From major to minor

I’ve recently come through a minor breakdown.

I make the distinction between a minor breakdown and a major breakdown on the basis of the level of functionality that I lost, and the time it has taken to return to a semblance of normal functionality (whatever that means).

When I had a major breakdown over thirty years ago, it took years to recover to the point where I could do paid work again (although I did a lot of voluntary work as part of the recovery process).

In the years leading to my major breakdown, which was effectively from my teens until my late thirties, I developed unhealthy coping strategies.

With no idea how to deal with things differently, I worked out ways of getting through that worked – to a degree – but they weren’t sustainable, and I came crashing down.

“The wound is the place where the Light enters you.” – Rumi

The main thing was – in the trauma of the breakdown experience – I didn’t give up; the survivor in me kicked in. Reaching out for and finding sources of support helped me to rebuild. I started to retrain my brain through meditation and affirmations, did hard physical work and exercise when I could, pushed myself when I felt I needed to; tried to rest and relax into feelings that had previously been buried and then surfaced like a volcano. They were so difficult to deal with.

What do I do
with all these feelings?
Do I chew them up
and spit them out
and start again?
And if I do
what then?

I’m now retired, so in a sense the pressure is off, in that I don’t have to recover enough to fulfil the demands of a job. However, in retirement it is all the more important – and can be difficult – to find reasons to be motivated; to get up in the morning; to have a sense of purpose.

After my recent breakdown, and with support from my partner, good friends, and effective medication, I was able to start drawing on these healthier coping strategies fairly quickly, because I had already built them in to my life over many years; they had become part of my ‘muscle memory’, in brain and in body.

The Chinese exercise for health and well-being – Qigong – works on the whole person; walking our dog takes me into fresh air and the opportunity to appreciate the morning or evening light; making things with clay helps to take my mind away from unwelcome thoughts; Buddhist mind training helps me to just accept these thoughts as thoughts; meditation and affirmations provide the opportunity to let go of negative and introduce positive, even if it’s just for a few moments.

I haven’t yet achieved that all elusive peace of mind – my mind is still a work in progress – but I can at times feel a sense of peacefulness in the moment, and that is very welcome.