POV: navigating anxiety and Hypervigilance.
2025 is about character development the girls are saying.
My birthday this year was hard. I’m not going to lie.
Last year, after my mom passed I dove head first into making new rituals and routines to keep my mind busy. I was in contact at the time with my mom’s last living parent, 90 (her stepmother) and her sister 89, whom also helped raised me. We made a big ordeal taking them to McCormick and Schmidt’s for Christmas. Private car service from #Roseland to #downtownchicago. Miller and I really poured our heart into this experience for me, for them and for us as a collective family. Being home didn’t feel like a burden, it felt like a much needed gift.
2024 turbulence hit our family in so many directions. Health scares were at the top of the list. We knew we needed to find our way back to somewhere closer than the west coast so we could actually be with family in intentional ways. But it also clarified who was really there and who wasn’t.
after much difficult deliberation and avoidance from them starting during mom’s hospice journey I decided to part ways. A parting that felt like a hole was left in a place that was already empty. Going #nocontact was the only option.
This cocktail of feelings of abandonment from your family of origin, mixed with the usual holiday grief of being an adult orphan and having just lost mom, working through marriage growth spurts simultaneously my head felt like it was going to explode.
I left the house to take a drive and clear my mind. Decided to go be in mama’s energy and visit our family home still in it’s same setup as the day I came and got mama 5 years ago. Got some more family pictures and just spent time in her energy. It felt like the only place my body would find a sense of regulation. While I did find some calmness it didn’t last. lol- I was wrong because the anxiety continued for another two days. It took me everything to pull myself up and remember I leaned into those rituals for a reason.
It was time to let them work their magic. #grief #healing #depression #mentalhealthrecovery #ptsd #survivor #areturntopleasure #sephoraplay