May Day

I have always loved May Day.

May Day, with sun and warmth and spring-like smells of new life.  All the Maple trees are that vibrant chartreuse green and the lawns?  Oh my!  The Red Bud trees are deliciously pink as are the Magnolia bushes and that neon yellow of the Forsythia.  Tulips and Daffodils give color to the green growth of future blooming perennials of Lilies and Iris, Peonies and Shasta Daisies.  The Lilacs are starting out, from the top of the bushes downward and already their scent is noticed.  Lovely.

It's all there, in my garden, if you look real hard through the downpour that has been going on for 3 days straight--if you step out on the porch, bundled up in your winter jacket, because it's 48 degrees.

Not exactly the May Day I prefer!!
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Darlene came over Saturday night.  Her brother and his wife had taken Dad to a movie.

It was exactly one year from her minor accident.  Nine different doctors and specialists.  Six months of physical therapy, twice a week.  Another round of MRI's and CAT scans.  There is nothing out of place on any of those scans.  A bit of inflammation near her tail bone--that's it.  Yet she claims to be in severe pain all the time.

Friday she had an appointment, 50 miles away, with a renowned (for the area) Psycho Therapist that deals with pain.  Her appointment was 3 hours long.

She had to fill out a questionnaire of 150 questions--repeated in different formats to see if she gave the same answer each time.  A memory test, in which she scored quite low.  Some sort of brain scan, with wires attached to her head, in which she was asked questions.  When the technician was putting the wires on her head, she had her arm in front of Dar's eyes and Dar jumped up and ran over to the corner of the small room.

#1--she cannot stand for anyone to get that close to her face.  #2--she had the feeling the technician was trying to strap her in the chair and was going to give her shock treatments through the electrodes.  So, they allowed her to stand by the door, that was opened a bit, while they did the test--so she wouldn't feel confined and could run out the door if she needed to,.

Then the doctor came in and talked to her for over an hour.  

She had to recount the accident, or what she could remember about it and she became quite anxious and near hysteria.  Doc thinks she has PTSD.  The accident was a minor rear-ender with only a small repairable dent in her back bumper and no front-end damage to the other car.

The doc flat out told her, she has magnified the accident into an "unreal" major incident.  That her mind has locked into it and the pain she is feeling?  Purely in her mind, feelings, emotions.

He can help her with the (imagined) pain, through talk therapy and hypnosis.

She claims she cannot be hypnotized and so there is no reason for her to go back to him!
She will not allow herself to be hypnotized because she is afraid of what will happen while she is "out".  I tried to explain the whole process to her and that she wouldn't be "out", but............

When she left, I walked out with her as far as my mail box, we were talking all the way, and I talked to her as she walked the few steps to her house.  She walked right along, as straight and flexible as can be.  I did that on purpose, to see if my talking could distract her from the pain she usually displays when she walks.

Well, we've known for years that Dar is a mental mess.  I've seen her weird actions so many times.  Now, she has even given up reading her Bible and praying, which was such a great part of her life.  She said, "It doesn't make any sense to me anymore.  God has left me and I don't know how to find Him again."

I told her, "This is the time when you should be praying more.  You are trying to control everything again and you know--you can't do that.  God hasn't left you...you have allowed your mind to be so filled with all this junk--imaginations, fears, jumbled thoughts...there isn't any room for God."

That doesn't sound very kind, but Dar reacts better to straight, sometimes hard talk.

"I know.  You're right." she said.
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AND--I best get too it!