When I Could Embrace Who I Am

I have been diagnosed with clinical depression and schizoid personality disorder.  A person with schizoid personality disorder avoids social activities and has limited emotional expressions.  And yes, I generally do not like social gatherings of more than four or five people.  In small gatherings, everyone tends to stay together in one group.  I can handle that.  In large gatherings, I can handle it if everyone is involved in the same activity - story-telling or singing, for examples.  But if people are interacting in small groups, I am out of place.  Everyone else forms into a little group, and I am not in a group.  I can "hang out" with a group, eavesdropping, but I am not part of the group.  I can't really follow the conversation.  I get jokes, but other conversations I tend to take literally.  So I don't get it when someone is joking around.  And the noise - different conversations going on at once - is disturbing to me.
Recently, I've been reading about people who are on the Autism Spectrum.  And I realized that many of their comments were true for me as well, although I had never put them into words.  There are things that I find distressful:  loud noises, bright lights, crowds, ceiling fans, scratchy or ill-fitting clothing, wrinkled sheets, bad hair days.  I can't sleep if my sheets or pjs are wrinkled up underneath me.  Feeling the wind from a ceiling fan for too long will give me a headache, as will bright sunshine. I prefer clothes made from cotton.  Other fabrics, especially synthetics, are irritating to me.  By the end of the day, I can't wait to change my clothes.
I need time to decompress after stressful experiences.  Even things I enjoy can leave me craving solitude and quiet.  For example, I have never been able to come home and go straight to bed.  I have to spend time in solitude and let things wash away from me until I feel calm.  Sometimes I have to walk away in the middle of things I am enjoying because they also contain stressors for me.
No, I haven't been diagnosed; nor have I sought out a diagnosis.  It is enough for me to know that I can let go of the struggle trying to be someone I am not.  I don't need to be "fixed."  This is who I am, and I can embrace myself as I am.
So, my friends and family, know that I really do appreciate your invitations to join you, and I do want to be with you.  But also know that being with other people, especially in large groups, comes with a price for me.  Sometimes I can pay the price, but sometimes I cannot.  Imagine that I have a reservoir for interacting with my environment, which includes other people.  That reservoir can be filled up or drained down by what sensory inputs I experience each day.  If I don't show up, it's not because I don't care or don't want to see the people who are there.  It's because my reservoir has been exhausted.  Please do not take it personally.  
And large, loud, crowded events, no thank you.

Ya Just Never Know

It's frustrating that I never know from day to day how I'm going to feel.  Today, I feel pretty good.  But yesterday I didn't get to work until noon, and that followed a whole weekend of not doing anything.  My biggest cooking accomplishment did not rise above a fried egg sandwich.  Peanut butter, crackers, popcorn, and cheese rounded out my meals for the weekend.  Stopped by the store on my way home to pick up a few things.  Really wanted a home-made hamburger with lettuce, tomatoes, pickles, mayo & mustard.  By the time I got home, I was too tired to cook.  Had cereal & milk instead.  Feeling hopeful that I will get that hamburger tonight.



Just wish that I could plan things and count on having the energy to go through with them.  If there is some secret formula of activity + food = feeling good, I'd like to discover the secret.



In the meantime, I'll accept this is my life right now, stay the course, and expect better things in the future.



By the way, after eating low-sodium for weeks, I'm eating a Weight Watchers meal with 560 grams of sodium today.  It is too salty for me.

“Apprehension, uncertainty, waiting, expectation, fear of surprise, do a patient more harm than any exertion.”
Florence Nightengale

Decision

I have been struggling with the issues of health and fitness for 60 years.  Well, okay, maybe that's a stretch.  56 years.  My weight was an issue when I was very young.  My mother tried unsuccessfully to get me to lose weight.  She didn't have a chance at success.  Not when I had an aunt next door who gave me Hershey bars and chocolate milk.  And my dad didn't help, either.  He quickly gave in to my demands for sweets, potato salad, rice and gravy.  So my eating habits and food preferences were set early on.  I remember how proud I was to add corn to my diet - finally, I thought, I'm eating a vegetable.

I've been challenged and encouraged in many different ways by many different people to lose weight.  Nothing ever worked long-term.

Now I am faced with the reality of diabetes, which will devastate my body if I don't control it.  I did very well at the beginning; my nurse practitioner was ecstatic at my results.  However, tax season crumbled away at my ability to stay low-carb, and it has been hard to get back on the wagon again.  Eating high-carb foods leads to eating lots of high-carb foods, which leads to craving high-carb foods.  I would love some chocolate right now.

As I've worked on keeping up the motivation, I've seen plenty of pictures and slogans designed to encourage women to become ultra-fit.  But that will never be me.  Whenever I lose weight, my skin sags, flops and waves around.  It was something that bothered me years ago when I was working out regularly with a trainer.  When I stopped training, and started gaining weight, I had the idea in the back of my mind that the hanging slab that had become my abdomen would fill out and move back up.  That didn't happen.  It continued to hang, just got bigger.

So I'm never going to have a lean silhouette.  All I want is to keep my blood pressure and blood sugar under control, have energy, and be able to move without stiffness and pain limiting my motion.

Mindfulness

My word for the day is mindfulness, otherwise known as the Zen of Chester.  Focusing on whatever I am doing at the moment, fully involved.  Not thinking about what I'm going to do later, or what I need to do.  Being present in the moment.

Lessons I Wish I Hadn't Had to Learn & Other Musings

Wow, it's been so long since I've been here that it took me a while to find  my blog and then to figure out how to sign in and post to it.

Lessons I wish I hadn't had to learn -
 1.  If I sit at just the right spot on my toilet and lean back, I will pee between the rim and the seat.  I will not know that I am doing this until I get up and find myself standing in a puddle of pee.
 2.  Larry the Cable Guy's joke about his grandmother being kicked out the the Bass Pro Shop because the clerks at store thought she was stealing duck calls and stink bait sometimes is not so far off the truth.  For about a month, I embodied his grandma.  I turned into a a real fart machine.  I would go outside and smoke at work just so I could pass gas.  Every time I bent over, or stood up, or made some other move, there I'd go.  Thank goodness it finally went away.  I have no idea why it came or went when it did.  I'm just glad it's gone.

Other musings -
The other night I dreamed that I was involved in some sort of alligator capture.  There were two guys trying to capture the gator, but they were unsuccessful.  After they walked away, I pinned it down with a shepherd's hook (pool safety equipment kind) and started yelling for the guys to come back.  They didn't appear, but Troy Landry showed up in his striped shirt and baseball cap!

Wednesday

I've found an apartment, and have a move in date of March 26.  That is a big relief.  I can relax now.  Of course, there's the packing and moving.  But now I know where I'm going.  I'm really excited about the  complex.  It's a stable community, very well maintained, with a couple of special features.  For example, not only will they accept deliveries for you, they will also place them inside your door, with your permission.  That's a great convenience since I'll be working during the week.  The clubhouse is beautiful, quite large, with an awesome kitchen.  And here's the best part - there's no charge to use it.  The sitting area around the pool is spacious, with plenty of seating in the shade.  And the refrigerators have ice makers.  Yay!  You can check out the apartment at http://www.riveroaksapartmenthomes.com/  My apartment is Model A.  It's smaller than the one I saw, so I won't be taking my love seat. 

Well, time's moving on, so I guess I'll sign off.  I want to get to work early today because I have a quit smoking class at 5 this evening.  I need it because I fell off the non-smoking wagon this weekend, and I really want to quit.

Tuesday

It's almost 6:30, so I'll keep this short.  I was really stressed over finding a new place to live.  The market is pretty tight, and I don't have a lot of time to find a place.  I didn't sleep much at all on Sunday night, and yesterday was a tough day.  I spent all day working on a spreadsheet.  But I had a glass of Coastal Red 2010 when I got home, and that helped a lot!  I slept much better last night.

Well, it's time to get ready for work.