It had been a long while before I felt as normal and as happy as I was a week and a bit ago. After I got back, and things got back to my normal (always slightly depressed), I started grasping as straws… there had to be a *reason* why I was as calm and clear as on my recent vacation. I wrote a blog about what the reasons might be…
Because if I could figure out a reason, that meant that I could change things. If I figured out a reason, that means I could FIX it and permanently have the mind I always expected myself to have: a happy one.
Except there’s a catch… that’s not the mind I was given. Reality has struck and I’m reminded, once more, that there is no fix. I have Bipolar. That means sometimes I’m up and sometimes I’m way down. And sometimes I’m slightly down, and sometimes… very rarely, I’m slightly up. How lucky I was to have a whole week visiting with my family and old friends being slightly up- where I do seem normal and everything is going right in my life. I expect that I was triggered, like I usually am during a visit with my family, or really any type of vacation, but because I had planned management strategies and used them, it turned out to be the best mindset I’ve had in a long time.
I just was hoping/expecting that to continue, but because I came home, the trigger ended, and the only choice I had (trick wording, I don’t get a choice in these matters) was to come down.
But now that I have accepted that, I’m ready to move forward.
It seems there is something I have become pretty good at, and that is making plans. I’m not talking so much about planning parties or things like that. My strength lies in making goals, and plans and schedules surrounding those goals. We made a whole summer out of making and following goals for the kids- and they have done an amazing job. So, now, it’s my turn to focus on myself again.
First, I need to put my management back on track. My meds are good… I don’t think anything there needs to change. It’s time I find a new therapist, so I’ve already taken the first step to getting one… I need to put that in my goals/schedule.
I say to people all the time that one of the most effective strategies for your mind is your body. This will involve 2 aspects for me: Exercise (either get to the gym or find an indoor swimming pool, or both), and the Brain Dance (an experiment to keep my mind more accessible this fall/winter… for more information on the brain dance, click on the link below.)
Journaling, I use blogging for this purpose, is an excellent way to make sense of what’s going on in your head. Ever since I was a teenager, I’ve known that writing my problems helps a great deal… but in order for me to feel that much better, I might want to write a solution. Or even just reframing my thoughts can put me in a better place, if I have enough energy for that. For my own sake, I will try to write in the blog, or a personal journal 2x a week.
Since my vacation, I’ve tried to get up from the couch more often to just do more things: chores, hobbies, run errands, clean out, make phone calls (from the couch, but you know…), being an adult, change activities throughout the day. This one, I know already, will not happen all the time. When depression hits, especially in the fall, it is not always possible to … well… be an adult- as hard as it is to admit. However, I can make efforts in this area.
Another thing I want to do is continue to lose weight. I’ve made a few changes in my diet and have lost 7 pounds so far. If I make more effort to prep my food and cook healthy meals, along with the above mentioned exercise, I can keep taking that number lower. (I hate cooking, so this will be hard for me- BUT, I’ve enlisted the help of the rest of the family, and they’ve all agreed to take a day to cook a meal… I’ll still need to help my two girls… but once they know how to be safe and follow a recipe, things will be a lot easier). Yes, I know this goal is mainly for the physical, and not the mental; but eating healthy is also really good for your brain.
Oh! Meditations… the only thing they do for me anymore is put me to sleep. Even the guided meditations I’ve used don’t seem to have the same boost in it anymore. I gotta find something else that will do for me what meditations have in the past: help me focus on the now and concentrate. My brain has been quite noisy lately (except for the vacation), and it would be nice to have a different tool that works for this purpose. (Yes, I have a whole list of management strategies that might work, I just haven’t looked through it yet.) Do you have any tools/strategies that work for this? That I could try?
GOALS:
Get a new therapist
Exercise (gym &/or swimming)
Write in blog 2x a week
Multiple activities in a day
Take time for healthy food
Strategy for focus
Now that my list is complete… who am I kidding? There are plenty more things I want to accomplish besides these… I want to write a book, I want to be able to swim under water, I want to reach more people, I want to feel pretty again, I want to become certified in movement and use it in a career, I want to read a lot of the “classics”, I want to travel Europe, I want to … too much?
Really my main goal right now is to get my mental health/Bipolar management back in control- as part of a routine system so that I can get to those other things and have the life that I want (at least as close as I can get with Bipolar). Now, I just need to figure out when to do what… but that part’s easy.