Friday I went on a hike with my husband and my dog. It was an 8.1 mile hike from Switzer to Gould in the Angeles Crest mountains. I have made one previous hike of this length and it took me ten hours to complete. In Todd's words, my love for him caused me to overestimate my skill level and agree to this hike. Let me just say that by the middle of my hike there was no love for him left (some has returned as of this writing).
Furthermore, I need to say that Todd and Maggie (the dog) usually make this hike in 2.5 hours. I assumed it would take me 4 hours at my current skill and weight. I am stunned, after living through it and completing the hike without being air-lifted out, that I completed it in 5.5 hours.
The first two miles of the hike were filled with thoughts of how strong I was feeling and how I'd even made the first hill with such grace and stamina that surely there'd be no difficulty finishing this hike by noon. Sure, there were more "helicopter" gnats than I knew existed, but they didn't stray to the sunny parts of the path. Sure, in the shade with the gnats there were large stands of poison oak, but it was beautiful in it's malevolence and easy to spot with it's gorgeous turning-red leaves. Sure, the terrain was shifting from smooth, round river rocks to sandy, to scrabble with leaves and teeny rocks that slip when you step on them, narrow to narrower, spiky rocks that threaten to take your foot off your ankle, but I was confident.
Todd said we were at the quarter of the way mark and asked if I'd like to turn around. Huh? What? I am confident, serene and haven't wobbled or fallen once. Sure, my foot hurts from where I stepped in the sprinkler well and fell on Tuesday, but I'm fit and healthy and strong. "I'm in, let's keep going," I say. Todd & Maggie stay about 5 yards ahead of me on the trail. I am swatting gnats, killing them with my eyelashes as they dive into my eyes, breathing them in through my mouth and nose and for many times I am holding my hands over my ears as I hike so that I can drown out their buzzing and protect myself from the possibility of them moving into my ear orifices also. As I swat the gnats I close my eyes. Closing my eyes causes me to stumble on the sharp rocks, so I open my eyes just in time to try to right myself before I fall into the poison oak. At about mile 3 I am swearing. I am trying not to swear loudly because I don't want to harsh Todd's mellow...he loves to hike. I start to agree with him that I am doing this for love...I'm trying to believe that I love him so much that I imagined that I also love to hike. By mile 4 I am praying to God with all earnestness that He will PLEASE kill the gnats, make them go away or teach me what to do to make them leave me alone. I am walking with my hands over my ears and one eye closing at a time. I say, in my prayer, "please kill these damn gnats." I've never sworn in a prayer before--which will probably surprise some of you because of the vitriol that spews out of my mouth when I get going...but I have never sworn at God before...especially about HIS creatures.
I trip over a rock, have to move my hands from my ears to brace my fall and I go down. I've twisted my left ankle. I've said the queen mother of all swear words...I'm in the middle of this gorgeous environment and all I can see is the stinking path, the poisonous obstacles and the "black death" cloud of gnats. My humor and confidence are gone. The voices begin.
The voices.
Here's a little sample, "Todd likes this? How on earth could he like this?" "What were you thinking coming on this hike?" "Your center of gravity is way off because you are still 100 lbs. overweight!" "How come you have such a distorted sense of your own strength--you can't
even do 6-count military push-ups at boot camp." "You really are a failure because you don't see yourself as you really are. You THINK you can do these things, but you are not healthy enough, you don't have any business being on this mountain." "Do not let Todd see how
frustrated you are, you need to keep a positive attitude so he doesn't regret bringing you along." "Why is Todd encouraging me to drink water? Even though my throat is dry and parched, I'm sure I can last a little longer without the water." "I think I am a little thirsty." "I think I might need to go pee." "I don't even know what my bodily needs are...I am SO out of touch with myself. Do I need to go pee? Do I need some water?" "It isn't fair to be a girl and need to pee and be hiking. It will get all over me because I'm too unfit to aim and squat deep enough..." "Why am I covered in sweat? What is wrong with my body that I can't handle this and Todd can?" "It's okay that you're not as strong as Todd. He weighs at least 80 lbs less than you. Imagine that you are carrying two five year-olds in addition to hiking. Could Todd do that?"
And that last little bit is what I need to talk about. The voices in my head, despite what I shared above, are getting much, much nicer. They remind me that I have physical limitations like weighing more than others, that prevent me from enjoying a full life. They suggest that for my limited skills, I am being successful. They remind me that I am obligated to get better so that I can spread the word and the joy of healing that comes from working (with God's help) really hard. They sound so compassionate. "Give yourself a break, you're doing your best." But there is something cruel behind the encouragement they're trying to give me. Here's what's really there: "Give yourself a break, you're doing your best, LOSER." "It's YOUR FAULT you're like this! Live with the consequences!"
At one point along the hike Todd said, "I'm going to run ahead to the river so Maggie can cool off." Maggie, is a small black lab. So she's hiking with a black fur coat on and she's not got the fantastic evaporative cooling system of skin that Todd & I have, so she needs to periodically sit in the river/stream and drink and revive. We're on a fairly steep downhill descent when he tells me he's going ahead. No problem. He stops and turns around and gives me a black referee's whistle, "just in case." I take the whistle and I say, "what about you?" and he says, "I'll be fine." It's true, I think. He'll be fine and I'll die. The fight to not think or say, "I give up, this is awful, I can't do it" has been lost. I begin indulging in the failure thoughts as though I am at an ice-cream sundae buffet. Mmmmm....a little self-pity is sooooo delicious, let's see what MORE self-pity tastes like...mmmmmm, ooooohhh, so delicious.
I begin to compare this hike to the Bataan Death March. To this, one of "the helpful voices" says "oh, drama much? like what you're doing now is anything like that tragic moment in our history!" Then a really frightened and frustrated voice says, "at least they were marching to their death." And then, "maybe the lucky ones were the ones like me who couldn't make it and just died along the way. That would have been more merciful than completing the march." Then I delve into some truly awful thoughts of how I might fall off the cliff and just die and that would be easier (I will spare you the details).
By the time I find Todd and Maggie at the bottom of the hill, they are relaxing and enjoying the stream. I burst into deep, hacking, sobbing tears. And I could not stop. And so I kept trying to hike. God bless Todd for not making a big deal about it. He asks me what I'm thinking. I say, "that we're not even half way through" and he is silent. So, I now know for sure that we are not even halfway through.
*****This is probably a good time for you to go get a beverage and take a potty break.*****
When I began crying I was totally and completely stunned at the outburst of emotion. Where had that come from? I didn't even know I was feeling sad. Why am I crying? "What am I feeling?" I have no idea. I'm probably just tired, I think.
Saturday morning as I meditated I realized something really important. I started crying because I was being tortured by "the voices." More importantly, I realize that the voices are being much, much kinder. They seem more understanding and compassionate. But I am smart and I am suspicious and it occurred to me that despite the kindness and superficial compassion, there is a great deal of cruelty. It seems that as I am practicing good self-care--eating right, exercising, meditating, etc,--the voices have become suspicious that I am changing and they seem to fear that they are becoming obsolete. They fear that I'm trying to get rid of them; so they have changed their tactics and are trying to talk more sweetly. They are saying the exact same things in a much, much nicer way. I have a pattern with this. My step-mother did this to me too. She was so beautiful physically, and so careful to always look good for others, that we were all sucked into her beauty and then blindsided by the reality of her anger and hate. Not surprisingly then, the discovery of this shift in the way the voices are talking to me brought up a lot of memories about the physical abuse I endured as a child. I have been keeping the abuse a secret even from me. I was repeatedly told never to mention any of what was happening. In fact, if I was suspected of telling even the smallest tidbit of what was going on in my home, I would get into trouble. When I have been brave enough to say, "I was beaten and hated" aloud, the protective voice is always VERY quick to say, "you're exaggerating and being dramatic. It wasn't bad."
I have been telling myself, "you're exaggerating" and "it wasn't that bad" and "you deserved it" for so long that I don't know the truth anymore. But I do know why the cruelest voice started. She is was designed to protect me. She took on the job of hurting me before someone else does. She learned that being successful would get me into trouble...there was only one star on our family's set. My job was not supporting actress, it was catering and cleaning...and when the director or other actors noticed the good work I was doing behind the scenes the Diva lost her mind and did all she could to shove me out of sight. So, I learned some ways of protecting myself. I thought that it would be safer to weigh a lot--it's harder to shove an elephant around. And I learned that extreme obesity got me attention too--in an extremely passive aggressive way--so it served a double purpose of shifting the light to the sidelines and revealing that everything under the big top was not roses and butterflies. The price I pay for this "protection" is a habit of sabotaging my success. It is also deluded. My protector actually believed that there was something she could do to protect me from getting beaten..."Don't do that!" "Do that!" "Quick!" But she was wrong. For the love of God, breathing in and out would get me beaten. Little Kristen--the one who was picked up and thrown against a wall the first time she met the Diva (at < 2 years old) --is scared to death of being whom she is meant to be. She is scared that her success threatens you and that you will withdraw from, hate, or hurt her. So she is hurting herself preemptively. And what happens is that she gets hurt no matter what.
I am horrified, stunned, and extremely grateful to discover how the voices have shifted. The other day I actually thought, "Oh! I don't even have self-hate any more. I'm really getting enlightened and I can't believe how easy it was to get those mean voices to quiet down!" I cannot stress enough my completely stunned feeling as I realized how my self-hate voices metamorphosed into something I would be willing to listen to. It's as though they put on some lipstick and a prettier dress, so I'd be less likely to see the ugliness.
It's time to thank the "protector" for her service, and let her go. The protector is not my friend.
**********
And so, I need to say that I finished an 8.1 mile hike on Friday. I used every muscle in my body, and every "muscle" in my mind to fight the physical and mental battle of getting on and off that mountain. I did it! I was incredibly successful, and I paid the price in sweat and pain. The mountain beat me up...but I kicked back, and I won. I don't ever have to go on that hike again. But I did it.
I did it!
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