June was a blur.
Moments of it were crystal clear: my daughter’s pursed lips as she gets her passport photo taken. My fingers brush a Grey Spider Flower on a bush walk. The cocoon feeling takes over me as I sit down in a packed cinema. But the rest…the rest was pretty weird.
What do I mean when I say the month was a “blur”? I mean: I did EMDR therapy every week. I mean: I re-processed memories from 2021 that would make your skin crawl and your eyes burn. I mean: I felt things I have never let myself feel. I mean: I fell asleep in Lilo and Stitch on cheap tuesday.
EMDR is changing my brain and body. I don’t know how to talk about it, or if I even want to talk about it. Throughout June I’d get these fleeting urges to share things, insights, flashes here in a post, but ultimately didn’t. I still feel ambivalent about documenting parts of it. This belongs to me! It’s private! And yet…it feels insane not to mention here, in the place I am supposed to feel free to play around with words. For better or worse, I am a writer who uses herself in her work.
EMDR is time-consuming, expensive as fuck, and bone-tiring. It’s somewhat mysterious in pace and I hate not knowing how long I’m going to keep doing it, though it is nice to remember it will have an eventual end-point. I dislike how intense and overwhelmed my body and brain get in the days following a session. It’s like a full-body shedding. The avalanche of physical memory, the jolts of realisation, the swinging between extreme opinions, the ache behind the eyes. I do enjoy the way perspectives open up in my mind. It’s hard to describe. It kinda feels like new rooms of myself open after each session. Some rooms are jarring and spooky, others feel fresh and interesting. Overall the changes I am experiencing from EMDR are helping me live with the difficult things that have happened to my body, so I will keep showing up.
Miley Cyrus described her experience of EMDR in an interview with The New York Times recently. She went to address her stage fright, which I enjoyed learning about. “It’s so weird because it’s like watching a movie in your mind, but it’s different than dreaming,” she says. “You’re kind of more in yourself but still in another place of consciousness that’s kind of hard to describe unless you’ve been in that hypnotic state.” I relate to this. You’re in your body but you’re also making contact with past versions of yourself. There is a level of agency you didn’t have at the time available in the present, looking back. It’s almost like embodied time travel.
Lorde recently spoke with Bella Freud on Fashion Neurosis about her own stage fright, and the MDMA and psilocybin therapies that helped her overcome (or perhaps let go of) it. I don’t usually fuck with video podcasts but I must admit, it’s a good watch. (Are you loving Lorde’s new album Virgin btw? It’s a goood solo-drive or walk-in-the-forest album. Current favourite tracks are Shapeshifter, GRWM, Favourite Daughter and If She Could See Me Now).
Before you go, I want to share some good news: me and my book-in-progress got into this writer’s residency!
Annnd finally, here are some recommendations for winter:
Buy: Leeks
Wear: Hats
Try: Mat Pilates (enough with the machines!)
Eat: Chicken Schnitty
Make: Foccacia
Drink: Chilled red
Watch: Overcompensating (on prime)
See: Past Lives
Listen: Mess with Sydnee Washington and Marie Faustin
A note to my readers: Thank you for your patience and ongoing support as I find a new rhythm with this newsletter. Balancing writing with EMDR therapy (and life, work, parenting in general) is unpredictable and strange. My main objective since day dot has been to write things that are fun to read. And that continues! There are just some months where it's stupidly hard to make it fun. Thanks for being a reader who supports quality over quantity. I appreciate you <3
I’ll be back soon with some tarot cards for ya. ‘Til then, stay cosy and stay freaky. x