Ok.\n I decided after some self-reflection that I want to try to get my “Word\n of the Day” series going again. I will admit up front that it won’t \nlikely actually be daily. A few posts now and then may even be repeats \nfrom other blogs or from Facebook posts I made in past.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Some of the words will be political, and some will be social sciences\n related. I have decided though that some of them will also, from time \nto time, be related to mental health.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I’m from the US, and I realize that in the English speaking world as a\n whole, but especially in the US, mental health is not something we talk\n about. As such, it is not something most people understand, and it is \neasy to get isolated because of this.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So, this brings us to our current Word of the Day:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Dissociation is a mental health term. In short, it means your mind is separating you from your surroundings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This is not always clinical. There is an entire range from heavy \ndaydreaming to spacing out and legitimately not knowing where you are.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I chose to bring this up specifically because 1) I have been \nexperiencing it quite a bit myself lately, and 2) I don’t want people to\n feel like they are alone.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The last week has been an ongoing experience of internal screaming \nintermixed with sleeping in and constant daydreams. If this describes \nyou, you are not alone.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I have seen posts by cis allies, urging support and promising pain to\n those that aren’t gentle over the coming days. People promising to \nfight to their last breath. I am grateful for those posts that I have \nseen. They understand that we are afraid, but I am not certain they \nunderstand just how horrifying this is for us.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I understand the dearth of posts that I am seeing from my trans \nbrothers and sisters. It’s hard to process. It’s hard to think about. I\n see a lot of prominent trans voices going dark on social media. It’s \nfor their own mental health and safety.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I have a strong degree of anonymity and it’s still scary to me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So, in summary: If you are going through a hard time and things don’t seem entirely real, don’t feel bad. It’s not just you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If you find yourself sleeping as many hours a day as you can, and daydreaming the rest of the time, you are not alone.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
When the anger, the frustration, the screaming in your head gets to \nbe too much, the brain looks for ways to alleviate or avoid the stress. \nIt’s a normal reaction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If it becomes excessive, it can also be a sign that you need to seek \nhelp, even if that help is just a shoulder to cry on for a while.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We have come so far in the past decade, and it seems like the \nbastards in charge want to push us back more than a century. It is ok \nif you are scared, or frustrated, or just want to not deal with the \nworld for a bit. Know that you are not alone.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If you are interested in more real info on the clinical aspects, check out the Wikipedia Article on Dissociation<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n =====<\/p>\n\n\n\n I started this post over a week ago. It was short and brief, and \nbefore I posted this, I had a few friends look over it and they both had\n similar comments. They said that I should try to expand a bit on some \nparts, and perhaps provide more resource links.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I spent a day or so staring at the screen trying to decide how to \nfind the balance between explaining all of my thoughts, and leaving room\n to protect people’s feelings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Then the news kept coming in. The shootings kept happening. Brazil. \nAnd now Trump is taking yet another not entirely surprising step towards\n trying to deny citizenship to an unknown number of people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n What I have above, still stands well on it’s own, and I am still \nuncertain how to improve it, but reality itself has taken steps to \nexplain the thin bits for me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Why am I afraid, even though I have a strong degree of anonymity? \nBecause I have spiritual brothers and sisters who are no longer in the \ncloset, and are in danger every day now. I have spiritual brothers and \nsisters who are still in the closet, and suffering more than I am, who \nnow have no way of knowing when it will be safe to come out.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Even if I am somewhat anonymous, I haven’t actually buried my trail. I\n am not a “spook,” and the administration is already taking aim at \ncommunications outlets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Brazil. Brazil held an election that was won by a landslide. It was \nwon by a landslide because the majority of people who got out and voted \nwere relatively wealthy, and wanted this to happen. Within three days of\n his victory, the new president had military personnel taking over \nschools for the sole purpose of deciding which classes were allowed and \nwhich were not, based on the whether or not the class was critical of \nFascism and whether or not it was teaching the new government’s favored \nversion of western history.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This is horrifying.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Trump administration has been held in check by nothing more than \nlegitimate American values and the fear that if they go too far, they \nwill trigger a rebellion. The largest nation other than ourselves in \nthis hemisphere has now stood up a Fascist regime and given it absolute \npower, and the two leaders are already saying good things about each \nother.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We can’t depend on American societal norms to protect us anymore.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The word Fascism descended from the Latin word fasces, or a bundle of\n sticks. They use the symbolism of a bundle of sticks being stronger \ntogether than apart, and as Fascists pull together so do Fascist \nnations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Fascists in the US, where they still pretend to be oppressed, will be\n emboldened by every action taken by the Brazilian government from this \npoint forward, and Brazil is moving fast already.<\/p>\n\n\n\n So, this is why I am scared. I am scared for myself. I am scared for \nmy trans brothers and sisters. I am scared for those who don’t “look \nAmerican.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n And, I am scared for my wife and son.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I am scared for my child who was born to an American father and a \nJapanese mother, who is unlikely to be seen as “American enough,” if \nthings get that far.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I am scared because I don’t know if I have the resources to get them out.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I am scared because I don’t even know how to explain all of the things in my mind to my wife.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I am scared that our country is preparing to go up in flames and that\n the civil war that people seem scared is coming is the least of our \nworries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It won’t be a civil war, at least not entirely.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Most “good citizens,” will stay on the sidelines and do as they are \ntold. They will stand by as the fascists in power begin the cleans the \nundesirables from their lands. They will claim later that they just \nnever saw the signs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Guess what, we have been screaming about the signs for over a decade.<\/p>\n\n\n\n That screaming took on a fevered pitch in 2015 and has gotten louder everyday sense.<\/p>\n\n\n\n People like to use the concept of the canary in the coal mine. The \ncanary is already dead. It died years ago, and the miners have started \nto drop as well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n People ask what they can do. I’m going to say here something similar to what I have said in past.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I am running out of steam at the moment, but I want to make sure that this piece does get posted, so I will stop here.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Remember: We have to stand together and work to create the world we \nwant. We have to insulate our local communities so that when it comes \ndown to it we can protect ourselves.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Those of us with the emotional resources to do so need to do the \nheavy lifting. Those who are not scrambling just to survive need to \nfocus on the long term. Those who are coming under direct fire will be \ntoo busy keeping themselves together.<\/p>\n\n\n\n And, coming back to where the post first started: If you are feeling \nthe emotional weight of everything, and you find yourself tuning out \nmore than you would like, you are not alone. It is an entirely normal \nreaction. This world is fucked up at the moment, and your brain is \nworking to keep you in one piece. Reach out to others if you see that \nyou need help. Reach out to your comrades if you see that they need \nhelp. Keep tabs on each other. Be brothers and sisters. Be comrades. In \nthe realm of mental health, especially in what amounts to a battlefield \nenvironment, there is no such thing as checking on someone too much.<\/p>\n\n\n\n If we are going to survive this, we must do this together. The pretty\n words that the Fascists use to make their propaganda palatable are at \nleast partially true. The bundle of twigs is stronger than the twig \nstanding alone. The difference, what separates us from them, is that we \nunderstand that this metaphor expands beyond individuals to cultures. In\n diversity, we are stronger than in isolation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Fuck racism, fuck sexism, fuck gender and neural normativity. We all \nhave to stand together and take care of each other. The strong among us \nhave to insulate the week. We have to show them that their philosophies \nwill not destroy us. There is more to our evolution as a species than \nsurvival of the fittest.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I suppose that once I post this there is not much point in being on \nthe fence or holding too many of my views when discussing things in the \nworld.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Expect more posts in the future on subjects ranging from community building to operational security.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Editor’s Note: I am attempting to set the timestamp on this to match the day that I posted it to steemit.com (November 2018) . I realized that the post still has merit, and that I should share it here. it is now 11 January 2019. Ok. I decided after some self-reflection that I want to try to get my “Word of the Day” series going again. I will admit up front that it won’t likely actually be daily. A few posts now and then may even be repeats from other blogs or from Facebook posts I made in past. Some … Continue reading “Word of the Day: Dissociation”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/fellowtravelers.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/356"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/fellowtravelers.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/fellowtravelers.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fellowtravelers.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fellowtravelers.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=356"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/fellowtravelers.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/356\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":357,"href":"https:\/\/fellowtravelers.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/356\/revisions\/357"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/fellowtravelers.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=356"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fellowtravelers.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=356"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fellowtravelers.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=356"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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