NEW BODY OF WORK IN PROGRESS 2023

This is my latest project I am currently working on. It is still in the very early stages at this point and will take time to develop and find its full voice. It explores PTSD impacts on the body and resulting dissociative states.

I have had many medical interventions in my life. I have been consumed by pain with only the smallest, sweetest exhalations of relief in between. It has become the rhythm of my life. I have had 9 surgeries, organs removed, things sewn up. One thing ‘healed’ leads to 2 more things to deal with down the track. No one knows what is wrong with me most of the time. My body is a mystery that confounds even the greatest of minds. The thought of receiving medical treatment makes me panic, quickens my heartbeat and restricts my breath. The traumatic response gets worse with each event. I recently took my third ambulance ride to emergency in 18 months. Only 8 hours tethered up this time. CT scans, intravenous drugs, the never-ending beeps and the same questions over and over and over. No one advocates for me, no one listens to me. I end up in a dissociated state to manage the trauma. It isn’t voluntary, I just lose my grip on reality and am birthed into another place. But it isn’t a place, it is a nothingness…limitless, empty, soundless and without time. 8 hours moves like 100…or like 1, it is hard to tell when you have disappeared. I become no one and nothing and I never want to come back.

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