Couch 249: The Self Care Couch

Hugs, Lost.

I made blueberry muffins to take over to our friend's house for dinner this afternoon. I am having a relaxing birthday so far! 62 feels pretty darn good.

Happy Birthday, Artie!

So glad you're in the world.

Happy Birthday, Artie! Hope you have a good day.

Happy birthday @ArtieTheSequal !!

Hugs @LostOnTheTrail I really hope you feel better.

I am really upset at how much my thyroid is off according to my doctor. It explains why I am struggling so much with weight loss. Therapy was good on Tuesday, trying to work out the reason why I beat myself so much about my weight. I have serious dysmorphia issues.

Oh yeah happy birthday artie!

Born on the 4th of july!

Happy Birthday, Artie!

Hugs, Lost

Thanks for the birthday wishes y'all! It is being a nice quiet day. H's friend came over early this morning and they did some work in the backyard, friend went back home & H is resting now so I am playing on my computer.

Just got home from our friend's house. I drank a bit too much, we played a rousing game of Cards Against Humanity, and listened to music.

Sorry for being late to say “Happy Birthday “ ! Wishing you another year filled with joy, laughter, and lots of cake! 🎉🎂

I love that game. Only played it twice.

Perhaps drawing/ painting it out could help?

I’m genuinely happy for the first time in 2.5 months. Achieved a professional goal. Literally spent time after I came home dancing in my underwear at home.

It’s been a long 10 years. I love babies and children, but something tells me I’m supposed to be a gynaecologist.Anyway still have time to decide.

I’m 70% likely to do an unpaid trip overseas for 6 months. Other people are organising it, I just added my name. Current me wants to be an aid worker.

(The location is not an active war zone).

Going to get back to the gym as well. The depression coincides with stopping sessions, because I found it hard to keep up.

Perhaps you could reframe it. Now that you know about the levels, your medication can be adjusted to help you better. Have you also had a session with a nutritionist to help you come up with a plan specifically for you?

Lemon! Thanks for sharing your happiness and good news!

Glad to hear it, Lemon! And hope the trip works out.

Last night, I intended to just type up a couple notes of things to include in my memoir, but ended up with around 700 words! I'm trying to get back into the writing groove after being away from it for a couple months for assorted reasons.

I finally submitted the revision of one of my pieces (on ex-MC's wife's death) for the class I took in March last week (we had 6 months from start of class to submit it). Hoping I'll get feedback soon, but she's apparently running another class starting this weekend, so not sure if I'll have to wait till that's done?

The nice thing is, I apparently have access to all office hours (they're group meetings) of all instructors in this program going forward, so maybe I'll join the second one if I'm available (the first one in my course was 90% introductions, so it wasn't particularly useful).

Congratulations, LT!

I don't know how I'd feel about that definition of 'office hours'.
I've always thought of them as one-to-one meetings.

I'm curious as to whether you have the option of meeting with your tutor in that way as well?

Thanks, Lost! Unfortunately, I no longer have the option to meet with the tutor one-on-one, even if I pay. I was able to have one meeting with her the week after the course ended (for a small fee) and asked if I could continue to get any guidance from her, including paid. She said she doesn't do private consultations anymore and gave me the names of a couple other people (one seemed promising, but more for when I'm further along in my writing, like have a full memoir draft). I felt weirdly rejected.

The office hours thing seems a bit misnamed, as when I was in college/grad school, it was time when we could drop by or else schedule a meeting with a professor, one-on-one. But the "office hours" in this course are where the instructor posts a Zoom link, and anyone can join during that hour, so it's a group chat. We can ask questions, and I got to ask one or two in the one meeting. But it can be easy for someone to monopolize the time, too.

For what I paid for the course, I think I should have gotten more! I mean, I appreciated her feedback on my work, but...

I want to do some more work on my own, I think, then will see about someone who can work with me on a draft or maybe to provide a certain number of hours of guidance. There seem to be various options and models out there. I just want to keep working at it, but it can be difficult to stay motivated without, say, some sort of deadline, someone looking at my work, etc.