Grief and Trauma

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Welcome to the What's The Matter With Me? Podcast, "grief and trauma"

Overlapping grief and trauma and my new post-trigeminal neuralgia existence are causing anxiety and fear.

My brain chemistry, the amygdala, stress, fight-or-flight part of my brain is throttling my hippocampus, which is the intelligent part of my brain. The fear and anxiety part of my brain is getting the upper hand because of all of these traumas that are happening right now. I'm recording this episode to try and get it out there to say it all and to hopefully move beyond some of this fear, trauma, and anxiety.

Thank you for tuning in to the What's The Matter With Me? Podcast.

My name is John. I'm 40 years old, husband, father of two, small business owner, radio DJ, podcaster. I have multiple sclerosis, so I made this podcast to share what I'm going through. What's The Matter With Me? is an MS podcast and it's also about other things.

I'm not a medical professional. Don't take this for medical advice. And if you need medical advice, ask your healthcare provider.

Recap

Recap, last episode I was having a whole new life. It's like I have … My life feels totally different now because I don't have pain in my face. I'm recovering. Life feels different. I'm on less medication. Check the last episode. That's where I was last week. Past episodes can be downloaded on Apple Podcasts, whatsthematterwithme.org, or wherever you get it. You go there and get it there.

Why do I make this podcast?

I do it to let people know that when bad things happen they don't have to quit and they can keep going. It's not the end of the world. I thought I was a sick person, something wrong with me. That's how I started out. But now I know I'm in recovery

There's lots of grief and trauma in my life.

I'm having a lot of anxiety, and I think it's coming from these overlapping grieving processes that are the result of different traumas involved with different people in my life. For example, I have grief for my old self because I'm got MS, and I have MS, and I go through changes. So I have to grieve for my old self that … I used to be able to run, and jump, and play basketball, and shoot with two hands. I can't do that, so I have to grieve for that. So that's like a product of disability. But at the same time, it's a product of getting older, that everyone has to do. They have to grieve for their old selves . They go through changes, the limitations of space and time. I mean, everyone deals with this.

It's intense for me because it's part of having MS. The first thing they ask you in the doctor's office is, "Have there been any changes?" I feel like every day there is always change. I just don't know how to answer that question. I'm like, "Today's a new day. Of course everything is different." It's hard to kind of conceive of it that at one time everything is the same, but everything is changing. And that's life, you know? So that grief involved with MS kind of overlaps with the grief that's part of my life. That's how implicit feelings, and fears, and anxieties can get mixed up with explicit feelings, real feelings.

I have a family member who has gone through a major car accident.

A couple episodes ago, I talked through going to her wedding. Prior to having MVD surgery, I went to a wedding. It was both wonderful and very difficult. Then, four weeks after the wedding, the bride and groom got into a major car accident. The groom was okay, but the bride is deeply injured. So I have grieving process to go through for that trauma. That's trauma. People don't have to die for you to grieve because traumatic things have happened. I think it's a similar grieving process you have to go through the deal with trauma and get past it.

One of my very good friends who I've known for a very long time is very ill right n...