[life journey thread]Tales from the WorldTree

~ Lots of stuff happened lately!!

~ Uriel FINALLY got out of his shell and chatted with our best friends Team PSI! Now he cannot shut up, lol! But it's great! Also, he had to face his separation anxiety when Team PSI fell asleep on us while chatting late in the evening. When it was happening we were kind of powerless? Except Zami who is like, immune to anxiety, and used the insomnia-time to draw. But more on that later.

~ Good thing is, once Uriel was calmed down the next day when Team PSI woke up, the rest of the system was able to chat with him, and we discussed what it was, separation anxiety, and we talked about it and stuff, and talked with Team PSI about it too, and it got better. At least now Uriel knows he's NOT going to die and how to name it and how to ask the rest of the system for help when it happens. And knows that Zami is NOT a good one to go to for help about that since they just shrug it off, having been through worse.

~ Back to Zami and drawing! Oh my oh my awful drawings they are. But awesome of Zami to be able to draw that! Years of seeing an art therapist never lead to Zami being able to express that part of themself. Only self-censorship, doing pretty things, pretending everything is nice and pretty and amazing and neat and happy little trees. But there, in the middle of the night, with Uriel puppy-whining from anxiety, and nobody from the system being able to stay on the bridge to pay attention to them... Then, all hell broke loose. In a good way. For the very first time in this body's life, trama was explicitly drawn. Me thinks is not a good idea to share even though Zami is proud of themself for being able to draw that.

~ Plus, they're getting better and better at drawing, and that too they can be proud of. Doing the "Inktober" challenge helped, too.

~ Now, David, who was kinda in charge of meal plans, forgot the chicken! For his defense, we were super duper exhausted and ate a lot of sandwiches lately. Or simply cereals because even a sandwich was too much to do. To solve the issue, him and Ulysses re-did some of our Bujo templates to include the foods we need to eat and in what order (which ones will go bad first). This way we re-discovered we have eggs to be finished this week-end, and a slice of ham too, and greens. Less food wasted, less money wasted!

~ Which leads to: we are awesome! We are making our own personnalized notebook to follow our energy level throughout the days. And when I say "making" I mean, we printed the template pages, folded them neatly, sewed them together, made the rigid cover, etc. etc. Because yes, we know how to do that. We made some at our association for disabled people, from printed poems written by other members, to be sold by the association for a profit. We made some with blank pages to be used as personal notebooks. And now, making our own templates! It's funnier and cheaper than buying a brand-name notebook. And I love doing scrapbooking!

~ Maybe tomorrow I'll do more funny stuff like that! =^.^=

~ Ooooh and Lust makes the best tea ever! She knows all about the tea ceremony and everything. With Ulysses, she made a table we hang in the kitchen with the temperature and time for different varieties of tea. That way, everybody can learn to make the best tea too! Even though we know Lust's will be the very best. David is a bit jealous... But hey, his tea comes close second! (And Zami's is last. Never let Zami prepare tea. Ever. Again. Please.)

~ And this episode of Tales from the World-Tree is now over. Thanks for reading!

~ Theia ~

Sounds like you all had a good day today, thats great!

We hope tomorrow is good for you all too!

team Amythyst

~ Thank you! ~

~ I think that to-day, in-between the house chores, I'll make some pretty cover for the system's big, store-purchased journal/notebook. Making it all pretty pretty pretty on the outside! And when it'll be filled in completely, maybe make a pretty pretty handmade one? Ooooh that would be nice ^.^

~ Me loves paking pretty things!

~ Theia ~

And here I go again down the spiral of self-doubt.

The more I think about it the more I realize, most of the interactions I have with the outside, is just, the others acting through me - and me acting out like an "equalizer".

I feel like I'm only a fragment, a display window. The one who took most of the damages because, that's what happens when a store is robbed: the display window gets destroyed. One with a bit of a character of course, painted with letters and stuff. But a window still.

When I look at myself, I cannot say what is "me, the window" and what is "the others I see through the window, acting through me".

So, I wonder. People from outside of the system, who like me... do they like me, the equalizer - or do they like the whole of the World-Tree as seen through me?

Which makes me even more asking myself questions. Am I really multiple? Or am I just roleplaying unconsciously because I'm so sick and isolated and traumatized that I make up people in my head to care for me and love me and do the stuff I cannot do?

I think I'll take a nap.

--Zami--

I'm tired. From the constant sensory overload. You certainly got from other threads that the heater is turned on very intense and we have absolutely no control over it and try to keep cool by opening the windows. In winter. Oh joy. Plus, the new neighbors who purchased the apartment next door to mine, are very very noisy. Yelling. Slamming doors. Party-ing with all their friends. Talking in the corridor just outside my door. And S. who is messing with me at reading club, I'm avoiding the reading club now, because I just can't take her constant "hush hush shut up you are talking again" each time I answer someone's question.

I can't take it anymore. None of that. I need a vacation. I cancelled plans, lots of plans, because of that. I'm postponing groceries shopping, I don't go get the mail, I barely take the trash out, I am less and less often in front, and got a terrible headache. Autistic burnout is here.

And on top of that, I'm having fudging nightmares.

Not scary dreams. They are nice dreams, if you take them out of context. There is that boy whom I loved, I dream we are back together, back in that old small village where we lived, in that nice little centuries old farm turned into appartments where we rented one, nice countryside, charming, where I could really feel the seasons coming and going (something Theia really needs, and that I enjoy too), with very pleasant farmers' market close by, very very charming. In the dreams, he loves me very much, seduces me again, and we go in bed together...

Except that in the reality, that dude was an abuser through and through in each and every aspect of our relationship. And I am sick of dreaming of him. Sick of seeing myself in his arms again. Sick of it all, sick of this nice charming place that housed nightmarish events of my life, sick of the ways he submitted my through gaslighting and manipulation, sick of it all.

I know it represents a huge part of my life. But I don't want to think about it in a nice way! I don't want to dream about it in a nice way! In fact, I don't want to dream about it at all!

David, Ulysses, Lust, they're trying to pull me from the dreams, but each time they reach in, something shuts them out.

Do I have an introjection of my ex hanging around inside trying to make up for all the bad things the physical person did to me? Did that guy abuse me so much that I'm stuck forever with a copy of him inside of me?

I don't want to!

What can I do? How can I make it stop?

Please, help.

--Zami--

Tralked with a few friends about it. One of them suggested that someone in the system (we have a lot of "uncharted" / "unregistered" members) might be nostalgic of the good things that happened.

So we are working on aknowledging that this abusive relationship was not abusive 24/7, that it had nice aspects to it too. That it's okay to miss the good aspect. That both good and bad aspects can coexist and that it's okay to miss the good ones even if we ran away from the bad ones.

Had a few nightmares (nothing to do with the ex though) and others from the WorldTree managed to pull me out of them. It's a relief.

--Zami--

We recieved a very important and good new about a work project, which threw the most enthusiastic members into a state very... extatic. A bit as if they were high and drunk at the same time. I am doing my best to keep them away from front until they have calmed down, because violent emotions (the bad AND the good ones) are exhausting.

Keeping a balance is not easy, but we are together to keep it.

-David-

Posted in another thread but I repost here because it contains interesting things about how we work! ~ ♥


Zami is together, a host alter, the mask we wear when we want to interact with the outside world, a trauma carrier, an aspect of Theia, an aspect of Uriel, and a blend of a few of us.

It is like colors.

Try to visualize the colors on a color wheel. Now, each color you name is a different alter.

But, here is the trick: some colors can be either blue or green depending on how you look at it. Also, if you mix different colors together, you can get a new one, even if it is not the one present at the moment.

Now, trickier: some colors do not exist. Here is the Wikipedia article about it. Magenta for example is not a "real color". It is what your brain sees when the eyes get equal amount of blue and red. Isn't that exciting? ~ ♥

So, all in all you can see a "color" without this "color" to really be here.

This is what Zami is: a real color, AND a "color" that is not really here. Like, teal? Zami is teal! So, teal can be an aspect of green or an aspect of blue (Zami is an aspect of Uriel and Theia). But it is also, a blend of many colors (Zami is what we get when we co-front, sometimes). It is also how we name the colors we cannot name, or when we don't want to really specify what kind of blue-green or odd combination something is (Zami is our social mask / host). But, teal is also very real in its own way: Zami is also a specific alter.

~~~~~~

♥ Lust ♥

I saw your post about colours on another thread too. It's a really good analogy. Sometimes I'm not sure "who I am" Sometimes I know there's two alters or they know. Sometimes like now I feel like I'm have a bit of an alter there but they aren't fully forward they are like half there and I couldn't tell you who I am. So it's a really good way to describe it, the colours.

Oh my we haven't been around this place since like forever!

Went through stressfull events: gave up reading club because of S., work project came out, work piling up for other projects, then the organization of moving into a social housing appartment, now the world-wide quarantine...

And because of the quarantine, we're living in the middle of unpacked boxes! The kitchen is a pile of boxes because the quarantine started just before we could have it installed. The office is a pile of boxes because the quarantine started just before we could organize it and work on the thrift store shelves we got.

We feel like a cat. Living in a box among boxes, ticking boxes on a paper each time we need to go out to get boxed food... It's all boxes... But well, as long as we do not go to the bathroom in a litterbox, it's all good I guess.

Even though I know it's not very careful, I could not keep going like that anymore and I went out for a walk along the river. Good thing people keep being careful and keep 6 feet away from each-other on the road. Dang I was so happy to be outside that I could not help but to trot. Picture this: some very queer-looking person with a fake leather jacket, hands in pockets, wearing very not-for-sports shoes, trotting like a horse while a couple cycling or jogging people keep 6 feet away from them.

I guess they thought they were hallucinating me due to corona fever... Or that I was the one acting weird due to corona fever...

I really, really, needed that though. Made David laugh to see I could not keep still and kept on trotting forwards, making horse-like movements with my head.

--Zami--