Panic Attacks

Despite the title of this post, and what I am about to tell you, I feel like I have been doing better. I feel more active, that I have the ability to be active. I just feel a little better. I feel a little more friendly. I even went and sat by the pool with a girl from the dog park today. How about that?! (Not in  swimsuit. I assure you, I wore way more clothes than necessary or appropriate for the circumstances.)

 That's good right?
Now to get into the nitty-gritty depressing stuff.

Last weekend I flew to DC for a wedding and a couple of engagement shoots. I was a little more organized than I have been in the past and wasn't hours late to the airport for once. As my friend said, I planned in time for me to freak out going through security. A lot of extra time.

(And drugs.)

Of course you hope you don't need it (the time, I know I need the anxiety medication), and I practiced breathing the whole time on the bus and on the walk in, and while I got my boarding pass.

In and out.

I wasn't calm by any means but was working really hard to control my anxiety and not think about Matt and his wife screaming obscenities inside my head and being afraid of someone hitting me or shooting me.

I was fairly calm (relatively speaking- not heaving with sobs) when I stepped into the body scanner, having taken my sweet time putting my stuff on the conveyor belt and stalling as long as possible. I did everything therapy has taught me to do- I focused on the tiny details, told myself I was safe, and tried to tune out the crazed screaming I always hear in my head in these moments of stress.

The thing scanned, I stepped out, breathed a sigh of slight relief and tried to run away. TSA stopped me. "I need to check your side."

I start to pant. I begin to heave out hysterical sobs. I can't talk.

She asks me if I am ok and I shake my head no and turn my head away. I can't look at her uniform. All I see is Him.

The full panic attack is setting in and I can't really control myself anymore. She is going to touch me and I can't stop her. Very calmly she says it's just probably the buttons on my sweater and tells me I am OK. She's just going to check my sweater. She asks me if I am ok again and I, hysterical, wildly shake my head no. I hold my sweater away from my body so she can touch my clothes instead of my body and she does it. She touches my sweater and doesn't touch my body and then says I can go.

I was so relieved she didn't touch me. I was so scared. Touch is painful. It is violating. Everything he did to me was wrong, and against my will, had I known. He tricked me into doing things based on false information. He wrapped his arms around me, hugged me, looked into my eyes and told me he loved me. And they were all lies. He told me I saw safe with him and I wasn't. He handcuffed me, he took me away against my will. He lied to my face, over and over. Be brought a gun into my home. He was a liar and he was evil. He made touch evil and violating and wrong. Because every time he touched me, hugged me, held my hand, he was being evil. He was. So how do I differentiate between safe touches and love and what he did, when I thought he was being so loving and caring with me, and he was really just hurting me, over and over?

I sobbed in the bathroom, per usual, cleaned myself up, and began the next anxiety- loading onto the plane and making sure I would not be forced into sitting next to a man. The flight there it was okay. The flights were mostly half empty and that means safety for me. Women are safe, empty seats are safe.

The trip was okay until the night before I came home. I drove around an hour looking for parking in downtown DC at 11:00pm at night after driving 5 hours and shooting a 6 hour wedding and was just exhausted. When I finally found a place to park- where I could only park 4 hours and was blocks from where I was staying (with thousands of dollars of equipment on me), I just lost it, and had a full out panic attack in the parking lot. I cried and cried for an hour. It was awful and I felt like I was never going to calm down.

But I did. I reached out to a couple friends for soothing and they helped me get checked back in.

I was up at 2:30am and out of the lot by 3am so I wouldn't get charged extra.

Getting to the airport was stressful, returning my rental car frustrating and I was really tired by the time I got through security ( best trip so far- they didn't touch me and I cried less than 10 minutes in the bathroom afterwards! Success!) and on the plane. I was SO blessed that the plane was really empty and I got the entire aisle all to myself on the first two legs of the trip home.

The last leg was not so good. I kept hearing mutterings that the plane was full, and although I breathed a sigh of relief when a woman sat in the aisle seat, I was so anxious about who would take that middle seat. The first flight I took after I found out the truth, I had a full on panic attack on the plane and spent an hour in the back of the plane, hysterical, being fed Dramamine and wine by the stewardess. I was passed out before I even realized I had drunk alcohol, I was so out of it and hysterical. The stewardess was just doing whatever she could to calm me down and relax me.

Just as the cabin door was about to close, a man stepped on to the plane, and before I could stop her, the woman on the aisle seat offered him our middle seat. I practically jumped out of my seat and sat so tense I was shaking. But we were pulling out and heading down the runway before I could even think of what I should do or say.. What do you say? It's a freaking full flight, I'm crying, shaking, scared to buckle my seatbelt be trapped next to this man, who is obviously a monster just based on his sex alone. He's going to press his body up against me this whole flight and who knows what else. WHAT DO I DO???

As we are speeding down the runway I debate with myself as to what I should do. Ultimately I buckle my seat belt, carefully tuck my sweatshirt in between our seats so he can't touch me, accidentally or otherwise. I took my Dramamine and my Xanax and was passed out cold before we hit cruising altitude. I woke up in a panic, again when we landed hours later.

When it was time to disembark, the guy stays in his seat while I squish myself against the window with all my bags willing for him to get up. Finally I ask him if he's getting up and he said he was just letting the other people off first, but HELLO, they are milling around, packing their bags, they are not in a hurry, and if you don't get OUT OF MY WAY, I am going to climb over the top of this seat and run screaming off the plane!

(Didn't actually say that, but I almost did, and if he had not gotten his butt in gear in the next 15 seconds, I seriously, would have climbed over the top of  the seat to get the freak away from him.

I was so glad to get home and away from all of these situations that are so scary for me now. Normal situations.. and yet, so scary. I really am not normal, and my reactions are not normal, and this is not me. I am controlled by my trauma.

So anyway, I feel like I'm doing so much better. LOL