Inside Where We Live (Josslyn)

image from google

hi im josslyn an im like, i dunno, 13 i guess. i usedta be littler but i was scared of everything and spent a lot of time under my bed or in the closet cuz i was always scared. but then i took a really loong nap, like from november to march and now im awake an with my twin sister parker and im bigger and not scared anymore.

my job is kinda to help watch stuff inside and to help feel fear. i see a lot of what the inside sisters do and how they act and i see and feel when they feel scared and i can mostly tell where the fear is coming from an why. i can find help, like tellin mama and daddy, or i can keep it to myself, or i can tell kaysie or bella or brina. they are the protector team. mama and daddy are on the protector team too but i don't think they know that. some people think its weird that mama and daddy are only a few years older than the body but they raise us and treat us as our age but they don't gotta live our life and its really not their business anyways so no one asked them.

i really like to color. i have a stuffed animal pony that is striped with all kinds of bright colors and i love butterflys. at our old house before this one i had butterfly stickers on the walls all over by our bed but daddy said they wouldn't stick again so they didn't get to move with us when sister peeled them off the walls. that really sucks a lot and i miss them cuz they were bright and fun.

we usedta have a husband. i guess we kinda still do. he hurt us a lot in the heart and on the body. we have a half moon burn on our calf that itches a lot today that he burned in there. he called it a brand and he spent weeks peeling the scabs to make sure it scarred real good. i still have dreams about that. it was scary. he has our dog and we have the bodys kids with him that we gave to mama and daddy because we can't raise kids and none of us remember much about having kids and we didn't even really want to but he liked pregnant girls and liked to keep us pregnant cuz we were easier to keep quiet an we were clingy. its hard to look at the body's kids sometimes but mama and daddy help a lot an took over there and the body's kids say giving them to mommy and daddy was the best choice we ever made for them and that we usually make bad choices for them so they are happy about this one.

i wrote a lot. i guess. oh well. thats me and what my job is an what i was thinkin about. oh an we have a butterfly tattoo i hate cuz its a property mark we were made to get. but its a butterfly.

love,

jossy

Time Flies!

Its been over a month! I know, it sucks for me too. It turns out we despise trying to write a blog post on our cell phone. Our laptop is touchy and we really don't like being at the big computer with our back to the room, and the big computer takes forever to load stuff and its frustrating so we often don't bother. But then we don't write!  And Lord knows we need to write. We all do better writing and writing on paper isn't happening anymore.

Journaling is really helpful for most of us. Hand writing feels awkward and we all feel reluctant to have our thoughts laying around on paper. At least here we can make things private if we need to or want to, or we can share them with the world anytime we want to.

There are about 9 of us active right now.... they are....

Me (Kaysie)
Alayna
Jenna
Cadie
Lyssa
Hayley
Abby
Zoey
Bella

Bella isn't fronting at all unless absolutely necessary. The rest of us are handling day to day life as best we can. Its been tricky because we had to make the very hard choice to give our dog to our ex for reasons that are best for her....mostly health reasons. She was our therapy dog... our bond was tight and we miss her like crazy. Its only been a week but the chaos its created is nuts. Everything from feeling alone, abandoned, unsafe, unable to trust, attachment issues, and overwhelming sadness. I'm hoping it all starts to settle down soon.

Because everything is mixed up we have been working on new ways to stay connected and together. We have found a way to communicate outside when communication inside is tricky and the parents have been monitoring everything to make sure we can ask them whats been going on and they can help us out. They have been pretty patient too. We want to start writing more too.

Thats about it for now...

Kaysie

The List

This is, hands down, one of my most favorite memes from Facebook. It completely describes most of us in this system. People have asked us before why we always seem to need to learn things the hard way and the answer has always been the same..... we didn't realize there was any other way. I think, in a way, the hard road/way always seems easiest to understand. We are leery of things that seem too easy. Almost like its a trap or not "real". 

So, these silly girls take the hard road. Part of taking the hard road seems to be never looking at what's right in front of you. Right in front of me is a ton of opportunity to learn new things and to do things that previously were impossible. Mom and Daddy are really supportive of whatever it is we want to try. So some of us made lists of things we would like to try to learn or do.

My list so far: 

Lose weight (working on that, down 32lbs since we moved here in August)

Learn to bake

Learn to cook

Become a better and more consistent writer

Get divorced

Knit something useful

Change the way the body looks to better reflect us... get comfortable in our skin

Learn to bead on a loom

Become somewhat athletic

So far that's what I've got. Glee is playing now (binging on Netflix) and they are talking about Domestic Violence. I'm home alone, like usual these days, and anxiety is bad. I have brownies cooking for Mama in hopes that it makes her smile. I used a box mix because I have no idea how to bake anything from scratch, nor do I understand what ingredients would be needed. That's why baking is on my list. 

Its time to switch. I'll let you know how my list progress goes.

Alayna Jade

Our Aching Feet.....

Most weekday mornings we head out for a walk. We aim for anywhere between 3 and 5 miles, although sometimes we're lucky to hit two miles.... haha.  The walks weren't something we could really do in our old life. We didn't feel safe enough or comfortable enough and it always seemed like our time was better spent in other ways. Here, though, we are greeted every morning by this sight:

Our mountains wish us good morning (taken 11/1/15 with the samsung S6 around 7:45am).

We really didn't think the walks were accomplishing much except for aching feet. (Pretty sure we have a muscle/tendon problem in the right foot, but no pain no gain, right?!). When Mom realized we were serious about the walking she decided we needed new shoes and that has helped a lot (stupid arch in the right foot is still killing us tho....shhh). We seriously had no shortage of aches and pains but we own a mirror and nothing seemed to be changing. It was getting pretty disappointing, which was leading to feelings of defeat and failure. Those feelings were, in turn, fueling some massive bad energy and I'm willing to bet causing us to overreact to other things. We were getting tired of seeing this (see picture below) and still feeling rejected and worthless (other things contribute to that feeling but this wasn't helping):

This a partial screen shot of our Fitbit Flex today (11/1/15).

The negative emotions were eating us alive. We were second guessing a lot of our recent major decisions and trying to figure out how we had screwed up so badly in life. We were trying to figure out what was wrong with us and why we are always rejected and/or left behind. It was just bad. If you've read other posts, you know how bad things got. Everyone in this house was dealing with their own problems and adjusting to their transitions in their own way. Everyone was battling big things... and we were sick. We spent almost all of last week with a bad cold and a mild fever. That helped NOTHING at all, especially because we couldn't safely go for our walks. We could barely make it safely across the driveway. 

Being down for the count last week, having to rest and not walk seemed like a great thing. It seemed so wonderful to not ache and not deal with the arch pain in our right foot. It continued to seem like that, but our life seemed to be falling apart at the same time. We were a mess, our life felt like a huge mess. 

Thursday of last week Mom insisted that we were not only going on our walk, but that we would complete two miles before coming home. Honestly, I (meaning me, Alayna) was pretty sure she had lost her mind because we were still running a slight fever so in my mind we were still sick. Sick kids don't go for walks. Sick kids binge on Netflix. I wanted us to binge on Netflix. Needless to say, if you've ever met my mother, we lost and we went for our 2 mile walk. We lived through it and Jenna at least, was pretty proud of us for getting it done. Then we went back to hanging out with Netflix. (side note: Netflix is pretty much our only friend here, so we're pretty attached...lol)

Friday morning comes around and Mom, once again, insists on a 2 mile walk. We ended up with close to 2.5 miles on Friday. 

By yesterday, we realized that when we don't walk, we miss a lot of benefits from walking. We miss our park, our mountain, and our trees.

More importantly, we miss out on the good feelings that come from walking. We've always heard that walking releases endorphins and raises mood, blah blah blah. I can honestly tell you that the blah blah blah is real. Our mood and our life was spiraling out of control because we weren't doing what we needed to do in order to take care of ourselves. No, we shouldn't be walking when we're sick but we could have tried sooner. Mom knew though. She knew how badly we relied on that, even when we didn't. She made the choice to force us back into it knowing we didn't feel well. 

That's not to say that our problems as a family were all due to a lack of walking. God I wish it were that easy. No, we as a family have a lot of work to do in order to make everyone feel welcome, safe, and happy. But we can make it better on ourselves and, in turn on our family, by keeping up with our walking. 

This morning, while we were hanging out in Mama's room watching her go through her laundry, she had us try on some pants. Almost everything she gave us to try on fit, and most of them were smaller than what we already had. She had noticed that we were struggling to keep our pants up. We noticed too, kinda, but figured we stretched them out or something. We never considered that we were ready for smaller pants. Her scale (which she only lets us use once a week) showed us today that we have lost 30.2 pounds since we moved here in August. That's huge. It's seriously huge and we never noticed. I spent a bit looking in the mirror today, and I really can't see it. The neighbor sees it. Aunt Leslie says she sees it in pictures. Mom says she sees it. We just don't.

What we do see: Our hair is growing back thicker and in much better shape, our nails are getting healthier, our blood sugar is almost always close to perfect and a blood sugar level of 90 feels great. When we first moved here 130 triggered a low reaction. Our average blood sugar sat around 300 and refused to budge.  

Today, after completing 3 miles and seeing the scale, the clothes fitting differently, and spending some not emotional, perfectly normal time with Mama, I feel good. Not only do I feel good, I feel hopeful, strong, and I feel a weird sort of peace. I don't really feel safe yet, that I think will come in time. I think I need to work on not pushing myself to feel safe. Pushing this system to feel something we aren't ready for or can't seem to grasp always seems to lead to disaster. I think I'm going to do my best to keep my sisters and I looking ahead and I'm going to keep building my support system. I love my family and I won't give up.

Alayna Jade

Heroes

That's the truth. We are just kids. The body may be 34 years old, and our littles may be more advanced in some areas than chronological children, but we are just kids. We range in age from 4-17 years old and we have some stunning lacking skills in the area of social skills and emotional regulation. 

But you see, we have had to become superheroes over time. I guess some of us were created to be heroes. Being a hero is a really big job, and had K and A not been hurt so badly when the body was little (and through most of the rest of our life), there would be no need for most of us and no need for kids to be heroes.

Our system, the huge bunch of kids we are, has done alright through life. Jessa has been an incredible protector throughout the years. Yeah, she's made some awful choices (we all have) but she has been a rock and has been the first in line to help us navigate the murky and sometimes dangerous waters of life. She has been the first to slip out and take some of the worst abuse. She has had the worst things said to her, and has experienced the darkest sides of human nature and has never once held anything against the rest of us. She has been the biggest superhero this system ever had and she rarely misses anything.

Since we moved though, the terrain has been unfamiliar. No one has intentionally tried to hurt us or take advantage of us here. Dad has time and time again gone out of his way to ensure our happiness and our safety. He has made sure the littles know he loves them and thinks of them often... as is evidenced by.....

Real picture from the top of our shelves...

The unfamiliar environment and unfamiliar social setting has made things very hard on Jessa. Jessa, who has worked tirelessly in our life to keep us safe, is at a loss. Nothing she does here is right. Some of what is right feels really wrong (because it's uncomfortable, vulnerable, and unfamiliar), and some of what should be wrong feels familiar. We came here expecting things to be a certain way, and when there was something new inserted into there we tried to fight the new element that we weren't prepared for... and we lost. We lost big time. And while being expendable and inconvenient/unwanted isn't unfamiliar at all, it hurts and we aren't sure what to do with that pain. 

Yesterday was a day of several triggers, none of them small triggers. Jessa went into yesterday already struggling. She had weeks of feeling defeat on her shoulders. When the triggers hit yesterday and we had to work through them all by ourselves all day long, I think it may have broken something inside of her. There was an argument between Mom and the neighbor. The neighbor is Mom's best friend. They had been arguing for about 2 days. It was actually, now that I think about it, the most time Mom has spent with just us since we got here. But anyways, the argument started loud and sounded aggressive. That was all it took. The trigger hit and we were down for the count in a blind panic. What do we do? Do we try and save her? Do we let her fight her own battles? Is there anywhere to turn for comfort? Does anyone want to comfort us? There were so many questions. We ended up with a shower and some TV. Mom and her friend worked through their argument with conversation and weed, which moves into trigger number 2. We are living in a state where that is entirely legal (for inquiring minds) but them high reminds us of our cousin on heroin. We watched her roll unconscious off of our toilet when she took too much one day. The treasures were home for that. The fear, the feelings, the having to make huge decisions, the inconsistencies, the conversations that make absolutely no sense, and most importantly the utter disregard for anyone else's emotions or feelings are all shared between heroin use and weed use. Between the argument and the fact that they were high (which is NOT a problem for them... and only a problem for us because of triggers) and being alone all day (we were alone all afternoon due to an appointment Mom had a few hours away), I think Jessa broke. Last night, after Dad was home from work, Hayley came out for her 1 hour a week and Mom left to go hang out with the neighbor. Dad had left to pick up ice cream at the store so Hayley stayed home alone coloring pictures and sending pictures of her art work to Mom and Dad by messenger. Jessa felt like a complete failure as far as a protector goes because she hadn't expected Hayley to be alone, so she wasn't co-con or even paying attention. This morning K ended up alone all morning because Mom went to have coffee with the neighbor and they were smoking. One of the dogs went missing and K walked for 20 minutes trying to find her while running a slight fever and struggling to breathe. By the time her rotation scheduled was done she was convinced no one wants her and that she's a bad girl. 

Jessa had the scheduled time after that. Mom was back by then and gave Jessa meds and snuggled her up on the parents bed with the remote to their TV and it was quiet and dark and peaceful, but Jessa felt like she had been put away because the neighbor was here and by now I think they all figure we hate him but the truth is, we're terrified of him. His drug use and inability to have a coherent conversation (among other things) already had made us leery and threat assessment on him was very high but after yesterday we are really afraid of him.  

But see, the thing is, we have no reason to be afraid of him. He is NOT a bad person. He's a good guy who has gone out of his way to help us more than once. He's been patient, kind, and has even taught us a thing or two. He's good with the treasures and even better with the dogs. I won't even hold it against him that he likes all the other dogs better than ours... he's still good to her.

After all of this... Jessa has decided she's done being a hero. More specifically she's decided that she sucks at being a hero and that we are obviously too much work, unwanted, inconvenient, and expendable. We are the ones that people feel fine about ditching last minute after making plans and something better comes up. We're the ones that will still be there later so we can be safely ignored in favor of others. The littles hurting is more than Jessa can stomach and she no longer has any desire to fight with anyone about it. Because she's learned that she can beg to talk all she wants, she's going to be turned away. She's going to be told that its not family therapy, that she needs to get a handle on her emotions, that she needs to back down, and that she needs to fix herself... that we all do. 

We try. We try so hard. We bought books about therapy and have worked hard at distraction, visualization, and even imagining a white healing light. We list everything we are grateful for every night before we go to sleep. We talk to each other near constantly, we remind each other to be good, to be kind, to be patient, to be fair. We analyze almost every action and word that comes out of this mouth to see how it could affect someone else. We walk on eggshells so that we can survive, like we have always done. And its still not enough. And Jessa no longer believes that we can ever be enough. 

Jessa posted on Facebook today in a group for systems like ours, specifically protectors, and asked if protectors can resign. She wants to be done with her job as protector and she's decided we failed as members of this family. My heart is broken. It takes me a long time to attach to anyone emotionally and Jessa and are bonded. We are a bonded pair. I have always taken Jessa's presence and activity as a definite. Now there's talk about me taking over the primary protector duties and Jessa taking a break/going dormant. My heart is broken.

We're just kids... we aren't supposed to be heroes.

This is what happens when kids are expected to be heroes. 

Understanding Ourselves....

Henry David Thoreau said "Not until we are lost do we begin to understand ourselves."

We have spent the better part of our lives lost. We didn't really gain much for understanding ourselves.

I'm not really sure where I'm going with that. I just know that today has been rough, almost from the beginning. Jessa was out this morning, and she's struggling hard emotionally and has been for months now. She faced our first major trigger by  9:30am and then the triggers just kept coming.

We have been working hard at reigning in strong emotion and not forcing anyone to pay for our emotional fall out. We succeeded in keeping our emotions quiet so far today, but not with a lot of struggle and a lot of silent tears. We are losing time badly and aren't even positive who is out. I know right now I'm Layna, but I have no idea who was here or what happened in the last hour. Its Cadie's turn at 3pm and I hope we can get that together. 

I just now remembered that the youngest child is here in the house.  I was in a full blown panic because I could hear noises and I didn't know where they were coming from. I was sure that I was in danger... and it wasn't the fist time today we thought we (or someone we love) was in danger. Being faced with triggers like that, especially the big triggers, ends up causing intense fear, dissociation, and paranoia. When faced with big triggers together, like we did today, we become almost emotionally catatonic, or an emotional volcano. 

I hate when it gets like this. I hate when we are triggered so badly that we slide into black outs and losing time. I hate that we can't handle being alone at home for more than a couple of hours. I hate that we are so pathetic. I hate the messages from J and J. I hate the fact that we are expendable and second string. I hate that we are so easy to push aside and not at all worth chasing or talking things out with. I hate that I can not remember what I'm writing right now and I have to keep re-reading to remember. 

 

I hate that today we feel defeated and either useless or a fuck up (can't agree on which). I don't even know what to write about. Noises keep coming from outside and a couple of the dogs keep whining and crying and I have no idea whats causing any of it. The kids that are home keep asking whats going on and I don't have an answer which is making me feel more scared, pathetic, and useless. I've done chores around then house in hopes of proving that we are worth something.... have any kind of value.  Anything that makes up for these PTSD reactions. 

Its now Cadie's turn but we're having trouble switching.We seem to be doing okay co-con. We just can't totally switch. We are gonna have to work on that because Cadie is less emotional than me and I'm freaking out and no one comes home for another 3 hours. so she'd really be the best option. We will have to keep on working on that. I feel so alone. I can't tell if this headache is from the emotions or the cold we are fighting. My eyes burn too. Hoping its not a fever.

**Layna**