Bad Day

It seems that at least a few days a month now, and often the whole week before my period too, I feel so depressed and desperate. I feel like it should not be this hard when I'm medicated.  The pain is palpable. I've had to take a few sick days. I feel like my mental illness is becoming debilitating. It's hard to contain my anxiety and maintain the appearance of normal function. It's becoming too large to hide. 

I was already feeling off this morning and trying to figure out how I would make it through the day at work when I got a text. A young woman I worked with was shot and killed this week. She did nothing wrong. Some crazy man shot her.  It adds to the feeling that this world has tilted and has become the hell I sometimes feel I'm living in. 

My thoughts are muddled. I can't even express this turmoil I feel caught in. It's a bad day. I would like more good days please. 

The Disconnect

In the past year or so I have becoming increasingly isolated. Friends that I used to call close I can't seem to keep up with anymore. My mind is easily filled with thoughts that my friends find me to be a nuisance or that they're mad at me. 

I have one friend who admitted to me last year that she had distanced herself from me intentionally. I think she meant my anxiety was too much for her. Since she told me that I feel awkward reaching out to her. I read into her response or lack of response on Facebook to comments I post. I'm not sure if she's genuine when she agrees that we should get together. I'm not surprised that none of those plans have worked out. I saw her the other day and it was awkward. I was awkward. I'm getting more and more uncomfortable in my own skin. So many negative thoughts flood my head. I know that all of my friends can't feel as negatively as my mind tells me right now. I feel trapped by my anxiety. It's taking away my friends. I don't know how to be myself anymore. 

My Procrastination

I like to procrastinate. Maybe that's the wrong way to say it. I feel the need to procrastinate. A deep gripping overwhelming need to procrastinate. As though my life depended on it. I recently had an epiphany about this. I procrastinate to avoid The anxiety. The anxiety is too much.  If I look at my bills then I know that I'll be anxious about money and I'll be anxious about how much I make and I'll be anxious about the coming dentist bill that I can't pay. I think about the taxes I need to file and whether or not I did healthcare right last year. This turns into a worry about how the IRS is going to take away all my tax return. Then I worry about my retirement and how I'm behind on saving for it. Then I think about how I shouldn't file all of these papers floating around my apartment. Which makes me think I need to clean my apartment. If if I clean my apartment then I start to think about all of the things that I need to get rid of or the things I have nowhere to put. And then I think about how I have too much stuff. And then I think about how I have only six months left on my lease and I still haven't gotten everything put away. I'm  going to have to start packing soon.  

So at least now I know where all this avoidance comes from. Perhaps this seems obvious.  But I didn't know why I was sending everything out and hoping that it would go away. I had become such an airhead. I realize now it was self-preservation because there was too much anxiety over every thoughts I hadn't realized that I was anxious all the time. Somehow I missed that this was the over arching feeling. But I feel like I'm finally waking up.  I hope it's not too painful. 

Hey.

It's been a while. I would like to say it's because I've been super busy, but I haven't. Still no job. Lots of interviews. Everyone loves me. Tells me I was a top contender. Then offers job to other candidate. Very frustrating. Very wearing. Not feeling super good about myself currently. Also, you know how there's no extensions on unemployment? Yeah, that sucks too. Not sure what I'm going to do if someone doesn't hire me soon.

I've been noticing about myself lately that there is a serious edge of paranoia to my anxiety. I easily go from sending my friend a text to a minute later thinking that I probably offended them and they aren't answering me right away because I was so inconsiderate and that they are probably tired of me and my depressed ways and they've been distancing themselves from me anyways....

Yeah.  That's depressing. And exhausting. I'm exhausting to ME. But I seriously have been thinking that at least three or four of my friends didn't answer that ONE text message or like some joke I made on their Facebook page because they don't like me anymore. And I have two friends I can think of off the top of my head I'm scared to call because of that. Mind you, I'm not usually that girl. The one that people burn out on. I tend to isolate myself before anyone gets too burned out on my depression. But it could still happen right? That's probably what happened...


And this is how my brain occupies all this downtime.

And Some More Despair

Today I'm feeling pretty despair-y. Things just keep getting worse. In my saner moments, I can see that somehow I'm still standing, and I think that maybe this is a path I need to take that is hard but something I can survive and be stronger and happier for. And junk. But I am also tired. And I have moments where my heart cries out "how much more?"  Could I please have some peace and calm and rightness in my life?

Right now the miracle is probably that I am surviving. And I know I should be grateful. And many moments I am. But other moments, I just feel like the crazy is going to suck me in. And I feel scared. Because I don't know how much longer I can stand.

Anger and Despair

Anger and Despair,
Anger and Despair,
Do dodo dooo
Anger and Despair.

I thought maybe if I made up a cute little song about my crazy, it would be kind of cute and fun. Maybe whimsical. Not so much.

I'm having one of my really angry cranky weeks. I'm feeling some anger toward pretty much anyone who crosses my path. Holy crazy. My sweet, well intentioned man came over last night with the intention of cheering me up. I had to work very hard at not biting his head off. He does not have the experience with depression to understand that the plan of "cheering up" a depressed person does not necessarily work. He did make me feel loved and warm for a minute. But then I think it might have backfired somehow, because we ended the evening with him annoyed with me. I'm not even totally clear on what it was that he was upset about. I'm not saying he was upset for no reason... but I have no idea what I did. I was trying very hard not to be irritable and angry with him. I don't know if he felt like I was being cold because I was holding back... I'm not really sure.

I hate how my depression seems to cripple my relationships. Bleh.

Make the Jaw Clenching Stop

I have developed this thing in adulthood where I clench my jaw when I  am stressed out, to the point where my jaw gets tired. I have had to learn to stretch the muscles to try to get it to stop hurting. This is not a good sign. Today is a jaw clenching day. I'm so tired of jaw clenching days. I really, really love my job. But I also hate it. I love what I do. But I also hate what I do. I love it because it's a job that helps people. And that is good. I hate it because it is so thankless. Don't get me wrong; I'm not one of those people that needs to be thanked all the time. But it would be great if my coworkers and boss didn't seem to be constantly under the impression that I'm not doing ENOUGH. They tell me that they know I work hard and then in the same day, will tell me what ELSE I should be doing, with the time I do not have. Because what I have done is not enough. There needs to be More. Everything needs to be improved on. No one ever seems to think that I rock at anything. When I say I rocked at something, they have to point out how I, in fact, was only passable in my performance. Because, you know, you can always improve. Like I don't have that constant narrative in my head. I know I can always improve. I am WELL AWARE that I am not perfect, and cannot achieve perfection. But thank you, lovely work people, for driving home JUST HOW FLAWED I really am. Just when I thought I was aware of my flaws and the way I suck, you point out more ways. And my anxiety goes into overdrive. You know this, and you still do it. You're jerks. There, I've said it. And admitting you are a jerk does not mean it's okay to continue being one.

Grr.

I hate Mondays.

Weird Teetery Place

First, I need to tell you I found this, which I seriously think is the best description of how depression feels that I have ever read. Ever. Also it's funny and the pictures crack me up. 

I feel like I'm on an anxiety teeter totter right now. It is not fun like real ones. It just has the butterlfly-ey feeling, but like the I'm about to fall off this big teeter totter kind of butterflies. Right now I am feeling vaguely anxious about work tomorrow. I have managed to turn off my work thoughts enough that I am not obsessing about something that is making me anxious. But I have a vague sense that something is about to go very, very wrong. This feeling is only useful when your spidey senses are working correctly. Mine are all out of whack. I'm going to go crazy soon if this doesn't stop. The good news is, the vague feeling is a step up from the all-consuming anxiety where the thought practically eats you alive. So I think the meds are working. But still, I think I went a little crazy while the meds weren't working, and maybe there is no cure for that portion of crazy. This does not bode well.

I'm rambley tonight. The end.

Scary Happiness!

I have a friend who has told me a few times that she sometimes thinks I'm afraid to be happy. She also has asked before if I think I might look for things to worry about. I sometimes think she is right. I do seem to latch onto something to worry about, and then just worry away at it. With my struggles with anxiety lately, I've noticed that if I'm anxious about something, and then that thing becomes a non-issue, the feeling of elation is short-lived (right now sometimes even seconds) and then my mind has grabbed onto something new to worry about. Now that the meds are being a wee bit kinder, I'm feeling a little less obsessively anxious, which is fabulous. But, still. Today is Saturday. I don't have to work today. I can't do anything about the things that I need to take care of. I left things at work in a state where there was nothing urgent. I don't have a specific thing I'm worried about, and yet I have an uneasy feeling, like something bad is going to happen. And if I let myself start searching my mind, I have several things on deck that I could spend the day worrying about.

I really need to figure this anxiety thing out. This is the focus of counseling sessions for me. My last counselor was not cutting it. I don't like to reject people, and also I'm quick to think that counseling will not fix me, so I was countering that feeling with a resistance to looking at getting a new counselor. Fortunately, that counselor had some personal things that is keeping her out of the office, and since I need to stay on the counseling bandwagon, I found a new counselor. I have a very good feeling about her. I am fairly certain she will give me the tools I need to move forward a wee bit finally. And she probably won't take some of my excuses and stuff, which both scares and encourages me.

So, I need to do self-care today. And make the most of it. And resist the urge to turn off my brain and check out. Which is what I want to do right now. Being productive is hard. I need a nap.

Deeper and Uglier (or, Where Is the Love)

Just when I think that I have seen the worst it will be for me, and that I can hold onto brighter times in the future, things get worse. And uglier. And my sorrow and anxiety and all those bad feelings delve so deep. If I had the option, I would have had weeks of not getting out of bed. Things have been looking pretty bleak. The world is pretty hard on people struggling with depression, especially when they mess up. Even people who have that shared experience are hard on you. In some respects I think they are harder on you. I am struggling to find an explanation for why friends who say they love me, who have been through some form of this, have so little tolerance for my misery. Perhaps it is because things haven't been as bad for them. Perhaps it is because their ways of coping are different from mine, and they don't understand why I'm not coping like they do. Perhaps it's because they are just as critical of themselves, and this is more about projecting than truly judging me. Whatever it is, it feels devastating to me sometimes.

This perhaps reflects my personal issues with wanting to please people. I really, really, really, want my friends and loved ones (and bosses, and coworkers, and the waiter, and the bus driver...) to think I'm great. I want them to think I'm smart. I want them to think I'm trustworthy, honest, and a solid friend. It's not enough for me to know those things myself. I need other people to see that, and acknowledge that. But, also, I think that most "normal" people would feel a little forsaken if their friends had indicated, when it was taking everything in them to hang on, that they weren't doing enough, and that they were not good enough the way that they were.

I think of one friend in particular. If she were to read this, she would probably dispute it, and say that she had never said I am not good enough. I've seen her do this to other people, so I shouldn't take it so personally, right? The bottom line is, though, that she sends the message, with her irritation, and her dismissal of the things I have to tell her, that if I were more on top of things, I would be more healthy, and my misery is due to my own laziness. Perhaps there is some truth to this. Depression is an ugly tangly thing, and the apathy and lack of interest in activities can lead to being more sedentary, which can then lead to feeling more depressed... it's one of the ugly truths of the disease. But, I spend a lot of time and effort pushing past that. And it's exhausting. That's where I feel like she needs to cut me some slack.

Really, I need to stop worrying about what she thinks. I know that's the healthy thing. But the reality is that we care what people think of us. Especially people we love. We want them to be proud of us. We want them to respect us. We want them to support us.

Why does it have to be so complicated?

So Much Anxiety

I suppose I should be thankful that the amount of anxiety I am feeling right now has not been constant lately. Although, when it was, I was not eating my feelings so much, and I was not the heaviest I have ever been. But it felt like crap emotionally so I suppose I should count my blessings and go for a jog or something.

Tonight I'm feeling anxious and stupid over everything I said and did today. And I am thinking that people are having conversations about me. And I'm thinking people aren't answering texts on purpose, and not just because they are busy or distracted or, you know, having a life. Being inside my head tonight is exhausting.

The crappy thing is that I was looking forward to this weekend all week. I got to spend time with some of my favorite people, and do fun things that were totally non-work related. I should be happy and content right now. It really irritates me that I don't feel happy and content right now. But that just ratchets up the anxiety, because I'm irritated with myself for being like this, and feeling like a crazy person, which makes me think that if people are talking, or avoiding, or whatever they are doing, I wouldn't blame them. Because I am a crazy person.

Currently my man seems to be dodging my call/text. I'm fairly certain that is not paranoia and anxiety, but that I'm actually aware of what he is doing. He's frustrated with me for not being what he wants me to be. But clearly there is something about me that IS what he wants me to be, or he would not be as IN as he is, and he would not be so irritated, because it wouldn't matter so much. Honestly and truly, I'm not sure what it is he sees in me. I don't understand why, when he is so frustrated, he is still here. Well, clearly not literally here, or I would not be musing about how he's avoiding me. But I can't figure what he DOES see in me. And when I see him really loving me it makes me feel all panicky. And I want to put up good safe walls. And I don't know why I do this. And I don't know why it panicks me. I think my mother's cool reception to physical affection from my dad in my formative years have had a larger impact than I have ever realized. Because I catch myself doing it too. Apparently I subconsciously think that's normal. And I reflexively react coolly. What is wrong with me? I feel like I am balancing on a very narrow beam over a very deep ravine. that is the feeling in my chest and in my gut. Like only a string is holding me up and away from catastrophe. Why on earth do I feel like that?

Writing.

Sometimes I think about writing. I think about coming home from work and spending the whole night writing, and how I will love it, and it will soothe my soul and I will feel all creative and have an outlet and not think about the crap at work, and the crap in my personal life, and it will be magical. And then I go and catch up on Facebook. And then there is pinterest....

So, clearly I am leading a rich life recreation-wise. I'm totally rejuvenated each morning and just RARING to go back to work, as you can imagine. Which, as you may guess, means I hate everyone's stinking guts, and was telling people to bite me as I wrote back the stupid diplomatic, cooperative emails. So, yeah. Happy, happy.

We won't get into the reasons I dread work and feel incredibly isolated, alone, and helpless every day now. I'm hoping this feeling passes soon. This morning, however, I had an anxiety attack larger than I have had in a while, and was convinced as I drove into work that my boss and the HR guy would be sitting in my office, and they would fire me. Don't ask me why. I am not aware of any (more) ways I have screwed up. But I'm still terrified  I've tried to talk to my boss about the impact some of the ways she manages me cause me to panic and despond. But, um, yeah. She takes it personally (as she in teh same breath tells me I need to learn how to not take things personally), and doesn't understand why I don't trust her. And yet, tells me that if I get fired, I will bring it on myself. Um, thanks for putting those positive thoughts out there? So, now? Don't really trust her. Because she doesn't seem to believe in me. And I want to tell her to bite me.

But, seriously, I used to love writing, and swore I would be a writer forever. I'm now failing. Haven't really written since college, in any kind of meaningful way. Sooooo... I really should start writing instead of pinning stuff on my boards on pinterest....

Tomorrow.

Crazycakes.

I feel absolutely raw inside. It has been one of the most emotional, tumultuous, horrible, agonizing weeks in my life in some ways. And much of this has centered around work, which seems a little crazy to me. I should not have been taken to such depths over work. The thing about my work is, I feel very passionately about it. I feel passionately about what I do, and the people I do it for. So it would make sense that I would have very strong emotions. But crying in meetings? In front of my boss? In front of my boss's boss, and her boss? What am I, twelve?

The sheer emotion, humiliation, agony, pain, feeling of dismissal and inadequacy... I can't even describe how ripped up I feel inside emotionally. I am exhausted. I feel so beaten down.

Add onto that the conversation I had to have with boyfriend about how he should plan time into his week to spend with me, not just to go to the gym, and do all his other things on his to-do list. Feeling really valued here. If I have to remind him he should want to spend time with me, what are we doing? It's only been 3 months... I hear this is a bad sign.

With all this rawness and this emotionalness I feel so crazy, and I think, why WOULD he want to spend time with me? I'm crazycakes! I get emotional over everything. Everything seems to be the end of the world. He told me tonight that I am just really tender. I'm like a very ripe peach whose skin is about to burst. How can he make crazy sound so beautiful. And can he really believe that? Because everything seems to be a crisis in my life right now. What is wrong with me???

Please Oh Please Let the Meds Make it Better.

So talked to the doc today and I will be upping my meds. Really hoping that this will be the step up that makes the anxiety that's been consuming me manageable. Really afraid that it won't do anything, and we'll be on the continued search for the med that is the answer. My doctor is resistant to prescribing an anti-anxiety med since she says they should not be taken frequently, or you can build up a resistance and addiction to them. I think that's benzo's she is talking about. I really need to educated myself because I'm not sure, and I am also unsure if there are other meds she could be looking at. All I know is that this anxiety is making my life miserable and I want it to stop. I'm trying to be healthy and junk. I am just so tired of my thoughts being so miserable and sad and desperate and angry and paranoid and corrosive. Praying for the meds to work.

Today I was thinking about starting another blog. I would make it my blog where I updated the webiverse on how big of jerks some of my coworkers/friends can be. I could say all the mean things they did and how very abused I am. I concluded that while this sounded satisfying at the time, it would really probably not feel so great. I feel like I already spend so much time devoting thought to negative stuff. The rational part of me tells me that focusing on the crappy moments will not make anything better, and that I shouldn't devote my energy to thinking about them, since I can't change it or make them behave differently. Stupid rationalness. Being grown up and reasonable sucks sometimes. This is what I think when I have moments of reasonableness, at least.

How Can I Disappoint YOU Today?

So the theme of my life this week/month/year is disappointment. Not my own feelings of disappointment, although I seem to succeed in being disappointed in everything and everybody lately, what with my whole glass mostly empty view on life. No. The disappointment I speak of is the gazillion ways that I can disappoint the people I work with, the people I love, the people who love me, and the people I serve. I have blown it in some big ways lately with people.

I've stood friends up for dinner frequently (mostly unintentionally because I have turned into the biggest airhead in the world). They have been patient but I can feel them resigning themselves to my inconsiderateness, which means the socialness I have been working so hard to engage in will be that much more difficult to achieve, since no one will want to set dates with me.

I screwed up in a major way at work, and the effect of what I messed up on has caused ripples that keep rebounding off things and lapping back over me, extending the moments of disappointment and magnifying my feelings of ineffectiveness and perpetual failure. So, yeah. The career is looking great.

I'm failing at church. Failing to go, failing to follow through on service I have committed to. Failing to engage in the spiritual rites and practices I know would soothe me. Even now, writing about how I could be soothed, I feel so anxious and guilty that even though somewhere in my heart I feel my religion could help heal me, most of my heart seems to be saying that I am too far gone and that there is no point. In my heart of hearts I think I must be greatly disappointing God.

I've been working forever, it seems, to learn how to cope with my depression. i thought that I had grown in my depression and that the deep wounds have made me wise and that I had weathered hard times and it had smoothed some of my rough edges. And then this last year or so happened. I feel as though with all the tumult, my edges should be smooth like a rounded pebble on the beach. They should be. But when I examine myself, I feel like a jagged rock that has just been shattered and has more edges than the ocean could ever smooth. My flaws are more glaring and my barriers to being a whole person loom larger than ever before. People I trust and love tell me that I am so unhealthy,so odd, so not normal, that they must go over here and be happy together, away from my toxicity. They tell me the truth as they feel bound to say it, and move away before they are infected. And I don't blame them. I envy them. It must be nice to know how to Be. To give and receive love and feel the glow of being a light in the lives of the ones you love.

I used to feel like that. I used to be able to draw myself out of the space I'm in now and feel that there was hope. That I had friends I gave light to. That my soul was not as ugly and dark and decrepit as it felt in my low moments. I have fleeting moments of that feeling now, but I seem to stumble upon it. I can't intentionally elicit it, and I half hold my breath when I am feeling it, because at any moment an ugly thought or sudden realization of what feels like the horrible truth of my condition  could emerge and take my brain hostage again.

My therapist says I am doing better. She says I am dealing with ugly thought patterns better and that I should not be so hard on myself and celebrate my successes. My friends who have told me how hard it is to be around me have remarked that I have been doing better. But they are still over there. And I need them over here. All of this isolation might possibly drive me mad.

There is a woman who is mentally ill who uses services in the building I work at. Often, in the afternoon, things get to be too much for her. When the internal stimuli that is taunting her gets to be too much, she lets loose with blood curdling, heart rending screams. Over and over and over. For as long as 30-45 minutes. One day, after one of these episodes, she remarked to me, "I want to apologize. I don't know why it happens. It just gets to be too much." I wanted to tell her, I know how you feel. I want to join you. Those screams sound just like the ones in my head. My heart answers every scream torn from her lips. I want to join her. If I did, maybe I could just stop trying.Give into the crazy in my head. They would commit me somewhere, put me on nice soothing medication that soften all the hard feelings. And in the moments the medication was not working, I could purge my soul and get it all out. I could scream until it was drained out of me.

I think it might be time to talk to the doc about upping my meds....

Killing the Anxiety

This icky feeling is getting really, really old. I'm tired of it. I am hoping I am on my way out of it. Sometimes I think I'm coming up out of it, and then I wake up with it again, or I sit and relax and my brain starts going and I find myself back in an anxious state. So annoying.

I have a friend who has a very dry sense of humor who jokes about being "dead inside" when she's feeling down. I've been thinking about that phrase a lot lately. I kind of miss the times I have felt "dead inside." It used to be weird and concerning to me when I would go through periods where I was the opposite of emotional. I would not be able to remember the last time I had cried. I would not freak out about things that I knew I would "normally" be upset about. It would really trouble me.

I miss that. I would like to be dead inside. I'm ready to go back to that. How do I get back there?

Worn Down with Worry and Yuckiness

You know that icky, anxious, worrying feeling you can have when something is really not going right in your life? I have that right now. It started with my PMS. I sunk down into an icky place, and I allowed myself to isolate and basically hide in my room the majority of the three day weekend. I did still go to church for a few minutes, and I had dinner with my parents one night, so I give myself points for that. 

The annoying thing is that this bout of anxiousness is not exactly about something specific in my life I feel like I can fix. It's not really about a situation, it's more just about who I am. It's accompanied by a large dose of self-loathing, too, which is fun. Maybe it kind of goes back to my feelings about the fallout from setting boundaries with Red. It was his birthday this week. I haven't talked to him since October last year, when he told me repeatedly via text to F off. That was the last I heard from him. That hostility was his reaction to a letter I wrote saying that I couldn't allow him to treat me the way he had been treating me anymore, and telling me what I needed. It was much more firm than I've ever been. But it was necessary. And he could not forgive me for it. 

So this week was his birthday. And if there is one thing I know about myself, it's that I define being a good friend by the things I do to show support and loyalty, and showing love in many ways, including on their birthday, because they are important and I remember those dates. And I did not text, call, email, or message him on his birthday. I don't know where he is, or what he is doing. I'm pretty sure he's still alive. Intellectually I know this is the healthier choice for me--to not reach out to him. If we were still in contact he would still guilt me, do things to offend and degrade me in passive aggressive ways, and make me cry. Also if I knew the things that he was allowing to go badly in his life I would want to fix it all for him. This is not healthy for me. Our relationship would not be healthy at all. I know this. But I feel, at a very deep place in my heart, like a horrible friend. And like I don't know the point of me. 

I've cut the friends out of my life who I really felt like needed me. The ones I have now don't really need me. Sometimes they are in need, and i can help fill a need. But they don't really need me. They can go weeks without really talking to me or seeing me and be fine. They have stuff going on in their lives. They have partners and kids and hobbies and social circles all outside of me. And I have nothing. 

I do have friends. And I have family. I have people I care about who care about me. I have opportunities for beautiful moments. When I feel like making effort, I have people to make plans with, and things to fill my time with. But I feel like I have no world. I come home to an apartment with no one waiting for me. I don't have a home base with people who love me where I can go whenever I need to just be in a happy little cocoon of love. I mean, I do have places I am welcome. But not all the time. Because they have their lives too, and their home bases are already filled with the people who belong there. 

So I feel like I have no place and no purpose. And I don't understand why I can't have that place and purpose with the people that I love. I feel like they are not allowing that place for me in their lives. 

And this is where the self loathing comes in. I don't feel like my insides are very pretty right now. I feel as awkward and skittish as certain people have observed I seem lately. I annoy myself as much with my anxiousness as I seem to be annoying those who have to be around me daily. I don't want to be around me either. Gifts and talents I thought I had I'm not so certain I have now. No one else seems to see them in me, so maybe if I ever had them I don't now. I have the revolving thought, "what is the point of me?"  Now, I am a religious woman. I have always believed that we are all God's children, that we are special, that we all have gifts and talents and special things about us, and that we have a purpose in life and things we are meant to do and all that stuff. I still do believe that about other people. I look at my friends and see them fulfilling their purpose in so many ways, and I see them flourishing and progressing and touching others for good. While in some ways I can still convince myself that I am touching others for good in at least some ways, I am feeling very much like the great impact I thought I could strive for in life is a joke. The people I thought I could touch for good seem to not need or want my touch. The things I am doing to try to make myself better just seem so pointless when, after all that effort, I spend a whole week in this horrible sucking void of happiness. If I can't even keep perspective and find my happy place in times of despair, how can I progress into a place where I'm a decent person. My friends look at me all sad and try to encourage me to seek relationships to fill my life, but they don't want to spend time with me. They say I am so nice and so sweet and if I just put myself out there I will find someone to love me. I'm at a loss as to why they think this is possible. 

See? Ugly thoughts. I have not really expressed too much of them to my usual confidantes. Coolgirl would tell me I need to get counseling or some other practical thing. Shorty would as well. BFF would just feel really bad and wish she knew how to help me, and then I would feel bad for bringing her down. She would also be mystified and not understand why or how I could be in that place, which would only remind me how much of a mutant I feel like. I know that talking to a counselor is the practical solution that many would suggest for this. Hey, if I were the sounding board to something like this, it would be my suggestion. But I don't feel like sharing these ugly thoughts is going to make them go away, and I don't feel like it's going to fix anything or help lead me out of this dark place. I do think that this is partially a chemical imbalance. It's worse around my menstrual cycle, and exercise helps lift my mood. 

What I think I need to do is exercise fairly religiously, possibly multiple times a day. Darn apathy is not helping me break into that habit. I also think I need to look at the things I'm doing medically. I have already contacted my doctor, and we've discussed some things that I can start doing right away. One of them is birth control, which is thought to help regulate things like cramps and mood if you have PMDD. (Awesome that I can start finding new disorders to label myself with, right?) So we will be trying that. In a very, very small place I feel a spark of hope that there may be a light at the end of this dark tunnel. But I don't want to get my hopes up, and I am also fairly fearful that I'm stuck with this crazy brain for the rest of my life and there's nothing I can do about it. 

When I was a teenager there was a lady at church who would sit out on the couch in the lobby during services and cry. I would walk by her sometimes when I was avoiding being in Sunday School. Often there would be another woman comforting her, listening to her, or just being there for her. I always felt bad for her. Somehow, someone told me or mentioned in front of me that she was depressed. I didn't really understand that then. I didn't get that it was a disorder. I wondered what in her life had happened that had made her so sad. I remember thinking that she looked like she was in a lot of pain. I've been thinking recently that I might have turned into that woman. Mind you, I'm much more solitary in my suffering, and I try not to be the woman making a spectacle in the lobby. This might not be the best thing, since she had women trying to help lift her up and I run home from church and hide so that they don't see what a mess I am before I start crying. I have let a few individuals in, and they have been a comfort to me. But I don't want to be the poor woman they feel they need to do their christian duty by. I know they say you need to allow people to serve you, so they can reap the blessings and be God's hands and all that. But I don't know how to do that. I suck at asking for it, and the friends that I want it from don't seem to have the time or capacity. But I need some love. Can't they just read my mind? 

I Would Like to Let Go Now.

I have a tendency to brood. Coolgirl has pointed it out to me. I have always done it, but had not identified that I do it to a larger extent than many people until she pointed it out. I knew that when I'm really anxious I would grab onto a thought and think it over to death. But I have come to realize that I often grab hold of a thought and obsess about it and don't let it go.

Example: tonight, I went to a friend's birthday celebration. It was a great time but at the end the birthday girl disappeared, and a few other small things happened that seem to indicated to me that she is annoyed with me. I have analyzed my conduct and I really haven't done anything wrong. At most, I failed to recognize the moment when she took something personally that was not directed at her and not intended to give offense. But of course, this is where my brain won't shut up. I keep thinking over and over and over again to think of everything I said, every look she had, how she might have taken things I said, and what she might say to other friends. Then I start to worry about how how she appears to feel about me at this moment might impact the way other friends feel about me. This might impact how other friends interact with me in the future, and I don't want to lose those good relationships. Then I try to talk myself down by reminding myself that if she is irrationally angry, said friends will call her on it and refuse to allow her to blame me. But the thoughts of "what if" go on. I foresee manipulation and half truths that might convince said friends to spend less time with me. Basically I start to see the demise of friendships, all over one woman's cranky moment. Described here, I sound a little nutty to myself. But I still fear the power of this one woman over one particular friendship that I hold dear. Also, I don't like having people upset with me, and I want to resolve it, and it's aggravating that I can't. But this is not a situation where I can, or should, do or say anything. And I truly honestly didn't do anything wrong. Her anger isn't even really about me. But it keeps happening. And my brain won't let go of it. Shoosh, brain.

Waking to the Sounds of an Interminably Pessimistic Brain

I am so tired. I'm tired of waking up feeling yucky. I'm tired of waking up dreading the day. Dreading it for no good, sound reason. I know that I love my job. I love most of the people that I work with. Good things happen to me at work. I have some good relationships with people at work. Why do I wake up dreading to go to work? I'm anxious about everything lately. Anxious about if people will be happy with my work. Anxious that my boss's boss doesn't seem to like me. Anxious that I won't get enough done. Anxious that people are saying things about me. Anxious that people are complaining about me. Anxious that I will do something to make someone mad. It's crazy. No, really. I feel like my crazy side is taking over. I keep having conversations with myself. No, not out loud. At least not outside of my car. I keep telling myself, today is going well. Why are you stressing? There is nothing to worry about. But I can't quite seem to talk myself out of my anxiety. I take walks. That doesn't help. I pray. Doesn't seem to help. I meditate at my desk. Nada. I go and hide in a quiet place and meditate. Nope. I take deep, calming breaths. Not calm. I curse under my breath. Definitely doesn't help. I try focusing on work in hopes of distracting myself. Sometimes, sort of, works.

The good news is that many days the feeling seems to wear off after about 1 or so. Unless something happens for me to fixate on and be anxious about.

I feel like I should talk to someone about this. Don't feel like I can talk to anyone at work about this. Showing my insecurities does not seem to be a good way to advance myself professionally, and poor Coolgirl has been exposed to enough of my anxiety to last her for a year or two, at least. I've talked to other friends about it and they don't know what to say, and I end up feeling guilty for making them worry, not supported, and kind of stupid for showing my crazy. They don't have any advice to offer that I'm not already giving myself, and I'm tired of having people look at me like I am overemotional. I could go see my counselor, who I have not seen in quite a while. I don't really feel like she can say anything to make the feeling go away either, and she is far away from where I live now. Or at least, far enough away, especially in rush hour, to make it a huge effort to go see her. I don't want to change counselors. I like her. I know that is silly since I just said she is too far away so I'm not going to see her. But I don't think that telling anyone about my crazy is going to make it go away or fix it. I've already done a lot of talking to smart people and praying.

I don't feel like taking more meds is going to resolve this. Except the anxiety, my depression is pretty well in check. The anxiety does come coupled with some immense sadness sometimes when I first wake up. But I think it's more sadness over the things I'm anxious over. I've started taking Omega 3's in addition to my meds. They're supposed to do good things for your brain, and so far seem to be helping me balance out a little more in my PMS stage, which has been WAY too emotional up until this last month.

I know I should be exercising. Endorphins are good for you, blah, blah, blah. I know that. I intend to exercise. This week in fact. I just, you know, haven't.... Not tomorrow, I have a meeting after work. Wednesday. I'll exercise Wednesday. Yeah.

I've been making myself go outside after work. I sit and I read. Vitamin D is good, and natural light and fresh air and all that junk. I think that's helping me not be as bad as I could be.

How do I stop feeling so crazy? I'm tired of being so crazy anxious over things. When I do come down from my anxious place I realize how irrational a place it is. But I can't seem to talk myself out of it even when I realize I'm there and know it will look crazy later.

Man, it's exhausting being me.

Taking a Stand and All That Rot.

I really don't enjoy standing up for myself. Not that I enjoy being railroaded, but I really, really hate conflict and confrontation. So I have a hard time telling people in my life I don't like what they are doing or how they are treating me. Especially my friends. And if they tell me I am wrong and give their side, I am inclined to empathize with them and agree and I forget that my side is valid too. I'm very bad at standing my ground in that way. I do better with people I don't like as much. I am much less concerned about how they see me after the confrontation is over. But with friends, I really want them to like me, and not to be mad at me or think negatively about me. Which is not so realistic and doesn't really work. And yet, that is how I function.

With the whole thing with Red and Roomie, I did a lot of work on standing up for myself and setting boundaries. I have learned a little about how letting your friends treat you like crap is, in fact, not really doing them a favor and doesn't make you a better friend. Who knew? But seeing all that in retrospect does not make me any better about being assertive with other friends now. I still don't like conflict. It makes me anxious. Like, full-on panic attack, crazy-person-who-can't-think-rationally anxious. That's really hard to talk yourself through and overcome. But I am still trying to overcome it. I don't like the super-unhealthy feeling that I have when I am in those situations. I don't like what it does to my friendships. And I really want to feel not-crazy.

So a few weeks ago I told someone in my life that I didn't like the way she spoke to me one day, how it made me feel, and what I wanted from her. It was super hard. I get all nervous and weak sounding when I stand up for myself, which is not how one should sound, I'm pretty sure. But I did it, and fortunately it was someone who knows that this is difficult for me and did me the courtesy of hearing me out and not being too harsh in her response. I didn't think I had gotten anywhere. She didn't promise to change. She clearly thought I was overreacting. But I knew she would keep it in mind, and that I had at least planted a seed. I was so excited yesterday, when, indirectly, she conceded part of my point. She had seen the light regarding part of the thing I told her was bothering me. I don't know if she saw the correlation. I'm pretty sure she did, because she's one who is good at connecting things. I hope this means she has given what I said more thought. I know that this means that she values me, because of the way she weighed in my feelings in the discussion.

I'd like to say that in the future this will help me find more ease in standing up for myself. The reality is that I don't think this will magically fix the stupendous amount of anxiety I feel when addressing conflict. But it's a positive experience, and will hopefully help me be just a teensy less crazy the next time I need to put my foot down.