I had to stop going
to the Mindfulness Stress Reduction class a couple of weeks ago. My mom has
been having eye problems, and since my dad is an on-the-road trucker, she
needed me to drive her to her appointments. Unfortunately, her eye surgeon only
has office hours on Wednesdays in a town 40 miles away from us. He's a pretty
busy guy, so morning appointments weren't guaranteed, and there was no way I
could get back in town in time for my 2:30 class. I had to make a choice: class
or my mom. I chose my mom. Honestly, I'm really not upset about it. I enjoy the
class, but I'm having a really hard time in it. It's the yoga aspect. I'm
really not comfortable with yoga, yet. It's painful on my joints, and I'm so
fat, I can't get anything where it's supposed to be.
I know, I know.
Yoga isn't about doing it. It's about doing it the best that you can. That's
all well and good when you're doing it at home with no on watching you, but it
really sucks when you're doing it in a class. I'm not a fan of crying in
public, and knowing that I can't bring my knee into the same zip code as my
chest makes me cry, especially when it was only 2 years ago when I would have
been able to do it. (Not that I was skinny then, but I was skinnier and more
bendy.) Until I can do yoga without crying because of shame or pain, I will
stick to doing it in private. On to the next!
I've started seeing
an employment councilor, Kelsey. She's very nice, and I like her. However, she
seems a bit stuck on my teaching credentials and keeps asking me about what I
liked and didn't like about teaching. It's so hard to put it into words. I
loved talking about literature with the kids. I hated everything else: grading
papers, talking to parents, learning the standards, dealing with the
administration, discipline, having to buy the supplies for my classroom, etc. (I
only had to deal with large class size for 2 of my 6 classes. That was lucky, I
guess.) But I really liked talking literature with the kids. I'm think that
teaching in a traditional setting isn't for me. Unfortunately, I'm so confused
right now that I'm not sure what IS for me. I feel bad for Kelsey. She's got
her work cut out for her.
About 7 weeks ago,
I asked Meredith about putting me on an antidepressant. It took a lot for me
to admit that I need one, but I'm having a really hard time motivating myself
to do everything I need to do to get well. I think medication will help me find
that motivation. Like I mentioned in my last post, medication may be a
necessary component to reaching wellness. However, it shouldn't be the first
choice. I knew from the start that I would probably need an antidepressant,
but I wanted to try doing it without pharmaceuticals first. I wanted to see if
just talking and relaxing/meditating would help. While both do help, they
aren't enough. I don't know how to explain why, but I'll try.
Talking with
someone who isn't judging me or judging her own past behavior with me is
wonderful. I've started to recognize my negative self-talk when it happens.
I've even started to give myself pep talks. So that's good. Purposeful relaxing
and being mindfully in the present is also helping. While I'm still not very
good at either, I can see improvement from how I was before. What's causing the
problem is that I have no desire, no get-up-and-go, no passion, no purpose.
Every day I still wish I had died in my sleep. Every day I still want to cry,
not as often each day, but still every day. I still don't know what the point
of me is, and that's okay. The problem is that I'm not really motivated to look
for the point of me. I've been on medication before, and it made me feel a lot
better. However, at the time, I wasn't in therapy, so I never developed the
tools to cope off of medication. This time, the whole point of the medication
is to help me develop those tools, not just get me through this episode.
At my appointment
last week, Meredith asked if the clinician had called me yet to set up an
appointment to evaluate me for medication. They hadn't. She said she would
contact them again. I hope they call me soon. It's going to take about 6 weeks
for it to start working, so I'm looking at another 2 months, at least, before
my will-to-work kicks in. That makes it really hard when you're looking for a
job. Speaking of which, I'm supposed to be filling out job applications for my
appointment with Kelsey tomorrow. I really don't want to, but I guess I should.
