Normal vs. Normal for me

This stems from a conversation with a friend in my secular recovery chat room saying she was starting to wonder what a “normal” range of emotional expression might be. Then, I started thinking about having talked about this with my intern counselor earlier this year, and a little bit with my last regular counselor. I told the intern that I don’t even know what’s normal for me, but I believe I’m learning more. I also believe that I can never fully “recover” my pre-abuse, pre-drinking emotional states, or the rest of my self, but that I can get closer. As for those emotional states, I liken the degree of my emotional “blunting” to being like Canada or Siberia during the last Ice Age, weighted down by a massive ice sheet. One the glacial sheets retreated, the land started “rebounding,” or “recovering,” if you will. But, it was a slow process, still ongoing.