Phew

Just when I was starting to think Summer was over, we're going to have another hot one today.  It's early and already warm.  I guess it'll be "full keep things cool" protocols today!

I was out last evening and the air temperature was lovely.  And then I came back into my apartment and the air temperature was not at all lovely!  Which reminds me... I have a thermometer thing around here somewhere... wait, are 'thermometers' the things for when you're sick?  What do you call the regular temperature ones?  Same?  ERMAGHERD it's too early in the day for my brain to think!

Tutus On

It's Tuesday, and were I at Burning Man I would be wearing a tutu since it's often thought of as "tutu Tuesday" out there.

There aren't "theme" days, but wearing a tutu on Tuesday of burn week is something that seems to have become popular moreso than anything else a camp has started.  I think it's because tutus are fun to wear and "tutu Tuesday" is fun to say!

When I was a kid doing ballet, in the youngest classes (think three or four years old) if we'd had a good class (honestly, I have no idea of the teacher's reasoning, I just assumed we'd been "good") she'd pull out a little basket of pull on tutus and we'd get to "dance" around in them until class was over.  It was seriously the highlight of my day/week back then!

Growing up doing ballet I'd look up to the prima ballerinas and at that time most of their performance outfits included a tutu.  Yes, there are reasons (apparently) that tutus became a thing in ballet but they just always looked so cool, and important, and pretty.  And you really only get to wear them for special occasions!  So imagine my joy when someone mentioned before my first year that some people wore a tutu on Tuesday down in BRC.

So I made a few "easy to make" tutus and I happily woke up Tuesday morning that year and put one on!  I've put one on every Tuesday down there since.  They're not comfortable, but hey, who doesn't want to wear a tutu!  YAY!

This doesn't have anything to do with much of course, just..... I'm missing being there this year and yes, I know I could put a tutu on today, it's just in a bin in my closet, but... I'll just wait until the next time I'm down that way... or have some other "legit" reason to. 

Have a good Tuesday y'all.  Tutu or not!

Monday Again

Welp, there's another weekend where I made no time for writing...

Yesterday was my plan but I spent the entire day (like really, it was like a full work day!) helping pass on info and updates for folks on their way to Burning Man (which... sadly, I am not... sigh)

Unfortunately there was a bad accident down that way (right near the entry to the event) and as people aren't always on their devices while travelling (and shouldn't be when driving of course) I tried to sort of be a middle person to pass on the info that the highways were closed, etc.

I did run some errands during the day though and at one point was buying candy (Lik-m-Aid/Fun-Dip to be precise... what, I can't eat the same stuff I did when I was a kid?  That's the whole point of growing up!) and I ran into my parents in the store!  Yep, I totally got found out at buying flavoured sugar, d'oh!

I'm also clearly a little stumped at how to talk about EVERYTHINGGGGGG now that I started talking about everything so most of the time my brain is blank for posts and I sort of try to wait for ... inspiration or something but it's been a couple of weeks now so I may just have to "force" it.

Bit of an odd weekend weather wise... woke up to rain/drizzle two days in a row, but yesterday was sunny and looks like today will be too.  Feels colder to me, but forecasts says it'll warm this week so we'll see how everything goes.

I suppose I had a decent weekend if not terribly exciting.  I tried a "mask" on my hair... a new thing for me, but C-Dawg raved about it and how soft it made her hair so I tried it (I'm a sucker sometimes) and, well, my hair smells nice this morning.

Hope you had a decent weekend and that your week to come is a good one.  I'd much rather be at Burning Man, of course, but I'll be here enjoying running water and electricity and flush toilets and keeping an eye on things down there... a little.  Jason reminded me that I had a hard time last year (and the year before) too but I swear I felt extra sad not going this year.  Some days it's a mixed bag and others I just miss being there. 

The Slowening (I Made That Word Up, You're Welcome)

Alright, where were we?  Somewhere in the Fall of 2015 (or this Monday and a wasp sting, depending on which post you read last!)

I haven't re-read those posts I wrote (it's a bit much when I try...) so bear with me repeating myself if I do, k?  Thanks.

So... very busy summer, came back from an intense Burning Man with an honest to goodness love of my life new relationship and heading back to work hit me really hard and as Fall progressed I started not really being able to handle things and not being able to pretend I was "ok" and I started talking to counselling/support type people and then at their insistence, to my doctor and then within the first few days (or weeks) of being pulled from work I found myself a counsellor to work with and I was (ironically?) broken up with around the same time and that breakup was unrelated (as I hadn't talked to him about what was going on just that I wasn't loving work) but I suppose it didn't help matters and the Christmas holiday trip he'd planned for us had been the ONE thing I was looking forward to and it was suddenly gone and like I said the other week I do wish I'd blogged honestly at the time but I wasn't able to and was warned not to (shrug) so things are not as clear as to how I was doing at the time as they might be...

I remember feeling like I had a lot of appointments and even though I wasn't doing my regular day to day I was still feeling incredibly busy.  Seeing my doctor, seeing the counsellor, seeing the provided/suggested counsellor (work related supports), and all the rest of life things (physio, massage, acupuncture, etc.) that I didn't quite mention all the details to right away but did mention that I thought I was dealing with some anxiety... or something and everyone I dealt with was kind and I'm not sure any of them were surprised but that's neither here nor there.  I was busy.  And everything was tiring.  Draining.

My doctor had thrown in "major depression" on top of all the anxiety diagnoses but I didn't really "buy" it.  She had diagnosed me with depression years and years ago when I had a breakup (I mean, who DOESN'T cry after a breakup!?) and what I felt then did not match what I was feeling now, in 2015.  So because I didn't feel that deep sadness I associated with "depression" I sort of shrugged that part off. 

Looking back now I guess I can see it.  Things were SOOOOOOOO hard.  And I didn't want or didn't have the energy to do anything other than what I "had" to do (appointments, getting basic groceries, etc.)  I, again, didn't fit the stereotypes I had for myself around depression... I could get out of bed, I didn't stop showering or anything, I still talked to Jason and C-Dawg and I interacted with friends and stuff online so... I mean.. that wasn't the depression I'd read about or seen on movies and tv...?  I do remember having a conversation with my counsellor where I said I would like to be doing more physical activity (or exercise) but so often I just couldn't and then telling myself I could at least just walk around the block.. throw a big jacket on and my boots over my pjs and walk around the block and then be like "see?  I got fresh air..." and how that was... like... a lot. 

It was some time around then that I guess I started thinking about what my "bare minimums" could be.  And I have no idea when I started but at some point I started a "22 minute minimum" of "kind of cardio".  So... every day, no matter what, at a bare minimum, I will put my laptop on my kitchen counter, put on some show (oh man the hours and hours I have spent watching shows since I got sick) and walk on the spot in my kitchen with my microwave timer counting down 22 minutes and then I would be like "ok, that's done... got some ... exercise" even though it's not really all that much cardio or all that much of anything it was still something.  And I still do that.  Even on a day where I don't get up to much or don't head outside I will still get that 22 minutes of walking on the spot (or doing weird half dancing on the spot) and I now keep a calendar and I check it off when it's done and I don't miss a day, and I haven't in a long while.  I'm sure it helps, and helped.

I do feel a whole lot lighter now and I suppose I did have depression on top of everything else and even if it wasn't the same as how I remember it or as "bad" as I remember it or thought it "should" be, it was there and it was rough and it didn't help.  At all.  They're a nasty combo... having both depression and anxiety, and I've learned that they tend to tag team for a lot of folks.  And that sucks.  There were things that I didn't notice at the time but see now... like I can walk to my counsellor appointments from my place, and I used to give myself 30 or 40 minutes to get there and that would be just about enough time.  Now?  Well, it's a not even 10 minute walk away and so now I give myself 20 minutes and I often arrive with more than 10 minutes left to wait.  It was a bit stunning when I realized I was moving slowly and not even knowing it.  And I'm not a speed walker by any stretch of the imagination (although I don't stroll much either I guess) but when I noticed I was arriving really really early and started adjusting when I left my place, it was surprising to see I'd been in some slow motion world without knowing.

It's Monday, Whoops!

Well the week and weekend got away from me again and writing posts wasn't something my brain felt up to (it was more of a catch up with good (and bad!) tv shows kind of weekend! whoops!) so I didn't push.

I did, however, get stung by a wasp this morning so that was lame!

Ok, that's me being polite, it was totally unfair!  I was just walking along, minding my own business when out of nowhere BAM on the back of my leg.  Like what?  Can't imagine what I might have done to make that little guy so angry... maybe I accidentally ran over his mother?

Anyhow, it's Monday, it was foggy, now it's not, I got stung by a wasp, now you're all up to date!

Resistance Is Futile

I know I didn't have this awareness at the time, but I wonder if I struggled more than I might have because I was somehow resistant to what was actually going on.

I guess I sort of mean that because I had limited (no?) experience with anxiety (worry, sure, but anxiety?  it's a whole other beast) I wasn't able to say "oh, hey, I'm having panic attacks, let me get some help with that."  It was like "My entire life is falling apart in a way I can't quite figure out or understand and everything is going wrong but it shouldn't be and I can't handle things that I *know* are totally handleable and I was just handling them not that long ago and now I'm getting dizzy spells and other weird stuff (that I know forget) and I know SOMETHING isn't right but I have no idea what and there is no way I have the time or space to figure this out but it isn't getting better I HAVE NO IDEA WHAT TO DO!!!"

Like... I've gone to the doctor plenty of times in my life.  Usually with something I at least partially understand or can figure out an onset for.  Like..."Hey, I have this really deep barking cough that won't go away and keeps me up at night... it's been ten days... I think I might not be getting better." and then you go in and they listen to your chest and ask some questions (are you coughing stuff up?  what colour is it? etc etc) and then maybe you get a chest xray or they take some bloodwork and then they say hey, here's what's going to help, do X, Y, Z, rest for a few days and you should start to feel better.  And usually you DO start to feel better.  And maybe you take that diagnosis and look up home remedies and so you're sipping honey and orange juice teas while you nap on your couch with your antibiotics and cold and flu advil and it'll be a miserable few days but you will start to mend and you'll maybe have a friend who brings you chicken noodle soup and people will commiserate that yeah, they had that cold too, but damn, it didn't turn to bronchitis for them and hope you feel better soon!

Or you walk in with a limp because you tripped over your computer cord and the doctor says ok, go to physio, or hey, put ice on that and take advil, or uh oh, you need an x-ray and, well, you usually go to the doctor with some vague idea, or at least a FRIGGING SYMPTOM!

I feel like I went in just... having no idea what was going on.  Maybe, maybe a small guess that this might be some anxiety?  But with no reason for it to be.  No onset.  No trauma event.  This wasn't even post breakup... everything in my life was fine and good and nothing was "wrong".

I'm not even sure what I might have said in my first few sessions with a counsellor...?  Did I say that my doctor had told me I had to stop work for a while and that I had anxiety?  Did she tell me I had anxiety?  I don't remember.  (I'm half tempted at this stage to ask my counsellor next week what I said in my first few sessions, but that'd be more for our amusement and interest than any therapeutic purpose.)

I guess what I'm saying is that I'm not sure I had any real idea what was going on.  And I'm pretty darn sure I didn't think I'd be dealing with being unwell for more than a few days.  (Ok, a week maybe?  Hmmm... possibly two at this point???)

I can look back now and see a few hints and glimmers and even look and see times I maybe should have paid more attention to what I was thinking and feeling but really, the way I started feeling in Fall of 2015 was new to me.  And it came on in a way that felt sudden and brutal.  I'd had this summer of fun and joy... wedding, cruise, falling deeply in love, Burning Man and BAM.  I remember saying that walking back into work that first week home from Burning Man felt like walking into a brick wall.  But I shook it off, kept moving forward and pushing through until apparently my brain/mind and body said no, you know what?  You're not listening to us... we're going to force the issue.

Anxiety

The CAMH states the following about Anxiety Disorders:  

"Each of these anxiety disorders is distinct in some ways, but they all share the same hallmark features:  

-irrational and excessive fear 
-apprehensive and tense feelings 
-difficulty managing daily tasks and/or distress related to these tasks."

I can tell you for a fact that the fear I was feeling was not irrational.  Not to me. It was real and true and so when I read things like this I thought to myself, well... that doesn't sound right, I'm not dealing with irrational thoughts, my fears aren't excessive... it was sort of confusing.  The "apprehensive and tense" feelings?  Yeah... that was for sure going on.  And while I'm not sure I was aware I was having difficulty managing daily tasks, I certainly was noticing distress... which I guess I could say was causing difficulty. 

They go on to say "The physical symptoms of anxiety may be mistaken for symptoms of a physical illness, such as a heart attack."

And this is what I've heard repeatedly from tv and media, that people having a panic attack think they're having a heart attack.

I didn't.  I KNEW something was wrong with me.  I was having physical symptoms that I had never encountered before and that were disturbing enough that I knew I had to go to the doctor.  But at no point did I or have I ever thought I was having a heart attack.

(Other than the time years ago I unknowingly pulled and intercostal muscle and was having chest pains and did indeed think I was having a heart attack!  Spoiler, I wasn't, yay!)

I am not an expert in anxiety, but I have come to learn that it isn't necessarily going to present in a stereotypical way and it isn't going to look or feel the same way on everyone.  

I wondered for a while if maybe I was going into very early menopause?  Were my hormones going wacky in some way?

So it was the combination of the thoughts and the physical distress that lead me to going to my doctor.  I have to say I'm grateful for her.  Because I'd known her for years, she recognized that I was in great distress.  Now that she has retired and I've gotten a new doctor, I'm realizing that things might have gone very differently had I been with, say, this new doctor.  I wasn't walking in saying "hey, I think I might be manifesting the physical and mental symptoms of an anxiety disorder!" I was walking in going "I'm really not ok and I don't know why, help?!"  So having a doctor that had known me over many years was probably really helpful in that situation.

Like I said, I don't remember much of that initial visit other than it was apparently long, and I'm pretty sure I cried (maybe a lot, not sure.)

Initially

Ok, so I'm trying to recall the initial days of being sick and all and I think one of the things I did pretty quickly was connect with a counsellor.  I literally googled and read through bios and went with someone I had a good feeling about, knowing that if we didn't click, I could just try again with someone else.  (I'll talk more about them later.)

So I saw my doctor a lot in those first few days and weeks and I started seeing a counsellor weekly.  I didn't tell a lot of people that I was off sick.  C-Dawg knew, Jasson knew, my brother knew, I think that was it for a while.  In part because I thought it would just be a couple of days.  And then I thought it would be maybe a week.  Or, ok, maybe ten days... two weeks?  I had no concept of it being anything more than just a little bit of time off but it's almost as if once I stepped away and took "a few days" everything just went boom for me, emotionally and mentally speaking.

It's honestly a bit of a blur at this point.  I have my day planner diary I could fish out of storage and look through but there were appointments almost every day initially.  Doctor here, counsellor type there, acupuncture or whatever else I was doing before, financial type appointments and the list goes on.  I did not just go home and lay on my couch and zone out.  Not all the time anyway.... I had appointment after appointment after meeting after meeting and I was dealing with feeling so unwell, and a breakup and frigging regular life and friendships and family and looking back I have no idea how I did it.

I even just went back and glanced at some posts from December 2015 and y'all?  I sound quite chipper!  Wow.

But I digress.

My doctor, as I think I've half mentioned before here or there, diagnosed me with a fairly long list of diagnoses.  PTSD, Panic Disorder, Social Anxiety, Major Depression, Generalized Anxiety.... I think that's most of them as best I remember.  (I'm sure it's written down somewhere but damn I do not want to start going through records.)

It may sound callous, but the PTSD wasn't anything new, I'd had to deal with some of that after the car accident in... what, 2009?  And I just kind of shrugged off the depression diagnosis since I'd dealt with that in my life before and this felt nothing like that.  But panic and anxiety disorders?  These were new to me.  And frightening.  But in the rare moments of relative calm I figured she was probably right.  This was beyond anything I'd experienced before.  It was more than feeling claustrophobic in a crowded elevator.  It was WAY WAY more than feeling nervous on a blind date.  This was unbearable.  And new to me.  And, as I mentioned, it had started affecting me physically.

I think I knew I was dealing with capital A anxiety because I talked to a few friends who'd confided in me that they had been struggling with anxiety and I told them I thought maybe I was too.  They were the ones who recommended some natural based products that my acupuncturist then agreed might help.  They also, and this is still kind of awkward to talk about, recommended CBD, the non-hallucinogenic portion of marijuana as something that had worked for them, but it wasn't something I was willing to try at the time, nor was it something I knew anything about.  (I did, however, early on ask my doctor if she felt there was any medical marijuana that might help and she practically yelled at me ABSOLUTELY NOT (even though medical marijuana had been legalized for a while by then and I wasn't looking for the "get high" stuff) so.... I didn't ever pursue that with her, even though it wasn't me wanting to smoke a doobie... man, it was me wondering about the "other" stuff...)

So I had my doctor who was very concerned about me and was having me come in regularly (was it almost weekly at first?) and I started seeing a counsellor right away, and I told a very small number of people and I did not talk about it AT FRIGGGING ALL on the blog that I'd been writing on for more than a decade.  And that really didn't help.

The Big One... (That I Maybe Shouldn't Say?)

I'm going to be blunt and honest here and say that I have not been able (well enough) to return to full time work since the end of October, 2015.

I know my big question, were you to tell me a similar thing, would be to ask about financials. (Although I'd probably be too polite to actually ask you, I'd sure as heck wonder.)

And, well, financials are a tricky thing to talk about on a good day, and in this case, it was one of the main reasons Jason told me not to blog about anything.

I know I'm being vague, sorry, but a) privacy b) concerned cuz... dunno?  c) it's money.

So all I'll say is that I don't want to talk about it (in no small part because I was warned not to) but I am struggling but managing. (Kinda)

So, um, yeah.  I hate money, I hate talking about money, it is one of my major major stressors and causes me a massive amount of anxiety.  Many of the panic attacks and worst anxiety I've had since this all happened have involved money and let's just leave it at that.

Relatively speaking, I am a very rich person.  I have a roof over my head, fresh, clean, running water, electricity, food, a vehicle, and the list goes on.  I am grateful and know I'm lucky.

I also, because of what Jason said "DO NOT TALK ABOUT THIS STUFF" and the anxiety that had taken over my life and psyche I was terrified of even existing for a while there.  As in... was every car parked on the street someone watching me to make sure I wasn't faking?  If I smiled at someone on the street, would I get "in trouble" in some way?

None of this might make any sense, but it's what I was stuck in at the time.

And lord do I hate talking about money so can we just leave it for now?  I'm coping and managing but it's not easy and it's a massive, massive stress.

But yeah, spoiler... see sentence one.

(And yeah, sorry, going to turn comments off for this one, I'm freaking out already at the fact that I typed this out and that it might be a really stupid thing to do but y'all?  This is such a stress and has been a major trigger for me.  Major.  So I wanted to be honest... in at least a small way.)

Un-Calm

Man, just writing about this stuff ramps up my anxiety pretty intensely.  Or, as I discovered Sunday night, having written about this stuff ramps it up massively too.  Sigh.  

I'm not going to get things 100% accurate because I'm going from memory and it was a while ago now, but I think before I saw my doctor I maybe made a call to a health and wellness line or something? 

I remember talking to someone on the phone and them asking me if I was a risk to myself or someone else (I wasn't) and then them sort of saying that I should go see my doctor.  I think my brother (?) had suggested I call and while I'm glad those types of lines are there for those who need them, they seemingly didn't apply to me.  I *was* in crisis, just not the type of crisis they're there for, I suppose? 

I also (trying to keep things work related vague) think I contacted a service through HR at work and saw someone (I think it was low/no cost?) who also suggested that I stop work and see my doctor.  I had probably already seen my doctor by that point, but had still not thought (or accepted) that I would be taking more than "a couple" of days off. 

I don't remember what my doctor said or suggested, but I would imagine she gave me some sort of note or letter for work and since I don't talk about work and pretend that I'm a spy (or maybe I really am a spy and am just saying it's "pretend" to throw you off the scent!) I won't get into details and will keep things vague but I would imagine she helped me in dealing with that and I think I thought maybe I would be off work for a week or so, but that CLEARLY there was no way I could take more than that amount of time off.

I remember someone at the time telling me that that was probably a symptom of whatever stresses my brain was dealing with... the thought that my workplace could not and would not function without me; that literally only *I* could do the things that I do in the spy work world.  Or something like that.  I just remember this overwhelming feeling that I couldn't take time, I just couldn't, and the doctors and specialists I talked to in those first few days telling me that not only COULD I, but I actually HAD to.

So I did.

I don't remember the details of those first few days but I do remember that less than a week after I'd dealt with taking a bit of time, Max broke up with me and in our phone call I actually said to him, half laughing "you have no idea what's going on in my life."

I remember C-Dawg coming over when I called to tell her about Max and she brought me a care package (junk food, junk magazines, tea, flowers) and I sat on my kitchen floor crying and looked up at her and smiled... "well, at least I'm off of work already to deal with this breakup!" and then I cried some more.

It was, I suppose, the best possible timing for the bad thing to happen and while the breakup wasn't a cause of my illness, it probably factored in to the difficulty of those first few months.  (Or maybe it didn't... it would have been hard to deal with no matter what, I'm sure.)

Twenty Fifteen

I keep starting and stopping posts in my head.  I think through what I might say as I'm lying in bed some nights and then I wake up and hope the time will magically become right to write it all out or that the inspirational moment will POW show up but... it doesn't, or it hasn't and I keep sort of "hearing" the same first line in my head....

About this exact time in the Summer of 2015 I had no idea my life was about to almost completely unravel.

It was a busy summer, which I'm sure I wrote about at the time.  C-Dawg got married, then my parents took my whole family on a cruise (my first), and all at the same time I was getting to know Max (online) and finding myself really interested and hopeful about meeting him and the wedding was right before the cruise and then I came back from the cruise and was heading out to Burning Man not only to meet Max (and hopefully connect the way we both thought we might) but to take one of my oldest, dearest friends and I probably didn't mention but work had been pretty darn difficult the last while (don't talk about work!) and the wedding was wonderful, the cruise was beautiful but stressful and the drive down to Burning Man I was so worried and anxious about Max and everything but that ended up being amazing too.

I was so happy at the end of that August, and then I came back to work and life and the shortening days of the Pacific Northwest and I guess the best way I can come up with to say it is that I got sick.

I got sick?  I got sick.  I got really sick.  I was really unwell. 

I suppose it was one of those things that both did and didn't sneak up on me.  I'm not sure how many illnesses are truly sudden... a broken bone perhaps, although that's not quite an "illness"... so if we say that I became ill I'm not sure we'd put it all on the Fall of 2015, but I would say that that's when things got really acute... really bad enough that all the ignoring in the world wasn't working.

I'd have to look back and see what I wrote about things at the time.  I know I talked about Burning Man and my relationship with Max and I would imagine that as I was recounting all the best of that is when I was doing increasingly poorly in my day to day.

I can tell you now that I was having panic attacks.  I wouldn't have been able to tell you that then because I didn't know.  I just know that everything was awful.  I had to force myself to do things... to get out of the car and walk into work... to do the things I've done for years at work... to keep up that "everything's ok" mask/facade/truth that I apparently do oh so well.

Before that Fall, the only time I'd had anything close to what I now know as anxiety or panic attacks would be when I had a hard time thinking about getting on a flight after getting very ill just in time for a long, cramped flight home from wherever.  Or after my car accident when I had some form of PTSD and driving was really really scary for a while. 

I got counselling (therapy I suppose if we're technical?) at the time after that accident and it helped and I went back to therapy when my Dad got sick with his heart stuff because it was hard facing the mortality of my parents and I've gone to counselling on and off for most of my adult life for this and that... breakups, relationship struggles, figuring stuff out, but I hadn't *needed* it in a long while, I was doing ok, if not wonderfully.

And then I wasn't.

I remember sometime, probably in October (?) thinking to myself that things weren't "ok".  I was getting dizzy (although that doesn't quite describe it)  I was taking herbs that I'd talked to my acupuncturist about (GABA, skullcap) and it felt like I was self medicating and that it wasn't doing enough.  I'm not sure I can remember all the other things I was experiencing but at some point at the end of October 2015, at least a part of me knew I was pretty damn unwell, and I booked a couple of days off and went in to see my doctor.

I must have gotten an appointment near the end of her (my doctor's) day and not even known it because by the time I got out of that appointment (she had a LOT of questions for me and some checklists and I had no notion of time I just knew that I didn't feel good and that I was scared at how my body and mind were acting and how I was feeling) her office staff only had one person left and they seemed surprised to see me.  I might have been in there a half hour?  An hour?  I don't know.  I just know that she all but insisted that I take some time off of work and that, to me, seemed like the worst possible idea and the end of the world.

And this is where things got extra tricky for me here.  As in *here* at this blog.

Because I don't talk about work. For a number of reasons.  And so here I was about to take a break (?) from work (I thought maybe a week?) and I didn't want to and so wasn't able to talk about it here.

I mentioned to Jason that I didn't know what to do about talking about things here and he said that I absolutely should not talk about things, especially not work and the situation with my health so I suddenly had nothing I felt I was safe to talk about.

Fortunately for us here, Max then ended our relationship (without knowing I was unwell or had been told to take time off) and so I was able to write about that for a while but then things just sort of... became off limits.  Again, I would have to go back through archives to see what all came out of my mouth at the time (or ok, not mouth but hands but you get the point) but it was really an added discomfort not to be able to "journal and diary" in the one place I had been for years and years.

I'm not sure it helped, but it's the choice I made at the time.

I wish now that I *had* written about it.  Because I'd like to be able to look back and see how far I've come.  I'd like to be able to read through just how things were then and maybe even how they progressed, but it was all too big and too scary and too potentially damaging to do so.

Which is why I've ended up here, in 2019 with a blog that drifted far away from being my place to talk and vent and think and grow.

I'm trying to get it back.  I'm still scared and wary and nervous of doing or saying the wrong thing here.  I appreciate those of you who've stuck by through the... nothing.  And I appreciate those of you who are around, even if just from time to time.  I know you care.  I both feel and read your support and it is a gift I cherish.

I hope this post is a catalyst for me to talk and share.  I've been trying to for a while now, with hints and fits and starts and what do they call it... meta blogging, and vague...blogging.  I'm still trying to balance privacy and actual literal smarts (because there are a ton of reasons I don't talk about work and I'm not going to start now) with honesty and truth and talking through and journalling.

Life is a long, strange, trip, they say... I'm hoping to get back to talking more openly about this part of mine.