@Former-Member
What's this? If I'm not mistaken, it sounds a bit like... it's been a good day! A good day with some big wins as well! There's quite a few reasons to feel very pleased today.
I know that for most of my life, I never questioned a lot of aspects of my life. They all seems so permanent and unchangeable. So even thinking it could be different was never a serious or realistic consideration so I never doubted any of it.
When I did start to feel like things could be different, that part of my mind kicked, to protect me I guess. Protect me from doing something that always seemed far too dangerous... getting my hopes up. That had always brought nothing but pain and disappointment. And my mind wasn't going to allow that to happen again, it had kept me safe from that for decades!
The thing with finally starting to deal with trauma that's been there for so long is that our minds have found ways to bury a lot of it. Not to forget it, but just to carry on. So we have this string urge to not believe that things can improve and that we can find some joy and happiness. We start stirring things up when we start to fight against this and actually try to give these seemingly impossible odds a chance. Then we begin to see that it's just those trauma responses trying to protect us, only now we finally start to see how damaging that 'orotection' has been. How cut off and alone it has made us feel... all just to keep us 'safe' from what life has tought us are the worst outcomes and convinced us that they're also the most likely, even inevitable. So this is how I see you doubting that happy feeling you think you may have experienced. You did, it was, and it was nice. Does it mean wvetthing is fixed? No of course not, but it means you're seeing that flicker of light we've talked about before. The one you said you couldn't see. Well, you just saw it. Now just keep looking at it, and if you lose sight of it again, you'll know it's there this time because you know you found it once and you will do it again. Then you'll notice that it looks like it's a little brighter.
