This is a Really Real Mental Health post.
This is a Really Real Health post.
TW: Mention of weight, exercise, and food choices, but in a body accepting way.
I haven’t written a long post in a couple of weeks.
Short posts detailing my current day to day stuff have been ongoing.
It’s a different way of communicating.
But less cathartic.
When I’m doing well I don’t feel the need to write the long, soul spilling posts that have become such a coping tool for me.
And I am doing well.
I’m slowly figuring out what is mood and mental health related, and what is habit learned by months and months of being depressed.
I’m working on not judging myself for either.
A couple of weeks ago I got on a scale to see if I was above the weight limit for something.
It’s frustrating that many things aren’t built for someone my size.
But, the truth is, I am bigger than many things allow for, and I’m accepting that it isn’t my fault.
I am allowed to exist as I am, and it’s sad that there are things that won’t accommodate me.
I’ve started speaking up. Letting professional offices, especially those in medical settings, know that they should consider having some seating without arms, seating that will accommodate all body types.
But anyway,
I got on the scale again recently, and realized that even with making conscious food choices, and moving intentionally, I haven’t lost any weight.
And honestly, I felt okay with that.
I’m moving around easier, I’m enjoying the things my body can do for me.
I’m working on stretching and strengthening the muscles and joints that help me get from place to place. I’m working on gaining more mobility,
more stamina.
Some days I’m still sleeping more than I would like.
My mood seems a bit better, and I’m more productive on the days that I sleep less,
but I can’t always get myself out of bed in the morning,
even when I go to sleep early.
And that’s okay.
I’m a constant work in progress.
Pushing myself gently to do a little more than I think I can.
But loving myself either way.
And when I can’t love myself as I am,
I accept myself as I am.
I remind myself of all of the things I have survived and overcome.
I remember that my body does amazing things for me.
Movement helps with that.
Especially yoga,
it helps me get in touch with my body and my mind.
It helps me push just a little bit further.
Also, the videos I’m following remind me that it’s okay to modify things in ways that fit my body and my ability that day.
They remind me that it’s okay to need props and items that help.
They remind me that every body is different,
every body has different abilities.
And that every body takes up space.
At the end,
in my Savasana pose,
they remind me to take up as much space as I want.
To open my body and feel comfortable, instead of shrinking myself.
It pertains to mental health as well.
So often we try to shrink our emotions and our symptoms.
We try to fit into a box created by the world.
Right now I’m feeling that I’m not disabled,
but that I’m differently abled.
Not everyone can open up and share their struggles the way I do.
Not everyone can see their vulnerability as a strength.
Not everyone can change lives by speaking their truth.
Well, that isn’t quite true.
Everyone will change lives if they speak their truth.
But speaking our truth is hard.
Accepting our truth is hard.
Accepting ourselves is hard.
Accepting myself is hard.
But I’m doing it.
And lately,
more than accepting me as I am
I’m loving me,
for who I am,
and for what I have to offer.
It may not be the type of productivity that this capitalistic world sees as valuable.
But I’m learning,
because of those around me,
that value isn’t just monetary.
ADHD
Where do I begin?
This is a Really Real Mental Health post.
I’m doing some of the things, but there are so many things that are going undone..
I’m going to the gym every night.
But I’m not running the errands I need to run before the sun goes down.
I’m making more intentional food choices.
But I’m eating all day.
I’m cooking.
But dishes often pile up, and my stove top is gross.
I’m getting up early.
But then I’m napping most of the day.
I feel
better
I guess.
But there’s so much I still haven’t done.
The increased dose of my meds are working.
But they aren’t working enough.
Or, maybe this isn’t the bipolar or the depression.
Maybe it’s me?
Where does my illness end,
and my lack of willpower begin.
When does it become lazy, instead of ill.
But, writing this has me thinking.
Maybe,
I’m being too hard on myself.
Maybe,
everything doesn’t have to change at once.
Maybe,
I’ve spent so long minimally functioning,
that I can’t expect to reverse those habits in a week.
Maybe,
it is both mental illness
and me.
And all I can do is make the next right decision.
Keep moving forward.
Picking myself up when I stumble.
Doing what I can and slowly adding more
and more.
Maybe I just need to take it one day at a time.
Maybe I need to be nicer to me.
Just because
This is a Really Real Mental Health post.
I just felt like writing today.
I don’t have any real reason, anything pressing on my mind,
but I felt the need to put fingers to keys.
Earbuds in my ears, gentle piano music piping through.
My writing music.
I woke up before 4 pm today.
I’m already on my second cup of coffee.
I talked to my pdoc, and we discussed options.
Different anti-depressants that may be activating.
We’re restarting my Ritalin, something that the trauma unit discontinued.
And that’s when I started having problems with sleeping too much.
We’re also raising my antidepressant.
Hopefully this fixes it.
It will be a week or two before I know, she doesn’t use electronic prescriptions and will have to mail me a paper script.
She’s the best psychiatrist I’ve ever had, but at her age even a fax machine seems advanced.
She works for herself, no staff, just a tiny little messy office in an apartment building.
Of course, now she’s working from home. All of our appointments done via phone call.
I’m not even sure that she owns a computer.
I’ve wondered what will happen if she dies. Who will inform me?
Will I just suddenly not get the call at our scheduled time, and eventually I’ll find a new prescriber?
Weird thoughts that run through my head.
I’m starting on the preparations for the Florida trip.
Laundry is gathered, list is started, plans to clean out the fridge more completely for trash night tonight.
Tomorrow we will dig out the car and run some errands.
It’s still snowing.
Yesterday it was tiny little flakes, today it’s big and fluffy.
It’s supposed to rain and get icy.
Ew.
Snow days used to be the only days I took a break.
Running around for appointments and interesting things.
Plans with friends, the gym, long walks.
Snow days are just another day now.
I’m such a homebody.
Finding the balance between safety and using it as an excuse is just hard.
I haven’t found that point yet.
This trip is taking me way outside of my covid comfort zone.
But it’s with good reason.
And it will break the monotony that has become my life.
A monotony that so many people feel right now.
Ew.
Today my pdoc called me a lady.
I got that gross feeling that I get when I’m misgendered.
I don’t think I’ve ever told her though.
And by the time I realized I should say something, the moment had passed and we were on to other topics.
It’s hard to know when to say something, and when to just let it pass.
We’re heading south.
I know I’ll get “ma’am”ed and “miss”ed on a regular basis.
I’ll get that gross feeling but just let it go.
It’s easier that way.
I don’t get the weird looks and the lack of understanding.
Day 19
This is a Really Real Mental Health post.
Two steps forward.
One step back.
I cancelled almost everything today.
I showed up late to PHP, and was thankful when we ended both groups early.
I cancelled meeting up with a friend.
I cancelled my doctors appointment.
I barely made it out to the store to pick up a medication I had run out of.
Part of it is that I’m flaring right now.
Every joint hurts.
A burning pain that makes me want to cry.
But I don’t.
Honestly, I look just like I look any other day.
I just,
deal with it.
Silently.
But inside I’m screaming.
And, it was also depression.
I could feel it gripping at me, holding me back.
Holding me down in bed this morning.
Holding me back from leaving the house.
Some days it’s releasing its grip enough to let me function almost normally.
Whatever that is.
But today it held firm.
I pushed through some this afternoon.
Staring at my design software I stopped scrolling Facebook long enough to work on some cards.
I kept having to push every step of the way.
I would make a few edits and find myself mindlessly scrolling again.
I would cut a few pages and catch myself mindlessly reading post after post.
Eventually I’d get them put together.
I managed to make 12 cards today.
I was wading through the thickest mud though.
Even writing this,
I’m forcing myself to stay on track.
I keep getting distracted by everything.
Zoning off into the distance.
Two steps forward.
One step back.
I’ll move forward again tomorrow.
Music
This is a Really Real Trauma post.
TW: Quick Mention of Completed Suicide by Gunshot.
I inherited 3 more alexa echo dots when Dad died. We had bought them to set up throughout his house so that I could drop in and hear him where ever he was hanging out.
I was listening in on the one in his kitchen when he shot himself, which was part of what made things echo back and forth so much. But, that’s beside the point.
We already had a couple of them here, but with the addition of the ones from dad’s house, we have one in every room except for the spare room that Wonder Woman sees clients virtually in. Even in the bathroom, which is pretty awesome for playing and switching music while showering. (Or making those notes to myself that I inevitably think of while covered in soap and water.)
I almost always have music playing when I’m cleaning, and especially when I’m alone. If I’m moving throughout the house it’s usually via wireless earbuds.
Right now I can’t handle being cut off from the world via headphones, and even one headphone makes me feel vulnerable from that side. (One of many little things that are driving me nuts about this trauma).
Today I realized I could play music across all of our echo devices. No matter where I walked in the house I could hear Lizzo (my music of choice this afternoon) as I scurried to clean the bathroom and the kitchen (which of course, due to ADHD meant 100 little side trips to other things). But I could play it low enough that I still heard the doorknob as Wonder Woman got home from a quick grocery run and getting us Starbucks.
I apparently said something in PHP the last time I was there, that has stuck with a good friend of mine. I had forgotten about it, but she often brings up how she uses that tip on a regular basis.
If you can’t find the way straight through your struggles, find a way to work with it, over it, or around it.
This particular trauma is going to take a new set of work arounds as I learn the different triggers. It will take some stops and starts and it won’t be as quick or as easy as I want it to be.
But when I can’t push straight through, I can work with it, over it, or around it.
Where’s My Roller Coaster?
This is a Really Real Mental Health Post.
It’s been 2 weeks since I’ve written. Now granted, time is going super fast, so it feels like less than that, but it really has been 2 weeks. I wrote daily for a long time, I wrote at least twice a week for a long time. Now I’m lucky if I write every couple of weeks.
Part of it is Covid. Nothing exciting is happening in my life. It’s the same shit, different day, different week, different month.
But a bigger part of it is that I’m just stuck in this low grade, constant, depression.
I miss my roller coaster. The monotony of day to day life with mental illness was broken up by constantly changing levels of mania and depression.
Good news: we stopped the rapid cycling.
Bad news: we stopped the rapid cycling.
Mental health was an obstacle course before. Making it through this episode just long enough for the next one to kick in. It was exhausting, but it was interesting.
Now my mental health is a long marathon. Just keep functioning at some constant level, reserving energy for the long haul.
The benefit to the obstacle course was that the adrenaline, kept me going, The hypomania and the influx of serotonin that it brought, kept me going.
That said, I read the posts I made in years past and I know that it wasn’t all that comfortable riding the roller coaster either. The suicidal thoughts were worse (and more dangerous) during mixed episodes. The hypomania brought along poor decision making. The lows were so dark, so so dark.
But, this version of stability is its own type of difficult.
I mean, I should be thankful that I’m stable. The suicidal thoughts are fleeting. I’ve held a job for close to 6 months. I’m not constantly in crisis.
But I’m also depressed enough that I’m often doing the bare minimum. Just enough to get me through to the next day. I can’t seem to find the will or the energy to do more.
I have enough work available to easily pull 20-30 hours a week. Yet, some weeks I’m lucky if I do half that.
And it isn’t that I don’t want to. I sit here stuck. I want to work, I know what I want to work on, but I just can’t find the energy to actually do it.
And it’s not just work, so it’s not just that I’m avoiding that.
I have a list of cards to make for friends. The list was made in April and May. It’s July. I’m still only part way through this list.
Side note for those that requested cards, they will make it to you eventually, I promise.
I sit here, aimlessly scrolling facebook. I want to craft, I want to game, I want to do SOMETHING, but I can’t find the will or the energy to start.
This is hard. A different kind of hard than constant crisis.
I miss my roller coaster.
Blah
This is a Really Real Mental Health post.
TW: Mention of weight being a problem for me, but no mention of dieting.
First of all, I realize I’ve slowed way down on my writing. I’m writing some short stuff for the Facebook page/group I’m a part of, but mostly, my writing has just stopped. (Link to page and group in the comments.)
Second, everything I have written, for awhile now, seems to deal with either my weight, or work, and how hard both of those things are for me right now.
And I really did plan to make this post different, maybe come up with some more interesting topic, or something new. Except my weight, and work are the two things that are most difficult in my life. Everything else is just . . . there . . . it doesn’t really bother me.
I mean, the dishes keep piling up in the sink, and I can’t find the will to cook. Showering, and even brushing my teeth are chores that are difficult to force myself through. I’m sleeping for 12-ish hours a night.
If it sounds like depression and looks like depression it must be nothing. This is fine, everything is fine.
Well, I guess the other things are bothering me, they just don’t feel as pressing, or has as much of a sense of urgency about them. They are just part of my current normal.
I feel like I have no will power to just muscle through this stuff. Weight and work included. I haven’t been able to make the changes I need to make. I haven’t been able to stick to a schedule. I haven’t been able to just “do the things.”
But also, I know this will pass. I will get back into a routine. I will slowly change these new, unhealthy, habits, back into the healthier habits I had before. I will go back to thriving with a routine, and find satisfaction in a job well done. Dishes and menu planning and straightening up around the house will go back to being just things that I do.
My current meds, probably the higher dose of Abilify, are muting my emotions. In an effort to keep me from rapid cycling and ending up in a mixed mood episode, we’ve made life kind of flat for me. Yeah, I don’t get hypomanic, and the suicidal thoughts are mostly controlled, but the world is kind of grey and 2 dimensional. I don’t feel difficult things as strongly, but I’m also missing out on the bright colors of emotions I’m used to seeing.
This is fueling my depression, I’m sure. When the world seems flat and made up mostly of various shades of grey, it’s harder to see the positives and feel hopeful. It’s hard to be excited about life.
When there’s no sense of accomplishment when I complete a task, it’s hard to keep repeating that task over and over again.
But, mental illness is hard. It’s an everyday battle. The constant fight is draining. Even just riding the waves without fighting against them is draining.
This too shall pass. Hopefully some slow med changes will help. Hopefully the warmer months and more sun will help (If I can get myself out of the house.) Hopefully continuing to adjust to this new normal will help.
Hopefully.
If I can hold onto that hope, I’m winning the battle.
Work, Work, Work, Work, Work
This is a Really Real Mental Health Post.
My brain is doing much better. I’ve walked and gotten out of the house and set up a plan to get my eating under control. Taking some control back has helped a lot. I felt like I was just stuck in the same loop and couldn’t get off that path.
But work is still a struggle. I haven’t done any real work since Monday. I’ve done the bare minimum, keeping fires from starting. I did talk to my boss, which was a huge thing for me, and he reminded me that nothing is an emergency, I can take the time I need and get my brain back together.
But my brain is mostly back together, and I still haven’t been able to pull out the stacks of paper that need entering. I haven’t been able to scan the papers that need scanning. I haven’t been able to file the papers that need filing.
I definitely haven’t had the creative brain to create new ads and write new copy.
But this is a start.
Getting my feelings and my struggles out of my brain and onto the screen helps me gather the focus I need to succeed. Work is super important to me. After years of being unable to be productive in that way, it makes me feel like a functional adult.
It’s a bit of normality among my disabilities.
It’s a huge accomplishment.
Taking off most of this week means I have to go back to leaning on people for financial help. That’s hard, even though I know I’m so very lucky to have people to lean on. There has already been a reduction in hours due to the state of the world and it feels unfair that I slacked off this week.
But I’m not sure that I had a choice. Without taking a break I would have sunk further and further and honestly, I’d like to avoid the danger zone.
Now it’s time to pick up where I left off, to get back into the swing of things, and to do what I know I’m capable of.
I appreciate everyone that lets me be heard. I appreciate everyone that comments. I appreciate the fact that getting my words on the screen not only helps me, but helps others as well.
I’m very grateful for my life as it is now, even with the ups and downs and struggles.
I’m grateful to be alive.
Now it’s time to get some work done.
How Really Real Am I?
This is a Really Real Mental Health Post.
Therapy was hard today.
I mean, you all may not believe it, but I work my ASS off in therapy.
I wish there was a sarcasm font, of course I work my ass off in therapy. Therapy is a really really big part of my recovery. And today we covered some really really hard stuff and we landed on a really really big thing.
I don’t let people see who I am. Even the people who are closest to me don’t see the real me. And it’s not fair to them, or me.
I censor myself.
I squash myself.
I quiet myself.
I write a blog called Really Real, for fuck’s sake, and I am very far from my really real self. Even in my own home. I’m an abridged version of me. I’m a well thought out representation.
I’m afraid to take up too much space.
I’m afraid to take up too much time.
I’m afraid to take up too much energy.
I’m afraid to be too much.
Too much.
Too much.
Too much.
Such a big theme in my life, that feeling of being too much.
As much as I share, as open as I am, as much of my story as I tell, I’m still not living an authentic life.
It’s not fair to the people around me. It’s not fair to the people closest to me. It’s not fair to the people who love me.
Because they deserve to know the full version of me.
Hell, they deserve to decide if that version of me is still someone they love.
Which I guess is where the fear comes from. Am I still lovable if I take up space. Am I still lovable if I say what’s on my mind. Am I still lovable if I don’t censor myself.
Am I still lovable if I start fully being me, for me, instead of trying to be the smallest version of my self?
If I stop monitoring the mood of the room and making sure I don’t disrupt it?
If I stop making sure I don’t make waves? If I stop tiptoeing around?
Is the real, authentic, me, lovable?
I don’t even know who I am under all of this censoring and squashing and quieting. I’ve done it my whole life. I have been too much since I was small, so I learned to bottle it up, hide it away, only let parts of myself out at a time.
Never be too much.
I think and overthink before I talk. Before I write. Before I move.
I think and overthink.
It’s exhausting.
What if I just say what I’m thinking? What if I just write what I feel? What if I just move how I want?
What if I stop overthinking so much?
What if I stop worrying about being too much?
What if I start being really real?
What if?
First Paycheck!
This is a Really Real Mental Health Post.
I got my first paycheck.
My first paycheck since I went on disability.
This is a really big deal.
A really big deal.
I feel like a contributing member of society again, even though others (my therapist, Wonder Woman) point out that I was a contributing member of society even when I wasn’t working. Just in different ways.
It didn’t feel like it.
I’ve written before about that question everyone asks when you first meet them,
“What do you do?”
I have an answer for that now. I have a thing that I do. It gives me an identity other than disabled. Even “student” didn’t make me feel that great because after 20 years and countless dropped classes, countless failed classes, countless incomplete classes, countless changes of my major, I’m still working on my two year degree.
But now I’m doing the thing.
I’m finally a real person.
Which implies I wasn’t a real person before. And that was how I felt. I wasn’t really an adult. I wasn’t a kid anymore either. Which left me in some void.
Not really anything.
Not real.
And I spent the day in therapy yesterday trying to break apart where that message came from, and how it came to be so much a part of my identity. It isn’t the first time I’ve asked those questions, but new therapist, new perspective, revisiting old topics.
But now I have a new identity. I have a thing that I do.
I’m a contributing member of society.
I get a paycheck.
And I’m afraid of fucking it up.
Working isn’t easy for me, there’s a reason I’ve spent the last bunch of years on disability. I want, so very much, to work each day. But finding the focus to start is hard, getting past myself and my anxiety is hard, getting out of bed in the morning when depression wants to hold me there, is hard.
I’m doing the thing, but I’m afraid of letting everyone down. I’m afraid of proving everyone right or proving everyone wrong, depending on their faith in me.
And I’m trying not to let that fear cause its own problems. I’m trying to let myself be afraid and keep pushing forward. I’m trying to prove to myself that I can do this, and also that it’s okay if I find out that I can’t, that trying is the most important part of all of this.
Trying is more than I would have done a year ago.
Six months ago.
And now look at me.
I got my first paycheck.
Really Real Blog 