Gone Through Some Ups and Downs Lately

They always say don't apologize for not writing in your blog, but I feel bad it's been so long!

I've been going through some ups and downs lately, mainly felt anxious for a while, and then went through some depression as well.

But guess what? I only missed one day of work, so it was a very successful week or too of depression and anxiety.

I firmly believe it was because I forced myself to stick to a schedule, and kept up with my list making (I bought a planner a few months ago that I have been using to make my list/schedule).

I forced myself to get up every morning, do yoga, eat, and shower, and I took my anxiety medicine when I needed it. I get stubborn about taking my anxiety medicine sometimes, it makes me feel like I'm failing or something. But this time I told myself it was okay to take it, that's what it's there for.

While I was in my depression it was hard to see how well I was actually doing all things considered. Once I started feeling better, I was able to give myself a pat on the back and allow myself to be proud of how well I did. I was especially proud that I was able to go to work pretty much the whole time. I didn't even have to cut short any of my shifts which was really good. To be honest going to work seemed to help, because I felt accomplished after my shift was over.

I have been feeling much better now, and I was glad that I was able to enjoy my vacation at cedar point last weekend.

I am also excited for fall weather :)

Trusting that Happy Feeling: Stop Over Analyzing Your Emotions

So the past few days have been interesting.

I went to a theme park on the weekend and rode a few major roller coasters. Ever sense I've felt incredibly happy. And being the paranoid person that I am when it comes to my feelings, I started second guessing myself: was I just feeling happy? Or was it the start of an up swing that could lead to mania?

I don't know about any of you, but I second guess my emotions A LOT. I suppose it's a good thing, to be in tune to how you are feeling, keeping track of whether or not you might be sliding into mania or depression.

However there is one very important thing to remember: It is okay to feel good and happy. This does not mean you are going to become manic simply because you have more energy, or feel good.

What I ended up doing to calm my fears, was checking in with my mom and my boyfriend, asking them if I seemed to be acting any different than usual. They both reassured me that while I did seem more energetic and talkative, I simply seemed happy.

My boyfriend had a very good point. My sleep schedule was still normal, even if I was getting up earlier, I was still getting 7-8 hours of sleep (as opposed to my usual 9-10). I was able to fall asleep and stay asleep without any trouble. The first sign of mania for me is usually that I can't fall asleep due to racing thoughts and excessive energy.

Also, I realized I was still able to focus on things that needed to get done, and I wasn't doing anything impulsive or making rash decisions.

The conclusion? I was simply happy, maybe even relaxed, because the stress of the previous weekend was over, and I had just come back from a really fun mini-vacation!

That's me and the very tall roller coaster Diamondback

How do you all deal with the times you second guess your feelings and emotions?

Panic Attacks and Anxiety: Ways to Cope while Working

I've written a lot about anxiety on this blog. Even though I have Bipolar Disorder, it's usually the anxiety that most affects my day-to-day life.

The past few weeks have been especially hard, so I thought I'd write about some tips that I've been trying to help myself push through this anxiety while still managing to go to work.

Here's what I wrote in my journal:

I didn't end up going to work today. While I was driving on my way to work, I started having a panic attack so I pulled over into a neighborhood, and tried to calm down. I didn't feel safe driving though. So I ended up driving back home and then took a GABA and watched Age of Adaline and just tried to relax.

That was just the beginning of what would go on for 3 weeks. After about a week and a half I called my psychiatrist and saw her that Monday. She had to increase my medication gradually, and within about a week and a half I started feeling like myself again.

I was able to only miss three days of work in those 3 weeks though, so I consider it very successful.

How did I manage, you might ask?

It wasn't easy, it took a lot of support from those around me, and a lot of pushing myself to go to work when every part of my body and mind was telling me to stay home.

I forced myself to go outside, and get some sun (strangely enough Michigan was having 60 degree weather in February when all of this was happening. This helped a lot. Not just the exercise, but to get rid of some of that nervous energy. My therapist recommended that I try doing some sort of stretching or exercise before work. This way, I'd sort of tire myself out before driving to work, again, getting rid of the nervous energy so I wouldn't panic while driving to work.

I would also either take some GABA or some other meds that my doctor prescribed me for anxiety a few hours before going to work, to prevent myself from panicking before or even during work.

I also had myself do "practice runs." For example one day when I was especially nervous about driving to work, I got up early and practiced driving places. I went to CVS in the morning and sort of walked around, and then practiced interacting with people by making small talk with the cashier.

Perhaps the hardest part about this period of anxiety was near the end of it I was waking up at around 3 in the morning and having panic attacks. This is extremely unpleasant. I hadn't felt that bad in a long time. My boyfriend was very supportive and helpful, comforting me and listening to my fears until I felt calm enough to fall back asleep. My mother was also helpful by letting me call her whenever I needed to talk. My sister and I would text sometimes during the day and it helped to talk about random things with her to distract myself from the uncomfortable feeling of anxiety.

It helped that I was able to be pretty honest about what was going on with work. They were very understanding and did not make me feel like I was somehow failing or disappointing them on days that I was unable to go into work. This took off the pressure and actually made it easier to go into work more than I normally would have been able to.

I have since had a follow up with my psychiatrist and she is very happy with my improved mental health.

What are some of the ways you cope with anxiety while working?

Quitting My Job Because of Anxiety

It’s happening again. And I’m angry. And tired.

Tired of this crippling anxiety that has me chained to this bed, threatening to derail my life again. I can’t afford to lose this job, not another one. But I can’t afford to go in either. This anxiety won’t let me.

I feel unsafe, and the only way to feel safe again is to quit. It’s the same story each time. I’ll quit, feel some relief, but then spend the next few days beating myself up about quitting. The same damn cycle each time. I know what’s coming: the self-loathing, the self-punishment.

I’ll convince myself I’m not hungry, or that I don’t deserve food. I don’t deserve to be happy because look what I did. I’m ruining my life again, and it’s all my fault.

At least that is what my brain is telling me. All of those nasty self critical, anxiety ridden thoughts. My brain can be cruel sometimes.

Finally my voice of reason will come in and remind me that maybe this is something I needed to do, because I was becoming unhappy at work. I remind myself that the work environment was becoming uncomfortable. It was getting to be too hot, too stressful, and just too much in general.

I know it’s going to be hard. Finding another job is not going to be easy. But it is worth trying again and finding something that works better. A schedule that it is easier on me. A place that pays better, is more rewarding, and has air conditioning. All of these things will be better for me in the long run. So no matter how hard it might seem, know that in the end it is going to be okay and that maybe this actually was the best option for right now.

Slowly But Surely Starting to Feel Better

I decided I'd write a little update for you all on how I've been feeling.

I took off work yesterday because I knew I needed to. I took some anti-anxiety medicine yesterday and the day before and that lessened my feeling anxious about everything. My mom also came and stayed with me for a few hours, and we took a walk to the store and got some snacks for when we'd relax and watch Netflix.

I'm glad I just let myself relax though, rather than making myself feel guilty about needing to take off work. It's more important to take care of yourself sometimes, and listen to what you need.

I spent some time napping and then colored and listened to some relaxing music.

I also spent some time writing about everything I was feeling, just to sort of let everything out. It really helped to have my mom there some of the time to keep me from dwelling on the anxious and sad thoughts I've been having since I was off my medication.

I'm glad that lately I've been doing a good job of letting myself take care of myself and not trying to over do things when I don't feel quite up to it. I'm learning that it's more important to take a break than to try and pretend I'm fine when I'm not.

I called my therapist on Tuesday and she also suggested I take the day off to give the Lithium time to be fully in my system again. Sometimes trying to force yourself to do things too soon can backfire. I've also done my best to stay away from caffeine so that way I'll sleep better and it won't aggravate my anxiety.

Today I don't have work, and I'm planning on going to my therapy session and spending the rest of the day to relax and get a few things done around the house. Hopefully I'll do some yoga too.

I'm planning on working tomorrow, and luckily it's only a half day that doesn't start until 11:30 in the morning.

What things do you do when you have to take a step back from everything?

Letting Yourself Not Be Okay, But Don't Beat Yourself Up About It

I had a "moment" today.

I hadn't had my Lithium in 3 days because my pharmacy wasn't able to refill my prescription until four days later. I should have transferred my prescription to another pharmacy sooner, but I thought I'd be okay to wait. By Day 2 without Lithium I was having severe headaches. By Day 3, I was crying for no reason. At least it felt like no reason. It could be I was feeling really stupid and beating myself up about not getting my medication sooner.

I was able to get my medicine today (Day 3), and I've taken it. So I should start feeling better.

Emotions are tricky. Usually what happens with me is I'll start crying and then get angry at myself for crying for no reason. I talked to my boyfriend about how I was feeling and he suggested I should call my therapist or my doctor tomorrow. My sister called before she came home and was sweet enough to bring me a Passion Tea Lemonade from Starbucks. This seemed to help me calm down and it also helped to talk to her, and she distracted me by showing me some clothes she'd bought.

I'm glad I have people around me who I can count on to be there for me when I start feeling a little off. I also know better then to go without taking Lithium for so long. I should start feeling better in a couple of days I hope.

So today I'm simply trying to not beat myself up about what happened this weekend.

How do you cope when things don't go the way you had hoped they would?

Life Changes: If At First You Don't Succed

Work didn't happen today. I've made a major change in my life and it caused a lot of anxiety for me yesterday. I almost didn't make it to work yesterday. I ended up having to stop by my parent's house to have my mom calm me down and then later drive me (we work at the same place.)

I hate having to do this. I hate feeling weak and needing to ask for help.  Before I go on a whole: I hate having anxiety and panic attacks, let me at least congratulate myself for making it to work yesterday, even though I only stayed for four hours. Yesterday, I barely made it to my parents' house because I could barely breathe. I was trying to keep myself from having panic attacks while I was driving. Trust me, panic attacks and driving don't mix very well. When I did finally make it to work, of course it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. However, I was exhausted from all the anxiety I'd been feeling, and my boss was understanding enough to let me go home early.

Today? Yeah today didn't go half as well as yesterday. But you know what? I needed today. I needed to take care of myself. I kept putting off taking my emergency anti-anxiety medicine because it makes me really sleepy. So, today I woke up, decided I wasn't going to work, and texted my boss the truth: that my anxiety was really bad today and I needed to stay home. Again, thank goodness I have an understanding boss. I took my medicine, and took a nice long nap.

Now, I'm continuing to work on not beating myself up about not going to work. That's the other thing about anxiety, the minute I decide to not do what is making me feel anxious, the guilt kicks in. Not this time though, I won't let it. I know I needed to give myself a day off. Tomorrow will be much better.

How do you deal with anxiety and guilt?

Am I Manic? Trusting Yourself: This is Not the Time to Freak Out

We all forget to take our meds sometimes. It happens

Anxiously starting to think you're going to throw yourself into a manic/hypomanic state because you forgot to take your meds one too many times? It also happens.

Welcome to my day today. I was feeling restless, more than usual and unfocused. I haven't been the best at taking my meds every day this week and I started to think: Shoot, what if this is the beginnings of a manic episode?

Before I let myself go into full blown panic mode (this is when my anxiety kicks in and tries to freak me out) I stopped and really thought about it. Had I been showing any signs of real mania?

I'd slept at least 8 hours last night, and the night before. To be honest, I've been sleeping at least 8 hours a night all week. I hadn't been talking excessively, and I wasn't doing anything out of the ordinary. I wasn't having any unusual racing thoughts other than trying to freak out about whether I was manic or not. However I had drank a large cup of caffeinated tea and diet Coke.

Ah, too much caffeine. I was also feeling a little dehydrated, which could explain why I was feeling extra jittery and a little "off."

So, no, I told myself, I wasn't becoming manic.

After I drank a couple of glasses of water, I went to the store to distract myself and to get out of the house.

It's 60 degrees out. I think it was just a case of too much caffeine and becoming a little stir crazy.

I'm still learning to trust myself when it comes to the fear of becoming Manic. I think sometimes I don't give myself enough credit. Granted, I need to take my meds every night (and I'm definitely going to work on this now), but otherwise I'm doing a good job of taking care of myself.

Lesson learned: Don't drink too much caffeine, drink plenty of water, and take your medicines every day!

What do you do to keep yourself from freaking out?

Off Days: What To Do With Them

Today was definitely an "off day" for me.

The kind of day you don't want to admit that something is wrong and it's not just that you don't want to go to work.

I've written a lot about working in this blog, because that's something that stresses me out and I'm still getting used to it.

Lately it seems Wednesdays are the hardest days for me to get up and go to work. Tuesdays are usually fine, because I don't normally work on Mondays, but the past two weeks I have worked Monday. Last week I was lucky and only had to stay at work on Wednesday for half of a day. The week before, it just didn't happen.

Today, I woke up after pushing the snooze button on my alarm three times to where I was going to be at least fifteen minutes late. It didn't help that the day before I had a really frustrating day and I didn't want to have to put myself back in that environment. To make things worse I'd felt weepy all day, and then found out before I went to bed that one of my favorite professors had died.

To say the least, I didn't wake up feeling motivated to do anything let alone go to work.

Then the guilt sets in. I start piling it all on thinking about how I should have just gone to work because I need to make the money. And how I'm lazy and a bad person because I didn't go. I start worrying about what is my boss going to think of me and is she going to be angry?

Most of these thoughts are not even realistic. Of course I need to make the money, but that can be solved by working an extra day or even two half days if I really need to split them up. I'm lucky that my boss is understanding. Of course I don't want to take advantage of this, but then again I don't want to compromise my health either.

I'm not going to lie and say I haven't spent some of today feeling guilty and bad about myself. But sometimes you have to let yourself feel these things. So I told myself I'd let myself feel bad for some of today but then I'm going to do something that will make me feel better, even if I feel like I don't deserve it. So I'm going to hang out with my friend and that's that. I'm done feeling bad about myself for today.

Tomorrow is going to be better and work is going to be fine.

What do you do when you have off days?

Self-Care

I found this on twitter today from Buzzfeed. One of the posts really resonated with me: 

We should always remind ourselves that we are important too. You should treat yourself just as well as you treat other people if not better. 

Lately I've spending a lot of time by myself and while at first it drove me a little crazy. I'm learning to enjoy my own company. It's nice not to have to constantly be entertaining the people I'm with. You know to be "on." To appear to be happy and interested in what the other person is saying. When you're alone you can just, be. 

So, even though I've said this before. Go ahead and relax for an afternoon if you want to. Watch your favorite show, or do a project that you've been putting off because you've been too busy. I always feel better after I've cooked myself a meal. 

What sort of things do you like to do for self care?

It's Okay to Give Yourself a Break

I've officially started a "real job." One that I have to go to twice a week on Tuesdays and Wednesdays. Luckily, I've known the people I work with for a very long time and they know about my bipolar and anxiety. I've only worked two days so far, one last week, and one this week. I was supposed to work today but I barely had any sleep and had a raging headache all night and woke up and it was still there. It didn't help that the cat and decided to howl in my ear most of the night (love you kitty!).

So, by taking off today most people would say that I'm babying myself. Could I have gone into work today? Sure. Would I have been very productive? Probably not. Instead it would probably have caused a lot of unwanted anxiety. The lack of sleep could have caused me to feel unstable, whether that be depression or mania. Although the mania is less likely as I'm on two mood stabilizers, but still is it worth trying to prove that I can do what a "normal" person would have done and just go into work, rather than taking care of myself? I don't think so.

So what I'm saying is it's okay to give yourself a break. Catch up on sleep, watch your favorite t.v show, and maybe even do that pile of laundry you keep putting off. It's been really hard but I think I'm finally learning how to NOT feel guilty about taking care of myself.

It was really hard this morning to tell myself that it was okay to not go into work. It was hard to not immediately go into the "Oh, I'm such a disappointing, bad person" mode. Instead I'm choosing to tell myself that "it's okay." And I can always try again tomorrow, when I've gotten better sleep.

So how about we all try and give ourselves a break and be proud that we're taking care of ourselves instead!