Last night I finally broached up to my sister re: my fear. And believe you me, this fear is already eating me alive and I can’t stand it anymore. My sister was very supportive and she’s willing to find someone who could really help me uproot my fear, like a shrink, a head-shrink or something like that. I am not feigning damsel in distress here. I just know when to call someone when I needed help. Good thing is I am already aware of my feelings and my emotions. Whatever disrupts the daily routine of my life, I am willing to change for my own good. I acknowledge my “fears” and I’m willing to conquer the worst battle of my life.
Before, I happen to excel at pretensions because I want to show the world that I am not a coward especially when it deals with my inner battles. But this time, I will try to resolve and cull down deeper my fear issue. I am paralyzed by this fear so I come up with some important things to do before this problem can get bigger and bigger.
My first experience of fear started when my grandfather passed away. It was the first time I witnessed someone close in the family died. After the burial, I had the hard time putting myself to sleep. The crazy dances/stories my brother and my cousin performed nor the medicine the doctor gave me never lull me to sleep. Nah-uh! Those things did not work for me.
When I was a kid, my parents or any adult for that matter will always tell me that if I will not sleep or I if I throw tantrums, I will be eaten by some kind of monster or something like that or there’s someone outside with one eye who will come and ferry me out and bring me to creepy land. I guess my fears build up from the moment the concept of fear was introduced to me.
Actually, I had so many experiences of my own “fears” that sometimes I dismissed it as something really weird, funny, silly and crazy after the event happens. Whenever my high school close friends and I get together for chitchat, they could not help but bring up the experience we had in Malaybalay They probably thought its funny and silly but for me, it was one hell of an experience.
It happened during my senior year in high school. My friends, Mara, Michelle, Ian and I took the UPCAT in Malaybalay City so our CLVE teacher told us we could stay in one of the dormitories there. So off we went to Malaybalay on a rainy and gloomy afternoon. When we arrived at the place, we were like, “oh boy, is this the place we will spend for the night?” We were housed in that creepy, scary dormitory with lots of double deck beds and comfort rooms. Call me crazy, but while my friends were deep in slumber I went out and asked these two men if there were still cabs going to Pines Hill Hotel where my friends from Infant Jesus School stayed and they told me there’s none and it would be dangerous for me to go there alone. So, I knocked someone else’s house and begged them to let me stay for a night. I pointed the place where I was supposed to stay and told them I couldn’t sleep in that creepy dormitory and they took me in. An hour or two after midnight, the lights went out but I still managed to shut my eyes and sleep. In the early break of dawn, with candles and flashlights on their hands and totally pissed off with what I did, my friends went out and looked for me all over the place. And in those few minutes of semi consciousness before I woke up, I heard them calling out my name and someone(my guardian angel, perhaps) might have send a fed-ex to my cerebral cortex ( telling me what the hell are you doing in someone else’s house, they could have been killers or what-not) so I jumped out of bed, thanked the people who saved me from my craziness (in fairness, they were very nice to me) and faced my angry, sick worried friends. * Ives, blah blah… where were you during the night when we woke up were not in your bed, ives, why did you do that, ives blah blah…Ives, you could have at least lock the main door…or leave a note…blah blah. And I simply answered them…”I can’t just sleep in that creepy dormitory…ever!”
I can actually do the craziest things when I am scared to death and it’s really eating me alive. But you see these fears of mine are branching out--- but they are all fears just the same. Fear of being left behind, fear of losing someone in my family, fear of facing a large crowd, fear of expressing my feelings and fear of unrequited love among others. I know I am a human being capable of changing it, capable of eliminating those fears of mine. Sooner or later the people whom I cling whenever I feel scared will one by one be slipping out of my life. My parents cannot be there for me forever nor can my siblings hold my hand until the end of time for they have their own lives to live and I don’t want them to see me in this state forever. I need to learn how to detach my self, to let go and heal my inner child.
So I came up with some catharsis (purging of emotions) to help me relieve this crazy emotionally twisted fear of mine.
Healing of memories/healing the inner child— I want to turn back the hands of time and go back to help the “little Ivy” who was still struggling and groping in the darkness. I will try to remember that 1st time fear was introduced in my system and I will lead the “little ivy” to another state of being. I could probably tell her,” its okay, I am here” and hug the little helpless me.
Desensitization— otherwise called as inurement—I am actually trying myself to face my fears head-on by gradually exposing myself to it. There maybe situations wherein I have to put myself in a quite uncomfortable situation but I and some people concerned should make sure that it is not panic-provoking so that I can journey slowly but surely,
jOurnal writing— ever since I was a kid I always write on my daily journal. It keeps me updated with the things that are going on with my life. This time I’ll write a journal of my fears—the different things I do every day to overcome it like maybe sleeping alone with the lights off, or maybe facing a crowd or expressing my opinions without fear and hesitations…blah blah..
Some of my fears are not really earth-shaking in itself but if pro-longed, I guess it will drive me crazy. Really.
If I can stand the heat then…I can control the fire.
(note: This entry was written & saved to drafts a week ago. I can’t seem to open blogspot in our Bukidnon connection so now is the only chance to post it.)
