Ticket to ride (TRIGGER)

***** Trigger: I am going to graphically cover a self injury attempt with an overdose . ******

Your about to step into my head and whoa nelly....that's a dungeon with more trap doors then your party's thief can de-trap.

my main goal this summer is to de-stress and get my health/ head back in alignment. This is a peek at why this became my goal recently.

I remember 12 years ago when the nurse came flying into my room and shouted at me "put that baby to breast, his blood sugar is incompatible with life!" It was a clear warning of approaching death/danger.

You don't usually get told that clearly when death/danger is threating you or your loved ones, and if you aren't paying attention you can miss those subtle messages that life gives you.

I had that same experience happen to me the night I turned in my two week notice. Except it came to me in a different format. I had arrived at work and before I got out of the truck, I opened my purse to get my name badge and keys. The first thing my hand found was my bottle of Ativan I carry with me for emergencies.

It took me a nano second to realize that I had opened it and chugged the contents, without even realizing I had done so.

To be so far dissociated from my self to have no memory of even doing a potentially fatal action, is something that has not happened to my system since I was pre-therapy in my 20's.

I glanced in the rearview mirror to make sure it was me in there. The eyes that meant mine were haunted and wounded, and worse then that, they had let go of the rope...let go of the ledge... "put that baby to breast, his blood sugar is incompatible with life!"

Then my eyes dragged themselves to the symbol burned into my wrist along time ago when I was in therapy.

< o ( 0

a code, a life saving code. A message left there by me years and years ago, just in case of emergency.
 
A rip cord to yank and deploy a parachute. A 911 call that my soul would hear.

Finger in throat, puke.

what the hell P? what the  *!^&%$ hell just happened?

I faded into my head and quietly watched as my body went in to work, clocked in and began working. Within a few minutes I found something on the desk that slammed me to the front of my head again.

Tsunami scale waves of urges to hurt my selves crashed over me. No the kind that will be appeased with a 3rd degree burn, the kind of urges that want a limb or my life as payment.

Again I find my self looking at the code branded into my wrist. call a support person now!

I reach out to my husband without telling him anything more then, "I'm done. I think I want to turn in my two week notice."

He agrees and offers reassurances that he's backing me.

I hang up and immediately email my two week notice.

what the hell P? what the  *!^&%$ hell just happened?

Wait, did that just happen? I check the sent folder, and there is the email.

The self injury tsunami waves roll over into waves of nausea and I taste the puke in my mouth again.

I struggle to catch my breath.

A movement in the doorway catches my eye. A resident is slowly coming in to see me. Its a gentleman who visits me each night. "Oh, it's you!" he toothlessly grins. "Honey I am here to save you!"

The sob clamps my throat shut and all I can do is smile back at him.

"lets go dancing!" He says continuing his usual nightly repertoire.

I catch my breath as the parachute finally deploys and catches me in mid free fall and yanks me upwards.

The heavy waves of calmness of the Ativan that my body had been able to grab before I puked it out finally hits me.

For a second I close my eyes.

Breath....hang on. Someone in your internal system jerked the rusty track switch and headed you down an unknown direction. Your life is switching tracks and your going to be okay.

"No dancing tonight, " I finally say to him, pointing to the stack of papers on my desk. "Work is filling up my dance card tonight." I reach into my bag and get us both a Pepsi and as he tells me stories, I sort though my stacks of paperwork.

Your life is switching tracks and your going to be okay. Just hang on.