Parts

Work started today. My HRV has been higher today than any other day during the break. I have discovered my pattern—my HRV is lower during sleep than during the day when I’m awake, and my HRV during breaks is almost 30% lower than what it is during my work days. In conclusion, I feel less stress when I’m at work than when I am on vacation, having to face Angel, his family, and my fears during quiet alone times.

I was a bit nervous for work today; I always get nightmares when a long break ends. My nightmare before work today was about Jinu, but I couldn’t remember what he said to me—it was something mean and I got so activated during sleep.

Yes, I did miss him during the break and I had wondered how we’d feel when we saw each other at work today, but the good thing was that I wasn’t really anxious. Then again, why would I have a nightmare about him if I wasn’t feeling anxious?

Recently I’ve been working on Janina Fisher’s “Healing the Fragmented Selves of Trauma Survivors” and I’m starting to see that the different voices I have in my head belong to different parts of myself so I need to learn to communicate with them to achieve a fully integrated adult self that is neutral and calm. So now I want to write about my day while trying to identify where my feelings came from.

Jinu and I spent a lot of time chatting at work again. We caught up about our break—he said he had some dramas with his family, especially with his brother and I told him about my drama with Angel’s parents. Because his stepdad is a WASP from New England so he really hates Angel’s parents from just the stories I’ve told him. He also talked about the tension he had with his brother when he was back home; his brother seems to be a very successful but also narcissistic Wall Street guy, making a ton of money at age only 32 who goes on a different date every week. I tried to get intel from Jinu about a new director who I think could make an impact to inclusion, and at one point I joked that if this new director is charismatic that just means he knows what to say to different people but it doesn’t mean he’d commit to one cause so I need to figure out a way to charm him, maybe show my cleavage or something. The Jinu said “ok but you’re not dressed for that today”. I laughed and said, “this is workplace harassment!”

Ok now my different parts have different voices. One part thinks today was so much fun with Jinu and that he was so sweet to spend so much time on such a busy work day with me (maybe almost 2 hours in total) out of an 8-hour packed professional development day. Which part is thinking this? The little girl part? My adult part?

Then a smaller part of me still thinks that he doesn’t care about me and that he does this for everyone, every friend. Today the college counselor who I thought had a crush on him came into our office to chat with him again. They were speaking their native language most of the time so I couldn’t understand it. A part of me felt jealous, trying to confirm that he chats about equally deep and fun things with everyone, not only with me. OK, this part is probably my hurt child part—the part that has a really hard time believing that I am special and I deserve better than others. Actually at one point of our conversation Jinu said that he doesn’t do talk shop with everyone although he does that with me. He told me when he hangs out with the director he’d almost talk about grocery and superficial things. OK even with some evidence right here this part of me still has a hard time believing in herself.

Today I had a separate discussion with SpongeBob in my office. He used to be pretty mean to me over the 9 years we’ve been working together, but he seem to be somewhat different recently because he has a pretty serious local gf now and this girl has changed a lot of the ways he thinks. So today somehow we ended up talking about relationships and how to make choices, what security is. He has a somewhat transactional view, as in, “why would I invest so much emotionally without knowing how the other person feels about me?” I told him I’d never chase a man because it had never ended well for me; even with Angel, I’d say he chased me first and I did so many, too many things for him because I knew that’d make him stay. As long as I could do things he couldn’t do then he’d need me. I was right. So at this point I just don’t want to chase anyone anymore, but the two men in the conversation both thought they wanted the woman to initiate. The other guy is married for almost 25 years. From my observation, these men may be passive in the beginning, but once they know a woman likes them, they begin to take care of her. Somehow this experience has never occurred to me. Whenever I revealed to a man that I’d like to take things to the next level, he left. Even my relationship with Ivan had a bumpy start and he was hesitant and emotionally tangled with D, who he later married. A part of me wonders—why can’t a man just find me so special and cherish-able so that they’re willing to take the risk to escalate? Eric couldn’t escalate despite all the things he had said to me so the other option is to terminate. Which part of me says this? Maybe the abandoned infant self upon birth? I fought so hard to stay alive given my near death experience at birth and yet my own mother would not see me or hold me.

There’s one more part of me that hates myself for feeling happy and laughing out loud whenever I talk to Jinu. This part wishes I don’t have to feel so much joy when hanging out with him. Maybe this is the “protector part” of myself? This part is trying to protect my heart from another disappointment. This is still the little girl of me tho—because at age 5 I already learned to hold back my tears to protect my mom’s feelings and never told her that my nanny and teachers at school had slapped me on my face and beat me upside down on my feet with bamboo sticks. I had no adult I could trust, so when Jinu brings me so much joy and is always protective of me whenever I told him how random people threatened me on the street, this protector part of me is afraid that it’s just another person who’s going to hurt me even tho they’re supposed to protect and take care of me.

There’s one more part of me that wonders what Richard and I will be doing if Richard does land in the City of Rain on Friday. What will we talk about? Will we still laugh like 20 years ago? Will he still feel an irresistible charm in me? Ok so which part of me is thinking about this? I have no idea.