(no subject)

Once upon a time, I tried out cognitive behavioral therapy, though I didn't approach it with the most open of minds, I've never been well versed in types of therapy and went along with the suggestion. ( Even saying this, I worry about needing to make my emotional problems more legitimate by their persistent nature. If CBT had worked, then maybe I wasn't really as panicky as I thought I was. If Zoloft helps, then somehow, this was my fault all along. ) There was a lot I failed to pick up at first, places where the therapist was trying to help me unlearn things that I don't think I ever learned in the first place. I once spent one session desperately confused because she was trying to explain to me that when I'm having an anxiety attack, even if it feels like I'm having a heart attack, I'm really not. And I don't think I'd ever thought I was having one, but maybe it was a good thing to make explicit.

But, she also got at the same point that pretty much everyone I've seen in a psychiatric capacity in the past 18 years (and that once when I was in second grade) has. I don't know how to self-soothe. I'm here at my desk, with that sinking feeling of dread in my stomach and that jittery sensation that always rounds my shoulders and hunches my back, while my brain free-wheels through all of the things I might have possibly done wrong, trying to find something to attach to. And some of it is about work, but most of it is about people. Was I interesting enough? Was I clear enough? Did I read such-and-such correctly? Should I have come with something more interesting to do/talk about/see?

I liked the part a couple weeks ago, when I was feeling fairly confident and self-sufficient, and I just went to the gym or cleaned something every time I felt lonely. I'm swamped enough at work that most days, I don't really have to be me while I'm doing my work, which pretty much neatly shunts the anxieties to one side. Sure, I'm occasionally petrified I'm doing something wrong, but work has now become absurd enough that it almost doesn't matter. I've told my boss that I simply can't do all the work I was doing, and then some of the admin assistant's duties as well, and I must be mellowing in my old age, but I really do believe they've asked too much, and that's on them, not me.

I want attention so desperately some days. Attention, and possibly a little more self-assurance, a little more belief that I don't have to say the exactly right thing to everyone, that sometimes I might not have to craft the message so carefully to lure people into responding, sometimes people will just talk to me because I say fun and interesting things. I'm convinced, and possibly erroneously so, that there remains the possibility of finding a place, or a set of people where I just don't worry anymore, where I get to believe that I'm not one misstep away from everyone who isn't Light leaving me, and that the misstep isn't just an active thing, but it might be a thing that I'm not doing that I wasn't fast enough or smart enough to figure out needing doing. Today is one of those days.

The other night I had a dream where I was part of an installation art piece called "Kissing people you don't get to have". Blessedly, Asshat wasn't on that roster, but other real people were and it was uncomfortable. Oh, subconscious, when will you stop being such a ham-handed thug?

But "enough" is an impossible, indefinable, fickle goalpost. If the things I want aren't things I can self-generate, then I'm always going to be at the mercy of the elements. And if I don't learn to give the good input more weight than the negative input(internal or external), it's going to be an unwinnable challenge.

External: Catching some of SoS with Delight and her delightful husband was amazing. Seeing the Avengers with Chile was wicked fun. Random person from Arisia gave me random, meaningful compliment. Bespoke said something that made me ache, in what I think is probably an enjoyable if bittersweet way. Internal: I actually went to my very first sewing class, and made idle chitchat with strangers, I weathered a Readercon meeting, I met sweet kittens and even if they weren't the one, there's still a world with kittens in it. I managed to come up with a list of 60 bands/people I've seen perform live. Fig, fennel and almond chocolate is awesome. I'm going to the gym often enough that I can actually see I'm getting stronger. My tattoos still rock mightily, I don't need to think of them the same way I think of trauma. (I believe as soon as I am about three-to-six months away from something, I don't get to talk about it anymore, or try to use it as a way to be understood by other people. Sure, there aren't many days when I don't want a cigarette at some point, but since I quit like nine years ago, I don't usually allow myself to talk about it. Even if I'm still having hot flashes, I started menopause three years ago, it shouldn't be something I admit influences my days.

(no subject)

Once upon a time, I tried out cognitive behavioral therapy, though I didn't approach it with the most open of minds, I've never been well versed in types of therapy and went along with the suggestion. ( Even saying this, I worry about needing to make my emotional problems more legitimate by their persistent nature. If CBT had worked, then maybe I wasn't really as panicky as I thought I was. If Zoloft helps, then somehow, this was my fault all along. ) There was a lot I failed to pick up at first, places where the therapist was trying to help me unlearn things that I don't think I ever learned in the first place. I once spent one session desperately confused because she was trying to explain to me that when I'm having an anxiety attack, even if it feels like I'm having a heart attack, I'm really not. And I don't think I'd ever thought I was having one, but maybe it was a good thing to make explicit.

But, she also got at the same point that pretty much everyone I've seen in a psychiatric capacity in the past 18 years (and that once when I was in second grade) has. I don't know how to self-soothe. I'm here at my desk, with that sinking feeling of dread in my stomach and that jittery sensation that always rounds my shoulders and hunches my back, while my brain free-wheels through all of the things I might have possibly done wrong, trying to find something to attach to. And some of it is about work, but most of it is about people. Was I interesting enough? Was I clear enough? Did I read such-and-such correctly? Should I have come with something more interesting to do/talk about/see?

I liked the part a couple weeks ago, when I was feeling fairly confident and self-sufficient, and I just went to the gym or cleaned something every time I felt lonely. I'm swamped enough at work that most days, I don't really have to be me while I'm doing my work, which pretty much neatly shunts the anxieties to one side. Sure, I'm occasionally petrified I'm doing something wrong, but work has now become absurd enough that it almost doesn't matter. I've told my boss that I simply can't do all the work I was doing, and then some of the admin assistant's duties as well, and I must be mellowing in my old age, but I really do believe they've asked too much, and that's on them, not me.

I want attention so desperately some days. Attention, and possibly a little more self-assurance, a little more belief that I don't have to say the exactly right thing to everyone, that sometimes I might not have to craft the message so carefully to lure people into responding, sometimes people will just talk to me because I say fun and interesting things. I'm convinced, and possibly erroneously so, that there remains the possibility of finding a place, or a set of people where I just don't worry anymore, where I get to believe that I'm not one misstep away from everyone who isn't Light leaving me, and that the misstep isn't just an active thing, but it might be a thing that I'm not doing that I wasn't fast enough or smart enough to figure out needing doing. Today is one of those days.

The other night I had a dream where I was part of an installation art piece called "Kissing people you don't get to have". Blessedly, Asshat wasn't on that roster, but other real people were and it was uncomfortable. Oh, subconscious, when will you stop being such a ham-handed thug?

But "enough" is an impossible, indefinable, fickle goalpost. If the things I want aren't things I can self-generate, then I'm always going to be at the mercy of the elements. And if I don't learn to give the good input more weight than the negative input(internal or external), it's going to be an unwinnable challenge.

External: Catching some of SoS with Delight and her delightful husband was amazing. Seeing the Avengers with Chile was wicked fun. Random person from Arisia gave me random, meaningful compliment. Bespoke said something that made me ache, in what I think is probably an enjoyable if bittersweet way. Internal: I actually went to my very first sewing class, and made idle chitchat with strangers, I weathered a Readercon meeting, I met sweet kittens and even if they weren't the one, there's still a world with kittens in it. I managed to come up with a list of 60 bands/people I've seen perform live. Fig, fennel and almond chocolate is awesome. I'm going to the gym often enough that I can actually see I'm getting stronger. My tattoos still rock mightily, I don't need to think of them the same way I think of trauma. (I believe as soon as I am about three-to-six months away from something, I don't get to talk about it anymore, or try to use it as a way to be understood by other people. Sure, there aren't many days when I don't want a cigarette at some point, but since I quit like nine years ago, I don't usually allow myself to talk about it. Even if I'm still having hot flashes, I started menopause three years ago, it shouldn't be something I admit influences my days.