Dear Friend,
whew, I'm really sleepy! That's a good thing. Today started off rough. I set my alarm, but didn't turn it on, so I was sound asleep when workers came in the house. They were locksmiths who needed to do work on several of the inside doors. So I called through my bedroom door for them to do two of the other doors before starting on the ones in my bedroom. I tried as best as I could to wake up and got dressed and went it to talk to them. I looked white as a sheet. Seriously. One bathroom door didn't have a lock on it, and one bathroom door wouldn't even latch AND didn't have a lock. My husband's bathroom door had broken and all sorts of other things. It's really weird having separate bathrooms! I'd love to open up the wall between them and redo them into one glorious bathroom! It's not going to happen, of course, but it's nice to dream.
A worker also came out and hung up six of my curtain rods finally. They look really great. The rods haven acted crystal globes at the end that look a lot like the crystal doorknobs all through the house. I told him not to hang the drapes, br he did anyway. They are very wrinkled, I'm going to try steaming them first, but I suspect I will have to iron them. That's going to be a LOT of ironing,
I got a good amount of work done today, though I did not leave the house and do any errands. I blamed it on there being people in the house all day, but the truth was that I didn't want to leave. I also out off having a prayer time till the last minute because I had determined that I was going to sit outside to pray ... and that was hard. Al I could do was sit there looking at all the work that needed to be done, but I did go outside and have my prayer time. I have to claim this space and make it mine.
Tomorrow is a big day. I hope to be able to clean all of the rest of my cushions. They took the pressure washer back for some work they were doing, but they're supposed to let me use it Saturday. Then I found some stuff that yu spray onto cushions to make them waterproof. I'm definitely going to do that! That will help a whole lot.
There's supposed to be a plant sale tomorrow down at the train depot. I need to buy a BUNCH of flowers!
We have a very important dinner with all of the trustees and all sorts of other people next week ... I think it's next weekl. I've been looking for the perfect dress to wear because I don't think I have anything that's right for it. Especially my first time to go when I don't really know hw people dress. I was advised to wear a cocktail-length dress ... and that was the extent of the advice. I know when in doubt, you're supposed to dress down a little, it's better to be slightly under-dressed than over-dressed, and I know I want to wear navy. So I fnd two wonderful dresses in modcloth and a gorgeous pair of retro heels in navy! One of our school colors is navy and I want to "represent"! I also ordered a few other pairs of navy shoes all on incredible sales on 6pm! I wish I had learned about this site sooner. I don't think a single one cost more than $30 something.
Tomorrow is a big, big day for our daughter. It would have been the fifth anniversary for her and her boyfriend. So it's working out that she and I are going into the city tomorrow night for dinner and to watch an off-Broadway show her company is producing. For free! So that should be fun. And she's getting her hair cut tomorrow which should lift her spirits considerably. She learned today that the owner is already talking about possibly hiring her at the end of the internship because she's doing such a good job. That would be so wonderful!
I hope you have a great weekend!
Lisa
Friday, May 1, 2015
Thursday, April 30, 2015
Day 58 - Crashed But Didn't Burn
Dear Friend,
Well, today was a it of a no-go. I woke up feeling just very, very week. I wasn't able to get anything done this morning. It took all my energy just to make myself a sandwich for lunch. So that whole, great to-do list got chucked. I was able to get dressed and made it to my psychologist appointment. We talked about how shut down I was last week. Apparently, it was pretty extreme from the way she talked about it. I told her I still felt very shut down and hidden and guarded which surprised me because I expected it to be gone by now. We talked about what she thinks made it so bad was having my mother in my house. I haven't felt this way when I've gone to see her, but being in my house made me feel in danger, so I threw up all the guards internally that I had. When I let myself relax a ought to examine it I could tell that I was still clenched up in a little knot of fear inside. She talked about somatic memory. I didn't follow it all, but apparently yr body harbors memories you made from before you had language. And so when you hit a trigger, the body remembers and reacts. She tried doing a body relaxation thing with me to unclench my gut, and it was going well until we hit my thighs and then a series of really bad memories hit. While I jockeyed it around I made a decision, there is a particular terror from my childhood and growing up years that has always been too frightening for me to talk about. I decided that I was going to deal with it with her. So I told her about it and what I decided. It's kind of out of her realm of expertise, but she's game to go there with me. I warned her that next week I would probably have shut down entirely on it and won't want to talk about it at all, when was why I needed to tell her today. As you can tell, I haven't decided yet if I'm going to take about it here or not.
I told her that I had burned a candle in the room my mother stayed in one day, a candle called "Healing" that is made with essential oils that are supposed to have healing properties. Go ahead and groan, it won't bother me! That I had burned it all day as sort of a reclaiming of my space. I told her I felt like burning a sage stick but had wondered if it was too pagan of a practice. She said she didn't think so, that it was a ceremonial act of purifying and cleansing your space and that there's a lot of benefit from ceremony. Here's a short article about what I'm talking about. http://www.beliefnet.com/columnists/freshliving/2009/07/how-to-cleanse-your-home-with-sage.html
Then I went to my naturopath to get my Xanax and klonopin refills and I went ahead and had a saline infusion while I was there. I didn't watch my water or salt intake for a whole week and a half and I think I had lost a lot of blood plasma. I paid attention today, and sure enough, I was peeing all the time. So a liter of saline water ought to help a lot. She added some extra B12 to the mix since I was pretty run down. I hope to be feeling better tomorrow.
That's it for me now. I think I'm going to be able to go to sleep a little earlier than usual. But I do still have to make my to-do list for tomorrow. I'm helpless without it! Maybe I'll do a lemonade fast over the weekend. Maybe not. Well see.
Cheers!
Lisa
Well, today was a it of a no-go. I woke up feeling just very, very week. I wasn't able to get anything done this morning. It took all my energy just to make myself a sandwich for lunch. So that whole, great to-do list got chucked. I was able to get dressed and made it to my psychologist appointment. We talked about how shut down I was last week. Apparently, it was pretty extreme from the way she talked about it. I told her I still felt very shut down and hidden and guarded which surprised me because I expected it to be gone by now. We talked about what she thinks made it so bad was having my mother in my house. I haven't felt this way when I've gone to see her, but being in my house made me feel in danger, so I threw up all the guards internally that I had. When I let myself relax a ought to examine it I could tell that I was still clenched up in a little knot of fear inside. She talked about somatic memory. I didn't follow it all, but apparently yr body harbors memories you made from before you had language. And so when you hit a trigger, the body remembers and reacts. She tried doing a body relaxation thing with me to unclench my gut, and it was going well until we hit my thighs and then a series of really bad memories hit. While I jockeyed it around I made a decision, there is a particular terror from my childhood and growing up years that has always been too frightening for me to talk about. I decided that I was going to deal with it with her. So I told her about it and what I decided. It's kind of out of her realm of expertise, but she's game to go there with me. I warned her that next week I would probably have shut down entirely on it and won't want to talk about it at all, when was why I needed to tell her today. As you can tell, I haven't decided yet if I'm going to take about it here or not.
I told her that I had burned a candle in the room my mother stayed in one day, a candle called "Healing" that is made with essential oils that are supposed to have healing properties. Go ahead and groan, it won't bother me! That I had burned it all day as sort of a reclaiming of my space. I told her I felt like burning a sage stick but had wondered if it was too pagan of a practice. She said she didn't think so, that it was a ceremonial act of purifying and cleansing your space and that there's a lot of benefit from ceremony. Here's a short article about what I'm talking about. http://www.beliefnet.com/columnists/freshliving/2009/07/how-to-cleanse-your-home-with-sage.html
Then I went to my naturopath to get my Xanax and klonopin refills and I went ahead and had a saline infusion while I was there. I didn't watch my water or salt intake for a whole week and a half and I think I had lost a lot of blood plasma. I paid attention today, and sure enough, I was peeing all the time. So a liter of saline water ought to help a lot. She added some extra B12 to the mix since I was pretty run down. I hope to be feeling better tomorrow.
That's it for me now. I think I'm going to be able to go to sleep a little earlier than usual. But I do still have to make my to-do list for tomorrow. I'm helpless without it! Maybe I'll do a lemonade fast over the weekend. Maybe not. Well see.
Cheers!
Lisa
Wednesday, April 29, 2015
Day 59 - Got a Lot Done Today
Dear Friend,
I felt better today, thank goodness. I had a couple of moments of feeling very weak and one almost-passing-out moment, but overall ... much better.
I worked very hard today. Altogether harder than I care to work! But I did get a lot done. I got most of the laundry done and I got almost all of the packages packed up and loaded into my car.
The goal tomorrow is to go to the Salvation Army to donate a bunch of things. Then UPS and the post office. Then Talbots, Chicos, Loft, Lord & Taylor, Bed Bath and Beyond, and Nordstrom! And make it to an appointment with my psychologist by 2:30 and then my doctor at 3:45! Then I'm going to stop at a grocery store to pick up dinner and come home. I've got so many returns to make! So, so, soooo many returns!!! I've got a nice, tidy plan for tomorrow and have already written out all of the addresses for every place I need to go.
My husband was able to get home earlier than I had expected, so I felt bad about the kind of crummy meal I had planned for just my daughter and I. I made turkey patties and a frozen bag of sweet potato fries, some corn and roasted Brussels Sprouts. Pretty yucky, but it will keep body and soul together at least.
I watched another TED talk this morning and really enjoyed it. It's a good way to help myself to wake up in the morning.
In all my doing, though, guess what I did NOT do? EXERCISES!! Apparently I'm still at the bottom of my list when it comes to priorities!
I opened an email today and found I have to give six more events in the near future. In fact, I'll be hosting a dinner for 21 on Monday!
They finally installed the light fixture I got for the bottom of the back staircase. It matches the really beautiful one at the top of the staircase. The plaster is cracking badly, and so we've decided to -- wait for it -- put wallpaper over it and let someone else deal with it some time in the future!! But I can't pick out the wallpaper until they get in the runner for the stairs. What is there is so hideous, I just can't tell you!
I'm trying to pick out an 11-ft umbrella for the wicker dining table and chairs by the pool, and two 9-ft umbrellas for the patio. That patio gets so hot in the middle of the day, and there are bees nesting under the field stones!
Well ... I'm closing down now. Speaking of closing down, I still don't feel like I've completely come back out of hiding since my mother left. There's still a pretty tight wall of protection up. I thought it would be gone by now.
Our air conditioner upstairs is completely frozen up! It's not being too bad tonight, but I sure hope they are able to get it working tomorrow. Right now they are just waiting for all the ice to melt.
Nighty night!
Lisa
I felt better today, thank goodness. I had a couple of moments of feeling very weak and one almost-passing-out moment, but overall ... much better.
I worked very hard today. Altogether harder than I care to work! But I did get a lot done. I got most of the laundry done and I got almost all of the packages packed up and loaded into my car.
The goal tomorrow is to go to the Salvation Army to donate a bunch of things. Then UPS and the post office. Then Talbots, Chicos, Loft, Lord & Taylor, Bed Bath and Beyond, and Nordstrom! And make it to an appointment with my psychologist by 2:30 and then my doctor at 3:45! Then I'm going to stop at a grocery store to pick up dinner and come home. I've got so many returns to make! So, so, soooo many returns!!! I've got a nice, tidy plan for tomorrow and have already written out all of the addresses for every place I need to go.
My husband was able to get home earlier than I had expected, so I felt bad about the kind of crummy meal I had planned for just my daughter and I. I made turkey patties and a frozen bag of sweet potato fries, some corn and roasted Brussels Sprouts. Pretty yucky, but it will keep body and soul together at least.
I watched another TED talk this morning and really enjoyed it. It's a good way to help myself to wake up in the morning.
In all my doing, though, guess what I did NOT do? EXERCISES!! Apparently I'm still at the bottom of my list when it comes to priorities!
I opened an email today and found I have to give six more events in the near future. In fact, I'll be hosting a dinner for 21 on Monday!
They finally installed the light fixture I got for the bottom of the back staircase. It matches the really beautiful one at the top of the staircase. The plaster is cracking badly, and so we've decided to -- wait for it -- put wallpaper over it and let someone else deal with it some time in the future!! But I can't pick out the wallpaper until they get in the runner for the stairs. What is there is so hideous, I just can't tell you!
I'm trying to pick out an 11-ft umbrella for the wicker dining table and chairs by the pool, and two 9-ft umbrellas for the patio. That patio gets so hot in the middle of the day, and there are bees nesting under the field stones!
Well ... I'm closing down now. Speaking of closing down, I still don't feel like I've completely come back out of hiding since my mother left. There's still a pretty tight wall of protection up. I thought it would be gone by now.
Our air conditioner upstairs is completely frozen up! It's not being too bad tonight, but I sure hope they are able to get it working tomorrow. Right now they are just waiting for all the ice to melt.
Nighty night!
Lisa
Tuesday, April 28, 2015
Day 60 - Looking for 1% Improvements
Dear Friend,
Best laid plans and all that. I set my alarm for 8:00 this morning and was using the snooze button, but somehow must have turned it off because the next thing I knew, it was 10:00. As you know, it takes me a while to get moving, but I watched a TED talk and did a few other things and was out of bed by 11:00. It took me almost two full hours to clean the kitchen and the island! The crockpot in which I burned the BBQ chicken is still having to soak! After about thirty minutes of working fatigue slammed into me like a brick. Or I slammed into it like a brick wall. Or whatever the appropriate metaphor is. I kept working, though, and before long I started hurting badly in my legs which turned into aching all over my body, even my face. I was taking some things into one of the bathrooms and caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror and realized that I looked green! Shortly after that the chills hit me. So I went back to bed on a heating pad with the electric blanket turned up high. The fever never "broke", but I didn't have chills anymore when I woke up after sleeping hard for three hours.
I read my Bible and had a prayer time and ordered some delivery for my daughter and I. She got home around 7:00 and we had a nice talk about her day. She is really liking working at this place and commented on how much better she feels to be doing something. Gee! That sounds familiar, like maybe my husband or I said that to her once or twice in the past!
The turkey wrap made me terribly sick at my stomach and I couldn't eat the fries at all. I felt well enough to get a little more done to the house before my husband got home around 9:00.
I think I can get the house cleaned tomorrow and get all my packages ready to be sent back and get a food order in. If I could get the laundry done, too, that would be amazing!
I found out about a conference by an organization called longevity now. It's apparently got every health guru there is in America. They have a ton of videos online. I watched one the other day about an experiment done on plants using grounding. This is a new thing in the health world, but it seems like it's got some merit. I know my husband will mock, but the basic theory, as I understand it, is that ... well you know that all the body processes are carried out by electricity, right? Your body has an electric charge. And the earth has an electric charge and ... oh, well ... Anyway, the basic thing is that we need to be in actual physical contact with the earth every day, like waking barefoot on grass or sitting down on the lawn or things that out us in direct contact with the earth. Because ... the earth is basically negatively charged so there are loose electrons on the surface of the earth and they enter your body when you have direct contact. This shifts the electrical charge of your body in beneficial ways. And, free radicals are oxygen atoms that are missing an electron and so they cause all sorts of damage to your body. The idea is that the electrons that enter your body will bind with these oxygen atoms and provide the missing electron which causes them to stop their damaging maurading. At least that's the best I understand it right now. I know the part about the free radicals and anti-oxidants is true. But the idea of receiving needed electrons by direct contact with the ground to take care of this is new. But, they showed an experiment done with flowers that was amazing. In one set of flowers they put a grounding wire and in the other they out an inert wire. The difference between the growth and duration of the flowers was astounding!
I subscribed to newsletters by a guy named James Clear. It's all about how to become ... better. I read an article tonight by him and it was really good. It was about improving things by 1% and seeing how the cumulative consequences of these 1%improvements bring about great change. So, instead of trying to create dramatic change in your life, try instead to make a 1% change in all sorts of areas of your life. It was encouraging.
So, tomorrow I'm back to trying to get the house fully back together from the effects of the inauguration and all the visitors. It's frustrating to be working to regain lost ground instead of moving forward but, c'est la vie. At least the worse if over ... I think!
Cheers!
Lisa
Best laid plans and all that. I set my alarm for 8:00 this morning and was using the snooze button, but somehow must have turned it off because the next thing I knew, it was 10:00. As you know, it takes me a while to get moving, but I watched a TED talk and did a few other things and was out of bed by 11:00. It took me almost two full hours to clean the kitchen and the island! The crockpot in which I burned the BBQ chicken is still having to soak! After about thirty minutes of working fatigue slammed into me like a brick. Or I slammed into it like a brick wall. Or whatever the appropriate metaphor is. I kept working, though, and before long I started hurting badly in my legs which turned into aching all over my body, even my face. I was taking some things into one of the bathrooms and caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror and realized that I looked green! Shortly after that the chills hit me. So I went back to bed on a heating pad with the electric blanket turned up high. The fever never "broke", but I didn't have chills anymore when I woke up after sleeping hard for three hours.
I read my Bible and had a prayer time and ordered some delivery for my daughter and I. She got home around 7:00 and we had a nice talk about her day. She is really liking working at this place and commented on how much better she feels to be doing something. Gee! That sounds familiar, like maybe my husband or I said that to her once or twice in the past!
The turkey wrap made me terribly sick at my stomach and I couldn't eat the fries at all. I felt well enough to get a little more done to the house before my husband got home around 9:00.
I think I can get the house cleaned tomorrow and get all my packages ready to be sent back and get a food order in. If I could get the laundry done, too, that would be amazing!
I found out about a conference by an organization called longevity now. It's apparently got every health guru there is in America. They have a ton of videos online. I watched one the other day about an experiment done on plants using grounding. This is a new thing in the health world, but it seems like it's got some merit. I know my husband will mock, but the basic theory, as I understand it, is that ... well you know that all the body processes are carried out by electricity, right? Your body has an electric charge. And the earth has an electric charge and ... oh, well ... Anyway, the basic thing is that we need to be in actual physical contact with the earth every day, like waking barefoot on grass or sitting down on the lawn or things that out us in direct contact with the earth. Because ... the earth is basically negatively charged so there are loose electrons on the surface of the earth and they enter your body when you have direct contact. This shifts the electrical charge of your body in beneficial ways. And, free radicals are oxygen atoms that are missing an electron and so they cause all sorts of damage to your body. The idea is that the electrons that enter your body will bind with these oxygen atoms and provide the missing electron which causes them to stop their damaging maurading. At least that's the best I understand it right now. I know the part about the free radicals and anti-oxidants is true. But the idea of receiving needed electrons by direct contact with the ground to take care of this is new. But, they showed an experiment done with flowers that was amazing. In one set of flowers they put a grounding wire and in the other they out an inert wire. The difference between the growth and duration of the flowers was astounding!
I subscribed to newsletters by a guy named James Clear. It's all about how to become ... better. I read an article tonight by him and it was really good. It was about improving things by 1% and seeing how the cumulative consequences of these 1%improvements bring about great change. So, instead of trying to create dramatic change in your life, try instead to make a 1% change in all sorts of areas of your life. It was encouraging.
So, tomorrow I'm back to trying to get the house fully back together from the effects of the inauguration and all the visitors. It's frustrating to be working to regain lost ground instead of moving forward but, c'est la vie. At least the worse if over ... I think!
Cheers!
Lisa
Monday, April 27, 2015
Day 60 - Trying This "Kindness" Thing!
Dear Friend,
Sometimes I really hate keeping this blog. Especially when I bombed again, two days in a row. I had a terrible time waking up again this morning. My daughter told me to try taking my Welbutrin in the morning when I take the cortisol because it helps wake you up also. I kept falling into a dream where my mother had cancer and I was trying to find her a place to live where we used to live in Oxford, Mississippi. It was a very strange dream and I was very upset because she had cancer. Anyway, I finally grabbed my iPad and pulled up TED Talks. I listened to one by a pediatrician who talked about how childhood trauma has lasting health effects, even greatly increasing your risks for heart disease and cancer. Something she mentioned that was interesting is that the amygdala in people who experienced constant childhood trauma is bigger than the amygdala in people with normal childhoods. The amygdala is the gland in your brain that creates adrenaline ad is responsible for your feelings of fear and fear conditioning. And it is actually larger in adults who had trauma-filled childhoods. It was very interesting, and it did wake me up. But it wasn't exactly cheering or encouraging.
I didn't function as well today as I had hoped. I remained very sleepy all day. I did, however, do something significant. I went outside.
I don't know if I told you that I used to have full-blown agoraphobia, fear of open places. It came on me after the nervous breakdown I had when I was 37. I couldn't leave the house without having a major panic attack. For one long period, two years, I didn't leave the house at all. Then one day, I went outside and walked around the house three times and then went back inside. That was all I could stand. I eventually got past it, but I've had some problems with it since we moved. Very small problems comparatively speaking. But quite noticeable. I just really, really don't want to leave the house, and it's very hard for me to make myself do it. I CAN do it. I just REALLY don't want to.
Before we moved, I was outside as much as was possible. All of my prayer times, Bible reading, emailing, work of any nature involving the computer, planning grocery lists were all done outside. But since we've moved, I've stayed almost exclusively inside. But, today, I took my prayer journal and went out to the patio and sat there and read my Bible and had my prayer time and planned out my day. I was uneasy, sure. But I stayed. So I think that was an important step. I want to take the power washer out there and spray everything really, really good. Even the flagstones! I have a lot of planters to fill and I need to clean the cushions and the furniture, but it shouldn't be too terribly hard to get it looking really nice. I'm planning on sitting outside again. I want to build my tolerance up so that I can start going on walks in the area. Hopefully before summer is over I'll be doing that.
Between not being able to wake u all day, starting the day with a talk ant childhood trauma and then making myself go outside and stay there ... well, I was just "off" for the rest of the day.
My husband had an event tonight and asked if I could have supper ready by 6:00 and mentioned that he would be really hungry because of not being able to eat during the day. So, I phoned in a refill for a prescription of his to Walgreens and then planned a menu and wrote out a grocery list. Then I went to Walgreens and the grocery store. I didn't feel well at all doing the shopping sort of like I didn't have any blood pressure or something. I haven't been paying attention to eating a lot of salt, so I may have lost some blood volume.
Anyway, I came home and started dinner and actually had it ready at 6:00. But, after he left, our daughter got home so I sat with her while she ate and we started a documentary our son told us about called "Fed Up" about the food industry. Then, when she finished eating, instead of getting up and cleaning the kitchen and doing the other things I needed to do, I sat there still watching the show and trying to figure out menus for this week and get a grocery order filled out. But nothing sounded good at all. I didn't pay attention to the time and then saw it was almost 8:30! So I jumped up and started the dishes. I forgot to turn on the dishwasher on Sunday, so I couldn't load very many things. And then my husband got home and I had to just get that load started and sit down with him for a little bit to watch "Friends" before going to bed. Unfortunately, we watched two episodes that were Ross and Rachel breaking up badly. So I guess that was the perfect end to an already uncomfortable day.
The kitchen is still a mess, and I realized that I haven't dealt with the crock pot with the burned BBQ chicken in it! Two nights in a row that I didn't get the kitchen clean!! So, I'm alternating between "I hate myself! I'm a terrible person! I'm such a loser!" and, trying to be kind to myself and giving myself room to not function well without hating myself for it.
But,the cleaning company is coming tomorrow, so I have to have everything cleaned by 1:00 when they get here! The whole house is kind of a mess and I still haven't taken care of all of these packages yet!!
What would be lovely tomorrow would be to have everything ready for them at 1:00 and be able to leave the house and go to Starbucks and read my Bible and pray and get a grocery order in. My husband has a dinner to go to tomorrow night, so I'll have some extra time to work on the house. I'm wanting to start spending fifteen minutes a day in the basement, maybe unpack just one box.
Didn't exercise today, either. I am hoping for and planning on a much better day tomorrow. I'm about to write out my to-do list right now.
Cheers!
Lisa
Sometimes I really hate keeping this blog. Especially when I bombed again, two days in a row. I had a terrible time waking up again this morning. My daughter told me to try taking my Welbutrin in the morning when I take the cortisol because it helps wake you up also. I kept falling into a dream where my mother had cancer and I was trying to find her a place to live where we used to live in Oxford, Mississippi. It was a very strange dream and I was very upset because she had cancer. Anyway, I finally grabbed my iPad and pulled up TED Talks. I listened to one by a pediatrician who talked about how childhood trauma has lasting health effects, even greatly increasing your risks for heart disease and cancer. Something she mentioned that was interesting is that the amygdala in people who experienced constant childhood trauma is bigger than the amygdala in people with normal childhoods. The amygdala is the gland in your brain that creates adrenaline ad is responsible for your feelings of fear and fear conditioning. And it is actually larger in adults who had trauma-filled childhoods. It was very interesting, and it did wake me up. But it wasn't exactly cheering or encouraging.
I didn't function as well today as I had hoped. I remained very sleepy all day. I did, however, do something significant. I went outside.
I don't know if I told you that I used to have full-blown agoraphobia, fear of open places. It came on me after the nervous breakdown I had when I was 37. I couldn't leave the house without having a major panic attack. For one long period, two years, I didn't leave the house at all. Then one day, I went outside and walked around the house three times and then went back inside. That was all I could stand. I eventually got past it, but I've had some problems with it since we moved. Very small problems comparatively speaking. But quite noticeable. I just really, really don't want to leave the house, and it's very hard for me to make myself do it. I CAN do it. I just REALLY don't want to.
Before we moved, I was outside as much as was possible. All of my prayer times, Bible reading, emailing, work of any nature involving the computer, planning grocery lists were all done outside. But since we've moved, I've stayed almost exclusively inside. But, today, I took my prayer journal and went out to the patio and sat there and read my Bible and had my prayer time and planned out my day. I was uneasy, sure. But I stayed. So I think that was an important step. I want to take the power washer out there and spray everything really, really good. Even the flagstones! I have a lot of planters to fill and I need to clean the cushions and the furniture, but it shouldn't be too terribly hard to get it looking really nice. I'm planning on sitting outside again. I want to build my tolerance up so that I can start going on walks in the area. Hopefully before summer is over I'll be doing that.
Between not being able to wake u all day, starting the day with a talk ant childhood trauma and then making myself go outside and stay there ... well, I was just "off" for the rest of the day.
My husband had an event tonight and asked if I could have supper ready by 6:00 and mentioned that he would be really hungry because of not being able to eat during the day. So, I phoned in a refill for a prescription of his to Walgreens and then planned a menu and wrote out a grocery list. Then I went to Walgreens and the grocery store. I didn't feel well at all doing the shopping sort of like I didn't have any blood pressure or something. I haven't been paying attention to eating a lot of salt, so I may have lost some blood volume.
Anyway, I came home and started dinner and actually had it ready at 6:00. But, after he left, our daughter got home so I sat with her while she ate and we started a documentary our son told us about called "Fed Up" about the food industry. Then, when she finished eating, instead of getting up and cleaning the kitchen and doing the other things I needed to do, I sat there still watching the show and trying to figure out menus for this week and get a grocery order filled out. But nothing sounded good at all. I didn't pay attention to the time and then saw it was almost 8:30! So I jumped up and started the dishes. I forgot to turn on the dishwasher on Sunday, so I couldn't load very many things. And then my husband got home and I had to just get that load started and sit down with him for a little bit to watch "Friends" before going to bed. Unfortunately, we watched two episodes that were Ross and Rachel breaking up badly. So I guess that was the perfect end to an already uncomfortable day.
The kitchen is still a mess, and I realized that I haven't dealt with the crock pot with the burned BBQ chicken in it! Two nights in a row that I didn't get the kitchen clean!! So, I'm alternating between "I hate myself! I'm a terrible person! I'm such a loser!" and, trying to be kind to myself and giving myself room to not function well without hating myself for it.
But,the cleaning company is coming tomorrow, so I have to have everything cleaned by 1:00 when they get here! The whole house is kind of a mess and I still haven't taken care of all of these packages yet!!
What would be lovely tomorrow would be to have everything ready for them at 1:00 and be able to leave the house and go to Starbucks and read my Bible and pray and get a grocery order in. My husband has a dinner to go to tomorrow night, so I'll have some extra time to work on the house. I'm wanting to start spending fifteen minutes a day in the basement, maybe unpack just one box.
Didn't exercise today, either. I am hoping for and planning on a much better day tomorrow. I'm about to write out my to-do list right now.
Cheers!
Lisa
Sunday, April 26, 2015
Day 61 - Rats!! Wasted the Day
Dear Friend,
I'm trying to not be too hard on myself, but I'm still pretty irritated. Today slid right out from under me. I couldn't sleep last night. After I wrote down everything that still had to be done outside, I think that made me get tense and I wound up not going to sleep till after 3:00 am. I did, though, get up and we went to this church. I really liked it again. It was "missionary Sunday". If yu don't know what that is, it means you didn't grow up Baptist! This is not a Baptist church, but it does have a strong emphasis on missions. So, we groaned inwardly, remembering too many awful sermons in our past by missionaries. So we were surprised that this one turned out to be really good! I was glad we went.
There wasn't any time to stop for groceries on the way home because my husband had an afternoon event he had to get to. So I scrounged up something to eat and went to bed immediately. Slept solid till 3:00 in the afternoon and then basically stayed 75% asleep and 25% awake the rest of the day. I got caught in this zombie book and couldn't out it down until just now. The Raising of Stony Mayhall. It's about a zombie baby that is found by an old woman and her three daughters and is kept hidden in their home where he grows up, completely loving, sentient, and non-violent, but definitely ... dead. It's a long, involved story, very highly rated and reviewed. Everyone said they couldn't put it down and I'll be darned if they weren't right!
Anyway. I just finished it and read my Bible and I'm going to go on to sleep now. I'll have to make my to-do list in the morning. I can't believe I did so badly today. Maybe stress will start winding down and I'll stop reading so much fiction. One can hope!
I hope you had a good weekend and are ready for Monday! Who am I kidding?? Is anyone EVER ready for Monday?!
Cheers!
Lisa
I'm trying to not be too hard on myself, but I'm still pretty irritated. Today slid right out from under me. I couldn't sleep last night. After I wrote down everything that still had to be done outside, I think that made me get tense and I wound up not going to sleep till after 3:00 am. I did, though, get up and we went to this church. I really liked it again. It was "missionary Sunday". If yu don't know what that is, it means you didn't grow up Baptist! This is not a Baptist church, but it does have a strong emphasis on missions. So, we groaned inwardly, remembering too many awful sermons in our past by missionaries. So we were surprised that this one turned out to be really good! I was glad we went.
There wasn't any time to stop for groceries on the way home because my husband had an afternoon event he had to get to. So I scrounged up something to eat and went to bed immediately. Slept solid till 3:00 in the afternoon and then basically stayed 75% asleep and 25% awake the rest of the day. I got caught in this zombie book and couldn't out it down until just now. The Raising of Stony Mayhall. It's about a zombie baby that is found by an old woman and her three daughters and is kept hidden in their home where he grows up, completely loving, sentient, and non-violent, but definitely ... dead. It's a long, involved story, very highly rated and reviewed. Everyone said they couldn't put it down and I'll be darned if they weren't right!
Anyway. I just finished it and read my Bible and I'm going to go on to sleep now. I'll have to make my to-do list in the morning. I can't believe I did so badly today. Maybe stress will start winding down and I'll stop reading so much fiction. One can hope!
I hope you had a good weekend and are ready for Monday! Who am I kidding?? Is anyone EVER ready for Monday?!
Cheers!
Lisa
Saturday, April 25, 2015
Day 62 - Pretty Proud If I Say So Myself!
Dear Friend,
Today alllllmost went down the drain! I stayed up late reading ... again (SELF-DEFEATING BEHAVIOR #1!). Then my husband forgot his keys and rang the doorbell at 10:00 this morning, rousing me out of a deep sleep. That never goes well. My daughter went down and let him in and I fell back asleep, and then couldn't really wake up when I tried and stayed in bed too long wrestling to wake up. I finally grabbed my iPad and started reading the book ( ... yes, a zombie book!) and finally woke up.
There is no food in the house!!! I had a healthy smoothie because there was nothing else to eat. Which reminds me, I have some frozen chicken thighs downstairs in the freezer. I should set them out to defrost so I can put them in the slow-cooker in the morning. I do a BBQ recipe that is like pulled pork, but made with chicken thighs. It's actually really good and would be nice for dinner tomorrow on some baked potatoes. There's not a thing in the house for lunch, though, so I guess I'll have to stop at the store on the way home from church.
Anyway ... where was I? Okay, I made the smoothie and then started to work on cleaning up the garage. First problem: they forgot to fill the pressure washer with gas for me. Second problem: the water spigot on the front of the house wouldn't turn on. It's apparently tied into the sprinkler system (looks like the foundation planting has a sprinkler system, but I don't think the yard does). So, I figured out how to turn on the spigot at the control box, but the control box had no power to it so I couldn't. I found another spigot at the back of the house, but my hose wasn't long enough and someone has moved my other hose. So, they came and got the pressure washer, but couldn't get it to work. So they brought me a different one and a long hose that made it to the back spigot and, with some help, I got it functioning finally. I swept the floor first because of leaves that had blown in, and then started spraying it down. Good heavens!! I couldn't find anyway to control the force of the spray and it was on crazy high! I realized I could walk to the backyard again and turn the water down ... but that was too far for me. I decided I would also clean out all the recycling bins and the trash cans. The caterers dumped stuff in one of the trash cans without bagging it. I asked someone to tell them and have them come clean it, but I opened it and found that it was still untouched, after a week! Well, the guy who was helping me get everything together was super nice and got the trash out and bagged it up and carried it away for me. Wish I hd noticed that they had done the SAME THING to another trash can! So I had to deal with that one by myself. And then, spraying out that trash can was sooooo gross because napkins and junk had stuck to the bottom and they got all shredded when I used that high powered spray in them and made such a gross mess in the driveway when I dumped the water out. UGH!
Any way, then I power washed the garage floor at last. After I got it as clean as I could with just water, I used a broom and scrubbed it with Clorox Cleanup and then let it sit for about twenty minutes while I worked on the trash cans some more.
After that, I rinsed the floor off and used a broom to get the dirty water to go down the center drain, then I got the cushions off the wicker table that's out by the pool. I had read that the Clorox Cleanup would clean off all the mildew, so I had bought two half-gallon bottles of it which, happily, arrived the day before. So ... I went to my shed and looked for my pressure sprayer thing. I have three. Only one of them was there, so I got it and out the cleaner in it to spray it onto the cushions. Then I started pumping up the pressure only to find that there was a LEAK and it wouldn't work!! So, I poured it all into a bucket, got another bucket and turned it over to use as a bench, and got a big scrub brush and started applying the cleaner to one of the cushions. And THAT'S when I remembered that you have to soak the cushions with WATER ... FIRST ... so they don't bleach out!
So, I stopped and got the pressure washer and washed them down really good and got off the surface dirt. And then I sat down and used the scrub brush to apply the cleaner and scrub it all over every inch of the four seat cushions and four decorative pillows. I let them sit about fifteen minutes (more work on trash cans and cleaning up the driveway from the gross paper napkins and YUCK that had gotten all over it from the trash can). Then, I rinsed them off with the pressure washer and -- GLORY BE!!! They look brand new! Except for the area that looks bleached out, but were not going to worry about that!
So, then I got my two huge cushions I have for some really large wicker chairs and two more regular seat cushions and two decorative pillows. This required three trips all the way to the other end of the house ... and it's a long house. I worried about these big cushions because they have a lot of white on them and it looked like it had mildewed. But I treated all of these cushions, too, and they came out perfect! I should have taken before and after pictures.
And, here is the remarkable thing. I have Servella more cushions to do, but I was able to STOP! That's something brand new for me. Usually when I'm doing a messy job ... There is no stopping!! I keep working until I'm totally finished and I don't care how exhausted I get or how much damage I do to my body ... I won't stop. But, today, I was ABLE to. That's pretty huge for me.
So I set all the cushions against a wall on their edge to get them drying and then sprayed down the floor one last time. I used a plastic bag to pick u the gross stuff on the driveway and used the power washer to clean it up. I set the three smaller trash cans to the side of the pool house and set the two rolling trash cans, one for recycling, just outside the garage door so they are convenient. I tired to take the hose off the pressure washer but only succeeded in slightly loosening it. I brought the pressure washer into the garage, congratulated myself on making the day count after all ... and then found that the garage door won't close!!
For real. Perfect ending to the day.
My husband was able to get it shut manually, but couldn't lock it. I haven't brought my car back in, and it's lovely looking in there at the clean floor and the clean cushions lined up against the wall and the whole thing smells like bleach. Yay!!!
I've got a lot to do, still, before the backyard is ready for entertaining. I have four small round cushions that are seat cushions for my small wicker dining set, a long cushion that goes on the wicker chaise lounge, and several more decorative pillows to clean. I have some metal furniture on the patio that has thick, light green cushions that appear to have faded from being in the direct sunlight. I think I can flip them and get one more season out of them.
My two concrete urns broke apart during the winter from the cold! How is that possible? They will have to be thrown away. I need to power wash the large, outdoor wicker dining set. It's gotten pretty dirty. Clean up the glass tops on all the tables and find two big umbrellas. Then dump out all of my pots that were left out all winter, plant all my containers with flowers, scrub out the bird baths, and fix my chimes that are outside.
The pergola does have some rotten boards, so those will have to be replaced. A lot of the paint is peeling and a lot of it is mildewed. So that will all have to be taken care of before it can all be repainted. Theres a lot more to be done out here. The entire patio has to be dug up and leveled so that we can bring people out there without risking a law suit from them tripping!
I have a fourth outside seating area that is behind a large shrub under a huge tree on a little patio area that looks like it's been completely forgotten about. It's really odd and I'm not sure what to do with it, but there's one area that would be perfect for a place to make fires.
Then I have to make a bunch of hanging baskets and the outside should start being inviting! It was so yucky last year that I didn't even want to go outside. I still miss my huge covered veranda. I always fixed it up really beautiful, if I say so myself. But I love everything about this house much better than the house we were in in Tennessee at the university.
So. There's my day. I am very glad that I was able to pull it out of the mire. I would have been so depressed if I had totally lost the day.
We're going to church again tomorrow. I sure hope we've finally found the right place for us.
I hope your Saturday went well.
Cheers!
Lisa
Today alllllmost went down the drain! I stayed up late reading ... again (SELF-DEFEATING BEHAVIOR #1!). Then my husband forgot his keys and rang the doorbell at 10:00 this morning, rousing me out of a deep sleep. That never goes well. My daughter went down and let him in and I fell back asleep, and then couldn't really wake up when I tried and stayed in bed too long wrestling to wake up. I finally grabbed my iPad and started reading the book ( ... yes, a zombie book!) and finally woke up.
There is no food in the house!!! I had a healthy smoothie because there was nothing else to eat. Which reminds me, I have some frozen chicken thighs downstairs in the freezer. I should set them out to defrost so I can put them in the slow-cooker in the morning. I do a BBQ recipe that is like pulled pork, but made with chicken thighs. It's actually really good and would be nice for dinner tomorrow on some baked potatoes. There's not a thing in the house for lunch, though, so I guess I'll have to stop at the store on the way home from church.
Anyway ... where was I? Okay, I made the smoothie and then started to work on cleaning up the garage. First problem: they forgot to fill the pressure washer with gas for me. Second problem: the water spigot on the front of the house wouldn't turn on. It's apparently tied into the sprinkler system (looks like the foundation planting has a sprinkler system, but I don't think the yard does). So, I figured out how to turn on the spigot at the control box, but the control box had no power to it so I couldn't. I found another spigot at the back of the house, but my hose wasn't long enough and someone has moved my other hose. So, they came and got the pressure washer, but couldn't get it to work. So they brought me a different one and a long hose that made it to the back spigot and, with some help, I got it functioning finally. I swept the floor first because of leaves that had blown in, and then started spraying it down. Good heavens!! I couldn't find anyway to control the force of the spray and it was on crazy high! I realized I could walk to the backyard again and turn the water down ... but that was too far for me. I decided I would also clean out all the recycling bins and the trash cans. The caterers dumped stuff in one of the trash cans without bagging it. I asked someone to tell them and have them come clean it, but I opened it and found that it was still untouched, after a week! Well, the guy who was helping me get everything together was super nice and got the trash out and bagged it up and carried it away for me. Wish I hd noticed that they had done the SAME THING to another trash can! So I had to deal with that one by myself. And then, spraying out that trash can was sooooo gross because napkins and junk had stuck to the bottom and they got all shredded when I used that high powered spray in them and made such a gross mess in the driveway when I dumped the water out. UGH!
Any way, then I power washed the garage floor at last. After I got it as clean as I could with just water, I used a broom and scrubbed it with Clorox Cleanup and then let it sit for about twenty minutes while I worked on the trash cans some more.
After that, I rinsed the floor off and used a broom to get the dirty water to go down the center drain, then I got the cushions off the wicker table that's out by the pool. I had read that the Clorox Cleanup would clean off all the mildew, so I had bought two half-gallon bottles of it which, happily, arrived the day before. So ... I went to my shed and looked for my pressure sprayer thing. I have three. Only one of them was there, so I got it and out the cleaner in it to spray it onto the cushions. Then I started pumping up the pressure only to find that there was a LEAK and it wouldn't work!! So, I poured it all into a bucket, got another bucket and turned it over to use as a bench, and got a big scrub brush and started applying the cleaner to one of the cushions. And THAT'S when I remembered that you have to soak the cushions with WATER ... FIRST ... so they don't bleach out!
So, I stopped and got the pressure washer and washed them down really good and got off the surface dirt. And then I sat down and used the scrub brush to apply the cleaner and scrub it all over every inch of the four seat cushions and four decorative pillows. I let them sit about fifteen minutes (more work on trash cans and cleaning up the driveway from the gross paper napkins and YUCK that had gotten all over it from the trash can). Then, I rinsed them off with the pressure washer and -- GLORY BE!!! They look brand new! Except for the area that looks bleached out, but were not going to worry about that!
So, then I got my two huge cushions I have for some really large wicker chairs and two more regular seat cushions and two decorative pillows. This required three trips all the way to the other end of the house ... and it's a long house. I worried about these big cushions because they have a lot of white on them and it looked like it had mildewed. But I treated all of these cushions, too, and they came out perfect! I should have taken before and after pictures.
And, here is the remarkable thing. I have Servella more cushions to do, but I was able to STOP! That's something brand new for me. Usually when I'm doing a messy job ... There is no stopping!! I keep working until I'm totally finished and I don't care how exhausted I get or how much damage I do to my body ... I won't stop. But, today, I was ABLE to. That's pretty huge for me.
So I set all the cushions against a wall on their edge to get them drying and then sprayed down the floor one last time. I used a plastic bag to pick u the gross stuff on the driveway and used the power washer to clean it up. I set the three smaller trash cans to the side of the pool house and set the two rolling trash cans, one for recycling, just outside the garage door so they are convenient. I tired to take the hose off the pressure washer but only succeeded in slightly loosening it. I brought the pressure washer into the garage, congratulated myself on making the day count after all ... and then found that the garage door won't close!!
For real. Perfect ending to the day.
My husband was able to get it shut manually, but couldn't lock it. I haven't brought my car back in, and it's lovely looking in there at the clean floor and the clean cushions lined up against the wall and the whole thing smells like bleach. Yay!!!
I've got a lot to do, still, before the backyard is ready for entertaining. I have four small round cushions that are seat cushions for my small wicker dining set, a long cushion that goes on the wicker chaise lounge, and several more decorative pillows to clean. I have some metal furniture on the patio that has thick, light green cushions that appear to have faded from being in the direct sunlight. I think I can flip them and get one more season out of them.
My two concrete urns broke apart during the winter from the cold! How is that possible? They will have to be thrown away. I need to power wash the large, outdoor wicker dining set. It's gotten pretty dirty. Clean up the glass tops on all the tables and find two big umbrellas. Then dump out all of my pots that were left out all winter, plant all my containers with flowers, scrub out the bird baths, and fix my chimes that are outside.
The pergola does have some rotten boards, so those will have to be replaced. A lot of the paint is peeling and a lot of it is mildewed. So that will all have to be taken care of before it can all be repainted. Theres a lot more to be done out here. The entire patio has to be dug up and leveled so that we can bring people out there without risking a law suit from them tripping!
I have a fourth outside seating area that is behind a large shrub under a huge tree on a little patio area that looks like it's been completely forgotten about. It's really odd and I'm not sure what to do with it, but there's one area that would be perfect for a place to make fires.
Then I have to make a bunch of hanging baskets and the outside should start being inviting! It was so yucky last year that I didn't even want to go outside. I still miss my huge covered veranda. I always fixed it up really beautiful, if I say so myself. But I love everything about this house much better than the house we were in in Tennessee at the university.
So. There's my day. I am very glad that I was able to pull it out of the mire. I would have been so depressed if I had totally lost the day.
We're going to church again tomorrow. I sure hope we've finally found the right place for us.
I hope your Saturday went well.
Cheers!
Lisa
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