I'm sane but I'm overwhelmed, I'm lost but I'm hopeful, baby, what it all comes down to, is that everything's gonna be fine, fine, fine

Tuesday, 11/07/17, 10:10am, 12:52pm

Well, yesterday, and so far, today, have been a bit better than the last, well bunch of days. I had felt like I was stuck in this depressive rut for almost 2 weeks, but maybe (??) I'm coming out of it? I'm not gonna get my hopes up too much, cuz sometimes that causes a bigger crash downward, but I am going to hope a little. Yesterday I had several things go right: I succeeded in making butternut squash soup in the crockpot (booyah! cuz I haven't made dinner successfully in quite some time...), I biked to my friend's house and picked up food for us on my way over (hah, I spent quite a bit of time transferring the to go orders into some leak proof containers I had brought so that I could put them in my backpack. I think I lot of people at the restaurant were like "that biker weirdo", haha!), I enjoyed a really good lunch with my friend and got to have really good friend talking time and she let me let out a lot of the bad feelings from the past 2 weeks (such a good friend you guys, she just got out of the hospital end of last week after spending a week in it!), and then I biked home. The rest of the day I got a lot of "chill" time, both before and after the kids came home from school, but I think the combination of feeling really successful at several things plus getting some good exercise in plus friend time, was perfect.

This morning I was going to do a cycle/core fusion class at the Y, but didn't make it since Nasser and I still had to fill out our ballots this morning. I could have made it there late, but then we also got some snow (!!) last night so I would have been extra late with clearing off the car. Oh well.

I ended up doing a 20 minute "yoga for anxiety" video, which certainly didn't burn very many calories, but it was rejuvenating regardless. And I intend to do more of a workout later in the day if I can since I've got therapy at 11 this morning.

I want to share a couple quotes that have meant a lot to me recently...

"Failure is simply the opportunity to begin again, 

this time more intelligently." 

-Henry Ford

"The moment that you feel, just possibly, 
you are walking down the street naked, 
exposing too much of your heart and your mind, 
and what exists on the inside, 
showing too much of yourself... That is the moment, 
you might be starting to get it right."
-Neil Gaiman

Both these quotes showed up at the end of my mindfulness practice with that app, Calm, on different days of the "7 Days of Calm." I am liking that app, although I haven't yet started the "21 Days of Calm," after having finished the 7 Days. I think that might help me get into the habit more of mindfulness every.single.day. Cuz I probably need that.

You know, today, it turns out, is my "blogiversary." I've now had this blog for 2 full years, and published 192 blog posts. Yikes. That seems like a lot of posts to me, but whatever. I think this blog has been huge for me in a lot of ways. It's given me a place to write, and pour out feelings, and reflect about things, and learn how to become more open about my mental illness. I didn't share the blog openly right away, it took some time. But I do kinda feel like that Neil Gaiman quote, I often feel like I am exposing too much of my heart and mind, and I do often wonder if it's the right thing or right thing for me at least to be doing. I like the validation I get from that quote. Cuz there's still this inner part of me that feels very strongly that it is the right thing to be doing. But it questions the blog, often.

So the other thing that I think helped my mood, was on Sunday night, Nasser reflecting over several recent things that I did, despite my foul mood. In my last blog post, I was feeling really crappy and yet forced myself to create some "hope statements", which isn't necessarily something I could have done pre-ECT. On Sunday, we were walking with my sister and her family to a restaurant across the street from our house. On the way, Nasser made a comment to me that I took a lot of offense to and felt really triggered by. I was talking with him really angrily and talked about going back home and skipping the meal with everyone. I was actually incredibly triggered (this is more a reflection on my depression than me, or Nasser) and felt super down, but I forced myself to go and actually enjoy the lunch and enjoy the discussion with my sister and brother-in-law and ended up helping myself more in the long run than had I ran off to go home. There were a few other things that Nasser brought up on Sunday night in this conversation and hearing all that made a big difference in my overall mood, I think.

When we're discussing medication changes and the possibility of a 2-3 ECT treatment burst, it's easy to feel lost in these feelings of, "I'm as depressed as I've ever been" and it's hard to see that despite the down times right now, I'm still doing better than before. I'm doing better than just a few months ago. And that's still huge, and that's still something to feel good about.

Ok, so, this next part I'm writing later, after therapy. My therapist got me talking today about some of the things that seem to motivate me, rather than focusing on the things that I feel should motivate me but haven't been. It helped to get a list started- we were able to come to a conclusion of at least 2 things. 1. I might need to plan in at least an hour every day of "relational" time, so like get together with a friend or spend time messaging with friends or even spending time on facebook catching up on friends or talk to a friend on the phone, etc. and 2. I might need to plan on one "project" a week- whether it's something around the house like getting together a pile of baby donation stuff or maybe working on ideas for our basement finish project. It was really helpful to start thinking about, like, what do I really need as a part of each day to feel good? Exercise each day probably needs to be the third item, but I'm having some trouble figuring out what "expectation" to set on that. I've been trying to exercise every day since meeting with my doctors on Thursday, and so far I've done it except for Sunday, and today I still need to (like I'm not really counting the yoga for anxiety from this morning since it was mostly laying on the yoga mat). I need to be careful about planning the exercise thing as an expectation because I tend to have a lot of issues when I don't "meet my expectation" and it all compounds into a horrid depressive state of feeling like a failure and yet the state makes me continue to not meet the expectation and it all gets worse and worse.

So like today. I'm a little demotivated with exercise since I didn't get it in this morning. This happens a lot when I don't accomplish it in the morning. Somehow the afternoon and evening are much less motivating times for me to exercise. I'm not really ready to exercise right now since I just ate lunch and feel too full still. But then, I don't really have much time to get the exercise in before I have to leave for an appointment at the gastroenterology place. Oi. I'm going to tell you about my appointment even if you don't want to hear about it. This afternoon I've got a hemorrhoid banding, my second of three of these. Sounds fun, right? I, unfortunately, but not, like, life threatening or anything, have hemorrhoids. We're currently treating the internal ones with this rubber band ligation procedure. Basically the doctor sticks a probe up my butt, sucks at the hemorrhoid, and puts a tiny rubber band around it. This cuts off the blood flow to the hemorrhoid and after a few days or so it falls off. But we can only do one at a time. So I have 3 separate treatment times for this, spaced out a few weeks apart. Anyway, my point was, I have one today, and I don't expect to be interested in exercising afterward... last time my butt hurt a fair bit.

Alright, I'm going to be done writing for today, since I don't feel like I have much else to say, and I could use some free time before this appointment. I do want to say, thank you to my readers, those of you who've stuck with me these 2 years, and even if this is the first post you're reading. You're all awesome.

well I know what's right, I got just one life in a world that keeps on pushin' me around, but I'll stand my ground and I won't back down

Wednesday, 10/11/17, 7:56am, 9:15am (and Tuesday, 10/10/17, 12:51pm, 1:46pm but I just couldn't get myself to finish it)

Do you know what? I have written 196 blog posts. That feels... crazy/ridiculous/maybe overkill?, to me at least. My "blogiversary" is coming up in less than a month- November 7th- and I'll have had this blog for two full years then. That doesn't seem very long, although it does feel like a lot has happened, emotionally speaking, in that time.

It's weird, looking back at some of my earlier posts, and emails to friends and family, sharing my blog. There was a lot of "I've figured out how to live with my depression" attitude. I'm not entirely sure if I was truly doing much better back when I started the blog; I mean it was before Adam's death and I know that triggered me quite a bit. But then, last November my psychiatrist diagnosed me with "treatment resistant depression", which was really a reflection of the bunch of years prior to that, not simply those few months. And as many of you know, if you've been following along with my blog, or my facebook, or just me, I've been doing much better, as of late, after going through 5 weeks of electro-convulsive therapy (ECT) acute phase (as in 3 treatments a week) and getting to a point of going every 2 weeks for treatment during the maintenance phase now. I'm also on some medications, and going to therapy regularly again (I quit going for a little while during the intense and very regular ECT treatments due to the short term memory loss), and I've gotten a lot of support from many different people, so really it's everything working together.

I've shared some about my "state dependent memory" loss, but there was a bit more that was hitting hard yesterday. I was going through old emails of sharing my blog, and the responses back and forth with various friends and family about it, especially with people who felt able to tell me about their own struggles, after I'd shared about mine. And it pains me, a lot, to realize I'd lost some of the memories of who else out there struggles. It's not like I necessarily discuss our shared illness regularly with most of these people, but I hate that we had these very personal emails about it that I simply don't remember. Thank goodness for emails saving and being able to look back on them, right? As Nasser reminded me this morning, looking back on all those, remembering all the people that share this illness or something similar with me, helps to remind me of how I'm not alone as well as why I share, most especially in the hopes that it helps others who struggle.

It's hard having memories that are just gone though, with no control over that. I guess I just need to keep reminding myself that it's just a sign that I really am doing much better.

I recently discovered a writer on the internet, who I'm a little obsessed with. I discovered her on Quora, where she's answered over 550 questions... woah. I have actually linked to one of those answers (hers is the top one here) before... to the question "Why do people suffering from depression always call their struggle a battle? What exactly are they battling?". Turns out she has a website, and she writes about all kinds of stuff, but I've been most intrigued with her posts about mental illness/depression. I really appreciated her post on helping a friend with depression. I've tried to write about this at times, but I think she writes a whole lot more eloquently than me. So I urge you all to check out her writing.

So this morning I opened up something like 5 different tabs on my Chromebook for "Couch to Half Marathon" training plans. I've definitely gained a lot of weight in the past... 4 months? 6 months? 12 months? more? It's been... needless to say... frustrating? embarrassing? confidence busting? And it shouldn't be. I don't, hopefully, judge others who weigh more than they want to or whatever. We are who we are. And it's so much better to embrace who we are. But I'm not very good at that... as probably most people aren't as well. It certainly bugs me that a lot of my clothes don't fit well or right or at all, but it definitely bugs me more that I haven't been able to run more than 1 and 3/4 miles yet (because it's so low, I have to count by the quarters!), I get winded really easily, I can't hold a plank in yoga for more than a couple seconds, the cycling class I've started going to with my brother-in-law once a week has me sweating uncontrollably and I often feel incapable at going at the higher resistances or reaching the cadence goals. Mostly I want to be in better shape. I want to be in the kind of shape to be able to hike 14ers (14,000+ mountains), bike long distances, run a half marathon again, do triathlons again, and plenty more. I expect some kind of body shape will follow if I focus on those things, even if I don't lose all the weight I've gained.

I rolled my ankle 2 weekends ago, which hasn't helped my exercise goals/attempts. I haven't run since prior to that; unfortunately my ankle isn't quite feeling right still. Luckily I was able to book a last minute physical therapy appointment for later this morning to get help with the ankle. Hopefully that helps. Until I'm back to more running/walking, I'll be trying to focus on the cycling stuff, yoga stuff, hopefully more swimming stuff too. At least I'm exercising a lot more than I was for much of treatment, right? I gotta appreciate the little steps forward.

I'm going to finish off with some gorgeous fall pictures, mixed with the snow, as well as my boys playing in the snow on Monday. (Did I mention that our crazy Colorado weather brought us snow on Monday? It's all melted now and today has a high of 67 degrees. Gotta love global warming!) Oh and FYI, the snowman is holding his own snowball and sitting in the sled, because apparently he went sledding too? And... TK is wearing flip flops because... Colorado kid? He had taken off his snowgear already when I insisted on some pictures with the snowman, and flip flops were his solution. Of course.

just cos you feel it doesn't mean it's there

Monday, 11/07/16, 2:00pm, 3:37pm

I thought about blogging earlier when I had quite a bit of time, but now I'm in the mood to blog and I'll have to get the boys from the bus before finishing this post.

Also I wrote quite a bit before remembering what today is. Do you all know what today is, my dear readers? Today is my "blogiversary". I have no idea if that's a thing or not, but I'm calling it one. Last year, on November 7th, I wrote my very first post. And I'm not gonna link it for you. Because I just reread it and I feel ahem, like maybe I've come a long way? Yikes, I'm sure I still have a long way to go.

My kitty cat got me in the mood to blog today. Buddy the cat found me upstairs, looking at crockpot recipes for tomorrow, zoning out. I think we both needed some quality petting time. I feel like I've been neglecting him lately. Or maybe he's just good at making me feel like he desperately needs petting. That may be it.

We had Nasser's mom and stepfather in town this weekend, which was nice, but I felt awkward and ashamed and those stupid, irrational feelings, when I was down at various points in the weekend. I tend to feel that way around people when I feel depressed or anxious. Even though I desperately fight and hate the stigma around mental illness, I still stigmatize myself. Ugh. I hate that.

And it's not like either of them would judge me if I just talked openly about the depressed feelings over the weekend. But it's so hard to do that in the moment. Talking about it tends to open those flood gates of tears and could then even trigger a little further depression, or maybe that's just what I'm afraid of.

Nasser and I went to my psychiatric appointment together today. The outcome was the medication I'm on isn't doing enough to combat the anxiety and maybe my anti-anxiety med isn't a high enough dosage. Whew. More meds. But that's ok. That's not a failure. Right?

Sigh. No, it is not a failure.

I am definitely anxious about the election, cuz, ya know, that's tomorrow. Yikes. And I know I shouldn't get all worked about it, but it's kinda a big election.

Go vote people.

in this town of Halloween

Tuesday, 11/01/16, 9:12am

Wow, it's November already. My "blogiversary" is coming up in just a few more days. It'll be a year that I will have been writing.

It's weird to think how much the blog means to me. How much I come back to it, even just to reread earlier posts. I'm quite sure it helps me a lot; my therapist most recently pointed out how when I've talked about it, I've only basically raved about how much it helps me. Hah.

On my run yesterday, I think I was practicing mindfulness decently well. I kept taking pictures- selfies and scenery. It's been a long time since I've ran. It felt really good for the first mile and a half, but then the rest wasn't so great especially with the foot pain from my (relatively) new shoes.

I think my shoes are a half size too small. Crap.

Actually if they made them in quarter sizes, I would be set. I need to be a women's 8.75 size. Haha. 9.25 in running shoes.

My run was fantastic in so many ways. Late fall beauty and late summer temps.

2.99 miles total (there was no way in hell I was going to force myself to get that extra 0.01 miles yesterday), not too shabby, but I wish it all had felt much better. And I wish my feet didn't hurt so much from the shoes. I feel like I've now run in them too many times to return them. Crap.

Then after the run, after eating something and taking a shower, I proceeded to face paint. 

It really didn't look right at the first part of the day, the Halloween parade at the boys' school, since I only had time for the white. But I looked creepy as hell at school. Hah!

RG was a kitty of course, but barely looked like he was in costume (he wore mostly black with a tail and ears). Sigh. Oh well. I suppose I was selfish with effort towards costumes this year, but the boys only wanted to be kitties! And had no interest in face painting on whiskers.

I'm the bad mom who didn't capture any good photos of the boys yesterday, and the parade was difficult to get a good shot of RG anyway, but I did get some good ones of the principal leading the parade, dressed as a construction contractor (funny to everyone there because they're currently undergoing construction of the new school on the same campus, so this entire school year is nuts with school continuing in the old building and construction going on of the new building). Anyway, literally the entire gym was chuckling at his costume and demeanor. I love our kids' school! Also, in a previous year, he dressed up as Matt Smith as the Doctor.

I was not the only parent who dressed up. Thankfully. There were few of us though. Sigh.

Here's the best I looked later on in the afternoon.

But then something happened. RG and I got into a fight about quitting the Kindle time (he really hadn't had much though at that point) and getting to Nasser's work for trick-or-treating there. It all just went to hell. RG stormed off upstairs saying he wasn't going and then eventually when we were all on the phone with Nasser talking it through, I got further depressed. I ruined a bunch of the face paint, then said well now I can't go anywhere and we decided to skip the work trick-or-treating and Nasser came home. Poor TK was especially disappointed in that I think. Sigh.

I recovered. Miraculously. It took some time, the kids got some "educational shows", which was fine in a lot of ways because I think they needed that downtime to do well later too. Nasser and I touched up my face, a lot, and then we headed out.

It ended up being a good night. Quality time spent with neighbors, some of whom we haven't known as well. There were two wagons brought along in the group, with adult beverages. I, of course, skipped that part, which was fine. It all was fun, we laughed, we scolded kids when they were climbing over too many bushes to shortcut their way to the next house, we reminded them to say thank you. And when we hit our cul-de-sac, our little family cut out a tad early. We needed it, we needed the time at home for the kids to peruse their candy before getting to bed, a tad later than normal, which was about where we needed it to be.