Street signs

Triggers are curious.

Picture this – I’m cleaning my garage and pick up a box. There’s a piece of paper on the floor where the box used to be. I look at it. It’s one of those forms a moving company makes you sign when they deliver your stuff. It’s from November 3, 2016 – six months after my life imploded – and it has my still-married signature on it. My name looks familiar and bizarre all at the same time.

As I realize what it is, my emotions swirl and shift. I’m consumed by sadness and confusion smushed together with complete and total exhaustion. I’m overwhelmed. My limbs are too heavy to move and my feet are stuck to the floor.

These are the emotions I was feeling on the day I took delivery of my possessions and signed that particular piece of paper.

These are the emotions I felt for more than a year after the crime occurred.

The memories break over me like a wave before pulling back to the places too deep for me to swim. And then it’s over. It lasts ten or fifteen seconds – no more than that. And then I’m ok. I don’t experience a massive surge of symptoms. I don’t even stop cleaning my garage. This makes me happier than you can possibly imagine.

This is what PTSD recovery looks like. I was triggered. I felt the swell and crash of the memories. But they passed and I kept on going, putting things where they belonged, almost as if nothing had happened. Last year, this wouldn’t have been possible. This type of trigger would have resulted in a full-blown attack of my symptoms.

I’m making progress and so can you.

If you’re feeling overwhelmed by your symptoms – triggering all the time for reasons you can’t always understand – I want you to know that you can recover, at least enough to keep on cleaning your garage. A year ago, those emotions would have taken root in every cell of my body, sapping my energy and rendering my muscles weak and ineffectual. A year ago, I would have pulled my stuff back into the garage, shut the door, and retreated deep into the safety of my house. I would have closed the curtains. I would have crawled into bed. I would have done anything to hide and forget. It would have taken me weeks to get back out there to finish cleaning. No more.

I. Am. Free.

And you can be too.

This doesn’t mean that I will never suffer a massive trigger again. I know I will continue to have experiences that trigger my symptoms. It just means that it’s no longer a given that the deal is done when I trigger. Instead, it’s now possible that despite a triggering incident, I might continue along with my previously scheduled day. How cool is that?

Super cool, folks. That’s how cool.

As National PTSD Awareness Month comes to an end, I encourage you to read about triggers here and be on alert for your own – especially the tricky ones. As your list expands, it will become easier for you to prepare for a triggering incident, even if it catches you off guard.

Today’s photos are from my trip to Florence. These street signs, a search-and-find come to life, have all been altered by Clet Abraham – a French artist living in Florence and making tourists happy every time they turn a corner.