Sometimes I absolutely crack myself up. At the end of last weeks Dilating Diaries entry I made the humble goal of dilating EVERY SINGLE DAY. It sounded like a great goal at the time but it kinda had the opposite effect. I put too much pressure on myself and spiralled into a ball of anxiety, which led to avoidance, which led to misery, which led to more avoidance, which led to more misery. ETC. The kicker is that I'd actually written at the bottom of the post something about how important it is to take things slowly and be kind to yourself. Honestly you couldn't make this stuff up.
The only good part of this is that I am now blindingly aware of my mistakes in recent weeks of going too fast and forgetting what's important. I've also written a more in-depth post about feeling under pressure so you guys can maybe learn what not to do.
Dilating Progress
Last week I had a bit of a downward trend in my sessions. At the time, all I wanted to achieve for this week was maintaining my routine so that I could get out of that rut. This led to a minor obsession about making sure I was dilating every day. It took me a while but once I'd realised what I was doing I immediately took stock and tried to relieve that pressure.
During the sessions that I did do this week I made a conscious effort to really work hard on mindfulness, being present and taking it slow. I tried something new this time which I don't think I've consciously used before. Positive affirmations. Basically verbally and out loud saying nice, confident, pep-talky things to myself and Narla before I start dilating (and maybe also during).
Something along the lines of "this is going to be a good session, there's no pressure to complete the session, let's just focus on what we are feeling and go from there". Unlike my normal sessions I took some pressure off the table by telling myself that I wasn't obligated to dilate today if I didn't feel like it. I made sure I did some mindfulness exercises at the start of the session, worked on arousal and pleasure and then assessed whether or not I wanted to dilate. If I did choose to dilate, I told myself (again verbally and out loud) that there was no pressure to insert the whole thing. I would just go until it became uncomfortable, then stop.
The thing is I've always known and understood that I'm under no obligation to dilate or insert the whole thing. At the same time though, I definitely have expectations that each sessions should be as good as the last, if not better. Anything else feels like a failure. So although making these verbal affirmations felt silly, it also made it sink in that I just need to accept each session for what it is.
I also decided to take 1 day off because I was busy and I felt like that would be a sort of circuit breaker to the pressure I'd been feeling. This 1 day turned into 2 and then 3, which is not a big deal in the grand scheme of things. In fact it's probably quite beneficial to occasionally take your foot off the pedal. The problem is that I had only envisioned taking 1 day off so when I failed to start again, it felt like I was losing control of my routine. Which did not help my already anxiety brain.
I was sitting on my bed last night thinking how much of a lousy week this has been, taking a long break (it wasn't long), feeling like a failure (definitely not a failure). I decided to read through the diary entries that I'd made in the past 7 days to see how bad the situation actually was. Here's the thing. I was a bit taken aback. The sessions had actually all been really good. I had just got so far inside my own head and wrapped up in my emotions that I'd twisted it to fit this failure narrative.
So here is my statement to myself: The sessions this week were SO MUCH better than last week's, despite there being fewer of them. Taking a break hasn't lost me any ground.
I'm very aware that this all sounds very melodramatic in hindsight once I'm writing it out which just goes to show how many emotions are tied up in this process.
The thing that I always come back to when I'm feeling so negative about this process is (unsurprisingly) sitting down and writing down what I'm feeling. Sometimes I use an emotion wheel to help with that since I'm not very good at expressing my feelings (I am definitely emotionally unavailable). And then I take stock and think. What is the actual reality of this situation? Does it match up to what I'm feeling? Is it all as bad as I think it is? It's not a miracle cure but sometimes it helps me to stop my anxiety spiralling and put things into perspective. I usually feel a little better after. What's really not helpful is when I slip into complete avoidance of everything, dilating, writing, drawing, socialising, exercising. It's not rocket science but it's hard to move into action when you're in that place sometimes.
I'm starting to see some positive patterns
This is great! It means I can keep refocusing back into these things over time:
Once I'm in the habit, it's much easier to keep going. The problem is when I break the routine. If I take a break in future I'll try to put a 'return' date in my diary.
Mindfulness is really helping me in my sessions. I always have a better session if I take 15 minutes to myself beforehand.
Taking the sessions slowly and using breathwork is vital. Inserting slowly in stages.
Maintaining my personal journals is keeping me on track and bringing me back to what's important each week.
Looking forward to next week
As I demonstrated impeccably last week, making a statement here is no guarantee that I will follow through but it certainly makes it more likely! I think I'm going to take it easy in the next 7 days. There's a lot going on in the world and in my life that is not Vaginismus related. This week also marks the start of the UK's second lockdown and I think that's enough to deal with let alone anything else. So here's what I'm going to do:
Get back into some sort of routine whether that's dilating everyday or every other day or every three days. I don't care. Just some routine.
Focusing on mindfulness and taking things slowly
Do things that make me happy in my free time (even more important during lockdown)
Catch you next week!
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