cane nero

[lobelia321]

The Institution of Horror has managed to penetrate les pillules and I have been feeling low and wobbly inside. It's interesting to note what activities and things go first. I can still manage to:

• get up and do my Flylady morning routine (get dressed to shoes, make coffee, empty dishwasher)

• write collaborative origfic political thriller

• read chick-lit (my second dose of Sophie Kinsella today, the Shopaholic novel)

• hang out for hours in bookshops but being frightened of many of the books (too heavy, too arty, too Japanese, too masculine, too sad-making, too faded-photo-of-woman-in-the-rain-on-the-cover'y, too aggressively marketed, too obscure, too unknown of author, too famous of author)

• sit for hours in coffee shops, consuming cappuccini and Danishs

• meditate for 4 minutes before bed (a new habit of mine: effort to stem anxiety)

• pet the kittens


What I'm not managing to do right now:

• plan stuff

• make a list of things-to-do

• remember everything (I almost forgot to go to a luncheon appointment yesterday, for example)

• open my office email account

• and if I open it, reading any of the office emails

• think of my Institution of Horror in a rational way (it was a letter from the Dean that penetrated the pillules on Thursday; it sent me into a spin; and it was even a nice letter!)

• talk or see any colleagues from the I of H, even the nice ones (I bumped into my HoD and one of his mates on Friday and it completely spooked me)

• go on LJ very much (losing LJ is a real symptom; sometimes going on LJ an obsessive lot is a symptom of procrastination but when I have no desire to go on LJ, this is also Not Good)

• listen to my ipod (the music thing seems to have turned itself right off)

• watch TV (I never watch much TV anyway but now, I can hardly bear even to enter the room where the TV set sits)

• watch DVDs (this is a spill-over from the TV-phobia; I haven't even been watching any Bollywood which often has been a Great Solace!)

• do anything related to my H of I, incl. organising student work placements which I volunteered for earlier this year and which I'm supposed to be doing right now and whereof my email inbox is full (but then I've lost the ability to cope with email)

• read fanfic

• write fanfic

ETA: • write my academic book (I totally forgot this! That is how little interest I have in it!)


I read a book called Sunbathing in the Rain by a Welsh poet called Gwyneth Lewis and there she describes her own depression and how she thinks it's good to give into the depression in order to learn what it may have to teach you. Some of this feels like giving up and wallowing, some of it feels right. Oh, I don't know.

Comments

[sheldrake.livejournal.com]

Bums. :(

I have heard of that book on depression. Did I mention the one I was reading - The Noon-Day Demon? I found it helpful because it's so exhaustive and detailed - I quite like that sort of thing when I'm feeling low, although it's so long I never actually finished it. But finding any sort of answers about this stuff is so difficult. I know exactly what you mean when you say:

Some of this feels like giving up and wallowing, some of it feels right. Oh, I don't know.

Somtimes I find that I can cope better by finding the lowest level on which I can operate and not actually have life collapse around my ears. Admittedly my level is proabably somewhat lower than yours, as I've few responsibilities and I can do my job pretty much on autopilot, but still. It's a way of getting through until you come out the other side.

Hope that black dog buggers off somewhere else soon.

[lobelia321.livejournal.com]

I saw the Noonday Demon in the shop on the shelf next to the sunbathing one! It looked awfully long and daunting and also it was written by a man and at the moment I'm finding it very difficult to read things written by men. An odd symptom. But I will keep it in mind.

The woman in the sunbathing book feel into deep, deep doldrums. She stayed in bed for two weeks, for one thing. I've not been that bad. I do get up every morning. The routines keep me going. I don't like coming unravelled. But for many months I've kept a daily to-do list and got into a state when I couldn't tick everything off (which was 28 days out of 29) and at the moment I write down nothing, and as a consequence I forget everything. But maybe that's what I needed? Time off from driving myself?

I borrowed Sarah Waters from t'local library but I'm gagging for more chick lit. Can I cope with Literature?

[viva-gloria.livejournal.com]

[gosh, am full of it this evening] re to-do lists, use categories: Must, Might, Some Time, Would Like To. Not all my Musts get done (oops gas bill) and my Mights and Some Time currently go from week to week. (I don't do a daily to-do, it's too much.)

[viva-gloria.livejournal.com]

I hear you, esp. on the memory-lapse and No Music. Also, my fan-thing is broken, so am off LJ mostly.

Have Ev0l Counsellor who is questioning all my coping strategies, so pretty soon I expect I won't be managing any semblance of normality.

My motto here: do what you can manage, write down whatever comes to mind that you can't, and why.

Incidentally, I was in your area today, doing cocktails and sushi with a fellow slasher. If I were to be in your area again, would you like to meet up for a coffee or something?

[msilverstar]

I'm in a funk too. It's so boring and annoying and I wish I could wish myself out of it. *bangs head against wall gently*

Let's hold hands and take one step at a time.