(no subject)
Today was sort of an uneven day characterized by an overarching sense of anxiety and nervousness. I got up early in the morning to use the bathroom and all of my anxiety and paranoid thoughts regarding my social relationships decided to pounce on my brain--further proof that, really, it's always more of a hassle to get up to pee than it is to just stay in bed and hold it in until I'm truly ready to wake up. :\ Not that my anxiety was any less when I finally rolled out of bed, but at least I wasn't as bad as when I got up to pee.
(I guess I've been thinking a lot about my social relationships lately, since I have friends who are going back or have already started back to school or they have work or they're busy with raising kids or just...stuff, and I just miss them all. I need to schedule some hangtimes with someone or actually get a job or something because I'm in this huge phase of wanting to socialize--which I haven't felt in a long time--and lack of it has left me feeling kind of lonely. I feel like I've temporarily forgotten how to enjoy spending time with myself, which makes me uncomfortable because in the past that forgetting has left me feeling like I cling to everyone unnecessarily and annoyingly. :|
On top of that, Adrian goes back to Texas State this weekend; it's going to be hard not to have him around every day to hang out with. Apart from maybe Sally, Patricia, and my mother, he knows me scarily well. My brother is one of the best at making me feel not just better, but like I'm actually wanted around. Not to say that my parents don't do that, but...I mean...as far as someone close to my age goes...and that's what I want right now. I just want to feel wanted, like my presence is valued in some way or acknowledged [which makes me feel selfish to say out loud]. More importantly, I need to remember how to cultivate that from within so I can resume feeling entirely self-sufficient.)
I was pretty much off and on all day in terms of anxiety/nervousness. In the middle of starting season three of ABDC, I just burst into tears when they started talking about the Puerto Rican dance crew and showing footage from San Juan--and then again when Lil Mama started to cry in reaction to how well the team from Brooklyn performed. Music helped to keep me calm--it's really kind of hard to be nervous while listening to Nicki Minaj--and when I finally got to the therapist's office, it felt like I'd finally come to a place where I could resume learning how to cope with my head.
Still, I kind of wish my brother and my dad had sat with me in the waiting room instead of going off to buy socks (though to be fair, Adrian did need some new socks). It took everything I had not to spam-text any of my friends or spam-tweet. (The last thing anyone needs is a flood of nervousness blowing up their phones.) The whole building is just... There's something very contained and quiet and surreal about the place. And the waiting room itself is just this one, rectangle-shaped room with a large window at one end and chairs against the wall and these two huge paintings (which I liked because they reminded me of how I always imagine the Penitents' District in UtVG) and (of course) magazines. I just felt kind of uncomfortable being there by myself. It didn't take them long to call me back once I'd checked in, though...
I have feeling I'm going to quite enjoy working with him. It turns out that he's a Cuban who studied in Puerto Rico and speaks Spanish. He reminds me of my uncles and my parents' friends. Plus, he had a firm handshake. (That's important to me!) Oh man, and his office is really neat, with a great view of the UT Health Science Center across the way and several little elephant statuettes. (I like elephants, so I was kind of envious.) Right now, to start with, he wants to see if the phases I've been feeling could have or be improved by an external source/change in habits, namely getting a better night's sleep.
He also wants me to work on cutting out caffeine and alcohol. Cutting out alcohol is easy--I rarely drink as it is--but caffeine? No more coffee? No more tea? I mean, yeah, there's decaf, but I'm still not entirely convinced it wasn't created by the devil. >.> Still, if it might go a ways towards improving my emotional health, I'm willing to give it a shot. Maybe I can start with cutting down sodas. Just have the one cup of coffee in the morning--a small cup--and then no soda the rest of the day. Which will be hard because my parents have grown to love Vanilla Coke as much as I do so they stock it pretty regularly in the fridge. /o\
The therapist also suggested investing in some Omega 3 supplements, as well as some theanine ones, which will apparently help reduce mental/physical stress? I think I need to do more researching on that first; find out if it might have any interactions with the medication I'm already taking. There was also talk of possibly switching or adding to my medication further down the road, though he wrote me a prescription for refills to use in February, because he was concerned that while it was raising my serotonin levels it wasn't doing anything for the other brain chemicals. However, since I've been doing fairly well on what I've been taking so far with only a few small episodes (like today's and a few tinier ones recently), we'll just monitor things and see how I do.
It's a little strange, because I don't officially get to see him again for another three months. Not entirely sure how I feel about that. I think the distant scheduling of the next appointment is just to see the results of implementing all the changes first and then we can decide from there how to approach treatment, but it's so different to what I'm used to regarding my previous experiences with counseling and therapy. I'm used to going in every week or every other week to sort out my brain and figure out how to deal with all the stuff I've vomited out. I have a feeling I might end up making a sooner appointment next month to ask him if that's something we can do (the cost of the copay isn't an expensive problem, thank goodness) at least until I feel more secure in my healthier coping mechanisms to space the appointments out more. Couldn't hurt, right?
(I guess I've been thinking a lot about my social relationships lately, since I have friends who are going back or have already started back to school or they have work or they're busy with raising kids or just...stuff, and I just miss them all. I need to schedule some hangtimes with someone or actually get a job or something because I'm in this huge phase of wanting to socialize--which I haven't felt in a long time--and lack of it has left me feeling kind of lonely. I feel like I've temporarily forgotten how to enjoy spending time with myself, which makes me uncomfortable because in the past that forgetting has left me feeling like I cling to everyone unnecessarily and annoyingly. :|
On top of that, Adrian goes back to Texas State this weekend; it's going to be hard not to have him around every day to hang out with. Apart from maybe Sally, Patricia, and my mother, he knows me scarily well. My brother is one of the best at making me feel not just better, but like I'm actually wanted around. Not to say that my parents don't do that, but...I mean...as far as someone close to my age goes...and that's what I want right now. I just want to feel wanted, like my presence is valued in some way or acknowledged [which makes me feel selfish to say out loud]. More importantly, I need to remember how to cultivate that from within so I can resume feeling entirely self-sufficient.)
I was pretty much off and on all day in terms of anxiety/nervousness. In the middle of starting season three of ABDC, I just burst into tears when they started talking about the Puerto Rican dance crew and showing footage from San Juan--and then again when Lil Mama started to cry in reaction to how well the team from Brooklyn performed. Music helped to keep me calm--it's really kind of hard to be nervous while listening to Nicki Minaj--and when I finally got to the therapist's office, it felt like I'd finally come to a place where I could resume learning how to cope with my head.
Still, I kind of wish my brother and my dad had sat with me in the waiting room instead of going off to buy socks (though to be fair, Adrian did need some new socks). It took everything I had not to spam-text any of my friends or spam-tweet. (The last thing anyone needs is a flood of nervousness blowing up their phones.) The whole building is just... There's something very contained and quiet and surreal about the place. And the waiting room itself is just this one, rectangle-shaped room with a large window at one end and chairs against the wall and these two huge paintings (which I liked because they reminded me of how I always imagine the Penitents' District in UtVG) and (of course) magazines. I just felt kind of uncomfortable being there by myself. It didn't take them long to call me back once I'd checked in, though...
I have feeling I'm going to quite enjoy working with him. It turns out that he's a Cuban who studied in Puerto Rico and speaks Spanish. He reminds me of my uncles and my parents' friends. Plus, he had a firm handshake. (That's important to me!) Oh man, and his office is really neat, with a great view of the UT Health Science Center across the way and several little elephant statuettes. (I like elephants, so I was kind of envious.) Right now, to start with, he wants to see if the phases I've been feeling could have or be improved by an external source/change in habits, namely getting a better night's sleep.
He also wants me to work on cutting out caffeine and alcohol. Cutting out alcohol is easy--I rarely drink as it is--but caffeine? No more coffee? No more tea? I mean, yeah, there's decaf, but I'm still not entirely convinced it wasn't created by the devil. >.> Still, if it might go a ways towards improving my emotional health, I'm willing to give it a shot. Maybe I can start with cutting down sodas. Just have the one cup of coffee in the morning--a small cup--and then no soda the rest of the day. Which will be hard because my parents have grown to love Vanilla Coke as much as I do so they stock it pretty regularly in the fridge. /o\
The therapist also suggested investing in some Omega 3 supplements, as well as some theanine ones, which will apparently help reduce mental/physical stress? I think I need to do more researching on that first; find out if it might have any interactions with the medication I'm already taking. There was also talk of possibly switching or adding to my medication further down the road, though he wrote me a prescription for refills to use in February, because he was concerned that while it was raising my serotonin levels it wasn't doing anything for the other brain chemicals. However, since I've been doing fairly well on what I've been taking so far with only a few small episodes (like today's and a few tinier ones recently), we'll just monitor things and see how I do.
It's a little strange, because I don't officially get to see him again for another three months. Not entirely sure how I feel about that. I think the distant scheduling of the next appointment is just to see the results of implementing all the changes first and then we can decide from there how to approach treatment, but it's so different to what I'm used to regarding my previous experiences with counseling and therapy. I'm used to going in every week or every other week to sort out my brain and figure out how to deal with all the stuff I've vomited out. I have a feeling I might end up making a sooner appointment next month to ask him if that's something we can do (the cost of the copay isn't an expensive problem, thank goodness) at least until I feel more secure in my healthier coping mechanisms to space the appointments out more. Couldn't hurt, right?