KT
Katie, welcome back. At least you came back. giving up or stopping half way seems to be a pretty common human trait. It is a hold over from a previous time, hunt till your belly is full and then sleep in the sun. I am guilty of this.
I think you stopped when you had coping skills good enough to function. Pretty common that.
Why go on, nicer to sit in the sun.
The problem is though that you still don't know how to get rid of the panic so all you can do is cope with it. You have built a negative core belief that you are going to have these ups and downs for ever. Now you are building negative thoughts on the belief. Waking in panic because you believe it belongs there because it always comes back. There is my favourite word again, "believe". You can believe negative or positive. And it doesn't help that we would rather sit in the sun. It will only get worse if you don't do something about it.
So to continue on where you left off. Take the next step look at this thought. (subconscious or not) This thought that says you are going to panic. Why are you going to panic? Well because you do. Not so, some times you don't. Why? Because you have a negative thought that says you will. It is just fear and if you have no reason to fear then you won't. I am not a proponent of the just do it school of thought. I won't tell you to do it till you get used to it because I don't think that works well enough. This is how I did it and you can try it, it works. Perception. Looking at how you look at the situation and changing that thought which will change the negative core belief and leave you nothing to build negative thought on and there by allowing you to sleep because positive thoughts do not keep you awake. (except for desire)
So since you know that you do not have to have thoughts of panic unless you want to, you have to think this and believe it. Really believe it. Is there a reason to have panic. No. No matter what you come up with it is false. Not the same as meeting a bear in the woods, that is a reason to panic and normal.
Shari calls these negative thoughts dragons and I do too. You can not get rid of them but you can chain them up so they are harmless unless you let them loose. This chaining them up takes time because you are so used to letting them loose.
So back to perception. Not the actual negative core belief but the belief itself. If you change how you look at it it will change also. actually you will bury it with positive thought because you can not actually get it out of memory where it is stored. Am I being confusing.
Take the thought that you will have these negative thoughts when you wake up and tell yourself there is no basis for them. If this does not dispel them then write it down. They are false and there is no reason for them to be there. It is how you are looking at them that allows them to exist. Perception. If this doesn't help get up and get a cup of calming tea and repeat it.
"this is not true" See once you manage to do this then you don't need the coping skill until you do exposure to reinforce it. And you will do exposure because you want it gone for good right.
You want to be able to sleep.
Here for you
Davit.
