Lizard Queen

3 minutes ago, HoodedCrow said:

That question is so rude. You can prove that you are not” on the spectrum” by telling them to go fiddle themselves and use a finely modulated and emotional tone. If you can use a metaphor and pronouns that would help:)

It's alright, I know she meant no harm  It did have relevance to what we were discussing and I don't think she realized the suggestion was going to rattle me because of the sort of stuff we talk about already (this part of the family is pretty open about personal mental health stuff) and how she knows me. 

Also, she's not my therapist -- we're related by marriage and she is a therapist professionally.

A therapist relative told me she thinks I'm on the spectrum, and the suggestion left me feeling shocked for a couple of hours. It did have bearing on the topic at hand between us, and we're pretty open about and accepting of mental health stuff in this family, so I don't think she guessed such a suggestion would unnerve me. I didn't inquire at the time as to why she thought that because of my shock, but I'd like to ask later.

How do we put stuff in the hide-y boxes?

(Vent, not sure I want to discuss the topic)

On 4/4/2021 at 11:44 AM, dog-days said:

I hope things are going a bit better at the moment, LizardQueen. 

[more venting]

  Hide contents

 

It was a beautiful day here; yesterday I went for my first proper cycle ride of the year - maybe twenty miles or so along the local canal. I was starting to get my anxiety under control, was eating healthily, and was feeling for the first time in quite a while a tiny bit optimistic about the future. 

Anyway, idiot that I am, I managed to make a mess of a potentially really good day by eating a piece of hot toast too fast and giving myself a blood blister. That sounds ridiculously trivial, and it is,  but at the same time it's pretty unpleasant and alarming if you live alone, you haven't had one before and don't know what it is. I noticed that there was a bump on the left side of my palate, and couldn't work out what it was. It started to get more swollen, and I, being me, began to panic and wonder if I was having some sort of severe allergic reaction to something, and was trying to make emergency plans to deal with that - how long would I have? When should I call 999?

 I went and sat down for a while because my breathing was getting out of control, but after a few minutes made it downstairs and looked in the bathroom mirror - I found that the entire top of my mouth was covered in blood. Everything tasted of iron, my mouth still felt swollen, and though I washed out my mouth with water several times, more blood kept coming. 

Anyway, some careful Googling informed me that what I had was most likely a blood blister. Checks every few minutes reassured me that the blood was clotting. After practising mandolin for a while, I went for a two hour walk. I was shaky to start with, but by the end my breathing was mostly back to normal. I still feel weak and headachy, most likely as a result of the panic earlier. 

I went to the doctor a few weeks ago with swollen lymph nodes; she gave me a blood test which didn't show anything, so she just told me to keep an eye on them and get back in touch if they get any bigger. So, anyway, March was health anxiety central for me; I was just starting to relax and get a grip, when this stupid accident comes along and sets me back.  

 

BTW, does anyone know how to hide text without using spoiler tags? I've tried using [hide]artichokes[/hide] but it's not getting me anywhere. 

Thank you for your well-wish :). (I didn't realize you'd sent it, so now I've responded "late")

Sounds like you're doing good work on anxiety and it's been better lately for it . Hopefully a health scare that turned out to be an non-serious wound can help you feel more optimistic if you go through any sort of similar incident in the future? 

--------------------------------

[Vent]

I've felt weird since yesterday. I have two school tests this coming week. A friend of mine has had breathing problems for months and has slept a ton this week after getting sick with what seemed like some bacterial or viral infection. No diagnosis has come up yet for the breathing issues, but their recent bout of sickness I think just simply worried me more than I probably would have been given the breathing issues and feeling a little more stressed than usual anyway. The friend also had cancer in the past (which was part of my worry), but it sounds like that's not the probable cause of their breathing difficulties from what they explained of their diagnostic tests so far when I asked today...

23 hours ago, Toth said:

That's... that's written with couples in mind, huh? I must say I squinted quite hard at the checklist. I am already extremely self-reflecting to the point of defeatism, so I don't see how being aware of my emotions isn't going to make things much worse because I am painfully aware of my feelings and where they are coming from.

It works for individuals too .

Well, as I've understood it -- identifying your emotions in a detached way (such as with "this is sadness" or "I am experiencing fear and worry", instead of just going with the emotional flow or personally identifying with it (for example, "I am sad")) helps you to put your head over the water when you're emotional. You won't be as caught up in your feelings and whatever they are compelling you to think and feel. The article author exemplified this when she wrote about keeping a centered/healthy detachment from her emotions while her husband was seriously ill -- she told herself "I know that I am experiencing anxiety and fear right now and I don’t know what will happen, but I am going to just ‘be’ with it.” She was able to avoid going into some painful, counterproductive thought processes as a result.

This detachment should dull the pain of whatever you're going through, and ground you a bit more. Well, perhaps to the contrary in some cases, you might become more emotional after identifying and acknowledging an emotion because you hadn't allowed yourself to feel it beforehand (you might have been blocking it out, whether you meant to or not). That's still good -- that means you are now letting that emotion out to run its course. That's what the acknowledging and accepting part is about -- just letting yourself process your feelings so they can leave your system. The detachment piece helps you to keep aware that you're just experiencing an emotion, and it's not going to last forever and the nasty things it could be telling you aren't necessarily true. 

On 1/14/2021 at 6:26 AM, HoodedCrow said:

Lizard Queen has some good tips, Toth. 
There are a lot of ways to deal with anxiety, so I would try to find a couple of techniques that work for you. There are auditory, visual and kinesthetic methods, but generally, pick a few, ( some of them take a few seconds) and test them out on a non lesson plan day. Practice them often and it will reduce overall anxiety. Labeling. sensing, tracking your emotions in a neutral way would help. The Rumi poem about the guesthouse can be helpful. Is there sadness, fear, anger, hope, hope?

Here are some methods, breathing with a long slow out breath can stimulate a relaxation response. Orienting by slowly naming objects in your environment helps( I believe that it changes ones focus from ones own disturbing thoughts and feelings without blocking them entirely) . Doing even one yoga pose can help, as long as it’s not too difficult. Tai Chi is great but there is a learning curve. Ordinary exercises like a runners stretch might help. Mindful walking is neat, but just interrupting your thought with some exercise or body attention can be grounding. Some animals “ shake it off” . Really. There is writing about how animals shake after trauma to reset themselves.
Listening to music that matches your mood can give you a sense of attunement. Play angsty music and as your mood changes, be willing to listen to something else. Moods always change, even a little. 
Images can help, if something comes to mind. Letting air out of a tire, is an example.

Here is something that works for me. Try a relaxation technique in the morning, find some tiny ones to use as needed. Write a “to do list” which includes some easy things that you would do anyway. You might think of some self care things. Cross them off as you finish. If you did anything towards that goal give yourself a checkmark. Think” progress not perfection”. 

if you have any notion of something greater than yourself, it is time to employ that. It can be as logical as recognizing the Fabric of Space/Time. I believe it relieves negative rumination.

There is an idea about using your positive qualities( I would give you a lot of credit for creating lesson plans on an off day.) Use reinforcers...on yourself! You know yourself best.

When you are feeling up to it, you may want to come up with a plan and problem solve with your mom, so you won’t be interrupted. No rush. We can’t control what other people do, but there are usually steps to be taken. Non violent communication skills are tricky but worth learning. I can’t do this well, but it helps!

If you are too jacked up, strategies may not work well that day. That feeling of  helplessness is frightening all by itself.  No one needs a specific reason for anxiety these days. There is a lot of global and personal threat to get through. I wish you well:)

Thanks  (this is the article I followed, if anyone is interested: https://www.gottman.com/blog/6stepstomindfullydealwithdifficultemotions/)

And thanks for your own tips (they were directed at Toth, but of course anyone could use them)!

I feel like talking about how I let out a lot of emotions to process them a few days ago, but the whole thing sounds weird . I think I'd unintentionally bottled up many emotions over something that's played out over a few months, and I'd also been upset on and off about something that happened on NYE that is connected to it. I had a moment a few days ago where I just felt emotional and tried to deal with it in a different way than how I had been. I Googled about emotional detachment because it was a technique that had been helpful for me in the past to process emotions. Found an article on "dealing with difficult emotions" that ended up being very helpful. As to detachment, it suggested saying something like "this is [emotion]" as you otherwise let yourself emote. I followed the other suggested steps (I did cry). I felt better afterwards, and didn't realize I still had pain over some of the things I emoted. I'm not really upset about the NYE thing anymore, and it hasn't pained me to think about some of the things I was sad about (with/without realizing it) from months ago. Well, I felt angry about the latter drawn out situation over the past few days, but I think that was probably healthy and normal as I move on...

I believe I've been hormonal -- I'm feeling sad right now after feeling mad almost all day. Earlier I was alternating between feeling like being alone and then feeling needy, hahaha (that's a new one). 

I've had a drawn out drama with a now exfriend since we quit being friends in September. I won't go over the details (well, not all, ha)... He sent me a text a few days before Thanksgiving where he called me "loco" for no reason apparent to me. It was harsh and kind of out of the blue. I blocked him after that. We have mutual friends and we all talk as a group over WhatsApp and do stuff together (of course). So it worried me that he seemed to harbor acrimonious feelings towards me since I can't avoid him. It also wasn't helpful for my moving on process to see messages from him to our other friends all the time, and stuff he was doing with some of them that I would have been invited to previously...

I happened to find an automatically rejected phone call record in my phone's call history around the middle of Dec. He called again (to no avail because of the block) the day after Christmas when I was talking to a couple of our friends in our shared WhatsApp group. He left a nice reply to a NYE gif I posted today. I think he feels guilty about being nasty to me.

Maybe I won't bother talking about many situational details. I was mostly over the friendship loss by late October or early November. But events last night left me feeling upset about this crap again. Basically, I think I just feel like he left me (as a friend).

Some of the things he did or said after our friendship loss were just nasty and uncalled for. Even emotionally manipulative (like when he told me I'd been "bat shit crazy" and said he thought I was "loco"). I really never did anything to hurt him. I always just wanted peace and for us to be respectful. I've felt mad about the disrespect again today.

I don't like him now. I don't plan on talking to him over the phone about whatever he was going to say. Frankly I don't care about the apology I think he wants to give. I also don't care to discuss what's happened between us. I'm also partly worried the discussion would backfire like our other "discussions" did. I'm tired of drama, and I think it's understandable for me to bypass talking to him given how he's spoken to me in very inappropriate ways that upset me. I did block him for my mental well-being. I just want him to not bother me again, which I don't think he will at this point.

The semester is officially over for me. My time of the month started again two weeks to the day of the last one's start and I think I have a cold. I didn't feel that stressed though!

I got tired of working in my room, and I think my mind had a hard time not associating it with "off the clock" so I just wouldn't stay on task well in there. The small change that was moving to the living room seems to have made a world of difference, ha . I've never hanged out in here much, so maybe that was why I came to view it as a place to work (and switch into the according mindset) pretty easily. 

I bought a stationary bike desk weeks before quarantine began where I live (I had no idea quarantine was coming at the time). I've been using it a lot again. I just don't get as sleepy using it like I do if I'm just sitting, and it obviously allows me to conveniently exercise, so that makes me happy.

I'm still having motivational troubles, but these small changes seemed to have been very helpful... And that makes my spirits better. 

Long vent... Are there spoiler boxes ? 

Edit: Yes there are!

I feel like I'm struggling to feel a comfortable sense of normalcy lately. As in, I just tend to feel weird and un-anchored to anything. I feel like any new changes somewhat perturb me easily, and I'm a more go-with-the-flow sort who generally adjusts to changes well. My roommate's new boyfriend physically spent about the half the week in here for about two weeks in a row and it got to me (lol). I complained, and while I didn't mean I wanted him to never return, she's not had him back here since. I made a new friend and the sudden daily conversations with them made me feel weird. I tried online dating again but pretty much quit a week into it for feeling weird. But I've felt weird even when nothing new was happening too at times, or that I noticed anyway. 

I think lot of this might have to do with the fact that I'm back in school when I definitely spent most my life up to this point in school. My college years had the same basic routine -- worked nearly full-time, and mostly in person, full-time classes. Now I do online classes, I'm not working, and I'm at home most the time. I think going back to something that was very normal for me in such a different way is probably what's causing me to feel strange. I also lost that other friend very early on at the start of school.

In other vents, I keep struggling with self-motivation at home...

I've been much more social in recent years (well, not really during the pandemic, obviously) since I've overcome much of my shyness. I see people as being more screwed up than I used to. That sounds disparaging, but I don't mean that way. I think people have their own wonderful traits too. I also think many of our good and bad tendencies come from the same places within us. Everyone's flawed and damaged though -- I don't think that's an issue if you're holding your own and treating other people with dignity. I had low self-esteem and was intimidated by other people. Seeing other people as being much more flawed than I used to has been comforting over disappointing (for the aforementioned reasons). At this point, I feel like I'm about as perfect/imperfect as the next guy, so there's no reason to worry about myself.

Quarantine wasn't too bad for me at the start. I lost a friendship early in September and it's been surprisingly emotional for me (which I'm not ashamed of or anything). I've been on this sort of emotional roller coaster ride since it happened, though I think it's more or less done now. But I'm sure the stress added from covid is just making sad occurrences and situations in our lives more difficult to (respectively) bounce back from or tolerate...

I would give it a 7. I think the show's quality has been on the decline since they've been off-road from the books (in terms of how overall entertaining it is), so I didn't have high hopes for this episode. But, I was pleasantly surprised -- I felt there was more character development in this episode, at least for a couple of characters.