Gym

Today

/ Self Saving Warrior Princess / 2 Comments

This is a Really Real Mental Health Post.

Today I just don’t wanna. So I’m not.

I’m not going to the gym.

I’m not even going to DBT.

(I never, ever skip DBT.)

I may not go to derby.

It’s not even my busiest Wednesday, it’s my low key one. But I just don’t want to participate in life. So I’m not. I’m fighting to stay out of bed, and I may not even do that. I may let the bed win.

Today I don’t feel like fighting.

I don’t feel like fighting so hard just to live a functional life.

I don’t feel like riding the roller coaster.

It’s not that I want to die, for a change it’s not that feeling. I just don’t feel like making myself participate in this glorious mess.

I want a break from pushing myself through everything.

Today I’m being willful and even obstinate, because I know this isn’t the best way.

And I’d love to say I don’t care, but I do. I feel guilty for giving myself this break but I just don’t have the energy or the willpower to fight it today.

Today I just needed to take a sidestep off the ride and let it pass me by.

Today I just don’t wanna. So I’m not.

Wednesdays are Hard

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This is a Really Real Mental Health Post.

Wednesdays are hard.

I leave the house at 930 in the morning and start with gym and get home at 1030 at night after derby. The middle of the day is filled with DBT and NAMI and school work during my down times and transportation issues and eating on the go.

Wednesdays are hard.

By the end of the day I’m emotionally and physically exhausted.

This week they moved NAMI to a new building and I couldn’t find food locally so I went way too long without eating. It just added to the complete feeling of overwhelm by the end of the day.

Wednesdays are hard.

Yesterday was harder than most, and I came home at the end of the day and felt completely overwhelmed and couldn’t tell if I was seeing real problems or thought distortions but I knew my emotions were bigger than me and I couldn’t contain them. I wanted to lash out. Well, not really, I just I needed them out of my head.

I went and laid with the covers over my head. My bed is my safe space. My cave in the covers is my place to be unsure of things and still be okay.

I told Wonder Woman about my fears and my insecurities. I vented out all of the emotions that were bigger than me until they seemed a bit more manageable.

I cried.

Wednesdays are hard.

This morning the last thing I wanted to do was get up.and go to the gym. I spent the morning in bed thinking of a million excuses, a million reasons why I just couldn’t go today.

I just needed a break from life after yesterday.

Wednesdays are hard.

But instead I got my gym clothes on before I sat down for my morning coffee, getting one step closer, making it a little more difficult to back out.

I’m still not quite sure how to fix Wednesdays. But it doesn’t have to bleed over into Thursday, too.

Defining Myself

/ Self Saving Warrior Princess / 3 Comments

This is a Really Real . . .

Well, I’m not sure how to categorize it actually.

It’s maybe a Really Real Dating Post and kind of a Really Real Identity Crisis Post.

Wonder Woman and I are polyamorus (simply put, we can openly and separately date other people) even though we’ve been functionally monogamous for the majority of our relationship.

This isn’t really about that, but it’s about defining myself for a dating profile and I figured I’d mention the whole polyamory thing before someone thinks we’re either breaking up or that I’m cheating in a very strange out in the open way. Neither of which is happening here.

Online dating means having a profile.

Which means I need to define myself.

Which is fucking hard.

I go to the gym almost daily, but I’m not really all that into fitness.

I write almost daily, but I don’t really know anything about writing.

I love coffee, but can’t really discuss any of the finer details or even explain what I like (Starbucks is fine, thank you very much).

I love cooking, but couldn’t tell you my favorite meal.

I enjoy officiating with derby, but don’t really do derby.

I’m a widow and that changed my life in HUGE ways, but I’m not only a dead woman’s wife.

I can have long conversations about weekly doctors appointments and DBT classes and therapy, and what’s it’s like to survive with not enough money and too much trauma.

I can’t keep up with politics or anything else in the news. I don’t read or watch TV or follow any current pop culture. I’m not big into board games or even video games. I can fake my way through conversations about music but mostly have no idea who sang which songs but I might know a few of the lyrics.

And all of this seems like a really negative way to describe myself but every time I think about who I am as a whole, that’s all I see.

All the things I’m not.

So, even though I don’t believe one person can meet all of my needs and I wouldn’t want her to even if she could.  And even though I strongly believe in polyamory as the right choice for me. I still haven’t really put much effort into dating, partially because I can’t figure out how to put myself out there authentically.

I can’t really figure out who I am.

And it makes me sad.

Wonder Woman obviously sees something in me. I have friends who obviously want to spend time around me so I obviously have good qualities. But being a good friend, a good listener, a kind person, those things aren’t really who I am and what I like to do.

Those things aren’t the kinds of things you use to describe yourself to another person.

Dating is hard!

Be Still

/ Self Saving Warrior Princess / 6 Comments

This is a Really Real Mental Health Post.

I didn’t want to get out of bed this morning.

But I did.

First I woke up Wonder Woman and asked her to hold me and remind me that it was just depression and that I really did need to get up and go to the gym.

(I realize how lucky I am to have a woman who doesn’t get mad at me when I wake her up for those sorts of reminders. She even threw a “You’ll feel better afterwards” in there.)

And then I packed my bag with clothes for DBT and I went to the gym with Bat Woman and I did the things.

(And Wonder Woman wasn’t wrong. I felt a bit better afterwards.)

And then I went to DBT and participated fully.

And then I sat reading chapters and articles for school while waiting for mobility.

But I still feel like I’m just going through the motions.

I still feel like I’m walking through a fog.

Now that I’m home I want to go take a nap, and I can’t tell if that would be great self care, or if it would be giving into depression. It really could go either way.

I guess it depends on if I get up when I wake up the first time, or if I lay there for 3 hours wallowing in self pity about how this depression

just

won’t

let

go.

I appreciate the fact that my moods have stabilized on my current medications, however, I kind of miss the hypomania breaking the monotony of the depression.

The other one is, I definitely don’t miss actual crises occurring in my life. I’m so glad I’ve had this past year or two where I haven’t spent most of my time in therapy putting out fires and have instead been able to spend time healing from all of the trauma. But, I miss the rush of crisis mode.

I miss the adrenaline and emotional response that was needed to survive that sort of thing.

Maybe that’s part of my depression. Maybe I was just so used to living in crisis mode for so long that now when I stop, when there isn’t something to fix, a fire to put out, something to be reacting to . . .

Maybe I’m still learning how to just

be still.

I’ll get there.

Logistically

/ Self Saving Warrior Princess / 2 Comments

This is a Really Real Mental Health Post.

Today is a day of logistics.

I woke up super early and popped out of bed. I’m definitely feeling better emotionally because I don’t dread the day as soon as I open my eyes.

Another sign that I’m doing better is that I’m working on “doing all the things.” I start an accelerated 6 week college course next week and they opened some of the course work early so I started working on that. I also did more work on plane tickets for an upcoming trip. I scheduled some appointments and also sent off an email asking my primary care NP for a letter of support before she leaves the practice.

Busy, busy, busy.

And if feels much better than sitting around staring at a computer screen scrolling Facebook endlessly.

Unfortunately when I’m stuck in that low grade depression all I really can do is sit and stare at the screen. I can’t find the motivation or interest in anything else. I want to be interested, I really do, but nothing grabs my attention.

Of course, even though I’m interested in doing stuff now, doesn’t mean I can figure out what, exactly I should be doing once I run out of logistical stuff to work through. I want to craft more stuff, but can’t figure figure out what to craft. I can only cook so many dishes. I can only plan meals so far ahead. Only so much school work has been opened.

I could clean more of the house but, lets not get carried away here, I’m not quite that bored.

I did finally color my hair. It was so faded it wasn’t even pastel anymore, it was, well, I’m not sure what it was but it was kinda gross. Now it’s bright and vibrant and you can see me coming from a few miles away.

Now I get to sweat pink and purple at the gym for the next week. I’m always afraid a drip of bright pink is going to run down my face while I’m on the elliptical. That’s the one problem with these bright colors, but I can’t imagine anything but my signature pink and purple.

Have you ever done anything wild with your hair?

Craft a Happier Day

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This is a Really Real Mental Health Post.

I’m having one of those chicken and egg moments. Which came first?

Am I feeling better because I started crafting?

Or was I able to start crafting because I was feeling better?

It’s hard to tell.

Sometime late yesterday evening I pulled myself out of bed and started playing around with the vinyl cutter.  I’ve made quite a few things since then and now I want to make more, more, more!

Eventually I’ll run out of ideas and then maybe I’ll be bummed again, or maybe I’ll pick up one of my other crafts.

I have plenty of supplies but only so many projects. It’s frustrating that I love to craft but have no interest in selling (it takes the joy out of it).  I can only store so many bracelets, vinyl projects, etc and I don’t always feel competent enough to give it away as gifts most of the time.

Anyway, back to the chicken and egg problem.

When I’m depressed, I can’t make myself get involved in this stuff. I can’t even come up with ideas of what to work on. I just have no interest.

Eventually I can force it, and then I can normally run with it.

Maybe that’s because I’m already pulling out of it, and the crafting just helps me come the rest of the way out.

I’m the same way with any activity. When I’m depressed nothing seems interesting, but once I can get something to take hold, it helps me pull my way out.

The gym definitely helped keep me going this past week. I went 6 days out of 7 and feel like I’m back in the groove of that. Batwoman and I sat down today and scheduled this week out as well.

For now I feel like I may be on stable ground, and I hope I can stay here over the next two weeks. This time of year is so, so hard and honestly, I think I’m handling it really well.

Time to go craft a happier day.

 

Question of the Day: Wednesday Check-In

/ Self Saving Warrior Princess / 11 Comments

Today’s Question Is:

How are you doing so far this week?

This has been a pretty good week so far. Monday was therapy and pdoc and I handled that busy day pretty well. Today is my really full day which often leaves me feeling overwhelmed.

I went to the gym at 10 this morning and then my gym buddy and I grabbed a quick lunch. That’s followed by DBT from 1-3, which is exhausting by itself. Then I’ll take mobility to the library where I have a NAMI support group from 6-730 and then I rush to Roller Derby which doesn’t end till 10.

I have dinner in the crockpot which we won’t get to eat until after we get home from Derby.

I’m hoping I can use my coping mechanisms to get through the day without the emotional meltdown that is pretty typical for my Wednesdays.

But, we’re halfway through the week.

How are you doing so far this week?

Quiet Voice of Defeat

/ Self Saving Warrior Princess / 4 Comments

This is a Really Real Mental Health Post, but also a Really Real Health Post.

CW: Talk of weight and food.

The quiet voice is back. The one that tells me it would be so much easier to just end it all.

Wednesdays are hard and even with my sister in town yesterday it was a long hard day. I came home after she left and climbed in bed without saying goodnight to Wonder Woman and pulled the covers up over my head.

I was irrationally angry over things that we just haven’t had time for.

Or maybe we haven’t made the time.

But either way I wanted to lash out and I wasn’t in a place to have a rational conversation so I climbed into bed and pulled the covers over my head and didn’t even stir when Wonder Woman came to bed hours later.

But that’s not why the voice is back.

I had a doctors appointment today and realized I’m looking for a quick fix when there isn’t one. I’m not willing to do the work right now because I feel like I have to work extra hard for minimal results and it’s just not fair.

When I was riding the wave of mania for almost a year it was hard work but at the same time it was easy. And there was all this external validation because in the midst of the hardest thing I’d ever been through I was making all these strides towards self improvement on so many different fronts.

Including losing weight.

But now I’m not manic, and now it is just hard work without all of the positive feedback and without even having anything to show for it.

I’m back in another weight loss surgery program and this one knows the problems I had with the last surgeon so I doubt I’ll have the same problem. Except the last time I was all about working the program and losing weight leading up to it, and really into how successful I was going to be pre and post surgery.

I gave a fuck and it showed.

This time I don’t really give a fuck. I just know I can’t keep living like this, and this is one program that won’t give me the amount of shit the last program gave me. It’s why I chose this program, it has minimal requirements.

See, I know surgery isn’t a quick fix. I know surgery is just a tool and if I don’t do the work it won’t work. I know it isn’t the easy way out.

And I also know that right now my heart isn’t in it.

And my heart isn’t in it because even while I was working so fucking hard, I just started gaining the weight back because I’m fighting against PCOS and I’m fighting against medications.

I don’t even know where to start with my food intake. There are so many things that need to change and I’m so overwhelmed about how to change them. I keep saying I’m going to do this or that differently but there are so many different areas that I end up not following through with any of them.

I’ve quit doing cardio at the gym because what’s the point of working myself to the point of exhaustion on the machines when I’m not getting a single benefit. I still go for strength training a few days a week because I feel the difference with that when I stop, I still walk a mile or two a few nights a week because walking made a huge difference in my life when I started, but even that I’m not all that consistent with.

I worked my ass off . . . and gained 25 lbs due to a medication change. Once that stabilized I kept working my ass off and my weight didn’t change. Now I’ve slacked way off for the last month and my weight didn’t change.

It makes me feel like the effort is useless.

I’m supposed to go for 4 more monthly nutrition appointments and then I can schedule surgery, but if I can’t get my heart into this, there’s no point in scheduling a surgery date.

Depression and poor self image are playing into this big time.

I care about how difficult my weight makes my life, but I hate my body so doing loving and caring things for it is difficult.

Self sabotage via food.

I’ve been here before, for a lot of years. Mania and post traumatic growth made it easy to overcome this cycle but it’s possible to overcome it even without that.

I need to get my heart back in the game.

I need to make changes.

Shining light on all my dark splotches

/ Self Saving Warrior Princess / 3 Comments

This is a Really Real Mental Health Post.

I just left therapy where we talked a lot about body image and why I am no longer able to be body positive like I once was.

I am pissed off at the body I inhabit.  I hate the skin that I am in.

At one point I worked out and I felt stronger, I lost weight, I felt I had control and was able to change the shape of this body of mine.

Now I have no control.

Medications have taken that control from me.

The same medication that reduced my suicidal thoughts has increased my weight and changed the distribution of my weight so that my abdomen is larger.

I am pissed off at the body I inhabit.  I hate the skin I am in.

I have an auto-inflammatory condition called hidradenitis suppurativa.

It causes painful abscesses, wounds, and tracts to develop in hair follicles and sweat glands in my underarms, breasts and groin.  When they heal they leave behind scar tissue.

My body is attacking itself.

I am pissed off at the body I inhabit. I hate the skin I am in.

Parker once asked me if I had to tell people I had HS. She was affirming that it was something to be ashamed of, something to hide.

I am afraid of sex, afraid of being seen naked because I’m fat and covered in sores and scar tissue. I can’t imagine that anyone, even Wonder Woman, would want to look at me. I hide my body. I have to fight against my own brain whenever I undress in front of her.

I am pissed off at the body I inhabit. I hate the skin I am in.

Even clothed I hate looking at myself in the mirror, my clothes no longer fit correctly, I’ve had to buy larger shirts. All I can see is my rolls and my fat. I see the parts of me that don’t fit in seats correctly.

“You’re pull up two chairs kinda big” is what my father once said.

I am pissed off at the body I inhabit. I hate the skin I am in.

I miss the days when I felt strong. I miss feeling beautiful.

I want to love the body I inhabit. Why can’t I love the skin I am in?

Maybe shining light on all of these dark thoughts is the beginning to loving myself again.