155. The Time In Between Place

Drawing by Serena

[Warning: some things may be triggering]

April 30 to May 7, 1996: Daily phone calls – in distress. “Shell (1, 2)” not out. Angela (5) terrified.

May 7, 1996: .. very discouraged at her slow process. She did memory work (Jenny Ru (4) and Angela (5)). Very tortured and in pain. Huge fear of being punished.

I think I’ve been depressed for a long time now. Months. It feels like I’m dying. I want to call someone and ask them to be with me while I die. Sometimes I feel so scared about this dying business. Nothing to hold onto anymore. A disappointment with life – is that all? No more? This is it?

I also know that the possibility of rebirth lays around the corner. But I’m not sure. You see I don’t believe I should be able to live longer and be happy. Is this survivor’s guilt? All these people I know who are sick. And people I don’t know who are sick, dying, dead. Why should I be able to go on living? Why should I be allowed to feel happy when others are miserable, have lost someone, are in grief, sick or dying themselves? What right do I have to feel okay?

I recognize our loneliness more often now. When Graham and Lance aren’t here. You can hear our loneliness when we read, when there is no tv on. When the house is quiet. How can we make our peace within?

We have lost interest in socializing, in even phoning and talking with people. This is a time of mourning and grieving for us. For so much that has been lost. But in order to begin something new, there must be an end to something old. Grieve.

A dream that the world around us is crumbling, falling apart, and dying. Our cat Sophie is lying down and we know she is dying too. Somehow that world seems similar to the Time In Between Place that Angéla refers to. She also mentions it to Lance. She hears voices – not ours, not from our Inside – and other noises but she can’t tell what they are. There seems to be shadows and ghosts there. It is a time between the past and the present. To her this is where memories are, and where secrets are kept. She says the past is definitely over and that you can’t go back to it and relive things there. You have to go to The Time In Between Place. She says I go there sometimes. I didn’t know that. Serena (5) knows about it too, very well. It’s the other half of the Central Core the part that is dark.

Angéla comes out in the multiple support group and cries. She is upset because The Time In Between Place scares her. She’s also afraid of other people knowing about it. She thinks they might get mad at her about it.

May 14, 1996: Angela present and in a lot of discomfort physically. Eventually she dealt with memories and wanted to die and fears punishment for speaking. She wonders if she is crazy, if I should commit her. Her realities are in another dimension, she thinks. Otherwise Caer seems to have support and is trying to keep up with everyday responsibilities.

Some of us knew early on why we needed to do the BFL group. We knew that MEA (8) and Angéla would be there. It was Mercedes (8) that said every week “We’ll never get what we need” and Angéla echoed that feeling. For some of you closer to the Outside, we understand this has been a very frustrating and confusing time but the answers lie deep Inside us. With Angéla, with No Self (4) and with Serena-AnereS and her mother Sean-Charlotte (5).

Sean-Charlotte has always thought she has done a fine job as “mother” to Serena. She has done what she could and she knows she could not save or rescue Serena (just as the facilitators in the group could not, just as our biological mother could not). The pain this has caused is tremendous. Serena feels it immensely, stuck in The Pit, dirt up to her shoulders, unable to move. And Sean-Charlotte right there, “doing nothing”. She cannot remove the dirt for Serena. And Serena asks why not? She is filled with so much anger at her mother’s inability to help her.

Angéla and MEA also feel tremendous pain but it is still buried deep for Angéla. There are buffers there for now because what is there inside for Angéla is way too much. Some of the Web knew that right at the beginning and had No Self build that wall strong.

Please don’t be in a hurry for answers now. Let them come out slowly and gently – for Angéla’s sake and for Serena’s sake, for the whole Web. We need some rest now and to do something different for a while.

We don’t want anyone telling us what to do now. We want to make all of our own decisions.

#4 secret released for Angéla. A memory surfaces and she tells Lance about it. She tells him what she saw and that Cinderella (4) was made to clean up afterwards. She does not want to tell Lyn when in a session with her so I do the telling.

We buy a silver feather pendant for Angéla and MEA, for taking all the risks of telling. They deserve something for their courage.

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We are about to take another big risk. We will be doing a presentation at the YWCA, telling our story. This is huge for us. And very scary but we want so much to do this. This means too that we must stabilize our life as much as possible so that we can prepare for this event. We have 4½ months. We also have 3 regular one-to-one clients with the possibility of a fourth. We are excited more than anything else.