Traveling Complications

I came home yesterday late after going up to see my parents with my oldest and her son, so I didn’t get to post. Hope that was OK.

So we’ve had a pretty good visit so far! I did get SOOO sick Sunday, but it was because I ate too much fried food Saturday night–we went to an all-you-can-eat catfish place, and I ate entirely too much :(. So that’s that.

So as far as mental illness goes today, I’m doing pretty good. I got a lot done at work today; just kicking along with all my responsibilities. (That word looks like it has too many I’s, but I guess it’s finally spelled correctly.) I think I’m going to spend the next two days catching up the last of the left-behind tasks from when I was first hired, so that will be nice. Nice to finally not feel chased down by too much pressure to move ahead while simultaneously catching up.

My grandson has been such a sweet baby. He wakes up cooing and goo-ing and happy just like my girls always did. He likes to run up to me and hold his little hands up for me to hug him or pick him up. And he has the cutest little pouty face when he’s not getting enough attention or is mad about something. He hasn’t had any kind of meltdown so far, so we count that as good as well. Very, very good-natured kid.

I guess that’s all for today. Let’s just see how the rest of the week goes–I should be able to post the rest of the week on time, somewhat, but no promises. Hope everyoen has a good week.

Gross

I tried going to church this morning but only got as far as the parking lot before getting extraordinarily sick. So I will write tomorrow.

Anticipation

So I am waiting for my oldest daughter and my grandson to get here this morning. We’re going to lunch and then grocery shopping after my youngest gets done with her dance competition this morning. It’s one of the local ones so no big deal if I miss it.

I’ve gotten a bit done this morning but not a lot. I’m just taking it relatively easy. Bob headed out this morning to Georgia to see the middle one for the weekend, so we were up early. I’ve gotten some laundry done and plan to do some more, so that will be taken care of.

It was nice to realize yesterday that I seem to be in a very good place right now with the bipolar. Not too high and not too low–just right. So now I just need to do whatever it takes to maintain that. I will pick up two meds today that are running low and get them stocked up.

I will be off Monday and Thursday to be with our visitors–we will go see my parents on Monday and then so some things around town with Bob on Thursday. So that will be fun. She is just going to hang out with my mother-in-law and sister-in-law the other two days, I think. It’s not like I’m tied up all of the other two days–I will get home in time to get more playtime with the baby before dinner.

I guess that’s all for today. Godspeed to all.

Action Steps

So. I decided to DO something about stuff that’s bothering me. One of my serious problems is my weight gain, aided and abetted by my psychotropics. So I was talking about this with a friend this morning and she asked if I had ever had my hormones checked as well. And I haven’t. So now I have a question out with my gynecologist of whether I need to see her soon to do this, wait until my annual checkup in May, or what. So something that has really been bothering me (my weight) I decided to take action on instead of keeping on stewing about.

That tells me I’m on an even keel right now mentally. If I were depressed, I would have kept on ruminating in a self-destructive way about it and not tried to do anything, therefore compounding the situation in my head all out of proportion. If I had been manic, I would have plowed ahead trying to go off half-cocked and doing something extreme. So instead I am taking action and trying to be measured about it instead of diving into something that may not be sustainable.

I think that’s a plus.

Work Fun!

I got to be the expert today at work–that was a nice feeling! My big boss had questions about WordPress this afternoon, and we had a really good talk about it, and I came up with a new way to leverage some work we were already doing in order to use it on our WordPress page. I was really proud of myself for thinking it up, and I hope I’m allowed to do it.

My ear isn’t bothering me very much right now–I suppose the steroid drops are helping. I’m going to ease off on the frequency of using them like you do whenever you do a steroid treatment and taper to using something else by the time the week is up. So things are going well on that front.

I’m going to write a BPHope column this weekend updating my work/bipolar journey for readers–I did one earlier about finding my job, and someone asked for a follow-up about how I was adjusting, etc. to it and how things were going. So that was nice that the editor was receptive to that suggestion.

I’m so glad I don’t feel particularly bipolar today. Aside from the ear making it hard to sleep, I have done remarkably well lately. And tomorrow my grandbaby starts his trip to come see me! 🙂 I am looking forward to that. They will get here Saturday; my oldest is breaking the trip up into two days so as not to overtax the little one by riding in the car on a marathon trip.

Telling my story–that’s what the blog is all about. I hope you have enjoyed reading my story throughout the years. You all have no idea how much it helps me to say all the things I feel. Godspeed.

Subtle Shift in Perspective

Wow.

I can tell I am now really getting INTO my job–I am talking shop about it at home.

Me and Bob have always talked shop. I know some couples who don’t–usually it’s a case of one or the other is unhappy with their job and doesn’t want to discuss it. Or they just have other things they talk to each other about. But we have always shared a lot about where we work and what’s going on there–and I’ve found myself talking more and more about the work as my responsibilities grow there.

It’s often enjoyable from the standpoint that while I don’t know exactly how to operate a zero-turn mower (the industry Bob is in), the business problems he finds himself in often do interest me. I don’t give advice so much as I often confirm what he already is thinking before he tells me he is thinking it. And I enjoy the feeling of being able to understand his frustrations and situations and being able to discuss them with him intelligently.

And he is interested in my work from the standpoint that he is reader of books and some of the book business is interesting to him as well–especially from a business perspective, a dollars-and-cents perspective. And when I did news, he was interested as a news junkie right along with me. And he also is a writer (although he considers it a pastime, not even a hobby) so we can talk about that as well.

So what I’m saying is that it isn’t new I can talk shop with him, but until just recently I haven’t been doing so because I think I was holding back from truly embracing the job until I found out I could succeed and have a future there. So that’s good to know.

As you can tell, my mood is rebounding and I feel better today than I have in a while. Well enough that he and I could have an entire conversation about work and how it went today instead of me retreating off because I don’t feel well. Win-win!

Getting Answers

So my ENT said that I am definitely having a flare-up of psoriasis in my right ear and had the remains of one in my left ear. She suctioned both of them out, and we cleared up my questions of when and how long to use my steroid ear drops for treatment of it. So hopefully we can be preventing these issues before they get to a bad place again. I have an appointment to go back in three months and see how the treatment is working.

I worked from home today, and it was a bit hectic. We had two authors asking questions about a task for their books that had not been taken care of in a timely manner since we were kicking around a new way of doing that task after the new year. So we will see what comes of all of that. So that was a case of dropping everything i had planned to work on today to take care of all those fires we had to put out from those folks.

And they were right to ask questions. Things had gotten really behind, and I did a lot of work to catch it up as much as it had been. I am going to do more tomorrow in this area and try to catch the task up completely. Just a run-around day. I should be able to do a good bit on it since we have a meeting tomorrow that doesn’t really require my active participation to run, so we will see how that turns out.

I suppose that’s all for today. My mood is improving with hope that i am now on a track to getting better. So we will see. Hope everyone is having a good week.

Still Ouch

I called to get an ENT appointment today, but I won’t see her until first thing tomorrow. I don’t hurt as badly as I did, but I still hurt and want to see what exactly is going on and get advice on how to keep this from happening again in two weeks. I did work and got permission to work from home tomorrow since I don’t feel well–I know it’s not catching, but I jut think I would be better off not going in and being grumpy the entire time.

My mood is still sour, too. I don’t think it would be if I didn’t hurt. I think we’re going to bring dinner in tonight from Newk’s so I don’t have to go to the grocery store again.

I hope I get to feeling better with my grandson and daughter coming in this weekend. We will see how it goes. I am so looking forward to a visit–I think it will be fun. He is really active now and showing off his personality a lot. He seems to understand a lot of what is said to him but hasn’t mastered very many words yet–he can say daddy and mama and hey, and I’ve heard him say hello, also. We will see what kind of talker he is when he gets here.

I’m going to rest the rest of the afternoon–I had a really strange dream last night. I dreamed that I had to go back to the mental hospital and was given electroshock therapy on very old-fashioned-looking electric chairs. Very scary and at least part of the reason I didn’t sleep good. I’ve never had ECT, but I do know enough to know that’s not how they do it nowadays.

I do wonder how that came bubbling up from my subconscious. My doctor did tell me one time that he was open to using it as a last resort on me, but that I haven’t seen severely depressed enough for it. The last time I went in, it was for mania/paranoia, as was when I went to the ER last year.

I suppose that’s all for today. We will see what happens tomorrow. Hope everyone has a good day.

Atrocious

I think I am going to go back to bed after I finish this post. I feel atrocious and sick. I stayed home from church today and just feel so rotten. If I don’t get to feeling better, I’m going to call in sick tomorrow. I am trying to do everything to get better, and nothing seems to be working. I have to take two Advil morning, noon, and night to be able to eat anything with my ear being as painful as it is. Gross.

And my mood has gone south as well. As you can probably tell.

I hate being sick.

Ick To Infinity

I didn’t sleep worth anything last night. My ear just kept hurting and hurting and hurting. I got up around midnight and took another dose of Advil, then around two a.m. my face felt so swollen on the right side that I took two Benadryl because I just wasn’t sure what was happening. And I just feel awful. I’m tired and I’m grumpy.

But I also got sent a batch of pictures of my grandson playing at a park not far from where his family lives. So that has been a bright spot today.

I am definitely going to see that ENT Monday. I need to know what is going on with this pain and swelling in my face next to my ears when they got infected. I’ve never swelled up like this before.

We’ve had a decent day–went out to lunch and the comic-book store. I need to go to the grocery store, but I sure don’t feel like it. Maybe when my next dose of Advil kicks in I can feel up to going. I don’t even like going to the grocery store on a good day, and right now I just don’t feel up to it at all.

I think I am going to go lie down.