Couch 215: The Overcoming Couch

CPS came over yesterday. The worker made everyone (my mom, dad, and me) to agree to be with my sister from 8am to 7pm everyday if she has any of the girls. I don't know how we're going to do it. My mom works 6 days a week, my dad can barely stay awake for 2 hours, and I'm at a limited mental capacity.

I know nothing about cat logic, but it strikes me that the lizards may be a gift.
Is there any way you could put a bell on her collar?

Quote of the day from PHP: "The mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell."

Profound thoughts in expression group.

Also, my work department's group text has been blowing up today. I'm ready to get back to work. I miss it, and I don't know that I'm getting as much out of PHP as I'd hoped. I feel like I'm on therapy overload. What is it called when a sponge can't absorb any more? That's what I'm feeling, between individual therapy, DBT group, and PHP for 5 hours a day.

That would be saturation point, Daisy.

My husband and I each have our own email account (I also have a work email), but my personal email is the one that we use most often for anything business/financially related. He rarely checks his own personal email and has a business email he only uses for business. We have separate social media accounts. We share a banking account.

My oldest son and his wife have a shared email for pretty much the same reasons. They only have one social media account - my son doesn't really do social media so it is really just hers. They share a bank account.

When my mother was alive, they had one email, one FB page, one banking account.

I think much depends on how people do their business. I rarely use email for anything personal like letters, etc. Neither does my husband, so it's not like there is anything much personal going on in our accounts. My son and his wife use their email the same way. My parents did a lot of personal correspondence via email in their later years, but they lived decades together before email was even a thing (well, now that I think about it, so did my husband and I). We come from a time of writing letters and putting them in the mailbox - our relationship with technology is probably a bit different. Our marriages are probably a bit different also - very much everything is shared and combined as was the norm and tradition. People just do things differently than what used to be.

As my husband and I are nudging closer to retirement, I'd say we are perhaps even more consolidated than before simply because the logistics of wills, living wills, possible medical powers of attorney, retirement accounts, life insurance policies, etc. is complicated enough - the more we can align, the easier it is to keep it all straight.

Hiking at a lake close to tonight’s campsite. I’m breaking in new Chacos so my feet hurt a bit but it was still nice.

It's perhaps because I'm in the UK, but I've never been certain of the difference between walking and hiking. Please can somebody explain?

Mileage may vary, but I think of a walk as on a simple path, whereas a hike is a walk through nature, either on a hiking trail or on no path at all.

Same here. In my area, I think of hiking as walking in the woods, though it could apply to, say, walking in a desert or something, too (no desert near me!) Though, I wouldn't think of taking a walk at the beach as a hike.

I am in the UK. I think a hike involves significant physical effort, like hill walking or walking long distances. By contrast, a walk describes me taking an indirect route (and thus kidding myself that I am all about the outdoor life) to the local shop to buy wine.

I've read how much of the work of therapy happens between sessions, where you process things and can have time to work through and practice what you've learned. Here, it's like no real time to process/practice. And your brain is likely getting overloaded.

I don't think it's too weird to have a shared email account for household admin - for receiving paperless statements, for example. However, I would think it was kind of weird to not also have individual email addresses - not in order to hide anything, but it just seems odd. I don't use email to communicate with personal contacts except if I need to forward a document or something. If I did, it would bother me that I couldn't reach out to someone without including their spouse on the email - just like it would bother me if I could only do a three way call or something.

No place to hang my hammock at the campsite but there’s a cushy part of ground to lay out a tarp and a sleeping bag. (When I worked at summer camp this was par for the course!) There’s also a nice fire pit and a little brook.

I’m also not sure where the line is between walking and hiking... I think the latter is longer and dirtier, mostly?

I think it is a walk unless you see a snake, a bear, a moose, or a monk.

I definitely disturbed at least one snake today.

I'm definitely super grateful to my T! I worried about her income and she said she's fine, and lightheartedly said she's not dying. That she has enough, and YES that she doesn't want me to go hungry just to afford therapy!

I asked her how I can show her care, because I love her and am so grateful and am concerned about her (she still sees me and other high risk patients face to face, the clinic got an exemption for that), she said the best thing I (and other clients) can do is take care of myself so she can worry less about how we are.

So is anyone doing video therapy now? I assume yes... but just curious

Yes, part of the time sessions are video. I hate it. I'd say 1 out of 3 sessions are remote.

LOL Yes anything in Tibet is a hike!

Eta - would yak have been funnier than monk? They are both k words. But monk could also imply adrian monk... it's a jungle out there!

Why do you hate it? I’ve been offered video therapy and I’m not sure how I feel about that.

Or Meteora.

Now that’s hiking, baby. (Unless you visit the one I think they still use baskets and winches to get up to.)

Today is sooo long. I cant wait til its dark and i can make preparations to go bed

Good lord.
And I don't know who adrian monk is. And the use of ....., or a monk would seem to take it out of being a proper name (...., or Monk) so I don't think it could imply a specific person named adrian monk.

Another day of feeling bad. I don't know if it's because of stress, my endo acting up or from SH. Still managed to write a paper today and do my discussion replies for my class. Met with the in home therapist today through Zoom and spent 90 minutes talking to him. He has the same name of my father who was abusive when I was younger, which I feel a little weird about, but not a big deal.

My mother sent a message relayed through my younger brother. I'm livid, furious, you name it, with her faux concern and fake care. She abused me for decades, and treated me like I'm invisible but now misses me and wants to keep in touch? She can go bleep off because every message from her makes me want to go No Contact for even longer.

I already told my younger brother twice that he doesn't have to relay messages and she can relay messages through my partner. But of course she refuses to do that. Just like how she refuses to seek therapy.

She just ruined my day and I lost all appetite for my lunch.