Unexpected Shadow Work

My chest felt tight. 

Full to bursting. 

The intensity of it was real.

Visceral. 

And it did not stop.

And because it did not stop.

The tears came. 

A need fulfilled. 

Unexpectedly. 

Powerfully. 

From people who did not lie

When they said we were a family. 

I was called a Nazi by a Facebook friend's friend. For what? For saying that I hoped that a business that had signs up saying "NO masks required" would be reported for a health violation. Two people backed her up. But my FB friend who originally posted in favor of this business stayed silent. 

And I did not notice. 

Not until the people I work with to run some FB groups got wind of what was going on, and they were like wait. And suddenly, I was being defended and supported and their BS was called out. I was stunned. 

In private group chats I was told, wtf, this isn't a real friend, thinking that's okay. And they were right. It's one thing to disagree, but it's another thing entirely to allow these level of vitriol. If roles were reversed I know I would have said something along the lines, hey, not a cool comparison, keep it civil please. 

I was gobsmacked I didn't notice.

And oh, it was so odd to have shadow work come up unexpectedly.

I was not used to having multiple people go OH HELL NO on my behalf, all at once. The boundaries laid out, the calling out in classy and sassy ways. It was breathtaking. 

And I felt like a kid again, the girl who was bullied at school, abused at home. The girl who was the problem child or the stupid/underachieving student (depending on the teacher). 

I mentioned how it felt like I was dealing with some unexpected shadow work, and I was immediately told, shadow work is hard stuff, you're not supposed to do it alone. And holy shit. My brain had somehow thought oh yes, for everyone else, except me. It feels so good to be wrong. 

I did not get made fun of once. I was only supported and listened to. And it was everything. 

I blocked that fake ass friend. And the people supporting the anti-Semitic Nazi comparison on mask wearing. 

I was seen and heard.

And it was safe. 

And I was supported. 

I wasn't alone. 

My resiliency leveled up.

 

artist unknown

Instrumental Comfort

The title of this blog post is the name of a playlist I have on Spotify. Most of the music on there is from the movie Interstellar.

The music I have on there is what I use to write things that are difficult. It honors the hope, the purpose, the drive, to keep moving, to keep going, to keep trying, no matter what. Even when it's hard, even when it feels hopeless. 

Because when you feel hopeless is exactly when you need to feel hope, just enough hope, to take one more step, to go farther, to do that hard thing anyway. Like in the anime My Hero Academia. You go full on "plus ultra!" to do the impossible. 

I love the music I have on that list. It honors the fear and the struggle, it doesn't hide from it, but at the same time, it is courage, because it says, YES, I see you, I feel you, and we are doing this anyway. 

I always start with the first piece on the list. Echo by Big Giant Circles. That is a song that I can be swept away by the sound of hope, saromei, and then, then I can work. I can write my oracle cards, the project where the emotional labor is intense, a lot of shadow work comes up for me. 

I hope you enjoy the playlist. ^__^

I hope you are inspired to make your own instrumental comfort playlist. 

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/0PCk3GpvYcPaTexnph8v5B?si=mRybRB_YRa--HoHvUPXXUw

A Litany of Lies

There are thoughts, intrusive thoughts, that repeat in my mind from time to time, from moment to moment. A litany of lies. I am going to list some of them. 

I'm a bad girl. (No, I was never called a bad girl as a kid)

I'm going to hell.

Taunting: dead girl dead girl

I'm a bad person. 

I want to cut myself.

I'm an idiot.

I'm a stupid girl.

I don't know what I'm doing.

WTF am I doing?

And it repeats, over and over again. When things are calm, when I'm in that in between space between tasks, thoughts arise. 

If the anxiety rises along with the intrusive thoughts, then I remember cutting sensations and I want to cut again, but never do. 

If I dwell in it, I wonder why I'm doing what I'm doing. 

And then, eventually, I remember, that there is nothing I can do to not have an impact on the world. I exist. I can't not exist. If I end myself I will hurt people, specifically the two most important people in my life, my spouse and my child. So there's no point in killing myself. If I hide myself I will hurt people especially my spouse and my child. So there's no point in hiding myself. 

The only way to not have an impact is to not exist, and since that's impossible, all I can do is my best to have a positive impact, and to right any wrong doings on my part. 

Radical acceptance that yes, I exist. 

Radical acceptance that yes, I have impact on others. 

Radical acceptance that yes, I hear these intrusive thoughts. 

And coming to the conclusion that it doesn't matter if they are truth or lies. All that matters are the actions I take now. That I do my best now. To do good. To increase light and love, to increase resilience so the darkness isn't so scary. 

I Am Not Neutral

I am not entirely sure how this happened, but it has come to my attention that some of my white friends and family think I am neutral when I speak about the protests and about politics, that I'm playing the "neutral card" or the "playing it cool" to just "show off" that I'm a "white ally" to my "liberal friends."

If I appear that way to you in a discussion then you are sorely mistaken. I am not neutral, nor am I trying to win white ally points. If you think that from things I say, especially when I am addressing you, what that means is, I'm being very very nice in the way I approach you because I care about my relationship with you and I am doing my best to preserve our relationship. 

I have had nightmares about having to cut certain people out of my life because they voted for a fascist dictator. I have had nightmares about my Black sister dying before her time and leaving her children motherless. I worry about the world those children are growing up in that tells them that they are fundamentally less than someone else because of their dark skin. Such beautiful souls being cruelly crushed under the weight of racism before they can even say a word.

No. I am not neutral. 
I am anti-fascist. 
I am anti-racist. 

I am kind. I am compassionate. I am inclusive.

I am radical in my ability to feel unconditional love for anyone and everyone. 

But never. 

Never mistake that for passivity or neutrality.
Never mistake that for endorsement of evil ideas.

Fascism is evil. 
Racism is evil. 
Sexism, ableism, homophobia, transphobia, are all expressions of evil thought. 
Unregulated capitalism is evil. 
Wealth hoarding is evil, every billionaire is a wealth hoarder.
Destroying our environment is evil, especially now since we have tools to undo the damage we have done but we refuse to do so as a society because capitalism is our national god, and changing that is intolerable, especially to those in power. The ultimate eff you got mine.

Good power is about having power with not power over people and nature. It is shared, like a birthday cake is at your birthday party. 

I don't care how nicely you wrap it up, but rot is still rot, and if you don't do something about the rot the roots of the fruit-bearing tree you rely on dies. 

You dishonor your soul, your Heart, who you truly are, when you allow that to happen, and you do this by by espousing evil ideas, by supporting evil people in doing evil things, by finding excuses for these things. You may be a good person fundamentally, but the lies you have grown up with, the lies you believe, the justifications and rationalizations you make, are still destroying the good fruit of your tree. To preserve your tree you have to heal the rot.

So no. I am not neutral. 
Not by a long shot. 
If you want to do something about the rot that's killing your fruit-bearing tree, I will help you do that. There are no throw away souls. But if you continue to try to spread the rot instead of healing the rot, I will stand my ground and say no.

You might feel like that suddenly means I don't love you. But that is not true. Of course I love you. But you aren't the one whose life is in danger. You are the one rescinding your hand from helping to save lives. So I have to say no, that is not okay. 

And then it's up to you to listen or not. I hope you do. 
Heal the rot. 

Healing from Lies I was Told - Racism

I'm going down memory lane on racism against Black people. 

When I was a little girl, some time before third grade since I wasn't in public school yet, I remember complaining to my mom about the girl next door who got all bossy about where I was allowed to color in my own coloring book. I seem to recall she was the one who brought some fancy crayons, and we were coloring on the concrete on the side of the house.  We had both wanted to color "the good part" and I only remember how much it bothered me specifically because it was my coloring book and I was sharing, but she was also sharing her crayons. 

We were just kids, we hadn't learned how to navigate each other's feelings, and even though I thought she was being too bossy, I decided to just roll with it.  I didn't know what to do about my feelings and that's why I decided to talk to my mom about it afterward. Mom always knows the right thing to say and do right? 

Well, I don't remember what Mom said. What I do remember is that after that, I never played with that little girl again. And that confused me. I liked her, and I still wanted to be friends. She was still next door, but somehow we never played together again. What I also remember is that she was Black. Surely her skin color didn't play a roll in this right? I don't know, but I suspect it did. 

I suspect it did because of clearer memories later. 

---

In 5th grade I was made fun of, a lot. Bullying was an every day occurrence in some form or another. One day, outside of regular school hours, I was walking to the post office to drop off some mail. There were a few very nearby shops and places that my parents would let me walk to as a way of giving me that coveted independence. I walked through the parking lot along the shops. In the parking lot was a running car of a bunch of teenage kids, and they were likely waiting for someone to come out of one of the stores. 

No big deal, right? Wrong. For whatever reason, they decided to shout mean things at me. I have no idea what they said, but one girl at the driver's seat was the loudest and the instigator. It very likely had something to do with the way I was dressed or the disrepair of my shoes. I was very obviously a poor girl. I got mad. I didn't know them, they were older than me, they shouldn't be mean to little kids, and I was just so mad, that I turned around and shouted at them. 

I do not remember what I said in the beginning, but I do remember what I said at the end. I said, ". . . LIKE YOUR BLACK ASS." Then I turned up my nose with a hmph and continued walking. I glanced back, and that girl who was mean to me started to get out of the car, and I was like OH NO, she's gonna beat me up! But, the friends she was with, a mix of boys and girls, calmed her down and she didn't.

And I kept walking, frowning, that whole scene, her expression, her friends pushing her back down and saying no, don't do it. She was angry, and I kept thinking about it on that walk and I realized, I was mean back. I realized on that walk I had hurt her feelings really badly by being mean about the color of her skin, that she couldn't do anything about. I wasn't even sure why I did it, I just knew I didn't like this whole experience at all, and didn't want to do that anymore. I decided then and there I wouldn't be mean like that again. 

Mulling this all over, on my way back from the post office I looked for them, but the car was gone. They were gone. I was going to apologize, but it was too late. It took me too long to figure out my feelings and what had happened and what I should do about it. 

No, where the hell did I learn that I could use race as a way to hurt someone?

At home, where racist things were spoken of in old movies without any discussion of how wrong they were.  My only saving grace was that I had loved the book Huckleberry Finn, and there were a few things I was also hearing that was nicer to Black people in school and other movies, but the racism I was exposed to was still there, and it came out of my mouth when I was 10 or 11 years old. 

---

In 7th grade I became friends with a Black girl who described herself as mulatto. I hadn't ever heard the word before but I learned it meant she was half white half Black. Cool with me. We really enjoyed each other's company, and I would go to her house after school sometimes, and we had a grand time. Her name was Monica Green. I still miss her, after losing touch. 

Anyway, one day, my paternal parent found out that Monica was a Black girl and suddenly I wasn't allowed to go to her house anymore. I realize now that he probably didn't realize she was Black because she had a "white" sounding name, particularly her last name. 

Of course, I protested saying  this is stupid, I went to her house before and it was fine, blah blah, and desperately I'm playing the "make my Black friend an exception" card. 

Nope. I then said, "but she's  half white! That should count!"

And that's when I learned the "one drop of blood" theory white people have about Blackness. If you have just one drop of Black blood you are Black and that's that. 

I was floored. I said, "that's so dumb!"

Now, I will say this whole time I was talking to my mother. My paternal parent left her to be the spokesperson for his bigotry. 

Mom said something to the effect of, "I know, and I don't agree with it but I can't do anything about it."

Oh, well now, okay. I saw my opening and I took it. I told my Mom, "I'm going to Monica's house, and you can't stop me. You can either tell dad I'm at someone else's house, or I start lying to you too."

And that was when Mom and I formed a team. I would tell Mom where I was going so she would know just in case there was an emergency, and she would lie to my paternal parent if he ever asked about my whereabouts. 

And this, this is why I think that somehow, my paternal parent found out about the coloring book incident with the little girl next door and wrecked my friendship with her. I have no proof and my parents say they have no memory, but it doesn't matter. The fact that that's even an option on the table? Gross.

---

Some of my family of origin would say that Ojiji (my paternal parent) didn't get racist until my big brother went on his mission (LDS). However, I say he was before, it's just that's when Ojiji started to get really overt. I remember hearing the N-word a LOT in high school. Even to the point that my mom pleaded with Ojiji to please stop saying it because my baby brother was saying it and she didn't want him to get into trouble at school (elementary school). Oh, that enraged him, and he started ranting even louder. 

He talked about how Black people had inferior brain waves. Cited the book "The Bell Curve" as gospel. And speaking of gospel, Black people had the Curse of Cain, and even talked about hearing a Black man saying it's true because he had a "black thumb", as in the man couldn't grow plants. He used passages in the Book of Mormon to further his view of the superiority of the white man (and yeah, he was definitely misogynist too, and racist against other non-white folk, but the point here is the racism against Black people so I won't go into those). 

I remember him telling me about the conspiracy of Black men tricking white women into marrying them to purify their black cursed bloodline. No joke. (Moreover, later, as a grown ass adult, I had to explain to another grown ass adult, that no, this wasn't true, and if any do exist that they are outlier extremists who believed the lies they were taught about their race. That was a thing.) 

I remember in high school finding out that the top student in all my teacher's math classes was a Black girl in my class, and I thought, "Ha! Take that Dad! If white people were smarter then that would be me, but it's not, it's her, a Black person so obviously they aren't inferior." I was so proud of her for existing and proving Ojiji wrong. I never told her. I just smiled and nodded at her when she got the big eyes for being called out as the best in the middle of class. 

During this time, on my jewelry box in my room was a sticker of a Black girl ballerina, an open testament to my defiance of Ojiji's racism. 

On my part of the wall was a part of Martin Luther King Jr's speech, a little out of the way, but there for anyone to see if they were paying attention. Another act of defiance. I still have this piece of paper. 

I grew up steeped in racism and I kept fighting it, using scripture, and things I was taught at school, and the experience of friends. I did my best. 

I did not come out unscathed. 

---

I believed that interracial marriage was a bad idea. 

When my boyfriend (now husband) found out, he was upset  by this. He said, "what if I were Black?" And the conversation turned into this whole back and forth thing and he got me to imagine a world without racism so I could imagine him having dark brown skin and having that be the only difference and thus be able to say, if he were Black, yes, I would still want to be with him. 

But I still had some misgivings because, racism existed, and racism changes how people experience the world and really, what Black person would want to marry into my family? That's crazy talk, because racism. No one wants Ojiji for a father-in-law. 

Other things, well, I sure didn't understand institutionalized racism, nor did I understand white culture. In fact, I had convinced myself that racism no longer truly existed, that it was just really old people, and I wasn't racist you know, so it's not a problem. 

Yeah, well, I didn't get the clue until I started attending San Jose State University to become a teacher, and I was floored about the unofficial segregation of our schools and other things I had learned and was right there in the data. Fascinating stuff that I won't go into. I still had a hard time understanding white culture and white privilege though, but I started getting it.

I learned a lot of things, I got better as a white ally.

And I still was not unscathed. 

In my student teaching I described a boy's actions as violent to the master teacher. She said she was concerned by my language use to describe a 5 year old's behavior.,. I gave some reason for it, she didn't say anything else, but I stood there and thought about it and I remembered a white boy doing something similar and not using the word "violent" to describe his actions, and I realized, holy crap, I am saying this because the boy is Black. !!!

I was shocked at myself. Ashamed. I was in a teaching program called the Critical Research Academy that was all about social justice work in the classroom and looking at silences and implicit biases in the school curricula, and here I was,  a grown ass adult behaving like a racist jerk face toward a CHILD. 

I then said to the master teacher, "but you're right, I shouldn't describe any child's actions that way, they are still learning."

Talk about needing to check myself. Flippin' A. 

I knew better, and I failed to do better. 

I was particularly surprised, too, because to me, any group of men is potentially dangerous, whatever their ethnicity. Other life traumas taught me that. Even so, it was just like what I read in a book by Denver Snuffer said, "We breathe in the smog of our culture" and our culture says that white is default, and ultimately noble no matter what. 

---

I was born into a world filled with lies about Black people, and I had to learn, that despite all that valiant effort of defying overt racism I heard while growing up I was still spouting racist stuff. I would say, "I'm not racist." and with comparing myself to Ojiji, I was right, I wasn't, but I was still racist, and I couldn't hear that. My boyfriend, now husband, would say to me, "I know YOU'RE not racist, but what you are SAYING is." That got me to separate myself from Ojiji. 

Ojiji was bad for a myriad of reasons, beyond racism (if you can believe that), and so in order to not fall down the dark hole of killing myself (I was suicidally depressed) anything that made me the same as Ojiji made me unfit to live so I couldn't tolerate being told I was racist because then I was him.

Bless my Robert forever for helping me with my own psychology so I could separate myself from racism and thus from Ojiji, so I could learn that yes, I was saying racist things, things that didn't match my true heart, and still feel like I had a right to breathe. 

I used to say, "I'm not racist" because I do the work of checking myself. Now, though,  I say, "I'm anti-racism" because it acknowledges that I still gotta check myself from time to time, and that there's still more work to do to help the situation.

I know there are plenty of good white folk out there who get their backs up when someone accuses them of racist thought. To you I say, it's okay, you're not evil, you were simply born with lies spilling out everywhere and there is more work for you to do to heal from those lies.

It's hard work, and it's worth it. 

I am happier for it, and I am closer to the Heavens for it.

But whatever you do, do not stay the same. 

Do not turn your backs on our Black brothers and sisters and siblings.

To have been deceived by the lies we grew up with isn't evil.

To stand with those lies after being given the truth is evil.  

The real curse is racism. 

Heal from that curse. 

Stand with Black Lives Matter. 

To do otherwise is to perpetuate evil. 

The Low Hum of Imminent Danger

The low hum of imminent danger pervades our societal atmosphere with the novel coronavirus, Covid-19, invading human bodies, using its RNA to replace ours; and the line "we won't be replaced" sings in my head when I think of this, from the song Hell Or Highwater by The Rescues. 

It's complicated and simple. Shining a light to social inequalities, judgement, scarcity thinking; to how vulnerable the vulnerable among us are. It sucks. 

And yet. 

When this all first started that low hum of imminent danger felt familiar, almost comfortable due to its familiarity. I've lived with this before. Every day of my life growing up since I was about seven years old. 

I thought, oh, I know how to live with this. I will be fine. I remember reading briefly that oh hey, people who experienced trauma are at an advantage. Reading that reinforced. 

But I forgot that over time I could feel my body shatter my experiences into little pieces to survive. I forgot that once my body tracks the now with the then she responds as if the now is the then. But I was comfortable, confident, and complacent because familiarity made me think I was just fine and would continue to be just fine.

The first time I had a post-traumatic stress dream during quarantine it didn't have much weight, and I thought, oh, wow, I must be really healing well then. And then the pervasive thoughts of, "I'm a bad girl, I'm going to hell" and other deeply shaming disempowering things entered my mind. I thought, oh, okay, it triggered these thoughts again. So, as I agreed to do, I told my husband and the telling made it go away.

But then it happened again. And again. And again. But I would brush it aside, and just deal with the moment, just do what I can in the moment, I got responsibilities, I gotta fulfill them, I'll tell my husband as soon as I'm done with xyz, just a little meditation here and there, I'm fine, I'm safe, it's all good, go for a walk, take a nap, breathe;  until suddenly it wasn't all good.

The dreams were more and more frequent, and I was losing more and more control of them, waking up and going right back into the horrible upon my return to sleep instead of being able to choose something different. And they began to be present during naps.  My quality of sleep was wrecked. Thoroughly wrecked.  Crash and burn. I could no longer function. 

The cards two weeks or so ago said to watch my dreams, the warning signs there. Right there. But I didn't see them. I was too busy spiritually bypassing. To busy rubbing at the problem not seeing I was rubbing it raw and making it worse. 

I was not okay. 

I managed to do the morning meditation with people in the morning (something I'm doing every day this month in my meetup group, Tarot Energy Healing). 

I tried my hardest to be fine, because I had a remote Reiki level 2 class to teach that day, but I wasn't fine. I was PTSD triggered, and it would take more than a 20 minute nap, a meditation, grounding etc, to get to the point where I could be fine. 

I had learned previously that when I'm triggered, I need to stop. I learned that the hard way because I took a massage practical after being PTSD triggered and I did not give that woman my best. 

And I knew I had to say no. 

I had to admit that I was not okay. 

I had to not push myself to pretend to be okay.

I had to stop. 

And engage in the self-care that I needed to do. 

So I canceled the class last minute. I took the day off, refusing to look at notifications, email, FB, etc. I wrote in my journal about it, the special journal that I started after shelter-in-place began. I cancelled the Tarot class I had scheduled for the following day as well, keeping only the morning meditation/prayer of empowerment scheduled. I figured if I could hold it together for 30 minutes that morning I could do it again the following morning. 

I felt in my body, bone deep, that I had made the right decision to cancel the classes. But doubt crept in and it was oh so hard not to pull an Odysseus and look back. Oh it was so hard at times to not go into judgment. I talked to my husband about things. I slept. A lot, relying on him to take care of the household.

The following day, I was able to figure out how to handle rescheduling things for my students, (and it turned out to work well for them, my Reiki students in particular). I was able to take time for myself, recharge, reset, and stay out of judgment, reminding myself what my body felt like when I had made the right decision and followed through with it. I would have been useless to my students.

A lesson I see in this is that I can keep my commitments to others and take time to care for myself, that the people wanting to learn from me won't hate me for doing so. 

Another is it's okay to admit that you're not okay. It's okay to not be okay. It's okay to stop, to slow down, and take time out for yourself. Time out is not a punishment in adulthood. Just like naps. Kids hate naps, but as adults we like naps! Kids hate time out but as adults we are like yehhhssssss time out! 

And today, today I am much better. 

Yeah, this all happened on Saturday the 11th of April. Yesterday was good as I solved problems, consulted Tarot, got my plans ready for the day and the week, etc. Slept. A lot of sleeping. 

I set up some oracle cards, crystals, to help, but then added an avocado pit next to my bed to store any horrible dreams, trigger dreams and unhelpful energy. My sleep has been more restorative as a result. And the PTSD dreams have been quiet. Blessedly quiet. 

***

Note: To learn more about how the body breaks up trauma memories please read the book, The Body Keeps the Score by Bessel Van Der Kolk. It is amazing! Click for link to book

Also note: I only did light editing. 

An Unexpected PTSD Triggering Experience

This is an awkward first post but right now, it is the most salient one because it's what I 'm going through right now. So, here it is without much context of me or my life. 

I received some news that triggered a post-traumatic stress response. (I have PTSD due to childhood sexual abuse.) I found out a well-respected family in a congregation I used to go to is dealing with a son who sexually abused his students in his role as a middle school teacher and even made the news. The father of said son was recently arrested for sexual misconduct when he was a Bishop (Mormon version of pastor). The mother was my seminary teacher, and I have always seen her as a spiritual powerhouse. I knew her other son in high school and got to know one of her daughters. I believed that this family was a normal good family with normal problems like any good family. 

For whatever reason, this has caused a cascade of triggering events in my life. 

• The news affected sexual intimacy with my spouse via intrusive thoughts (which I talked to him about.) 
• I have been taking longer than 30 minutes to fall asleep, something I had recently gotten under control in the last couple of months via Kaiser's sleep class (if you have Kaiser and are unsatisfied with your sleep I highly recommend this class). 
• I took my massage practical exam early and while I still got a good grade I am disturbed by the basic things I forgot (like how to apply proper pressure for lymph drainage). I wasn't able to be present, and several times she expressed discomfort and a couple of times pain. Her experience was ultimately unpleasant it seems to me. Since I have massaged her before and done lymph drainage on her before, she knew something was off with me that  was more than just test jitters. She was very compassionate when I told her what was up.
• I had to postpone meeting up  with one of my energy healing mentors for coffee. I was in panic mode.
• I panicked and rescheduled a healing session I was to do for a wonderful woman, a massage on her rotator cuff muscles and some energy  healing. 
• I lost work time. I am working on writing my novel, writing oracle cards, and other works. I have a lot to do to prepare for several upcoming events and for school. I have been unfocused. And when I do try to focus I can't seem able to sustain that focus. 
• I have had two migraines this week, which has prevented me from working and from exercising and doing powerlifting. 

I feel fundamentally dirty, like I shouldn't be touching people. I'm ashamed that my massage teacher experienced me triggered (she was very compassionate). I didn't want her to see that piece of me. I'm supposed to be healed enough to be able to set it aside and just do the work. I have dont that in the past without a problem, but those were other hardships, not PTSD triggers. 

I was able to give my husband a couple of massages this week, but it felt subpar, it was so hard to listen to his body. I don't think I did a good job. I spent so much of my energy managing symptoms. 

It feels like because I have this triggers that could happen at any time, like I am somehow horrible and evil and shouldn't ever touch anyone ever again. That my hands are poison; like I'm Winnowill from Elfquest, a healer turned inside out. 

I had had a vision of part of  my little girl self during the beginning of my Soul Retrieval journey, one that I'm still on. I saw her rocking back and forth, crouched and filthy, muttering. When she saw  me, she leaped up and put her back to the wall, terrified. She reminded me of Gus Gus in Disney's Cinderella. She wouldn't listen to a word I said, staying away from me. My spirit guides said there was nothing I could do for her right there. I had thought she was afraid of being hurt. 

However, this PTSD triggering experience has made me realize she isn't afraid of being hurt, she is afraid of hurting others; like Rogue who drains people's life energy away.  I know I will need to find a way to get her back, but I don't know how, not yet.