Yes you may!
Here goes.
Fuck PMS.
Fuck hormones that seem to effect some of us way more than others. Fuck feeling like a crazy person for like 5 days a month. Fuck spotting for like three days before the actual period starts making it seem like PMS is longer than it is supposed to be.
Fuck the lack of treatment for PMS. Fuck birth control being used to treat PMS and PMDD. Fuck that, I want something else. Fuck me for for being so stubborn and not taking medication when I probably should so that I'm not up writing at midnight like a maniac. Fuck medication. Fuck side effects. Fuck, "we don't really know why SSRIs work or don't work." Fuck that, do better science.
Fuck that my only two options are hormonal birth control or SSRIs. Fuck the lack of options. It's the twenty fucking first fucking century. Fuck that I just wrote a post about wanting to not feel like this.
Fuck changing PMS symptoms and changing periods. I get fucking used to it being one way and then you fucking change it on me and I have to cope with it all again. Fuck that.
Fuck staying seeing the bright side. Fuck fertility. I almost want to be pregnant again just to end this, except I think pregnancy was worse. Fuck being sensitive to hormones, seriously fuck that. Fuck pregnancy making my periods so much fucking heavier. Fuck the end of my light, not so bad, not so painful periods.
Fuck that PMS is so bad that I wish my super heavy, painful period would just get here already! Fuck not feeling like myself. Fuck insomnia during PMS. Fuck.
Thursday, December 20, 2012
You Can' Control How People Perceive You, Yet Perception is Everything.
I'm struggling with two different concepts in my life that I believe in. One being: You can't control what others think, and Two: perception is everything.
Basically I can only control myself, not how others perceive me, but that also this perception is actually the only thing that matters.
And I'm having trouble trying to be OK with these two things. Somehow for the future I will figure this out and somehow be true to myself but also be better for others. I'm guessing a lot of it will be closing my mouth, but that's almost a whole other topic.
I read in a book called "The Happiness Project," that there is no love, only proofs of love. This struck me very deeply. There is NO love, only PROOFS of love. It made me realize why I hate it when I'm arguing with someone and they tell me they love me. I don't actually care how you feel, SHOW me that you love me. Having love for someone is something YOU feel internally that doesn't actually effect them in anyway. Proving your love by, say, being nice to them and doing things for them, and being supportive, and listening empathetically, and accepting them for who they are, is how they know you love them. These are the things that really matter, sorry, but how you feel inside actually doesn't do crap.
Harsh, huh? But it is so true. Don't we all have or have had that person that is an asshole to us, but then keeps telling us they love us and it makes us feel really uncomfortable. Maybe they do feel that love, but they sure aren't proving it. You have to prove it. This is why perception is everything. If someone perceives that you are mean or crabby, you ARE mean and crabby, it doesn't matter if you actually don't feel very mean or crabby.
But then I also believe that I can't control how others perceive me. I can't read minds. I can't know how you are feeling, only how I perceive you. So there is something else missing here.
I'm guessing it must be something along the lines of accepting that not everyone is going to like you and trying to change how you are perceived for those who really matter. I imagine this is what really sucks about being famous. Not everyone can like you, but everyone knows you and many of them will tell you either way. So you have some people perceiving you as being awesome and some people perceiving you have being terrible for the exact same things sometimes, and then you somehow have to hold it together and find out who you really are.
For instance on more than one occasion I have been told how judgmental I am being, even when I don't feel judgmental at all. And often I am judging corporations who care more about profit than the safety of children, or doctors who are way out of touch with statistics and new research, but people perceive this as me judging the parents who are buying the products or doing what their doctor is telling them. Even when I spell it out sometimes that I'm NOT blaming them, I am blaming blank, they are still up in arms. This is usually when I throw my hands in the air and assume that this person just needs to be angry about this or has some unresolved feelings that actually have nothing to do with what I am saying.
So am I being judgmental simply because someone is insisting that I am? Not everyone thinks that I am. But someone does. Can I even change that? Should I just not comment on anything publicly? I feel that if I stopped that it would go against who I am fundamentally. Which is someone who wants the dissemination of good information. It is amazing to me how many people hold very weird beliefs about things that they actually have very little information about. My self included.
I used to cringe when I heard of people bringing their babies to bed. As recently as just three or four years ago. Then I started contemplating having children of my own and I took parenting on like a research project/ deep look into my own intuition. I started reading books, lots of books. Some of them were awful, some were great. And the conclusion I drew was that co-sleeping actually is SAFER than crib sleeping as long as you take a few necessary precautions. Holy crap, my view did a complete 180 when I actually looked into it.
Note: a good baby book or parenting book will back up what it has to say, not just say it. It will also give you many options and won't be rigid or claim that one method works for everyone.
Anyway, I'm getting sick of people misperceiving me, and getting sick of feeling like after I say something I then have to go back and reassure everyone that they are a good parent. I've contemplated just not saying anything. "You are in charge of your feelings, stop putting words into my mouth." Or something along those lines.
But I do feel bad when someone feels I'm judging them when I'm not. I might not agree with what you are doing, or I might want to do it a different way and actually feel pretty neutral on what you are doing, and I might totally be judging your doctor who told you that it was breastfeeding that was causing the tooth decay (common, untrue thing that gets said way too much by doctors), but I'm very rarely judging you. It's just unfortunate how much bad information is out there, and how little support there is for working against this bad info. So I WANT to reassure you. Kind of. Sometimes.
I have very strong opinions on many things. I try to form my opinions on facts. Facts are not as straight forward as you would think. It's amazing how some studies will counter other studies. A huge part of my education revolved around critically analyzing scientific studies and looking for BS (but they didn't call it that). So I feel I have a better than average grasp on what good information looks like. This further solidifies my opinions unless new good info comes along.
But I have to believe that I can be opinionated without being a judgmental asshole. And even if I present some facts and you choose to not believe them or do something else, then what can I do? Live and let live is another thing I believe in. I'm NOT an evangelical. I have faith that people will find their own way. But that doesn't mean I'm not going to express my opinion. And I rarely say anything to anyone's face. It's all on facebook or my blog, which people can totally choose to ignore. Person-to-person I assume most of the time people don't want to hear it (with close friends or my husband it's a bit different). If they ask me what I am doing, or straight up ask me for my opinion, then I can talk for hours!
Some of you might not believe this, but fundamentally I see myself as a very non-judgmental person. I've spent the vast majority of my working life working with people who have serious issues, people who are sometimes shunned from society, people who are stigmatized, people who are very misunderstood, people who sometimes feel trapped in the system or like they don't belong. And my job, mostly, is to be empathetic to it all, and to normalize what they think and do, and to accept them for who they are right now, no matter how bad it looks from the outside. That's what people pay me to do. And I couldn't imagine doing much else. This is what I want to do. It's something in my core that tells me to go find those that need the most help, who feel the most lost, and tell them that they are going to be OK. That they, in fact, are fine how they are and that if they want to change, they have this power, and I will help them.
You have to be non-judgmental to do that.
So this actually doesn't really have a conclusion, I'm just really focused on feeling better and doing better and becoming a better person right now and I'm trying to figure out exactly what needs to change in order for this to work.
Basically I can only control myself, not how others perceive me, but that also this perception is actually the only thing that matters.
And I'm having trouble trying to be OK with these two things. Somehow for the future I will figure this out and somehow be true to myself but also be better for others. I'm guessing a lot of it will be closing my mouth, but that's almost a whole other topic.
I read in a book called "The Happiness Project," that there is no love, only proofs of love. This struck me very deeply. There is NO love, only PROOFS of love. It made me realize why I hate it when I'm arguing with someone and they tell me they love me. I don't actually care how you feel, SHOW me that you love me. Having love for someone is something YOU feel internally that doesn't actually effect them in anyway. Proving your love by, say, being nice to them and doing things for them, and being supportive, and listening empathetically, and accepting them for who they are, is how they know you love them. These are the things that really matter, sorry, but how you feel inside actually doesn't do crap.
Harsh, huh? But it is so true. Don't we all have or have had that person that is an asshole to us, but then keeps telling us they love us and it makes us feel really uncomfortable. Maybe they do feel that love, but they sure aren't proving it. You have to prove it. This is why perception is everything. If someone perceives that you are mean or crabby, you ARE mean and crabby, it doesn't matter if you actually don't feel very mean or crabby.
But then I also believe that I can't control how others perceive me. I can't read minds. I can't know how you are feeling, only how I perceive you. So there is something else missing here.
I'm guessing it must be something along the lines of accepting that not everyone is going to like you and trying to change how you are perceived for those who really matter. I imagine this is what really sucks about being famous. Not everyone can like you, but everyone knows you and many of them will tell you either way. So you have some people perceiving you as being awesome and some people perceiving you have being terrible for the exact same things sometimes, and then you somehow have to hold it together and find out who you really are.
For instance on more than one occasion I have been told how judgmental I am being, even when I don't feel judgmental at all. And often I am judging corporations who care more about profit than the safety of children, or doctors who are way out of touch with statistics and new research, but people perceive this as me judging the parents who are buying the products or doing what their doctor is telling them. Even when I spell it out sometimes that I'm NOT blaming them, I am blaming blank, they are still up in arms. This is usually when I throw my hands in the air and assume that this person just needs to be angry about this or has some unresolved feelings that actually have nothing to do with what I am saying.
So am I being judgmental simply because someone is insisting that I am? Not everyone thinks that I am. But someone does. Can I even change that? Should I just not comment on anything publicly? I feel that if I stopped that it would go against who I am fundamentally. Which is someone who wants the dissemination of good information. It is amazing to me how many people hold very weird beliefs about things that they actually have very little information about. My self included.
I used to cringe when I heard of people bringing their babies to bed. As recently as just three or four years ago. Then I started contemplating having children of my own and I took parenting on like a research project/ deep look into my own intuition. I started reading books, lots of books. Some of them were awful, some were great. And the conclusion I drew was that co-sleeping actually is SAFER than crib sleeping as long as you take a few necessary precautions. Holy crap, my view did a complete 180 when I actually looked into it.
Note: a good baby book or parenting book will back up what it has to say, not just say it. It will also give you many options and won't be rigid or claim that one method works for everyone.
Anyway, I'm getting sick of people misperceiving me, and getting sick of feeling like after I say something I then have to go back and reassure everyone that they are a good parent. I've contemplated just not saying anything. "You are in charge of your feelings, stop putting words into my mouth." Or something along those lines.
But I do feel bad when someone feels I'm judging them when I'm not. I might not agree with what you are doing, or I might want to do it a different way and actually feel pretty neutral on what you are doing, and I might totally be judging your doctor who told you that it was breastfeeding that was causing the tooth decay (common, untrue thing that gets said way too much by doctors), but I'm very rarely judging you. It's just unfortunate how much bad information is out there, and how little support there is for working against this bad info. So I WANT to reassure you. Kind of. Sometimes.
I have very strong opinions on many things. I try to form my opinions on facts. Facts are not as straight forward as you would think. It's amazing how some studies will counter other studies. A huge part of my education revolved around critically analyzing scientific studies and looking for BS (but they didn't call it that). So I feel I have a better than average grasp on what good information looks like. This further solidifies my opinions unless new good info comes along.
But I have to believe that I can be opinionated without being a judgmental asshole. And even if I present some facts and you choose to not believe them or do something else, then what can I do? Live and let live is another thing I believe in. I'm NOT an evangelical. I have faith that people will find their own way. But that doesn't mean I'm not going to express my opinion. And I rarely say anything to anyone's face. It's all on facebook or my blog, which people can totally choose to ignore. Person-to-person I assume most of the time people don't want to hear it (with close friends or my husband it's a bit different). If they ask me what I am doing, or straight up ask me for my opinion, then I can talk for hours!
Some of you might not believe this, but fundamentally I see myself as a very non-judgmental person. I've spent the vast majority of my working life working with people who have serious issues, people who are sometimes shunned from society, people who are stigmatized, people who are very misunderstood, people who sometimes feel trapped in the system or like they don't belong. And my job, mostly, is to be empathetic to it all, and to normalize what they think and do, and to accept them for who they are right now, no matter how bad it looks from the outside. That's what people pay me to do. And I couldn't imagine doing much else. This is what I want to do. It's something in my core that tells me to go find those that need the most help, who feel the most lost, and tell them that they are going to be OK. That they, in fact, are fine how they are and that if they want to change, they have this power, and I will help them.
You have to be non-judgmental to do that.
So this actually doesn't really have a conclusion, I'm just really focused on feeling better and doing better and becoming a better person right now and I'm trying to figure out exactly what needs to change in order for this to work.
Wednesday, December 19, 2012
Want Change? Start with You!
Since the school shooting I've been thinking a lot about how messed up the world is. How there is way too much anger in it and how people don't seem to value being kind to one another. In stead we value "winning" arguments, many of which don't matter in the grand scheme of things.
But I can't fricking change the world. I mean, I'll do my darndest to try to end capitalism and stuff like that, but I actually personally have very little control over it. I can only change myself.
So my resolution this year is to experiment with some change for myself. Making myself kinder and nicer and more compassionate and less violent. Now hopefully you are all like, "but you already are so nice and compassionate and peaceful!" Well, I can be more so. And some of you are probably like, "good! You're a total bitch!" To you I say, no I'm not, but I guess you have a right to your opinion.
My husband is a huge inspiration for all of this. He doesn't get angry, really. He doesn't stuff his anger, he just simply accepts things and moves on without freaking out. It's something I've learned is called "radical acceptance" in dialectical behavior therapy. You can make him angry if you sit there and push is buttons like some crazy spouse of his... ahem... but he rarely complains about his job, or his low pay, or his health, or his anything. Somehow he, like, knows he is doing the best he can and nothing else is in his control. I mean that's what people like me go to 10 years of therapy to learn!
Not only does he know they aren't in his control, he knows there is no point in getting angered by the things outside of his control. He will certainly point out discrepancies, and injustices. He's smart and will calmly argue facts and knows a lot of them, but doesn't get all depressed or angry or bummed out when people act dumb or do illogical things or believe illogical things. He knows he can't make them agree with them. Again: Some of us go to 10 years of therapy to learn this stuff, then we need years of practice to be OK with it! He just does it already.
Sometimes I feel like I married the Buddha. At least some incarnate.
Yes, I know how lucky I am, and it seriously makes it hard for me to see faults in him because this one quality is so awesome that I feel I have no right to pick on anything else. Though, you should accept your spouse for who they are, but that's another topic all together...
I joke that he actually is my better half. But it is so true. He makes me want to be a better person. We don't have screaming fights not because I don't want to have those (I think they are fun sometimes!), but because he won't scream back at me and well that fact pretty much just diffuses any of my screaming. So I find myself standing there, having just lost my temper and just feeling stupid because he doesn't take the bait. Then I just feel horrible that I would yell at him. Then I'm like, "I gotta change and get this anger under control so I stop treating my husband like crap."
So anyway 2013 will be the year of experimental change. More details later for January's challenge.
But I can't fricking change the world. I mean, I'll do my darndest to try to end capitalism and stuff like that, but I actually personally have very little control over it. I can only change myself.
So my resolution this year is to experiment with some change for myself. Making myself kinder and nicer and more compassionate and less violent. Now hopefully you are all like, "but you already are so nice and compassionate and peaceful!" Well, I can be more so. And some of you are probably like, "good! You're a total bitch!" To you I say, no I'm not, but I guess you have a right to your opinion.
My husband is a huge inspiration for all of this. He doesn't get angry, really. He doesn't stuff his anger, he just simply accepts things and moves on without freaking out. It's something I've learned is called "radical acceptance" in dialectical behavior therapy. You can make him angry if you sit there and push is buttons like some crazy spouse of his... ahem... but he rarely complains about his job, or his low pay, or his health, or his anything. Somehow he, like, knows he is doing the best he can and nothing else is in his control. I mean that's what people like me go to 10 years of therapy to learn!
Not only does he know they aren't in his control, he knows there is no point in getting angered by the things outside of his control. He will certainly point out discrepancies, and injustices. He's smart and will calmly argue facts and knows a lot of them, but doesn't get all depressed or angry or bummed out when people act dumb or do illogical things or believe illogical things. He knows he can't make them agree with them. Again: Some of us go to 10 years of therapy to learn this stuff, then we need years of practice to be OK with it! He just does it already.
Sometimes I feel like I married the Buddha. At least some incarnate.
Yes, I know how lucky I am, and it seriously makes it hard for me to see faults in him because this one quality is so awesome that I feel I have no right to pick on anything else. Though, you should accept your spouse for who they are, but that's another topic all together...
I joke that he actually is my better half. But it is so true. He makes me want to be a better person. We don't have screaming fights not because I don't want to have those (I think they are fun sometimes!), but because he won't scream back at me and well that fact pretty much just diffuses any of my screaming. So I find myself standing there, having just lost my temper and just feeling stupid because he doesn't take the bait. Then I just feel horrible that I would yell at him. Then I'm like, "I gotta change and get this anger under control so I stop treating my husband like crap."
So anyway 2013 will be the year of experimental change. More details later for January's challenge.
Saturday, December 15, 2012
Thoughts On Working Overnight
I've been working overnight for about a month now two nights a week at a mental health crisis center. There are things I have noticed about the overnight shift.
1. Holy crap, give overnight shift people a break, this is really hard, we are not meant to stay up until 9 am. We are meant to sleep in beds next to our partners and children.
2. IQ drops as shift goes on. My first few nights I was positively insane and dumb by the time my shift ended, unable to really form a sentance that made sense to any one else. It doesn't quite get that bad, but I find myself making little mistakes more and more as the night goes on; turning the wrong way down a hall, leaving my keys places, forgetting some needed item, forgetting what things I need to do next.
3. Insanity rises. I start out as mostly sane, maybe around 10% insanity that's just always there. I'd say my mental state slowly turns into some kind of mild rapidly cycling bi-polar disorder. Not enough to interfear with my job really, but I do remember looking in one hallway once around 5 am one shift and I suddenly thought, "This is the Shining." And that was incredibly funny to me, "all work and no play makes me a dull girl," I thought. I imagined going crazy and running around the house with an axe. But then I'll have these times sitting at my desk that are suddenly filled with dread and anxiety, and I have no idea why. It's like my body knows I'm away from my family at a weird time and is like, "did they die? Did they abandon you? Where are your loved ones? Not here. You are all alone, forever." Luckily I'm rational and I know these feelings are totally incorrect, but I feel them, and then they pass. What's really bad is that around 6 am people start getting up and actually want to talk to me and process things with me and tell me their troubles and I have to really concentrate and try to not say something really, really stupid. usually I want to say, "OMG, I have no idea! Crap, that sucks, sheesh, look, I can barely think right now, save it for morning staff." But I can't do that, I'm suposed to be learning how to do this stuff, I WANT to learn it, so I do my best and do admit to them that I am incredibly tired.
4. It gets easier, somehow your body figures out, "oh crap, she's not kidding, she is not going to bed anytime soon, I guess we'll keep her up. Unfortunately this has meant that I once woke up at 1:45 am at home and could not for the life of me get back to sleep. My body said, "time to work!" My coworker says I'm still adjusting.
5. I fear permanent brain damage or permanent damage to my sleep schedule. There was some report that they gave mice permanent brain damage from simulating jet lag in them. Essentially I'm flying about 8 time zones away each weekend and then coming back at the end, this seems errily similar, but I'm not a mouse so maybe I'll be OK.
1. Holy crap, give overnight shift people a break, this is really hard, we are not meant to stay up until 9 am. We are meant to sleep in beds next to our partners and children.
2. IQ drops as shift goes on. My first few nights I was positively insane and dumb by the time my shift ended, unable to really form a sentance that made sense to any one else. It doesn't quite get that bad, but I find myself making little mistakes more and more as the night goes on; turning the wrong way down a hall, leaving my keys places, forgetting some needed item, forgetting what things I need to do next.
3. Insanity rises. I start out as mostly sane, maybe around 10% insanity that's just always there. I'd say my mental state slowly turns into some kind of mild rapidly cycling bi-polar disorder. Not enough to interfear with my job really, but I do remember looking in one hallway once around 5 am one shift and I suddenly thought, "This is the Shining." And that was incredibly funny to me, "all work and no play makes me a dull girl," I thought. I imagined going crazy and running around the house with an axe. But then I'll have these times sitting at my desk that are suddenly filled with dread and anxiety, and I have no idea why. It's like my body knows I'm away from my family at a weird time and is like, "did they die? Did they abandon you? Where are your loved ones? Not here. You are all alone, forever." Luckily I'm rational and I know these feelings are totally incorrect, but I feel them, and then they pass. What's really bad is that around 6 am people start getting up and actually want to talk to me and process things with me and tell me their troubles and I have to really concentrate and try to not say something really, really stupid. usually I want to say, "OMG, I have no idea! Crap, that sucks, sheesh, look, I can barely think right now, save it for morning staff." But I can't do that, I'm suposed to be learning how to do this stuff, I WANT to learn it, so I do my best and do admit to them that I am incredibly tired.
4. It gets easier, somehow your body figures out, "oh crap, she's not kidding, she is not going to bed anytime soon, I guess we'll keep her up. Unfortunately this has meant that I once woke up at 1:45 am at home and could not for the life of me get back to sleep. My body said, "time to work!" My coworker says I'm still adjusting.
5. I fear permanent brain damage or permanent damage to my sleep schedule. There was some report that they gave mice permanent brain damage from simulating jet lag in them. Essentially I'm flying about 8 time zones away each weekend and then coming back at the end, this seems errily similar, but I'm not a mouse so maybe I'll be OK.
Saturday, December 8, 2012
What Long Term Therapy is Like
I'm in recovery from depression, anxiety, and co-dependancy. I've been in therapy on and off, but mostly on for about 15 years. I like to think of my therapy now as getting rid of maladaptive behaviors. I had a lot of maladaptive behaviors. I used to get agoraphopic, have panic attacks, sleep awfully and at weird times, eat not enough or too much, date the wrong people, care about what the wrong people thought too much, take on other peoples problems, be influenced by other peoples feelings too much, and basically not live MY life how I really wanted to live it, I also had a temper, I still do, but few inantimate object get broken and yelled at now, and it causes me less distress than before. I also took nearly every psyche med known to man at one time or another (that could be a whole different blog post!).
I've come to realize that I hate diagnoses. I never fit one well enough, and I had it change too much, and you know what, your diagnoses doesn't really matter. And what you have isn't that different than what everyone else experiences, it's just that you experience it to the point where you are distressed enough by it to go seek out a psychiatrist or therapist.
So I didn't really click well with therapy until around 2009 when I was finally done dating total assholes. I wish my therapist had just say me down back in 2005 and said, "look, your boyfriend is a shithead, for godssake, dump his ass, you could do so much beter, he is bringing you WAY down." But therapists aren't supposed to say stuff like that.
So I did a bunch of truama therapy and and found a good therapist that deals a lot with co-dependancy issues. I'm not cured, but I have a way better grip on what exactly my form of maladaptive behavior takes and where it comes from. Knowing hepls a lot but it doesn't cure it all the way. For instance now I can say, "oh shit, I'm caught in a shame spiral!" But I'm still bad at preventing a shame spiral or getting out of it without a full blown anxiety atack and a small dose of anti-anxiety med. I fully embrace the possibility of making a mistake, but do really bad at the "after the mistake we..." part of it. I have to reassure myself a lot.
What is really great is that I finally actually feel like I'm a pretty great person. Deep down I do have this great self-esteem, but I've lived inside this framework of low self-esteem and caring too much about the thoughts and actions of others that it is hard to break out of the old habits for good. For now at least.
The kind of awesome, and kind of crappy part of this is that a lot of my therapy now is not how to deal with my own maladaptive behaviors, but how to deal with all of you guys' maladaptive behaviors, yes YOU, you reading this right now. Everyone has at least one silly thing they do that does not help them and influences someone like me who is highly influenced by others' feelings and actions. This includes people I love dearly, even my own husband.
But honestly you all have no idea how much I think about all the projecting you all do.
I've also noticed how much anger people have, some of you have WAY more than others too. Anger is something I've lowered a lot in myself, and I do get fed up with things sometimes and then bitch about them. But, seriously, some of you are loose cannons poised to be set off into angry mode and the first sniff of something being not quite right. You don't seem to get the concept of expecting the best in people and that everyone is trying to do their best. There are a few of you have have seriously thought about blocking on facebook just because of how many times you have turned my words into a fight when I wasn't looking for a fight at all. Then I spend way too much time just trying to NOT fight with you while you are fighting with me and then eventually I just stop, or sometimes you do.
I am very surprized at how much de-escalation I must do sometimes. This is something I did not notice a few years ago when I was a very angry person myself.
There are a lot of people who need to take a breather and assume that people mean the best. You waste so much energy on creating arguments with people that aren't even there. And then you often lable yourself as the "victim."
And I also notice some of you who are actually really awesome at not doing this, you get your point accross without personally attacking people, you patiently explain things, you only get really angry when something is truely awful. You roll with the punches and don't let the actions of others rule your life. Congrats. I wish it was appropriate to send out a little e-Card saying, "I've noticed you seem to have good mental health!"
What I'm trying to get at is that I feel like after having been in so much therapy and after spending a lot of time on introspection and comtemplating what really is the best way to live a happy life that I can see the opposite in other people. And I see it a lot, because we are kind of a fucked up human race right now (no judgment, I've been there).
So now I spend my therapy sessions talking about how to deal with the other crazy people in my life, instead of dealing with my own crazy. Because my own crazy is a lot better now. Not totally better, but a lot better. Oh and I hate the word crazy used by anyone but me if referring to me (crazy, right?) so don't think this means you get to call me crazy. I will not want to hang with you if you do.
I've come to realize that I hate diagnoses. I never fit one well enough, and I had it change too much, and you know what, your diagnoses doesn't really matter. And what you have isn't that different than what everyone else experiences, it's just that you experience it to the point where you are distressed enough by it to go seek out a psychiatrist or therapist.
So I didn't really click well with therapy until around 2009 when I was finally done dating total assholes. I wish my therapist had just say me down back in 2005 and said, "look, your boyfriend is a shithead, for godssake, dump his ass, you could do so much beter, he is bringing you WAY down." But therapists aren't supposed to say stuff like that.
So I did a bunch of truama therapy and and found a good therapist that deals a lot with co-dependancy issues. I'm not cured, but I have a way better grip on what exactly my form of maladaptive behavior takes and where it comes from. Knowing hepls a lot but it doesn't cure it all the way. For instance now I can say, "oh shit, I'm caught in a shame spiral!" But I'm still bad at preventing a shame spiral or getting out of it without a full blown anxiety atack and a small dose of anti-anxiety med. I fully embrace the possibility of making a mistake, but do really bad at the "after the mistake we..." part of it. I have to reassure myself a lot.
What is really great is that I finally actually feel like I'm a pretty great person. Deep down I do have this great self-esteem, but I've lived inside this framework of low self-esteem and caring too much about the thoughts and actions of others that it is hard to break out of the old habits for good. For now at least.
The kind of awesome, and kind of crappy part of this is that a lot of my therapy now is not how to deal with my own maladaptive behaviors, but how to deal with all of you guys' maladaptive behaviors, yes YOU, you reading this right now. Everyone has at least one silly thing they do that does not help them and influences someone like me who is highly influenced by others' feelings and actions. This includes people I love dearly, even my own husband.
But honestly you all have no idea how much I think about all the projecting you all do.
I've also noticed how much anger people have, some of you have WAY more than others too. Anger is something I've lowered a lot in myself, and I do get fed up with things sometimes and then bitch about them. But, seriously, some of you are loose cannons poised to be set off into angry mode and the first sniff of something being not quite right. You don't seem to get the concept of expecting the best in people and that everyone is trying to do their best. There are a few of you have have seriously thought about blocking on facebook just because of how many times you have turned my words into a fight when I wasn't looking for a fight at all. Then I spend way too much time just trying to NOT fight with you while you are fighting with me and then eventually I just stop, or sometimes you do.
I am very surprized at how much de-escalation I must do sometimes. This is something I did not notice a few years ago when I was a very angry person myself.
There are a lot of people who need to take a breather and assume that people mean the best. You waste so much energy on creating arguments with people that aren't even there. And then you often lable yourself as the "victim."
And I also notice some of you who are actually really awesome at not doing this, you get your point accross without personally attacking people, you patiently explain things, you only get really angry when something is truely awful. You roll with the punches and don't let the actions of others rule your life. Congrats. I wish it was appropriate to send out a little e-Card saying, "I've noticed you seem to have good mental health!"
What I'm trying to get at is that I feel like after having been in so much therapy and after spending a lot of time on introspection and comtemplating what really is the best way to live a happy life that I can see the opposite in other people. And I see it a lot, because we are kind of a fucked up human race right now (no judgment, I've been there).
So now I spend my therapy sessions talking about how to deal with the other crazy people in my life, instead of dealing with my own crazy. Because my own crazy is a lot better now. Not totally better, but a lot better. Oh and I hate the word crazy used by anyone but me if referring to me (crazy, right?) so don't think this means you get to call me crazy. I will not want to hang with you if you do.
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