Checking in

I took some time today to look at what the cause of the major anxiety I've been feeling of late is.  I found a few things there...  The first is that the incident at work yesterday has been building for awhile.  I can see now that I've been feeling uneasy about the person for some time now, well since this project started, and this has been showing up as anxiety.  Just this realization by itself makes me feel a lot calmer.  Anxiety for me is really an indication that something isn't right in my world somehow.

The other major thing I found is that I still have a high tolerance for anxiety, meaning that I can ignore it for a long time.  Getting to the point I was on Monday where it threatens to be full-on panic doesn't happen all at once.  It builds up over time.  As I ignore it, it gets worse.  This can be said of other emotions as well.  I am getting better at seeing myself, paying attention to what I feel and knowing what I want.  But, I still have an ability to avoid it for quite some mine.  For me this needs I need to check-in with myself more often.  This is a hard thing to think about.

I need to look at what is going on with me more intentionally.  I suspect that the more I do this intentionally, the easier and more natural it will become.  For now, discipline.  Anyone want to help me with this?

A big test

Today was a bad day.  It started out with some anxiety hang-over from yesterday.  I woke up and thought I should roll over and stay in bed.  But, I had a presentation to give today at work so I got up and went.  And then it got worse.  And incident happened with a co-worker that ended up with me crying I was so upset.  Upset at feeling blamed for what I views as either a miscommunication or the co-workers mistake.  Upset because my co-worker wouldn't stop.  Upset because I'm pretty sure that he/she already had come to a conclusion and it didn't matter what I was going to say or do, that conclusion wasn't going to change.

And yet, on some level I feel proud of myself.  I stood up for myself and told this person that their assumptions were incorrect.  I stood up and said it was unfair to blame me for the situation and I was doing exactly what I thought was appropriate in the situation, and the same thing I have done many times before in the same situation. I didn't let the person push me around.  I didn't take the crap and internalize it.  I still firmly believe that I didn't do anything wrong and there was absolutely no reason for the reaction.

There have been many times in my life where people have done this to me and for a lot of those times I just took it.  I took the blame and internalized it, and then put on the face that nothing was wrong.  This only gave those people permission to keep going and keep doing it.  It also allowed them to start to believe that I should be blamed for things, even when that was unfair.

In this situation, as hard as it is, I am doing things differently.  I stood up for myself.  Frankly even crying, as much as I hated doing it at work, showed the person that they had upset me and their actions were not ok.  I also talked to a co-worker and my boss about what to do, instead of just taking it and walking away.  These things are positive signs for me.  In fact, the mere fact that I was crying is a good sign.  I was letting myself feel something.  I was letting myself react to the situation, I was letting myself be connected to my life.  I think my reaction was at the appropriate level for what happened and a normal reaction to the situation.  As much as it sucked and was hard, it is progress.

This story is not over.  I am not sure how it will play out, but I refuse to put up with this this time.  I like my job and I will not let this person screw that up for me.

Anxiety rising

I feel the anxiety rising today.  I am irritable and my mind won't stop spinning in circles.  This could easily be the precursor to a full on panic attack.  I am not too sure what is causing this.  Not every day is good.  Sometimes there are what feel like set-backs. Today feels like one of those days.  I am working on keeping the panic at bay, I hope I will succeed.

Reconnecting with rational

I've been having some very honest and frank email discussions with a friend lately. It's interesting that through that process I can see that some part of me is able to be rational.  Or at least I can see that rational side of things and I can use that part of my brain during these conversation.  I am still pretty emotional about a lot of things, but these are things that were sad or hurtful.  I think this is a natural reaction.  But, on the other side of things I can say things like "sharing our stories is an important part of life, I believe it makes us less lonely and better able to cope with the hard things."  A year ago, even 3 months ago, I'm not sure I would have been able to get there.

In the middle of depression that was one of the hardest things for me, the inability to see anything rationally.  I'm smart and I like to think things through and see what is rational, what makes sense, and what all the sides of a story are.  I guess for a long time I was pretty willing to ignore my side as invaluable now that I think about it.  For me, being able to see at least some things in a rational light is a big sign of doing better.  I also find though that I am more likely to credit my story than I ever used to me.

Writing this blog has made me feel very sad.  Sad that I used the thing I like to do, explore different sides of an issue, to add to feeling like crap (by ignoring me).  I'm sad for what this says about how I felt about myself.  I'm sad because, while I feel better, I'm not so confident in that and I really hope that I don't go back to that place of thinking that I don't matter.

A crush

I found myself completely attracted to a woman this week.  The situation is impossible, start with she's straight and add a bunch more complications.  I know though, that under the right circumstances, I would have hit on her.  And yet, I feel good about the whole thing.

It's been a long time since I dated anyone.  And, in so many ways, I put that part of me away completely.  No risk, no hurt right?  Maybe, but no risk also means being lonely.  I see the fact that I felt that much attraction as a good sign.  It means that I am slowly embracing that side of myself again.  Only now it is different.  I am not trying to force myself to be attracted to men.  I let what is totally natural to me be on the surface.  I let myself find this woman amazingly beautiful and attractive.  I really felt something stir inside.

I feel very unsure of myself when it comes to dating women because I never have.  On the flip side I also know it is so much more of a natural thing for me.  I'm glad to have seen and met this woman.  It has helped me to start to think about a different side of me again.

The simplest things

I have been noticing of late things that are signals of change for me.  Cleaning my kitchen, cleaning my bathroom,   working out, basically doing.  So many of these things probably seem small to many people, and likely are things they take for granted.  But for me the mere fact that I am doing things, no matter how small, is new.  Depression sucked me dry of all energy and desire to do things.  So often I would come home and sit on the couch all night. I couldn't  make myself do the simplest things.  Doing nothing was all I had in me.  Cleaning up seemed overwhelming, really doing anything seemed overwhelming.

I do not take these things for granted, at least for now.  I cherish the fact that I am getting bored by sitting around doing nothing.  This is a new feeling for me and one that is a good sign.  I am really still in awe of how things feel for me and how much things still keep changing.  It makes me realize how bad things were and makes me grateful for the changes as they come along.

Fear

Fear is powerful and has an amazing impact on behaviour.  I was talking to my boss today about some challenges I have been having at work and I realized that the problem was actually me reacting out of fear, not reacting to what was in front of me.  The fear is explainable and reasonable as it is based in some past similar experiences where I was hurt and "punished" for acting a certain way.  But, the fear is not based on this situation.

Acting out of fear makes me take the most conservative approach.  It also makes me move back into my shell and hide myself because I am scared of what might happen.  This makes others react a certain way to me.  When I think about this situation I can see that I have been doing this and the reactions I have been getting are also explainable.

Amazing though what recognizing what is really going on can do.  I am not able to strategize better about how I will handle the situation.  I can also think about what an appropriate reaction to the current circumstances are, instead of relying on some instinctual reaction that is not necessarily that healthy.  I am sure this is not the last time I am going to face this situation as I have been in a number of bad situations.  But, I am working hard not to let fear run my life.  Some days it actually works.

Religion, Hiding and Disbelieving

As often happens with me of late, I have been reflecting on my life.  I starting thinking about my relationship with religion.  Some of you will know that I was really involved in the Anglican church for a number of years of my adult life.  I first started going, when I moved to Edmonton, because there was something about it that totally appealed to me.  I really had a sense that there was something there for me.  I enjoyed the singing, I enjoyed the worship and I enjoyed a quiet place to be.  I really believed, I really had faith, or at least I thought so at the time.

For a number of years this really worked for me.  And then things started to fall apart.  It started slowly. Finding a few Sundays when I really didn't want to be at church.  Feeling more and more dissatisfied with the fact that everyone was totally "fine" on Sunday mornings, especially when I was starting to not be fine at all.  I got involved in the management of the parish I was at in probably two of the most challenging years they have had in a long time and I got more disillusioned.  I tried changing parishes and that didn't work either.  Every week I felt more and more like a hypocrite just being at church at all.

Now while all of this was happening my life was unravelling on many fronts.  I am convinced I had the depression before all of this, but it was definitely getting worse.  There didn't seem to be anything I could do to make things better.  So, I left.  I so desperately needed support and I felt like church should be a place I could get it, and yet, I wasn't able to tell anyone how much I needed them.  I couldn't stand the disconnected feeling, so I left.

In hindsight, my relationship with church is complicated, but what isn't ?  On the one hand I found it all very appealing.  On the other hand I was running from some major things in my life.  Some major hurts and being gay.  Really church seems like the perfect place to hide.  For the most part people assume that if you are a member of the church, you are not gay, so I didn't have to deal with that.  There were no questions, including from me.  Hiding what is going on is also easier than you might think.  The truth is that for the most part people don't share hurts in life and church is no different.  On some level I knew they were there, but I wanted to forget, to ignore and not deal.  Avoidance 101.  So, I hid.

What do I think now?  I can see that so much of the disconnect was me.  People at the 2nd parish didn't know me very well, so how on earth could they have known how much I was hurting, how much I was floundering?  Even at the 1st parish I didn't really ever share or "fess up" do what was going on with me.  Truthfully I didn't really know myself.  I have no hard feelings, no blame, no nothing.  Just truth for some understanding.

And on faith?  I can't be part of something that continually tells me how horrible I am.  And that is how I felt about Christianity.  I don't believe that and so it is hypocritical for me to be there.  Do I believe in the whole story of Jesus?  Truthfully no.  Do I believe that love is what matters in life?  Yes.  Do I believe that all people have value and something beautiful about them (even though is it sometimes hard to see)?  Yes.

Where does this leave me?  It leaves me in a place where I believe in love, in relationship, in connection.  It leaves me in a place where I could believe in God, and sometimes find myself praying.  It also leaves me in a place where my traditional answers to all of this don't work.  I don't believe in Christianity.  This is hard for me as it was so much a part of my life.  But it is the truth.

It's never too late

This article from the Globe and Mail made me think about my own life and it reminds me a lot of it.  Education was just the way to go and another goal to tick off for me.  It's not that I regret it at all and some of it has provided a lot of open doors for me, but I am now considering what it is I really want to do with my life, what really matters to me and how I live to honour that.  We can't change the past, but it's never too  late to shape our future.  That is my work to do now.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/life/facts-and-arguments/the-essay/i-gave-up-law-school-to-cycle-to-mexico/article2238544/

What have I been missing?

I was noticing this week that I am more and more ok with no knowing everything that is going on, not being in control so much.  This thought though made me wonder what I have been giving up in order to be in control of everything, or at least try to be.  What kind of experiences have I passed up because I didn't have the energy to take anything else in?  What have I missed by being so focussed on surviving?  I know that I can't change the past, but I hope by being different in the future I will see some of these open doors and be able to take them.

Messages

I'm thinking tonight about how the messages we give ourselves and each other can have such a huge impact on our lives.  For instance I stopped wanted to be a writer because of something my grade 8 language arts teacher said.  Why did I believe her?  Probably because I was 13 and hadn't yet figured out that adults don't always know what they are talking about.  They make mistakes also.

Then I think about an ex-boyfriend who blamed me every time we would have a fight (which was pretty often for awhile) because I would be the first one to yell.  Because of the head space I was in at the time, including depression, I believe his messages that I was the one who wasn't good enough.  Forget the fact that he was a jerk to me for a whole evening and then I finally had enough and yelled.  I think also of a work environment where they had me convinced that my inability to deal with stress was the problem.  Nothing to do with the lack of respect shown for me or the micro-managing or the bullying...

Why did I believe them in both of these situations?  Depression was a huge factor.  My self-esteem was in the basement and I couldn't see past the survival mode I was in.

What's the point?  I guess I have three.  The first is to look below the surface of what you see with people. For me, so much of what was going on was either a cause or an effect of depression.  I wasn't able to come to terms with it, but maybe if someone had pushed harder I might have faced it sooner?  The second point is a lesson for all of us to watch the messages we give to people.  They may have a bigger impact than we know.  The third is that we need to be discerning about what we believe and don't believe about what other people tell us.  Having the self-esteem and confidence to figure what fits and what doesn't fit is important and one of the hardest things I have had to learn. What I think matters above all to me.  I can take what others say or I can reject it.

Curiousity

I'm curious to know what effect my blog is having on other people. I know that it is probably the best thing I  could have done for my own healing.  It makes me think through things in a more coherent fashion and it uses the creative side of my brain.

How about you?  Has my blog had an impact on your life?  What is the impact?  Any other thoughts you would like to share?

I would love it if you would share some thoughts with me.  Feel free to post them anonymously if you like.

A day where things were clicking

I had a good day today.  Everything clicked.  I enjoyed the walk to work (despite not wearing quite enough clothes and being chilly).  Once I got to work I had a nice chat with a co-worker.  A co-worker and I put together a silly joke for another co-worker.  We laughed when we were creating it, and he laughed pretty hard when we gave it to him.  I successfully figured out how to approach a different co-worker who is driving me a bit nuts.  The conversation with him went well and came to an outcome that I can live with for now.

A couple of things I realized about myself today.  I am energized when I do things that are creative and fun and silly, like the joke.  It is nice to do things like that and it uses a part of my brain that makes me happy.  The creative side of my brain has been pretty quiet for a long time.  The point is that it makes me happy to use that part of my brain.  I need to be more intentional at figuring out what exactly I can do on this front.  I'm not sure yet, but something to think about.

I also felt good for standing up and asking for my needs to be met with my co-worker.  In the end, even if things don't work out in a way that I like, I asked for what I needed.  And, I didn't feel any anxiety about doing it.  Wow, that is  such a great feeling.  I really felt like I had a right to ask him to consider my side of it. I also talked to him before I got really annoyed and was able to calmly state what I wanted to say.  I didn't apologize for my feelings or for asking him to consider things from a different angle. I am really not used to being able to do this.  It's a very empowering feeling.  And it's so nice to be able to deal with things that used to be so hard for me without it causing problems.

Days like today have been few and far between in my life.  Today was good.  No worry, no anxiety, only doing things that were good for me.

Not in control anymore

For so long in my life I have felt the need to be on top of things all the time.  Don't make mistakes, don't forget things, know everything that is going on.  Lately I have noticed myself relaxing a lot on that.  It means knowing that I don't have to know everything, I don't have to be on top of everything all the time.  It is nice actually.

The thing is, the world doesn't end.  I find myself apologizing a bit more often, for things like forgetting money to pay for dodgeball, or for missing a meeting...  None of these things are life and death, there is always a remedy.  

The being in control all the time, at least in some ways, was a reaction to being bullied.  There was always an undercurrent of my job being threatened if I didn't do everything perfectly.  There were always questions and if I didn't know all the answers it went poorly.  I learned to know everything and never give them a chance to find fault.  But, living like that is brutal.  It meant taking responsibility for things that I had no control over.  It meant taking on parts of other peoples jobs because they weren't doing them.  In hindsight I can see that this was not my problem.  In the end it was too much, and I cracked.

Even recently I have noticed myself acting like this, although there isn't any bullying going on.  Slowly though I am noticing this tendency before it happens.  I find myself thinking along this line and for the most part I can talk myself into different behaviour.  I can remember to only be responsible for myself and that if I don't know everything, that's ok.  It means letting other people have their own stuff and not trying to own it, and it means realizing that I don't need to be in that head space. I used to know this, but habits are hard to break, especially when you don't even know you are doing it.  

The outcome of this is that my stress level is greatly reduced.  I only have my own stuff to deal with, my own stress and not other peoples.  It is freeing really.

Some comedy

My friend told me tonight that for someone screwed up, I am remarkably well-adjusted.  That made me laugh.  She's right though in so many ways.  As I was talking to her I could see how much I have been able to think things through and see what I need to do.  And what I don't need to do.  I could see how much my rational brain is working again and how much I know about myself.  I also could see that I am learning to pay attention to what I need and do something with that.

Thanks my friend for the encouragement.  I appreciate it.  :)

How things have changed

I was just looking at the very first post on this blog, in March.  It was about having mixed feelings about some friends coming over.  Those same friends are coming for dinner again today.  I am looking forward to seeing them.  I have no misgivings about them coming, or my ability to handle it.  I also am way less worried about getting my place totally clean, as I know they care.  I will do a bit of tidying so we can use the kitchen table and all the seats in my living room, but I will likely leave it at that.

The changes I see are amazing.  The last time they came I was so anxious about having the perfectly clean place.  I was also anxious about my ability to manage through a visit.  Today, I am so much more relaxed and I believe I will be much more able to be present with my friends, rather than worrying and feeling anxious about a hundred other things.  I am grateful.  This feels like a gift to me.

Stigma

Today as I was walking to work I heard some guy announcing to another person that his probation officer was in Banff.  It got me to thinking about why we worry about telling people about depression or being gay, or at least why I worried about it, and why I still do with some people.  This person was obviously ok about telling someone he was on probation, he almost seemed proud of it.  If that was me, I'd probably be embarrassed about it.  What it really showed me is that there are all sorts of things out there that may have stigma attached to them.  I also makes me realize that maybe it doesn't matter so much.  What other people think is their stuff, not mine.

On edge

I was at a course today about coaching.  A big part of the goal of this is to help others find their own solutions to problems, issues etc...  What it also means is asking the rights kinds of questions to help people dig deeper into themselves to find those solutions.  The course also continues tomorrow.

I found myself a bit on edge all day.  This is a course with a lot of co-workers and so to me this is still my work environment.  We did a lot of practicing on each other today.  I found myself being very careful with what I was telling people about the issues I was looking for coaching on.  While there are some people from work who read this blog and know a lot about me, there is decidedly a vulnerability line I don't want to cross in that kind of environment.

This is hard for me.  I've had 2 types of ways of reacting to this kind of situation in the past.  Either it was to but up a huge wall and reveal nothing, or I reveal too much.  I'm not used to feeling myself protecting  myself to a point, and yet letting myself take risks and be vulnerable about other things.  My counselor has been telling me for a long time that I get to pick in these situations.  I've never really looked at picking and choosing and intentionally deciding how far I let people in.

It's extremely tiring as I am learning a new skill in the coaching, and I am also learning a new skill in deciding how vulnerable to be.  And yet, it is exhilarating also to really see that I have a real choice in the matter.  I can go on this course and learn and grow, and yet not put myself in a situation I don't want to be in.  As I write this, I realize this is another example of me finding ways to care about me, to do what I need to be ok.

The wide reaches of depression

It's amazing to me how much of my life was, and really still is, affected by the depression.  I'm not sure which came first, the depression or the real belief that I wasn't valuable and didn't deserve nice things.  This second thought really permeates everything.

The thing is, when you don't believe you are valuable, it affects everything you do.  I devalued myself so much that I would purposely make things ugly, or not nice, or sabotage things to make sure they weren't good for me.  It becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy at that point.  I thought I deserved the bad things that happened and so then I also created bad things and then thought I deserved those also.  It's a nasty circle and then once the depression starts, there is no way out.

One example is that I never really have cared about making my living space beautiful and nice for me.  I live there because I have to live somewhere.  Lately, I've been thinking about what I can do with where I live now to make it a great space for me to live in.  To me, this is a sign of good things.  I am finally finding ways to honour myself and to take responsibility for my life.  I know this might seem small, but to me it is huge.  I can see that I deserve to have a nice place, one that suits me. 

One step at a time is the way this is working.  Sometimes I see things that give me hope, other days that is hard to find.  But, the hope is winning out more often now.  And I see things are different, better for the most part.  It makes it easier to keep going.

Getting away

I spent this past weekend in Banff, AB, one of the most beautiful places I have ever been.  I went with a friend and some of her friends.  There is a film festival there every fall featuring all sorts of outdoors, and adventure type films. It was remarkable to me what a weekend away with fun, happy people, a fun activity and amazing scenery can do for my soul.

The company was lovely.  These are people that really know who they are and how to live their lives by their own rules.  This is something I am really working on in my life.  It is so relaxing to be around people like this as the atmosphere around them is light.  It's not to say they don't have their troubles, but there is just something so appealing about being with them.  It really made me see the benefits of getting to that place also.

Watching movies about people who like extreme adventure was good for me.  (Don't worry mum and dad, I'm not inspired to do the risky things some of these people do).  They made me see that life is about what you make of it.  We all have to take some risks in our lives to grow, to learn and to challenge ourselves.  It also leads us to be creative and see beauty in the world.  Without that we are stagnant and being stagnant, for me anyhow, leads to depression.

The mountains to me are always a place of recharging.  I am a prairie girl at heart and am not sure I could live there, but visiting is awesome.   They are beautiful, especially this weekend with a fresh coat of snow and then brilliant sunshine.  It reminded me that there is beauty all around and it is only a matter of noticing it.

It is so nice for me to be able to take time out of my life and recharge and take stock.

Taking care of me

This morning I woke up and didn't feel awesome.  I was so tired.  I tried for about 15 minutes to get up and then finally decided to sleep this morning and go to work this afternoon.  I was also supposed to go out tonight and decided not to. This kind of behaviour is strange for me in some ways.  It's behaviour that says I am important and I don't have to push myself until I drop or crash.  I can take time to listen to my body at the outset instead of go go go go...

This is a good sign and a lesson all in one.  It's a good sign that I am learning to listen to myself and act accordingly.  It, to me, shows that I am actually internalizing the thought that I deserve to have my needs met and I can take action to make that happen.  It shows that I am learning that I am worthy of love and attention, especially from me.  It's a lesson because I am only starting to realize what it means to have my emotional needs met and how to take action for that.  But, in the end it is the same as my physical needs.  I need to pay attention and take action.

Slowly I am learning what self-esteem really means.  I am learning what it means to show myself love and care.

Talking about it all

I was talking to someone today and telling her some of my story.  Every time I do this I get so emotional about it.  With her, I wasn't scared about her reaction because I know she has been there too and she would understand.  I guess it is just hard.  It's hard stuff to talk about.  It's hard stuff to let others be a part of.

This last year and a bit have been hard, period.  There have been good moments, but a lot of my life has been tied up with dealing with depression and its causes, and getting to understand myself, my tendencies and the fallacies I have been believing for so long.  When I share my story with people it evokes so many of those emotions again and again.  It leaves me feeling in a funk, distracted and down. I keep sharing though because I know that it is hard for others to share also.  I also know that I need the support of people around me and they can't read my mind.  The difficult things in our lives are the things we most need to share and the things that are so often the ones that we don't.

I hope that someday it will not be so hard.

Do I deserve it?

Things have been better for me the last bit here.  A lot of the time I have been feeling really good.  I forget about the depression, I forget about being sad, I forget about the negativity that was so pervasive for so long.  I love the moments when I realize this has happened.

Then there are the moments I am still struggling with.  I catch myself sometimes feeling good, smiling, feeling happy and then thinking, wait this can't be right.  I don't deserve to be happy, I must find something to be down about.  I must create or state something negative to get back to my "natural" state of being.  For so long I believed that I didn't deserve to be happy, that I deserved all the bad crap that happened to me, that I deserved to be down and sad and depressed, that somehow I had brought it on myself.  Rationally, I can see that now, and I don't really believe it anymore.  But, there is some part of me that wants to go back to the comfortable, the predictable, even though it wasn't good.

I am not used to feeling good.  When people ask me how I am, I'm not used to being able to say good, or fine.  I used to saying ok, at best.  Feeling better is unsettling, it awkward and unknown.  I'm not sure how to be, what to say, how to act when things are ok.  I so often feel unsure of myself.  When I feel myself authentically smiling (and it's not for show) I'm surprised by the feeling.  Maybe this is what "normal" feels like?  Maybe this is what it is like to not be depressed?