Of course it's worth it!

[Not Alone]

Baby steps matter.

[Blueberry]

They certainly do Notalone. Thanks for reminding me. Baby steps today too. I took the contents of a box marked 'Basement' into the basement, I wiped inside and outside my bedroom wardrobe so I can start putting clothing in and have moved other stuff out of that room because the carpenter is bringing my bed in a few hours. I note my way of working is to move things from room to room, occasionally actually finding a permanent place for something but mostly just back and forth like waves at the beach. Though I have done a little sweeping which does involve finding a permanent place for crumbs, dust and the like

New LL signed the form but I didn't manage to leave my apt in time to take it to Officialdom, so that will have to be tomorrow, a day too late but fortunately nothing really bad will happen to me.

Tenant's Rights phoned to say old LL has basically given in, but he wants me to meet him asap as in today-if-possible. I remembered that since I have a few things to organise before I get the money, e.g. a witness and a meeting place as close to bank as possible so I can deposit money and not wander all around town with it in my backpocket (or even inside pocket), it doesn't actually have to be today. It could be tomorrow. After all, old LL is the one who's been stalling on all this. As in, it's your fault mate you're so late getting those keys. Remembering I have rights here and sticking to them is exhausting. Haven't yet contacted the bank - it's not quite so easy to deposit large sums of cash any more, but I have to find out how. Also not just having a witness but moral support would be good too. Somebody who by their very stance is not going to feel intimidated by old LL and will in turn help me not feel intimidated.

I had bad dreams about new LL but none of it turned out true. In my dreams he and his wife came into my apt w/o my knowledge and permission and started cleaning and of course complaining. It was good to note earlier today that that did not in fact happen. He knocked at my door this morning and asked permission to come in, to sign the form. He didn't look around and make personal comments, as has happened in the past with other LLs.

Should isn't good for me so it's OK that I'm not feeling anything about getting money from ex LL. Presumably general worry and anxiety prevent me feeling anything else, except exhaustion.

[sanmagic7]

blueberry, that crapola is exhausting!  what you've dealt w/ from old LL has been draining at the very least, traumatic at the most.  and for so long.  it sounds like new LL at least has some respect for a tenant's privacy - glad to hear that.  here's hoping it's a very different, very pos. experience you have in your new place.  love and hugs 

[Not Alone]

Remembering I have rights here and sticking to them is exhausting.

It is exhausting. Blueberry, I am proud of you!

[Blueberry]

Thank you notalone

It continues exhausting. Today I had to give old LL my keys and more importantly collect the money he owed me. I was 5 minutes late because getting out of the house was so hard. Plus getting out of the house with everything I need. Getting my stuff together is difficult due to my dissociation stuff, OSDD.

Today I felt sad about something, I don't even know what about. It was brief.

I can rally the energy to fight against something or someone but it's much more difficult for me to rally energy for myself w/o the fight. Rally energy to shower and wash hair which is looooong overdue or go off to choir practice which is starting rn and I'm still at home or rally energy to do something with a number of my senses combined with being outside. In short, it's hard to rally energy to thrive instead of merely surviving. Hard to rally energy to do things that would further my recovery.

Yesterday I thought it could be good to purposely look for and list things I enjoy. Or maybe purposely look for these things and reinforce them in my mind rather than writing them down.

Last time I was at my GP's he suggested it might be better to go back inpatient rather than waiting another 2 months while everything gets worse. He has a point. And now that I've moved there's no huge reason to remain outpatient, except my students. There will be waiting time involved anyway, so might as well let the inpatient place know. Last time I decided on inpatient, the very fact that I made this decision helped buoy me up for a while. I wish I could just buoy myself up day by day but that doesn't seem to work. Lightbulb: probably some Part needs to know that Help is on the way and/or I'm heading to a facility with structure for me to fall back on, so lots of help. Also when I'm inpatient it's clear what my task is or tasks are. Outside that setting it's not so easy. I know that is one of the reasons against going inpatient too often! otoh most people think I'd benefit from more intensive therapy than it's possible to get outpatient.

My age is something I think about often, in a shaming and blaming kind of way. I think things e.g: is this it?  or eg: If I don't get my act together soon, I'll be acting like a 70 yo. No disrespect meant to any seniors on here but in years spent on the planet, I'm too young to be acting like 70 e.g. with body breaking down etc. It's not even happening yet. Lightbulb: That's my ICr having a field day, that's the kind of stuff that comes from FOO. Doom and gloom about medical diagnoses they have no idea about.

On my tasks outside inpatient: it feels too easy to just be getting money e.g. from FOO but otoh whenever I try and work I collapse, that's been getting worse for a number of years now and I did decide to stop! But then it's hard for me to find a different purpose in life. Moving hasn't helped that. Anyway I'm just kind of babbling here, but at least writing on here has brought some clarity for me. Then some feelings - shame is at the root of things atm. Of course I know that shame is a biggie in cptsd.

[sanmagic7]

sitting with you, blueberry.  so much. i totally get the energy thing.  little by little, ok?  love and hugs

[Blueberry]

Thank you, san.

Some good things today: it was sunny and quite warm for this time of year, I finally had a shower and afterwards pointed out to a pretty small Inner that nothing had gone wrong - no water sprayed all over the bathroom, no leaks, no floods. I cycled to my GP's and made some realisations on the way e.g. that trying to force myself to do things I think I ought to be doing isn't working. What might get me out of bed instead would be planning to do what I want. What I'd most like to do is start putting my plants in rather than (re)arranging furniture and emptying boxes. If I allow myself to do what I really want, then it's generally easier to do some of the things that I ought to be doing afterwards. The 'wants' and the energy they generate sort of flow into the 'shoulds/oughts'.

'Should' really isn't good for me and it's possible that it never will be.

Some other good stuff from today: did manage to run some errands; I'm back on my non-winter bike which is fun - I notice it automatically makes me cheerier; I taught both my students well today; teaching them did me good; I'm beginning to cycle different routes than immediately after my move which is opening me up to glimpsing little things which I have otherwise not yet seen around town. Lots of spring flowers blooming today.

[rainydiary]

I resonate with being driven by shoulds.  I hope you had some time to spend on plants today.

[Not Alone]

I'm beginning to cycle different routes than immediately after my move which is opening me up to glimpsing little things which I have otherwise not yet seen around town. Lots of spring flowers blooming today.

That sounds lovely.

[Blueberry]

It is Notalone!

Today it is raining and windy, which was the original forecast for yesterday. I've just been enjoying watching a bird soaring in the sky above the trees the other side of the road.

Some other good things today: I got up when I woke up. I didn't have a clock in my room, on purpose. I have taken a break to drink tea and just have a break because I noticed I was getting tired. It seems sometimes just talking or thinking about doing fun things can be enough? And/or some things turn out surprisingly fun? I have been doing some tidying, especially of moving boxes - flattening them and putting them all in a stack in one particular out of the way place. And it was worth it! A couple of rooms look better now, especially my attic room, which is meant to be my creative and fun room. That was my vision for it before I moved and I still want it that way. I'm still in my night clothes with a fleece thrown on top. Being in my night clothes has helped me too, which means there's something to discover about why getting dressed is so exhausting and maybe something to be processed too in trauma T.

rainy, I'm sorry you get the 'shoulds' too.

[Armee]

It's nice to get those breaks of things feeling better and easier.

I struggle with many of the same things you do too and I'm not sure if it resonates with you but what I'm picking up on is that there are so many parts who all have their different motivations and pleasures and dreads and I sit down to do one thing and then within a couple minutes find myself doing another thing and then another and then thinking about all the things I need to do and want to do and just spin around not getting any of them done efficiently. Even if that is resting. I don't have a solution. But I hope that in seeing this pattern I can start to pull it together into a more workable way to do the things I want to do or need to do without the chaos (in my case).

I think ive mentioned this website somewhere before but it has really amazing resources on it for dissociation, ranging from cptsd to osdd to did. It's really good. It's called DIS-SOS. https://www.dis-sos.com/. It's also in Dutch I think as well as English.

[Blueberry]

That's it pretty exactly, Armee.

In difficult phase like now, I tend on my own to do round about zero or to do the easiest things like lying around reading which is good for one Part or sleeping half the day which is preferred by another Part - but still not all day. There are however many more Parts which often get neglected because I can't be 'bothered' for want of a better word to do all the things that help the individual Parts which then helps me as a whole because I don't have all these Parts going on strike because they're not getting what they want and presumably need. From listening to music, to moving to music, to being creative, working with colour, being outside, moving my body, eating a varied diet, feeling 'useful' in some way and much more.

Thanks for the link, I don't remember you mentioning it to me, but you may have. It's in German actually as well as English. I will be looking at it more!

_____________________________

I think I may need to start a new Journal for a while and then come back to this one.

[Blueberry]

Some things I am looking forward to in my new apartment
1) Clean windows with unobstructed view (no scaffolding or tarpaulin)
2) Less clutter (because bit by bit I am getting rid of some)
3) Better room layout and more but smaller rooms
4) Warm rooms
5) Being able to shower and wash hair at home again!
6) Never having to deal with current LL again!
7) Never having to deal with business neighbour again
8 ) No longer tracking so much dust and dirt around and having it come under my door etc.
9) Knowing roughly what's going on in bldg from day to day

I've just re-read this whole Journal, it was good for me. But it's still difficult to feel that it's worth it atm!

Above I've used bold on the points that are still true. Quite a lot really.

2) clutter is back because I'm not good at keeping things clean and organised and tidy
4) It's not the time of year I need to try and keep warm

But also when I think back to my old apartment, I think back to how it mostly was, I don't think back to how it was in the final months.

Actually last week I got rid of a bit of clutter, deposited it at a charity shop in another town, but not enough de-cluttering to make a visual difference.

[AphoticAtramentous]

Above I've used bold on the points that are still true. Quite a lot really.

It's really nice to see the positive changes listed out so clearly, glad you're in a more comfortable space.

Actually last week I got rid of a bit of clutter, deposited it at a charity shop in another town, but not enough de-cluttering to make a visual difference.

Can be so hard to see these things, yeah... Unfortunately we humans like to work in blacks and whites, and it's so hard to distinguish the different levels of grey. I do hope you can appreciate the work you've done regardless of appearance!

Regards,
Aphotic.

[Blueberry]

Part of final post in previous Journal of 2 pages: I realise now - once again - how important it is for me to do things that are good for me because that helps with resilience which I need in order to keep going with my plans! And I also need in order not to be bowled over by anything from whoever.

So this is my new Journal with an important healing sentence I came up with when I was inpatient: Of course it's worth it! Because huge parts of me say that it's not worth it. Not worth it to do anything, not even worth getting out of bed and getting on with my day. Or not worth doing what I'd planned/envisaged because too small, too minor w/o remembering that when that small thing is accomplished, then I can move onto the next. When I don't accomplish that small thing, I don't move onto the next bigger thing either. I just get stuck.

I'm back in "It's not worth it." So partly it's good to see how much this is a recurring theme in my life. Knowing that lifts a bit of the power of It's not worth it. I'm not capable of saying or feeling OF COURSE IT'S WORTH IT! tho I have just written it. Not feeling it though. Just tried singing it too, not getting through to me, gave up.

I remember way back my therapist of 8 years gave me the image of trauma being like a huge balloon that will decrease in size and over time and treatment it will lose more and more air until eventually it's pretty much shrunken and collapses on the ground due to lack of air. I remember hearing that helped me and thinking of this image over time helped me and I could 'see/feel' it shrinking. But then it seemed to get big again. And now? It's mostly shrunken but there are hard vertical ridges in it where the air is stuck, some air anyway, and more difficult - it's still upright.
https://www.cptsd.org/forum/index.php?topic=8370.0 Imagery for CPTSD

Please nobody suggest I'm keeping it upright on purpose. That might be true, but it won't be helpful hearing that. Well, anyway, it's trying to take on more air atm. So I could maybe feel into that Part. I have already not wanted to feel into the Part of me that doesn't want to live and thrive, I mean I felt that Part pretty strongly today but didn't feel up to dialoguing with it, tho dialoguing and finding out what it wants to say and maybe even what it needs is probably the answer. It's what I'd do with a capable therapist. It's what it might be best to do with new trauma T on Friday, that way instead of discussing with her whether she's best for me or not, I could test her.

I haven't so far done anything particularly good for me today, of the resilience stuff. Just writing in theory. But actually that is better than nothing.