The Anatomy of Ayn's Brain
Good morning.
Just me tuning in to see what’s up. Thank you for those who have made the change-over with us. Please don’t think your comments are not appreciated. When I read them, ‘bout brings me to tears and I feel humbled. I feel very fortunate that someone has taken the time to get to know us a little better. Unfortunately, I am a poor responder most often. Never forget I cherish each for spending this time with us. K? I do admit though that when we write, most often we are considering the “normal” things going on in our life, which leaves us feeling sometimes self-centered. However, through a great amount of time spent with journals (blogs) over the last several years, I know that it is important; we note our thoughts and the progress of them. So, we continue on.
As to the Thanksgiving Day dinner, it was a pretty big success. As it turned out, Sr. had placed the seating so that each of the five client groups sat together with their own. Then, she had one table for the “extras” including staff, such as the other QMRP and the Sister who lives with her, and a few clients. As “luck” would have it, she sat me to her immediate right. I would like to think this was because I am important, but I had 2-3 scoffs, which lead me back to thinking; she was just putting up with me again. BUT, there were a few things that happened that lead me to believe she was more relaxed and mellow than normal. YAYYYY!
I enjoyed being at the banquet hall and there was enough room for everyone to be comfortable. I felt most impressed by how the clients all treated the event as special – best manners and all We felt cared for in that Sr. put out quite a bit of money for the event and made good effort at seeing things were well thought through. The meal was delightful. We had turkey, dressing, potatoes, buns, corn, cranberries, and ice cream. After the dinner was done, she told the clients there was time for dancing, which has become THE favored client activity. ‘Cept, this time, there was a whole large dance floor to do so and they were all dressed up to impress!
They went wild in excitement, and many of the staff got up to share the exuberance. I have to admit that Sr.’s recent hiring of a dance teacher two days a week has only gone to improve the turbulence of this free movement. YAYYYY Sr.! The other aspect that is driving, is that during my 15 minutes of lunch duty (after most people have finished lunch), we turn on the music from CDs the group brings in and they get a daily chance to improve their movements and come together as a group through dancing. To them, I think it is becoming a profound expression of themselves. If only I could explain what the active floor looked like with nearly all 50 of the clients in action. We can’t stand or move any longer to even think of dancing, but we were in enraptured by the event. It is also a good time to figure out who is now relating to whom, and who has lost the most inhibition. It is grand!
I think also for myself, it is an appreciation of all that is within the work being done at the center, and my effort towards the whole. It is a very intimate feeling of belonging. I celebrate actual holidays alone since I have no family and the boys spend the time with their father and his extended family. So, for me, this IS Thanksgiving Day. I was able to share this sentiment with Sr. in one of her better frames of mind. That was pretty important to me and the commitment I feel toward the center. One can only hope to be accepted.
Work at work, wasn’t quite as productive as it has been the last couple of weeks. First, I was an hour late in getting there … problems leaving the home computer. Then, there was all the pre-dinner excitement, and then afterward, I was lulled to sleepiness by the big dinner. I was able to salvage about two hours of real work. We were a little miffed, because an hour before the end of the day, the person from the State I do not like, called and tried to demand an extra report immediately. We were like, umm, no, that is not going to happen. She may have thought it a crisis, but I know that I have a month to turn in the work, AND it was something definitely more possible on Monday morning. I refuse to live in someone else’s crisis who is not a client! Besides, who in their right mind thinks that things get done extra late on a Friday afternoon?? This is the time reserved for finalizing the week, not starting new projects. So, we figured that was that!
Also, our friend was coming over and there was no way, I was going to put in overtime hours last night. We had a very enjoyable time for the most part. He had brought pot-luck dinner, which he said meant included whatever looked good while standing in the grocery aisle. Hehehe, you gotta love him! We had a little trouble, because afterward, he let me do most the talking this time, and our minds we’re still tuned into our relationship with the good doctor. I don’t want to repeat how many times we impressed the fact about how cute he is! *Sigh* our friend was patient
Leads us up to today already. Shoot! I want to write a bit, which means we look further than past our schedule. I know, I know school. That’s coming, just need a few moments to unwind. As truth would have it, we’ve been already a little emotional today. We found ourselves in conversation and overwhelmed by our own tears of insecurity. Mostly, the problem with this is not with the events in the present, but that the present events trigger some place in our mind from the past where we were very hurt. The past sort of piggy-backs on the present.
When this happens, we try to regain fairly quickly what is happening so we don’t overwhelm those in the present, but it is hard. Hmm, think here … to be anxious is to grow!
This time, I tried to be more accepting that it was an ok thing to cry. And, that that amount of feelings was not going to overwhelm our system. I was feeling a sense of abandonment, that wasn’t really happening, but like I’ve mentioned triggering that from the past. It brought-up the issue of my Grandfather’s sexual abuse of me. What had happened at the time was he held that relationship with us, until we were seven, and then although the intimacy between us was destructive, it was still the only intimacy I knew. There wasn’t that kind of relationship between my parents and siblings. So, when it stopped I had strong feelings of abandonment that are still present today, when I get the sense of important people in my life as leaving, which in most cases, they do not. To add insult to injury, my Grandfather devoted the rest of his years catering to the relationships with my parents, and especially my mother and her siblings – My parents were lifelong physical and emotional abusers, so I was left feeling extremely alone and vulnerable.
I re-live over and over again the point where total sense of family came screeching to an abrupt halt. We were at a family holiday gathering … oh oh … forgot that holidays are laden with bad feelings … shoot! Anyway, at this particular one, I was sitting at a card table with my cousins, which was just off from the “adult” table. My Grandfather, of course, was drinking and he had reached from behind me to feel my breast. I was about seven years old. Something inside me exploded, and in one movement I jumped up and hit his face and the movement unbalanced him and he fell to his back. My mother and her brother (controllers) were outraged by what I had done, and the other family members were in shock. I can still here the hiss of my mother yelling, “ANN MARIE!!!”
I felt that I was going to die, at least wished, I could disappear from the face of the Earth. My Uncle, another drunk, took over. I didn’t know what he was going to do with me, but fortunately, my Grandfather came to my rescue. I don’t think he really apologized for what he had done, nor did he confess what anyone could have seen. He did say, leave the girl alone and that he had just lost his balance. My Uncle sputtered, but my Grandfather was the leader of the family. His word held the power. It could not, however, save me from the alienation of the group that would continue the balance of my life.
Somehow this morning, we found ourselves back at this place, as we are now. But, I know I need to get back to a place of remembering that this had happened almost 40 years ago. I can do this more easily on an intellectual plane, than I can an emotional plane. It leaves me feeling scared and restless. Ok, we can do this too. It is a matter of looking around the room and seeing things that represent me and my present life, such as my bookshelves, the computer, my calculator, my colored pencils and markers, and the cup of coffee in front of me. I feel a little lost and confused. Not sure what to write next. My thoughts slide over to Dr. M. He would be the first to remind me to look around and appreciate being with only him in the office and not all those others. Maybe there would be a few moments of quiet left for me to reacquaint myself.
If he were here, he would allow the extra few moments for me to somehow summarize the experience into a new mold. How would I do that now? Maybe with the same anger I felt in Christina’s situation, I might fight to regain a better sense of being more able to affect my life in the present. There are a lot of people who say and do very stupid things to others. My Grandfather was one of many like him and the family was like hyenas. I don’t have to deal with them any longer. My sense of inadequacy surrounding that era, does not have to carry further. Possibly their abandonment of me was just the thing to make me as strong as I am today. I never became like them. I will never respect them. And, I no longer have to tolerate their presence in my mind. They certainly should not affect my relating to people in the present. They were idiots.
Thinking now back to the client dinner yesterday. I felt a holiday without feeling alone. It’ll be ok. Right? I’d forgotten how hard holidays have been for me in the past. And, now another is upon me. So far, up to this point, I had only thought, GREAT! More school time. Maybe that is where I need to again find myself. But, for the moment, I am still not there. I am at a feeling place, maybe just some of the undefined past on the present. I refuse to step back in time; however, it leaves me with a sense of the present that still feels fragile. If I felt a little bit stronger, I think I would color in our anatomy book on the brain. Yes, that would be a good step, right? Maybe, I can color and talk at the same time?
Hmm, just cleared a spot and rearranged the table. Maybe, I could color just the next page? I have finished just one page. It was an introduction to the brain. Next, is a big picture that reads introduction to the brain structure. It includes the items in the forebrain of fissures, lobes and other areas, then again the temporal lobe, parietal lobe, occipital lobe, and the hindbrain. Yes, I think this is a good idea.
Good morning.
The Frontal lobe we colored blue on both the right and left hemisphere and the longitudinal fissure between them we colored dark blue. We colored the speech area turquoise, and colored the motor area raspberry. We completed the forebrain by coloring the central sulcus dark raspberry. I’m not sure the difference between a fissure and a sulcus, because in the picture they both look like a long thin line dividing sections. AHA! We just looked it up in our new handy-dandy dictionary. A fissure is deep and a sulcus is shallow, but they are both dividers! Next, E1 the primary sensory area in the parietal lobe. We’ll color that maroon. Yeeks, not enough separation in color between the frontal and parietal! Aha! Nothing that a little bronze yellow wouldn’t fix! I think we’ll finish off the parietal area in tan! Very Good. The temporal lobe screams for orange, and of course, the lateral fissure then would be dark orange. Let’s see what’s the difference between longitudinal and lateral? I think we are supposed to know this. Hmm, longitudinal – lengthwise, and lateral – side. So, then the longitudinal fissure goes the whole length down the middle of the brain separating hemispheres, and the lateral is on the side over the ears. Hmm, good. We’re getting somewhere! We like our occipital lobes in red! The cerebellum? Hmm, haven’t used green yet. Nice! We used slate, gray, and black for the pons, medulla oblongata and the spinal cord. They all seem to be an extension of themselves … whoops, brain is done, but we need to color in the letters! Hmm, Chief wants to color too! Wow! Did all the little letters, that was hard! I can repeat back all the names now except medulla oblongata is hard to say! Also a little confused about the general category of hind brain, it holds the pons and medulla oblongata, but looks only like a continuation of the spinal chord. Wow! Ok, the next test. We’re going to set our alarm for an hour and see if we still remember! Done DEAL!
Hmm, that was a pretty good idea; it got us to at least thinking toward school work. And, it relaxed us some. To be totally relaxed would mean not going out of the lines! Apology to all you big art fans out there, who are cringing at the thought of us barely getting out of the primary colors. *Sigh*
More coffee and a smoke! Opened the door too for the kitties. Ahh, feel good enough to cook some rice for breakfast! YAYYY!
As soon as we finish eating, we’ll start some school work. REALLY!!!!
Let’s see … anything else on my mind? Not really. School has to fill it up some. I’m not sure if Macadam thing is going to work out. When I called yesterday, he said he would have to call me back, but did not before I left work. And, of course, no phone here. Ahh, breakfast is served, SPICY!
Hmm, I have my work journal to look through too. Maybe we’ll save that for a treat later tonight. A nice goal for the day would be to get at least two cognitive papers done. I would have to hold them both under just 6 hours a piece. While I am sitting here now … that seems like a lot of time, but I know it goes pretty fast. Would be a dream to say three papers in four hours. Hmm, we better hold to two and work hard at it. Then, maybe we could do two tomorrow, then there are four days off work the rest of the week. If I could keep up with that schedule, I would be on time by the end of next Sunday. WOW!!! A new goal! I think we should concentrate on that very hard.
Maybe I can stop in in-between times? I’ll start-up a new entry … hmm, hadn’t thought that through. I still haven’t figured out what to do about my second Masters’ Journal. I am thinking now whether or not to combine journals. Hmm. No, I’m thinking they should still be separate. If my dream were to some day come true, I would think five years of pure schoolwork, would be plenty to fill-up a journal. Hmm… I would like to see that journal kept together though. Maybe what I will do is reserve some vacation time to bringing some stuff over. Or, at least thinking about it. Our AOL MPD journal, we just want printed out, or at least over to Word. Suppose that would really be the way to go, then when I printed it, it would not have all the AOL Ads. Tested it out entry and comments transfer nicely. Just would think about erasing the blue buttons. That would be more time consuming, but look better. We usually go the fuller route. I think too, that maybe we would save the entries by year. It is going to be a big copy and paste effort, but I will be much happier knowing the entries were secured.
Hehehe, we’re thinking in our old age, we’ll go back to review … the good ‘ol years *silly grin*
What I don’t like about transferring the MPD journal is that it would be difficult to get over all the pictures and slides. It will be hard enough with Word. However, I want the on-line access to school and that journal has, I think, just two pictures we could do without. I like it that we will be able to most likely link by course and not just date.
Anything else, I can use to avoid??? Ok, we weren’t going to do that, right … and you’ll be here right around the corner? It will mean more thinking and less typing. Shoot, do we hate to take our fingers off the keyboard. Like not breathing. Ok, we can do this … back to the thought growth comes from anxiety, so we’re really primed now. And, if we add the thought, let’s make some progress?
posted by Ann Marie @ 11/19/2005 09:09:00 AM
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