Tuesday, May 3, 2011

Paranoia will Destroya

Two months ago to the day my mind and body just completely crapped out on me. I had done two straight months of being completely on top of my game and feeling great about it. Then one day, it all just broke.

My anxiety is constant and shifts from quietly lurking in the background to full out, screaming loud hyperventilation as it feels like the weight of the world has been rested on my chest. As I write this, I'm about a five on the ten point scale between those to ends. I'm terrified of everything.

Once again on my lunch hour I found myself in the self-help section of the bookstore scouring the shelves for the book, the program or the workbook that would help me fix my lousy fucking life. But it's not there. No matter how much I want it to be there, it's not.

My neurologist doesn't want me to do cardio (other than walking) or strength training every day because recovering from the nerve fatigue gets harder and harder with each successive day. So instead of figuring out a routine that would work I just quit. I just quit because I know myself.

Building a habit for me means I have to do it, practice it every single day. If I can't do something every day, I won't do it. I know myself. That's how I maintain my employment, I have daily routine that gets me out of bed and to the office and then home again. Any deviation from that can cause problems. Which is why I sit here.

I'm sitting here because I know I am being judged. I'm being judged by everyone I come into contact in a day. That is not rational, but I feel it. Every screaming loud hyperventilation trying to get out is telling me that I am a failure and completely worthless. No book or program or church or whatever is going to fix the MS to take this away.

My brain is broken. That is the most difficult thing for me to accept. I rebel against the idea on an hourly basis, but then reality smacks me in the face by making me bang into a door frame, not be able to lift my arm up, or just leave me so hopeless I wonder if there's any redemption in this world at all.

I keep making plans that keep getting blown up before they even taxi down the runway. It's gotten to the point that if the next plan gets shot down, I'm not telling anyone until they actually happen. It's just too devastating and makes me self-loathe with almost a religious fervor.

My friend Karen sent me a BBM after the MS Walk telling me that I am awesome and the over $2,100 we raised as a team was because of me. I never thanked her, because I was too embarrassed by her words. So Karen, if you are reading this... thank you. Your kindness humbles me.

So here I am with a sink full of dirty dishes left by Joe as he skipped the country, a disorganized house, a 1000 piece photomosaic jigsaw puzzle of the Canadian flag set up on the table, two cross-stitch projects started and one to just do the finishing on and all I can do is sit here and just obsess about how much my life sucks already and how what happened last night can only make matters worse.

I've been through enough therapy in my life to know that reality is what you focus on. I just don't know where you get the drive to just keep going through the motions. I don't have any goals that are important. The only dream I have is to have enough money that I can have a haircut, manicure & pedicure, waxing and threading scheduled in the same month. My only goal is to have a clean enough house and do enough writing in a month that I don't completely lose my mind. I'd like to lose 30 lbs, but that's highly unlikely given my strange food obsessions, fear of cooking and grocery stores and propensity to sit for hours and days on end.

I finally started to cry. That's where this ends.