I was not the only one that started having these experiences. Several months after this started happening to me, another individual who had also been involved in the study of these topics and had taken the possibility of a Mormonism-Tolkien connection seriously also started to have words in other languages come into his mind. If I remember timing correctly (I am not sure I do, exactly, but I don't have any documentation anymore to go off of), whereas my experiences started in the summer of 2019 and really ramped up in the fall, he would have begun in early 2020 - perhaps January or February. But I don't remember exactly; it could have been before the end of 2019, also.
The two of us started working very closely with each other. I would share the words I was receiving, and he would do the same. We would work together on trying to decipher and understand both the experience itself, as well as interpret the words to see if we could tease out what was being communicated. It was both an exciting and very confusing time, and I remember feeling glad that there was someone else along for the ride. We had very frequent calls, along with texts and emails to update each other on what was happening.
In any case, this individual also had a front row seat to my mental deterioration, and was usually the person I would call as my panic attacks and anxiety started rising to critical levels, which he would try to walk me down from. Even after my initial hospitalization in May 2020, I would continue to interact with this person in the weeks following.
I remember the fact that this person both existed (they are not imaginary like something from 'A Beautiful Mind'... trust me, I checked into it!) and was having similar experiences to my own was probably one of the most confusing aspects I was facing in my recovery. In my medical treatment, I was introduced to the concept of psychosis and psychotic events, and that this was a likely diagnosis for what had happened to me. I could accept the possibility that this was all in my head and that I had gone through psychosis, but the fact that there were two independent and separate heads that this was happening in made it harder to fully accept that this was the only explanation.
Group psychosis does happen, apparently, and both myself and this other person did look into it as a possibility. It remains a possibility, although some of the things that happened and the way in which they happened I think are hard to fully explain under this diagnosis.
But, if I am being fair, there are things that are hard to explain if one believes these things were real, so I am left with multiple explanations and possibilities. In the beginning, this was hard to accept. I wanted answers about what happened to me and needed to know whether I had just simply gone crazy, or if there was more to this than that. I remember Sophia talking to me about the difference between a values-driven life vs. an answers-driven life, and trying to let go of needing to know answers to questions that, for the time being, are just not answerable, and rather decide to live a life that is based on values that I could set for myself.
In therapy, Piper also worked with me on challenging my assumptions and 'answers' I arrived at. This was important because in that critical first year after I was hospitalized and everything was bad, answers I arrived at were usually (always, actually) negative, anxiety-inducing answers that put me into a kind of existential despair. I would go through formal exercises to challenge these answers, and the anxiety they caused, by forcing myself to come up with 3-5 alternative explanations for every conclusion or thought that I would have. Again, my thoughts (whatever their source) had gotten me into this mess, and it would be learning to think in a different way that would get me out.
Both Sophia's paradigm shift and Piper's exercises really helped me. Rather than getting in endless loops thinking and stressing about things that were beyond my control, I could focus on things that I could know, set my values in how I believe and act, and base my life on those things. I became much more comfortable sitting in a place where there might be multiple explanations for something and not knowing which of these explanations was 'The Answer'.
I actually think that is one of the differences between what and how I am writing about now in this blog vs. my last one. In that first one, it was me looking for answers. Stacks of books and research, tracing down and cross-referencing minute details, etc. I was on a mission to get answers. This then carried over to how I treated those words and experiences - I needed to know what they meant, why I was getting them, and why everything was happening to me.
With this blog, at least in how it feels to me, I am just writing about a story, or at least interesting story elements or characters that fit into a much larger or more expansive story than I think any of us can really understand currently. No books or notes laying all around... just relaying what is in my head, or different story elements or possibilities that seem interesting to me. As I said in my last post, throughout this whole experience, the story never left me, even as it changed (or my understanding and perspective changed), so why not write about it in that way?
I will confess that I want something to be 'true' about this - that desire hasn't left me, either. I would like for this to not just be in my head. And I currently believe that there is something to this, though as to whether it takes the shape of what I write here or as something different, I don't know, and I've accepted the fact that maybe I won't ever know, But maybe I will. If not, or if this does ultimately prove to be completely imaginary, why not have fun with it? If my brain is creative enough to come up with everything that has happened in the last several years and the story that emerges from it, then I may as well put it to good use!
Anyway, I was hesitant to bring up another person as I recounted my experiences as sometimes it feels like you are pulling someone else in and running the risk of presenting things (or them!) in a way they may or may not agree with, or would say in a different way if given the chance to add their voice to the discussion. So, I've tried to just leave it at summary level to illustrate that it wasn't just me that this was happening to, which added to the strangeness and complexity of understanding what was going on.
I haven't actually been in contact with them for a couple years now. At some point in my recovery, I decided that maybe it was best to not remain in touch, and I suppose that is how things have remained.
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