life in the darkness

It comes from within. The deep anxiety of being told, can we have a word?
Nausea, tachycardia, the temperature turning ice cold around you, but the clammy feeling is there too. Then the memory’s The echo stairwells, the voices, the leaning over you, the pulling of your ears, the quick footsteps of the clip-clop shoes she wore. The perfume, Sherevienne.
That familiar, Samantha ash!

Being trapped in the room with nothing you can do! I’ve done nothing wrong! You can’t answer back. She’ll threaten you otherwise. Will she carry it out? It’s you against her. Just sit and let her go on! The bullying from other students. Pulling your hair. Pretending to cut it. The throwing of salt. Phones near your ear. Bells being rung next to your ears on purpose. When you ar put next to the school bells to wait for the start of your lesson.

One form of trauma I have been through, but there are others.
Conflict with people at home. Shouting, smashing of Glass. Telling them: Stop! Stamping my feet, thinking they would listen and hear, but no! They didn’t. They carried on. They then split in 2002. Grandad’s voice breaking with emotion as he left the garden for the last time.

RNC. Hereford.
Main trauma? Residential halls and my first ever seizures. I was diagnosed with epilepsy. The students though went one step too far! A group of boys would ring my doorbell at 1 AM or just after, to wake me up on purpose, but one night they took things further! I heard the scrape of a key in the lock of the door that lead into my corridor. The voices, is Samantha Ash in there? Three of them lingering outside the bedroom door; What would they do when entering? I stayed very quiet and still. Trying not to breathe. I waited and for what seemed like an eternity, they leftt. I wasn’t sure what they would have done had they gained entry! Would they? Would they try? Would they sexually assault me? I still wonder that to this day. They would have I think if they could. They would have gained great pleasure in that.

UCLAN.
The lectures were good, but the residential side was not.
Students accusing me of violence. The disciplinary hearing which caused a small seizure.
That day being brought in front of the Dean.
The room went cold. The head of faculty reading out the accusations and evidence. I sat, sweat on my head. But not sweat you could see. Sweat you could feel coming from within. The clammy feeling was there, like all those years ago.. Was my future on the line? I wasn’t answering the head of faculty. I wasn’t paying attention. I was tense. Sat in the chair thinking of what would happen. What the people doing this to me would do once they had won their battle. Battle of kicking me out of Uni. The assignments I had failed. The tutors I had let down. Nan, myself. Then what?
Still he went on. The evidence shows that… What can you understand? Is it wrong to do this? And again! He still pursued his point.
A few weeks later, they did a fitness to study plan. This is it; They’re kicking me out! The assignments I’d failed had come up. Straight away I had a panic attack. I never had them often.
There was then the trauma of people taking control of my healthcare, treating me to eat or I do not go out. This was in Wales. Eventually I had had enough.

I tried to ask permission to go home, but was stopped. I was told I was impulsive. That my family were evil. How could I get away?
Eventually I was taken to my friend’s house.
When I got there, the flood gates opened. A wave of nonstop crying. I was shaking uncontrollably. Was this cognitive freezing? The relief I had been rescued? Saved from those who were potentially very bad for my future. But also from the exams I could never now sit, as they made me withdraw from my place at the University. The mixed feeling of anger, anguish, relief, and pain!
Pain because I couldn’t complete my course that I’d wanted to do so much. Couldn’t have the chance to resit the assignments I had failed. Could not enjoy the lectures I had enjoyed with the people who were so lovely to me. It was a deep numbness. A deep pain that I cannot even explain. But Visceral.

There were also the visits from the police. Again, accusations of harassment, of fraud, which I would never do. I sat in bed, struggling to breathe. Breathing in air was like breathing through a straw. It felt like my airways had closed. The stridor loud and distressing to hear from an outsider’s point of view. WOULD I be arrested. What would happen to me then? What would I do? Who would defend me? Would my family support me? Who would? The next day, I spoke to the officers, but my brain couldn’t handle it. It triggered an epileptic seizure. A tonic-clonic.

Yes, These are examples of some of the traumas I have gone through in my life. My own conflicts with my nan where I lashed out. I’m not proud of it. But at the time, I was taken over by anger, frustration and defence mode. But why? What was going on in my brain? Afterwards comes the amnaesia. What happened after the row? What happened before it? Time was going bye so fast, but in my head, it had frozen. The flashback of the row continuing to play like a record on loop! Again and again and again. What could I do? It was my fault! I shouldn’t be here anymore! If anything happens to her it’s my fault! So I planned it. The pills; I knew where they were. All I had to do was go to my box, open the packs and take all of them in one go! But I couldn’t! The rational part of my brain had kicked in. No, you can’t Sam! That’s not the answer! Taking your life is never the answer! So I waited. The amnaesia still there. The events going like a blur. Who said what was a blur. I couldn’t remember anything, except the main event. Me lashing out. That’s what trauma does! Your brain shuts down! The cortizol floods round your body, thanks to the amygdola setting off the alarms of threat! Cortizol, adrenalin and noradrenalin are rushing round your body, to make the major organs work harder to fight off the apparent threat. This is the sympathetic nervous system.
Can you deal with it? Yes. But in my view, as was Skinner’s viewand the view of other psychologists, to deal with the trauma after effects, you have to face it head-on. It won’t be nice. But you must. then dissect every part and learn how to put it into the back of your mind. I recommend reading books like What doesn’t Kill us by Prof Steven Joseph. Researching the psychology of survival. It is very interesting when I have researched it myself. I would love to help people with traumatic brain injury, but not just on a psychological level, on a hands-on level too. With speech, language, support, to understand their brain, to help their carers learn what to say, how to say it, what not to say. To support the surviver in walking, holding things, and helping them from their journey out of coma, to the community and in it. I myself have an ABI. I know some of the frustration. I know some of the social difficulties. I would like to help.