My body became my voice, when I lost the ability to speak. Not literally, I’ve always been fluent with words, but there came a time in my life where speaking wasn’t okay. A repetitive message to not talk or say anything left me loosing my voice, a fasting diminishing self confidence left me too scared to say anything, and the self hatred I felt toward myself left me hating anything I had to say. I always hated causing a fuss, and to me, talking or saying anything was causing a problem, needing attention, being a burden.
But no one can cope silently. Trust me. I had so much pain built up inside that channeled it in the only ‘safe’ way I could see, the only way that stayed hidden from others and gave me some release, I turned it on myself. Self harm, restriction, over exercise, pill after pill after pill, it gave me a quick fix, it numbed the pain. But not for long enough. The more I tried to numb it, the stronger it returned which meant I had to do more to block it out again, a vicious cycle that put my life in danger. People noticed something wasn’t okay, the quiet but ‘coping’ fiona, wasn’t really coping. She was wearing long sleeves, her clothes were baggy, she was out for hours a day and crying herself to sleep at night. But I still couldn’t talk about it. At this point, I didn’t realise the power of my voice and talking, I had shut out the world so viciously that I couldn’t even imagine letting that wall come down.
I got stuck in the vicious cycle for years. I wasn’t okay, everyone knew I wasn’t okay, but I couldn’t find an (unharmful) way of communicating just how much pain I was in. My body became my voice because I could SHOW it. The increasing lines on my arms and recording hospital trips. The bloods tests that showed severe abnormalities and ecg’s that left worried faces.
It’s taken a lot of time, and a lot of work and trust to find the ability to communicate the actual problem. Not just the fact that I was struggling, but what I was struggling with. I learnt the only way I could ever deal with the pain was to feel it, and to do that I had to acknowledge it. Baby steps, I started off a few years ago with play dough in therapy. I barely said a word for months, but I started to write, and draw. In the past year, I’ve gone backward and forward between having the wall come down and block out everyone, but then managing to break through it again. I’ve learnt the power of words, when I say what’s going on in my head, I can let people help me break it down. From ‘that sandwich is overwhelming’ to ‘I haven’t slept for 3 days because I’m too scared’ to ‘I hate myself at the moment, I feel vulnerable and inadequate’. If I can’t talk, I write and draw.
Don’t get me wrong, when I’m struggling, my default is still to go back to finding a way to show it. Restriction and self harm are still my biggest struggles, and I’d be lying if I said it was plain sailing. There’s been relapses but there’s also been times I’ve been close but held on. I’ve learn to stop myself before I act and think; what is going on right now? How will doing (insert behaviour here) help the situation? The answer is, usually it won’t. The problem will remain, but I’ll have the added guilt and shame for lapsing into a behaviour. I know I need to be compassionate to myself as to WHY those behaviours are there - there was a time that they helped me. But now, I’m older, stronger and a hell of a lot wiser, and I know the power is back in my voice.
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