Month: April 2005

I’m posting from the downtown seattle library, sitting in the big open area on the 3rd floor. the light in here really is just about right for using the laptop, and the low chairs are just about the right height too.

I have the day off, which I used the first part to take deconstruction trash to the dump with C, and this 2nd part to get to Seattle for the 2nd higher ed web people dinner. (Which Dylan was gracious enough to make reservations for.) I might stay over with Kat, if she’ll have me, or I’ll be heading home on a late bus.

today was the first day when I felt like the meds “kicked in,” meaning that I had a conversation that was stressful, but I didn’t feel like flinging myself into the pit of despair, which seems like a good sign.

I looked up and just noticed that there’s some sort of abstract art thing being played on one of the gigantic white walls of the central well of the building. unfortunately, at this angle it mostly just reminds me of the plumbing screensaver for windows. 🙂

this is a huge open space, and yet it feel surprisingly comfortable. I’m just wondering if there’s a plug at hand if my power level dips too low before I take off for the U-district. (ah, I see a powerstrip on a table not too far off, which I may head for if I stay a while.)

I feel like I could sleep for a thousand years.

Rain, so we didn’t go to either the dump or the procession of the species. On the other hand, there were breaks enough that we bundled up some deconstruction trash and I clipped the last of the dead daffodils. Ah, the passing of spring.

I also made myself do a little work on cleaning up the home office by setting a timer so I “only” needed to spend 20 minutes. Mostly just threw away old reciepts, manuals for things we don’t, etc.

I’ve been fighting sleepiness all week, and I really don’t know if that’s my chronic low-level sleep deprivation or the meds. (Off and on queasiness, on the other hand, I blame entirely on the meds…especially with generic Aleve thrown in the mix.)

Most happily for me, I even got a little work done for my big redesign, playing around with templates and such while C was playing GTA. (I really enjoy San Andreas, as a spectator.)

I’m sure this is entirely dull to anybody but me, but it does help me to write what I’m feeling close to when I’m feeling it, to get a sense of how my moods flow through the day.

Still tired a lot of the time, and I don’t know quite how much is being low emotionally, and how much is just being a little bit sleep-deprived all the time. I love my cats, but they do seem to interrupt myself just about every night, even when I manage to get to bed on time.

I got what should be good news about my knee yesterday: went to the orthopedist, who asked a bunch of questions, tweaked my legs in several directions, asked me to walk back and forth, and then told me to take Aleve, 4 pills a day. Along with the exercises, it should get me 80+% of the way to normal in a couple of weeks.

Nice to have something be that simple.

Had a huge burst of anxiety early on in the day, triggered by things I hadn’t done that I’d meant to do, plus a big project I wasn’t looking forward to, plus a bit of med-induced queasiness. So I wrote out what was make me so uneasy, and looked for things I could *do* to work through it. A few emails, some oatmeal, and just getting started set me back in the right direction.

Forced myself to communicate in a few different ways today, too…email to Kat, plus a couple of work conversations I was nervous about, which turned out just fine.

Later I’m going to stretch myself again, going to the neighborhood association board meeting, both to talk web stuff and to get more involved in general.

I’m going to quote Kermit, quoting Doctor Who, from a recent comment (why don’t I have permalinks for my comments?!):

?Courage isn?t just a matter of not being frightened, you know. It?s being afraid, and doing what you have to do anyway.?

was mostly draggy again today; I think I’m permanently sleep-deprived. had some caffeine in the afternoon, and it just made me feel weird & kinda woozy. plus I’m definitely getting a bit of nausea with my little green pills, not very bad, and I think having breakfast (!) would help, but sort of annoying.

on the other hand, I started working on two work projects I’ve been dreading, even though they’ve turned out to be just as yucky as I’d anticipated (word! into html! with a form!), and I’m gradually getting done a couple of personal/home things that needed some attention.

as I think I said yesterday, part of the trick is to just not think too hard about all the trillions of things that I ought to have done, or could have been doing, or will need to do eventually, but to just tackle this thing that is right in front of my face, until it is done and I can see the next thing. which drives C, in particular, a little nuts, but that’s just life.

things that seem particularly important to stay on top of (non-work-edition):
* money
* various house craziness, esp. water heater, floor, process stuff
* journal writing (here and on paper)
* side work for the neighborhood association
* cats (general well-being)
* clean clothing
* food
* sleep
* stretching & cycling

on which topic, the weather is looking particularly lovely this week, so I’m hoping to get some rides in. we’ll see….

My mood still feels exceptionally fragile, motivation is a rare thing, and I had a few moments of super-intense antisociality/crowd-anxiety on Friday. On the other hand, we actually did some work on the house this weekend, with substantially less sturm-und-drang (sp?) than usual.

Dunno how much of it has to do with adjusting brain chemicals, and how much with intense attention to my moods and habits. Don’t really care, at this point.

More than anything, I’m trying to hold back the sensation of being entirely overwhelmed by…well, everything.

I find myself even more tongue-tied than usual at the moment.

I tried talking about all this to Kat last night, at least until C shouted that dinner was ready, and I found myself having a hard time describing this place I’ve been at, and the choice I just made.

I managed to fumble out the word to my boss this afternoon, and somehow I’ll do the same with my assistant next week.

I’ve been depressed, really, severely depressed…with the sense of pressure increasing the last few months as my knee injury has lingered. I’ve had thoughts I can’t write or even really put into words.

I’ve started and deleted at least four sentences already, none of which quite express what I want to say. I’m feeling particularly delicate in this venue, knowing that I remain the Elaine Nelson in Google, Yahoo and MSN Search, that my personal site is in my gmail sig, that at least once at least one of my coworkers has read my site.

But this is who I am, and this is where I am in my journey, right now: fighting, sometimes, not to fall into the crevasse of despair, to keep a steady hand on my own too-short sense of irritation at the universe, to maintain some sense of equilibrum. I haven’t been doing very well at it.

What is my plan to stay safe? I was asked yesterday, and it occurs to me now that this is one part of it; to remember that I can always write it down, and that writing it down can be a release, even when I feel all alone.

I went to therapy, last fall, and it helped hold me in place. This time, after considering back and forth, I’m taking an extra step…I’m still a little uneasy about it. But after reading the Midnight Disease (excellent book, btw), and remembering other things I’ve read, and just thinking back on the curvature of my moods, I am choosing to try medication.

Whew…can’t believe I just wrote that. Like stripping naked in a public place.

But I have hope, a thin thread of it.

Also, the more I write, the more I hope I can make sense of it all.

I’m a little surprised, although I think it was all about the mood I was in while waiting for the bus this morning. The weather was really quite lovely, although of course over the day it switched to rain, and I did a little bit of journal writing. Ah, paper. Even turned my hand at a couple of (impressively awkward!) haiku.

A couple of awkward/uneasy moments during the day, but I’m focusing on feeling the emotion and then letting it flow out of me. No idea how this is going to work over the long run, but today it felt just about right.

That, and trying to better communicate exactly where I am, working on finding the “flow” moment.

I had a lovely moment solving a tiny code problem, coming up with an impressively more elegant solution to something I’d been tackling rather clumsily, which brings to mind Shelley’s recent ode to her love of coding. That feeling carried all the way through the afternoon, which is my mental & emotional ebb time. A four-o’clock snack didn’t hurt either.

Still feel as though I’m skimming the surface in order to get by, rather than living as I would truly deeply want. But at least I’m skimming instead of drowning.

I was doing really well, too…or at least, I gave the appearance of it. I’d regained enough equanimity to talk like a professional…and now I’m despondent enough to not really want to do anything.

but I managed to do a difficult thing today, even though I REALLY didn’t want to, and admitted that I might be making a bad decision, and figured out how to (maybe) turn it into a good one.

I went from drifting to crashing in about an hour this afternoon. too much time indoors, too much sugar or not enough. oh, and my little red friend. hurrah.