Conversation

I was never a big fan of small talk. If we've interacted enough in person, that may be hard for you to believe. But, given that I'd often walk around with things on my mind like trauma, flash-backs, looping memories, the imprints of others despair just absorbing into the empath part of my brain. But small talk is how we prove trust, how we gain enough rapport with someone to talk about the big things. So the next time you find yourself hating small talk, just remember that something you may never foresee can come as a result of it. In my case, it's exposure therapy. Replacing bad memories with good ones. What do I mean by this? Say we had a bad interaction with someone. Maybe I left a sour taste in your mouth. maybe you said something that pissed me off. But the next time we see each other, we forget about that for a minute and just talk about audio or tech instead. Do that enough times, and all you eventually remember about the bad interaction, at least in your heart if maybe not your brain, is the fact that neither of you triggered each other. And maybe that's the start you both needed to begin to heal. I'm not here to be too heavy for anyone. I want to know what is the right level of deep for you and me as friends. With my closest of friends, I'm going to have heavy conversations, because that comes with the territory. With my closer friends, maybe the right level of deep is sharing stories but leaving the intensity out of it. But if we're still getting to know each other, maybe it's just enough to know how you think or feel about something. Maybe that's the right kind of deep for us in that moment.

All that to say, the past year or two has taught me three important life lessons.

1. Don't look at PTSD as a disorder. Look at it as a group of injuries that can heal over time, if given the right care. In my case, talking about the bad memories until they don't hurt anymore. And you have to do this with the right people, because not everyone will have the spoons. And low and slow exposure. Through slow exposure, I notice things that used to trigger me just don't anymore.

2. ADHD brain invites hyper focus. This can be great if fixating on things that make our neurodivergent brains stim. But for a trauma survivor with PTSI, hyper focus can be catastrophic. It can lead to sleepless nights and even mania. Invite in hyper focus when it's for a good purpose. But when it comes to trauma, flash-backs can be the match to an ADHD fire. Lean on folks who know how to help manage these symptoms. But also realize that your ADHD people and your trauma people will not always be one and the same. And that's okay.

3. If someone or something is triggering us, it's okay to distance ourselves until we can process. Nobody minds a person who pulls away because they're feeling sick. But as a society, we have a lot less tolerance for trauma trigger moments that mask themselves as passive aggressive bitch fits. And if you stick around just to please someone else, that doesn't really work. Because the person who wants to see you happy just gets to watch you relive flash-backs for the duration of that person or thing being present. Distance is not a bad word. It's a healthy one.