Denial or Subjective Reality
Denial of Self
Sometimes when I look back it can make me feel like I’ve been Peter denying Christ after the Last Supper and a lot more than three times. The parallel that I’d forgotten was that after the third denial the cock crowed and it reminded Peter that Jesus had said Peter would deny him three times that night before cock crow. At which point Peter broke down and sobbed bitterly.
I’ve asked a lot of questions about myself over a long period of time and veered away from the difficult answers, telling myself that the unpalatable conclusions can’t be right, repressing and denying what now seems so obvious. Much of that can be put down to cultural pressures though it now feels more like a cop out.
Denying one’s self and nature can only go on for so long. I’m oddly grateful that my current job became so tedious as it allowed me to time to focus on other things, personal things and to discover that by no longer denying them I have far more important things to do in my life.
I can’t say that coming out of self denial makes things easier, it presents new problems that are harder to deal with than when in denial. What it does do is make me far more relaxed in being who I am and facing those problems (and opportunities). It makes it possible to persevere when the new-ish sensations of anxiety and depression attack. It makes it possible to really appreciate the people who knew who I was long before I stopped denying it and to enjoy their support.
And although not sobbing like Peter, in recognising that denial and starting to move beyond it the emotional overload has at times been intense. Sometimes I wish I’d been able to sob, it would have helped on the path to self-redemption.
Covid-19
The current situation with Covid-19 exposes a wide range of reactions from people. The company meeting this week to ‘encourage’ working from home, as per the latest government advice, descended in to something of a farce with a number of people close to full blown anxiety and panic attacks.
Given that I have my own triggers for anxiety attacks I can understand what they’re going through, however, these are none of my triggers.
I find myself quite dispassionate about the whole thing. I had a good think as to why that may be. Perhaps it’s partly because I haven’t owned a television in over 5 years. I see meltdowns online and at work and have to think why I feel totally dissociated from it. Am I perhaps in denial about the whole thing.
On the whole, I think not. I’m perfectly happy to take precautions to help protect people I come into contact with, I get that. When I consider my own possibility of infection and potential mortality I find a strange disconnect – I don’t care, I really don’t. I’m sure that some readers may find that shocking. I have no active suicidal desire, but from recently learning to cope with depression I have learned that mortal oblivion holds no fears and at times is a quite attractive thought train.
May 25, 2020 @ 10:16 am
Hey melody, this is a very personal post and one I’m glad you felt in a position to share because it marks the massive progress you’ve made in accepting and embracing the person inside, your true identity.
At home we use TV to wind down in the evenings, and when I realised that it was doing more to wind up my anxieties I made a conscious decision to avoid news type programmes. I feel better for it and, for the most part, the lockdown isn’t cramping my lifestyle too much – I am lucky in that way. I worry for those whose business and education is suffering. Those who have to put their lives on the line regularly are taking risks and making great sacrifices – I hope they are better rewarded than with claps on a Thursday night and ringfenced shopping times. (eek I just went a bit political!)
Stay safe and positive melody.
May 25, 2020 @ 12:53 pm
I think I could have continued denying what I am (and becoming increasingly unhappy) if it wasn’t for multiple people telling me not only that this was the person they knew me to be, but that they’d always known this was the real me. I can be slow on the uptake at times 😛
I’m lucky in that I’ve been able to do my job working from home and have been even busier than usual with it. Sadly some of my colleagues are up for redundancy and I fear that many out there currently enjoying being furloughed are going to get a rude awakening when the furlough ends and there’s no job to go back to.
Thanks for commenting and do stay away from the TV news 🌹🌹
May 25, 2020 @ 3:48 pm
Yep I may be one of those ‘furlough is the last hurrah’ people – hopefully not as this was the first job I’ve enjoyed in ages!
Your friends were looking out for you <3
May 25, 2020 @ 3:50 pm
fingers crossed for you 🌹🌹
April 7, 2020 @ 11:07 pm
I can absolutely relate to this with regard to that “meh, whatever” attitude as to whether I catch it, or catch it badly enough to die. And also, the recognition that while so many people are panicked, for me, someone who lives with anxiety disorder and panic every day, I’m almost chilled out about everything!
April 16, 2020 @ 5:01 pm
I think we’re similar here. This specific panic leaves me bemused even if I understand it from my own triggers.
Still, I hope you’re keeping safe. 🌹🌹`
March 21, 2020 @ 7:44 am
Denying parts of yourself is so difficult but I can imagine that opening up about them and watching others struggle to embrace them is equally as hard. Although I can deny things about myself I am lucky in that it has never had to be something that really defined they way that I and others see me. I am glad that your post made me think about this. Thank you 😊
March 21, 2020 @ 9:43 am
I think that it is difficult to maintain self-denial for ever. Where the real conflict is created is when despite acknowledging what’s inside there is an overriding need to deny this to the rest of the world.
Always appreciate your comments, thank you 🌹🌹
March 19, 2020 @ 7:58 pm
Self-denial is a tough one, I think I was also in that position in my life at one point. Coming out of it was like walking out into the sun from being inside a dark room. Its blinding but just need some time for the eyes to adjust.
Being a former Catholic I should have thought of Peter but that never entered my mind. LOL
And I’m right there with you on the denial of the COVID-19 outbreak.
March 20, 2020 @ 8:42 am
Thanks, Cat.
Running back into the dark room seems so attractive, yet you know you can’t let yourself do it. At least as a former/lapsed Catholic you won’t need to do penance 😉
March 18, 2020 @ 10:52 pm
I think I know more people who feel like they don’t care in regard to themselves than one might think. I personally, also feel like that, a little bit. I am worried for myself in that I have recently experienced what it feels like when you can’t breathe and I would really not like to experience that again! (unless it’s in a kinky sense ha) but mostly I am afraid of catching it, it being really bad and my dad then being like: see I told you you should have come home.
I feel like I have trailed off now, but I think it’s good not to panic. It’s just what it is and whatever happens, happens.
I think you’re saying a very true thing about how when you come out of denial it doesn’t just become easier. In fact, it isn’t easier, really. Yet I’m glad that you’re no longer that stuck in denying yourself.
March 19, 2020 @ 2:26 pm
Thank you, Mari-Louise. Stay safe 🌹🌹
March 18, 2020 @ 8:19 pm
I wonder if it is the knowledge that comes from learning to deal with and mostly manage anxiety and depression than enables the disconnect you describe, because I too feel it. I attributed it to the acceptance that it is something I can not change. I dont go out but my husband and son do. They are taking all precautions they can but we can do no more than that….
Que sera, sera
Whatever will be, will be
The future’s not ours to see
Que sera, sera…
And all that 🙂🙂
March 19, 2020 @ 9:19 am
Thank you, sweet – I am not going to try dressing as Doris Day for your new photo meme 😂
You have a point about anxiety and depression enabling the disconnect. For me I’m sure the ace/aro also contributes to the disconnect. 🌹🌹
March 18, 2020 @ 8:06 pm
“Peter denying Christ after the Last Supper and a lot more than three times.” is the firs thing I thought about when i saw the prompt! What does that say about me lol
Like my man said we live is isolation in general. But i will add my daughters do not and I have felt very proud at how they are navigating the virus fall out. Rationally and determined not to let it beat them
x
March 19, 2020 @ 9:14 am
I wonder how many people did think of Peter ?
All the best to you and yours and may rationality win through 🌹🌹
March 18, 2020 @ 5:08 pm
100% behind this post. As a fellow non-tv user, I experience similar feelings of disconnect. Fear (-the promotion of it and expansion of it) seems to play such a huge part in all public discourse centred on the media. Having spent too much of my life within that paradigm, I can’t get far enough away now. The covid 19 alarmism looks both misguided and futile to me. May and I are in one way very lucky, of course, as our entire lifestyle is one of social isolation, so nothing much has changed in that respect. Unfortunately, however, our customers are queueing up to cancel bookings and we live -by our own choice- from week to week and hand to mouth. I suspect, however, this crisis hysteria will be difficult for the authorities to prolong indefinitely. My own mortality seems irrelevant in all this. I don’t think you’re in denial at all. I think you’re one of the few sensible voices I get to hear. Hang in there, Melody.
March 18, 2020 @ 5:27 pm
I’m certain that eschewing television creates a buffer against the insanity, conformity and panic they try to program into us. I get to choose a wide variety of sources, a diversity of opinions and viewpoints.
Well I do have my doubts about emergency measures being rescinded. Bureaucracy has a nasty habit of finding emergency measures very handy once the emergency is passed – Income Tax was an emergency measure brought in to fund the fight against Napolean and at only 5% for the top rate.
So many people are very much in limbo as work and customers dry up. I hope you and May will find your way through it and reach the sunny uplands on the other side.
March 18, 2020 @ 12:53 pm
I can’t even begin to imagine how hard it must have been for you to deny who you really are, to try and conform to the image society expected of you. We should all be able to be true to ourselves, and not be judged for it. As for the Covid-19 thing, its a good thing not all of us go into panic about it. My husband is very rational about it, and I think more or less on the same line you are. There is nothing wrong with that.
Rebel xox
March 18, 2020 @ 1:30 pm
I think that’s where the self-denial gets reinforced because it’s so much easier to decide that you must be wrong and everyone else right.
Master T sounds a cool laid back guy 🌹🌹
March 18, 2020 @ 11:31 am
You touch on a few points that resonate with me. I struggle with the same in terms of which battles to fight by in principle I agree that overall we may be better off expending our energy towards harder problems with better outcomes for us than easir ones that with superficial meaning for us.
The other thing is about being dissociated with the outcome of ones self. I have always felt myself a laid back person, perhaps there is more to that than I thought and perhaps how I disconnect my feelings of something I shoulf think out.
March 18, 2020 @ 1:13 pm
I think it’s part of the human condition to fight the internal battles. I hope you manage to expend your energy to your best benefit.