I wouldn't have thought it possible, but today I feel more "normal" than I have felt for at least the last 5 years. I am not feeling like leaping tall buildings in a single bound or composing a sonata, but I can actually feel a change in my brain chemistry. Now, before you run off and begin the Hallelujah Chorus, I still had some struggles today to keep my attention at more complex work tasks, but I do indeed feel a little stronger. I am abstaining from many of the more self-destructive behaviors, which in and of itself feels like a small victory. I am being very conscious of sharing my feelings when I can actually identify those strange things, something that this blog and my email friends can attest to. I am also looking at my own thought patterns and actions surrounding them (being petty, being gossipy, being overly emotional) and seeking to diffuse my feelings before I drift to negativity.
Now comes the hard part, and I know it. I am going to have a bad day, or an emotional set back and my response to that will tell all. Will I drift to the easy solutions, of finding solace in the wrong ideation? I don't know, and I am scared to find out. I want to be better, I want to not feel so heavy and lifeless. I want so badly to get some life back. I am trying to express that while I am scared, I am also hopeful that I am putting some small pieces in place to try to get my snit-shit together.
My enemy, my greatest enemy, my mortal enemy at this point, is self-pity. I can get so wrapped up in it that it blinds me to all other things. I can literally wallow like a pig on Sunday with the best of them. I feel sorry for who I am, for all the horrors that happened to me, for how I feel so destroyed inside and for all the little things that people have done to me that I cease functioning. So my faithful readers, I beseech you a request. Self-pity, it is a destroyer of worlds. How do you cope? What do you do to overcome its tempting embrace? I really would appreciate a bon mot or deux on the topic.
"How do you cope?"
ReplyDeletePersonally, my first line of defense is always a gratitude list. A well-trained, long-term 12 Stepper, this is hardly an original answer, and yet there you have it.
This story tells it all. When I had about 16 years clean I signed up to go to (basically, the equivalent of) food treatment. I was at the tiny airport in time but had been waiting at the wrong airlines' counter. By the time I corrected my mistake there were no more employees manning the desk. I watched my plane finish boarding & then fly off without me.
I worked to re-ground myself. I started a gratitude list, rote, out of a well ingrained habit. "I'd rather watch my plane fly off without me than... (what would be worse than that?) 1. I could be decapitated."
Suddenly I laughed & laughed. Compared to decapitation, missing a plane... or even NEEDING to go to food treatment... really didn't seem like much of a big deal any more.
I finished off my list of 10, then did 25, and was in fine shape to face the rest of the day after that.
I arrived at treatment a few hours later. I'd missed nothing; they'd even saved an evening meal.
The gratitude list gave me better perspective about my situation so that the catastrophic situation then seemed not really that horrific.