Triggers, Triggers, Everywhere!

Today has been a day FULL of triggers and I have not handled it as well as I would've liked. I'm not exactly sure why there were so many triggering things in my day today, but if I had to put money down on something it would be lack of sleep. I have had some late nights and busy days and it has led to complete physical exhaustion. I am just plain worn out and so I haven't handled my triggers as well as sometimes do.

If you are easily triggered by others experiences, consider yourself warned not to read any farther. I need to write about some of today's triggers and process them and how I handled them.

I absolutely LOVE Christmas time! I love that we get to celebrate the birth of our Savior, Jesus Christ. I  think I've said this before, if not I'm saying it now, nothing speaks to me as easily as music. I can be touched by almost any emotion more easily and effectively through music. I should come as no surprise to me then that music can sometimes easily trigger me. Today it was about a particular artist who also happens to be an actress and one of B's favorites. I don't know if she has ever starred in his fantasies, but it's a wager that I would feel safe taking to say she has. When B's playlist played a song by this particular artist I made him change it because it triggered me.

One of my all time favorite things about Christmas is finding THAT gift. You know, the one that you know they will absolutely love. Well after five hours of shopping with my teenager we have almost covered everyone on our list. One of the things we were shopping for was makeup for me (my parents send us money to shop for ourselves every year). I have not been much or a makeup wearer for years. It's just too much effort most of the time and, if I was being completely transparent here, I would admit part of it was that I figured no matter how beautiful I looked, it wasn't me that B wanted. It was triggering to buy makeup for Pete's sake!

Here's my biggest trigger though, spending time in civil conversation with a friend of ours who is an "addict in recovery" (my opinion, he's not in recovery but it's only my observation which is admittedly tainted by the trauma). Here is what was so triggering for me. He said something to the effect that he thinks he and his wife were raised completely differently because she was raised that you made a list of your wants for Christmas and that he was raised to make a list knowing that it was a wish list and that you weren't going to get everything on it. Well…no s**t Sherlock! Give that boy a medal! He said that she never liked what he gets for her. He also said that she never liked what he picks out for her for Christmas and later that he picks out stuff for her because he likes it because that's what he knows. All I could think of was, "She gets upset about what you buy for her because you don't LISTEN to what she really wants. You but what you want to buy and not what she wants to get because you either couldn't be bothered to list to what your wife wants or that you don't care what she wants because you will get her what you want anyway. I'm sorry she doesn't like your gifts, maybe if you listened to her you would know that by doing what you are doing you are essentially telling your wife that she doesn't matter enough to not only listen to what you are saying but to take it to heart as well. This is so completely triggering for me because it has been my experience almost our entire marriage. B puts off buying me presents because "I'm too hard to shop for"…ummm nope! I am actually really easy to please if you listen to the suggestions I give you.  I don't care if the present cost $300 or $3 as long as thought went into it. That's the triggering part, feeling like I'm not important enough to waste time or energy on.

The capstone to my triggers tonight was that I was self-medicating with chocolate (let's not throw stones at me ok self and others, I know self medicating with anything is bad, no lecture or shaming needed. I was eating Dove Promises (the dark chocolate with caramel and sea salt…YUMMY) when I read one of the encouragements on the inside that triggered me. I even get triggered by some of my favorite things! Ugh!

I am going to head to bed and see if I can wake up and be less triggered in the morning.

Trggered,

T.