storms

I have to keep reminding myself, no matter what happens, I have friends and family who love me and I am worth more than I think. The weather (inside & out) has been pretty oppressive these last few days. I get caught up with my emotions too hard and quickly, it takes time after the storm to find my balance again. My even keel. 

I need to stop crashing through doors that aren't open to me. Granted, this time it really felt as if I were invited, but the door was still shut. I am okay, got a good night's sleep, didn't drink away the emotions (sitting sober with them is very uncomfortable, but necessary). There's a calm today, and I can see that there's never going to be clear skies for long. But weathering these storms and coming back out (mostly) unscathed, it just toughens me up to survive the next one. And the next one. And the next one. Bring it.

Fierce morning brain stuff

Feeling pretty free lately, despite the occasional head storm (which is inevitable for me). Feeling fierce, actually. Fine time for list making. What to list...ah, how about Things I'm Letting Go: 

• The idea that I need to censor parts of myself to make others comfortable. If I make someone uncomfortable by being myself, that's probably not the company I need to be keeping. 

• The need to be alone to wallow in my thoughts. This never ends well, usually with me overthinking and imagining, writing needy pathetic poetry. Funk dat, I have my tribe of weirdos that love me and who also need another human to pull them back out of themselves. With hugs. Real squeezy hugs. Human physical contact helps keep me grounded.

• Alcohol as a form of medication. I have writing, art, music, books, films, friends, family, cats, laughter, nature, ALL THIS FUCKING WORLD as medication, I don't need to tamp myself down with booze. Not saying I've stopped altogether, but not drinking alone anymore. A few drinks always helps connect my brain to my mouth, though.

• The need to self diagnose myself with bullshit. I have an imbalance. Every fucking person has some sort of imbalance. There is no grown adult who is 100% sane. I don't need to hyper focus on what's wrong with me, or label it. As long as it stays within the realm of neurosis, I'm cool. 

yeah, I'm tired of this list already. It's not even 9am, for fuck's sake.

some happy words

dealing with my hills and dips, some higher and lower than others. I've had a bright shiny light lately, I just have to wait and see how that plays out. optimistic though (which, I realize, doesn't appear to be my norm, given everything I write, but know that I write more of my lows than of my highs -- the highs are a far more frequent occurance). drinking has definitely been under control for awhile now, which makes life so so much easier. trying hard not to internalize the stress of others and make it my own. 

just thought I'd write something positive here, so I don't appear to be this pit of despair.

life is lovely.

List: Yeah, I'm making another list

This one is: Coping Strategies? I guess? I don't know, I just had a hankering for listing things.

• Recently learned helpful hint: people become 200x less intimidating once you remember they still have to wipe their asses. Yeah, probably don't picture it, though. I mean, unless you think it will help.

• Buy a bag of goldfish crackers and bite them all in half along their seams. This gives one an enormous sense of accomplishment. Also, don't put them back in the bag after doing this, you really just have to eat them at this point. What are you, five years old? I shouldn't have to tell you this! 

• Put on the Electric Six album Fire. Loudly. Like, crank that shit to eleven. Sing and dance furiously to the entire album at least twice through. Forget about doing the dishes. What dishes? The dishes are an illusion. There's only Fire today.

• See all your unfinished paintings? Yeah, girl, pop one on the easel and stare at it for a half hour. Just really get nowhere with it. Now put that shit away and get a fresh canvas out. Paint a lovely shade of orange over the entire thing. Yeah, that's pretty. What next? I have no idea, let's just finish that one later. I'm sick of painting now. 

• Start making a list. Get intensely into it for...eh, five minutes. Then... yeah, no, I'm done. 

guilty

A little late for a resolution this year, but fuck it. Time is an illusion. 

This resolution: indulge in every one of my "guilty pleasures" until I stop feeling guilty and ashamed for liking things other people don't. It's my life, my brain, my heart. I'm going to pour in as much good stuff as I can and stop judging myself for it. 

Sitting home with covid

This isn't really about covid, but I'm stuck home with it and the fun of being off work has worn off. 

Depression isn't just not being able to get out of bed. I finally escaped and I'm trying I'M TRYING, but now all of my music somehow sounds the same and that's the worst. 

I tried a self care app with this cute little bird thing. Sort of like a depression tamagotchi. I feed it energy I don't really have in the form of words and goals, and then it fucking goes adventuring without me. 

Thanks bird, fine, just leave me after I tell you all of my problems. 

Anyways, it picks words out of my prompt responses to focus on, and now it's decided that penguins are the source of my depression. 

I mean... why not. 

Meditation Technique

"Shoving a butt plug in the asshole of your mind."

Sorry... watching Midnight Gospel and couldn't get that phrase out of my head until I wrote it down. Next time I attempt to meditate, this will be the visual. 

List: Reasons why Jenny is losing her damn mind

• I stopped drinking (more or less). I've had exactly one beer in the span of seven weeks. I had basically been drinking to self medicate my depression, so now I'm just stuck... dealing with it. Unfortunately, so is everyone around me. 
• I just ended a 15 year relationship, which has basically been most of my adult life. It's the right decision, but it's hard thinking about the aftereffects and what the future's going to be like. We're also still going to be living together for quite awhile until we get everything sorted out, so...yeah.
• I might be going through early perimenopause. I dunno, I've been having pretty big mood swings and what might be small hot flashes, and it's around the age mom started going through it.
• I'm at long last trying to finalize a divorce that should've happened 18 years ago and realizing how much of a mess I am at an age when I should have my shit together.
• There are adorable hyperactive kittens getting into everything in my house. 
• (there are more reasons, but I think I've unpacked enough for now, thank you) 

big feelings

I know by my peace that I've made the right decision. I'm ending a 15 year long relationship and that's so fucking scary. Especially because it's with someone I still deeply care about and always will. But I also know that the feelings I've held and kept secret were slowly eating away at me and would have destroyed everything around me, anyway. I don't feel like an imposter anymore. I feel like I can slowly find myself again.

From here on out, I'm going to try harder to make my feelings clear to the people I care about. I've gotten very skilled at guarding myself and speaking in cryptic ways. I need to face it, I can't expect everyone to know my heart's language. I always thought... if they cared, they'd learn. But that's not being fair. Also, I realize that's a very unhealthy way to go through life, alienating and testing people. I have to accept that, at times, I'm going to hurt people with the truth and I will also be hurt, that's just part of being human. I don't need to live on the defensive.

Anyways, I saw this picture on FB from a movie I've yet to watch, and it made me feel alright this morning. Hence this post. 

*side note: I just watched this movie, Coco, this quote is nowhere in it. FB is full of lies lol

I got this

It's morning. I'm starting to like the morning. My head finally feels clear in what feels like forever. I can see what I had been feeling in a different light. 

It was just loneliness and insecurity. That's it. Just two silly fucking emotions amplified from isolating myself. Those feelings build exponentially when I leave them unchecked until I feel crushed under them. I stupidly start assuming other people's thoughts instead of just talking. I don't look at my own thought processes for what they are, but instead see it as my failure as a human being. As if it's me, I'm the problem. I'm not enough, or I'm too (fill in the blank). I am my own worst enemy and biggest critic. 

But, nah... fuck that. I am enough. I am a fucking badass. I think it took being actively judged by someone else (and she can piss right the fuck off) to finally stand up and defend myself. I am a grown ass woman, I live my life however the fuck I want, and no, I don't have it all figured out yet, but no one really does.

Nah. I got this. 

Feelings suck. Also, no feelings suck.

I've gotta get out of the loop I'm stuck in. I can't think, I can't speak, I can't feel. I'm deadened by the thought of the unknown. I'm mind reading instead of communicating. I'm folding inward. I feel I can't improve upon the silence. Whatever spark I had is smoldering. It hasn't gone out, but I'm just so tired and confused. I'm not propping myself up with alcohol like I've done for so long, so I'm just... floundering. 

I don't know how to do this. 

resolutions. plural.

Lots of resolutions...I'm feeling ambitious. Hold my beer, I got this.

1. Be patient, kind, and understanding... even with those who I don't think deserve it. It's not my place to judge. Everyone needs more kindness and less snark. I want to be the sort of person that I would look up to. Above all the pettiness.

2. Put down my phone and read more books -- ones I already own. I've got way too many unread books on my shelves.

3. Paint more and experiment with different styles.

4. Listen to new music -- a new album (as in one I've never heard all the way through) every few days.

5. Be kind to myself. This includes eating healthier, drinking less alcohol, getting more exercise, and taking mental health days (from work and/or everything) when I need them. It also includes dragging myself to the doctor when I need to.

Time is a missed bus

No matter what good happens, there's always moments where I wake up and just feel buried under every single thing. I look at everything I've done wrong, or the things I shoud be doing or should have done. My stomach is tied in knots. It's raining and gray and I feel like this gross lazy thing that adds nothing to anything. Like I'm wasting my life and everyone else's time.

I know time is an illusion. But it's a very convincing illusion. It takes everyone with it when it speeds on past me. It feels like the rest of the world is on a bus that I just missed and am too tired to catch up with.

Excitement

Making a list of things that I find exciting and worth it, for the times that I find nothing exciting or worth it.

A Jenny Jump Start, if you will.

1. Discovering new (or, new to me) music by artists I've never heard of, in a different genre than what I've recently been listening to
2. Reading relatable poetry
3. Furious kitchen dancing
4. Painting something lovely
5. Lighting incense and sitting around listening to records during a thunderstorm
6. Walking through trees (meaning a bunch of trees... not, like... THROUGH A TREE)
7. Playing piano with headphones on and imagining a rapt audience
8. Ghost stories in the dark
9. Writing haikus about fun things
10. Backfloating in the sun
11. Writing lists about things that make me happy

Stopping here for now, until I think of more.

Peace & Love

Still doing this

I'm alive.

I don't feel like it sometimes, but I'm here.

Something feels off. Something's missing. I don't know. I feel a little lost. Daydreamy and surreal. Isolated. Even around people. It's like I'm not connecting. I'm in a parallel dimension where I can still see people. Speak. Hear. But I'm not really there. They're not really there. Everything's empty.

I spent a half hour outside talking to my cat tonight.

I'm losing my fucking mind.

Ready set GODDAMMIT

Let's start by listing everything I'm angry about.

1. Dishes not done.
2. Trash overflowing.
3. No one else in the house caring about the first two items on this list.
4. Pants. They're never fucking comfortable.
5. My phone has amnesia and has recently started autocorrecting all my texts to bizarre shit.
6. STINK FUCKING BUGS I HATE THEM.
7. I'm angry and I don't want to be angry and that makes me ANGRY!
8. I'm too tired to do anything cool but I don't want to be in this bed.
9. Elderly people in large groups. Ugh.
10. Having to wait for someone to get off their billionth goddamn personal call at work to talk to them. You are at work. Act like it. Also, I'm telling on you. Fuck that shit.
11. Know it all holier than thou types. I will eat whatever seafood I fucking want. And like it.
12. The word "thou."

Okay, I think that helped. I've gone off my antidepressants and I'm experiencing random anger again. But it's stuff that should be bitched about. So there.

Also realized that my meds were effecting my sleep quality. Maybe just thyroid supplements for awhile. Trying to not be a zombie. I'm bored with my medicated state of mind. I need my mind back. My brain fog had gotten terrible. I couldn't remember simple words. And how much have I even written over the past year? Yeah, fucking nothing. Okay, I think I'm no longer too angry to sleep so...

Uhh...my throat is making a weird popcorn sound. Popopop pop pop. What in the world. Huh.

Letting the empty void know, I'm still alive.

Okay, so I don't, in fact, have cancer. That I know of ( the hypochondriac in me will always think I have some undetected form of cancer). But after much testing and racking up much doctor bills, it amounts to "cat scratch disease" and is now done with. I also found out I have an under active thyroid, Hashimoto's Disease, which explains my depression and weight gain and a million other symptoms. But I can't afford the doctor visits and medications for it (no more insurance), so knowing about it is about it. I'm on OTC thyroid supplements, that's better than nothing I guess. The good thing that came out of all of this: I went back on antidepressants. Which is my explanation for the gap in depressing blog posts this year. I've gone from hell to being mildly content, with a tinge of maybe not very content sometimes. Basically, all of my emotions are dulled down to the point where I can live with them. Which does nothing for my creativity, but whatever.

I just had a horrifying dream this morning after the kids left for school. I dreamed that my brother came very close to shooting me in the face and killing me. I haven't spoken to my brother for months. We had a falling out over his stupid backwards worldview (pro Trump, anti-gay/trans/nonreligious/basically everyone interesting). But...the fuck was up with that dream? It's upset my afternoon. It's a beautiful sunny day and I just want to pull all the curtains and drink until I'm unconscious. Stupid dream.

I'm going to try to force myself to write. Hopefully inspiration is not only tied to depression for me. I want to write shitty haiku about nature. Or whatever. This is going to be awesome. More to come. From MILDLY CONTENT JENNY. BOOM.

Lump

I can't feel much at the moment. I have a lump in my neck, which OF COURSE I've googled and Web MD'ed to death, so I'm sure I'm dying. I have a doctor appointment in two days, and I know that's only a start. I won't find out anything about it straight away. There will be labs, tests, whatever. In the meantime, I'm as much of a wreck as someone who is mostly numb to emotions can be. Wondering if I should plug on like normal, or whip out my bucket list. Which I haven't really even made yet. What do I want from life? I don't even know.

Details, coming soon.

I'm clearly not good at being human

I'm roaming around in a mind fog. My days are all blurring together. I can't think clearly. I'm no fun. I'm just tired of all social interaction. I have the urge to just gather up my stuff and go camping by myself for a week. I'd probably be eaten by something, but at this point that almost sounds nice. Can't come in to work, sorry, I'm being eaten by a motherfucking bear. *sigh* I just can't anymore, but still have to anyway.

Drunk and watching Waking Life

Things are too real. Or unreal. Reality is oppressive. Or nothing is happening. Pain is real, as I slap my face, cheek and cheek until my skin is singing. Awake is pointless movement in space. Dream is worlds in worlds in worlds, too few, far between and forgotten, devoid of routine and full with everything. I am so done with reality.