This is a great example of my poor trigger management….: )
I’ve not been sleeping well at night lately (which is a problem in and of itself)…and this morning I gave my cable boxes back to my landlord, so no television…I had already done some painting, read the news, blogs, eaten, flossed, played with Samson, photigraphed my paintings, eaten again, and painted my nails…so at around 3 am I, VERY stupidly, looked up all my ex’s on FB. What a nightmare. I saw the women they married right after me…the woman one ex met while dating me - they are now married and have a dog. And a house.
I’m smart enough by now, and have enough lived experience, to know looking up ex’s will never, ever, ever end well or bring any comfort to me. But I kept looking. And digging. And looking. And digging. What I would call 'emotional self-injury'. And now, I just feel awful. Awwwwwful.
I have been really good (super good, really) at minimizing triggers over the last handful of months…so good, in fact, that I have significantly decreased them to the point where I really only have one or two to be mindful of. Four actually, well, five actually : ) But tonight was bad…and now my brain is spinning.
It’s really hard not to compare. Of course, years have gone by, we are all older…but I am so different than they seem to be - physically and personality wise. They are so different from me. My ex’s are doing things they only talked about doing during the time we were together. One ex has the same type of puppy we talked about getting one day. Another ex took a four country trip after our break-up…when we were together he wouldn’t even go away for the weekend. Or spend any money for that matter. He has a house now (probably because he never spent any money) : ) The list goes on.
So…if you have any inclination, even the slightest feeling, that doing something, seeing someone, talking to someone - or that reading their Facebook entries - is going to bring *unnecessary* (keyword here) angst…just say no! (This is also a great example of where DBT - dialectical behaviorial therapy - skills would work wonders. At the computer looking at your ex’s profiles? Practice distraction by getting up and cleaning or drawing or jogging in place.) We, obviously, can’t insulate ourselves from every triggering thing…but we can definetly not engage if we know ‘that thing’ simply won’t do us any good, if we know it won’t bring anything positive into our lives.
Ask yourself…is it worth my mental health?