Got home and read about yet another young queer person from the american south being bullied until they were dead.
I am no medicine woman, but here are some ideas for tending to a nervous system which is badly shaken by this news.
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– Start with a drink of water. Cold water is good. Roll the cool of the glass or water bottle across your forehead.
– Walk. Move your body. Stretch. Adrenaline is released into your bloodstream when your sympathic nervous system kicks into a fight or flight response; energy and resources are allocated away from nonessential body functions like the immune system or digesting essential nutrients out of your food, and everything is sent to the places meant to help you fight your way out of a tight corner, or run the hell away from danger. This is why you might shake when you read about something profoundly sad and unsettling, a perceived threat to your safety. When you increase your heartrate with even just a little mild exercise, it helps push the adrenaline through your system so that you can disengage from fight or flight. Extended time spent in fight or flight has some pretty gruesome affects on health in the long term and it feels fucking terrible in the short term, so learning how to keep your nervous system from taking you to that place unless you have to be there is a good skill.
– Showers also accomplish something similar, here. Let the water wash away the pain.
– Engage your prefrontal cortex with a distraction. Grab a favorite book into which you can escape as comfortably as possible. Listen to music or a podcast. Watch a show. Just please choose the content of the distraction with care, so it doesn’t fuel a bad feeling.
– Locate any sources of physical discomfort and try to address that. If you have a headache take ibuprofen, if your pants are too stiff change into something cozier.
– Chocolate. Enough said. Hot cocoa is nice on a rainy day.
– Grieve however you need to grieve. Journal about your thoughts. Scream into a pillow. Talk to someone you trust.
– It is okay to cry for the dead, especially when the dead remind you of your loved ones, remind you of yourself.
– Avoid despair, even when that’s tricky.
– It is okay to wallow in your sadness for as long as necessary, and at the same time it is not okay to rot away in pain until you have fused to your mattress and your bones have atrophied and gone all wobbley. I have tried that and it is so much better to rise, slowly, eventually, from your slimey cocoon of grief and go make yourself some tea. Have a cookie. If you’re going to wallow, get comfortable with some ice cream and a duvet and put on your favorite show.
– formally reschedule obligations if necessary to make time to feel sad, instead of disappearing off the face of the planet without notice or trying to show up for your regularly scheduled life in an emotionally compromised state. People can sometimes be more understanding then you give them credit for and it is up to you to discern who those people are.
– Remember that you don’t have to heal this hatefully broken world on your own, and you don’t have to do all of it right away. It feels overwhelming to think about trying to make a difference to such a profoundly embedded prejudice that is very old and very strong and very stupid. But you can create an intention to find a way to help. Make yourself a promise to show up, in little ways. For them. When you’re ready.
– It also helps to try to believe that it is possible for this reality to change and soften into something more loving, even if all you have is just a little control over a very little sphere of this world we’re living in. Other people are fighting and grieving and loving, too, and they’ll be there when it matters.
– Don’t you dare lose yourself trying to change who you are because you’re scared of that same stupid bullying hatred being directed at you. Do the opposite. There are people who are scared and shy and just like you who need to know you exist and that you are lovely, so don’t fall for the trap of fear and hate and dim your light. And yeah, okay, there are some places where it is safer to shine than others – this is the part where you learn how to shape-shift. But please don’t let the fire go out, because the warmth from the fire is important to more than just yourself.
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Rest in peace, NB.