New Year's Resolutions

I’m tired. So tired. I started a new medication and I think that is making me more tired that I should be. It’s making it very tough to get through the day and I keep going to bed at a stupid early hour. It only really concerns me because I’m starting school tomorrow and I won’t have nights anymore where I can go to sleep at 7pm.

There are a lot of people around me who are concerned about the amount of classes I’m taking. I have a very strong feeling that I can do it, and do it right. I just may need some adjustments in my life. A big part is to generally be happy and healthier so I can handle the school stress better. That brings us to this:

New Year’s Resolutions!!

Yes I’m a little late. I’m not someone who usually believes in NYRs. However I thought it might be fun. My resolutions are all about keeping me happy and healthy.

 * Exercise once a day, even if it’s only 10 minutes of yoga

* Drink tea, like green tea, daily 

*Replace junk food with healthy snacks 

*Drink more water 

*Journal/blog more

*Attend to my to do list quicker (don’t want stress to build up) 

*Be more positive 

*Cook more

*Finish what I start

*Take a break

The last one is probably the most important. Too many times I feel myself slipping and I think “well if I just ignore this feeling and keep pushing myself I’ll be fine. Wrong. Wrong, wrong, wrong.  I need to learn to recognize these feelings coming to me and take a break. Take some time to figure out what my next move will be.

Let us see if I can stick to this list.

5 things I'm loving right now

To try to keep this blog a little happier, I'm going to start doing a "5 things I'm loving right now" every few weeks.

In no particular order....

Chocolate almond milk, yummmmmy. I only recently tried this. Need to try the regular almond milk soon.

Dried pineapple. A great little snack. My three year old discovered she loves it as well so I'm now not getting as much as I'd like :)

Water enhancer. Probably not as good as drinking plain water, but I'm not much of a water drinker so at least I'm getting in the habit. It says "energy" but I haven't noticed any extra energy so I'll probably get the regular stuff next time. 

Yay for insurance so I can get my medicine (this is only one of four meds by the way!).

Great show! Similar to 24 which I loved too much. Also happy I started watching this after it aired cause now I don't have to wait a week between episodes!

Feeling damaged

I slept 12 hours last night. And took two naps today. And if I could I would be sleeping right now. I'm not up for dealing with much.

I had therapy for the first time in a month. It was worse than I expected. And I expected bad. Most of the session was going over what had happened right before Christmas, when I seemed to have temporarily lost it. We talked about my accident and how it could have been so much worse and I could have actually got in major trouble. Which trust me, I knew, but it was not pleasant hearing someone else talk about it. Then we talked about my delusions and hallucinations and he asked if I thought I was psychotic. Well, at the present time no. But yes, I worry about it happening again.

He wanted to know how my anxiety spiked so bad so suddenly. I didn't know. He wanted to know how I crashed. I didn't know. He wanted to know a lot that I didn't know. I ended up just sitting for a while in silence. Then I got up and left.

Somehow I probably benefited from what happened today but right now I just feel like crying. Crying because I had to revisit all these things. Crying because this session broke my heart. It just made me see how much more damaged I actually am.

When will I be ready?

While I'm working on my social work degree I would like to be a peer mental health specialist. I think it's something I would enjoy and it would be a way for me to help others. I came across a job advertisement for a peer recovery specialist close to where I live. I've thought about it a lot. I'm not applying.

Thankfully I have a job I quite like so it's not absolutely heart breaking that I can't have this job. Although it does make me sad. It could be an amazing opportunity. I could be letting something really good pass right by me. Why am I not applying? Because even though I think it is a job I could handle for the most part, I know that I'm not stable enough. It is still too often that I find myself in a crisis. I'm one of those who still need to be helped.

What I keep asking myself is, when would I consider myself ready to be in the position to start helping others? I have no idea. And I think that's what really makes me sad. I feel like I have to put parts of my life on hold because of a disorder. What if I'm never stable enough for what I want in life?

Today was a good day. I woke up early, with a ton of energy. I was super productive at work and had a nice afternoon to myself. And now here I am, feeling a bit hopeless.

And I just realized I forgot to pick up my rx.

Arg.

Dreading my next appointment

I was supposed to have a therapy appointment today. I of course found out it was cancelled last minute. Luckily I wasn’t looking forward to that appointment anyway. See, I haven’t seen, or even talked to my therapist since before my episode last week. I’m sure at some point I’m going to want to dive into this and take a deeper look at what happened, but not now. In fact probably not anytime soon. And that’s what my next therapy appointment is going to be about. This doctor is good at his job, and even more than that he is good for me. I value what he thinks and what he has to say. However, I’m just not in the mood to have a professional weigh in on this. I don’t really want to talk about amnesia, delusions, and hallucinations.

My therapist did call me and we spoke briefly over the phone. We didn’t go into any details, he just asked the basic “are you stable now” questions to make sure I was going to make it until our next appointment in 1 ½ weeks. I told him I would be fine. He pretty much ignored me and told me that I am “on top of the waiting list for an appointment”.

I’m always on the top of the waiting list and have been for a long time. I never asked him why I’m there. Maybe it has something to do with the fact that I could be in crisis at any sudden moment. I get calls all the time from reception staff asking if I need to come in.  It’s like in a way they care. It’s nice to have that feeling from your doctors.

I’m getting tried so have to wrap things up. The last thing I want to leave with you is the thoughts currently in my head. If I don’t want to talk about last week with my doctor, what do I want to talk about? I can’t think of anything, so maybe I have to prepare to deal with talking about what happened. Now, how do I become comfortable with that? 

This stuff can't wait!

The re-start of my medication resulted in a touch of hypomania, which I’ve been enjoying for the most part. It’s nice to be in a good mood and have a lot of energy. It’s nice to hear my husband comment on the positive change of mood (even though he seems a little suspicious).

So yeah, I’ve been enjoying it for the most part until today, where I hit a couple bumps. See, the good thing about this kind of mood is the energy and motivation to get things done. The bad side is that things HAVE TO GET DONE NOW!! Not tomorrow, not in a couple hours, but RIGHT NOW!

First issue I ran into was the fact that the bank closed early today and is closed tomorrow. I have things that I need to get done there. Things that I can’t stand waiting until Thursday to do. The second issue was my husband and I decided to put our daughters’ bunk beds together. However, we are missing some parts. Again this is something that can’t wait. The idea was put in my head to do this now and it’s driving me insane that we can’t. Third issue is I decided I have to go through the girls’ old clothes. Again, right now. However, deep down I know this is not a project I should start while the girls are awake. I also have to take the Christmas tree down today. Again, I should wait until the girls are in bed.

So here I am, trying to figure out what to do. I need to keep myself busy before I drive myself completely insane with thinking about everything I want to be doing but can’t. 

Sudoku

I’m playing Sudoku for the first time in over a year. Last time I played it was when I was in the hospital. Playing Sudoku was such a big part of my hospital stay that I couldn’t even think about it without getting upset. There was a lot that I wasn’t able to do for a while because of the hospital; eat Kraft mac & cheese, go to sleep with the lights off, watch Jeopardy.

My hospital stay was very boring. I had meetings to go to and meals to eat, but other than that I didn’t have much to do. There was an art room but I didn’t have privileges to do any art activities (because of sharp objects). There was a TV room but I was too scared to go in with all the other patients (true story). I did join in on some of the games though. I played a killer game of Janga and lost horribly at the Worst Case Scenario Survival board game. And then I won a Sudoku book at bingo. Well that’s a lie, I got the book because I didn’t win any of the games. But everyone else was jealous of my prize so I felt like I won.

My first 48 hours there was horrible. I couldn’t stand actually being stuck there. I just couldn’t calm down. But once I got that Sudoku book I relaxed.  I don’t exactly know why, but I did.

I was doing some cleaning today and came across a Sudoku book. Instead of hiding it somewhere I took a moment to remember how much Sudoku helped me 13 months ago. I’ve been working a lot lately at trying to find ways to keep me calm; when I get angry, when I get sad. Well, maybe this game should be on my list. I spent so much time and effort into not thinking about Sudoku because of the negativity it held, maybe I missed the fact that this could be something positive in my life.

Why not do this more in my life? Why not search for these negatives and see what I can turn into positives? Maybe it’s something everyone should try.