[Sunflower123]

It’s beautiful here too. It’s about 60F but feels hotter in the sun.

I get my 2nd dose tomorrow. Yay! That makes me feel better now that I’m going to PT. I have more than one family member who aren’t getting the vaccine. Smh.

I was tired and not feeling good yesterday. Slept around the clock. Feeling much better. Looking forward to Easter and celebrating my brother’s birthday. I’ll miss my daughter though. This is the first holiday we’ve not spent together in her lifetime. I’ll survive. I’m going to make a huge Easter basket to keep me occupied.

[Mountaindewed]

What a ****ing mess I’m in. We are waiting to hear back on our offer on the house. I had my Pdoc appointment. He’s raising my Xanax to 3 times a day. Whatever. But he told me the office is going back to in person sessions in 2 weeks. This just absolutely kills me. I’m not moving until the middle of may. I could have had several in person therapy sessions with my old T.

I am just downright devastated right now. I’ve been curled up in a ball on the recliner since my appointment ended.

But I’m also like “ok” and part of me doesn’t care and the going back and forth on these things is so emotional for me. I constantly change my mind about how I feel about everything I do. I don’t know if it’s an OCD thing or what but it’s so draining.

[Nammu]

Oh, it was so nice out for a March day. I did drag the Adirondack chairs out. With my dark clothes sitting in the sun was brilliantly warm. The breeze was a bit too much to read by tho. Great kite weather. Back in the day we made kites at school to fly for spring. Wonder what happened to that? Went the way of May Day I guess. But I did notice a few things sitting outside, the trees mostly have buds on them, the eagles are still around. I thought at first they were having fun in the air currents but I think they were hunting. Still no bunnies around. Before the eagles showed up last summer there were a lot of bunnies in the back yard. They must have moved over to the nature center where there’s more cover. Saw a couple silver birds, bony know what they could possibly be but they positively glittered in the sun. Then there was the flock of I think chickadees. I’m glad I took time out to see it all. I’m feeling very grateful right now.

[Soupe du jour]

Tomorrow I meet with a new psychiatrist for the first time. I haven't a clue what to expect. It's odd meeting new people wearing an N-95 mask. It's almost like they aren't fully meeting you. Anyway, I decided to do a mess load of "self-care". I doubt there will be any examination, besides a verbal one, but who knows. I was looking mighty bad! Bad! I then have a video appointment with my American psychiatrist, later in the week.

I'll attempt sleeping on the futon tonight. Hubby said he may even join me. I'm hoping not to have a painful back (or shoulder) tomorrow morning.

[Scooter9]

After a couple of months of strange and negative dreams, I had a positive dream last night!

The positive dream is a small thing but it was a positive start to my day, something I have not experienced in months.

[Mountaindewed]

Also I’m trying to figure out when to get my procedure on my chest done. I called the office and the doctor is out until next Monday. They are super booked until the middle of may. Plus they called it a surgery because I’ll be under general anesthesia again. This particular hospital intubates you with any surgery that requires general anesthesia. Which freaks me out a bit. I didn’t know it was so involved but I need to get it done. But since we are moving at that exact time my mom just has to figure out how to get it done. I’ll need a Covid test 3 days before and then do we stay in a hotel for a couple nights while I’m recovering and will he want to see me again in a week. Or what.

It has been one bad thing after another today. And everyone in my family is being affected by the stress of everything not just me.

[*Beth*]

Originally Posted by Nammu

Oh, it was so nice out for a March day. I did drag the Adirondack chairs out. With my dark clothes sitting in the sun was brilliantly warm. The breeze was a bit too much to read by tho. Great kite weather. Back in the day we made kites at school to fly for spring. Wonder what happened to that? Went the way of May Day I guess. But I did notice a few things sitting outside, the trees mostly have buds on them, the eagles are still around. I thought at first they were having fun in the air currents but I think they were hunting. Still no bunnies around. Before the eagles showed up last summer there were a lot of bunnies in the back yard. They must have moved over to the nature center where there’s more cover. Saw a couple silver birds, bony know what they could possibly be but they positively glittered in the sun. Then there was the flock of I think chickadees. I’m glad I took time out to see it all. I’m feeling very grateful right now.

That sounds lovely! When I was a child my older sister took me kite-flying every March. Also, my friends and I made kites. What fun that was! I haven't seen anyone fly a kite in many years, except at the beach. I guess kite flying isn't "tech" enough for kids. Too bad, really.

[*Beth*]

I'm waiting for a new vacuum to come. This time I bought the kind with a bag. I've had it with the "new and improved" bagless vacuums. They're a perpetually filthy mess. Sure wish I had my mom's old Electrolux!

Windy here today! This spring has been quite windy, in general. Not my favorite.

[Mountaindewed]

It looks like we got the house we all really wanted. They wanted a bit more money but it wasn’t a big deal. We can breathe a lot now but it’s still going to be a crazy next 6 weeks. But at least we got the house we wanted. I’ll have my own walk in closet and the shower has a shower curtain so I can get the Wild Thornberrys one with Nigel that I wanted.

[Moose72]

Originally Posted by Mountaindewed

It looks like we got the house we all really wanted. They wanted a bit more money but it wasn’t a big deal. We can breathe a lot now but it’s still going to be a crazy next 6 weeks. But at least we got the house we wanted. I’ll have my own walk in closet and the shower has a shower curtain so I can get the Wild Thornberrys one with Nigel that I wanted.

That's GREAT NEWS!! I'M SO HAPPY FOR YOU!

[Moose72]

I didn't do much today besides call the eye doctor about pricing colored contacts. I think I'm going to get green contacts- prescription- again. I had them maybe 15 years ago or more and everybody loved them on me! What with my auburn hair and all. I'd get people coming up to me asking "Are those your REAL EYES?!?!" Why no. No they're not. My other ones are in the shop!

My first night on 13mg of Valium (down from 20mg) went fine. I've found a nice quiet mall to have lunch at after joyriding the train. It has a soaring skylight over the food court. It was all lit up with sun today, the mall and the train. It was a good-looking day but too cold for comfort. But at least all our snow is gone after the rain! The ZOOM drop-in was good with us trying break-out rooms for the first time. It went well. I kidded with a young man about "Breaking Bad." I sure seem to get on well with the young men! I figured out another thing about ZOOM and my phone. Everyday i get better at it! Still no word from the weight loss clinic. Sigh! So hard to wait.

@BethRags: Yeah, it's really windy here too this Spring and i don't care for it either.

Hugs to all!

[Soupe du jour]

I slept on the futon last night, alone, but still woke up with the pain in my lower back. All these pains in recent weeks have been on the right side only. I don't know what to do. I still think the mattresses are at least partly to blame since when I get up the pain goes away and doesn't return until I sleep again. At least with this back or shoulder pain, I barely notice tingling in my hands anymore, an issue that my nephrologist blamed on my sleep position. Perhaps I need to lose the extra weight.

I made special Czech pancakes this morning. In recent months, it has been hard making a hot breakfast. Of course I screwed up the batter the first time around and had to dump it and start again. I almost cried.

[Soupe du jour]

Originally Posted by BethRags

I'm waiting for a new vacuum to come. This time I bought the kind with a bag. I've had it with the "new and improved" bagless vacuums. They're a perpetually filthy mess. Sure wish I had my mom's old Electrolux!

Windy here today! This spring has been quite windy, in general. Not my favorite.

It's apparently been ultra windy in New Jersey, too. My sister told me so, plus my husband still gets weather alerts from there even though we are in Europe. There's often downed trees and power lines.

I hope your new vacuum makes that task more pleasant.

[Soupe du jour]

whatever2013, I am happy you're doing great with the benzo reductions! It's also been nice reading about your efforts to seek out pleasant treats.

[Soupe du jour]

My husband joined me for my first appointment with a new psychiatrist here in Czech Republic. The pdoc was extremely nice and knowledgeable and asked great questions that seemed to help him understand my flavor of bipolar disorder, quickly and well. His English is excellent since he worked for a while in the UK. He seemed to take great notes, too. I'm actually quite relieved! He told me to always contact him any time I need to. In fact, that is something that many of his patients praised in the excellent reviews we saw for him. I did tell him that I'm a little sad leaving my psychiatrist of 13 years. He fully understood and said how difficult it was when he moved from Ostrava to Brno, and had to start over, leaving his old patients. Hubby read how his old patients expressed grief at that fact. This characteristic reminds me of my beloved American psychiatrist. It would suck to have to go to an uncaring doctor who rushes patients out.

I talk to my American psychiatrist by video session this Thursday. I will tell him that I saw this new Czech psychiatrist. I'm not sure that this next appointment will be my last with him, or if one after will be. The new psychiatrist did not change any of my medications. He did give me a prescription for one that I was running low on. Since I do not quite yet have public insurance set up in my new country, I had to pay 100% for both the introduction session and the prescription refill for quetiapine ER (generic Seroquel XR). The full 100% fee for the 40 to 50 minutes with the psychiatrist was 1,500 czk (that's about $67 US). I'm not even sure how much the quetiapine was 100% because we bought some OTC Vitamin A and OTC B-Complex with it. The total pharmacy bill for the vitamins and quetiapine ER was about 550 czk ($24 US). I assume the quetiapine ER cost less than $20. Again 100% patient pay. Once I have public insurance, the prescription med copays will likely be 0 czk or almost 0. Apparently future appointments with the psychiatrist will be quicker medication checks. He charges 500 czk ($22 US) for them. Again, once I have insurance, they will be 0 czk ($0). If anyone in the US is jealous, it's time to write your congress people.

[*Beth*]

Originally Posted by Mountaindewed

It looks like we got the house we all really wanted. They wanted a bit more money but it wasn’t a big deal. We can breathe a lot now but it’s still going to be a crazy next 6 weeks. But at least we got the house we wanted. I’ll have my own walk in closet and the shower has a shower curtain so I can get the Wild Thornberrys one with Nigel that I wanted.

Congratulations! How exciting!!

[*Beth*]

Crazy windy! Almost no doubt that there will be downed trees, especially because we haven't had enough rain to soak the earth.

On today's agenda: vacuuming with my new, cute little canister vac! Oh, yeah- and a pdoc appointment.

Hugs all around

[buddha1too]

Originally Posted by Soupe du jour

The full 100% fee for the 40 to 50 minutes with the psychiatrist was 1,500 czk (that's about $67 US). I'm not even sure how much the quetiapine was 100% because we bought some OTC Vitamin A and OTC B-Complex with it. The total pharmacy bill for the vitamins and quetiapine ER was about 550 czk ($24 US). I assume the quetiapine ER cost less than $20. Again 100% patient pay. Once I have public insurance, the prescription med copays will likely be 0 czk or almost 0. Apparently future appointments with the psychiatrist will be quicker medication checks. He charges 500 czk ($22 US) for them. Again, once I have insurance, they will be 0 czk ($0). If anyone in the US is jealous, it's time to write your congress people.

I'm glad your appointment went so well. It's comforting to know you have a safety net in place. My partner sometimes talks about moving to be closer to her family, but the thought of leaving my mental health providers is a great concern

Even without insurance you got a bargain! Because of powerful lobbyists & politicians (who know better) using the terms "communist" & "socialist" as rhetoric to scare the under-educated, I'm not sure writing Congress will do any good. Oh, to be young & idealistic again!

Lately I've been watching quite a few YouTube documentaries about homelessness & incarceration, especially as they relate to mental illness (I'm a lot of fun at parties!). It's so easy for people to fall through the cracks of the mental health system in the USA. As a young man, I was involuntarily commited to one of those huge, old state hospitals, so I'm certainly not suggesting we bring those back. There's got to be a better system for "tweeners," though...for folks who fall between being poor enough to get assistance through community mental health agencies, & those who have or can afford health insurance. When people get in bad spaces, they're generally not capable of advocating on their own behalf. We have a sad & (IMO) selfish system here in the States.

I'd be curious to hear about the experiences of Canadians & folks in the UK or elsewhere in Europe.

[Nammu]

Buddha when I was a community college tutor I took classes and I did a huge report on community mental health. Political influences and the mindset of not in my neighborhood really cut the foundation of what was planned to replace the state hospitals. I too was committed to two of them and they were bad. There was a very idealistic plan, very much like socialized medicine but politics and fear got in the way and monies disappeared and these communities never happened. So the closed many state hospitals and nothing replaced them. So jails took over.. ( yeah I’m a lot of fun at parties too! ). These neighborhood communities were first planed in the 50-and 60’s under jfk administration but it’s all on paper. Never had a chance. Where I live there’s two small departments for ip many people are driven by police to out of state hospitals for ip. And of course there’s no follow up when they get out and go home. It’s a mess. For 5 counties they are building a mental health ip but they are building it not central to the counties but in the biggest most populous city that will probably use up all the beds and it will be a headache for travel for the others rural.

I’ll stop now, I could go on and on about this

[Mountaindewed]

I “saw” my therapist today. She is so nice and so knowledgeable and shows emotion. I explained to her about what happened yesterday with the Pdoc and them returning to in person sessions. She seemed to think the sudden news, because I didn’t know anything before Pdoc told me, and the sudden change in things threw me off and it was like sensory overload almost. But she was super nice and understanding. I mentioned having transference with the old t and that was one of the reasons I wanted to stop seeing her. My new therapist said “so you wanted her to be your girlfriend?” And I said “I just had a crush on her” and she said “she must have been pretty.” Then we discussed that hopefully there won’t be transference between the two of us and we laughed about the age difference and that she’s old enough to be my mom. I mentioned the cosmic brownies I like so much because they are dense. She mentioned this really dense bread called eskiel bread and thought I’d like it because it’s really dense too. I am going to go to the store to get some. I talked about old T but I was adamant that I liked working with new T and thought she was really nice. She said the same thing to me.

But now that I have a good client/therapist relationship with my new T and we got the house we wanted, I feel pretty good right now. The doctor called in my Xanax so I now take 1mil 3 times a day. And it’s a 3 month supply and 270 Xanax didn’t cost me anything. So hopefully my anxiety stays under control now.

[Moose72]

Someone trashed the laundry room in my building! Mud all over the floor wet/drying clothes in a basket on the floor, one broken washing machine and two that are full of wet clothes and are finished running. Two of the three dryers are full and finished. And its been this way all day! I checked at 9 a.m. to do laundry and found it this way. I left home around 2:45 p.m. today and it was exactly the same. I called the office and reported this. I got an email saying it has been fixed now. Doubt anyone has cleared the clothes away. The person in the office that I talked with said she'd send out an email to everybody in my building. That might work if the culprit actually lives in this part of the building. Could be people from outside the complex!

Rant off.

I have just done nothing today but get gas in the car and now I'm at my mom's place and doing laundry here. I wouldn't have called had this not happened many times before- leaving their laundry in the machines all day.

I texted the radio station I listen to to enter a competition to win $1400. They never called me. Lol.

Thursday (day after tomorrow) I go to the eye doctor! I'm so excited! I hope I answer the questions right! Lol Reminds me of a comedienne who said she'd dated an optometrist who was no fun in bed - he kept asking "Better like this or better like this?" Hahaha....

[BeyondtheRainbow]

Originally Posted by Moose72

Someone trashed the laundry room in my building! Mud all over the floor wet/drying clothes in a basket on the floor, one broken washing machine and two that are full of wet clothes and are finished running. Two of the three dryers are full and finished. And its been this way all day!

Apartment laundry is the worst. When I lived in an apartment once someone had left their clothes in the machines for hours so I finally put the clothes in the dryer (without running it) and ran mine through. I came back and they had put some of my clothes in the trash and stolen the rest, including my favorite shirt.

After that I went to a laundromat or went to my mom's if I wasn't on call. I was a little afraid that someone could be so rageful over something that seemed like no big deal to me. If I left my clothes in the machine for hours I would expect someone to move the clothes. there were only 4 or 5 machines for the whole complex which wasn't small.

[Moose72]

Originally Posted by BeyondtheRainbow

Apartment laundry is the worst. When I lived in an apartment once someone had left their clothes in the machines for hours so I finally put the clothes in the dryer (without running it) and ran mine through. I came back and they had put some of my clothes in the trash and stolen the rest, including my favorite shirt.

After that I went to a laundromat or went to my mom's if I wasn't on call. I was a little afraid that someone could be so rageful over something that seemed like no big deal to me. If I left my clothes in the machine for hours I would expect someone to move the clothes. there were only 4 or 5 machines for the whole complex which wasn't small.

That's why I don't move people's laundry but other people do and then it sits out and dries half way and all the wrinkles and possible mildew. We have three washers (one is unplugged because its broken) and three dryers for each building- I think. I set a timer when I do laundry- 28 minutes per wash and 60 minutes per dry. I go get my laundry to change it over or take it back up when the timer on my phone goes off. Mostly this is to save me time but its also nice to the other tenants. My friend tells a story of public laundry and her washed clothes got put on the floor so she put a snickers bar in that person's dryer! I think she should've been there to get her laundry out.

[*Beth*]

Good optometrist joke

That seriously sucks about your laundry room! The manager where I live is a fanatic about people not leaving their clothes in the washers or dryers. There are only 2 dryers for 29 units. Ridiculous. So if someone leaves their clothing in the dryer long after it's finished and I need to use it I pull their clothes out and put them in their basket.