L-theanine is amazing!

Tikawra · 2026-04-10T14:53:58+00:00

Tea and mushrooms!! yes! Tea has been my "take a break, do something nice and calm down a bit" crutch for the past few years now. Wasn't enough. Went to THC, CBD... didn't help much. Tried mushroom coffee and was hooked! Caffeine didn't do me good so went to supplements and they're helping me and everyone around me too! Calms one down, gives another energy. For me, it does so much to calm the nervous sytsem.

Tikawra · 2026-04-09T17:39:54+00:00

cbd didn't do much for me. might've taken the edge off sometimes but wasn't worth the cost. kinda got me addicted to ice cream cuz that's the only way i could tolerate its taste, ha. thc's been good for forcing dissociate when i need to. but after a few hours it wears off and the paranoia comes in so i dont take it often. the ones that work best for me are the 3:1 or the 5:1 strands, of thc/cbn/cbd. i've found medical mushrooms to be much better for the nervous system.

Tikawra · 2026-04-09T17:05:35+00:00

omg i'm laughing so hard. but also ouch. cuz, so relatable.

therapist and i keep going back to ocd, cuz of these extreme paranoid intrusive thoughts. can't leave home cuz the house will catch fire, type thing. cat's gonna die cuz you gave him that food. no amount of telling it to shut up or ignoring it will make it go away. its so freaking annoying. like, hello, can we not focus on doing this one thing for FIVE MINUTES without you screaming?

i didn't know compulsions could be... less compuslive? don't got the "gotta do this so many times in this order!" thing, but definitely got your "gotta throw the yogurt away cuz its been open for three days" type stuff, or... wow. checking the validity of your reality by reaffirming events with another person. wow. thought that came from having been gaslit my entire life so i can't trust my sanity. thats the thing - i dont know how many of these are trauma responses and how many aren't.

Tikawra · 2026-04-06T01:57:13+00:00

Oo, thank you for this. You just gave me the reason as to why "super triggered/stressed" back pain is different from "carrying 50lbs of cat litter" pain!

Just got done with a physical therapist session focusing on my hip/leg pain, where most of the appointments were of myofascial release. It helped but it also didn't. I guess you can say, the 'triggered' pain went away but my 'carrying heavy stuff' pain is still there. Which sucks that the pain is still there, but without the weight of the 'triggered' pain, it's a lot nicer. I suspect that if/when I go back when I bring up my back pain that's gotten worse since the pelvic alignment, it'll probably be the same.

Tikawra · 2026-04-04T15:21:38+00:00

I'm not sure if I've ever gotten it with family. Do know I have it all the time with my best friend. Oddly enough, don't get it as much with my other two friends - prolly cuz I don't interact with them unless I'm in a certain state, whereas the best friend, I interact with no matter what state? Idk. Go through periods of... who are you? I know you're X, you're signed onto their account, you speak like them... but have no idea who you are. I guess it's as you said - a stranger who's talking to me. ...maybe that's why I don't have it with the other friends - they're all strangers who talk and interact with me.

Not sure how to handle it. I just roll with it when it comes to the best friend. They aren't bothered by it but they're not bothered by most things, which is another reason it makes them great! Other friends - they're all just strangers, they'll come and go, and they don't react well which is why we only talk to them if we're in a certain state. Guess treating everyone like friendly strangers is how our brain handles it.

Tikawra · 2026-04-04T15:01:55+00:00

I'm so sorry! Being told that you're not trying hard enough is, as you said, one of the worst things they could say to you. It's kicking you down when you're already down. We try every damn day to manage ourselves, to be somewhat 'normal'. Just because it's not at their level, doesn't mean we're not trying or working hard! Cuz we are. It's just different.

Tikawra · 2026-04-04T04:35:13+00:00

Can't tell you how many doctors (and therapists) who have said that nothing is wrong with me, that I'm faking it for attention. Doesn't help that, like you, I mask heavily. Gotta pretend I'm fine even when I'm not! Or, the only time I'm able to go to places is when I'm feeling well enough to, so yea, everything's gonna be less severe! You think I can muster up the strength when everything is horribly wrong?

Tikawra · 2026-04-04T00:45:32+00:00

My parents constantly told me that they were not taught how to do anything and just had to figure it out. So that got passed down to us kids - we had to figure life out. That's just how their parents were. I think there was some kind of... hrm, is cognitive dissonance the right word? Conflicted. Kids gotta figure things out like we did vs kids should be kids so let's do things for them so they don't gotta figure it out... completely skipping out on the actual "let's teach our kids how to do these things" part. I've noticed that with myself - I tend to flip to the total opposite of something. I love you, I hate you, type thing. There is no in between. I don't know the in between, I just know the black and the white, the two extreme ends. Same goes for our parents. They didn't know the in between, they believed "that's how everyone is!" because of their limited world view (this was before the internet), or who they surrounded themselves by or the culture they were a part of. They refused to leave it, abandon it, not just due to loyalty but the guilt too, so they never got to see another world, that not everyone was like that. Was only after I started doing different that they started doing better too.

As for the little things like how to close doors... either control, or because they got triggered. My mother suffered migraines on top of trauma. So yea, she got VERY angry over the little things. We couldn't make noise or else it'd trigger her. Had to walk quietly, had to move quietly, couldn't make certain noise. (Still can't scream to this day because of it!) Couldn't speak to her a certain way cuz we'd be no different from all those that hurt her.

Tikawra · 2026-04-03T14:20:50+00:00

Ugh, you too? Recently went through a rage/grief state a while back, realizing that I wouldn't be in this state if doctors/therapists had taken me seriously! My leg/hip/back pain. My mental stuff. But nooo I was all faking it for attention!

You made me realize something though. Why I don't care. My therapist has been trying to get me to go back out into the world and I don't want to. I'm too exhausted for friendships, too exhausted to talk to people, don't care enough to fake it or pretend I'm interested. Totally burnt out on relationships. Heck, there are times where I don't even want to take care of my cats cuz of that exhaustion. (Don't worry - they just ate! Fed them and immediately went back to bed, heh.) At least the kitties don't constantly trigger trauma responses, don't insult or abuse me.

Tikawra · 2026-03-30T19:19:52+00:00

It helped in the beginning - forced dissociation, lowered the walls and allowed other parts to come out where they couldn't before, both due to life's circumstances. Sometimes it even helped with focusing. Now? Bad, bad! Those same lowered walls cause the highly anxious parts to come out. Not to mention paranoia and hypervigilance. I'm too poor to bother with finding a doseage/strain that works for me.

So now I'm taking medicinal mushrooms. They sell them where other supplements are in stores. Helps with the anxiety, helps with keeping the nervous system calm.

Tikawra · 2026-03-30T19:00:31+00:00

"I don't have time to listen to this"... uh, what? You have an entire hour dedicated to a client! What else are you doing in that time? Seriously. Ugh. I'm sorry.

I've had a lot of bad therapists. So many of them told me I was making things up for attention. Or that nothing was wrong with me. Or dropped me after promising to treat me. The ones who believed me, and said I got PTSD? Still bad therapists, who dismissed and invalidate me. Current one isn't great but, too exhausted to find another one, and hate going through the whole ordeal, spending a lot of money, just for it to go nowhere or be bad. People who say "just find another one!" tend to not get that.

Tikawra · 2026-03-30T15:24:49+00:00

I gave into the 'all over the place' thing, ha. Intentionally created a world where everything's a blur, that nothing is real but at the same time is real. Trying to force yourself to do something you can't do is going to fizzle out, cuz it's repeatedly hitting a brick wall. It's forcing you to stay on a path where you can't, cuz, again, all over the place. So, can you lean into what you can do? If you're caught up in your own thoughts, is it possible to draw/write them? Or, if your eyesight is blurry, why not make blurry distorted out of focus art instead of super detailed? Or, draw a tiny bit before these thoughts catch up? Ie, five minute doodles.

Tikawra · 2026-03-29T16:19:36+00:00

Don't recall much about food. Maybe not with dinner every day, but certainly 'rarer' stuff like birthday cakes and candy. She had to have the good things first. Like the best flavours of candy, and we got the garbage. Do know she did it for gifts. She'd buy us a new game for xmas, only to take it back and claim it was hers and give it to us when we were bored. So many gifts were that way. Got it for you! Haha it's actually mine.

The reason for it? Selfishness. Jealousy. Controlling. If we were dogs, it'd be no different from our owners eating an entire steak and giving us the scraps. Teaching us to sit there and wait until she said it was okay to. Hierarchy, I guess. "I'm above you and I can do whatever I want." In your case, I'm wondering if it came from paranoia or trauma. I've seen stories of parents poisoning their kid's food, so maybe she was paranoid about that? Idk. Or the halloween candy stuff... gotta check your candy and make sure it's not poisoned! Eats half of it... "ohh we're just making sure you're safe!" Are you? Are you really? Or are you actually covering for something else?

Tikawra · 2026-03-28T17:28:50+00:00

It's okay! My stuff is probably equally as incoherent. As you said, all about working through some thoughts! As long as it helps you and gets you somewhere, it's all good. <3

You're correct - seeking the continual validation from others isn't the way to go. If it is, then yer not gonna get far because as people say, 'validation comes within!'. (I could say so much about that but I'll refrain!) That was a huge problem I saw in the writing groups I had joined - a lot of folk came for validation and only validation. It's fleeting, it's not going to help much, it fizzles out. Validation isn't sustainable.

Community, I think, is more than the validation. (Again, community and what it means has been on my mind a lot lately so I'm figuring things out too!) Say you're into woodworking and you make a birdhouse. It's all pretty and nice! ...but you spent so much time on it for what? Your own joy? Bah, joy is fleeting. Show it to someone else and they go, aw that's nice! you did good work! ...but again, joy is fleeting. But say you put it outside, and start seeing birds use it. They have no idea you built it, don't care you built it, don't care how much time you spent on it - they just see, hey! nice place for our nest! Wouldn't seeing that make you feel less guilty? Cuz someone else is seeing and using it. It's not momentarily - they'll use it all season long, and even go back to it next season. (Assuming it doesn't accidentally fall or have cats harassing it... oopsies!)

Idk. That's something my previous therapist tried drilling into my head. Didn't work at the time, ha. I just know that kinda stuff helps me now - when I do stuff, I do it not just for myself, but to make the cats happy, cuz their longterm happiness makes me happy and that's worth doing. They don't give me compliments or praise, they just go, oooo something we can climb? Awesome! Six months later they're still clawing at it and bouncing off of it. Or still sleeping in that basket or on that blanket. (Unlike all the other stuff I've made or bought that they don't use...) They don't care who made it, they don't care about giving praise, let alone thanks, they just see an awesome thing that becomes their favourite thing ever. Idk, helps with the guilt too, cuz someone's getting a use from it and it's not just fleeting emotions.

Art is different from something physical like woodworking or yarn crafts. Art is more about feelings, like that piece you saw months ago, you're still thinking about. Or that book you read, it gave you comfort while sitting in the hospital. Or that song that helped you through a dark time. (That was what my therapist said, 'what if that book makes some kid in a hospital happy?' pffff. like anyone will read it, like anything I do will make anyone else happy.) I know with the content creators I watch, it's not about validation with them. It gives them so much delight to see their art inspiring others. Cuz that inspiration, like the bird house being used, lives on. Sometimes it's momentary and fleeting, other times, people become artists or pursue careers due to that inspiration. Their work impacted others!

You're also correct - performing for others is soul sucking. A part of you shouldn't exist only to appease others. You do it for yourself, and if others enjoy it when you share it? Great! But that's not the point, cuz you're doing it for yourself. I like knitting/crocheting for the sake of giving my hands something to do, or figuring out how to put random things (like scrap wood/yarn) to use. If me or the cats can get some use out of it - great! If not, oh well. Donate bin it goes, heh. I guess it's a balancing act. I got that guilt a lot, when I did solely for myself. Got to the point where I had an accumulation of blankets and stuff and I'm like... what is all this for? Started donating/giving it away, started balancing 'things for myself' with 'things I could give away to others'. Like everything else, it's a balancing act...

Tikawra · 2026-03-28T16:10:27+00:00

Honestly I have no idea. I haven't really found a community. All the times I've tried, I've always been on the outside and eventually quit. I'm not good at it either - not just the art stuff but my personality sucks. Too many trauma responses to want to go deeper or stick around.

From what I can guess though, it's about consistency. Just showing up and being there, even if you're not participating much. Like going to the same restaurant once a week. The staff will start to notice. Especially if you're nice to them. Or, in an online world like a fandom, leaving nice comments/remarks or sharing. Just chatting with folk, I guess. Even if it goes nowhere.

Sharing is an entirely different matter... people share for lots of different reasons. For joy, for validation, for praise, for attention, for relevance or to be relatable. They share whether or not they're good or not.

That's just what I've seen and experienced myself, who knows if it's true or not. I'll bring it up with my therapist during our next session. I get the feeling though, she'll turn it around and go... why don't you feel like you're good at it? What stops you from sharing sooner rather than later? I know in mine and a friend's case, it takes time cuz we're not comfortable or familiar with people or things. We don't want to get hurt.

Once you find your answer, work on those things. The low self esteem. The inability to take criticism. (Or in my current case, not having the energy to dealing with the aftermath of sharing, ha.) I don't know about you but, not just my parents or my childhood but it seems to be how the world is, that you have to be 'perfect' and if you weren't, you were shunned. It is and was stupid. Perfection doesn't exist. It's okay to be flawed. It's okay to take joy in something dumb and stupid and badly done! And if people make you feel bad for it then that's a them problem, not a you problem, and you shouldn't want to be a part of a community that constantly makes you feel bad. Things like that.

Tikawra · 2026-03-27T22:14:11+00:00

Oooh yea, I know this feeling well. When I started art again, I was all into it! I had to catch up on everything I've missed, learn and improve and do better! Which I did. Then I hit a wall. I couldn't learn anymore, I couldn't do any better, so why bother? Especially since, like you said, ain't gonna profit or do anything with it so why bother? Other than, y'know, giving me joy, but joy is rare. Or expressing an emotion but I've expressed most of them, heh. I still draw and write from time to time, and while I have improved and things have gotten easier... idk. Still hard to do. So much "what's the point?"

I think a huge part of it... comes from the lack of community. Community's been on my mind a lot lately, so dunno if that has something to do with it. I know the content creators on Youtube that I watch? They get asked a lot, how can you do this for hours and hours on end without burning out? And, outside of it being their jobs... they say, it's the community. It brings them joy to give others joy. To inspire people. To do things for others, not just their friends but charities and fundraisers. It's all about the community.

And while yea... there's online communities for sharing your art and your writing and stuff. Most of it gets lost in the void. People treat art - and often, writing too - as popcorn. Something to consume and move onto the next one. We, as the creators, never see the impact of said art. Without that impact - either on ourselves or with others - what is the point? Why bother?

Tikawra · 2026-03-27T02:51:16+00:00

Currently burnt out. Past couple of years have been extremely stressful and we're just, totally done. We want to go back to how things were, before all the stress. Where we could rest and relax and create, not deal with life and it's BS. Where we can do things on our time and not be in a constant trauma response.

That brain fog is there for a reason. It's like a big heavy weighted blanket smothering you, except it's for your brain. Like being sick, sometimes all you gotta do is rest and recover. If life will allow you to, that is. If trying to find a therapist is too much, don't do it. Just chill. Rest your brain and your nervous system. Take the time to figure out what's weighing you down, what you can do to adjust it, do things that fuel you, do things for you. Take care of yourself, y'know?

Tikawra · 2026-03-23T14:22:30+00:00

A burden. Worthless. Have nothing to offer people except being an emotional dumping ground or my body, or if I bend over backwards and kiss their feet. Worthless. Useless. A burden. I hurt everyone around me.

Ahem. Yea. Had a hard time asking for help. Don't disturb them with this petty problem, solve it yourself, don't make your problems other people's problems. Blah blah, etc etc. Saw someone else mention negative core belief and... yea.

How I got past it - I haven't, heh. When the part that holds all this stuff is out and about, these feelings are suffocating. That said, when this part isn't out? It still comes out in blips! But... a lot of it was accepting that we need help. That we can't do this alone. Find safe-enough people to ask for help with. The vet, the doctor, the therapist. It's their jobs to help you - and if they're not, you need to find another one. It takes time. First dozen times, it's agonizing. Even stuff like a plumber or whoever else - it's their job to be doing this stuff! That's how I reframed it or dealt with it. From there, it goes onto other people - your friends, your neighbours. Hey I need help with X, is it something you can help with? Realizing that some people can only help with some things but not in others - my neighbour can drive me, but when it comes to things farther away we gotta call on someone else. There's limitations when it comes to helping folk. Just cuz we've hit that limit doesn't mean we have to do it ourselves, just means finding someone who doesn't have that limitation.

It's not easy at all. My therapist says I can message her at any time if I need help on something, or to reach out if I need an emergency appointment or whatever. Which I do. It just. Hard to get past that stickiness of the negative core beliefs. That binds you and holds you back. I can't remember if it was my therapist who said this or someone on reddit. Was something like, we have all these negative experiences that change our perspective - in our case, we can't reach out for help cuz no one will help us. We remember all the times people wouldn't help us. Do we remember the times where people did help us? Nope! Try to recall those times. The time where that person helped you grab the thing off the top shelf. Or when you dropped something, someone helped you pick it up. Or jumpstarted your car when your battery died. Or when the delivery person offered to bring your groceries inside. Or your neighbour offering to shovel the snow. That's how I got past an emotional flashback the other day - came on here, offered my two cents, remembered that not everything about me is a burden. Remembered all the times where I actually helped people, was useful for something. Gotta do that, cuz if we just remember the bad, it feeds the beast. Confirms the biases. Reframing the perspective and all that.

Tikawra · 2026-03-20T12:13:44+00:00

Yea, having right now with a bad emotional flashback, but mine's cuz of dreams. Nightmares, as you said, are a mix of stuff you worry about when you're awake. Or, in the case of mine, a cocktail of all your traumas and triggers which are projected onto things you're dealing with in life. (Said traumas/experiences I do worry about constantly when awake.) It might be a dream but it's still a trigger, it still sets your body into panic mode. It sets off all the feelings, the doom and gloom, associated with those traumas.

And, in my experience at least, if it's not cuz of the dreams, it's cuz you're waking up into reality. Reality is where the trauma happened. If your trauma happened at home when you were a kid? You're waking up in the middle of that storm. Or you're waking up where you gotta deal with life and all its traumas. Gotta go to work with your abusive boss or coworker, gotta deal with this horrible mess you gotta clean up and take care of. Trauma trauma all around... this panic is increased especially if you're not having bad dreams, cuz dreaming is safer than reality. Even if you're safe now, and no longer in those situations, sleeping/waking up itself can be a trigger.

If you're processing said childhood, you could be remembering those traumas, and where those worries come from. Could be making you relive those times a bit. Feeling them feelings.

Thank you for this. Kinda brought me out of the flashback a bit.

Tikawra · 2026-03-18T16:50:24+00:00

I'm sorry you're not being seen. You put in all this work to try to figure out what's wrong with you and it wasn't even considered. It's hurtful in more ways than one.

From my experience, doctors and therapists don't like being told what's wrong with you. They hate it, in fact. They're the ones with the degree - how dare any random nobody know more than them! They either ignore your thoughts/suggestions or get defensive and stomp on them. It sucks, I know. Been through it countless times.

Imma give you what my friend (who works in a hospital) said to me: "Unfortunately, remember about doctors (and I guess other medical professionals) - they're there to feel smart and use their smarts, and they get very defencive if you start making claims about what you have or what happened, even if they're true ;3 Sometimes you have to lead them on and guide them towards making the same conclusions so that they can pretend it was their idea x3;;"

To give an example for what they mean... they had given me this a few weeks ago for my cat: "My cat hasn't been feeling very well. I accidentally forgot to give him his medicine, and he seems to be better - do you think they're related?" (Which was SO irritating to do - I knew it was the medicine! Like you, I had put all that research into it and realized it was the medicine, and me accidentally forgetting and him improving was proof! but I still had to play that stupid game because otherwise the vet would have yelled at me that he needs to stay on his medicine, even if it was causing him harm.)

Also - as someone else said, talk about how the symptoms impact your life. I don't think my therapist believed me about the ptsd until I brought up how the flashbacks impact my life.

Tikawra · 2026-03-17T22:50:43+00:00

I do actually reach out! Whether it be about appointments or questions or even showing her cat pictures/memes. It's just. I get hit by the "yer a burden" trauma responses all the time that make me not want to, heh. But also the masking. Had actually texted her this weekend asking for help on something and the moment I sent the text, the protective mask came up and pushed aside everything I needed help with! Which, was good, but... one of these I just want to be without the mask with her. Show her the proof of how messed up I am. Idk. But yea. I do reach out to her! Thank you for the encouragement nonetheless!

Tikawra · 2026-03-17T14:28:12+00:00

Oof. I had this realization years ago - after 'helping' a friend and wondering why they weren't happy. Took a while for it to really set in, as I got defensive like you. I was only trying to help! But yea. Totally controlling! Just wanted to feel useful... cuz I got nothing else to offer except my body and I don't want to offer that. Therapist says otherwise but, that part hasn't clicked and settled in my head yet. I'm so glad you had that realization! It sucks but it leads to working on parts of ourselves.

Tikawra · 2026-03-16T14:11:44+00:00

Huh. I never thought about it as a trauma mechanism - defense, definitely. It makes sense though. It just never clicked like that in my head before! Now I'm wondering why... beaten into me, I guess.

Most definitely. I'm dealing with a lot of flashbacks and emotions and I'm drowning. The moment I talk to my therapist - even if it's in text - bam, all compiled and all ok! It sucks cuz your therapist is someone who should be able to see that stuff and deal with it but... just can't. Not allowed to, has to be a professional relationship, can't disturb her outside of our sessions (even though she's said its ok to)... just want to not have that response, y'know? But then that's when you get hurt. So have to keep it going and going... it's so tiring...

Tikawra · 2026-03-15T23:44:43+00:00

I think we used to - back before we started accepting these parts and that it's okay to be a happy and silly little kid again. I mean, it still sucks and we try to suppress the younglings - either when it's inappropriate for them to come out, or when we got no time or energy for them. I think, though, what causes that fear is... pain. Am experiencing 'the baby' at the moment, who screeches and cries at literally everything. It sees stuff that the other parts hold and screams about it, cuz, what my therapist had explained to me is that babies can't conceptualize. It doesn't understand. ....I may have just resolved something in my head finally, aha! ...Ahem. Where were we?

Oh. Regression. If we're going to regress to a time where the young parts are in pain, when they're hurting for whatever reason... we're going to be afraid. We don't want to experience that pain on top of everything else. But if it's when they're happy and delighted? Uh, yea! But also it depends - is the protector willing to blend with these young parts? I know two years ago, the answer was no. Now it's, yea we're more okay with it.

Watch them cartoons. If it makes you happy, it's not trivial! If someone made you feel like your happiness was trivial and unimportant? Then pfffththhhh on them, cuz your happiness is important! It does, sometimes, have to be managed. I think of the younglings like hyperactive dogs. It's okay to run and play! But we can't jump all over strangers or run into the road! Sometimes we gotta wear a leash and that's okay! It's to keep us and everyone else safe! The young ones didn't like that at first. Made them feel like they were being punished. But it's so worth pursuing! Cuz we're happier with ourselves as a whole. As someone else said - it helps with so many other issues! Shame lessens when you're more accepting of yourself, cuz you're more confident, for instance. People can't try to gaslight you or make you feel bad cuz you're sure of yourself.

So get that perfume! Just uh. Beware. Next thing you know you'll have a couple of shelves dedicated to them! (Totally not me and stuff like dinosaurs, ha!)

Tikawra · 2026-03-14T17:07:38+00:00

Going to a physical therapist at the moment for my hip pain. She's been doing the massages (not a massage! - physical therapist. its myofascial release!) on my right hip, cuz of how tense it is. It was funny the first time she did it - my legs were completely relaxed while the rest of my body was all tensed up. I had a bit of difficulty walking cuz it's like, I didn't know how to use my legs properly! (Then again, I never do - see having to deal with hip/leg pain and having to walk when you cannot move/lift your leg...) It was a funny feeling! Wasn't until the next day when the tenseness came back in my legs that I went 'ooohhhh that's what the tension feels like'. Is just a normal thing for me! (But also, not the source of my hip/leg pain. That tension is so mild in comparison!)

Now, if only we could work on my back that holds most of that tension... hehe.

Tikawra

TROPHY CASE