Everything is in kilter

I’m having a good day. Nothing of particular note, I’m just feeling good, even with the “lost” hour of the clocks going to BST today. My favourite crystal ring fellows the floor and shattered and I still felt okay. I was sad, but it didn’t send me to bed for the rest of the day as it might have done last month. Hopefully I have turned a corner in my thinking. The important thing is that I am able to acknowledge that even if I haven’t, I’ll be okay. I’ve read and cooked and took a walk around the block, listened to some radio… It’s great to have a day where I don’t feel at the mercy of my emotions.

I think that my new attitude to this blog has helped. I’ve blogged daily, and done some activities – three, plus an update on one last year, but I found a couple of other things to blog about too. It’s easier to do the activities when a)I don’t have to, and I don’t beat myself up for not doing them and b) I am allowing myself to post about other things without feeling like I have to apologise for not doing an activity. Anything that reduces stress is a good thing. And if doing that leads to me feeling like this, then I definitely want to do more of it 😀

Self-Kindness

I began a blog post about self care, but realised that I’m too tired to say what I want to say.

I’m also too tired to even read the blog activity for today, never mind understand it. Some activities in the book are only a few sentences, but the activities for yesterday, today and tomorrow are all long ones. I have been unusually busy this week. Not bad things, but just things that have tired me out. I think I mentioned that I went to events on Saturday and Sunday. Both were great and I got a lot out of them. In an ideal world I would have had time to think through them, but they were on the same weekend and so I wore myself out. This lead to sleeping most of Wednesday, just to recover from the weekend, and Tuesday and to prepare for Thursday and Friday.

Result: exhausted again 😩 I have learned that it is important to look after my mental wellbeing. One of the strategies I have developed for this is my Kindness Diary.

I have a diary separate from my regular one and do my best to write a kind thing I have done for myself every day. Have I blogged about this before? I’m too tired to check, but it’s worth repeating because I have found it to be the best way of ensuring I treat myself better.

Some examples:

• Early night
• Bought magazine (the titles vary)
• Made myself go to workshop
• Installed free app to try out
• Wore new piece of clothing that I got ages ago
• Asked for help getting groceries
• Charity shop purchase
• Spent time reading
• Went for walk in snow
• Online “window shopping”

Today’s post has been cancelled…

…due to my having a panic attack earlier this evening. I rarely get them these days, and this wasn’t a full blown one – but that meant that it lasted longer, or maybe I had lots of little panic attacks.

I don’t know, but I’m not up to thinking properly yet. In the meantime, here’s a couple of links to panic attack information and help:

Mind

Anxiety Coach

Seeing what’s real

Today’s activity continues the decluttering.

When was the last time you peered in the bottom of your handbag or wallet?

Take a few minutes to empty the contents of your bag onto the table and be ruthless about throwing away [everything] that doesn’t need to be there.

This is something I do regularly. I saw my doctor this morning, and am resting this afternoon. I’m not sure if I’ll have the energy to clear out my bag today. On the plus side, my doctor reminded me that while I do still have bad days (as I have blogged about often), I have better ones in between. A few years back and a low period would last for days. It’s good to have people on the outside to point out how far you have come when you can’t see it. I expect this blog will be another way to remind me in the future.

It is lucky there’s not much to blog about today, because I still have yesterday’s activity to write up.

What is this life if full of care, We have no time to stop and stare?

– W H Davies

Yesterday’s activity was about taking time to stare around, to

Look hard at this incredible world.

I posted yesterday about staring at the snow. I also looked hard at Marley when she deigned to curl up in my lap, purring away.

Last night we ate out as a family before my cousin went to the states. We ate at Atomic Diner, and there was plenty to stare at over dinner:

Too tired to think…again

It’s too much again. Today’s activities was supposed to be looking at fears, but I can’t face that today. I can barely face myself. It’s one of those “the only thing I see in the mirror are flaws” days. I looked at the other two activities for the week – garden centre? Impossible without a car around here. DVD? I don’t want to watch anything, plus it was too much trouble to have breakfast, because getting food into a bowl was unachievable this morning, so finding the disc drive to plug into the laptop (currently my only way to watch DVD’s) is way beyond me.

I am writing this because one day I may look back over my depress-tagged posts and this will remind me that after a good day you can have a bad day, and yes, Ingrid, your instincts are right, if you can’t stand the idea of something on a particular day, it’s far better to journal about whatever is going on, not just go and feel worse afterwards.

Hopefully I will also reread this and remind myself that tomorrow went better, that it’s possible to have good days after bad and that bed isn’t such a bad idea.

I’d be going there now if I had written anything other than this post today. I know that if I don’t write today I will regret it tomorrow.

Edit:

Tomorrow was better.

Tired

I posted. Only it was a page not a post. And so I saved it as a draft. I was going to sort it, but no idea how to find drafts.

I am at the tired point where I want to cry because it hits to think. I may not manage anything else today due to tiredness. I have posted. I will find it, the original I mean. It’s just I am so tired, too tired and I can’t think and it is like this, when tired. My head can’t think. It needs food. Only I have forgotten how Food works. And battery is low, and I’m getting obsessed with posting a post I cannot find, so I am at least recognised it and I think how it is like this when ill mental and physical obsessions come up because there is no energy left to push it down, and that’s what a lot of mental health is, I think, not being able to find energy to stop the symptoms.

This post would be unreadable if not for the words appearing on the keyboard but I need to stoptyping and rest now, please.

Still a Survivor

Today’s activity involves journaling. It’s based on the premise of Feel the Fear and Do It Anyway – that you can handle it when your fears come true.

Today’s activity was to journal about the times when your worst fears were realised

As you recall each one of them, remind yourself that you did handle those things somehow. You wouldn’t be here if you hadn’t.

It was a powerful thing to sit and write the things I have been able to handle. I knew I had survived all of these, yet it wasn’t until I wrote them down that I was able to really say “Well Done!” 👏

Usually they come up in a more negative context, as my inner complainer tells me What are you making a fuss for? You’ve been through worse. As if that is ever helpful.

Some things I have had to handle

• Kidney failure as a teenager
• Painful, sudden transplant rejection
• 2 operations within a week
• Breakdown
• Dropping out of college
• Long, drawn-out transplant rejection
• Suicidal thoughts
• Intense group therapy
• Coming off antidepressants (hell, but I no longer need them)
• Being broken up with
• Being told I had to move out of my last place

Releasing resentment

Change of plan today, because I felt drawn to do the exercise about resentment today.

One reason we hide our emotions is because we feel guilty for having them in the first place.

I know how damaging this can be. One thing I read about depression stuck with me. I wish I could remember where I read it because it makes sense. Depression comes from suppressing or pressing down your emotions. I know that once I began examining my emotions I began to get better. Not 100% obviously – the last few posts are proof of that – but I come out of these periods quicker, and I can sense what’s going on sooner, which usually stops me falling quite so far.

The exercise is simple:

• Complete the sentence I am feeling resentful about…(what?) or I am feeling resentful with… (who?) as many times as you need.
• Look at each statement in turn and ask the questions:
• What lies behind this feeling?
• what if anything do I need to do about it?

I did this four times tonight. I won’t say what I was resentful about, because once it was over I tore up the paper and flushed it away. This was actually the answer to one of the questions “what do I need to do about it?” This helped because it’s a good way of releasing the guilt – not only is the resentment out of my mind, but now it’s torn into little bits and (symbolically) out of my life too.

I work well with symbolism like this. My brain may not always be helpful or indeed healthy, but it does work in some wonderful ways too.

👁 💗 my 🧠

It’s important to give love to all parts of yourself, especially the bits you don’t like. I’ve been moaning about my brain a lot recently but that’s as effective as moaning about my kidney. It doesn’t contribute anything to getting better.

Today’s activity was a good one. I will be doing this one again.

It’s not a good sign when…

• I can’t remember how food works. I walk around the kitchen and look at food but it is impossible to get from looking to eating because complicated things like cutlery or packaging are in the way
• I can’t think about time. I lose time playing games on the tablet, but worse is looking at the clock, seeing the time and thinking I have half an hour to listen to this before I have to do such and such then find the timer to do such and such going off ten minutes later because my brain can no longer process what a clock is saying.
• I have unopened packages on the kitchen table. Receiving post is something I usually enjoy, but they just sit there and I have no interstate in them.
• I cannot make sense and even handwriting something is hard because I look back and see mistakes like I have written the word “it” as “ti” and this is handwriting so it’s not even a typo.

and yet, with all these bad signs, signs that my brain is not working, I have to go to work soon. This has advantages; buying a sandwich on the way will ensure that I eat because, while making a sandwich is currently impossible, eating one isn’t, but I am wondering if I am up to it, given how tired I am. And I have my evening class, but I have to go because it’s half term next week.

Thing is, it’s a writing class. And given how badly I am writing….

But somehow I stay stubborn. I pack my bag for class and for work. I can tell what’ll happen; I will arrive home ten pm and fall asleep, and not have time to Blog (why does WordPress capitalise that word?) so I am blogging now, even with nothin to say.

Apologies. It’s my perfectionist streak, and it’s not a good sign when that is in charge of how “good” or “bad” I am.

Blogging while exhausted

I want to write a bit more about yesterday’s blog post.

I was at the stage that is un-technically called “exhausted frustration” I used to get to this state all the time and I think I used to think it was another symptom of depression.

It’s what I call the frame of mind when any and every little thing can send the mind into unreasonable frustration and, if unchecked, rage. I used to not recognise it as a result of my body being hungry and exhausted. By tiny things, I mean swearing under my breath at the phone keyboard because whenever I press the “t” key it gets me to the “tag” section on instagram. I don’t usually swear in public. But every time it did this I muttered another swear word, which I won’t type here because it’s not that kind of a blog, under my breath.

Thing is, because I was so tired, I wasn’t even aware I was doing it, not at first. I don’t know, maybe about 5 minutes of this before I caught myself and put away the phone. This is scary because it’s like my tiredness has taken away normal rules from me and not told me.

I am still exhausted today. I was in bed around 8pm last night. I also, because I was too tired to think, barely ate. Which only makes it worse. It’s weird, the way physical and mental health are divided, when your mind is another part of your body. Physical illness can affect the mental illness in decisive ways – I guess that’s why the HALT technique I blogged about recently is so effective – because it does acknowledge this. Too little Food can affect my mental health profoundly. It affects my sleep, because a hungry body will not sleep properly. It also impares my thinking (and possibly spelling too since the app is telling me there’s no such word as “impares”) my decision making, and my emotions go haywire – basically if I don’t eat, my mental health goes down hill. Which is a problem when I am too ill to cook.

Have I blogged about the difficulty I have with…..

There was a sentence there. Then half way through typing Poof! Vanished. No words in my head matched the words. This is exhaustion, not even frustration, just the exhaustion of a heavy head cold. It’s frightening, losing words. It’s frightening knowing that I have little Food in the house that I can eat. When I am so tired that I cannot complete a sentence, cooking becomes potentially dangerous. When I can’t trust myself with words I know I am not in the right ability to trust myself with a knife, or an oven.

Also, ev3n as I write this I am aware of the ability to type coherently is leaving me. Like the way I left , I mean put the number 3 in my word even just then. I am not even sure how it got there. I am not in the grip of exhausted frustration now. If I was a tiny thing like that would have me literally in tears and begging the machine, out loud, to please stop doing this and why are you doing this too me? Which I’m not. I’m too tired to insert italics though. I am tempted to delete this post, but a) I am too tired to do another one and I want to do one each day, even if I’ll, as a record for, I mean of, how it is. b)This typing is a illustration of how tired I am. Maybe the (lack of) structure will make my point of how tiredness affects me mentally better than my saying it?

I am going to change the title of this post to reflect it.

It is nearly 8pm.time for bed.

In a week or two I will have to reread these posts to see if they make any sense whatsoever.