For those who haven't opened up:
"I'm seeing many posts now about the difficult feelings that are emerging specifically today, friends describing feelings of exhaustion, indifference, lack of energy, emptiness, disconnection and more.
Morning edit: These words were written before the terrible news from Gaza was published, which adds another layer of horrible pain and loss to the complex feelings of this day and the insane gaps we're experiencing between the euphoria of controlling Iranian skies and the floundering in the Gazan mud and the helplessness in returning the hostages.
It's important to say a few words about this.
What we're going through now is very, very confusing.
Today we suddenly learned - that the war with Iran is over.
The terrible hurricane that passed through here for 12 days that felt like a year and simultaneously like one long day,
The insane storm that shook all of us, that left enormous damage here to property, body and soul.
And simultaneously, for some of us, also brought feelings of victory, euphoria and the threshold of redemption.
Stopped in one moment, with the diagnosis of a tweet by one person who decided that's enough. That's it. The goals he wanted and defined were fulfilled, and now - game over.
In one moment everything returns to being "normal"
(This situation might, for example, surface existential difficulties, raise a feeling of meaninglessness, a feeling that we are pawns in other people's game. That our feelings, existence, body and soul are subject to the control of strong and powerful forces where it's unclear who decided and why they receive this power)
And here we are all supposed to return to work tomorrow, the children who were almost two weeks at home, without framework, in such an apocalyptic vacation
Are supposed to get up tomorrow, get organized and go to school.
Yesterday we worried when they moved away from home and whether they knew how to enter the protected space, and tomorrow they return to frameworks of 35 children in a classroom.
One moment we're all in extreme terror, afraid of hundreds of tons of explosives falling from the sky, and even from nuclear terror, and a moment later the threat is removed.
So as a start, there's room to say that this is quite a transition and it doesn't suit everyone. There are those for whom the immediate and quick return to routine is the best possible. That's what allows survival.
On the other hand, there are those for whom this is impossible, who need gradualness, who need a moment to take a timeout at home. To make the transition more processual.
For some of us, this expectation that we'll move from 0 to 100 is disconnected and absurd.
And there's room for this need.
Another important aspect to mention is the physical and mental response to trauma and stress. The body mobilizes systems to survive. The body secretes hormones and additional substances that help us bear the unbearable stress we were in.
These can be numbing substances that ease anxiety, helplessness, suffering and pain.
And these can be stimulating and arousing substances that help function during periods when you really can't sleep properly and there's no rest.
The substances we have in our body are just like drugs or medications that change our consciousness and feelings. To survive (our body is a genius).
When these substances flow in us for 12 days at high frequency (even if changing)
It affects, it accumulates.
The mental response to trauma also behaves this way (mind and body are connected even when it seems otherwise)
The mind also moves between numbing, disconnection, indifference and hyperarousal. It's hard to be with things as they are...
And then comes this moment when we receive a message from the environment, from the reality outside
"Everything's okay, the threat has passed"
Now what do we do with all these substances that the body has already become accustomed to, what will the mind do with all the thoughts, feelings and emotions that were frozen and pushed aside to function within the event...
This is what we mean when we say "stress crash"
And for each and every one of us, this stress crash will look different, and also for each and every one of us, it will look and feel different at different times in dealing with this sharp transition.
It can be collapsing into bed and long, deep sleep (if we have the privilege)
It can be a feeling of emptiness and alienation
It can be fatigue and exhaustion of the body, an outbreak of illness or physical pain
A kind of flu or such symptoms.
It can be a feeling of depression or a kind of post-event depression
It can also be a feeling of relief and comfort, a feeling of release and relief.
It can be restlessness and a need to fill the day with things.
And it can be movement between all these states.
If you feel different from the world around you – it's not that you're not okay, it's that the world is too crazy
And the beginning is to recognize this, to pay attention to the effect this transition has on us and to see what we need right now and maybe also to succeed in noticing what those around us need, without canceling our own need."
Ori Sherman-Knohl