ups and downs (personal stuff + Doctor Who 5.03 - 5.05)
It's been a sort of blah week for me. Nothing particularly bad to report, but nothing particularly good, either.
Don't feel like you have to read all this, by the way, especially the really personal stuff.
I've been kind of bogged down this week. "Bogged down" is my nice euphemism for "backsliding into depression." That no longer terrifies me -- because I know it's not permanent and that I can dig myself back out. But I am indeed trying to stay vigilant to make sure I do dig out or at least keep a good handhold somewhere near the top.
It doesn't help that I'm having a lot of allergy-related sinus trouble lately. I have this weird problem: the physical feeling of having pressure in my head is a lot like the mental pressure of depression for me, so I can get awfully emotionally bogged down if I spend too much time with a headache (or wisdom teeth pain, or wearing glasses). The only good thing about the unhealthily strong mind-body connection I have is that it can work both ways. I used to have a lot of stomach aches that were tied to stress and anxiety, and when I got good at banishing them, I realized I could also banish some legitimate physically-originating stomach aches. If I can get my sinuses under control (probably by going back to the 24-hour Claritin), I can probably snap myself out of my funk.
I'm still learning how to deal with my chronic anxiety/depression, and one of the best lessons I've learned lately is that "fake it till you make it" is a pretty good approach for me. I came to associate my major depression so strongly with certain behavioral symptoms (sleeping too much or too late, eating poorly, etc.) that anytime they recur, I get nervous. The nerves are good. They make me pay attention. As long as they don't make me guilt, I'm okay. That was the hard part for me: learning to evaluate my behavior, to identify it as something that needed changing, without feeling shitty about it. (I was a fucking ninja master at finding ways to convert perfectly normal but undesirable emotions like sadness into anxiety and guilt.) Anyway, I've discovered if I can forcibly change the behavior and pep talk myself into remembering how awesome it is that I'm being a functional human, I can convince myself I'm not depressed.
I don't mean that in an unhealthy way, like I'm deluding myself. I'm just pulling myself out of that vicious cycle thinking that makes me see a bad day as the start of a trend of bad days, a bad morning as the start of a trend of a bad day. Along those lines, another helpful skill for me has been the art of wiping the slate clean. Pep talks that 1) identify the bad week, bad day, bad morning for what it is, 2) give me permission to objectively root out the cause (my mental illness, forces outside my control, or forces well within my control that I just fucked up), just for the sake of fixing the problem, and 3) remind me that there's still part of the week/day left and I can probably make it pretty awesome. And if I don't, I'm not a bad person.
So that's what I did this morning as I walked to work late. Crappy morning, mostly crappy week -- but that doesn't have to mean I'm going down a path toward destruction.
~
Anyway, I had a nice day yesterday. I was only marginally late to work, but while I was there I was productive. I get off at 1 p.m. on Thursdays, and my best friend took an extra long lunch so we could go to one of our favorite self-indulgent places to eat, City Cafe. It's just a meat & three kind of place, serving good old southern fare, but it's a very popular place around here. Any given time you walk in the door, the booths are packed and there's a long line of people waiting to snatch up the next available booth, before it's even been cleared. My lunch? Chicken and dressing, blackeyed peas, candied yams, and fried green tomatoes, with corn bread and sweet tea. More grease than I've allowed myself to have in a long time, but it was worth it. :)
My best friend's obsession with knitting has finally taken hold with me, so I was happy to accompany her to the fancy yarn store so she could get more yarn for her log cabin afghan. I'm so used to spending ridiculous amounts of time shopping for yarn virtually (browsing pretty pictures, putting things in a shopping cart, but not buying a bit of it) that it was a treat to get to actually handle nice merino wool, alpaca, cashmere, and cotton yarns. I'm starting an afghan of my own soon, with stripes in 8 or 9 colors. I'm also in the process of making my second pair of socks ever, and I've finally gotten the hang of the kitchener stitch (used for grafting the toe together), so this pair will look neat and nice, as opposed to my wacky first pair. I'm also making my boyfriend a scarf with a simple little zig-zag pattern (seen here; this pattern is cute and really easy, btw -- if you can knit and purl, you can do it).
Despite the heat, I also went to the farmer's market yesterday afternoon. Picked up some squash, yellow tomatoes, sweet red peppers, grapes, and a quart of lima beans. I'm really enjoyed having fresh local produce this summer.
~
Something else I'm enjoying: Doctor Who series five. For the first time, I'm watching with my best friend and her husband, who is a sci-fi geek. It's hilarious listening to him overthink the logic of the plot, which at its best is often predicated upon sonic screwdrivers and handwavey bullshit and serious nonsense (oblivion continuum, ftw!). Sometimes, I have to look over at him and say, "Austin, it's just Geordi LaForge recalibrating the tractor beam/photon torpedoes/sensors" or, simply, "wibbly-wobbly, timey-wimey."
Daleks continue to make me squeal with delight at their very existence. Not only were they fighting in WWII, but they were in technicolor. And the Doctor was beating the crap out of them with a enormous wrench. I still think Matt Smith is quite Tennant-y, mostly because of his line delivery, but I think he's different enough and interesting and awesome. But not as awesome as Amy.
I was so happy to see the return of River Song. I loved the contentious dynamic between her and the Doctor, especially as it got flirtier as the episode went on. That was one crazysauce story arc with the angels, but it was what I've come to expect from Moffatt -- the genuinely creepy and suspenseful, a bit of action, and a lot of thinky stuff. Some of it was handwavey bullshit to an extreme degree (plus I find it really hard to keep up with Matt Smith's Doctor when he gets into hyper talking mode), but the business about the Crack in the Universe and the anomalous Amy Pond was v. v. interesting. I can't wait to see how the season's story arc plays out!
So, how's your day (or week!) been?
Don't feel like you have to read all this, by the way, especially the really personal stuff.
I've been kind of bogged down this week. "Bogged down" is my nice euphemism for "backsliding into depression." That no longer terrifies me -- because I know it's not permanent and that I can dig myself back out. But I am indeed trying to stay vigilant to make sure I do dig out or at least keep a good handhold somewhere near the top.
It doesn't help that I'm having a lot of allergy-related sinus trouble lately. I have this weird problem: the physical feeling of having pressure in my head is a lot like the mental pressure of depression for me, so I can get awfully emotionally bogged down if I spend too much time with a headache (or wisdom teeth pain, or wearing glasses). The only good thing about the unhealthily strong mind-body connection I have is that it can work both ways. I used to have a lot of stomach aches that were tied to stress and anxiety, and when I got good at banishing them, I realized I could also banish some legitimate physically-originating stomach aches. If I can get my sinuses under control (probably by going back to the 24-hour Claritin), I can probably snap myself out of my funk.
I'm still learning how to deal with my chronic anxiety/depression, and one of the best lessons I've learned lately is that "fake it till you make it" is a pretty good approach for me. I came to associate my major depression so strongly with certain behavioral symptoms (sleeping too much or too late, eating poorly, etc.) that anytime they recur, I get nervous. The nerves are good. They make me pay attention. As long as they don't make me guilt, I'm okay. That was the hard part for me: learning to evaluate my behavior, to identify it as something that needed changing, without feeling shitty about it. (I was a fucking ninja master at finding ways to convert perfectly normal but undesirable emotions like sadness into anxiety and guilt.) Anyway, I've discovered if I can forcibly change the behavior and pep talk myself into remembering how awesome it is that I'm being a functional human, I can convince myself I'm not depressed.
I don't mean that in an unhealthy way, like I'm deluding myself. I'm just pulling myself out of that vicious cycle thinking that makes me see a bad day as the start of a trend of bad days, a bad morning as the start of a trend of a bad day. Along those lines, another helpful skill for me has been the art of wiping the slate clean. Pep talks that 1) identify the bad week, bad day, bad morning for what it is, 2) give me permission to objectively root out the cause (my mental illness, forces outside my control, or forces well within my control that I just fucked up), just for the sake of fixing the problem, and 3) remind me that there's still part of the week/day left and I can probably make it pretty awesome. And if I don't, I'm not a bad person.
So that's what I did this morning as I walked to work late. Crappy morning, mostly crappy week -- but that doesn't have to mean I'm going down a path toward destruction.
~
Anyway, I had a nice day yesterday. I was only marginally late to work, but while I was there I was productive. I get off at 1 p.m. on Thursdays, and my best friend took an extra long lunch so we could go to one of our favorite self-indulgent places to eat, City Cafe. It's just a meat & three kind of place, serving good old southern fare, but it's a very popular place around here. Any given time you walk in the door, the booths are packed and there's a long line of people waiting to snatch up the next available booth, before it's even been cleared. My lunch? Chicken and dressing, blackeyed peas, candied yams, and fried green tomatoes, with corn bread and sweet tea. More grease than I've allowed myself to have in a long time, but it was worth it. :)
My best friend's obsession with knitting has finally taken hold with me, so I was happy to accompany her to the fancy yarn store so she could get more yarn for her log cabin afghan. I'm so used to spending ridiculous amounts of time shopping for yarn virtually (browsing pretty pictures, putting things in a shopping cart, but not buying a bit of it) that it was a treat to get to actually handle nice merino wool, alpaca, cashmere, and cotton yarns. I'm starting an afghan of my own soon, with stripes in 8 or 9 colors. I'm also in the process of making my second pair of socks ever, and I've finally gotten the hang of the kitchener stitch (used for grafting the toe together), so this pair will look neat and nice, as opposed to my wacky first pair. I'm also making my boyfriend a scarf with a simple little zig-zag pattern (seen here; this pattern is cute and really easy, btw -- if you can knit and purl, you can do it).
Despite the heat, I also went to the farmer's market yesterday afternoon. Picked up some squash, yellow tomatoes, sweet red peppers, grapes, and a quart of lima beans. I'm really enjoyed having fresh local produce this summer.
~
Something else I'm enjoying: Doctor Who series five. For the first time, I'm watching with my best friend and her husband, who is a sci-fi geek. It's hilarious listening to him overthink the logic of the plot, which at its best is often predicated upon sonic screwdrivers and handwavey bullshit and serious nonsense (oblivion continuum, ftw!). Sometimes, I have to look over at him and say, "Austin, it's just Geordi LaForge recalibrating the tractor beam/photon torpedoes/sensors" or, simply, "wibbly-wobbly, timey-wimey."
Daleks continue to make me squeal with delight at their very existence. Not only were they fighting in WWII, but they were in technicolor. And the Doctor was beating the crap out of them with a enormous wrench. I still think Matt Smith is quite Tennant-y, mostly because of his line delivery, but I think he's different enough and interesting and awesome. But not as awesome as Amy.
I was so happy to see the return of River Song. I loved the contentious dynamic between her and the Doctor, especially as it got flirtier as the episode went on. That was one crazysauce story arc with the angels, but it was what I've come to expect from Moffatt -- the genuinely creepy and suspenseful, a bit of action, and a lot of thinky stuff. Some of it was handwavey bullshit to an extreme degree (plus I find it really hard to keep up with Matt Smith's Doctor when he gets into hyper talking mode), but the business about the Crack in the Universe and the anomalous Amy Pond was v. v. interesting. I can't wait to see how the season's story arc plays out!
So, how's your day (or week!) been?