New Experiences in Dissociation and Friendship

Some more on dissociation.  I haven't been having much of a problem with it for the last few months even though I've been in church and fully engaged in listening and participating in the services.  A few blips here and there at church, but nothing I wasn't able to hide due to how the service is structured.  I may sit down or get up a bit later than everyone else or blank out for most of a song but it has been manageable.

One thing I've never done, up until last Monday, is to purposefully fight the entire time to not dissociate without my fighting it off method to be loudly arguing and slamming doors.  I was at a friends house, a very good friend who didn't freak out that I was shaking with cold in front of a fire and had strange things going on with my eyes.  She got me a blanket and a shawl and kept talking to help keep me in the here instead of drifting off to safety.  I think I fought so much to stay "here" because I knew I was completely safe, and that's my guess as to why I didn't just drift off.  I actually had blurred vision and could barely see and my eyes felt stretchy and like I needed to shove them back into my eye sockets.  I don't know how long I shivered in front of her fire wrapped up in blankets listening to her talk and talking some myself too.  My speech was also messed up. 

That was another first time event; talking while in the warp speed mode of dissociation.  If you have watched much Star Trek then you will have likely seen the Enterprise going into warp speed.  Somewhere along the way I saw an episode where time was distorted and someone got stuck in an alternate time.  Just imagine the effect on yourself if part of you is at warp speed and the rest of you is at half impulse.  It's a major disconnect and communication between the two parts of you is greatly distorted.

I'm not positive that my default to dissociate under stress is something that will go away, but the longer I am in a place of safety and have close friends that I could see myself wrapped up in their living room fighting to stay in the moment, the less I actually do dissociate.  Of course the exceptions are when something new gets opened up that has been buried for most of my life.  It was such a topic that spiraled me almost back to how I was coping about a year and a half ago. 

Friends are of all different sorts.  I am blessed with growing, face to face, local friends that in some small ways know my story.  I also have some friends from my childhood that remember who the 6th grade teacher was.  They are still my friends and even though we don't see each other, we maintain some connection.  Thank God for facebook and phones!  Other friends are no longer local to me; I moved or they moved, yet I can call and we are instantly reconnected.  Strangest of all are the friendships which came through facebook and turned into something real.  These last couple of weeks have been like friendship growth on overload.  What is completely amazing to me is that these are friends who have been able to hear my story and more categories of it than anyone else; they even beat out my incredible pastor who in the last two years has brought me from an incoherent mess to a point of beginning to thrive.

I've been a good friend to many people, but I am in awe of these two ladies who are able to be good friends to me even though they know so much of my story.  It is an unexpected gift at a time when I really am in need of it.