Whisper

We try (and fail) to pretend it isn't happening. Birthday is one of the big stressors of November, and no matter how hard I try, I can't seem to get people to just leave it alone. I don't have a problem with getting older, it just pokes at a lot of past pain.

Forgot to say: made major progress on my FSA yesterday! I finally got a call back from the person I needed to talk to at that doctor's office (first call was on Oct. 11). She refunded the $312 that was overcharged back to my FSA, and sent my an itemized receipt and payment history. Uploaded all that to the FSA people, so the ball is now in their court. I don't see the refund on the FSA site yet, so it might take a few days for all of that to process through. Once it does, I need to repay my CPAP supplier, so that I can order more supplies, and then I need to work on claiming all the stuff I paid out of pocket while the FSA was frozen; so much fun!

Just so long as you don't get a visit from the Verruca Gnome.

W4 Tuesday Food went fine. They had a birthday lunch for me at work, so that was off plan, but logged as well as I could. Had a bunch off the veggie tray. Took care of the registration after work. About 15 minutes in and out. Everyone was really nice, didn't need to deal with a crowd. Need to remember that it really isn't that bad. Still ended up in a bit of a funk after and didn't want to go hiking at all, just wanted to go home and hide. Went back and forth with myself, but finally went and did some. Felt good to get out and enjoy a little bit of solitude at the bridge before heading back. Hit my step goal and got stairs done while at work. Still in a funk came back again after getting home and ended up staying up too late watching YouTube videos instead of taking a shower and getting my sheet music put together. Finally got myself to close the laptop and start the Bedtime Ritual. Going through the steps helped, and while I didn't feel like sleeping when I first got into bed, I made an agreement to at least try and sleep for 30 minutes before getting back up, and fell asleep quickly. I've got time to get the sheet music sorted before orchestra today, and should be able to squeeze in a shower either before or after. Gonna "forget" the laptop at work so it doesn't distract me.

Good use of delegation. It is understandable that people would want to know, but it is more understandable that you need space and they can put their curiosity on the back burner.

We need to figure out a way to convince them that they've always wanted to go on a long road trip, and now is the perfect time to do. The National Parks are slow right now, maybe they can be convinced to take a tour of all of them...

More good bits than bad bits is good to see.

Interested in both! Unless wall shelf and zig-zag shelf are the same, than still interested, but just in one thing... Keep coming back. Even when I'm not doing well with my goals, coming back keeps me closer to them than just giving up entirely.

Yay heat!

W4 Monday Did really good with logging my food. Was on plan for Breakfast 1, Breakfast 2 and Lunch. Skipped snack. Had a bunch of stuff to do, so rather than dinner at home, stopped by Chipotle for a steak salad. (If you haven't checked their website, they have a really good nutrition calculator) Hit my step and stair goals. Last night was the big test for my new Bedtime Ritual. Monday is always a late night with bells and I often find it hard to settle down and go to bed. Followed the ritual, shortened the reading and prayer journal slightly, checked all the other steps, climbed into bed, put on my wrist braces and went to sleep fairly quickly and slept well. I've got an appointment set to take care of my registration after work. Should be a quick in and out, so planning on getting in a bit of a hike after that before heading home. Need to get my Orchestra music hole punched and sorted in my binder before rehearsal tomorrow, so that'll be part of today's plan too. I've checked off most of the dreaded November tasks. In reality, most of them are fairly simple, my head makes way to big of a deal about them.

I don't think you are. Gift cards can be really good gifts, if you either get it for a place you've been told they like to shop, or if you know the person well and are gifting them an experience to a place you think they'll really like. Randomized and trying to get people to "horse trade?" That sounds like a fast way to create a miserable situation. Don't want to go through the effort of getting a good gift card? Prepaid Visa cards are a thing! This Christmas was going to be hard on you, even without other people being dicks (they are being dicks, it isn't just you). I wish I could give you some advice that would make it better, but I do have faith in the resiliency that you have shown, and I know that you will do everything you can to make it good for your Agents.

Truer words have never been spoken. Both of these things are really awesome! Because brains, much like children, are often dicks. I think that is why a bunch of us are here, because our brains are dicks to us, but we can lend some logical brain function to each other. I've been really impressed by all the ways you keep getting back up, getting back at it.

I am most definitely cycling through depressive episodes right now. Keep finding myself overly tired and wanting to cry, often for no reason. I'm also running a really short fuse on my temper and finding it hard not to blow up at people. Things that are important for treating depression (other than drugs): Proper sleep, finding things to be grateful for, proper nutrition, and exercise. My new bedtime ritual is definitely helping with the first two. I've gone to bed and initially fallen asleep at a reasonable time every night since I started practicing it. It isn't a panacea, there were two nights where I woke up later and ended up reading and eating for an hour, but I definitely have gotten more and better sleep, but at least I'm not starting that way. I'm not sure what to do to fix the getting up issue, but still, progress. Gratitude is a major component of the Examen, and I am finding that really helpful. On the food front, I just haven't had the energy to plan out meals, buy a bunch of ingredients and spend a bunch of time cooking it, so I've been falling back on prepared food, which is often really high in carbs, which seem to trigger a lot of my food cravings. Went to the grocery store yesterday and got a bunch of meatballs, six bags of cook in microwave veggies, some "Nut-thins" and mixed nuts to bring to work for lunches. While cooking the meatballs in the oven, I portioned out the nuts and thins so I would have them ready for work. Hopefully this will work better than fully premade stuff, and wasn't beyond what I was up for doing during my only day off. I also tried portioning out some candy, but this was probably a bad idea, I should probably just not have any around. Meal plan for Mon - Sat First Breakfast (5 am): Bulletproof coffee, 400 cals Second Breakfast (8am): Whole milk plain greek yogurt with 1 cup frozen mixed berries 290 cals Lunch (11am): Meatballs and Veggies 640 cals, plus variable for veggies. Snack (if hungry) Mixed nuts or nut things 130-170 cals. Dinner, small portion of whatever is served at home. Desert: 1 serving of candy. After looking at my weight Sunday, I had thought about going full bore Keto and IF (skipping dinner at home as I have the least control over that), but last time I tried Keto, I didn't transition into it, crashed my blood sugar hard and ended up in really bad shape. Sure, I lost weight; temporarily. I'm hoping that this format will work at least "okay" and be more sustainable. If I keep waking up to binge candy in the middle of the night, I need to toss the rest of it and accept that I simply can't have any around. I might also start taking a multivitamin again to help cover for anything I'm missing in my diet. Exercise: my "breath hard outside" thing went out the window when I hurt my foot over a week ago. My foot is doing better, I need get back outside. I did make an effort on Saturday, but the lady wasn't home to work on her leaves (need to get into garage) and then my car was acting up bad so ended up at the mechanics. Didn't have the spoons to get outside on Sunday, was feeling totally wiped out. Aiming for after work Tuesday and Thursday this week, but might need to adjust as I need to make a registration appointment and I'm not sure when that'll be. I'm adding climbing up and down 10 flights of stairs to my work day 10,000 step goal. I'll try and get it done as early in the day as possible, so it doesn't get skipped for being to busy or tired. That'll help get my heart rate up at least once a day, and I figure it'll use the muscle's I'll need for hiking. Already got that done today, did it on Saturday too. I called this "Whisper and the Invention of Time" because I wanted to fix my priorities and felt that I was sinking too much time, and getting too much negativity from my Xbox and following Politics. They started freaking IMPEACHMENT proceedings, yeah, I went back to reading Politics threads, yeah, losing lots of time to it and getting lots of negative feelings and feedback loops. Need to stop that again. What is going to happen is nearly a foregone conclusion, the House will Impeach, the Senate will acquit. My obsessing and getting mad isn't going to change or make anything better. I took Monday the 11th off work to rest my foot. I started playing Bioshock (the original one) that day, and have sunk time into it most days since. Reflecting on my day in the Examen yesterday made clear to me that this is not a good plan. I really do not need to immerse myself into a really dark place (literally and metaphorically) where I am nothing more than a psychotic killer in a labyrinth full of psychotic killers. So I need to knock that shit off again.

356.9 lbs, up 4.5 pounds from last week alone. Really upset. Really don't want to hit 360 again.

"The problem is that I am from a dysfunctional family, work in a dysfunctional job, and am surrounded by neurotics, with whom I fit perfectly." -Joseph Tetlow, SJ I'm stuck in a Big O for a few hours while my car is being looked at, again, and I am thankful that they have a solid idea of what is wrong, that the part is local and fairly cheap, that they are waving the cost of labour, as this was missed on Thursday, and that it affords me time to do some reading that I've been wanting to do, but been crowded out of my schedule. I'll try and do a fuller update when I'm not on my phone.

Sorry MrC isn't pulling his weight.

Oy! I think my tolerance would be much less than 3 days.

I now want to visit your place for dinner, but think it might be a bit too much of a drive

I hope the time with him was still good, even with the pain.

I want to make it really clear that I do value your feedback and like having this conversation with you. Tone can be really hard to coney over writing and I don't want to sound like I'm arguing... 1. When I say "a few seconds" I mean it. This is meant to be able to say that I did something today to improve my space, not an opportunity to get into a cleaning session, just throw out a wrapper, or stand up a knocked over book, just something to scratch that mental itch. 5. Yeah, this is a good spot to maybe do something shorter 10. I have a dark secret with this one, it is mostly to give the sedative a little more time to kick in. Don't tell God. I've found that I need to get the water heated as a step zero, and multi task the drinking with steps 6, 7, and 8, but yeah, I can see nights where this one might need to get kiboshed.

I get your point with having a shorter one, but I'm not sure it is a good idea for me. Late nights tend to turn into really late nights, because I have trouble switching myself off. I try rushing to bed, and then I don't sleep and start doing other stuff to "relax" and get stuck in a cycle. Youtube, reading, eating... While there are a lot of steps in this ritual, most of them are best measured in seconds, and the longer ones (prayer, brushing) are the ones I least think I should be skipping. I do think permission to myself to read a shorter devotional, or skip the journaling aspect of prayer does make sense.

A sinus infections with "no sniff, no blowing" orders for your nose sounds like a whole heap of not fun, but I'm glad that it hasn't bled again. Also good that you were able to register for your needed classes and have the rest of work for your required class. Take it easy as you get back into exercising. Dropping the step goal down to 4/5,000 and working it back up gradually is probably a good idea.

W3 Wednesday I'm actually really happy with how yesterday went. Did a fairly good job of logging my food and hit my step goal. I made progress reading A Simple Life Changing Prayer. I marked my violin to help me move in and out of 3rd position, and practiced playing some familiar hymns in 3rd position. Got a shower and shave. Did some tidying up. Wrote and followed a bedtime ritual. I think overall the bedtime ritual is going to serve me well. It was nice to have a path to follow to transition from the day's activities to the nights rest, and to have some tea and reflection. I am really hoping that over time this will give my brain some strong "time to rest" signals that will help me avoid staying up all night and binge eating, which otherwise seems to happen on the regular. I did at times feel some impatience, but it was passing. I started around 7:30, and was initially annoyed to see that I was finished around 8:30, but reminded myself that I almost never hit my 8:00 "bedtime", and can adjust my start time to accommodate. When I went to close my eyes and get comfortable, I remember feeling like my body wasn't yet ready for sleep and thinking about reading for a while, but have no recollection to it taking much time at all to fall asleep, so happy I ignored those thoughts. I'm not totally sure what today is going to bring. I might try and get some raking done after work today. It looks like I'm going to be working both Friday, and a half day Saturday, so might try and go to painting Friday afternoon, as I won't be able to go Saturday morning.

Bedtime Ritual 1. Spend a few seconds to make something cleaner / more tidy. 2. Add water to CPAP humidifier and preheat. 3. Get laptop bag packed for next day. 4. Make sure lunch is ready for next day. 5. Make a cup of caffeine free tea. 6. Read a devotional / something uplifting. 7. Pray the Examen 8. Take night meds 9. Floss / brush teeth, wash face, brush hair 10. Sing a hymn 11. Pray Luther’s Evening Prayer 12. Shut off lights, get comfortable in bed and close my eyes. Calling this a rough draft. I'll try it out tonight and see how it works. Unless I see a big problem, I'll try sticking with it for at least a week before tweaking it. Printing a copy to have with me at home.

Trying to get back to equilibrium. November has lots of things that freak me out. I've got a chunk of them done, I've got a chunk left to do. Just finished Open Enrollment for my work benefits. Don't know why this always freaks me out, but it really does. I was told a week ago that "the check is in the mail" to fix my FSA issue, but I still haven't received it. Need to call that Dr's office again. Need to drop some more money on car maintenance, but I don't like where my checking account balance is. Need to straighten something out with the locale police department. Should only take a few minutes, but still freaks me out. My birthday is coming up and so is Thanksgiving and I've got a lot of baggage with both of them. Need to get labs drawn; I hate needles. Trying to convince myself that today is really October 44th isn't working. Ok, going to try and focus on the good. I've done a hard thing today, I don't need to do any others right now. My foot is mostly better, but I'm still trying to take it a little easy. I'm trying to come up with something of a "bedtime ritual" based more on a series of steps to put myself in the proper frame for sleep, not tied to time, so I can use the same ritual even on nights where I'm getting to bed late.