Couch 242: madam i'm adam

Yes you can - although not different other than time and temp -here are a couple of recipes
Crazy Good No-Knead Air Fryer Crusty Herb Bread In 1 Hour

Air Fryer No Knead Bread | Punchfork

There are a lot out there

(Yawn) my eyes are gettin' heavy even though I haven't done overtime for a few days - it'll take a few weeks of no OT before I normalize again I think. I'm gonna go take a hot shower then go to bed and watch TV til I fall asleep. I hope Mom reruns are on tonight. I just love that show, especially Bonnie's therapy sessions with Trevor. They play off each other so perfectly.

Mom disappeared from tv here, i really liked it.

The Real McCoys were on Sunday morning, i only caught a bit. I did watch the whole series a few years ago tho. It was a family favorite when i was growing up. All the cousins watched it. Same cousins that liked House! That uncle - their dad - was very strict and crabby. Like Dr House and Grampa McCoy...

Tonight im watching a confession on britbox with martin freeman (dr watson) and the goofy son from Doc Martin. Oh and imelda staunton. Love her!

Cool whip!

I'm here now, Lost! How are you doing?

Hi LT,

Thanks for speaking up.
In the noble tradition of 'Everything happens at once' and 'It never rains, it pours...' I'm feeling like crap, and I have just learned that one of my favourite mental health organisations is closing with immediate effect.

I thought something was wrong when they didn't send last week's Saturday email.

Hugs, Lost, I'm sorry.

Thanks, LT.

It's weird to feel so much about it, but I am definitely having the feelings.

Hugs, Lost.

Morning couch, just popped in for a minute, getting ready to go to h's liver study appt. not sure what else is on the agenda today, well except I have laundry to do of course. I'm bummed that I mixed up today's and tomorrow's appointment times so I could have still seen L this afternoon. Oh, well. I guess that's what I'm doing this afternoon - working on the homework I haven't finished yet. And we still have a little more to do on our taxes, we thought we were done but in the review thing at the end, some errors popped up (a couple of boxes that need numbers in them and we have no clue where to obtain said numbers) that we need to contact the turbo tax people for help with.

Happy Friday, couchies. Hugs and headnods all around as wanted/needed/appropriate.

Thanks for the hugs, Artie.

I hope H's appointment is useful, and not too problematic.

So the second memoir course I had been checking into, I emailed the woman who'd be doing the instruction about what I wanted to do with the memoir. She said, "Your project sounds fascinating!" So think I may need to work with her. It's through an Irish (I think?) publishing house.

That's always encouraging, LT!

I hope you find a course that's a good fit.

HUGS Lost!

My friend who has been away doing Emergency Management in the local mountains since 2/27/23 (since the mountains got a ton of snow in a very short amount of time) texted me today. I was disappointed because it was just IDK not as supportive as I would have wished for from someone who I feel is one of my closest friends. I know she has had a lot of her plate and I haven't really been texting her about my stuff much although she reads what I post in our Wednesday night group at Church and I have been opening up in there so she should have some idea what is going on. It was nice to hear from her but it's just reinforcing that feeling that no one really cares, even though I know it is a feeling, and that feelings lie and that I need to not believe it. It's just really hard when I keep seeing evidence to the contrary. However, despite all the disappointment and distress and everything that I have been feeling the past few days I am really proud of myself for not doing more SH because I really wanted to. But I abstained. I feel like I am at a breaking point though. I really want to isolate all weekend. Not go to Church or anything. I probably will still go to Church. Because I know that isolation really won't make me feel better. It just feels like it would feel better, y'know? And of course, work is slow today. Gives me way too much time to think. However, I am determined to wash my sheets this weekend. I think that will make me feel better. Fresh sheets. I might wash my comforter too, since Zoey, my beagle, sleeps with me. She likes to roll up in the comforter. And I need to sew up a few holes she has made in the comforter. She likes to bite things. I have mostly gotten her to stop biting me. Which is good because my arms were covered in bruises that I didn't make. So hopefully I can get her to stop chewing on the bedding. I already had to throw out some pillowcases.

Hugs, Kit. I hope washing and then sleeping in fresh bedding helps you feel at least a little better. Freshly washed bedding is always nice.

We're back from h's liver study appt, and running a few errands after. The appointment was uneventful, just the usual bloodwork/vitals, ekg, ultrasound, physical exam, a bunch of questions, and waiting in between each thing. Then he has to do his injection while they watch (silly since he does it every day at home, but whatev). He's been in the study for like 4 months now, has 8 months plus followup left.

That does sound encouraging LT, I hope you're able to do this one if it feels more like the right place for you.

Thanks, Artie! I went ahead and signed up for it just now. Dr. T made a good point today--that right now, I'm at the early point in working on this. And he sees how potentially, say, one student negatively critiquing me (the other one was a workshop) could lead me to just deciding to abandon it entirely.

I know I need a thicker skin with things like this, but I think he's right. At a further point along, like when I have more of a draft, or at least a good chunk of one, I think *that's* when I need the more direct, potentially harsh criticism. Though I'll get critique in this course.

My Therapist abruptly ended things with me today so needless to say I am feeling pretty sad.

I'm so sorry...they shouldn't be allowed to do that. Hugs, if wanted.

Well it wasn't her decision.

Today is the 8th year anniversary of ex-T abandoning me. And I'm feeling really good about ending it with my last letter. I feel no against or anxiety. No sadness. I feel relief.

I'm glad you're feeling good about it, Scarlet! It seems like you've made a lot of progress (in general, not just with that).

Hi Couch,

Anybody have any thoughts on how to balance caring about your work and caring about yourself a little better?

The past week has been weird, and really illuminated how I use work to avoid dealing with my emotional stuff.

Watching the week's work commitments disappear was a kind of torture, but it's made it abundantly clear that I need to redefine my relationship with rest.

Being freelance means that I don't really have a set end to my work day...and I'm always thinking about the next thing.

I'd be grateful for any thoughts you'd be open to sharing.

I'm currently thinking of quitting therapy with P, or maybe taking a pause, because it feels like I can't handle my feelings about him right now. This feeling of needing to be more than just therapist and client, however that looks, is overwhelming right now. Maybe friends, family, other. I don't know. But I've also been dealing with some things this year that are really hitting on some of my core issues in a way that I'm not dealing with very well and I don't know if this is a reaction to that.

I started seeing a dietician to get some extra support, and, wow, that's bringing up a lot for me. Stuff with my mother, the way my husband would name call and shame me for my weight and food, my self-loathing because of my weight. We've only met 3 times, but it's been triggering me. I brought up yesterday some of the abusive stuff with my ex, got triggered, dissociated and ended the session early. I felt like a failure because I ended it early. In one of my sessions with P, where I was talking through my feelings about continuing with her, he brought up how I tend to not give stuff a chance (DBT, medication) and quit and we had a mini rupture because he hit a nerve and I shut down and couldn't stop crying. I wasn't actually talking about quitting, I was just working through my feelings about continuing to go.

I've also recently discovered who my birth mother is through a DNA test and a lot of online sleuthing. I found that I have two half-sisters. Then I found them all on facebook and have now seen pictures. I don't know what to do with these feelings or this information. The pictures especially have been painful to look at. I feel like an outsider and I *am* an outsider. I don't belong and even though they don't know me, I feel rejected all over again. P is the only person I feel like I can talk to about any of this. I'm not ready to tell my mom yet.

I've been dealing with these feelings by avoiding and by emotionally eating. So, I don't know if my wanting to quit therapy is a reaction to all this. I know I should probably tell P these things, but I don't feel like I can bear telling him just how much I wish we were more right now. He knows, but he doesn't know the strength of my feelings. It feels so humiliating to admit how much I feel for him knowing that it can't be more and, even though it's not, it feels like yet another rejection that it can't. I don't know what to do with my feelings!