Week 43: Advice for the Season

Well, this topic is a tough one for me, because I am one who avoids the holiday chaos as much as possible.  I'm not one for social gatherings, especially when the attendance is more than 8.  The topic is recovery advice or encouragement that is helpful during the holiday season.

The timing was quite perfect, as my friend Tamara over at Faith and Substance reminded me of a little saying that I've heard for years, but had forgotten about until she reminded me:

 
I think this is a great reminder for all of us this holiday season - from those of us who celebrate nearly every weekend till the new year, to those of us who celebrate solo.  For me, it's a reminder to stop and remember the little things that I have.  Some people wish they had a steady job, a warm bed, and food to eat.  I've got all of that, and more.  So when the depression of winter sets in, and the stress over the holidays knocks me out, I am going to work to remember that in the grand scheme of things, I really am too blessed to be stressed!

Week 42: Overcoming Stressful Times

Stress?  I have NO idea what you're talking about.  My life is stress free, and any stress that does exist is chocolate covered, making it easily digestible.  I have the patience of a rock, the grace of a swan, and flow like the waves in the ocean, quietly kissing the shore and retreating seamlessly.

Whatever.  (I can dream, right?)

Stress? My world is covered in stress, where as I'd much prefer a chocolate covered world.  This topic is actually rather timely for me, as this time of year is pretty stressful and frustrating for me.  It's also an opportunity for me to remind myself what tools I do have to get me through stressfully frustrating times like these.

One tool that helps is to focus on my breathing.  Usually that involves remembering to breathe!  I try to count my inhales and exhales and use my breath to distract myself from the situation that is setting off the alarms in my head.  From the breathing I try to move into my phone list - I have a few friends that I know are exceptionally good at getting me out of tough spots in a short conversation.  If my phone list isn't available, then I'll pull out my distraction box.  This box is literally a toolbox of distractions that are neatly packaged and always stored in the same place so I can grab it at my lowest level of functioning.

An overarching tool that I try to constantly remember is the slogan "this too shall pass" as an effort to remind me that the situation may feel stressful at the moment, or I may be frustrated at the moment, but for the moment, I can handle it.  The feeling will pass, the situation will end, and all will be restored to it's typical level of sanity.

And when all else fails I reach for a Xanax.  In keeping with the goal of complete honesty, sometimes I go for the Xanax first.  Hey, you gotta do what you gotta do!

When Life Gives You Lemons...

I really like lemonade.  Like, it's one of the few "juice-type" beverages that I actually enjoy.  But only if it's fresh squeezed - that powdered crap?  Yuck.  To me it tastes like chemicals.  My therapist actually used this line on me the other day.  She started the sentence, but I cut her off... cause sometimes, it is true that lemonade just doesn't cut it.

This is one of those times.  I've been handed this bowl of lemons, and instead of making lemonade and giving it away so I'm holding less lemons, more lemons keep getting added to my bowl.  By the dozen.  And it is getting really heavy.  And it's all out of my control.

The good news (cause you know me, I always try to find something positive!) is that I know it will all work out in the end.  It always does.  The bad news is that my stress level is off the charts as my classroom was not finished on schedule.  It wasn't finished on the back up date.  In fact, it won't be finished until the holiday weekend.  Literally, that Friday.  Which means I'm in school on my three day weekend preparing my room, and during this time this week that has been designated as prep time in the classroom, I'm twiddling my thumbs.  Which I don't do well.

Believe it or not, once school starts my stress level will actually go down.  The excitement of a new year will kick in.  My days will be long, and I'll have worked in my classroom for 12 days straight, but come Tuesday morning when those kids arrive?  My stress level will trickle down, and maybe I'll be able to enjoy a glass of lemonade...

Comfort Zone

I am a person who loves routine and stability.  Which is why when I was asked to step out of my comfort zone, and do something that I'd rather not do, I panicked.

A few weeks ago I, was encouraged to start volunteering.  I mean, why not?  Anne Frank said "no one ever became poor by giving."  She may have meant that in financial terms, but I think it also applies to time.  I do have time to give, so why not give some?

Because I am afraid.  That's why.  Because I am afraid to commit doing something that I might not be able to handle.  How do I know I won't be able to handle it?  I don't.  And I won't, unless I try.  No matter how scared I am, I have to try.

So this afternoon I finally took a chance and emailed an organization I am interested in volunteering for.  According to their website, they require a minimum commitment of one hour a week.  I think I can handle that.  At least, I hope I can.  Volunteering is something that would help me in so many ways, especially volunteering for an organization like the one I chose to contact. Now that the ball is in motion, I'm in that information gathering stage, where I need to know as much as possible, so I can find a bit of a life preserver as I head out of my comfort zone and into the zone where the magic happens.

Here's hoping for some magic.....

Truth

Challenge 1, Part 2: Self Soothing

Continuing with this challenging topic, moving into self-soothing, where I struggle even more, has been an interesting process.  Again, keep in mind, as negative as this might seem, I do know that things can only get better and easier, which is the silver lining on this whole process!  I think that compared to self care, self soothing is a whole different ball game.  My ways of soothing myself, of calming myself, aren't the healthiest.  So once again, a heck of a lot of effort gets put into this area as well.  I am super sensitive to light, sound, texture, temperature, all that stuff.  It poses a challenge more often than not, but I'm getting better at figuring out (with the help of my therapist and team) how to work through these sensory overload situations.

This might sound childish or corny, but I am very much a texture person - I love the feel of softness.  If I'm having a really hard day, I may tuck a scrap of this ultra soft cuddly fleece into my pocket, just so I have it for comfort.  I have super soft sheets for my bed, and a blanket made of the ultra soft fleece as well.  In addition, I do have a few stuffies that live on my bed that are perfect for when I need to wrap my arms around something and just hold tight.  All the softness is really comforting.  Strangely enough, as much as I hate the dentist, I like the feeling of having the lead vest covering me.  It is really helpful in grounding me when I get too spacy.  I have looked into weighted blankets that are helpful for those with autism, and due to costs, I'm hoping I'll eventually be able to make my own?  Not that crafty, so we'll see how that goes!

Other things I do at home to self-soothe include napping, reading a familiar book (it's like visiting my best friends,) and listening to music.  I also like to do yoga, and find a few restorative poses can be really helpful.  Sometimes I'm just so disoriented and upset, that all I can do is curl up in a ball and breathe, but you know what?  It works.

When I'm not at home, it's a little tougher to self-soothe when I get into a bad spot.  I do carry Xanax with me (and would not be able to survive without it) which is great because of it's near instant impact.  It usually gives me enough time to get refocused without going into a full on anxiety attack.  Carrying the little bit of fabric helps too, cause the softness can easily be run through my fingers without drawing attention to me.  Considering I teach grade school, my students often have little fidgets in their hands, so they see it the same and love that their teacher uses fidgets too!  Strange as this may sound, if I'm struggling, sometimes I will call my therapist's voicemail, just to hear her voice, which has a really calming effect on me.  At home or out and about, sometimes a walk outside (if the weather is cooperative) can also help.

While I know that many of my self-soothing tools are rather childish, they're what I've got right now.  Eventually I hope that I don't get as overstimulated and am better able to regulate just through breathing or what-not, but for now?  You gotta do what you gotta do, right?!

Coping Mechanisms

How do you react under stress?  How do you respond to stressful situations?  How do you handle things that are out of your control, yet impact you rather a lot?  How do you catch life's curve balls in a healthy manner?

I ask... cause I don't.

My biggest coping mechanism is probably one of the most unhealthy ways to cope.  Period.

Right now, I'm in a myriad of stressful situations.  Between school, health, work, and life in general, there are at least 3 major stressors in every area right now.  As in, this very moment.

And I want to go back.  I want to go back to the coping mechanism that has been helpful for so many years, and at the same time, has been so hurtful and unhealthy, I know I shouldn't go there.

Right now, I'm trying to invest myself in a project for school that I have no energy to do.  I want to do it, I know I could, but since I don't have the energy to do it to my standards, I don't want to do it at all.  Right now, I'm trying to organize some support, unsuccessfully, I might add, to help me through a big medical procedure I'm having in just over a week.  Right now, I'm trying to put together lesson plans for four weeks.  Yep, four.  This week, the two weeks I'll be out of school, and the week I return.  Right now, I'm wishing I knew how to better communicate with those I care about cause it's going to be really hard to pull through without them.

The sadness of the reality in my head is suffocating me right now.  It's clouded my vision and strained my breathing so that I can't see clearly what really is.  The reality in my head isn't some place that I like to spend time.

But until I learn some healthier coping mechanisms, it's where I tend to retreat, cause at least it isn't as bad as what I used to do, what I want to do... run back to the place of familiarity, where I am comfortable listening to the grumblings... in fact, they're music to my ears.

47 days down, 71 days to go.

The Power of Sleep

It is amazing how important sleep is.  I know that my body needs 7-8 hours of sleep every night.  I'm an absolute mess if I get less than that multiple days in a row.  It's kind of ironic, though, that the times that are most important for me to get enough sleep, like, say, when there's a big event coming up, or I have a presentation due, or something like that, are the times when I get the least amount of sleep.

This is one of those times.  I have a pretty big weekend coming up, and am going to be going pretty much non-stop for three straight days.  You'd think I'd be certain to get enough sleep!  I really planned on it, tried to, was all set-up for sleep success.... and then my computer decided to act up.  Which mean that the little project that was supposed to take a half hour, took longer.  Like 10 times longer.  Literally.  Five hours.  Five hours of work on a very simple, already done project, that just needed to be exported.

Nine.  That's the number right now.  Nine.  It's the number of hours of sleep I've gotten in the last TWO days.  Yes, you read that correctly.  I've gotten 4.5 hours of sleep for the last two nights in a row, and something is going to have to change ASAP if I'm going to stay healthy on this little sleep.

So what to do?  Can I just throw the computer out the window?  I don't know that I've ever been as frustrated with technology as I was last night.  Usually, me and my tech toys are connected at the hip, but last night.... oh was it a mess.  I actually had no choice but to give up and go to sleep, otherwise I'd have been in big trouble today.  A nap today would be nice, but I'm not sure my students would go along with the afternoon nap plan... sleeping on desks would get uncomfortable.

I'm going to go to work and try to make the day as simple as possible (and might actually play a video for my class, something I rarely do!) so that all that needs to be done can get done.  I actually don't plan on even opening my computer tonight when I get home from the festivities, instead, I'm going to go straight to bed.   That's not going to be easy, but as a good friend once said, we don't need easy, we just need possible.

Life is full of possible... I just like the possibilities a lot more when I'm well rested!

Numbers

The world is FULL of numbers.  I mean FULL.  There are numbers every where you look.  Numbers on the clock.  Numbers on the cable box.  The thermometer.  The train schedule.  The bus.  The grocery store.  Mail.  Books.  The phone.  Keyboards.  Your toothbrush.

Ev-re-where.  Everywhere!

So can anyone tell me why some numbers seem to have this eerie power over me more than others?

I never rarely cringe when I'm at the grocery store buying apples (though off season prices can be yikes!)  I like apples.  They're good for me.  So I buy them.  I grab a few (complete with the numbers on the bar code, and on the price tag) and toss them gently into my cart.  They're yummy.  Recipes are full of numbers, but those don't seem to stop me from eating.  Usually.

I sometimes cringe when I'm shopping in general, as sticker shock is pretty regular these days.  But I never rarely question prices when shopping.  I see what I need, I buy it.  Sometimes I even buy things just cause I want them.  I usually cringe when I get to the numbers at the gas station, but that's another story.  I score my students spelling tests and add a number to each one.  I attach numbers to math tests, to pages, to all sorts of things.  None of those numbers are any big deal, even though they are not taken lightly.

So why, why, does one specific number seem to throw a wrench into my whole world?  Why do I avoid that number like it's an infectious disease?  Why, when I saw that number for the first time in five months, did I have a complete internal meltdown?

If the world is full of numbers, why can I coexist peacefully with 99% of them, but one, little, three-digit number has the power to rock my world in all the wrong ways?

"Scales only have the power which we bestow upon them.

Imagine if I said my self-worth is determined by the toaster."

-- unknown

Another Wake-up Call

I took a break from life for a while... I'd like to say I've been away enjoying a vacation or travels or some other wonderful adventure.  But that wasn't the case.

Instead, I took a little trip to the local emergency room.  Which is anything but fun.  Especially since going to the ER felt like my worst fears were swallowing me whole.

I have been working my tail off the last few weeks while I was on break, only this time, I wasn't really working on stuff for work.  I was actually working on me.  For nearly ten days, my only job was to focus on me.

It sounds so simple, right?  I mean, as an adult, we are responsible for taking care of our own needs on a daily basis.  Not like when we were kids, and theoretically, our parental figures took care of us and met our needs.  Nope, when you're an adult, you're on your own for that.

And it should be somewhat easy by the time you hit your 30's, right?  Not.

I'm great at putting what everyone else needs ahead of what I need.  I'm great at avoiding taking care of my needs because something else (hello, pinterest) gets in the way.  I'm great at putting things off until the last second, and then stressing myself out while I squeeze in whatever it is that must be done, just in the nick of time.

Sunset, January 2012

It all caught up with me Wednesday.  Thankfully the previous ten days were well spent, and I did manage to take better care of myself than I have done in the past.  I didn't even think about work, instead I kept the focus on what I needed to do to take care of me.  It wasn't as complicated as I thought it would be, but again, I was on vacation, so I only had one focus.  When it came time to go back to work, I had to split my focus - still maintaining the priority of taking care of me, but also getting back into work mode, and taking care of all my work responsibilities.  I love what I do, so it was actually really nice to be back at work and in the routine of things again!

(I digress, back to the point.)

However, had I not spent the previous ten days taking care of myself, Wednesday's ER visit would have been a lot worse.  Still, after ten hours in the ER, they never determined the exact cause of my passing out.  I was sent home with instructions to follow up with my doctor and rest.  And you know what?  I listened.  I did what I needed to do to take care of me.  I actually stayed home from work because I knew if I went to work, resting would not be on the agenda.

Some of you reading this might think that my 2012 has started off horribly (I know some of you are thinking this because I was thinking it myself for a while!)  I have to disagree with that thought.  It started off exactly as it needed to start.  It started off with the reminder that no matter what I am doing, I have to take care of myself first.  I did that for the tail end of 2011, and when 2012 started, I tried to go back to my old ways.  Wednesday's wake-up call was yet another reminder that if I don't take care of myself, there's no way I'll be able to be good for anyone else.  Guess this is one time that "me first" is an appropriate expression!

By the way, spending the day in the ER was pretty miserable.  I was a wreck, terrified they would have to admit me, and I'd be stuck in misery.  My saving grace was having my BFF there... on her day off, no less... After eight hours, I did convince her to leave and go take care of herself, which she did, and another friend came to take me home... but...

"A true friend is one who reaches for your 

hand... but touches your heart..." --unknown

Week 11: Recovery

Recovery of what?  My dignity?  Never really had much of that to begin with!  How about my sense of humor?  Eh, that's debatable.  Exactly what am I trying to recover from?  Can I just say "life" and leave it at that?

Didn't think so.

So, it turns out that I must have been born an overachiever, as I seem to have skipped several developmental stages and life experiences while growing up.  And part of what this "recovery" process is all about is learning to move through all those skipped stages and experiences, now.

So.  Not.  Easy.

It isn't easy to do things you don't want to do, even though you know you have to.  It isn't easy convincing yourself that the excruciatingly painful work you are doing is worth it.  It isn't easy acknowledging and accepting that you have something from which it is necessary to recover in the first place.

Don't stress- we're not talking a life-threatening illness from which I will never recover, and I am grateful for that.  But it is something that requires accepting that there is a problem in the first place.  It also requires making a commitment to overcome that problem, and a willingness to accept help from those supporting the journey.  All of which I struggled with.  And frankly, at times, I still do.

When I look in the mirror I see a very different person than what the rest of the world sees.  The twisted perception I have of myself turned into an unmanageable and semi-dangerous lifestyle pattern that wasn't (isn't) very healthy.  And that has become a daily challenge that I live with.  Sometimes I just want to give up, not bother fighting anymore, and keep moving forward, unhealthy as it may be.  Sometimes I'm just too afraid to keep trying to get better.  Sometimes it doesn't seem worth the struggle. 

But life is.  Life is worth all the pain and agony and struggle and tears and hurt and stress and fear and frustration and everything else that sucks about going through this right now.  Life is worth living, but it can't be lived the way I was living, at least not for long.  I've been promised that all this work will be worth it when I arrive on the other side, the recovered side, where mirrors aren't the enemy, food is a friend, and life is worth living to it's very fullest expression. 

"Just when the caterpillar thought life 

was over, it became a butterfly."
-- Anonymous

Week 6: Where I am at this moment

I've had the blog topic for this week in my mind for a while now.  I was hoping to have a bit more positivity to write about, but I seem to be running short on positivity these days.

Taken Wednesday 11/9/11

However, while I was on my way home the other day, I actually had to pull over and get out of the car to snap these photos - the sky was brilliant!  And they are so fitting as to where I am right now...

See, some of the clouds are incredibly dark and somewhat frightening, which is how I've been feeling lately - dark and fearful.

Taken Wednesday 11/9/11

But if you look closely... surrounding the darkness is a beautiful glow, one that may even take your breath away.  (Or cause you to pull over to the side of the road, despite freezing temperatures, and snap a few pictures!)  That glow, though, is not created by the clouds... it's the light of the sun that illuminates the cloud... And with all the darkness that I've been feeling these days, my life is illuminated by those around me.

There's been a lot of stress in my world lately.  Some of these stressors, I have control over, most of them, though, I don't.  I really don't handle stress all that well.  (I don't know many people that do!)  Unfortunately, in my world, stress is the norm these days, and I'm trying to learn how to better deal with it all.

Taken Wednesday 11/9/11

Kinda reminds me of this picture, where the cloud looks like it's ready to devour whatever crosses it's path.  There are lot of things "eating" at me lately, occupying my mind, invading my thoughts...  I sometimes feel like those dark and dreary clouds, ready to unleash a storm.... I'm working to stay lighter, to surround myself with the sunshine others bring, and above all, I'm trying to take things one day at a time.

"Attitude is a little thing that makes a big difference." 

-- Winston Churchill

Taken Wednesday 11/9/11

P.S.  I found it kinda cool that I finished this post about where I am on 11/11/11...
which is a once in a lifetime day. Maybe that means things will start looking up!