First lessons learned (that you actually do not want to learn at all)

Pragmatics – Prepare your shelter:
One of the first things I actually did the next morning was bringing pillows and blankets to the guest bathroom downstairs. Later I also added fitness mats, searched for an inflatable mattress (which we apparently disposed of before or during one of our moves) and thought about adding sleeping bags. The past night’s experience had already taught me that you might simply not be able to grab something mid-alert.

How quickly you learn new threats and heightened vigilance: 
You quickly learn that loud bangs (the kind where windows shake for a second) and also more distant bangs are sounds of interceptions. These bangs, especially when they are close by and thus loud, make you jump or flinch or react in whatever way just due to the particular noise. When then hearing a car or motorbike in the evening makes you startle, your kids scared, or your husband jump up from his chair, you know that your nervous system is functioning on a different level. In the community, people quickly started to go crazy over leaf blowers, construction and traffic noise. The sound of an ambulance (something that you hear quite frequently, especially in large cities) can have a different meaning after an alert has happened. In psychology, this is known as threat or fear conditioning. This is especially observable when hearing the emergency alert on your mobile phone immediately gets you to experience a different threat level.

Where stress can show in your body:
Interestingly, I felt it in my wrists (and I am feeling it again to some extent as I am writing this). As if my wrists are weaker and I cannot control them as I usually can. Something I have never experienced before… My wrists were working totally fine though, perfectly able to do as they were supposed to. Still, something that was out of my control gave me the feeling that I am also starting to lose control of parts of my body. In e.g. positive psychotherapy, this is also called “psychosomatic achilles heel” and can affect people differently (e.g. some respond with sleep problems, others have headaches/back or stomach pains).

And still: I cannot begin to imagine how this experience would have been without a military defence system like the one in UAE. Thinking of those in war zones that are less protected and/or attacked more heavily – we are incredibly privileged.

I will soon share what is helping me to deal with this, so stay tuned.
Want to talk more – pleasereach out!