Coping, not Coping Ramblings

Sometimes you just have to find a quiet place and cry your eyes out, or you need to do some shouting therapy. 

I think I need to do some shouting therapy and then have a good cry.  I have been on the verge of tears for the last week and have had a very short temper. 

I have realised that sometimes it feels like we are coping, and finding it ‘easy’ to cope, but if someone asks the wrong question, we watch a sad show, or we are triggered by ANYTHING – the dam wall breaks and we have a tidal wave of emotion.  Then we sit back and wander what the hell just happened – because we thought we were coping pretty well.  The danger in thinking you are doing well, is that you don’t address an emotion or feeling as it arises, we push it down, brush it under the carpet because we are doing well, we don’t need to look at that in any closer details – or do we? 

I have been going through the motions, and feeling ok, and I was coping.  That was until a close friend asked me how I was doing.  I nearly started crying there and then!  I met this friend when I was in hospital since then, and for the last year it has been amazing getting to know her and sharing my journey with someone who understands it better than most. 

Was it because of the space we met in I wandered, was it the questions itself?  It made me question a few things on my drive home, and I realised that while I thought I was coping pretty well I had stopped checking in with myself and actually being honest with myself.  In truth I have gone down a side track, and I need to put the breaks on.  I am still alcohol free, but along the way I started taking painkillers for my foot, which led to me taking more painkillers when I wasn’t really in physical pain, which led to me missing a dose or two of my actual medication. ☹ 

So, what to do next!  I have to first be honest, and admit that I have wandered down the side track, I have to stop and take stock and decide, do I keep going down this side track, or do I reverse and try and get back to the main road, stop taking the painkillers and get back on my meds properly again.  Aaaarggh why is it so hard to just do the right thing.  It is so much easier doing the ‘wrong’ thing.  Taking the painkillers numbs the emotions that I thought I was coping with, so all it does is numb the immediate sensation, and it gets stuffed down a hole, and it’s like a volcano, once that hole is too full it will explode, and that’s when the tidal wave hits and things go really wrong. 

So I am still alcohol free, but I have to start again with my meds and the painkillers, and smoking.  

My First Email - YAY

I got an amazing email this morning that really made my day, so thank you so much.  

I have been feeling a bit low and uninspired for the last few weeks, and your email made me feel all warm and fuzzy, and gave me the motivation to keep going.

If anyone else wants to get in touch please feel free to email me, or comment on any post.  It is so encouraging for me to hear from people, and makes me feel less alone.  

Trying Times - Day 57

Being alcohol free, taking your meds at the right times and in the right doses, staying off all forms of self-medication is really hard work.

I have two injuries at the moment that I am carrying and two weeks ago I had to take a stronger painkiller as I was nearly not walking, I was in so much pain.  No, I am an all or nothing type of person, so after the first dose I completely failed at taking the medication as it is meant to be taking and

landed up taking higher doses.  It was an over the counter medication with codeine in it.  I felt awful the next day, not only did my head feel cloudy, but I had failed and done what I said I wasn’t going to do.

Now I hadn’t posted for awhile till this last weekend, and this is the reason why.  I wasn’t sure what to say or if I was going to blog about it at all.  But if I can’t be honest with myself then who can I be honest with.  I must stand up to my mistakes, face them, forgive them, and put them behind me and move forward.  So, I have finally made some form of peace with the mistake I made

.

I am proud that I have stayed alcohol and cigarette free.  I slipped up, but sometimes you must go backwards in order to move forward, and this was my few steps back – now to make a leap forward again. 

My anxiety is high again, today was one of those days when by lunch time you are craving wine o’clock or gin o’clock to come quicker, wishing the day away.  I must learn to stop doing that.  There are a few stresses in my life at the moment, and one of them can trigger my PTSD so that’s why my anxiety is high again.  I am trying to learn to breathe through it, it can be so hard and debilitating though.

My son isn’t well at the moment either so that just adds another layer to the anxiety.  Hopefully I won’t have to take him into the hospital.  He has asthma, and he is very wheezy at the moment.

I still can’t believe that I have managed 57 days without drinking, I never thought I would be able to stop drinking for this long, and I have to say I am loving the fact that I wake up hangover free.  I am tired though, really tired a lot of the time, and I haven’t lost any weight, in fact I think I might have put on even more weight, and it’s not like I needed to do that at all.
  

So, now that the alcohol-free thing is ticking over, I have decided to join the gym to try and get my life back on track, loose a lot of weight and take another step to being healthier.  One of the things that I do struggle with is eating, when my anxiety is high, I often can’t eat, so land up taking small snacks, but never healthy ones to tide me over, and this is normally followed by me over indulging when it passes.  This does not help my weight problem at all.  I have bulimia, who would have thought that bulimia is not only for people who are anorexic!  It’s not all the time, but when I am under duress or anxiety is high this is one of the things that I turn to. 

It’s frustrating in a way that I can’t just wake up and be better, it is a slow step by step journey that I am on, changing one thing at a time, it would be too overwhelming trying to change everything in one go.  I have also learnt to be a lot more compassionate towards my self.  I still carry a deep sense of shame because of what I have done to myself over the years, and I think it is going to take a lot more time to get over that feeling of intense shame, but I am on the journey.  I might take a few steps back every now and then, but I have to learn to forgive myself and get back up, never quit – slowly keep moving towards my goals.  Slow and steady right.  This is a new concept for me,

First Test - Day 55

So last night was my first test, having people over and them drinking while I was not!  I think having the non-alcoholic gin in the house helped me, it is a nice treat to have a nice drink in the evening, and it is even better that it is not alcohol!!!  Bonus, no sore head this morning, no feeling wrecked or dragging my heals. 

So, I managed ok, there were a few moments in the evening where I nearly lost myself.  Little things like my husband drinks Whiskey, and occasionally I would normally take a sip and I found myself going for the glass on one occasion as I walked past his drink, and then I realised what I was doing!  The other was my friends left a beer and a bit of wine behind, I had to toss them down the sink, I couldn’t have that bit of an open bottle of wine in the house, it would play on my mind too much. 

All in all it was nowhere near as bad as I thought it was going to be, and our friends don’t drink that much either so it was a very relaxed evening and I really enjoyed it even without drinking – who knew staying sober could be fun too!

I am on day 55 now of being sober, I can’t believe in a way that I have made it this far.  Will I drink again, I honestly don’t know?  I started this journey saying I would give up for a hundred days, I am 55 days in, more than half way.  Has it been easy?  No, not all the time.  The first few weeks were hard because I was so used to coming home in the evening and craving that all important glass of wine, or gin and tonic.  I think I lived for that drink in the evening that would take the edge off, even though taking the edge off meant paying for it later.  I never realised how anxious drinking made me the next day until I got a few weeks into being alcohol free.  The alcohol was great at distracting and numbing the pain in the short term, but you always pay for it the next morning with either a hangover or intense anxious feelings. 

Did I find last night easy, yes, I did, I never thought I would be so at peace at a dinner without having alcohol, but it was fine.  To be fair it wasn’t a roaring party, but it was my first try at being in the company of people who are drinking, and I survived, I have to give myself that and I am proud of myself. 

I started CBT therapy last week.  I have never been to a CBT therapist before and I found it interesting.  She confirmed my psychiatrist’s diagnosis of PTSD.  I don’t find it as jarring to hear someone else tell me I have PTSD anymore.  I think I am slowly coming to accept that I have it, and now I have to learn to live with it, and I need to understand it.  I am looking forward to this journey into CBT, it is so different to art psychotherapy which I am studying, but it is good. 

As for everything else in my life, I am trying so hard to be with everything, it is hard, and I am still not 100% good on taking my medication properly.  What is it about mental illness that we don’t want to take the medication?  If I have a headache, I have no problem taking a tablet, or when I tore my ligaments, I had no problem seeking help and doing the therapy and the operations and taking medication when I had to.  But my depression, it is a silent killer, because it is the unseen that is so dangerous.  In front of people we put up a brave front, but a lot of the time it takes everything we have to put the brave front up, and it is exhausting.  I know that I am so much better than I was, but I still collapsed in a heap when our guests left last night because I was tired.  There are a lot of factors to this feeling, a lot of them are not my issues, but I know there is an element of exhaustion which comes from the effort of being with other people.  It is not always exhausting, but it often is.

Now I am heading into day fifty six, I am tired from the weekend – I have a friend going through a really hard time, and I am trying really hard to be there for her.  She recently started therapy because she has been struggling with anxiety, she has been through a lot recently, and is currently going through a lot.  She revealed some of her past to me last week, and it triggered me – and being with her is triggering because of what she is going through, but I am trying to use the tools my course has given me to listen and recognise that I am not always feeling things that are mine.

I apologise if this entry is a bit confusing or all over the place, I have had to sit down to it three times.  I hope you get it though. 

42 Days - Nearly Slipped Up

I have been really struggling with writing my blog this month.  I know what I want to say, but putting it down has just felt wrong.  It has been a strange and sometimes stressful few weeks.  This past weekend I was at college and we had a video assessment to do.  I was so stressed on the Saturday before the video'd assessment.  I think part of my nerves had to do with the fact that I am so ashamed at the moment, since being on my anti depressants I have put on even more weight, and I am deeply ashamed of my body.  I know that there is no one to blame but myself, and like drinking and smoking the next thing I have to do is sort out my diet and get joined up to a gym, only I can fix what I have done.  

So by the time I got home on Saturday evening all I wanted to do was return to my creature comforts but having a drink, a smoke and inevitably I am sure there would have been some self harm thrown in as well.  
It was really hard, but I am so proud I didn't have a drink, instead I went to bed early, I was exhausted.  I know having the drink would not have solved anything, if anything it would have just delayed the inevitable feelings I was dealing with, and it would make me feel worse, because I would also then feel guilty of having the drink!  I have not had a drink in 6 weeks!!!  

On Sunday we had to watch back our video'd assessments for college.  Now for awhile I have completely avoided any chance to look at myself in the mirror, but there I was, confronted by how other people see me.  Now everyone in my college class is lovely, but when I saw myself on the big screen I was truly horrified.  It is imperative that I do something more about my weight.  Since I gave up drinking I did loose a bit, hopefully with a healthier diet I can continue to reach my goals.  
I am going to have to buy a scale, as much as I hate the thought of having one, I have to do something before it's too late.  

So that's it for this week, I am super proud of myself that I have gone the six weeks without drinking, I have been feeling more engaged in my life because I am not suffering with a hangover most of the time.  I am sleeping more which is amazing, I was only getting about 4 hours sleep a night, now I am averaging 8, such a change for me.  I have nearly slipped up but managed to hang on, and if I can, anyone can with enough determination. 
I am horrified that I weigh so much at the moment, but I will start to make changes that will hopefully lead to a healthier life.  

Healing from an abusive past.

Emotional pain is a b*tch. 

What does it mean to heal from the past?  How do you know when you have healed?  Do you ever truly heal from the past?  How will I know when I am better?

All these are questions that I used to constantly ask my psychiatrist when I was an inpatient for 9 weeks.  9 weeks, sounds so long, in reality it went by in a flash after the first weekend.  I got used to being there, I got used to the routine.  I didn’t want to leave in the end.  But I was glad to get home to my boys, when I was an inpatient, I missed them like crazy.  It was hard in the beginning adjusting to ‘life on the outside’, you become institutionalised being an inpatient with your movements restricted.  But I was so grateful for all the help that I had received whilst I was an inpatient. 

It is nearly a year since I was first admitted to the day hospital, the 29th March.  The last year has been one of the hardest, and longest and at times I didn’t think I wanted to be around anymore because it was so hard.  I had remembered the abuse throughout my life, but anytime it surfaced I would push it back to a place I didn’t have to face it.  Stopping and taking the time to face the past is hard.  Being triggered and finding out more of your past is hard, it’s amazing how the mind works, and how much of our past we are able to bury.  I spent my teen years and in my twenties running so hard from myself, my 30’s I was in self destruct mode along the way, but I tried really hard to be a good Mom and pull myself together.  To cope I started drinking more and more to dull the pain of the present and the past. 

Which day is it Again???

Which day is it Again??? 

So, for a second there I couldn’t remember what day I was on being drink free.  I shocked myself, I thought I would be clock watching all the time, turns out a few days went by, in fact nearly a week without me counting how many days I have gone without drinking!  Who knew I could actually have a day or two free of thinking about drinking or the fact that I have gone alcohol free! 

I am on day 24, doesn’t sound like a lot when you write it down.  But when I think of November and December where I couldn’t go a day without drinking I am pretty happy with the results so far.  The last few days have been tough though.  As I have mentioned before I was sexually abused as a child.  I am still finding it hard to know what to do next on my current journey towards healing myself.  I went to the police and they sent the report off to the country where the abuse happened, but it turned out that it is part of the countries constitution that they will not follow up on a crime that is more than 20 years old.  They recommend I try taking the case to civil court.  I have contacted a lawyer and it turns out I will have to go back in order to proceed with the case if I choose to take legal action.  I was speaking with a friend about it this morning, and she said she is really worried about me because she can see that all of this is eating away at me, and that I need to try and put it behind me.  The problem is I don’t know what to do or how to put it behind me at this point.  What if he does it again, and I know I could have done something to stop him.  How would I live with that knowledge! 

I don’t know what to do, and I really do feel a bit trapped at the moment.  So I know this is having an impact on my emotional state, and my anxiety levels.  Before I would have consumed alcohol to dull the pain, which in turn would lead to sleepless nights filled with insomnia and bad thoughts and feeling depressed which would more than likely lead to me self harming.  Alcohol consumption is also a form of self harm!  But instead I have eaten doughnuts {I have been craving sugar}, and heading to bed early.  I haven't been getting the best nights sleep, and have had bad dreams twice this week already, but I am proud of the fact that I am not drinking and doing more damage to myself.  

Where do we go from here, well I am still taking it one day at a time, trying not to think too far into the future, but I know that I have already come further than I ever thought I could or would.  I have had wobbles, and I have had hard days.  On those days I tend to treat myself to a cake, muffin or doughnut.  

I have tried a few non alcoholic beers and have found one that I like, I have also found non alcoholic gin, having tried a few I know which one I like.  Pouring myself a glass of sparkling water with ice and lemon has also proved a success.  

The hardest thing so far is having to deal with the emotional pain, it is always there, and I would drink  to take the edge off.  Now I have to find healthier alternatives and I am finding them slowly.  If I can do this, anyone can.  You just have to make up your mind to do it.  I think I need to apply that to my other problems too instead of letting them fester.  

It is all a learning curve, and I am learning a lot about myself, I am finding myself after years of self abuse.