Eruption

The Trapped Butterfly has been fighting for this opportunity for a few months after the tattoo artist she found to give her a private tattoo session failed her this fall. She finally found another private shop where they are very liberal about everything. She took her time researching the shop and the artists. She hemmed and hawed over reaching out to them.

See, her biological family, including her narcissistic mother, have tattoos and she always wanted one, but due to her inability to sit still due to her severe cerebral palsy as well as her low tolerance for pain, she never thought she could do it. After her beloved grandfather went to Heaven, she decided she wanted to do it and get one for her grandpa.

Nobody thought that it would work for her. As determined as she was, The Trapped Butterfly had her doubts about it. Then she researched it herself and found out that others with her condition had tattoos. She still remembers the day when her husband took her to a local tattoo shop to see if anyone was even willing to try it with her…Ahhhh….The days before Covid…The days before all hell really broke loose leading to pretty much constant trauma…The days when she was as free as she could be…

Anyway, the day they went to the tattoo shop, she was so anxious that they would just reject her. She hated rejection. But they didn’t reject her! She got the appointment for the day after her birthday and she got so fucking high for the tattoo and she did it!!

Since then, she can’t get enough ink. In the past 6 years she has covered her body with beautiful colors and artwork that reflect her and the different things she loves as well as the different traumas she has been through. Getting tattoos makes her have to remain in the present moment. Tattoos make her feel accomplished, successful, pretty, and in control. She has constant physical and emotional pain. Tattoo pain is her choice!!

She tries so desperately to keep her emotional pain under wraps but it comes out. And it came out this morning when she got a message from her, hopefully, new artist that she’s not able to get her in in the best time of day for The Trapped Butterfly and her husband. Well, her brain, even though she had just meditated, went into panic and fight and flight mode. She knows that this is a very difficult time of day for them to be getting her tattooed. It’s during dinner time and tattoos usually take 2 hours or more. When her husband wasn’t able to give her what she needed, she erupted.

She admitted that the time was awful. She wanted him to help. But he couldn’t help her, and then she felt backed into a corner. Trapped. Her wings fluttered frantically in attempt to right themselves and not let go of some freedom.

As trapped animals do, when he couldn’t help her, she lashed out at him. In this moment, he was an enemy to protect herself from. She could feel herself doing it again and couldn’t do anything about it. She screamed at him for not helping her even though he does everything for her. The Trapped Butterfly wanted him to understand and feel the pain she was feeling and said something stupid about him not being able to smoke cigars anymore. That led to the response of her being like her dad. Her dad was so selfish and narcissistic that he couldn’t be happy for anyone who had something that he wanted and couldn’t have.

She knows that she can be like her parents. But gawd damnit, she was fucking trapped for almost 3 years!!! Man, not even being able to do anything herself should make her bitter. She desperately wanted children but it didn’t work out, so she should be mad at people for having children. Fuck, she should be pissed at all abled-bodied people for being able to do everything but SHE’S NOT!!! Yes, throughout her life she has felt left out and depressed. She’s gotten envious and angry. But never to the point of her dad. She is not perfect. The majority of the time she’s truly happy for people because she’s got her own full life, or at least she did.

The comment only made her feel worse about herself as she had already felt bad for hurting him. Unfortunately, she was out of control so that comment was the breaking point and she screamed “I HATE YOU” over and over again and that he was like her dad and mother and she screamed her dad’s name over and over.

She screamed and flailed as she was in more pain about her out of control eruption of emotions that she couldn’t control until finally she started to cry and she started to be able to breathe and use some comfort phrases. She played the song, “Beautiful Girl” by Sarah McLachlan in her head to help calm her down and be like a mom talking to her daughter.

She took a while to calm but finally everything started to quit flailing around and she apologized for what she said but she expected it back. She isn’t perfect and she has a trigger about apologies being accepted and forgiveness. She was still in somewhat her head when he apologized and she already forgave him but she forgot to say it so she said it when he asked if she was going to tell him that she forgave her.

The Trapped Butterfly has to be selfish and see if this can be her new home and safe place. Here in rural country, there’s not much selection for tattoo shops and they have to be willing to work with her body as well as keep her and her husband safe from viruses that are spreading because people are selfish and won’t keep wearing masks and keep up with their vaccinations. It’s just bullshit that she continues to be trapped despite being up on all the vaccinations! So she made the decision to go ahead with her tattoo appointment with the new artist and hope for the best with the messed up schedule. Hope that she can release some of the agitation, the restlessness, the pain, the rage by getting really high on cannabis and the meds she needs for her body to relax as much as possible and feeling the pain of the needle going across her skin, stabbing her hundreds of times. The pain that is producing beauty on her body in which she gets to keep forever and ever.

While The Trapped Butterfly still feels very anxious about it for many reasons, the fact that the artist has already been so willing to work with her and responds to her is a hopeful sign. It will all work out. But in a few weeks The Trapped Butterfly will get some much needed freedom and relief!!!