Archives for category: Anxiety

A Slower Pace

September 20, 2019 //

I took some time off. I needed the break from routine, and even from distractions. I just needed some real rest. 🙂 For some reason, I haven’t been sleeping more than 4-5 hours a night, with rare exceptions, for weeks. I was losing the ability to easily keep track of details, and reminders were becoming a necessity on a whole other rather critical level that feels uncomfortable – and sometimes “weak”.

…So… time off? Yep. That’s the plan. It’s also been uncomfortable to manage the day-to-day distractions; my brain is so used to be busy at maximum intensity that not only is my sleep disturbed by it, but also, my every waking moment I also seem to be racing to grasp the next distraction – no time to waste! Hurry! See that?!? What’s that?! And that over there – do I know what that is?? Have I read that article? Am I up-to-date on this new crisis? Have I overlooked a detail? What am I forgetting!?? Distracted and pressed for time have been becoming my default settings – which is neither helpful, nor healthy. So. Definitely some time off, but also… some down time. Properly taking time – real, slow, committed, undistracted time – for myself. To slow down. To unwind. To listen to the breeze, and the sound of raindrops pattering on the deck… for hours. Put down the email. Turn off the tv. Cease the ceaseless conversation – for at least a little while.

Brunch with a friend, perhaps…? Thanks, no, I’m “busy” not doing that, for a couple days.

Want to go to this movie…? Um, no, I can catch it streaming at home, some other time.

What about work email?! Don’t want to fall behind on… Yeah, no. I’m explicitly turning work off for 4 days. Off. Completely off.

Well, but there’s this thing you’ve just got to see/do/experience… Nope. I’m good, thanks. It’ll be there later on, or… not. No “FOMO” here; I am focusing the quality of the life I have right now, just as it is. 🙂 It’s enough.

So, yeah. I haven’t been posting anything to Instagram (the only social media account I still have). I haven’t been “staying caught up” on my email, or the news, or the latest whatever that folks are wound up about. I’m just chilling at home with my Traveling Partner, gently, joyfully, calmly. It’s nice. Pleasant. Relaxed – and relaxing. Most of yesterday was spent in defiance of the busy-ness of the days prior to that; we hung out, listening to music, enjoying our morning coffee together, whiling away the hours content in each other’s good company, without any other agenda. Super chill. I don’t know how I could have spent the first day of this long chill weekend any better than that. I even managed to sleep in, yesterday. The entire day was spent present, aware, connected, and enjoying each moment without feeling any need to race “productively” to the next.

This morning, a new day begins. I’m awake earlier. A vague sensation that I’d meant to do something specific today nags at me, but I’ve reviewed the budget (it’s a payday, so that’s a thing I do), took a look at upcoming bills, and accounted for expenses we’d discussed being part of this pay cycle, before moving on. I guess maybe I mean to go grocery shopping, and since I’m sitting here drinking coffee, the lurking desire to also shop feels like a weight on my consciousness… damn, I’ve needed a proper break.

So, yeah… that’s what I’m up to, right now, taking care of myself and this fragile mortal vessel, by getting some down time. Maybe I write… maybe I don’t. I recommend it. 😉

It’s time to begin again… gently. 🙂

Tags begin again, I am my own cartographer, MBSR, mindfulness matters, perspective, practicing the practices, ptsd, sufficiency, taking care of me too, TBI, The Art of Being, The Big 5, the map is not the world, there are verbs involved, walking my own path, we become what we practice, what matters most?

Categories Allegories, Anxiety, Brain Injury, Free Will, gratitude, Healthy Living, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Practices, Sleepless Nights, Summer, The Art of Being, The Big 5

Complimentary PITA

September 11, 2019 //

Same routine, different location – at least for this morning bit – and I’m okay with that. 🙂 My coffee is still too hot to even sip on, and made in a peculiar molded plastic drip contraption of some utterly ordinary sort. I don’t expect much of it, and I’m considering walking down the corridor to the ice machine to cool it down more quickly, just because ice is readily available…and I really want a cup of coffee, without having to see any people, yet. lol

Air travel has some uncomfortable moments for me. It wasn’t the seating on the aircraft that was the problem. It wasn’t the line to go through security. It was just… all the people. By far too many. All talking. Many grousing about absolute bullshit (much as I am right now, but a lot less of me, and a whole lot more of them. lol) I’m just saying; it was a bit much. The roughest bit was the high-pitched, fast-paced, near-continuous, over-sharing, stream of consciousness from a very insecure-seeming young woman who latched onto anyone near her and just… downloaded. Total brain dump. Unfortunately, seated just behind me on the aircraft, after having to deal with the noise and overshare in the seating area at the gate as well. Loathsome creature. Oh, sure, just one of many human beings, and ordinary enough, I’m sure. Just… fuuuuuuuuck. I did not really need that.

Seated on the plane, I expected things would quiet down. The talking woman never stopped. There was that. A man in a seat ahead of me decided to occupy his time with video game. A combat first-person shooter. The entire flight. With the volume up, no head phones. (Seriously??) O…M…G… “Complimentary PITA” (pains in the ass) served generously.

…Earplugs for the win.

Getting to the hotel looked like the easy part. I had set my expectations too high, and further, made assumptions that were incorrect. I was nearly in tears by the time I located my ride-share driver (and I assure you, I had to find him, not the other way round), exhausted, cranky from traveling without being medicated (hard to find a smoking area, especially once I was cleared through security, and I was traveling without any cannabis on me), blood sugar low, ankle screaming at me to get off my feet… I was so relieved just to finally be in a car and headed to the hotel, I almost didn’t take a moment to appreciate that in spite of all the stressors, I never snarled at anyone, never actually wept, never broke down. 😀 I sat back in the seat, took a breath, and looked around…

…So this is Los Angeles, huh? It’s very… busy.

The hotel room is a hotel room. Clean. This one is even quiet. I even (mostly) slept through the night… sort of. Weird ambient light from smoke detectors and whatnot coming from different locations and angles relative to my sleeping self resulted in some restlessness. The bed is comfortable, the linens clean, but it feels unfamiliar, and sleep was difficult in spite of my fatigue. The nearest smoking area, where I can vape, is a long corridor away from the elevator, 3 floors down, and about half a city block walk from the front entrance of the hotel. lol I’ll get some exercise, just getting a quick vape. LOL I’m settled in for a couple days, though… and I’m reasonably comfortable. It’s enough.

I crashed early… then couldn’t sleep. I read awhile, until sleep caught up with me, and the alarm went off too soon. Suddenly, it’s time to begin again, there’s a day ahead of me, I’m surrounded by the vastness of busy-ness that Los Angeles… and… I guess all that’s quite okay. 🙂 All my temptingly ambitious plans about time between working hours have dissipated like dreams – I’ll be content to stay on top of my self-care, and enjoy my work gently. I hope to return home in good spirits, feeling well-cared-for and accomplished. Nothing fancy, nothing broken. 🙂

…I have yet to see the dawn. 🙂 It’s definitely time to begin again. 😀

Tags are you going my way?, be here now, be the change, begin again, breathe, emotional self sufficiency, flying, good self-care, I am my own cartographer, MBSR, meditation, OPD, people watching in airports, perspective, PITA, practicing the practices, ptsd, seriously please stop talking, shhh, taking care of me, TBI, The Art of Being, The Big 5, there are verbs involved, we become what we practice, what matters most?

Categories Anxiety, Brain Injury, Free Will, Frustration, gratitude, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, more than a little bit of bitching, pain, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Practices, Summer, The Art of Being, The Big 5

The Damage Is Done

September 9, 2019 //

For awhile now, I’ve just been sitting here, staring at my monitor. It’s not quite 3:30 a.m., now. My heart is still pounding, and my hands are trembling. There’s nothing actually wrong; I woke up triggered, around 2:50 a.m., and I’m fighting off both confusion (from being groggy) and panic. It’s not personal, and it’s unlikely that any detail of waking me into this state was intentional, at all. I’m awake, though, and sleep won’t return in the short time left before my alarm would go off, so… I’m beginning again, a bit early, is all.

“Purple Tiger” blooming on the deck. Life is filled with small delights.

…Just yesterday, I was relaxing and giving thought to how content I am, how lovely life is, how comfortable I feel in my own skin day-to-day, and how fortunate I am to have the healthy relationships that I do. The contrast with my internal state this morning is a useful reminder that emotional wellness is built over time, and that taking it for granted is not an ideal approach to maintaining it. The phrase “the damage is done” seems fitting here. I can heal a lot of chaos and damage, over time, and doing so is a pretty extraordinary quality of life improvement, in general. What I can’t do is change what I’ve been through, or eliminate the trauma in my history, and even now, sometimes it “comes back to me” in a problematic way. I still have disturbed sleep. I still have some uncomfortable moments. I still don’t “bounce back” as easily from some emotional experiences as someone else might. “Much improved” still doesn’t mean “forever and always symptom free”.

Early hints of autumn approaching have turned up in the garden.

What a great weekend; in spite of both my partner and I being in considerable pain, we had a great time together. A local power outage ended our evening, last night. It didn’t seem necessary to stay up until power came back on. Rather unfortunately, I went to bed without really considering which lights had been on, when the power went out. I woke abruptly to bright light (when the power came back on?), confused, startled, and frightened. My Traveling Partner was up, apparently trying to make sense of whatever mess the bed linens were in, also awakened by the return of power, but at the time I was trapped in my confusion, and still startled, and I felt “trapped” in the room, and my panic started to build, quickly. I was on my way to a serious over-reaction, and chose simply to go ahead and get up, instead, hoping that pushing myself through regular morning routines would soothe me quickly, and help to calm my nerves. I was not clear on what time it actually was, in that moment.

I started coffee and dressed myself, still sort of bumbling around clumsily, not yet fully awake or entirely calmed, and doing my best to stay focused and present in this “now” moment. My heart was still hammering away in my chest, and I was feeling short of breath. My partner approached me, and asked “aren’t you coming back to bed?” I felt my jaw clench and un-clench, working to shape words that fit. I tried “the way I woke up… I won’t go back to sleep, now”. I felt self-conscious, and dreading that anything I said could “make things worse” (What things? More chaos and damage – that hell was a long time ago, in a very different relationship.) I did what I could to explain that I woke triggered without placing any blame; my PTSD isn’t something my Traveling Partner caused, and there is no circumstance under which he would trigger my symptoms deliberately. Nothing personal in any of it. I felt tears start. Neither of us reacted to that; we’re experienced with emotionality as a shitty byproduct of my chaos and damage. I turned toward my studio. He went back to bed.

One of the most horrible things about PTSD is how often there is a negative consequence to people who love us, who didn’t do the damage that made us who we are, but so often find themselves paying a pretty high price to love us, anyway. Spectacularly unfair. I try to be considerate about that sort of thing, when I can hang on to the presence of mind it takes to do so. :-\

Meditation continues to be a key practice supporting my emotional wellness.

…It’s just two minutes shy of 4:00 a.m. now. I’m not shaking any more. My heart rate is back down to 62 bpm. My breathing feels relaxed. I feel calm. I could probably go back to sleep now, if I chose to… but the alarm would go off in 30 minutes, and I’d likely wake groggier and less well-rested feeling than I am now. I sip my coffee, and rub the sleep out of my eyes, and hope the day ahead is not an overly complicated one. I feel my anxiety surge in the background. Small things are likely to set me off today; it’ll need to be managed attentively, compassionately, and with a commitment to caring for myself skillfully. I breathe. Exhale. Relax. I set a couple reminders on my work calendar to take 10 minutes to meditate during the day. Each moment today may be a needed chance to begin again; that has to be okay with me, to really get this handled well. I feel my shoulders relax. “I’ve got this…” The reassurance swells from within myself, built on experience. That feels pretty good – solid, and reliable. Safe.

I give thought to my Traveling Partner, and hope that he has returned to a deep and untroubled sleep, and wakes well-rested. I finish my coffee, and prepare to face a new day. It’s a good time to begin again. 🙂

Tags be the change, begin again, being and becoming, breathe, choose wisely, emotional self sufficiency, experience, good self-care, I am my own cartographer, listening deeply, love, love and lovers, MBSR, meditation, mindfulness matters, p.s. I love you, perspective, please don't wake me with bright lights, practicing the practices, ptsd, relationships, sometimes I stumble, taking care of me, The Art of Being, The Big 5, the map is not the world, there are verbs involved, trauma history, we become what we practice, what matters most?

Categories Anxiety, Brain Injury, Free Will, gratitude, Healthy Living, Mindfulness, Moments, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Practices, Relationships, Sleepless Nights, Summer, The Art of Being, The Big 5

It’s a Catastrophe! (No, It’s a Trap)

August 29, 2019 //

Well, last night the guy repairing our A/C came by, fixed a thing, and wryly admitted that doing so hadn’t fixed the A/C. Something entirely else is wrong, and there are parts to be ordered, and it’s fucking hot, in the middle of summer, and uncomfortable as hell, and…

…And my Traveling Partner enjoyed the stifling hot uncomfortable evening in good company, together. It was fine. Hot, sure. Summer, definitely. We drank plenty of water. We stayed comfortable. I enjoyed a cool leisurely shower at some point. Later, I went to bed. It was hot. I still slept. As soon as the outside temperature was equal to, or less than, the inside temperature, we opened the windows to the breezes, and let the house cool down with the night temperatures.

I woke to the sound of rain, very audible through open windows. Lovely. The smell of petrichor quickly dissipated the last of the smell of burning electrical components of the A/C. The house is comfortably cool. I make a cup of tea and sit by the open door to the deck for some minutes, listening to the rain fall. I am thinking about how often what feels catastrophic in life is, after all the fuss and bother, really not that big a deal after all. 🙂

I listen to thunder in the distance, and the shhhhh-shhhhh of the earliest commuters heading down the rain-slick hill beyond my window. I consider how often a moment of patience, of non-attachment, of perspective, have preventing me (lately) from over-reacting to what seems catastrophic in some moment. It’s rarely helpful to treat some circumstance as catastrophic; so few really are. It’s a trap. Stuck in some past or future moment, we let our fear, or our anxiety, or our baggage, call the shots. It’s generally a poor choice.

We could have treated a failed A/C as a catastrophe (it isn’t). We could have bitched endlessly and ruined our shared good time together. We could have been nasty to the repair guy who showed up very late, and then “couldn’t even fix it”. We could have been sour with our landlord, who lives far away, and chose the repair guy based on cost and convenience to himself. Doing those things would not have fixed the A/C faster, and most definitely would have created problems in those helpful relationships. And…seriously? Are there not much more important things to be stressed or angry about than the damned weather, and an A/C failure in summertime? lol The entire fucking planet definitely needs us each to be our best selves – but that’s also a journey, and “the best I can do” right now, in this moment, is likely not the best you can do, or the best some repair guy can do, or the best someone else, over there, can do… we’re each having our own experience. We do well to do our best with each other, because we’re also all in this together. Less a contradiction, than something to meditate on. 😉

…So, we did our best to simply deal with the A/C failure, as we do with so many things that go wrong in small ways (which is most things, when they go wrong in some way), and this morning? The rain falls softly. The air is cool and fresh, and the day unlikely to be quite so hot. Good enough.

I sip my cup of tea, thinking about a friend in recovery. Life took a pleasant turn toward success and security for him, and… he relapsed. Fuck. Recovery is already hard without that. I find myself wondering if he knows to forgive himself? If he will remember to begin again, and simply go forward, counting his recovery time from a new date, or hell, even simply acknowledging that we fail, we fall, we stumble, we struggle – and it’s okay; we can get back up and start over. It’s a hard mile to walk. I wish there were anything at all I could do to make it easier for him. I reached out and let him know I’m still here if he needs to talk. I wonder if he understands? He’s taking steps. Even this mess doesn’t have to be catastrophic, but he’s blinded by his regret and shame, and weighed down by guilt and a sense of “letting people down”. Fuck that’s hard. I want to tell him to let it go, to trust that the rain will come, the wheel keeps turning, and this, too, shall pass.

(I hope you’re reading this one, that you get what I’m trying to tell you, and that you are okay. You can begin again.)

My morning started a bit early; the clock tells me it is time to get up. Well… sure…? lol I sip my tea content to be where I am in life, and present in this moment. This morning, after years of practice, years of new beginnings, years of “resetting the clock” and walking my own hard mile, it feels pretty easy, and very natural. It wasn’t an overnight transformation, although there were many epiphanies and “light-bulb moments” along the way – mostly, there was a lot of practice. I see on the calendar that I’ve got an appointment scheduled with my therapist; I scheduled it during a stressful time, shortly before my Mom died (was that really only a couple months ago?). I had to reschedule it, and there it sits on my calendar, in the middle of a week I’ll be out of town for work. lol I smile; rescheduling it doesn’t feel like a catastrophe, either. I don’t actually recall quite why I wanted it, from the vantage point of this rainy morning over a hot cup of tea. Progress. Incremental change over time.

I send my therapist a request to reschedule our appointment, finish my tea, and begin again. 😀

Tags AC isn't everything, be here now, be kind to yourself, be the change, begin again, being and becoming, breathe, catastrophe!, choose again, choose wisely, consistency instead of intensity, do over, emotional self sufficiency, experience, let it go and move on, MBSR, meditation, mindfulness matters, practicing the practices, recovering from failure, recovery failure, The Big 5 matters, the rain will come, the wheel keeps turning, there are verbs involved, this too shall pass, walking that hard mile

Categories anger, Anxiety, Brain Injury, forgiveness, Free Will, Frustration, gratitude, grief, Healthy Living, Love, Mindfulness, Moments, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Practices, Relationships, Summer, The Big 5

Nightmares and Crazy Dreams

August 22, 2019 //

Well. That was a night of something other than rest. lol Nightmares woke me around 2 am. It was almost three before sleep caught up with me again. My dreams, thankfully, shifted gears, but… the content was strange (very) and fantastical… something about a church service breaking out into a raucous, violent, drunken party in the basement of a building in which corporate performance reviews were about to be given out under (for some reason) strict secrecy. There were Leprechauns in attendance (whether they were party-goers or work colleagues wasn’t at all clear), and for some reason, the professional folks were all wearing pajamas, and big screen tvs were showing Saturday morning cartoons. Very odd. Let’s never discuss it again. LOL

…Being awake, sipping a hot cup of coffee, seems a relief, and a clear return to normalcy. 🙂 It’s enough. I yawn through these first sips of coffee, tired after the 3rd (4th?) consecutive night of fairly bad sleep. These things often go in cycles, so I refrain from taking it at all personally, and figure, more than likely, the rough sleep is due to the injured shoulder; it is a pain that is disrupting my sleep. I feel it every time I try to turn over, every time I lay on my right side, and my sleep ends up interrupted, restless, and not very deep. Lots of opportunity for dreams, and yes, nightmares. I remind myself that I already have a doctor’s appointment scheduled, and look at my calendar. It’s not on my calendar, so I look it up online, and add it – and invite “my work self”, so it’ll be on my calendar in the office also. 🙂

Nothing to see here – all routine human stuff, the business of living life. 🙂 I’m okay with “average”, “routine”, and “normal”, and drama is not welcome here…so… yeah. I get back to sipping coffee, and feeling this shoulder ache. lol

My thoughts careen through memories and random stream-of-consciousness weirdness for a time.

I breathe, exhale, relax, and sit present with the pain in my shoulder, and the tinnitus in my ears. It’s some time before I realize some of what I’m hearing is traffic beyond the window, and some of it is the fan on my computer. Another sip of coffee, contemplating the day ahead, gently (work has been intense, lately). The cup returns to the stone coaster on the desk with an unexpectedly loud clunk, and I shoot a suspicious look at cup, coaster, and fingers still wrapped through and around the white porcelain handle, motionless – as though freezing for a brief instant somehow mitigates the loud noise in the quiet room. LOL

…I wonder, for the first time, why the hell I am using a stone coaster with a porcelain coffee mug, early in the mornings, in a very quiet environment, when I am specifically cultivating the quiet? This seems an inexplicably counter-productive choice. Shouldn’t I be using a soft, silent, coaster, perhaps of cork… or… fake fur…with googly eyes? I quake silently with mirth at the mental image of a fake fur coaster. (Omg, I need more sleep. lol)

Something about the mirthful moment is a reminder of recent inspiration; my Traveling Partner shared something artistic (a painting technique), and I found it inspiring, fascinating, and potentially very suited to my artistic approach. I’m excited about the weekend to come; maybe I will spend some of it in the studio? The idea becomes a smile, another sip of coffee, and a moment – it almost becomes a plan. My eye roams the room… paint… glitter… glow in the dark… canvases… Yeah, I’m overdue to get some creative work done. I think I screwed myself attempted to exorcise the toxic demon that is an X of mine by way of paint on canvas; an individual so utterly vile, so irredeemably poisonous, that even finishing the representation was hard to approach, and the likeness sits unfinished on my easel, holding me back. Maybe I should “finish” it with some quick machete work, instead? The idea amuses me, maybe enough to finish it properly, let go, and really, finally, completely move on.

…It’s the forgiveness that’s hard, isn’t it? Once we have been wounded badly enough, deeply enough, damaged thoroughly enough, the forgiveness becomes… difficult. It’s hard to stay with the awareness that the forgiveness isn’t about the person who hurt us, not really, it’s about us, ourselves, letting go. Forgiveness doesn’t absolve someone of the wrongs they have done. It’s not an excuse, and does not condone bad behavior. From my perspective, the forgiveness simply allows us to move on, to admit to our pain, to refuse someone who has injured us any further opportunity to command our attention through their hurtful acts; we can walk on, and leave them to deal with their own pain, their own chaos and damage. Not my circus, not my monkeys. It’s a letting go that mitigates some of the damage, releases us from the powerful hold someone who has hurt us can maintain, and lets us get on with our own lives. There is no lasting requirement to see the forgiven one again, ever, or interact with them, or pretend we were not hurt, or to allow any further damage. I think what makes forgiveness hard is that it is clearly more kind, and more compassionate, than vengeance or punishment – but even though either of those (or both) may be entirely deserved, they do a lot of damage to the person needing to deliver them. It’s a bother, and a weird puzzle.

I can’t have vengeance, and I can’t punish that X, ever, enough to “make things right” – there is no amount of punishment available that could do that work. It is what it is. (Maybe we’re all someone’s villain?) Forgiveness tastes bitter in my mouth, like unripe fruit; I haven’t been ready. That portrait has mocked me, now, for months. That X does not “deserve” forgiveness… then I remember; my X may not “deserve” the relief that forgiveness may bring… but I do. 🙂 Forgiveness is for the one forgiving. Forgiveness allows us to walk on. I guess it’s time. After all, what are they to me, now? Nothing and no one; it’s time to let them go in a proper and final way. I’ll feel so much better – and I’ll finish that damned painting. LOL

I glance into my empty coffee mug. Obviously. It’s time to begin again. 🙂

Tags be love, be the change, being and becoming, emotional self sufficiency, fake fur and googly eyes, forgiveness, good self-care, I am my own cartographer, just breathe, love and lovers, meditation proven to work?, mindfulness matters, no possible vengeance, perspective, practicing the practices, ptsd, punishment, relationships, TBI, The Art of Being, The Big 5, the map is not the world, the nature of forgiveness, there are verbs involved, vengeance, walk on, walking my own path, we become what we practice, what matters most?

Categories anger, Anxiety, Brain Injury, forgiveness, Free Will, gratitude, inspiration, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, pain, Parables, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Practices, Relationships, Sleepless Nights, Summer, The Art of Being, The Big 5, women

A Slower Pace

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Complimentary PITA

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The Damage Is Done

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It’s a Catastrophe! (No, It’s a Trap)

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Nightmares and Crazy Dreams

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