When the first wave crashes, TheSecondWave rises

[TheSecondWave]

Alright, so... Hi there.

 

I'm TheSecondWave, and I'm new here.

I'll explain the name first, then go into detail as to why I'm here (warning - I mean detail)

 

My IRL name can be translated as "great wave", and I guess saying that I've had a crash recently is a way of putting things.

Things have been rough, and in at least a few ways I'm starting over. So TheSecondWave it is!

 

Anyways, I'll get to the "crash"...

 

The Crash

 

Things have gone downhill for me since September, and I still am not 100% (although admittedly I don't think I ever truly was 100%).

 

University was the major issue - I was in the fifth year of a four-year degree, having failed a third-year course that was a prerequisite for roughly half of my fourth-year courses, and was doing a full-semester specialty practice. My supervisor noticed things starting to change in October, and they only got worse from there. Suffice to say I was struggling to keep up, was a nervous/emotional wreck, had trouble focusing and keeping things organized in my head, and had extremely shaky confidence. I even did extra rotations in order to try and catch up. And that was only when I was at "work"...

 

I gave up my social life to focus on passing, I stopped exercising, and eventually I had no energy to do anything when I was home. I stopped eating right, and even stopped cooking/making my own food; I lived off of oven pizzas, subway and junk food. I let myself go, and even good habits like cleaning my apartment fell to the wayside. I was mentally drained, as everything I had to give was directed towards school.

 

Eventually, my supervisor and the professor in charge of the course had an intervention, and recommended I seek professional help. I had already been seeing a counsellor/psychologist for several years, but I went to see a different one. Literally no progress was made, as my appointments were the only things keeping me sane and still in the course.

 

So in the end I failed, and I now had to plan how I was going to make up for the lost semester and finish my degree... If I wanted to...

 

I started seeing a career counsellor, and eventually led to me realising I had been struggling all along, not getting as much out of it as classmates who didn't have to work as hard, and decided that I couldn't keep this up. So I made a plan and started arranging myself in a new direction, with some plans and a general direction. I'm now registered for this new degree, and start in September.

 

Another key issue is the fact that the career counsellor noticed some things during our first appointment and a few red flags popped up. This got me referred to a learning disabilities specialist - this eventually got me screened and found that some of my issues were significant enough to warrant further investigation. So I got a referral to a psychiatrist and was diagnosed with Attention Deficit Disorder.

 

The After-Effects

 

So I still haven't really recovered from this crash, and even with these new developments I have yet to really make any significant progress.

 

I've struggled for months to regain good habits. I've started to do things like clean my apartment, build on hygiene routines, make the effort to make food, try to reduce my sweets intake, etc. But I never keep these habits, and falling so constantly off the wagon that I can't even say I'm on it. I still haven't started exercising, even though I would love to.

 

My focus is shot... I have no motivation (Heck I held this off for at least a few weeks, if not longer) to do anything that is not absolutely mandatory, and find myself distracted most of the time. This even applies to things that I want to do, but that may take some effort, and it means that I don't get things done. So I have been a terrible procrastinator, and am struggling to get anything done.

 

My social life hasn't recovered, although I am making some significant progress with a new group I've been becoming increasingly involved with in the past few months. But my social anxiety issues, which I've been seeing a psychologist for most of my time in university, continue to get in the way - but that is a whole other can of worms. I've lost all contact with at least one social scene, and am rarely involved with another. So I spend quite a bit of time alone, which doesn't help things.

 

I am continuing to see the psychiatrist, and I'm just finishing an initial trial period with medication. I find that once I start things, I work to get them done, but I still have so much trouble motivating myself to do them. I've also seen the accessibility centre at the university, and have further appointments with the career counsellor and learning disabilities specialist.

 

***Okay, this post is really long, so let me talk about what I plan on doing and what I want to do in another post.***

[TheSecondWave]

So, Part 2 begins here...

 

What's Left?

 

So right now I'm thinking about what I have, and what I want, and where I'm headed.

I'm essentially at a crossroads and have no idea which road to follow.

 

I think the next few years are essentially going to be me starting over a building a new life, becoming a completely different person.

I know there are things that I need to deal with, things I need to figure out, things I need to accept and things I need to change.

Let's be honest, I want everything to change.

 

So I'll just think about what I have right now, instead of ranting like I did last post:

-I have a family that doesn't always understand everything or knows what's going on, but they're supportive.

-I have a summer job that I find tolerable, and can save up some money for spending and helping pay my way through school.
-I have a group of nerdy acquaintances that may eventually become something I would recognize as "friends"
-I have a support network: counsellor, psychiatrist, career counsellor, psychologist (learning disabilities)
-I have a summer that I can use to start some of these changes

-And now I also have NF to keep me accountable to myself.

 

My Plans

 

Okay, so at the moment my goal is simply to build good habits - healthy eating, increased self-control/impulse control, getting my chores done regularly, exercise, etc.

 

I have several empty journals, one of which I'll use to track and control my finances, one to track what I do in the day and write to-do lists in, and one to record longer rants that will likely give me greater insight into who I am and who I want to be. I need to start these, preferably tomorrow...

 

I have a board, which I will keep track of some of these good habits (primarily my diet, my dental hygiene, and my chores). This board will likely expand as things change, and will likely contain schedules and checklists/sections for other habits as they become routine.

 

I also need to buy a large calendar that I can write things on, in order to keep track of everything that needs to be done or that I feel is important to consider. I have to that soon too...

 

So that's really my major plans for the moment, although I'm hoping to start figuring out what NF can do for me and what goals I should set for myself.

 

But that's enough ranting for now.