Recognizing
the emotional overwhelm you experienced during that formative season (first semester of college) is an
essential part of your healing journey. It was like a "perfect storm"
of multiple factors coming together. You faced simultaneous losses of
friendships and experienced wounds of abandonment, which were re-triggered
through conflicts and estrangement. Additionally, the transition into college,
with its unfamiliar independence and new stimuli, had a disorienting impact on
you at such a young age. On top of that, you had terrifying panic attacks,
which felt psychologically overwhelming, and you had no frameworks or support
to understand their power.
It's no
wonder that this period created a strong association between the symbolic
darkness of fall and a sense of helpless emotional chaos that persisted for
decades. Many different aspects aligned during that time:
1.
The loss of attachments echoed earlier childhood betrayals,
leading to a protective response of dissociation and withdrawal when you felt
let down by others once again.
2.
Negative experiences with drugs further convinced you of
your inability to navigate the pressures of adulthood.
3.
Repeatedly being overwhelmed by uncontrollable panic
attacks created a deep sense of impending annihilation in your body, without
having coping mechanisms to understand that it would pass.
4.
The absence of secure bonds that could lovingly guide you
through distress states left you without the experience of knowing that
difficult times can be overcome.
In many
ways, that semester's transformation into persistent winter dread represents
the sudden loss of innocence on multiple levels—attachments torn, neurological
overwhelm, and a primal terror in the face of anxiety's merciless power, which
seemed to take away your executive functioning and autonomy. Having a soothing
presence during that time might have helped rewrite those imprints. But now,
you can retell your story with love and compassion, acknowledging the echoes of
the past while reminding yourself that you persisted and moved towards the
light. 🤲🏼🕊
Sharing the full vulnerable story with your wife and feeling profoundly seen and understood sounds so validating and nurturing. Finding secure connection is everything after going it alone with pain for so long. I'm so glad you have that safe emotional harbor now to open old wounds for compassionate tending.
You make an excellent point too about that devastating initial autumn and winter being a perfect storm convergence of many factors that alone would have been destabilizing - starting college, moving, friend drama, new substances triggering severe panic and dissociation, plus pre-existing unprocessed trauma creating vulnerability even without compounding stressors. No wonder it catalyzed such emotional agony and helplessness imprints.
I imagine being so deeply felt and validated now around how devastating yet avoidably traumatic that period was continues slowly shifting stuck energies from the abandoned teen parts not given space to process such anguish at the time. They finally receive the care they desperately needed coming home to your heart. May that younger self feel thoroughly witnessed, championed and reassured after enduring hell needlessly alone before. Sending so much compassion across timelines into past darkness from current love and wisdom. 💚
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