Yearning.

There is a deep, pervasive ache. A scream being stifled, just below the surface.

Wheels are spinning in place.

Time is wasting.

what dreams may come

Blargh.

So I fail at this blog challenge, that is clear enough. Friday's post was a cop-out, and then I missed yesterday's post, which was an additional "what I wore today" day, because I was visiting family all day... and it completely slipped my mind.

Today's topic is "my dreams". I'm not sure if it's meant to be about my goals/aspirations, or my nighttime forays into my own psyche, so I'm going to go with the latter.

Lately, my dreams have very clearly been centred around my anxiety. There have been elaborate labyrinths, puzzles, and nonsensical problems that need solving, and a cast of characters who are modelled mostly after my family. I have a tendency to try to analyze my dreams when I wake up and am still in the midst of that sleep fog, before the details disappear... I'm sure this only adds to my neurosis, but it is what it is.

We watched inception recently, and it reminded me of how often I experience lucid dreams. Very frequently, I will me in the middle of a completely crazy dream, and I will become aware that I am dreaming and will feel like I need to influence the dream or direct it a certain way in order to try to figure out what it is my subconscious is trying to tell me.

See how I over-analyze things, even when I'm not awake?

The topic of dreams, and why we dream, has always been very interesting to me. I enjoy reading about the research of sleep and the studies done on the sleeping brain. I find it so interesting to watch documentaries on the subject, or segments of NOVA that talk about sleep research. I like that we haven't really figured out why we need sleep yet, or how exactly dreams come about. I sometimes which I had tried a little harder in high school to focus on my maths and sciences, and become a neurologist or psychologist.

Years ago, I used to keep a notebook by my bed so that I could write bits of my dreams down before I forgot them, thereby being able to look up symbols and meanings in a dream dictionary and try to interpret things, but I have since given up this behaviour. Mostly because I feel like it is a silly, fruitless practice that only leads me to dwell on things that are best left as they are.

I am not a very good sleeper. It is difficult for me to fall asleep, and when I am woken up suddenly, either by a nightmare or a noise in the night, it is really hard for me to fall back asleep. There is always this track running in my mind of things that need doing, and things that I want to think about... and when the plot of a crazy dream is added to that, I can sometimes fixate on whatever it was about. I've noticed that since I've been on the Effexor, the dreams have been a little kookier than they used to be. Maybe it's a side-effect, or maybe it's just my brain trying to work things out and heal itself.

Who really knows?

making lists

Endless to-do lists are pouring out of me. I can't sleep. One leg hangs off the bed, bobbing and swaying... the motion comforts me, like a rocking chair and a mother's chest to a fussy infant. This analogy comforts me.

I try to focus on the motion. Focus on my breathing. Clear blue skies. A calm ocean. Anything to stop my racing mind. Can't avoid it any longer. I get up to pee, and instead of heading back to bed I walk down the hallway to my office. And so here I sit, scribbling lists.

I think that if I get it all out... get it all down on paper, then it will leave my mind. If I can actually see the tasks and reminders laid out in an orderly manner that I will be able to stop worrying about all of the to-dos and haven't-dones. I wish this were true.

I want it to stop. I do my best to think rationally and calmly but I can't stop it. It's coming no matter how many calm blue seas I imagine, or what number of breathes I count. The more I push it away, the more rational I attempt to be, the quicker my heart beats.

The panic. My heartbeat is erratic, isn't it? Did it just skip a beat? I'm breathing too fast! I must breathe more slowly. SLOWER! I'm not getting enough air. I have to breathe slower. SLOWER. Deeper. Please! Why won't my lungs cooperate? I'm going to hyperventilate if I keep this up. Why can't I stop? There it is again! My heart! Did it skip a beat, or was that one beat extra? What IS that flutter? Just breathe. Just. Breathe.

Oh god, this is going to kill me one of these days.

regret

Sometimes I wish there was a gaping void where my conscience lives.

the almosts and could-have-beens

I've been feeling nauseous off and on for the past three days. I'm attributing it to my meds, or that I started taking the pre-natals again (just in case we ever get lucky), or that it's just another symptom of the foul mood I've been in lately.

I do my best not to let the boy know just how foul I'm feeling lately because he worries so much. It's probably counter-productive, since I end up feeling cruddy longer because I'm holding it in... but I don't like that look he gets when he's worried about me... his brow is knit with concern and he is determined to fix me... to take on my stress, or ask an endless stream of questions until he gets to the bottom of what's bothering me. Sometimes I don't want to have to explain that there is nothing in particular that is bothering me, it's just that I am bothered in general. Does that even make sense?

Probably not.

So I'm sitting at my desk, working away... reconciling receipts, listing prints, and sipping on room-temperature water, trying to ignore that wave of yuckiness (is too a word spellchecker! Because I said so, that's why!) that comes and goes. I put my head down on the desk periodically and wait for it to go away. I'm trying to ignore it because I'm sure that it's nothing. I really am.

I won't let my mind go there anymore... I used to get just a little bit excited if I started feeling nauseous, because it could mean that we had succeeded... that my biology wasn't a failure after all! I don't allow myself to get my hopes up anymore because I don't want to feel like I'm mourning every time I bleed... especially when it comes late, as it often does. I don't like imagining that we were (at least partially) successful, and maybe conception had in fact occurred, and it's more than run-of-the-mill menses being flushed away.

I don't like knowing that it is often the case... that my problem isn't entirely with conception, but with getting it to stick. I don't know how to stop myself from grieving the almosts and the could-have-beens.

Then I get angry with myself for feeling like I'm losing hope... for not being more positive. As if a smile on my face will somehow a baby make. I try not to let it get to me when people say "maybe if you weren't trying so hard" or "maybe if you just stopped thinking about it... it will happen when it is meant to". Because it's somehow my fault that my plumbing doesn't work, right? Clearly I am subconsciously and deliberately self-defeating, psychically destroying each zygote with my negative thoughts! Thank you for pointing that out to me - it's all so clear now!!!

Grrrrrrr!!!

I know... I don't need to be an asshole about it. It's not anyone else's fault either, and their intentions are not to make me feel worse. I know that I should lighten up, and that there are other (very expensive) options out there for me... for us... but it's hard to be positive when the chaos in your uterus matches the clutter in your mind.

I know I shouldn't dwell, and I'm not trying to be this way... I swear that I don't live in my own perpetual self-pity party. I'm actually a pretty bubbly person... but sometimes I'm a mess, and I wish I was just a little less so.

I'm rambling. Again.

can I fake it 'till I make it?

I have these pictures in my mind that I need to get out.

That's the way my drawings and paintings start. But I try to get them out too quickly I think... I draw furiously, rushing to empty the image from my mind before it slips away, before the idea is gone... and the end result ends up feeling flat.

I feel like I should take more time with my pictures. Nurture them. Build them slowly, bits at a time. Leave them for a while and then revisit them. I beleive that this approach would produce better art... that the paintings and drawings, and little doodles and bits would have more emotion in them... I think that they would have more feeling, and consequently they would draw more people to them... maybe then I would be a "successful artist".

Maybe then more people would buy my work.

But I can't create this way. I want to. I need to. But I can't. Instead I am compelled to rush into it when the mood strikes, and work away at a feverish pace, producing many pieces in a night, until I am completely spent... until all the pictures and ideas are drained from my mind... my fingertips are numb... my hand is aching... my heart is empty... I push myself until I have to sleep.

It seems manic, almost. It is a little crazy, but that's the only way I know how to produce my art. One would think that this would result in fun, fiery paintings with lots of movement and texture and feeling... but what it produces are paintings of birds, and drawings of goldfish... sketches of dainty ballerinas in fluttery tutus.

If I'm feeling especially "indie" I might come up with a tattooed woman, or a sassy pin-up... but that's about as badass as my artwork can get.

I want more.

I want to produce giant pieces with thick flashes of colour, and found pieces of pages from old texts... swirling abstracts and striking colour fields... dark portraits of lost lovers with haunting eyes. But when I try to paint like that... when I try to get those images down on canvas, or paper, or whatever surface I can... what comes out feels fake. It feels like I'm trying too hard to be something that I'm not. It doesn't feel... authentic.

I don't know what I'm doing... I don't know who I am as an artist.

Why did I think this was a good idea again?

I get frustrated with myself for thinking that I could possibly make it as a full-time artist... as a small business owner... as my own boss. I'm not good enough. I'm not talented enough. I'm not strong enough. Sometimes I feel like I'm only pretending to be an artist, and that someone is going to notice... that they'll point out how there are too many brush strokes in that particular painting... I must have struggled to get the right gradation in the shading... Then everyone will know I'm not a "real" artist. I'm just good at faking it.

Okay. Breathe.

I know... we are all our own worst critics. I know that I can do more. I am capable. I am better than this. Maybe I just need to write affirmations like that all over my office and repeat them to myself all day... that wouldn't make me seem any more crazy, right?

Haha. Yup. Manic.

I don't know where I'm going with this, or why I even started typing this out. I probably shouldn't even hit publish. I don't know what I'm doing here, right now, this minute. Beating myself up because my sales aren't where I hoped they'd be when I decided to take this risk and focus on my art. What is the point of this? This isn't productive, and this won't help me be a better artist... and it's certainly doing nothing good for my level of anxiety.

I wish I could just get over myself and get on with it.

wind and rain and thunder and lightning

The sounds outside my office window are ferocious. I swear I can feel the house tremble from the thunder, and it's as if the whole structure is swaying, just slightly, from the force of the wind gusts. The rain sounds almost solid, beating against the glass. I've always loved a good thunderstorm. Ordinarily there is something about them that makes me feel peaceful... like drinking tea, curled up on the couch with a blanket. Tonight, or this morning rather, this particular storm sounds ominous and a little to close over the house... and the racket of it is doing nothing to improve my foul mood.

Maybe it's the quiet of this time in the morning that is amplifying the sounds and making them seem more powerful than they really are. Everyone else is in the deepest stages of sleep, and the house has settled...it's too early for people to be up and driving towards their day shifts, so the roads are free of traffic and the sidewalks are clear. The only sounds are the crashes from the sky and the howling wind. It's startling. It's haunting.

I keep toying with the idea of going outside and standing in the storm... face up to the sky... letting the rain and the wind whip my skin... allowing the cold to numb my body. I feel like maybe if I stand there long enough, and soak in enough of it, the numbness will reach my mind... and then I will have some rest tonight.

Typing that sentence feels melodramatic, and pitiful, and tired. It feels like I'm going on about nothing... like I have a woe-is-me attitude that would make you roll your eyes and think that I should just get over myself. You might think that I should just walk it off... suck it up... get on with it... I feel like I should be able to brush this aside... get over these feelings... but I can't... at least not tonight.

Tonight I am in a dark place. It's as if there is an invisible blanket wrapped around me... wrapping tighter and tighter... the pressure on my chest, and my temples, and my neck... my shoulders are tense and my legs are restless... I try to shake them out... shake it off... but the pressure keeps building... I feel as if I am burdened down with some great weight that I can't slide out from under. There is a buzzing in my ears... behind my eyes... a persistent hum that forces me to focus on little else but the pressure, and the tightness, and the humming, and this feeling like I need to run away somewhere and hide... somewhere that I can be still, and calm, and quiet.

And then there's a crash of thunder and I almost jump out of my skin. I'm nauseous and flighty and lethargic all at once. I'm a snivelling contradiction.

I focus on my breathing. Inhale deeply.... count to five.... hold it for five... exhale slowly... counting to five... hold it for five... inhale deeply... "Picture a plateau" the doctor has said... coping exercises... "Visualize yourself relaxing".... count to five... hold it for five...

The wind howls and breaks my focus... I want to cry... I want to cry out... I want to be okay.

I want to be better.

my new space

Friday was my last day at the soul-sucking cube job. My last day of staring at that computer monitor and those beige walls and that evil old crone with the awful bleached hairdo.

I'm going to miss some things about my cube job, of course. I made friends in the three years I was there... it's hard to spend nine hours a day, five days a week with a group of people, and not get close to at least some of them. I will miss those people, and I will miss our daily conversations. I will miss that place for the social interaction, and of course the consistent paycheque... but I am happy to be out of that cube... out of that space, and into my home office full-time.

This is what I will be staring at for hours on end now instead. I have done my best to create a functional, comfortable space where I can be creative and productive. It is well ordered, and tidy.


Now if only I could get the space inside my head in as good a shape, I would be set.

It's funny how the giant leaps have been the easiest things this past year... surprisingly... but the baby steps, the slow and steady pace of treating my issues and managing my anxiety and depression, that's what's really kicking my ass...

I'm afraid that if I can't get out of my head and get on with things... if I can't figure out these baby steps, and get one foot in front of the other when it comes to my thoughts and emotions... then there is no way I can be successful with my big plans. I don't know how to focus on the big picture and getting down to the business of my new business, when I'm smack in the middle of one of what the boy and I refer to as my "sad for no reason" times.

I know what to do, and how to do it, but sometimes it's so hard to keep my mind on my goals when all I want to do is lay down in my room with the curtains closed and a blanket over my head. I'm afraid that I won't be motivated to succeed now that I'm not tied to an office schedule that determined my hours of productivity. I'm afraid of spending too much time inside my head. I'm afraid that the relief I feel from no longer being stressed out about my previous job is nothing in comparison to what I've got ahead of me.

Left. Right. Left. Right. Left. Right....

on feeling normal

I didn't realize just how anxious I was really feeling, until I felt calm.

I never considered myself to be a stressed out or edgy person... people don't describe me as highly-strung or tightly wound (at least not to my face - ha!)... but I am coming to terms with the fact that I do indeed have anxiety, and the issues that come along with that.

The attacks are one thing... they are a blip... a bump... an event that affects only the time and space it occupies, and not the rest of my life. At least that's what I thought. I never realized how constant and persistent the anxiety was... how ingrained it was in what I had considered to be my usual way of feeling, until it was gone.

So.

So the boy and I were in the car, driving to visit some friends the other weekend, talking about nothing in particular... I mentioned that I was feeling weird...

The Boy: Weird how? Are you Okay? Is it another attack?
Me: No! Please don't worry... I'm fine!
The Boy: Are you sure? How's your breathing?
Me: Not like that... I feel odd... good... but odd... it's like, this... nothingness...
The Boy: Nothingness?
Me: Yeah... I mean, I'm okay... it's just that... I don't know... I don't know how to describe it... I wouldn't say that I'm numb... it's just... I'm not particularly sad, but I'm not especially happy either... I'm... I just am.
The Boy: *laughs at me*
Me: What?
The Boy: So what you're saying is that you're relaxed.
Me: Huh. Yeah. I guess that's it.

And then we laughed... and laughed...

*sigh*

So I'm feeling more normal... and calm... at least most of the time. I'm still working with my doctor to get the right dosage levels and such... and then there's the impending counselling (Dun-dun-duuuhhnn!).

But there are still some days that are pretty rough. There are days when I have to try really hard to listen to that rational part of my brain that tells me that what I am feeling is temporary, and that tomorrow will be better... that I can handle whatever is happening... that I am indeed okay... and all that jazz...

Work in progress, right?

still

I want to be still. I want to be gentle, and quiet, and soft. I want to sit, alone, and empty of worries, and without a "to do", and be okay with that.

I want to be calm, and peaceful, and serene.

I want to be untroubled without being lifeless, close-mouthed but not silenced. I want to be motionless without being stagnant. Restful. Stable.

I want to be still.

anxiety

Last week I began taking serotonin-norepinephrine reuptake inhibitor drugs for depression and anxiety disorder. That's an awfully long-winded way of saying that I am on antidepressants... mood-stabilizers... crazy pills.

I haven't told anyone, and I made my husband promise not to tell a soul (so, naturally, I am blabbing about it on the internet...makes perfect sense!)... I have this self-imposed shame and stigma attached to taking medication for my anxiety issues... even referring to it as "my anxiety issues" feels foreign... like something I would not say... should not say.

Part of my brain (the calm, rational part) knows that this should not be a big deal... I tell myself that I'm an asshole for feeling like some sort of freak for needing medication to deal with my "issues"... as this means that I somehow think that other people who need simillar drugs for their own treatment must be freaks, by extension of this line of thinking... and I definately do not think that... Rationally speaking, I know that anxiety and depression are fairly common... pretty normal... and that people should do what they need to do to feel better and be able to function like they need to...

But part of my brain feels like this somehow makes me a "crazy person"... damaged... weak.

I should be stronger than this... I should be able to handle things... I've always been able to handle everything that life threw at me... I roll with the punches... I take care of business... I don't break down... and I certainly do not have anxiety attacks.

Afterall, what have I got to be stressed about? I have a wonderful husband... I have a job... I have a house... pets... friends... love... food in the fridge... fresh air... clean water to drink... I am happy.

I feel like I should not have anything to complain about... that so many people are far worse off than I am... afterall, most of my issues are "first world problems", and I should be thankful for what I have... right?

I have this internal dialogue that runs through my head when I start to feel sorry for myself... it goes something like this:

Crappy, dead-end job... pffft! that's nothing... evil co-worker... let it roll off your back... starting my own business as an escape plan from crappy job... I should be so lucky to have that opportunity... haven't had an actual vacation ever... neither have most working-class people, right? fertility issues? at least I have other options left to explore... issues from a very, um, complicated childhood... not a problem! It's in the past!

And on and on it goes... complaining makes me feel like a whiner... ungrateful.

I have always had that "keep calm and carry on" mentality... and that's my problem. Things don't bother me... I don't get "stressed out".

When the anxiety attacks started, I was convinced it was an asthma attack. The boy ran downstairs to get my ventalin, and I took two puffs... two more... but I couldn't breathe... and the steroids just made my heart race harder... my head was swimming... I was convinced that I was going to die.

I tried to convince the doctors that if it wasn't my lungs, that it must be my heart... I was sent for tests... and an EKG... the doctor tried to teach me some breathing techniques for quieting a panic attack... I was sure it had to be physical... It couldn't be mental... not me... I don't feel "crazy".

...

So here I am, a week into my new treatment... and I'm feeling a little better... a little calmer. I am supposed to start seeing a counsellor later this month, and aside from the waves of nausea as I get used to the medications, I think I'm feeling pretty good...

I am being forced to do some hard self-examination... exercise some demons... adjust my priorities.

This is a good thing.