Bipolar Check-in #86

I was gonna take a break but I think I’m just gonna try to be more mindful and use meditation and art and violin to cope with my anxiety

I feel better today but I'm tired despite sleeping well. My smaller pair of jeans now fit and this shirt I had that shrunk now fits. So my gastro diet and work outs are going well. I'm thinking of going to the store to try to get out of the house. I have therapy but not until this afternoon.

I slipped and fell really hard on ice today. All my body weight fell onto one knee when I landed. My knee hurts now and is swollen. All my groceries in the paper bag fell out because the bag ripped when I fell. Thankfully I had my backpack with me too though so I put them in there. All these construction guys were just standing near me watching me struggle to get up and get my stuff together

Did they ask if you were ok?

Nope they didn’t

That was rude.

Yeah I agree. I would ask is someone was okay if they slipped and fell in front of me

geez. id ask if someone was oka nd help them up if they wanted/needed it. sorr that happened to you

OMG, my washing machine flooded AGAIN. Water all of the garage rugs, into the kitchen, the dining room carpet, the den. I am so over it. We just got all the rugs dried out from the last time it flooded. The stupid machine is not sensing it has filled up and keeps filling and filling and won't stop until someone manually stops it, so water floods all over the top of the machine and EVERYWHERE.

work is slow. no group today and my 9:00 client no showed. i get off in 30 minutes. then i work 4 hours at practicum

been working on some homework due this weekend. i normally wouldnt do this at work but i literally have to if im gonna get it doen plus im all caught up calling referrals and everything.

Whew! Got some rag towels washed okay, but they have to wait to dry until my load of laundry is done. I still need them for the carpet. Everything is still very wet.

I slept decently but had a dream where I was driving my car crazy, trying to get away from a car chasing me, passing cars when oncoming traffic was too close, speeding, horns blaring, ugh! Very weird too because my car is a 2004 Subaru Forester, and let me tell you, they did not put very good acceleration into 2004 Foresters. It would never beat a car chasing it!

My power walk was a slog, I should have listened to my body and stopped sooner than I did. I'm awake mentally today but physically my body is blah. I am pretty sure it's hormones with my cycle as I often am very tired halfway through my cycle. I showered, started laundry, started reading with the SAD lamp when H noticed water all over the kitchen, dining room, den, garage, etc. from my F**King washing machine. I would NEVER wish this washing machine on anyone!

I thought I wasn't going to be up to drawing this morning, but I'm sort of feeling like it now, so maybe I'll sketch a little. Maybe redo the bird's nest; that was a pretty good picture for taking out aggression and being a bit worked up.

Welcome.

You now have over 6 posts so they should appear when you type then and not be delayed.

I drew a little only 2 pictures today after that washing machine drama. The panda turned out okay the other kind of blah (both in creative corner forum). I'm starting to think I may not be too bad at drawing bears as my polar bear also turned out pretty good.



Edited: I got to thinking...In the past if I'd had so many times of the washing machine flooding all over the place, I would have broken down into tears and been inconsolabe. But that hasn't happened these past few times. Don't get my wrong, I'm definitely NOT happy to have water all over the place and to own this particular washing machine, but it could be worse. It couldn't have been sewage water all over the place, and while my washing machine sucks, I do at least own a washing machine that works most days, and I don't have to spend hours at the laundromat, not to mention how expensive laudromats have gotten these days!

The SAD lamp along with the extra 50 mg Seroquel daily have helped me so, so much. I am really grateful for this wonderful period of stability, just knowing life can be okay and minor stresses don't cause me to lose it completely these days.

@JaneOnceMore - Thank you so much for your kind post. You too are awesome. I am very lucky right now to be stable. I'm glad to bring positive posts to the board even if sometimes I do become a bit of a mother hen. But I guess I'm getting to that age, approaching 50, will have a daughter grown up and turning 18 her next birthday (yikes!!).

@Blue_Bird - I am so sorry about your fall. It is awful those people watched and didn't offer to help you or check if you were all right. It really gets to me how impersonal the world has gotten. Though I did grow up in a very small town, most people knew everybody or at least knew someone related to everyone else, and it was always very friendly and neighborly. Now I live in a suburb where I only know my closest neighbors to wave to and maybe to bring over a piece of mail that accidently got delivere to my house. I've fallen before in the street and had cars just drive right by me, not checking if I was okay, which is a sad state.

Blueberry when I lived in Texas I had a washer dryer in my apartment. The last few months my washer wouldn’t fill with water! I had to use a bucket and fill it from the sink. What a pain. Ran all right and emptied the water and spun dried my clothes. Much better that water all over but it was a pain. A pain I’d like to have now. There’s no washer dryer hook up here just one laundry room with 4 washers and dryers. At first between 11:30am and noon was a great time to wash clothes. Now if always busy. I can’t find a quiet time! What a pain.

Blueberrybook, i noticed that about myself too, that i dont completely freak out like i used to! Maybe its not a real high bar, but hey a win is a win!

My GI was able to fit me in as an emergency this morning. Which is really rare for GI doctors. It was a different one in the practice. She says it seems like I have a textbook case of something called cyclic vomiting syndrome. Which is periods of throwing up, feeling well for awhile, and then getting sick again. A lot of different foods and emotions can trigger it. Plus it makes you ****in exhausted. She raised my stomach med and told me to start CoQ-10 and vitamin B. So I'm hoping these work. I read CoQ-10 helps with your energy levels.

@Blue_Bird:

That's really good of you. Your neighbor can still enjoy their cat without having to care for it while ill. You're a gem, Blue_Bird!

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Got 2.5 more hours of sleep, but had to resort to a PRN to do it. But it was getting to be an emergency, i tried to run meals around to my neighbors but i got all confused about their apartment numbers. I said, whoa, Jane, it is time to take a PRN, and get some emergency sleep.

I feel ever so much better! So that's a grand total of 5.5 hours of sleep today, which it grand according to what has been typical lately. Don't know where this ability for function (mostly) one three hours of sleep has come from. Used to sleep so much it was like short comas!

But i get so much more done. Like yesterday, i prepared for my friend's visit for lunch from 2:00am to 11:30am. Nine point five hours! I really put on a good show for her!

She said it was better service than in a fancy restaurant! High praise indeed! I guess i learned a thing or two dining in fancy restaurants all these years. Now i am able to replicate their service chez moi!

Note that if you want to respond to me, use the @Mention method, rather than requoting me, as i sometimes don't have time to scan the entire thread, try as i might.

Thank you @Blueberrybook for reminding me I put clothes in the dryer before I left this morning even if it wasn't your intent haha.

We got about 4-5" of snow and a glazing on top of it yesterday, WMUR has a nearby town as the "jackpot" of the storm out of the state at 5". Round two coming tomorrow night: 5-9" for most of the state as of what I saw last

I did an actual workout yesterday (in addition to shoveling--actually before shoveling so I'd have no excuses). 15 minutes of HIIT and I'm a little sore today. Today I want to do something, but I already finished shoveling (the plow didn't come until like 7pm and it's warm today so there was like a foot of wet snow at the end of the driveway and I had a bunch of ice to chop and shovel off while it's warm and easier around where I park). Think I'll do some vinyasa. I roughly planned out a book (well, I did for two but I think the first one really boils down to me complaining about my dad shytting in my room so probably not gonna go through with that ). So might work on that. Probably gonna read a couple chapters of my book too.


My therapist wants me to rate when I'm struggling on a scale of 1-5, 5 being hospital level, and to work on calling the emergency line if I'm at a 4+ and can't handle it well (and work on knowing I'm at a 4+ and can't handle it well).

I'm tired so I'm gonna go get working on at least laundry now. Hope everyone's rest of the day goes fine as pine.

Got the most kick-@$$ heater! It still rankles that i have to foot the bill for an external, portable heater, when i pay for heat from the building in my condo fees, but such is life in a small unit where the balcony doors have a chilling effect on almost all the full-length of the heating unit in the living room, and in living on the North side of the building, and getting virtually no direct sunlight.

So niiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiice to be toasty and warm! All that suffering, and a $90 tower heater cured it in a jiffy! I can afford a $90 investment in my well-being; in surviving the Canadian Winter in comfort! I like to be so warm i am sweating lightly. Or rather, GLOWING slightly, because women don't SWEAT! Men SWEAT, women GLOW! Have always liked being cozy indoors in Winter! My place is soooooooo much more comfortable!!!!!!!

The advantage of a Northern exposure it that colors are truer, which helped when i was doing color knitting. If i pick up sketching, and drawing with oil like @Blueberrybook recommends, it will come in handy there again too.

I always enjoyed art class in high school, and am a specialist in action-portraits. I liked water colors of flowers in French Immersion. Lastly, i liked multi-media in depictions of trauma in art therapy.

I'm tied up trying to learn to cook tho. That's my priority. Getting healthy, which may not include losing weight, as i am in menopause, and find it next to impossible to lose weight now. Also, i don't mind being fat so much anymore.

I'm not looking for a partner, and if a female friend would be so concerned about my weight that she would reject me for it, i don't want her friendship anyways, because that's shallow.

Also, i am more and more attracted to Middle-Eastern culture, and their loose flowing abayas are very flattering to me. I still have my pretty face, and lovely coloring, so being thin hardly matters to me anymore. Western women worry too much about their weight. Enjoy life, enjoy food, i say!

I cook to entertain my neighbors, too, who have helped me in the past, and it is my pleasure to have them over, and spoil them rotten. My mom was an exceptional hostess, so i am only being true to my roots! Feels great! Like i am paying an homage to my mom!

Drinking cola from my new stoneware mug, part of my new collection of high-end arty dishes, which have a contemporary Middle-Eastern vibe. Each plate, and bowl is a different riot of color. I think i already mentioned them, but i am just transifxed by them. I sent my sister, (who lives in another city), images of them, and she said, "Stunning! I loooooooooooove the vibrant colors!"

The utensils are these really unique iridescent purple-and-turquoise color, (i think i already said), but mention again because i am soooooooooo in enraptured with them! The are heavy-weight and really seem to be exceptionally good quality. I can't wait til my Family Day party on the 17th when i will showcase my new tableware!

The online shopping return guy came and i sent back all the stuff i ordered during a pressured-online-shopping-spree late one night. Some refunds are issued immediately, without waiting for the product return! Marvy! So glad to have that all off my hands, and survive that night's bad judgment unscathed.

It was just like i BORROWED all the merchandise! The return service didn't require any packaging or labels, and helped me get stuff off of high closet shelves that was to heavy for me, (i could get it up there, but couldn't get it down). Really good service, and the guys were totally pleasant and professional.

They were both Middle-Eastern looking. I find the Middle-Eastern men really treat a powerful women with respect. You definitely have to take charge with them, tho, but one the power dynamic is established, they fall all over themselves to help!

A good experience!

@JaneOnceMore - Glad you were able to return all that stuff! WTG for making the move to get rid of it while you can and get refunded. Do you think you could post a picture of your colorful dishes? I'd love to see what they look like!

@MuddyBoots:

That's so funny about one entirety of your novels being about your dad sshhiittiinngg in your room! I wrote a 17,000 page journal on computer over the last 25 years and a lot of it is about whether i had diarrhea or not, and how my dog's potty was! Hahaha!

It's for sharing once i pass. I've left instructions for my executor in my will. It's too personal to share while i am alive. Not the stuff about my dumps, but the stuff about my thoughts, and feelings. I value my privacy too highly.

Likewise, a piece of spoken word art i did in January. I don't feel comfortable sharing it while i am alive, and there might be legal repercussions as it's about my ex-husband. At any rate, he is wealthy, and it is unwise to attract his attention.

It's just for family, and friends right now, and i had a riot doing it. Love the creative process, but for the moment, i want to create in the kitchen, rather than on paper, canvas, sculpting, creative writing, etc.

Good on ya for being active with HIIT and shoveling snow. I find activity really promotes well-being. Good for you for working out the rating system from one to five to quantify your level of health. It's always helpful to quantify suffering. Hope it serves you well!

Is that a type of yoga you mentioned? It was a word that started with vee. Can't remember it exactly, but it's a word i've never encountered before, and i must know what it is. (I don't like to Google each and everything that is new to me, because i like to promote interactions with other humans, over interactions with computers.)

I think my shingles are actually crusting over and healing already. I'm grateful-- my pain has been very manageable. Knock on wood. Plus my boss is a complete fearmonger and doesnt want me around while I have it -- so I'm off work till Tuesday and I'm OK with that! I was going to ask for a break cause im burnt out, this just beat me to the punch.

[For the record, yes, shingles is contagious but not in the way he seems to think. People who have not been vaccinated for chickenpox or has not had chickenpox CAN get chickenpox from shingles. However, Shingles cannot cause shingles in someone else. that's not how your immune system works. In fact, there are some studies showing the development in shingles in younger people in the US may be because they arent exposed to the virus periodically and their immunity weakens. I do work with the public so it probably is better to just not be around them, to be fair though!]