The Christianville Spirit: My Three Biggest Triggers

The Christianville Spirit

The Spirit that Keeps Learning with Hope and Resilience

April 11th, 2018-TCS # 590

Let’s Talk, My Readers! So, as The Late Joan Rivers would say on Her Show Fashion Police, “Let’s Talk” and This is a “Let’s Talk” Newsletter indeed. It was her Trademark Line on that show when It came to Challenging Talks about Who wore what The Worst to What Event, and trying to criticize that without either Shaming them too much, or Making them feel horrible for Whatever They wore that They paid pretty much a Million Dollars for. I digress. So, Let’s Talk! So, This is going to a rather Challenging Newsletter for Me so Bear with Me. So, Let’s Talk about Two Things, Crazes and Triggers. Yes, That Triggers! So, In case You are not into Pop Culture, The Word, “Trigger” (or “Triggered” to be more precise) is a Common Word among Young People, It basically means “To be Upset at or With Something”. The Best Example I can think is When Patriotic Americans (My Name for “Trump Conservatives”) call those Opposite of Them, “Triggered Liberals” basically, People who are of Libertarian Decent getting upset about Something Political, Trump-related or not. Now, That is My Political Mind speaking, This is what This is NOT about. Anyway, Then, We have to talk about Crazes. Every Generation goes through Some Kind of Craze like Furbies, Different Video Games, Challenges (like The Cinnamon Challenge or The Most Recently, The TidePod Challenge). Now, When I was growing up, It was a Number of Things including Furbies, Geo-Pet (Something like that), and My Least Favorite, A Toy called Nickelodeon Gak) For Me, Just to Hear, See, Speak, or Even Write that Word makes My Stomach Turn. Now, These Days the Craze about town Turned to Slime. Which is like The “G-Word”, We will call it. But, It has come back up in what is Called “Slime-making Videos” on YouTube. It is Easy to make, So I am told. I am also told that Above All Videos on The Internet these Days, It is The Least Negative and Pretty Much The Only Type of Video that does not Play any kind of Message or Politics. So, Back to Triggers, We all have Our Own Triggers (Or Things that Upset Us a lot) , Whether It is Claustrophobia (Tight Spaces); Elevators (Believe Me, that was a Huge Trigger growing up.) I blame Grandma on My Dad’s Side telling me a Story of Her getting stuck in an Elevator. To This Day, I am Okay about it but, I would Rather not be in The Elevator by Myself for Very Long; Fear of Heights, Among Many Others. So, Here’s a Question, I am sure that You are Asking. What are Mine, and What is The Point? So, Mine are Gooey Substances like Gak, Slime, Silly Putty (or Silly Putty Equivalent), Silly String, and Anything that might look like It); Babies Crying (Basically, Something that can not be Controlled); and, Finally, People/Animals in Distress (Basically, People Crying, Being Upset, or Screaming for Help). So, Then, What happens when All Your Triggers occur at The Same Time. 

Now, I noticed that All Three Happened while I was in Atlanta recently. Some Part of Me knew that At Some Point during Whatever Craze is Happening that I would eventually run into It somehow. You can’t get away from Crazes! For Example, Gak (The G-Word), They made it in My Class when I was Younger, Sold It at an Economic Fair back in 4th Grade, and Of Course, The Newest Craze at The Time, “The Nickelodeon Store”. This is the First Trigger I want to talk about. Anyway, so Until a Couple Years ago, Kids only came to visit The Complex where My Grandma Honey lives, until They built a School down the Street from Her House. Today, There are More Kids living in Grandma Honey’s Complex. So, Kids naturally want to be Entrepreneurs, It is The American Way after all. For Some, It is selling Lemonade, and They do that during The Summer, but While I was there, They were Selling Slime. They had The Computer to show the making of it and They set Prices for Each One They made. Seeing This when I arriving, Made My Nerves shoot Way Up. My Stomach was pretty much in Knots the whole time I was there, for Fear that Someone in My Family might buy it, and The Kids may come and Visit with it in Their Hands. Thank God, They did not, but Still. I had a talk with my Grandma Honey about this and she understood. It was just the Anxiety of what might happen that bothered me all weekend. 

The Next Trigger is Babies Crying, or in Distress. I understand that Babies cry, It is what They do. It is Their Language. Not Sure Why We call it “Crying”, But We do. “We were Babies at One Time”, My Grandma Honey says. and, She is right. In Fact, She was once a Baby. It is just amazing how a Human can come out of Another Human! Now, Don’t Get Me Wrong, I don’t Hate Babies. They are Cute and Cuddly, They make funny Noises, They smell Good, and When They are Old Enough, They can Laugh. However, Babies do Cry to get what They need. I don’t like when Babies Cry. Now, If it is something that is Short-Term, like If They Need a Bottle because They are Hungry; They have a Poop in their Diaper or They want to be Held. That is Simple. Just do what They need. However, If Babies are Crying because of Teething, In An Airplane, If Something that can not be done to Stop The Crying. Then, To Me, They are in Distress. When They are in Distress, I feel the need to Help and If They can’t, then I feel Helpless and It gets me all Upset along with Them. The Time at Grandma Honey’s was Okay. Baby Jace was a Quiet Baby. There are Babies that are Quiet like I was, I hardly ever Cried when I was a Baby and Then, There are Those that Cry all The Time, like My Brother when He was a Baby. By The Way, He would not JUST Cry, He would Scream and Cry. When I was Younger, When My Brother would Cry, I would Cry with Him because I felt like How He felt. Now, Even though Baby Jace was a Quiet Baby, I did not know that before hand and It caused My Anxiety to Panic because I knew that a Baby was coming and I did not know What to do or Where to go in The Event that He cried a lot. Considering The Kids with The Slime outside, I had Less Options.

The Third Trigger is People and Animals in Distress. If People are Upset, Crying, Confused (like Dementia), or Animals Whining, It bothers me! Like The Babies, I can not do anything to help them so, I feel Helpless. If I can give The Person a Hug, then It helps me a little, like The Lady at Great Clips. So, For Example, My Aunt Carolee was Angry-Distressed at Something and I did not how to help, so I tried to get My Mind on Something Else. The Problem is I never know when It is going to Happen. 

So, When I was Younger, I did not know how to Handle My Triggers and Other People did not understand me. My Mom knows When I am experiencing These Triggers and She helps me learn how to Handle Them. These and Other Triggers are common in us PTLSers, It just takes others to understand us. All in all, Having Triggers is not Fun but, Once You learn to Manage Them, It becomes Easier.

Thanks for Reading The Christianville Spirit. Triggers are a Part of Life. Learn How to Manage Them. 

The Christianville Spirit: Conversations at Great Clips Story

The Christianville Spirit

The Spirit that Keeps Learning with Hope and Resilience

April 4th, 2018-TCS # 589

Ciao, My Readers! That is a Greeting among Friends in Italian. So, My Grandma Honey; There is Something You should know about Her. If You ever were to Meet Her, Talk to Her, Hang Out with Her, You would be Friends faster than You could say “Who is This Woman?!” My Grandma Honey, Miss Jan, The GA-Honey! That’s Who! As Far as You are concerned, She is Royalty! Okay, so She may not be Literally Royalty but, In Our Family, She pretty much is! I can just imagine saying in a Deep Royal Voice “Your Majesty Grandma Honey”. If You wanted to erase The Awkward Silence of Standing near Someone, She’s Your Gal. Need to be Introduced to Someone that You may like, Count Her in as Your Wingman err... Wing-Woman! In our Family, If She ever flew to see us and Many Times in Her Life, She has, You are Guaranteed that She will come out into The Arrivals Area with a New Friend (or in Some Cases, New Friends) that She met on The Airplane. She will not JUST be Friends with Her Neighboring Seat Buddies, but Those in The Seats in Front, Back and Across! It really is a Spectacle to Behold! Of Course, It does rub off on Us when The Opportunity presents Itself. Take The Story that I am about to Tell You. This is a Prime Example of Grandma Honey’s Wing-Woman-ship. So, Me and My Mom went to Atlanta for Grandma Honey’s 80th Birthday, It was a Big Deal! On Top of The Party that We had for Her at Her House; She also got to meet her First Great-Grandson, Jace. 6 Generations that She has seen, Isn’t that amazing?! Anyway, It was while We were in Atlanta for This, that This Story occurred. So, Grandma Honey figured that while We were waiting for My Uncle Bruce to come over, that She needed to get her Hair cut. I figured that My Hair was Long too and My Mom was probably going to cut it once We got Home, so Why not do it while We were in Atlanta. To Great Clips, We go! Now, The Thing about Great Clips is that You have to either Show up and Wait (Or Not, Depending on The Day), Call Ahead, or Reserve Your Place Online. Considering that It was a Friday Afternoon and Atlanta’s Spring Break was getting ready to start, Grandma Honey called ahead to let them know that We were coming. The Second Thing, You should know is that Things go One of Two Ways at a Hair Cut Place, either You meet a Ton of People that like to Talk or Those that Like to be Alone with Their Thoughts and Get their Hair Cut. This was not One of Those Days. So, We arrived and It was rather Busy. Only Two People cutting Hair and quite a Few People sitting and waiting, most of Them were Those that had Set Up Online to come. Or, at least, that is what I guess. So, First, comes a Family that We did not really talk to. one of those Come In-Cut, and Go on. It was not until after I got My Haircut that things started Happening. It was going to be Me getting Hair Cut, then My Mom, and then Grandma Honey. I told a Very Friendly Great Clips Lady that We were There to celebrate Grandma Honey’s 80th Birthday. “You see the Red Head over There, It’s Her!” Anyway, after I sat down after My Cut, I moved from Sitting looking at The Door over to Where Grandma Honey was sitting. In Walked This Lady that seemed a bit upset at Something. She had Reserved Online but, She had Showed up Late and They told her that She would have to wait another Hour to 30 Minutes until She could get her Hair Cut. She got More Frustrated, not wanting to Wait 30 Minutes or more. I decided that I should move over to Talk to Her, because There was My Seat, a Wall separating, Grandma Honey, an Empty Chair, and The Lady. So, That is where I sat. I said Hello and at that Moment, She pretty much cracked. It turned out that Her Friend’s Husband had Killed Himself and She had just Found Out on The Way over, therefore causing Her to be Late. So, My Grandma Honey being The Wonderful Wing-Woman that She is, gave her Her Hair Cut Position and Grandma Honey would wait until She was Done. Before The Lady went to get her Hair Cut and I asked her if It would be Okay if I hugged Her and I did it. As She was Leaving, after She got her Hair Cut, She thanked Me. I helped her in What was a Horrible Day for Her and Was going to be a Horrible Atlanta Spring Break. See? Grandma Honey’s Wing-Woman-Ship rubbing off on Me. After I sat back down, In Came a Guy with a Polo Shirt with an Atlanta Braves “A” on it. I wondered in My Mind, does He work with The Braves, The Ballpark, or Just an Atlanta Braves Fan with a Nice Shirt on? So, My Grandma Honey worked her magic and told him about Me and, about PTLS. She pretty much Introduced me to Him, and I asked if He worked at The Ballpark or Just a Fan. It was Opening Weekend for The Atlanta Braves after All. Anyway, I told him a little bit about PTLS, We talked about Geography, the Atlanta Region, and Of Course, Sports among Many other Things. After I was Done talking to Him, I moved back to The First Chair I sat in on The other side of The Wall. Then, Came a Man in a Wheelchair sporting a Sticker. I tried Very Hard not to stare while I was trying to see The Sticker. Again, My Questions came in My Head like Why is He is in a Wheelchair?, He looks like a Veteran. So, that was My Lead-On. I asked Him after saying Hello saying, “Are You a Veteran?” It turned out that He was not but, He worked with Veterans. It turns out that He was a Producer of a Documentary called Love after War, It is about Couples that are “Wounded Warriors” trying to figure out Intimate Relationships after One of Them coming back from War. It turns that He is a Relationship and Sex Therapist, His Name was Dr. Mitch. The Reason which He was in a Wheelchair and Therefor Understanding about Veteran and Relationships is because He had a Spinal Cord Injury. Of Course, At This Point, My Mom is done with Her Haircut and Grandma Honey is getting her Haircut now. My Mom, of course, Tells “Mitch” about Potocki-Lupski Syndrome (PTLS) as well as discussing that Maybe His Director Friend would be Interested in a Documentary about PTLS. He was Very Curious because Adults with PTLS and Their View of Being in a Relationship. He asked how I deal with Relationships. I told Him briefly about My “Dream Girl” before I came up with Bridgett, My “Woman of My Dreams”. He asked what details I had about Her and If I had had enough Details like Personality to make her fit. I did not get to tell him The Original Part of The Story that lead to that. After Talking to Him for a while, It was Time for Him to get his Hair Cut. My Mom and Him exchanged Contact Information to continue their conversation. Then, Finally came a Nicely Dressed Man and asking if My Grandma Honey was going to Some Local Event, I asked if He was The Mayor and He said “Something like that”. I later found out that It was The Mayor, The Mayor of Sandy Springs, The City that Grandma Honey lives in. 

After that, It was Time to go, head back to Grandma Honey’s House to meet with Uncle Bruce. This Birthday Event of Grandma Honey’s was certainly Rememberable, but A Story that will go on about My Trip to Atlanta was The “Conversations at Great Clips” Story! All in all, If You give it a Chance and Beat The Awkward Silence, You can really meet Very Interesting People!

Thanks for Reading The Christianville Spirit. Everyone has an Interesting Story. Share Yours with People.