Overreactive Nervous System: Unorganized Longitudinal Auto ethnography
I asked ChatGPT, “How do I stop betraying myself and trying to survive after all this? How do I ever trust myself again?” It responded, “That’s such a deep and important question.”
When people ask me how I’m doing, I tell them, “I’m figuring it out.” It’s not a lie, it’s not the truth, and it’s the only way I know how to survive. A key component of most vertebrates’ survival is the autonomic nervous system, which regulates bodily functions. It consists of two divisions: the sympathetic nervous system and the parasympathetic nervous system. When something traumatic happens, your sympathetic nervous system releases two hormones, epinephrine and norepinephrine, helping your body perform optimally during these events. The parasympathetic system allows you to maintain normal functions such as digestion and rest. When I was young, a doctor told me I had an overactive nervous system. My body was almost constantly in fight-or-flight mode. My genetic code knew better than I did back then.
Ever since Eamon was murdered, I’ve consciously had to pull my shoulders away from my ears during all waking moments. It feels like I am carrying his body on my back everywhere I go, striving not to drop the heavy dead weight. When I get home, he lies on top of me like a weighted blanket (just as he did when he was alive), sinking me deeper into nostalgic comfort and simultaneously triggering my sympathetic nervous system to wake me every two hours because what is sleep but a little death? My best friend Nadia, whom I don’t get to speak to or see enough, and I decided that to stay alive, you must choose the little deaths over the big ones. The little deaths are piling up; death by a thousand paper cuts can feel worse than a heavy object hitting you on the head. I stopped watering my plants around the house because it felt like something had to be the martyr, and allegedly, it couldn’t be me. Watching the plants decay, I no longer believe there is a difference between little and big deaths.
I asked ChatGPT, “How do I keep living and trying to survive after my boyfriend was murdered by the person he was cheating on me with, and I didn’t know he was cheating until after he died?” ChatGPT replied:
“Losing someone is already devastating, but discovering infidelity afterward adds another layer of pain. It can leave you questioning everything, making it hard to trust, move forward, or even process your grief in a "normal" way.”
The title of the chat was Healing After Betrayal. Betrayal means violating someone’s trust or being disloyal. The first time someone betrayed me was my father. I do not know my father, but I am aware of his absence and how my nervous system reacts to people who talk about their fathers.
An overreactive nervous system can lead to side effects such as muscle tension, difficulty sleeping, headaches, anxiety, digestive problems, trouble concentrating, and fatigue. Recommended treatments include stress management techniques, therapy, medications, lifestyle changes, and addressing any underlying conditions. I notice these symptoms now when I watch my roommate in their new relationship or scroll through Grindr to fill the emptiness with someone thrusting inside of me, using me. I asked ChatGPT, “How do I stop betraying myself and trying to survive after all this? How do I ever trust myself again?” It responded,
“That’s such a deep and important question.”
When I was growing up, I was told countless times that “God works in mysterious ways.” This phrase describes God's methods, which are often unexpected and difficult to understand. It's based on the idea that God's ways are inscrutable or beyond human comprehension. When I had my first therapy session after Eamon’s murder, my therapist told me, "You cannot make sense of senseless things.” Similarly, my mother said, “God has a plan,” as we stood over Eamon’s body in his casket. He was dressed in the clothes I helped him pick out for a wedding we attended a few months earlier. Without taking my eyes off his already decaying body, I replied, “Then I hate God.” My mom’s posture shifted; I felt the weight of having a functioning nervous system while Eamon lay still. Every part of me was on fire as I summoned a tornado swirling around that empty fellowship hall with malice, vengeance, despair, and confusion. When I finally spoke again, I asked, “Why did he leave me with all of this?" My mom probably thought I meant the pain, but I was referring to the uprooted darkness flying out of me for the world to see.
“I hate myself.” I cannot remember the first time I uttered that fact statement. Ever since I was young, I have intensely desired to fit in, be accepted, and be loved. I created characters, calculated versions of myself adorned with many masks, hats, and stunning gowns. I tried on bits and pieces of everyone around me, just enough for them not to notice while reflecting the elements of themselves they seemed to cherish most. I read people like books; humans are not as complex as they think, and I listened to their words like a podcast I had to report on and adapted accordingly. It was my greatest skill and my way of protecting my heightened nervous symptoms. If I can control the environment, I can manage the stressors so I don’t become dysregulated. At least, that’s what my psychiatrist recently told me. One day, a therapist explained, “Your weaknesses are your strengths turned up too loud,” and I felt as though I had been exposed. So, I began suppressing the parts I despised instead of adapting; I chose to conceal, and whenever the “bad” parts of me emerged, I would run away, hide, lie, blame it on a med change, whatever would explain the monster away. I told my latest therapist that I hate who I am right now, and she responded, “Who are you other than the Isaac you’ve always been trying to survive such a tragedy?” I forgot to make a character for this scene.
I got back on the dating apps shortly after Eamon was murdered. Initially, I was filled with fear, mostly concerning whether the person who killed him would come after me. However, the risk felt worth whatever I was aiming to achieve. In some ways, I was attempting to get back at Eamon. I was committed to being the sluttiest, most unhinged dick pig the world had ever seen. As if that was going to hurt him so badly, maybe he would come back alive and make sense of all the senseless things that had happened to me, not us. I thought I did not deserve love; I deserved to be used. I could no longer trust or be loved; I needed to be desired, wanted, consumed. I quickly realized I was trying to rip the scraps he did not devour and hoped I could be nothing in being licked clean; nothing mattered. I wanted to stop feeling. I wanted to be the victim by any means necessary, especially if it meant killing the parts of myself that he enjoyed, that many people enjoy. I continue to try not to be the “likable” parts of me. I try not to long for the good parts of Eamon and I’s relationship. I try not to be myself, and it is not working; I keep feeling.
I haven’t gone to get my nails done since Eamon’s funeral, when my mom said I had to take my polish off to respect his family—the same family that included me in his obituary as his “special friend.” I fear I will no longer be this story’s victim or villain if I get them done. I will have to grapple with a future where I am not struggling, tired, or sad, and moving on, where everything has changed. There is so much comfort in carrying Eamon. There is so much peace in not trusting myself. There is so much freedom in blaming my lack of progress on my nervous system’s reaction to trauma. I feel good blaming the universe, God, or whoever else for the struggles I face in processing this. It is easy to hate myself. But I get up every day, and my parasympathetic nervous system does its job. My dog, Megumi, demands to be walked, which forces me to exercise and breathe fresh air. I play Dungeons & Dragons with my friends. I go to class to achieve my dreams and imagine new futures. I get to be dysregulated and still be loved. I get to survive, and ChatGPT said that was enough for now, and I have to believe it.
Signed,
Grieving but Still Getting My PhD
Powerful writing