[04] protectionWhen I was 21 I started to notice that there were certain situations in which I would

[04] protectionWhen I was 21 I started to notice that there were certain situations in which I would suddenly and completely disengage from my surroundings. There didn’t seem to be anything extraordinary that was triggering it, and I struggled to find a common theme amongst occurrences. It just seemed that every once in a while I would find myself a million miles away from whatever was going on, unable to access certain things that I had come to understand as features of my personality: easy-going sociability, loud laughter, compassionate patience, and general zestiness. At first it was an inconvenience that I chalked up to tiredness and irritability.It got scary when I began to notice it happening. I understand better what brings on this phenomenon, and I can watch as the void begins to pool around my ankles, crawl up my back, and settle over my head and my heart, locking me in a haze that I still don’t know how to get out of. It happens fast, and while I know a little more about it, I still don’t really know how to stop it from happening, so there was, for a while, a terrifying inevitability to it. While it still scares me to be so immediately cut off from parts of myself that make me feel whole and happy, it has become less scary in learning that in some measure, this is the void trying to protect me from something. It usually begins when an argument turns sharp, when I feel like my feelings are about to be hurt, or when I feel like something delicate about me is about to be criticized. Sometimes it feels like an overreaction, and I wish I had more sturdiness of character so as to advocate for myself and handle other people’s sharpness without buckling. But knowing and loving who I actually am feels like such a new and precious thing, that I have a little more compassion for what the void is trying to do here. It’s shielding parts of me that are still growing so that they don’t have to weather the storms that they aren’t ready for. I feel confident that they will be ready some day, and I won’t always have to defend them so fiercely.This has caused me pain and confusion, and sometimes the void perceives threat where there is none, but I can appreciate the underlying effort to protect me. -- source link

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