though you were a victim to someone else’s bad behavior?

How many times has a man bought you drink after drink with the intention of having sex with you when you’re not legally able to consent?

How many times have you wound up in a sexual situation that you’re not sure you want to be in?

HOW MANY TIMES???

ENOUGH.

All of these men in the government are banking on this “blowing over”, some have even explicitly said so.  So we need to scream at the top of our lungs. We need to VOTE in record numbers. We need to protest every chance that we get.  We need to talk to whoever will listen. We need to burn it down (not literally of course ;)) and start over again.

If they won’t listen when we’re rational and intelligent and non-emotional, as Dr. Ford so bravely did, then we’ll get ugly.  We’ll get loud. We’ll get angry. And when they still won’t listen, we’ll vote them out. Every last one.  By all means, ladies and allies, take a moment to rest and mourn this historical, monumental loss and failure at the highest level.  But then get your pitchforks and megaphones and get ready...

Because hell hath no fury as millions of women scorned.

For all things voting, go here: https://crooked.com/articles/be-a-voter-save-america/

Dr. Colleen Cira is a Licensed Clinical Psychologist, trauma and anxiety expert, clinical supervisor, writer, speaker, wife and Mommy of two little ones.  She has a practice in Chicago’s Loop and Oak Park.  To schedule an appointment with her or her staff, please visit www.ciracenter.org

Broken Can Be Beautiful

Broken can be beautiful.

Does that sound strange to you?  Do you believe that it's actually true or that I'm just trying to spin something?

Initially, it sounded strange to me too, but it doesn't take more than a minute or two when I really think about what that means, for it to make perfect sense to me.  If you haven't already read my last post, read it here and then carry on with this one.  It'll all make more sense that way.

So let's be honest: brokenness does NOT always look or feel beautiful.  Sometimes that looks like we are a sobbing mess on the kitchen floor.  Sometimes that means that we're screaming at someone we love.  Sometimes that means we are pushing those away who want nothing more than to be close.  Sometimes we are so scared of getting hurt or someone actually seeing us that we stay isolated. Sometimes the depths of our despair is so powerful and heavy and dark that we feel like we can barely move under the weight of it.

I get that.  I've lived that.  I've been there.

But here's the thing: if we try to avoid suffering our whole lives, then we run around barely experiencing anything at all.  Life IS suffering.  At least some of the time, it just is.  There is no way around that.  Similarly, if we try to avoid showing anyone our true self, which is marred and scarred and flawed, then we run around barely knowing anyone...or letting anyone know US.

There are a lot of people who have known me for a long time....who were still shocked at my last post.  They never knew the extent to which mine and Meredith's battle against cancer affected me.  Affects me NOW.  Most people had no idea.  Why?

I don't talk about it.  Ever.

Talking about it serves as a reminder that it actually happened.  Talking about how it continues to affect me makes me feel crazy.  I'm not supposed to say that because I'm a psychologist and in my world, "crazy" is a dirty word.  I don't think other people are "crazy", ever, regardless of what they are struggling with or what they have been through.  I'm able to see other's problems very objectively and understand how they developed and see how they make perfect sense.

But that doesn't stop me from thinking that I'm crazy.

So I don't talk about it.  And to be fair, it's not like I'm dying to talk about it or thinking about it all the time.  I think about my identity as a cancer survivor on a pretty regular basis.  And I see Meredith's picture sitting on my nightstand every night before I go to bed.  But I don't think about our whole war and I certainly don't think about how the after-effects of that battle continue to play out in my life.  I don't think I could function very well if that was omni-present 24/7 (even though it kinda is).  But even when I have an intrusive image of something terrible happening to me or my kids and I know it connects back to Meredith, I tell almost no one.  My husband knows.  I just told one of my dearest friends last week as I was gearing up to write these posts.  But that's about it.

But how silly is that??  Feeling pain is only human!  Feeling upset after something upsetting has happened only makes good sense.  And the "upset" will show up differently in different people, but pain is pain is pain.

We cannot avoid suffering.  

And I don't think we should even want to.  Only when we experience deep despair can we truly experience profound joy.

Every day I get a chance to bear witness to people's flaws, quirks, struggles...to the parts of themselves that are broken.  And these struggles and their courage to talk about it is incredible.  Perfection bores me to tears.  Romance novels can shove it.  Disney movies - eff off.  I want the raw...the brutal truth...the good, the bad AND the ugly...the struggle.  THAT is amazing and inspiring and sometimes it is simply beautiful.

And maybe even my brokenness is too.

Inside My Childhood War

It was October 16, 1996.  I am 15 years old and sitting in an assembly at my high school chatting with my friends when the nurse finds me and tells me that my Mom is here and needs to talk to me.

Meredith is dead.

I hear my Mom’s words before I ever make it to the nurses station. Before I see her bloodshot, teary eyes. Before she actually says the words out loud and makes them real.

“Honey, Mere died this morning.”

Instantly, my world split open and I fall, swallowed up in the crevice. I don't remember anything else about that day after that moment.

I stumbled numbly - the shell of a person - through Meredith's wake, giving her eulogy, and then finally her funeral. When we were at the cemetery and it was time to leave, her coffin mere feet away, above ground for those final moments, the loss was so powerful, I literally doubled over in agony. A searing pain exploded from the pit of my stomach and chest that was so unbearable I thought I might die myself. Collapsed on the floor and completely inconsolable, grief wracking my body, tidal wave after tidal wave in an onslaught that seemed never-ending. I could not bring myself to leave her side.  It was some of the most traumatic pain I’ve ever experienced, my teenage self having no idea how to manage the intensity of those feelings.  

How does anyone bury a 15 year old?

------

Meredith and I fought in a war against cancer together.  Our first tour of duty was in the Winter of our 7th grade year, when Meredith lost both her Mom and Grandmother to cancer within weeks of each other.  A few months after that, Meredith herself was diagnosed with a rare and severe bone cancer that took every ounce of her strength and courage, almost dying several times throughout her battle.  It wasn’t until the end of our 8th grade year that she finally started to recover.  After that we got a few months of reprieve, but in December of our freshmen year, we were deployed again when I was diagnosed with cancer.  A much less severe cancer than Mere’s (Hodgkin's Lymphoma to be exact), but cancer nonetheless and Meredith helped me until I was in remission in the middle of that Summer.  Our final tour commenced just a few weeks after my recovery before our sophomore year, when Meredith got sick again and this time succumbed to the disease.

For 3 years straight, all Meredith and I did was fight for our lives or help the other fight for hers.  

Our very young lives that were still silly and childlike despite our illnesses, were constantly peppered with facing our own, and each other’s, mortality; a white noise in the background that was impossible to get rid of and equally impossible to ignore.  We had the same oncologist at the same hospital.  We helped each other through hair loss, friendships lost (what teenager wants to deal with cancer??), and school dances missed.  Through chemotherapy, radiation and stints in the ICU.  Through wig-vs-bandana decisions (being bald in junior high and high school is NOT fun, for the record). We were the only ones capable of understanding what the other was going through.  And we both fought courageously.  

The problem is that my fellow soldier died...and I survived.  

Just saying those simple words all these years later still makes my eyes well up with tears that eventually spill over.  It’s unconscionable.  She shouldn’t have died.  She had been through so much already.  She never fell in love.  She never learned how to drive a car.  We were supposed to be roommates in college together.  She was going to be a veterinarian. It shouldn't have happened that way.

And why her and not me?  The survivor’s guilt I felt - correction, still feel - is the most illogical sounding concept, but haunts me endlessly nonetheless.  I have always lived for the both of us without even fully realizing that’s what I was doing.  Always striving to be the absolute best person I can be because I feel like I owe that to her.  She wasn’t able to become an adult, to go on and do the great things I know she was capable of doing.  So I need to do that for her.

And not just because she didn’t get to, but because I feel like I need to prove that I deserve to be here.  I push myself SO HARD because some deep, dark part of me feels like I need to earn my keep.  That if I let myself slide even for a second, death will come for me again and this time I will not evade it.  Or even if I do, someone I love will pay dearly...again.

I know that sounds ridiculous.  

But that’s exactly how it feels.

Most people can recognize that they are anxious because their stomach turns, they get a pounding headache, they catch their thoughts spiraling out of control.  Me?  During a particularly difficult week, I was driving on the Eisenhower to have a play date (and a Mommy date ;)) and had a horrible image of getting into an accident, my car flipping over multiple times with my babies and I inside.  Intrusive images of something terrible happening to me or the people I love - that’s how I know that my anxiety is up.  Those horrific images serve as a reminder to me that screwing up or simply falling short of my enormously high expectations means that I should be punished.

The point is this: there are times when I feel SO BROKEN.  Despite the almost 20 years that have passed, despite the therapy, despite the money I raised for cancer research in Mere's name (more on that later), despite loving relationships that affirm my goodness, despite amazing children that reflect my goodness, despite a career that I LOVE and excel at...this nagging feeling of not being enough persists.  Which makes me feel even more broken.  And at times, the feeling of brokenness is so intense and real and isolating, it can seem as though I am the only person on the planet who feels this way.  Yet I know from my role as a psychologist that I am not alone in this feeling.

And you aren’t either.

There are times when we all feel broken...we all feel unworthy...we all feel undeserving...we all feel like it’s an up-hill battle and we don’t have the energy/courage/will to keep climbing.  There are moments in our life when we ALL feel that way.  

To feel broken is simply to be a human who is still breathing.  And being a human who is still breathing is a truly wondrous thing.

---------------

Dr. Colleen Cira is a Licensed Clinical Psychologist, trauma and anxiety expert, clinical supervisor, writer, speaker, wife and Mommy of two little ones.  She has a practice in Chicago's Loop and Oak Park.  To schedule an appointment with her, please visit: http://www.cirapsyd.com/

You May Have Experienced Trauma (And Don't Even Know It)

Sounds like a funny thing to say right?  I mean, you would know if you experienced trauma.  Right??
Not necessarily so.

So let's start at the beginning.  When I use the word "trauma" lots of things probably come to mind: war, rape, a tornado, a car accidents.  Am I hitting some of them?

And you are right!  Those things are often traumatic for folks that experience them.

We in the psych world call those events "Big T trauma".  It's a terrible name, but all that it means is that these are things that happened ONCE.  Except war.  War is obviously not a single incident trauma, but the powers that be threw it in there.  Don't ask.  But regardless, anything that happens one time is single incident trauma and therefore Big T.  And some of the folks that I work with come in for these sorts of reasons.

But FAR more of the folks that I work with have a different kind of trauma history.  They often have something called "little t trauma".  Again, terrible name, because while the name implies it, one is not better or worse, easier or harder.  But little t trauma is basically bad stuff that happened a lot.  For instance, a childhood filled with abuse and/or neglect.  Witnessing or being a victim of domestic violence.  Being diagnosed with a major medical illness or disability.  All of these things can also be traumatic.  But you probably could've guessed that too.

Here's the part that might surprise you.  There's a subset of little t trauma called "relational trauma".  This is where people hurt other people...but not necessarily with their fists or bodies.  A relational trauma survivor might be someone who...

• Endured a contentious divorce
• Has a history of physical/sexual abuse and/or neglect
• Had a parent/caregiver/family member who struggled with a medical illness 
• Had a parent/caregiver/family member who struggled with a mental illness or personality disorder
• Had a parent/caregiver/family member who struggled with a substance abuse/addiction
• The death of a loved one
• Experiencing sexism, racism, homophobia, etc

Are you surprised that any of those things can be traumatic? Are you reeling or confused because you see yourself in any of those examples? If so, how do you know if those experiences are still following you around and impacting your life NOW?

When we experience any kind of trauma, our body and brain respond in predictable and NORMAL ways. This may include:

• Difficulties with regulating your mood:
• Feeling mild to severe sadness more often than not
• Explosive or inhibited anger
• Chronic anxiety and/or panic attacks
• Unstable sense of who you are
• Sense of helplessness and/or powerlessness
• Frequent feelings of shame, guilt and self-blame
• Sense of being totally different from others
• Feeling numb or empty
• Relationship difficulties
• Feeling the need to isolate and withdraw
• Disruption in intimate relationships
• Difficulties with trust
• Ending up in the same relationship patterns that you know aren’t good for you, but you can’t figure out how to get out of them
• Memory/Consciousness difficulties
• Cannot remember major parts of childhood, including but not limited to, traumatic experiences
• Can remember in vivid detail your traumatic history and it comes into your mind when you least want/expect it to
• A sense of not being fully present in your life

Ok, so this is a lot of information to digest, especially if you are seeing yourself in this post so let's re-group for a second. Trauma is more than war and rape. Trauma is also when people do bad things to other people, with malintent or not, and it causes people to respond in similar and predictable ways as is detailed above.

So what if this is you?

If you experienced some (or several) of the traumatic experiences that I discussed above and you currently struggle with your mood, sense of self, relationships or memory, **treatment can help.

This does not mean that you are crazy. This simply means that you are having a normal reaction to something abnormal. That is all.

And you are not alone.  

According to a study done by some of the most highly respected trauma researchers out there, 60.7% of men and 51.2% of women reported experiencing at least one trauma in their lifetime (Kessler, 2000;Kessler et al. 1995; 1999).  

Ok so let's stop here for now even though there is a lot more to talk about.  How has trauma affected YOU?  What have you done to overcome it?  I want to hear about it on my FaceBook page!

**If after reading this, you want to talk to someone about potentially getting into therapy, feel free to visit me at my website to schedule a complimentary phone consultation or schedule an appointment.