Release the Snacken

She'll be fine. They'll... probably be fine too. A little bruised, though.

Not a word of a lie, this happened to me too! And I promise I am not bullshitting you when I say that this is normal and expected and EXTREMELY common.

The thing is, you've been in Survival Mode for a while. Probably a long time. And now your itty bitty lizard brain- the part that's been been clocking in overtime hours to sense and predict danger and mitigate crisis scenarios and plan escape routes and secure resources and so on- is no longer single-handedly keeping everything running by itself.

That bit of your brain has been working non-freaking-stop every waking minute for however long you've been in whatever clusterfuck you got out of, and it is now miraculously on its first ever vacation.

It's burnt out. It's exhausted. And now that it isn't running the show, the rest of your brain is scrambling to figure out how to make things work.

You're not in active danger anymore, so lizard-brain CAN take a rest without everything burning down, but... what now?

Emotional Brain has been helping carry Lizard Brain's load, but now it has a shitload of paperwork to catch up on. Like, YEARS of mismanaged backlog that it's just been jamming out of order into filing cabinets and spare storage boxes to deal with later.

Desires Brain has been keeping up with "food" and "don't die", but.... it HAS those now. So... what else could it possibly want? Everything? Nothing? What even IS desirable beyond survival? Goals Brain needs an answer before it can generate motivation. Fear Brain, too. Also Action Brain, and Motivation Brain.

So you're not being piloted by Lizard Brain anymore. That's good! "Keep Human Functioning Constantly Forever" was NOT in Lizard Brain's job description. But now that it's let go of the reins, the rest of Team Brain is going to need some time to figure out how to do their actual jobs the way they're supposed to, and they are WAY behind.

So my best advice is to let them adjust. Rest. Keep things simple. Help them out by establishing a regular routine- home life, work life, regular meals, regular showers, regular sleep.

Once that routine is established, you can ease of the training wheels by trying new things, new foods, new places, new people.

Help Desires Brain by experimenting, figuring out what makes you happier and what doesn't. What kind of fabrics you like, what kind of tastes you enjoy, what kind of work is pleasant and what is merely tolerable. How you enjoy being treated and what boundaries you'd prefer to maintain.

Help Emotions Brain by taking your time with strong feelings as they happen. Pause, consider how you feel, where those feelings live in your body, what physical sensations come with them. When those sensations appear, do they correspond to feelings? When? Why? Are they rational? How do you want to handle them?

Develop goals and plans from these findings. Once "tomorrow" or "next week" aren't an incomprehensible void, let yourself imagine a "next month", a "next season", a "next year".

Make stuff for fun. Save up to buy things that improve your daily life. Decide what kind of places you like to visit and when. What relaxation looks like, what self-care looks like, what a good friend or partner or coworker is.

You probably feel pretty shitty right now. You're probably going to be detached, or numb, or low, or even depressed, panicked, scared, or empty.

But eventually- once Team Brain starts to get a handle on things- the Empty and Dead will be less. New stuff will appear, like Angry and Sad and Joyous.

You're gonna Want things again, and be Excited again, and Look Forwards To things again.

It's gonna take time, though, and work, and it's definitely gonna suck sometimes, especially on days where it seems like you've gone backwards, or like you haven't moved at all.

It's not forever, though. It may SEEM like it, or like nothing else is even possible, but it isn't. I've got no damn reason to lie about that. I've been there, too.

It sucks right now. Might suck tomorrow, too. But eventually it won't. You're going to be happy, and safe, and you're going to enjoy your life and feel all kinds of love and joy and wonder again.

You're going to be okay.

I first packed it up in ziplock freezer bags along with matches and a tarp n other junk in case shit went south and I needed to lay low in the woods a couple days.

And now I'm an adult, living in my own apartment, paying my own rent with my own career in a job I enjoy, with my own towels and plates and shampoo I bought because I like the smell.

Don't date thirty-year-olds until you are at least 25.

Having a glass of water for every glass of alcohol will give you a 50% reduction in hangover viciousness.

Bad people will use your willingness to be quiet as a weapon against you. If someone's being awful to you and trusting you'll be quiet to keep from making waves, surprise them.

There is no physical object in the world that is worth as much as your honor.

Honor is not the same as dignity. Retaining one sometimes means leaving the other aside.

Don't have any sex you don't want to have; have as much as you want of the sex that you do, whether that's a lot, a little, or none at all. Nothing you can do to your own body is immoral, unless you're doing it as an act of self-punishment.

Food is morally neutral. You do not have to earn the right to eat calories. Fat and sugar keep your brain from eating itself.

Learning to sit still and breathe--in, in, in, hold, hold, hold, out, out, out, out, out, out--can give you five feet of clear space around yourself in a maelstrom.

Find out how to make three good meals: A comfort meal you can make for just yourself relatively easily, a fancy meal you can use to wow a date, and a meal you can feed a bunch of people. All the other cooking can come later, but you can build a community on those three meals.