The Second "First Date"

I have been undergoing hypnosis for a phobia I have been experiencing for years. I only mention my treatment because although, so far, I have not become less afraid of the centipedes that sometimes tread and tread and tread the gray, industrial carpeting that covers most of the floors in my apartment, I have noticed that my grieving habits have been affected.

Two sessions into my hypnosis, I noticed I was feeling pretty happy over a six-week period, which leads me to believe that I am undergoing hypnosis under the guise of bug-induced turmoil, when in reality, but quite subconsciously, I am really dealing with my grief, looking for a way out of the darkness. I plan to talk with the hypnotist to find out if switching gears and admitting to dealing with grief makes more sense. After all, what is fear, but anxiety, anyway and what has Chris’ death and my grief caused me? Anxiety.

Mostly over the past few weeks, I have been uncomfortably aware that I have been suppressing all of my grief, which is not the outcome I desire. I don’t want somebody to wave a magic wand and make my sadness vanish. What I really want is for somebody to wave a magic wand and make me give myself permission to let go and move on. There’s an imp within my soul who prevents me from allowing myself that luxury. Hypnosis may have nothing to do with my suppression. Yesterday was the exact two and a half year anniversary of Chris' death, which is likely the real culprit.

I haven’t written in a long time, because I haven’t been able to bring any of my thoughts and feelings to the forefront of my brain. I have been experiencing powerful depression, which almost stopped me from living my life. I quit the show I was singing in and my schoolwork has fallen four weeks behind. So, once again, I have increased my Zoloft dosage and I have begun to eek back up to a state of synthetic emotional stability. I suppose that one day I will be pouring a few bottles of Zoloft into my white, blue-rimmed breakfast bowl, adding soy milk and eating up. That's the aftermath of grief, I guess.

For anyone who doesn’t understand what type of hypnosis I am undergoing, I will explain that I am not receiving hypnotic suggestion from this man. Instead, I am traveling through time, backwards, through my life, landing on memories of times in my life when I felt the same terror I feel when I see a centipede. The hypnotist never asks me specifics about what I am remembering. He only asks how old I am, if I am in lightness or darkness and whether I am alone or with people. Since he doesn’t ask for details beyond those, my brain is prone to wandering and I’m beginning to suspect that I have somehow turned “centipede” into a metaphor for “grief.” Pretty sneaky, huh? I didn’t go to him for grief, but grief, as usual, is running the show.

I’m not sure what to do at this point. I have choices. I can either continue to go and make a concerted effort to think about centipedes throughout my treatment, I can decide to deal completely with grief, or I can stop going. I have lots of choices.

Tomorrow, I am finally meeting face-to-face with man I have been e-mailing with since March. I like him. We seem to have a lot in common and tomorrow, we are meeting for lunch and a drink to finally say hello to each other in person. I’m excited.

I am aware of the differences between now and a year ago, when I first began dating, again. I feel ready, now. I’m still scared and I still feel some guilt, but my loneliness has actually become instrumental in raising my awareness that I may need to push myself up and over the hill and around the bend in order to give myself happiness, again.

This man knows nothing about my situation, not even that I was once married. I feel good about that. If he asks me, I’ll tell him the truth (or some of it), but I’m hoping for more lighthearted conversation on our first date, which is another difference from a year ago when I felt the need to inform anyone who would listen that my husband died.

This will be my second "first date."

I’m nervous, in a nice kind of way. And I feel hopeful.