Finally a cozy moment

Since I started my happiness project, I was really having a hard time coping with some weird gnawing feelings that came out of nowhere frequently. It was a sort of desperate feeling, mixed with discontent and longing, with undertones of anger and fear. It was most unpleasant! But now they seem to have abated.

I have no idea what has changed. I still have some very big feelings that are barely kept at bay by the small suite of coping skills I possess. But the gnawing feelings have not put in an appearance for a little while now. I am grateful for that, because they were difficult to handle. I still have to cope moment by moment with feelings of helplessness, resignation, and fear. I want to give up and I am afraid of everything. But even though this is hard, I prefer this painful life to the empty zombie life I was living not long ago. I have my post-its with positive messages stuck on my monitor, and they actually do give me some reinforcement.

I am such a raggedy-ass mess. Hope is so hard to come by. Sometimes I look at my health and I get caught by a wave of despair because I don't think I can undo a lifetime's worth of disrepair. Then again, I don't have chronic pain, I can move freely, I can breathe, I can do for myself. I don't know how much longer that will be the case, but I can take actions now that can extend that. I am struggling with energy and motivation. I was doing well with exercising before the last major depression, but I haven't been able to drag myself back to any kind of level of physical activity. Walking is free, and it is easy, I can do it without help, and I have plenty of places to do it. All I need to do is do it.

Mentally and emotionally, I am changing. I don't know if I am intellectually more active than I was before the crash a year ago, because I was writing more before. However I know that my judgement has improved, and my social contacts have increased tremendously. I was more optimistic a year ago, so maybe I just have not reached the level I was at before. Maybe I am still improving, and the changes I want to make are going to be possible, just around the corner. I certainly wish that were so!

I don't want to have another crash and lose all the ground that I have so laboriously gained. It might be my imagination, but it seems like there is less and less for me to come back to after each major episode. I keep coming back older, more tired, more dysfunctional, with fewer options. At least this time it has only been a year, rather than five! It's hard to face the cyclical nature of my illness, to realize that I am on the way up, and that there will be another turn down, and I have no control over when that will happen. I'm aware of it now, but when it is happening, I won't be. I'll be in the middle of it, wondering why the hell my life suddenly hurts so much more. Right now the meds are working and I'm building as much as I can so that when the wheel does turn, maybe it will not turn as far or take as long to come back. It really is out of my control, though. It's hard to face that. I want to be better and never have another episode again. I would do electroconvulsive therapy, with the possibility of memory loss, in exchange for not losing another precious chunk of my life. It goes so quickly now.

But good grief. I wanted to talk about being cozy! It's raining, but I am inside and warm. I got rained on a little, but I made it to church despite having to work later than I'd planned, and then I went to the store. So now we have plenty of food. We even have some sugar-free candy, just because. There are clean sheets on the bed and a down comforter to snuggle under. It has been an evening of peace, and I have been able to appreciate it. Feeling cozy was something that eluded me during November and December, even though I wished for it deeply. I just could not get comfortable, and it was difficult to enjoy anything, despite feeling grateful for everything and knowing that I had a good life. I really wanted to experience contentment and peace. So tonight I have a mild case of contentment and peace; it's not a transcendent sort of emotion, but it's comfortable and homey.

So let's see if I can summarize. Today was okay, I feel content. I have so much more that I need to be doing, but not enough drive or energy to do it. I might in the future. I'm acknowledging that there will be downswings in the future, and that there is nothing I can do to stop that, but there are things that I can do to cope better. I don't have to lose everything every time. At least that is what I am thinking right now; who knows what I will be thinking when the time comes. All I can do is build as much of a life as I can during this grace period and hope that the structure will carry me through the bad times.

And so to bed, it's nearly 10pm. I have been in bed by 9pm exactly once since I started trying. I don't know what the deal is, you'd think I would dance at the chance to sleep! But anyway, goodnight world.