I did not have anything traumatic happen to me today. I had a pretty “normal” day. I even spent some time with a friend. I am in one piece. From the outside I look pretty average. But tonight I’m feeling very triggered.
Now, before we talk about me, let’s talk about something super important—the word triggered. It’s a super tricky one. People tend to throw it around super nonchalantly; “ew there’s a tomato on my sandwich—I’m triggered.” And, let’s be real, those of you who know me in real life know that I vehemently despise tomatoes (and that’s putting it nicely) but I also know that talking about something you don’t like on your sandwich is not the right way to use the word triggered. It’s a serious word, with serious connotations, that has been colloquialized as something much less serious.
A lot of times people use the word to mean that something simply causes some sort of negative emotions for them. Like that tomato on their sandwich. Or something political that they are offended by on facebook. Or a picture that they don’t want to see because they think it’s weird. Or something that upsets them a little or makes them cringe.
When, in reality, being triggered means that you are being brought back to something that initially caused a trauma in your life.
A trigger can be activated by any of your senses and it’s super personal and specific to you, as the person experiencing it. The trauma was yours and the trigger is yours.
Today I had a monitor placed on my chest in the exact same spot that my first port was. The smell of the prep pad that the nurse used was the same smell of my port preps. The monitor has a dressing on it that sticks out of the top of the neckline of my shirt like my port dressings did. It itches like my port dressings did. My seatbelt rests on it just like it rested on my port. I get a lump in my throat every time I look in the mirror and see it. And I’m in bed, in the dark, early tonight so that I don’t have to look at it anymore today.
It’s not my port. I know in my heart that it’s not my port, but in my brain for half a second every time I see it or feel it I go back. I go back to the pain, the fear, and the uncertainty of those days. I go back to waking up covered in blood that first night. I go back to the day lying on the table trying to save my first port so I didn’t have to get a new one. I go back to the handprint bruises from manually trying to flip it. I go back to the days of praying and crying for blood so that I just knew it was working. I go back to the burning pain when the medicine escaped into my chest. And I try my hardest not to go back to the day that I did have to get a second one.
I go back to all of it.
And, it may seem crazy that I’m writing about it when I’m straight up telling you that it’s upsetting me. It may seem counterproductive to talk about something that is clearly taking me back to days and times that I don’t want to remember. But in my case, I need to remember. It’s painful. Oh my god, it’s painful. But if I don’t remember those hardest days of my life, I won’t remember that I can get through these days too. I won’t remember that I can do anything.
And, thankfully, this new device will only be here for the rest of the week.
Then, hopefully, I will go back to looking in the mirror and seeing strength on my chest instead of fear.
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