I make a joke of the fact I have had three mental breakdowns before I turned 40…. Not the only area of life I may have taken overachieving too literally.
People with heaps of trauma do often make jokes about it. In fact, it's listed as a coping strategy in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Health Disorders, Fifth edition (DSM-5). What isn’t in the DSM-5 however is the term “nervous/mental breakdown”, but I can explain what I mean for me when I say that.
I had separated from my ex husband in 2021, in between covid lockdowns. My mental health was not great to say the least but immense stress continued to pile on (still does honestly) and at some point in 2023 things hit a tipping point. And it is that which I am referring to as a mental breakdown.
I had been really hugely under pressure and stress, I didn't realize it then but retrospectively I was spending a large portion of time in parts leadership and/or dissociated, more often than not. A few traumatic events back to back over a couple of weeks and my alcohol consumption also skyrocketed as a way to cope.
But I didn't cope.
One morning I just started shaking, like a dog does when there is thunder and lightning. I tried all the things i knew to self soothe, this happened after I had begun the process to actively engage with a therapist again so I had some kind of strategies and tools in place. But nothing helped.
I had muscle relaxants and antianxiety medications from my doctor, I was taking magnesium and eating decent food, too much food honestly. Too much of everything. Just stuck in a cycle of consumption to numb. In any way shape or form.
But I still shook.
I had a weighted blanket on me night after night, pinning me down, thinking, “tomorrow will be the day that i wake up and this stops”.
It went on for weeks.
Not just shakes either. Shakes were baseline level. I was completely lost, waking up was particularly raw, because I would immediately feel many layers of panic and have no sense of time or space. There was one point where my kids were telling me what year it was when we woke up in a ‘fun little role play’ was legit anchoring me in the present timeline.
If there was a loud noise or something unexpected that surprised me, I would be rocking in a corner, literally. If I felt like the energy around me was getting too loud or boisterous my shoulders would tense to the point of spasm, kicking off full blown neck and cranial muscle spasms which then induced debilitating migraines. I couldn't control my body at all so I tried to control my surroundings, which made me a pain in the arse to live with to say the least.
And it just went on and on. I was literally just stuck in panic attack mode. For months. The shaking constantly stopped somewhere in between a breathwork one on one with a hugely trusted friend and a good smashing from Hinemona after Romiromi with a trust kaiako.
But the chronic panic attack mode was solidly set to constantly on for months and months. The only thing that could keep me anchored in time and space was music and art.
I mean that very literally. I had one musician's album (thank you Mayyadda) I listened to constantly, the expected repetition, the affirmational lyrics, the instinctive sway it induced was a lulling of sorts for my nervous system. But if the music stopped, it was like the mad dash scramble of musical chairs and desperate panic to not be the one who missed out on a seat.
Another time, I was sitting in a hospital emergency room after being brought in by ambulance having no response to the nebulizer during an acute asthma attack, after 3 tries and still no to change to my breathing or heart rate. I had chest scans and ultrasounds, my body went into hard core shaking again. Violently.
I remember the non event of my urgent request, “can i just have a pen and some paper please?”. Yet the surprise at the difference in my physical symptoms once I had been actually listened to, trusted for my own knowing of my body, sought reassurance and then given some art supplies.
At that point, drawing, I could explain that my father & grandfather both died of heart attacks in their early 50s, my grandmother has emphysema and the non specific vauge discussion around my heart and lung health was making it worse not better. I asked them, with comparative calm to moments prior, to tell me if there were immediate issues they could see, of which they could not.
At that point, I could do the work of reassuring all the aspects of internal fear, then asked my body if all the physical reactions and symptoms could just chill the fuck out please so I could go.
And the hospital sent me home.
With more pills for me and a hand drawn bunch of flowers card for the doctor.
The things I most needed to calm my nervous system beyond somatic therapeutic tools and a great therapist was, to play with art shit. To lose myself in a project and slowly build up my tolerance and resilience to low level pressure and stress.
The arts processing is something that, abstractly is very familiar to me. Not just from my first onset of active PTSD shutdown at 17 when painting flowy colours on a canvas and writing words and quotes became constant creations for me, not something I would have even dreamed of deeming as art though. It was and is just fundamentally something in my being, something I remember doing as a little girl.
An 8 year old playing with flowers in the garden and pressing them. Using glue and magazine images to decopage boxes, creating a family newsletter and asking everyone to give me the highlights of their month so I could keep some sense of cohesion as my family physically dispersed around the globe.
An 8 year old having secret dance parties on my bed.
The things, that as an adult having a breakdown of the messages and inputs from my physical and emotional system felt completely overwhelmed by, things I became obsessed with and clung to like a life raft, where the same things 8 year old me would be so thrilled adult me was doing.
The arts and crafts needed to progress and grow to maintain interest, so I found myself increasingly lost in a hoard of art and craft supplies and evolving creations, not sure how to make it sustainable or affordable but just knowing I couldn't stop.
Everytime I put my artistic endeavors to the side, my commitment to play, pleasure, joy and creating not being the focus, again I would slip. The overwhelm became too much, the uncertainty and ongoing processes and structures out of my control made me feel stuck, like a puppet with limited movements.
I tried selling my art to make things sustainable. I was actively holding market stalls under my brand, Bush Magic, selling plant products and Rongoa products that I have been making for years. I decided to be brave and take my art to one.
I carefully selected the market with the most alternative art like products and an audience who appreciates them, a market I've done before. The first comment about it being “lovely but shame it's so expensive” sent me into anxiety spirals and I literally went and hid in the corner.
It was a resin art piece, a coffee table I scrounged from the recycling centre, spent countless hours scouring, cleaning and painting the frame of then pressed flowers from my garden and imbedded them in resin and glittery multidimensional black mica powder and Muriwai black sand to create like mini sand dunes in the texture. The materials alone would have cost close to the $150 price tag but it was the fact that I would have invested literally days after days in that creation which would never be factored in that got me. It was like a piece of me.
And I felt like screaming, “I know as a mother and woman my time has little value, I know all the things that are essential to my being right now have no money value attached. I FUCKING KNOW. If you dont want to buy it just fuck off but dont tell me yet again i am wasting tiime and not doing anything valuable because thats how i feel but also, my kids need me to sort this fucking shit out and I DONT KNOW HOW TO DO IT!”
Of course, I didn't. I just sat rocking and shaking in the corner instead and haven't taken my art or anything else to a market since.
Like most creatives however, I need to move things on so I can make more. I tried being part of an art collective store and someone commenting about my creations “not being art” also burnt me. Again, I tried to shake it off.
When I left the art collective store, we were already taking the big brave steps in making Social Nexus happen and I made a video that I put on TikTok about how I was just going to set up my own little shop. When the video hit over 10k views and the comments came asking where people could see what I had for sale or buy things I made, the dreaded fear of being perceived in that vulnerability smashed me again. I just ignored the questions entirely, I still do.
My being wasn't going to allow me to face that kind of criticism again, I would rather not be seen. But I can't stop creating. I rely on it for my mental health. I needed to find ways to incorporate the things I need into my life.
The creation of the Social Nexus Little Shop was one way to boundary and scaffold (buzz words for my therapist and I) that kind of interaction, if the sale was on a commission basis, then there was something between my sensitivity and the end purchaser (by that, I mean a Kelsey haha).
But also I realized, I think more of us could do with incorporating more of the things we love and spark joy and let us play, whatever that means to each of us. Even if, maybe especially if, the things we do to feed our families are not those things.
To create and to play, these are fundamental human needs. Needs that we only think about when life is dire. Because we don’t have a dollar value on them which relates to the process not the output.
But it is dire. The world is on fire. The systems are falling. People often feel desperate or apathetic about the state of things. The collective energy isn’t infused with a great deal of hope.
And what we focus on, we cultivate. Where socially are we focused on fostering joy and peace? How do we prioritize experimentation and play? Where do we seek pleasure and focus on finding things that feel good in our bodies?
And unless it is your paid job to do so, how many of us create? How do you, particularly as an adult, play?
If you are not sure, well, aren’t you in luck?! Not only do you have some joy filled self discovery ahead of you, but this is in essence, a big part of the reason we started this initiative. It is a big part of the Social Nexus story and what we hope to bring to the world.
So, as we continue our own journey, we invite you to come along and join us, in person, online, or even just from a distance in essence.
Because we know the world is on fire and the systems and order are unsustainable. But we also know we don’t need to wait until everything has fallen over to make solutions for the new. And we know we want to do whatever we can to make the world and the people in it a little bit lighter, a little more joy filled andat least a little more aligned in their beings.
If not for the individual and the world, for our children’s safety and security in it.
(The piece used as our banner image, ‘Wisdom Enters Through The Wound’ has been selected for the Kumeū Art Awards competition and exhibition which opens after the awards ceremony on 2 November, 2024 - 13 years to the day after my Dad died. Exhibition opens Nov 5-24th, Awards afternoon and exhibition open to the public, you are more than welcome to join us and come check it out, details can be found here - https://www.kumeuartscentre.co.nz/kaa-2024-selected-works.html)
Written by Jess Maher, originally published September, 2024