We all want to stay more present in the moment

Hey guys! It’s been a while.

Doing pretty decently but there are some issues that are really pressing.

We need advice .

We all want to stay present in the moment more. The involuntary dissociation is hurting us deeply. It’s not that we don’t want to be present but for one reason or another…there are blockages.
We are constantly scarred of saying the wrong thing or making the wrong choices. Very anxious. And randomly we will start to have episodes where we are verbally constipated. Not a damn thought in our head on top of that.

Freezing response.

I don’t know what to do. And I don’t have anyone in real life to talk to about it

We all try to stay up together and work together but ..it’s hard and it makes functioning really difficult.

Any techniques or advice?

Welcome back to the forums!

Since it seems to come from an anxiety overload, my advice would be to progressively add more and more relaxation exercises, grounding exercises and everything "learn to feel safe in the present" exercises.

I said "progressively" as in, learn one thing, do it every day twice, and when you are comfortable with it, add one more, and so on. Because if you try to ground yourself too intense too fast, it can be triggering since it's not usual to be that much grounded. At least that's how it was for me. Follow what you can do!

I fished my exercises for everything in the books "Coping with trauma related dissociation" and "Healing the fragmented selves of trauma survivors" (full references in the ressources post, link in my signature). But I guess you can find summaries of said exercises in other books or websites, such as this one (Fr->En translation) or this other one.

If I am feeling very dissociated, I have a lot of beaded bracelets with words on them that I wear- all of them are things that are important to me/have a lot of meaning, and it reminds me of who I am. The texture feels good against my arms too.

I usually carry things with different textures like a Nice Cube, crocheted bits and bobs, a soda tab, etc. If I start getting nervous I stick my hand in my pocket and feel the different textures.

Progressive muscle relaxation is really amazing, especially if you can find a soothing breathing pattern (try a few different ways of breathing, I really like plugging my ears and humming out my breath)

I also love love love walking, I'll walk for miles and miles, and I always feel very grounded and happy when I walk, even if my mind drifts a lot.

ArbreMonde wrote:Welcome back to the forums!

Since it seems to come from an anxiety overload, my advice would be to progressively add more and more relaxation exercises, grounding exercises and everything "learn to feel safe in the present" exercises.

I said "progressively" as in, learn one thing, do it every day twice, and when you are comfortable with it, add one more, and so on. Because if you try to ground yourself too intense too fast, it can be triggering since it's not usual to be that much grounded. At least that's how it was for me. Follow what you can do!

I fished my exercises for everything in the books "Coping with trauma related dissociation" and "Healing the fragmented selves of trauma survivors" (full references in the ressources post, link in my signature). But I guess you can find summaries of said exercises in other books or websites, such as this one (Fr->En translation) or this other one.

Thank you for the reply! I just got my hands on these two books. Going to see how they help me. So far I like how they’re approaching the issues . It’s triggering reading about our condition. So I’ll have to toughen up a bit to get through the books. Thank you as for replying!

stationeleven wrote:If I am feeling very dissociated, I have a lot of beaded bracelets with words on them that I wear- all of them are things that are important to me/have a lot of meaning, and it reminds me of who I am. The texture feels good against my arms too.

I usually carry things with different textures like a Nice Cube, crocheted bits and bobs, a soda tab, etc. If I start getting nervous I stick my hand in my pocket and feel the different textures.

Progressive muscle relaxation is really amazing, especially if you can find a soothing breathing pattern (try a few different ways of breathing, I really like plugging my ears and humming out my breath)

I also love love love walking, I'll walk for miles and miles, and I always feel very grounded and happy when I walk, even if my mind drifts a lot.

stationeleven wrote:If I am feeling very dissociated, I have a lot of beaded bracelets with words on them that I wear- all of them are things that are important to me/have a lot of meaning, and it reminds me of who I am. The texture feels good against my arms too.

I usually carry things with different textures like a Nice Cube, crocheted bits and bobs, a soda tab, etc. If I start getting nervous I stick my hand in my pocket and feel the different textures.

Progressive muscle relaxation is really amazing, especially if you can find a soothing breathing pattern (try a few different ways of breathing, I really like plugging my ears and humming out my breath)

I also love love love walking, I'll walk for miles and miles, and I always feel very grounded and happy when I walk, even if my mind drifts a lot.

It’s been a while since I’ve had a good walk. And I don’t meditate as much as I should. Great tips! I’m going to look into progressive muscle relation.
Thank you for replying.