Hiding in amongst the Daisies

we saw rachel today. We hurried in from a long service period at the cafe' where we had been on our feet for six hours without a break. Sitting down seemed like a luxury. Throughout the end of service our back had started aching, spasming in fact so bad i thought id pass out. Thankfully my co worker gave my back a rub and that helped. Oh yeh i forgot to say shes back my kitchen buddy and shes better and she has organised therapy and has quit drinking so thats fantastic.

I headed to Rachel office without much thought on what we wer going to do except that we knew we needed to do something regarding the cage memories. We actually thought that perhaps we might go and talk about the poem that was written on the poetry blog (see below or the side for the link). but first Rachel needed to check that we were ok. I guess its hard to not be concerned as you go through the session we did last week. but you know what as we have learnt to self nurture we are getting better. Saturday and Sunday we read a book on our beloved beach. We self soothe and am no longer ignoring any littles that want to let us know they are there.

So where to today. Today we went in a direction i wasnt expecting. Again alters talking about the cage but this time they also talked about the pain getting so bad that they had to leave. Now in our system our alters when they switched out from torture went to a place they call the daisies. When they left to hide in th daisy field a new alter was usually created or an old one took over. We have no idea why they go to hide with the daisies but for whatever reason from a very early age that is universally where most of them go or went. Others did strange things like leave the abuse and sit on the stairs or a chair listening to the situation but not present. Other times alters talk about other alters comforting them or warning them of trouble coming. until now Ive ignored them telling us how they have always co supported each other. Today i truly appreciated the true meaning of supporting and helping each other.

I will give warning at this point that what i say will be triggering and have thought long and hard about whether to share this, our decision has been that our therapy is also this blog so sharing thous for us is about us and as we are learning quickly therapy is about me/us.

Our first alter who now has a name called sunny knew mum was mad when her eyes didnt turn yellow but red. Sunny has no idea what she did wrong except the next thing you know she was under the house in the cage. the mother had previously drilled a hole and placed a hook in the floor. This time she hung a rope with two holes o little hands could go through. She came under the house this time it was different this time her eyes werent the usual yellow that she changed to when she was mad they were red blood red. Her whites at the side of her eyes were black and it was like looking at a rabid dog. She came forward and sunny got so scared she left, leaving new alter in her place. this alter was left there hanging and at whim her mother would twist and turne the rope until she got dizzy, she talks of wetting her self from fear. Finally the mother came down and whipped this seven year old body until it changed colour.

She passed out and paralyzed wit fear her father found her. She was carried in his arms the shock already set in and put in bed. He went off at the mother for being so stupid as to risk anyone seeing what they had done. Her body was covered in red blotches for a long time and she stayed in bed for days. Never again was she put in the cage under the house, never again was anyone put under the house it started when we were only three. I think it started because we could no longer fit in the vent cupboard in the kitchen.

This alter was left in such shock that she has lived with us for the last many many years. we have a makeshift bed/cradle for her to travel around in ion wheels. he body twisted by as terribly whipping. Today as she remembered in full magnitude i felt relieved. finally 32 years after her ordeal she was being heard. And for us her true healing had now made its way into her life. For us as they share they have no need anymore to relive their trauma or to own it. As she shared today i felt the freedom start to unfold in her life. Its often not what we see but what we feel and felt her relief. I know shes alive now one small breath at a time. She took them today small gulping air breaths, rachel wouldn't have recognised them but they were the gulping air of new life.

rachel asked me today how i was and if i needed any help in dealing with my issues. I was perhaps stunned, acantha didnt care about me but getting to those we cared for and i have to admit i felt overwhelmed not certain what to say, its been a long time since and outside person has asked me anything other than for information and i will need to think about her question, if not for my response but for its impact on me. Basic humanity does go a long way.

Tonight we feel drained. we spent the time home chasing terrible bouts of nausea and a headache that told me too many alters were around at the time of therapy. I feel in amongst the terrible memory lies so much hope and we are prepared to face those memories for our alters to to not have to chase their own demons anymore.

Cleo

poetry and pain

As we go through more healing we will probably we writing memories here http://sharingprivatemomentsthroughpoetry.blogspot.com/ so i thought id put the link up if youre interested. Now i need to warn there will be no spoiling in these exerts so remember to keep yourselves safe when reading. Our overall therapy and life journey will be here.

Sa'de

Our complaint against Acantha

i know people are waiting for me to be able to tell people whats going on with our previous therapist Acantha, its still in the process of appeal. I can say that a week ago i was informed that an appeal had been issued. Now what i can say is that i didnt appeal. So it will now take a few more weeks, but there is nothing i can do as i didnt place an appeal. No more evidence can be given from either parties but the appeal was granted because the charges were so serious and in that an appeal is automatically given for cases like ours if asked. we were quite satisfied with the findings the other party has not been, so thats why its at appeal.

Flame

Learning to love our inner selves.

First of all thankyou to those of you who come in and read our blogs. We know that we arent responding to yours as much if any but, our days are now about sixteen hour days with school sometimes taking up ten of those hours with travel time another two and study out of hours the remainder. it is a lot of theory right now. things like first aid and dietary requirements. its a lot to learn and that in itself can be exhausting. Yesterday was a rare treat we got to take apart a whole side of lamb. For me that was wonderful as i always wanted to be a butcher i was in my element. Whilst all the other people in my class went ughhh yuck we pulled it apart with ease and even cleaned up every ones scraps to make mince. Our teacher was amazed and kept saying maybe you can be a butcher after all. No one has ever seen a female butcher, but our passion of cooking also is something we cant give up on so we are now confused. What we do know is that we will finish our certIII and then decide, right now we are having a blast.

As for therapy last weeks session just brought back the rawness of pain that we had held so hidden for so long. We wake at night with one image our face behind bars and our little hands clutching them in the hope we might get rescued. But what we have found interesting is that we instead of letting it consume us like we used to have started to understand that acknowledging the child whose little fists are there is the first step to healing. Each time we see this image although it hurts terribly we also have the power to say you know what we acknowledge the pain you've held inside for too long now.

Its think this is made harder because for five years we lived in trauma with our last therapist Acantha. So last week when we first felt that terrible gnawing pain of hurt we started to panic terrified that we wouldnt be able to cope and that we would go into crisis again just like we used to. In fact the first sign of self doubt came in. This was the moment when Acantha would come in and take over and offer us 24 hours 7 days a week therapy. We realised that this was the first time in a long long time that we didnt have anyone rescuing us from our pain this was the time we needed to work on this ourselves. So at night we placed cuddles and otherr such self soothing toys for those alters remembering the cage and we started to put into motion what we had been taught.

its been hard im not saying it hasnt but its been rewarding also. We made a conscious decision two years ago to have no relationship with our therapist outside of therapy. We dont talk to them and we dont even think of them. Im finding that by doing this we are finding ways to soothe our own inner alters without needing to talk more than therapy time. But its scary changing so many things that youve had at your fingertips for so long. It was the first time that we realised how far we could have come had we done this earlier. Had Acantha been the therapist that let us feel the feelings and let it go then perhaps we wouldnt be in therapy now. but the fact is that we cant let that take over, Deshanti said the other day to rachel "i know its gonna hurt, i know its gonna feel like crap but im prepared to face that to let it go". So i think know we are really learning what letting go means.

us-etal

Cage children memories hurt so bad

See this child if faces were ours hers would be it. today we spent overtime talking to rachel. Today we talked about the cage children, we talked about me being a cage child. it was painful in fact at times i wanted to run out of the room and flee in pain that i knew was coming. Surely its better to run than face it. But last week i decided to face my past the best i could and face the pain so that in time it became less painful. Sure right now i feel raw today the body went through memories as much as we tried alas we cant stop the pain from forming in our body. my body ached as we stretched and tried to overcome it it came in waves small alters from the age of two/three felt the pain of years of hiding and never unstretching in the cage.

At age two the cage under the house we lived in was big enough to let the alter move by crawling , by four the noise of us crawling back an forth like a hunted dog caused the parents to organise no more movement. The punishment of what they did left a four year old alter scarred for life. Her feet in so much pain her hands furled by deformity. And we felt it all. The pain of alters remembering today made me nearly fall on the floor in pain. it hurt ssssssssssssssoooooooooooooo much. The years of being left under the house in a cage was suddenly in focus and although in pain we felt the first moments of healing.

we were talking, feeling albeit it at the time suffocating in pain it was needed. I held the blanket that rachel had provided and clutched a teddy bear let the pain flow what else can happen. At one point i saw rachels helplessness as we flailed in obvious pain i wanted to be rescued but at the same time wanted the alters to know we can survive this memory without being rescued. We need to support our system. Today Rachel didnt do as Acantha used to do she didnt rescue us in hugs and love she sat in her seat and reminded us that we were with her. She talked to his four year old she listened she let us share and most of all she let us know this was about us. Therapy for us has become about us in fact part of today i was in so much pain that I forgot Rachel was even there she was our facilitator and we just kept talking.

How do we feel now. Fragile i want to curl up in some doona's and get warm we know how to self soothe i know the cage memories are just starting but its time for it to come to get out to get over with and to get on, but fuck me it hurts!!!!!!!!

Deshanti and the un named four year known only as one of the cage children.

Any suggestions for a name would be appreciated.

For the first time in 1940 it seems Australia have no chance of finding a prime minister tonight o0r anywhere near in the future. Like England only a few months ago we have no one to elect tonight as prime minister, t is now a hung parliament.

So what does that mean for me well for me im returning to the workforce if Mr Abbot gets in hes for the lib/national; party well what does it mean for me. For me M r Abbott does not particularly like me, now im not being funny but its like this, Mr Abbot is catholic and he is against single parents (me), students (me) returnign to the workforce (me). No hope for me. So this is how it goes liberal gets in (mr abbot) his workplace relations for me means this ( in laymans terms) i under Mr Abbots reign will or could be compelled to work a sixteen hour shift, award wage at maybe if im lucky 12 dollars an hour, if i protest I in fact i will not even get a job at all. So the truth is this if Mr abbot gets in I will be told to work as many hours as he sees fit and if i dont like it i will get nothing at all thus meaning i will and my children be homeless.

So laymans terms if after many days liberal retain their seats me being a single mum needing childcare and certain hours means this. I will a have to work slave labour at bizarre rates and overall im fucked big time. NO chance of me seeing my kids for a long time to come. And it seems Australia voted for that, bizarre hey. So here goes my hopeful future. But as for tonight ITS A HUNG PARLIAMENT, NO ONE IN POWER NOTHING

sad as shit

lab

Moments of me

this week has been full on for many reasons. College is getting tight as far as hours and there is a possibility of a job in the next week.

I said goodbye to Mr Wonka this week but before i did I talked a long time about some issues i can see arising because of me deciding to get my own healing. Ive unusually asked noel to meet with us at therapy on monday. I know his schedules busy but i feel i need some moral support in my quest for my own healing. I also need to talk to both Rachel and Noel about some issues that effect me and some things Ive not talked about before that finally I feel safe enough top share.

But its more than that in moments that im lucky enough to be alone both internally and externally ive found myself in moments of terrible sadness. grief im not sure. For the first time i wanted to just talk, i want to say hey this freaking hurt me and i want It better so that i can have the life that's important to me. Im beginning to understand that the pain i feel is the pain I should have felt in the first place its just been taking me nearly fourty years to get there.

What I went through as a child is and was unspeakable and terrible systematic abuse. Its not that i had meant to suppress the terrible pain its just hat ive not felt safe enough to express it. Suddenly the waves of terrible pain is overcoming me but its strange its like i know its safe to feel because i know its going to get heard. So at night i curl up with my book and usually try to self soothe. H ow i do that is i make sure the room is warm (its a cold winter here). I bring the doona up tight around my chin and i read book whilst snuggling down in warmth with a electric blanket on. I find all these things self soothing because they are everything that i wasnt permitted as a child. i was often left outside for hours in winter at -1. So for me warmth is a secret to my self soothing. One of the things that Rachel has had in her room when i see her is a blanket and I looked at it last week and nearly grabbed it. . I guess i felt stupid but i have decided that therapy isnt about how others see me but how i get healing for myself and if that helps me self sooth as i talk about my pain i dont care.

Deshanti

and it felt like grief so i cried the best i could

We had a very busy service today in kitchens, we held up well we had to cook kangaroo and we hadnt done it before but we had a great teacher and did well. In fact at one point he turned and said JIP you re doing ok i dont need to worry about you. The highest compliment you can get from a chef whose worked under the likes of Marc Pierre white and Gordon Ramsey. Straight after service we left to see Rachel we didnt even a chance to change we arrived chefs clothes fully on.

we talked a lot about Acantha today. Maybe the fact that we are so close to closure is happening and we feel we need healing faster. Maybe getting the last of Acantha and her venom out of our life is important im not sure but y0u know what whatever it was it felt good to say what i fucking felt without hearing the bullshit of youre going to hell for saying what you did against god right then. I also know that we purchased a book via exhales recommendation and that is helping,. Finding we are not alone in spiritual abuse makes us feel like we can talk about it, in stead of feeling condemned for saying w3hat we thought when we used to.

We also talked a lot about Sam. About Acantha and Sam i felt for the first time i was sharing all the things that had been bothering me about Sam and Acantha. An overwhelming sadness reached my heart when i talked about what had gone on and my confusion on how much Acantha had played in perhaps setting Sam up when she knew she had met her match. The first time Acantha met Sam she had goaded her out when she did Sam met her full on and Acnantha was so shaken she actually placed a phone call for prayer. After that It was on between Sam and Acantha, I know personally that Sam scared the shit out of Acantha, she posed a threat to exposing Acantha for who she was a scam artist. it wasnt the first time Sam had shown her hand. we were staying at a friends place they had a border who we knew was taking them for a ride long and short one night he challenged us and sam emerged. What he saw from her changed his life forever. He apparently spent weeks in shock and later on went on the say what he saw when she faced him was something that never again would he ever want to see. He went on to become a pastor, strange hey.

Then somehow we moved onto pain, pain that i knew had to be dealt with but i didnt expect to do today. I went on to talk about mum and her punishment of being tied to a hot water pipe and her burning me until i passed out and al the time she laughed. Or her putting us in an oven an turning on the gas and warning she might light it. Or the harness we were left in, in the wardrobe. Countless moments of sheer indescribable pain. Or memories of cult activities. Pain id kept inside was seeping out what was i going to do. I looked at rachel and saw in her face not pity or disgust but pure care. I just kept talking, i couldn't or perhaps wasnt going to stop. I felt it though I felt grief sad unimaginable grief,i needed to feel It let it feel me. As rachel sat in silence i let tears seep my eyes. Hurt all of those years of hurt. It launched pain in my heart and i knew that i needed to feel it.

Theres something also so different normally after we left seeing Acnatha we would leave devasted. But with this new therapy we are getting I feel im telling the secrets and instead of feeling guilt i feel that one little bit freer.

Sa'de and Deshanti

Reuniting selves

we have been thinking a lot about a few changes that are going on in our life. Firstly we have some inroads into doing some hours in a nursing home. It seems that over here people dont stick with chef jobs at hospitals or nursing homes because its hard work. Understanding dietary requirements and all of that makes for extra work. But i know that we would thrive with that sort of challenge and it seems as we have made enquiries some roads are opening up for us. This makes us both nervous and excited. Its so daunting returning to workafter fifteen years but wow we cant wait either. We still have to do months in college but a lot of it now is field work and that we love doing. We start back at the cafe' on monday wohoooo.

But we realise that we need to make some changes we feel after two years of seeing Mr wonka that we have gone as far as we can for now and would like to concentrate on some things with Rachel. We know abut breathing and all of that we use the here and now method, we also use the internal safe area in our system. There are a few things left to do with Mr wonka but for now we feel we cant do anymore until we have done a bit with Rachel. Amelia's really opening up with her and earlier this week Amelia made her way down to the fountain to read a book to the littles, whop crowded around her asking if she wasnt sick anymore. It was a huge moment for so many years of heartache. Amelias also trying to communicate with those inside shes not blocking them anymore and i am wondering if perhaps its time that maybe Amelia bought her inner alters their own toy or something similar. Maybe by her doing that it might help reunite her selves with each other and herself. Im not sure but i feel that somehow Amelia needs to reunite with them in order for them to be free and so treating them as her inner children might help with her hearing them better and instead of it bening them and her it might bring them to her closer so they can get the healing they need and she needs herself. I will talk to Rachel about that when i see her next week.

We are finding the activity that was so part of our life prior to Acantha with alters talking and playing and safe. There are alters who are waiting to get healing but instead of hiding as they used to with the ex therapist they are watching and listening and when Amelia came out of her room the other day it was like some cataclysmic event took place in some ways i wonder if the alters are looking at Amelia and her future healing for inspiration in doing their own.

Deshanti

Its at appeal

The news on the ex therapist Acantha has now gone to an appeal process so im afraid another two weeks everyone will have to wait before i can say anything. This is a normal process nothing out of the ordinary.

Understanding what went on

Today we went and saw Rachel. Im not sure why but each time we see her we seem to have so much to say but today so many important things occurred that i felt we needed to find time to write while it was still fresh. one of the things i admire about Rachel is her ability to say i dont know. Maybe for her it might feel as though shes failed but for us its damn refreshing. our therapy has been so much about what the therapist wants and so little about us. For the last six months i feel like ive been given my job back as a protector and as a system manager. For so long ive felt pushed aside and for the last year of therapy with Acantha. In fact for a long time i felt like she was running the system not us. After Acantha, Turgid helped me get some order back but it certainly has been the last year with Rachel and more importantly the two years with Mr Wonka that i have realised that no one has the right to undermine our system. Both Mr Wonkas and Rachels idont knows tell us two things that we prefer a therapy style for us that is more of a walking journey and that we do our best therapy with people who dont suppose expertise but use their gifts to draw out us in ways that we can get to know ourselves. In fact the last year has been so many huge steps that we rarely can believe we used to take two steps forward and eight steps back which is what we did with Acantha.
.
Today came another milestone a huge boulder had been shifted it was personal but significant. Amelia came out and rachel asked her if she could talk about the first phone call she ever got from Acantha. Amelia told a story that i can equate so many times in our life and you sometimes dont join the dots until years later. Amelia talks of Acantha calling her and trying to elicit others than her out. Amelia scared of Acanthas phone call she froze and thus we were unable to get out as when Amelia freezes she also blocks anyone else from assisting her. Amelia was saying she was fine but as Acantha spoke Amelia suddenly saw and felt the darkness creep and seep it started off as a seed and it grew and stretched as far as the eye could see like a mist rolling and growing. Like hands stretching and limbs of trees growing she felt the darkness for Amelia it was the hand of pure evil stretching throguh the phone to her and her house. It lasted as long as it did but Amelia said that after a while her angel came and wrapped its wings around her eyes and she saw no more.

Amelia said the house was never the same again after this. Andshe was right it wasnt. Up until this point we had not been cutting or self inflicting or over dosing after this phone call the self infliction started all over again. Amelai tried to warn us but we were too blind to see but now shes talked i get it. That tree of darkness touched our home our marriage our life our friends. When we couldnt take it anymore we sold up this house and bought a new one, where once again the tree grew both inside and out. It was only when we stopped attaching ourselves to Acantha that the tree stopped weaving its darkness on our life. Long before we left Acantha we had mentally separated from her. Perhaps our saving grace from her hand interfering in our new life was the fact that we chose that separation from her long before we physically did.

As Amelia talked i realised what an amazing alter Amelia was, brave and true. She never stopped trying to tell us what a seed sower Acantha was and finally Amelia said the lat phone call Acangtha ever gave her Amelia watched the tree of death open in her room and she couldnt take it anymore and overdosed. Does understanding help you bet it does. I feel we have passed a impasse, we understand now why the shadows the tree the clawing hand hasnt been seen since we moved. We perhaps understand also why we need to see the ocean. As Rachel pointed out today and we hadnt thought of at least at the ocean where we live at least there arent any trees, it is open and free. Perhaps our peace we reach when we see the open water and we sit with our books and our deckchair its because its safe. We understand now.

As for the rest of the session once again alters inside Amelia appeared and together Rachel and us worked through that. I am excited by the prospect of what is to come, free from the shadows of trees.

sa'de

I miss her

Well we are back at school. Its an interesting bunch of students. From a woman whose nearly fifty going for her chefs hat after working all over the world, and whose job it is is to let us know why shes wonderful, to a student who cant even cut vegies and its obvious he got his cert II at some shonky college. We find ourselves fully immersed in what we do, perhaps faster and more content our teacher often lets us do as we want because our work is good. The other day he let us make up a spice dressing because which was then replicated by most members of the class.

The only sad bit is our fellow survivor and co worker has dropped out. The last time i saw her she was struggling with life. But it took me back to a conversation that i had with her late last year. We were travelling home and for some reason was talking about who needs therapy and who doesnt. And she was telling me t shed given up on therapy and didnt need it anyway. That she couldnt change what happened and no counsellor was helping so why bother. As i looked at her i wondered how blind we often can be when we dont want to see. to me she was a mess, her life resembled a train wreck. Although competent at college she often alienated and scared her fellow workers with her brash tongue and failure to read how they were themselves. In fact the last day of college no one bar me was willing to help her because her focused brash attitude moved people away rather than drawing them to her.

Perhaps our friendship developed because i saw some of ourselves in her. Our attitude not so long ago was about denial and ill be alright. When it was obvious that i wasnt going to be. the pain in her voice and face when she was saying her mum was visiting with her stepfather the same guy who had gone to jail for his abuse of her as a child and to whom her mother stood by. When i gently asked how she felt about that her response was painfully explosive yet at the same time she was still denying she had an issue.

But she also taught me a lot working beside her taught me to read people more succinctly. The last few years id been working on observation skills rather than ploughing in and seeing what happens. With my co worker if i didnt read her right she could sometimes flick off at the slightest wrong word or if i looked at her the wrong way. Unlike her we managed to leave our shit outside the kitchen door and for that moment in time no matter what had happened at home we immersed ourselves in a passion that time could take away. As time went on and we got into more heavier work, she started to skip class unable to get up to get there on time. Once she said she knew she always sabotaged her self but couldn't understand why she did it. I told her its because she doesnt believe she is worth the degree she was striving for but by then the darkness had crept in and there was no telling her anymore.

The truth is that self sabotage has pretty much taken all the people who could have loved her out of her life. She by her own admittance drives them away, then when shes not feeling depressed she drives herself back into depression because she believes shes so bad thats why her friends left. Her friends left because she is hard work but shes hard work because shes in so much pain. I know that her not answering the phone isnt because she doesnt like me its because she c ant believe anyone would like her.

Every week i leave her the same message, no matter what you do to self sabotage im one friend that will just keep coming back until eventually i guess i too will have to give up. But i care for her i see so many aspects of her and her pain that not long ago ruled our life. I see friends who have left us and others who have stayed. For me if i am the only friend she sees when she gets better i hope it makes a difference. I hope that one day she will have enough healing in her to also achieve at the highest level. but for now shes in pain and pain takes away so much, it sucks us dry and leaves us feeling emotionless. Perhaps the fact i understand that is why i will stick with her, just as others did for me.

jip-etal

The Fountain

The board met about the ex therapist who we have nicknamed Acantha. We are still waiting for an answer to see if shes derigistered, so its now simply a waiting game.

Yesterday i went to see Rachel, i chose to be out i chose to talk to her. I guess ive been watching her and Mr Wonka and Noel for a while now. The one thing that i have found between all of them is their ability to not judge, in fact far from judging they seem to truly understand the systems need to explore. Perhaps ive waited and braced myself for the bubble to burst and one of them say to someone that they are revolting and they cant come to therapy anymore. Ive even been afraid that they will do as Acantha used to do and tell someone that the cult would come and collect them if they didnt do as she instructed. I have braced myself for the pain of rejection and perhaps waited for it to come. But far from coming it is nowhere to be seen. It has been dawning on me that these therapists are actually people who arent there to judge hurt or harm me but indeed to help me.

But its been far more personal that that. Looking out from my bedroom window and down below is a fountain. For years and years this fountain has remained void of activity, people or even life. Over the last three months i have been watching as alters once again take their place around this fountain, littles play and bigs watch, i am watching as the system are starting to involve themselves again in life and its surrounds. At first i got scared not understanding what that meant, i was afraid it would mean the past and everything would get topsy turvy again. but it hasnt, in fact as time has gone on i realised how much calmer i was feeling. Almost like things were getting back to normal and the years of Acanthas rule was starting to go. Even stranger i was feeling better, my lethargy was leaving and i was hoping in a future more rather than wishing i was dead.

So yesterday i went to Rachel and asked for her help. For more years than i can remember i have heard voices in my head, little middle big, they werent mean to me but kept asking if i would get help to get them free. I was certain that only completely mad people heard voices and so i became afraid to tell anyone that this was different to the normal alter thing this was in me. I was certain that if anyone found out id be locked up and gone forever. So yesterday i went to Rachel and asked for help because i didnt know what to do. I wanted to let them free but how no clue how. It seemed that once i said that then the alters in me came out and talked to Rachel. When i came back i felt like id been in box and was growing too fast.

Many years ago this used to happen a lot, i would be say doing the dishes and suddenly i would feel myself shrink, i panicked and didnt know what to do. The i would find myself on the floor with a dummy in my mouth and a blanket on. It took me years to realise that the other alters had things available for smaller alters at ground level so they could calm themselves if this event occurred. For me i was ashamed. When i would come to i would feel my body stretching like ti was getting bigger and that scared me even more. So yesterday when this happened i could feel the panic set in. I tried to explain to rachel but she didnt understand. It was only later when Sa'de came out to talk to Rachel that she understood. A two year old had been out and hence why my body had shrunk and got bigger.

I know i cant keep living locked up in my room because im afraid of what i might find out about me that might hurt or even scare me. I also know that it isnt right that because i dont know what to do i wont get help and let those alters in me get out and enjoy their life by the fountain. Maybe with this decision i have a sense of relief, maybe i feel that if i can face this then my body wont always be so tired from scrunching bubbles of pain down. Maybe now that the people that i dont trust have gone from my life i can let go and get better. I guess i just have to do it.

Amelia

politics in australia

The next few days will have the outcome of my complaint against ex therapist who from now on i will nick name as ACANTHA. i am sure some of you can look up the meaning. the therapist after the ex therapist ACANTHA i will name TURGID. I am doing this so that i am not using the ex therapist in my blogs.

Anyway now that i have had fun looking up names and meanings i thought i would give an explanation of the political situation in Australia. This blog has been precipitated because of a conversation with someone i had from America who think our politics is quite strange.

In the next five weeks we will face an election but this is what happened before an election was called. Kevin Rudd (pictured above) was our prime minister, he was a good man and able prime minister but it seemed he had some fatal flaws. he worked his staff till they were near collapsing, he swore like a trouper and he came across as a smug asshole. Consequently the polls started to show that his popularity had dropped so dramatically that it was obvious unless someone stepped in there would be a whitewash at election time and his opposition leader who i call noddy (tony Abbott) would run the country.

So a knowing that noddy might run the country a woman name Julia Gillard (pictured above) who was deputy prime minister went and had a meeting with Kevin Rudd. The outcome was that Mr Rudd stepped down and we have our first unelected female prime minister. Now she immediately stepped in and mended some damaged fences that Mr Rudd had managed to help destroy. She is not married had no kids and her partner is a hairdresser. She comes from humble backgrounds with her family immigrants.

So an election is called for the 21st august. But in order for her to call an election she has to go the queens representative and ask for Parliament to be dissolved. Why well no one really knows but for some reason we still have the queen of England running our country. Now what that means is that the queen if she doesnt like our prime minister and because she is head of the country can sack her and call for a new election. This has been done in 1976 she sacked our then prime minister mr gough whitlam, causing a new election and mr whitlams reputation ruined forever. A task the queen im sure regrets and has never undertaken again. The country was so angry at her that she didn't visit again for about five years, due to the fact that she herself might have been lynched.

So top put it in perspective our prime ministers can be sacked and replaced by their own parties, he/she can be sacked and replaced by the queen and can be sacked and replaced by an election. Great job hey. And that is effectively what happened Mr Rudd was disliked by enough people that he lost his job only three years in, this guy has an impressive record though, he saved us from a recession by giving us a brave stimulus package, he tackled the rich miners for more tax, he spoke fluent mandarin and was a great diplomat for Australia, but wanna know what he will remembered for most, losing his job to a woman.

Now also over here it is illegal to not vote, illegal to not let the electoral know when you have moved and illegal to not register to vote once turned eighteen. This will either land you in jail or give you a fine.

Hope that gives and understanding into Australian politics well at least recently anyway.

Lab