no 16

Have you accidentally looked into the sun or bright light and then looked away, the image burned into your eyelids? That’s an afterimage.

I’m home and very lucky to be. I was caught in a rip tide during my vacation. My family asked me what happened, and I wasn't entirely able to say. So much happened in so little time that my brain had difficulty processing the event. I remember it felt easier to give up than to fight at a particular moment, but I got lucky and got out of the water. I’m all right, functional, and enjoying my second half of summer at home now, but I'm still processing when it comes to the accident. It’s helped to journal about it some, and at the same time, I’m finding it challenging to write about it in the first person. Bear with me this week.

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​Here's what I saw, heard, and sensed that's stayed with me. Let me begin.

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A Public Service Announcement from My Nervous System

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​In-flight reading

Nature had a lesson for me to learn. A rip tide pulled me under. It was utterly avoidable. I'm glad to be home and alive. I thought about what I could have done differently.

To figure out what the hell happened in the water, I downloaded the American Red Cross Water Safety Instructor’s Manual on my homebound flight and dug in. I never imagined a manual would be a good read, much less something that would give me comfort. Almost drowning changes things.

Reading about what’s intuitive, reactive, and counterintuitive for a drowning person gave me the language to describe what I had experienced. Here's a link to the website on water safety and emergency preparedness from the American Red Cross.
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Learn from My Mistakes!

The most simple and vital takeaways from the Manual aren’t the technical ones. They’re the obvious ones. They’re so obvious I'll likely bore you, or worse, risk giving you the impression I’m insulting your intelligence. Here's a list of the most obvious worth sharing:

• Do your due diligence. Before you find yourself out there, do your research and ask whether you’re up for it and fit enough for the task, no matter how expert your guide is.
• Don’t do it alone: Safety is everything. Swim in areas where lifeguards are on duty. Very little can save you if you don't know the tides that turn on you. Your smarts and physical prowess will not help if you’re drowning.
• Check cell reception. If you're in a water accident with no cell reception, 911 or Emergency Services is non-existent unless a witness can run to a place with cellphone reception to call for help. The time spent away from the victim can be a matter of life or death. From a distance, the witness won't be able to answer the dispatcher's questions about the condition of the drowning victim in real-time.
• “Reach or Throw, Don’t Go”: I went. (I know.) More precisely, I was already in the water, exhausted and ready to exit. The odds were stacked against me. I saw my nine-year-old niece somersaulting like a tumbleweed in the waves and heading toward the rocks. Biology kicked in, rendering logic and learning inexistent. I tried to save my niece. (I am not trained as a lifeguard.) She made it. I was depleted. The tide pulled down on my ankles. I couldn't fight. I started sinking. I did precisely what they tell you not to do: don't jump in to save a drowning person unless you're trained.
• Safety comes from the obvious. Your survival response will take over if you’re in an accident. The survival response can trigger panic. Panic accelerates drowning. Prevention— not learning- is your biggest lifesaver.

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Request from My Body: Aftercare

I managed to escape the water with minor cuts and bruises. You'd never know I was in an accident. An old version of myself would have minimized the incident, brushed it off, and said, “I’m okay thank goodness. Let's get going. I’m quite resilient.”

Instead, this time I've decided to acknowledge what's happened. My body wouldn't let me ignore it: my heart rate was at 150-160 bpm for about six hours after exiting the water. My body begged me to do something. I used pranayama and EFT- breathing and tapping acupressure points- to calm myself.

Since being home, I’ve been working with my acupuncturist to soothe my sympathetic nervous system- the system in charge of our survival and fight-or-flight response to dangerous or stressful situations. I'm working with my osteopath to release physical tension from the physical trauma I’m holding involuntarily in my body.

It feels good to take care of myself and be cared for by people I trust.

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To the Lifeguards Amongst Us: I’d love to hear from you. What else do we need to know? What would you add to this conversation?

Questions for All of Us:

• What are you doing to care for yourself? Who have you invited to help in this self-care endeavor, and what have you requested?
• Of these acts of self-care, is there one that might nourish you through the other side of the year?

If you haven’t offered yourself self-care recently, commit to one act of self-care this week, and invite someone to provide you with support or encouragement.

Let me know what happens when you look out for yourself with a little more love and intention.

Stay safe.

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