Catch up Post!

So it was brought to my attention that I haven't posted anything here in quite awhile. There is very good reason for that and it's time to start journaling again.

A few weeks ago I was pretty stressed out. Finances sucked, work was hectic and nothing seemed to be going my way at all. I was on a low and couldn't figure out just how I was going to turn it all into a positive situation. It was a Friday morning and I was at work just trying to make it through the day. I clocked out for lunch and realized there was a missed call from Dakota's daycare on my phone. I called them back to be told that Dakota had been suspended for a week and was to come get him immediately. That coupled with all the other stress in my life sent me over my limit. I went into my bosses office and told him what had happened. I had a major anxiety attack and ended up sitting on his floor not knowing what to do. He told me to go home and take care of things. I packed up and left the office. I drove to the campsite and got Dakota and headed home. I don't remember doing any of this. I texted Melissa and said some pretty bad things about myself. She immediately left work and her and Justin drove down to Chattanooga to take care of me.

I ended up in Valley Behavioral health hospital for a week. Melissa took Dakota for me so I didn't have to worry about his well being or care. All I had to worry about was myself. At first I hated being in the hospital, being told what to do and woken all hours of the night for room checks. It was awful. I started to warm up to people there and made a few close friends. We all agreed to be each other's support system once we were back home in the real world. I am currently on medication to manage my depression, my anxiety and my mood disorder. I am on a medicine to help me sleep as well. I hate taking pills, I am very anti-medication. Since my stay in the hospital, I have decided that sometimes you have to do what you have to do in order to be well and I have just started on my road to recovery.

Since I left the hospital I have been on the outpatient therapy program which is a class and therapy session there at the hospital for 3 hours each day for 2 solid weeks. I am learning quite a bit about how to cope with stress and how not to let my anxiety get the best of me. The road to recovery is hard but at least I know that I am not travelling this road alone.

I return back to work on August 9th. Motions are still in place for me to telecommute and work from home. Hopefully everything there will go ok and I can eliminate a lot of the stress by being in a safe and comfortable environment. I am looking forward to that change and I start the training for telecommuting on August 11th. I'm hoping that I can get my productivity back up in the acceptable range and that my absence from work will not negatively affect my overall performance. I don't want to end up losing my job after everything else I have been through lately, that would just suck.

So I am recovering from multiple disorders. I have chronic depression, an anxiety disorder, a mood disorder and OCD. I never realized just how messed up I truly was. It takes a professional to make you see sometimes that it's not all in your head, you really do have an illness. It was hard for me to handle at first. I hate not being perfect. I hate thinking that I cannot be in control of my life without medication. However this is reality and I have to face it dead on and not let worry get in my way of recovery. My support system is phenomenal and I love everyone who has been there for me and given me support over these last few weeks. I hope to continue going forward and that from here on out my life will balance out and I can be the parent and person that I need to be for myself, my son and my loved ones.

I am not allowed to have caffeine anymore because it will counteract my medication. I had to give up coffee. Well I guess there are worse things in life. So I will dream about coffee and drink some tasty water instead it's better for me anyways. Lord I miss Starbucks! However, like I said before, coffee can't fix everything. =D

Chaos and mayhem.....

Why does my life have to be such a mental mind fuck? I mean seriously. Why can I not simply find people or things that I enjoy and just dammit enjoy them? But no, that's not how my world works. Instead I second guess every action, I hate myself daily for something from my past, I tear myself up over how I make other people feel and I wish that I could just go back in time and do everything different. Today is not a good mental day at all. I have been sick to my stomach and brewing a headache all afternoon and I personally think that my existence is the cause of a number of problems for certain people in my life right now. Welcome to the negative side of me if you don't like it or are offended by my self loathing, STOP FUCKING READING MY BLOG!

I didn't make coffee this morning maybe that's why my day went to hell. Fuck coffee at this point I need vodka and lots of it. When you can't swim anymore drown in the bliss that is ignorance. Nuff said.

Can it be? Is she smiling?

Today was a very good day for me. Despite the fact that I only got about 3 hours of sleep last night, I am feeling quite wonderful. I'm not sure if my fears and doubts melted away with my dreams or if I am just on a high today, but I like it. I went to work and had a decent day. I didn't make my production but that was of no fault of my own, that was the fault of the horrific claims that I got all day today. No big deal I just have to work extra hard the rest of this week and hope I can bump my numbers up. I don't want to be one of the ones getting my pink slip come January.

With my recent financial situation finally being able to be gotten under control I am feeling for the first time like I just might be able to do this. I still get help from my two partners in crime when I need it, but I am trying to do most of this on my own so I can reap the benefits of being successful in my own way.

I am waiting to hear when my "work from home" schedule goes into effect. I got offered and accepted for the position of a telecommuter. That will make my life so much easier, you just don't know. If I'm sick I can still work from home, if my son is sick or out of school I can still work from home. I might even be able to not have to put him into daycare over holidays and such if I can work it.

I am feeling better about myself. I am learning to accept compliments again and know that there are people out there that find me attractive and that love me for just me being me. It's hard to grasp that concept sometimes and I'm sure my self esteem will falter from time to time as I am a woman and have hormones to contend with. However, I think that I am exactly where I need to be in life. It may be hard and I may not always like what happens around me or to me, but in the end I feel for the first time since I left my husband that things are going to be ok.

I think I'm going to brew myself coffee in the morning and see what happens!

A day in the life...

I got up this morning and went to work feeling groggy and unhappy. My financial situation is horrible right now. I am barely making ends meet and I'm behind on every single bill I have. I drug myself into work and tried to get through another day of tedium hoping that an answer might be reached as I daydreamed of solutions.

My support system texted me throughout my day to make sure I was ok. To tell me how special they thought I was and to make sure I didn't let my depression get the best of me. It's hard when they can't be here to offer support in person, but at least I have ways to communicate with my two guardians. I don't know what I'd do without them and I often wonder if I'm worth all the struggle they go through on my behalf.

I got to work early today for a change which means I got off work early too. I came home on a mission I was going to figure out a way to get my finances in better order. I sat down at my computer after work and started crunching numbers. It wasn't pretty at all. I got so sick to my stomach when I looked at what I bring home compared to what my bills are. I just knew that it was hopeless. On a whim I called the company I have my auto loan through. Maybe they might be able to help me? After a 30 minute phone conversation with a really helpful representative, I was able to get my car payments lowered from $380 per month to $257.89 per month. So over $100 less a month in payments. I was ecstatic. Now I might be able to get caught up with them and my pay schedule is a lot easier to handle on my income. I should be able to be all caught up hopefully by August 2nd. Keep your fingers crossed for me!

I have also filled out financial aide forms for daycare. At $460 per month, that's a bit much for me to afford. I need full time care for my little sprout since I work full time, but that's almost as much as the rent on my duplex, so I applied for the aide to see what they could offer for a reduction. Even if it's half that amount that would be so much easier for me to handle. I have to wait and see at this point.

The only thing in my life that I stress out about honestly is money. I'm accepting the being alone at home thing. I'm accepting being a single mom and having to make sure that I provide everything that my son needs while still being a parent and disciplinarian. I've even accepted that sleeping alone is not the end of the world, especially when you have a super cute squishy bear to sleep with. He's great to cuddle with and he smells really good. I just wish with everything I had in me that I made more money. People say "Get a second job." What would I do with my son in the evenings if I did that. I have no one local that would watch him for me, at least not reliably enough for me to get a part time job. So I struggle and scrap and try to make due with what is given to me but sometimes I just want to say "Screw it I'm done!"

My emotions are all sorts of messed up right now. I know I need to be strong, I know I have to go on for the sake of my family and friends that love and care about me. However, I'm so very tired. Not sleepy tired either, life tired. My Mama used to always say "Dammit Erin I'm so tired", I never understood what she meant until now. Life takes a little out of you every day. Stress, complications, highs, lows, they all have their effects on you. I just want to curl up and sleep. Sleep the sleep of the dreamers and not awaken until my life is less complicated. When something may go my way without months of struggle prior. If this is a test then I'd like to know what I'm being tested for, because good grief I deserve top prize for the life I've lived.

Coffee doesn't make me smile anymore. Tv make me cry for silly reasons. Music either makes me sad or extremely aggressive and angry. I have to clean my kitchen again I have no clean dishes, yet I can't seem to walk the 5 feet into the kitchen to do it. "I'll do it tomorrow" I hear myself promise, but then tomorrow never comes. I feel as if I'm winding down slowly and I'm not quite sure what to do to get myself back up. Gee, I guess paying my bills would be a good start and I'm attempting to work on that but seriously easier said than done. I'm a proud person and I have to be the best at everything so admitting that I am currently not the best, hurts my soul in ways that I never imagined. I feel broken. Used. Wondering if I can even salvage the person inside anymore because she has spent so many years damaged that it may be easier just to leave her locked inside. Is there hope or is it just a beautiful lie?

Welcome to a day in my life....

Coffee can't fix everything....

This is my first post on my new and improved blog. I am hoping to be able to post regularly and use this as my means to healing. It helps to talk things out, so I am using this to talk to everyone who wants to listen! I can't promise every post will be amazingly entertaining or reveal some life changing revelation but I will promise it will be real, honest and from the heart.

In April I made the hardest decision I have ever made in my life. I decided to end my almost 4 year marriage and move out on my own with my son. I was miserable in my life and I knew that in order to fix it I had to change it. My feelings for him had changed so drastically that instead of coming home to my husband every evening, it felt more like I was coming home to a roommate. We weren't being intimate, in fact I slept on the couch most evenings. It was time to end it and I did. 

When you are in a relationship for any length of time you get used to the mundane things. Little things like someone to sleep next to, someone to watch television with, someone to rub your feet after a long day at work. These are things that I always took for granted because they were always there. The money in a relationship is always nice. Two incomes are better than one and when as a family you are pulling in over 7k a month, lord does it make life easier. I went from 7k a month to barely over $1500 a month being single. My bills didn't change, I still have the same responsibilities, just not near enough money to pay everything I am supposed to be paying. This is where my mind starts to get the best of me and I start to self destruct.

My first week in my own place was the worst week of my life. I'd come home from work and sit on my perfectly comfortable couch and just bawl. I was so lonely and at the time my internet and television weren't connected yet so all I had as my lifeline to my friends was my Iphone. My phone is like my second heart. Without it I don't think I could live. It keeps me connected to the people I most cherish in my life in ways that are convenient and quick and my support system of friends is always a text away. I sleep with my phone and it is never turned off (unless I'm at the movie theater). I spent most of that week texting and on Facebook whenever I got the chance because I was trying so desperately to connect to something because my life felt so incredible empty and useless.

The second week was worst than the first. My bank account ended up overdrawn and my financial situation went from bad to worse. My paycheck that week was for over $700 and by the time the bank got their share I had $50 left in my account to try to live on for two weeks. I was not sleeping at night, my production levels at work started slipping and I was thinking about hurting myself on a daily basis. The only thing I had in my life that I could even remotely be proud of was my son. Without him I might have done something stupid and I probably wouldn't be here writing this if I had.

I began to throw myself into the fantasy world of live action role playing in the form of what our group calls Heroic. We get together monthly at state parks and have weekend long events where we get to play the roles of characters that we created and live out the lives of these characters. I've always loved live action RP because it allows me to interact with real people, not just some name on a screen that I know nothing about. These people not only took me in and became my friends but they have gone beyond that and accepted me as their family. Any single one of them if I needed them to would help me out in any way shape or form that I needed. That is something that not everyone has in their life and my LARP family means more to me than they will ever know. However even in the live action world there are breaks and we try not to schedule too many events in the summers seeing as how it is hot and we think about the safety of the players. My heart broke in May when we had our last event until August because I realized I wouldn't get to see my "family" for 2 1/2 months. I about died. I came home from the last event I was at and cried for hours to the point of making myself sick. I felt like my support system was gone and I was back to being all alone in my pathetic little life. 

Through the live action world I have met many good people. Two of the people I have met have become a staple in my life at this point and are my main means of support. I have been to their house, they have come to visit me in Chattanooga and we have spent more hours texting and chatting through whatever means are available to us than we probably should. They are two of the most amazing people in the world because beyond the silly stuff we say and do and beyond the gaming lifestyle they see the real me. The woman who is inside this hard outer shell that needs so badly to be healed so she can be complete again. I sat for hours this past weekend talking with them in my living room about where to go from here. It was a hard conversation to have and I hate admitting I need help but at this point in my life it's time to move forward and stop living in the past.

I have major issues with depression and self image. I don't sleep nights because I have horrific nightmares and night terrors that I just can't handle. The human body can only be pushed so much before it gives out and I have pushed myself to the edge of that brink. Not taking proper care of myself has left me tired and sad. I don't find joy in may things anymore and I wall myself up from everyone because I am terrified of letting anyone get close enough to hurt me, even though I feel I deserve to be hurt.

This is where my two best friends stepped in and said "Ok, intervention time babe." They are tired of seeing me hurt, they want me to get better and be able to be the mom I need to be, the business woman I need to be, the friend I need to be and eventually when the time comes the relationship partner I need to be. They held my hands, looked me in the eyes and told me exactly how it was. There was no sugar coating, there was no telling me what I wanted to hear, there was only honesty because I needed a good dose of reality staring me in the face and she did. I don't think I have ever made eye contact with someone for so long, the eyes are the gateway to the soul and I hate people being able to see in. However if I don't let people in, I'll never be able to get through what I'm about to endeavor into alone.

I see a therapist currently. My appointments are about once a month because my finances won't allow me to go more regularly. I am not completely honest with my therapist when I have my sessions. I don't admit how I'm truly feeling and I have turned down her suggestion of medication multiple times saying "If I need a pill to make me happy I have failed in life". However at this point I have two choices in life. I can go to her and admit that I need more proactive help with my condition and start to accept the help from the sources I have available to me or I can allow myself to self destruct and end up down the road of rock bottom where my life will fall apart completely and in that my son will be negatively impacted at well. I hate admitting I can't do everything myself. I have a super hero complex and yes dammit I have to save the world. However Stan Lee isn't writing my story so my super powers have failed me. I am so tired and I can finally say this honestly I'm sick. Depression isn't just something that lazy people use to lay around and not do anything. It's a condition that requires care and maintenance in order to control so the person can lead a functional and healthy life. My life is not healthy right now, far from it. So I am at the top of the waterfall looking down into the sparkling pool of health. All I have to do is jump. I'm scare of heights, I hate thinking about the unknown, what if the little pool down there isn't big enough for me and I hit bottom? Ok that is my mind trying to prevent me from doing what I need to do because for years I have been programmed by people who didn't have my best interests in mind when they were in my life. 

I see my friends holding out their hands to me. I feel the hugs, I see their eyes when they talk to me. The love, the concern, the caring not only for me but for Dakota as well. They want me better, they need me better so I can live life and not just go through the motions because I'm functioning on auto pilot. I hear the words "you have to want this we can't do this for you". So here I am at the top of that waterfall. I started taking Melatonin last night to help me sleep. It worked beautifully. I wasn't drugged out, I woke up just fine and didn't feel a bit groggy or ill. I slept for 11 hours last night. Something I haven't done in months. If I get 2-3 hours a night I'm excited. Sleep what a foreign concept. I didn't dream, I just slept. Step one complete, rest is required in order to function. Check that off my list of things to accomplish, a regular sleep schedule. My phone was set to silent and I didn't answer a text or facebook message at all. I need to learn that in order for me to be healthy and ok, it's necessary to unplug sometimes because the world won't stop if I'm not online or have my phone on. Everyone will still be there in the morning and I can answer messages then. I get it and it's going to be hard to unplug but I got through night one successfully! Go me!

Still looking down into that pool at the bottom of the waterfall. My friends are down there looking up at me. I fidgit nervously. I bite my lower lip. They look up at me and nod. I take a few steps back from the edge. I take a deep breath, get a running start and................jump!