Feeling Inadequate.......

You ever get that feeling where you are so annoyed you could literally claw your own face off? Yeah, I am in one of those moods. But I am perplexed because I have no reason to feel that way, I just do.

So I need to clean....like really bad. I am not sure if my house is really disgusting or if it is just my OCD but then again four cats, two kids, and a husband can really mess up a house quick. After dinner dishes can make my tiny kitchen look as though a food massacre has occurred.  A few misplaced cups can make my living room look like a factory that produces dirty drinking glasses. I don't know, it could be my anxiety. I feel on edge lately....edgy....like waiting for the other shoe to drop and I have no idea why. It bothers me, when I get like this. I mean, I get that OCD does that but I would like to have a discernible reason as to why I feel like I am waiting on something that never truly arises. I am just left feeling like this in a sort of anxiety ridden limbo. It sucks.


I have been feeling burnt out lately. Irritated. Annoyed. Frustrated. Under appreciated. Just all around yucky. I think I am going stir crazy. I think I need to get out and start walking again....I don't know get some air or something which leads me to my current dilemma.


I have a hard time finishing things. I mean, I can start them. I can even do them halfway but finishing them...that's a crap shoot. Usually ending more on the crap and less on the shoot. I have hundreds of examples. High school, beauty school, choir, craft shows, video games, my G.E.D test, learning french, making more videos of me singing, putting together my blog posts as a book, learning to ride the bus, walking more to lose more weight,  blah blah blah, ect, ect, ect. I don't know why I do this. I mean, I do want to or have wanted to desperately do these things and yet even if I get a running head start, I usually end up not finishing any of these tasks. Why? Sure, anxiety played a huge part in the schooling issue. My dyslexia makes me have to actually take time out of my day for tutoring for my G.E.D. I am still undecided on what posts I want to use in my book. I mean, there are reasons but holy crap, people have reasons all the time not to do things and yet they still manage to get them done....I am aware of that fact. You would think as someone with OCD I would be a master of scheduling and timing. Well, my OCD centers around the fear of germs and medical fears which is not conducive nor helpful in any thing currently going on in my life.....great (sarcasm). In fact, the only thing I have managed to do consistently in last year is write my blog posts. For some reason I haven't given up on that. I am thankful that I still write but I have no idea why I can write posts and not do these other things as well. Surely, writing in a blog is not an exclusive activity.

And then comes the dread and slight niggling of fear.....my oldest is going to the do the online school thing. It's a great option but I have this horrid fear that I am going to mess it up some how. I will be the one responsible for logging in his hours and checking e-mails from the teacher and I suck at schedules and repetitive actions that require me to be punctual and routine. I mean, I can't even remember to take my pills half of the time without telling my husband I did first, just in case I have to ask him whether or not I took them because the times get jumbled up in my mind. Damn OCD self doubt. The thought of having to actually keep all of this straight terrifies me. I am going to need a stop watch so I can log correctly because I want to do it right and I can't rely on me remembering what time he did which thing with just a normal clock. Trust me, I will get it all jumbled and most likely wrong. And the even worse fear is that I will have to finish doing this. I can not simply just let it fall to the wayside like other things. I am going to have continue no matter what. Which is a good thing because I have to stop starting things and then never finishing them. That's no way to live your life. I am so unhappy that I never finished doing something that I love, said no one ever.

So, I have to make some changes. Scary but doable. I am going to have to be more responsible and if that means getting a stop watch and an alarm to remind me to do certain things until they become a habit then I am just going to have to do it. I have to get over this not finishing curse that has plagued me my whole life and get with it. I am not going to allow my short comings to affect my kid's schooling. And I need to be happy with my choices, which means actually finishing some of the crap I seem to crap out on, like walking again. And sticking with it. I mean if I can blog for over a year I can certainly walk down the road and log into e-mails for God's sake. I just want to feel the satisfaction of finishing something meaningful and be able to say that I can do something all the way. I have some real fears that I am incapable of finishing things but then again that is probably just this stupid self doubt I carry around with me. It's hard to believe in my finishing things when I have so many examples of things I have not finished and so few examples of things I did. I guess I am just going to have to start dissecting my life and start working on finishing more of them until this fear of me being inadequate goes away. That's my plan anyway. Can't hurt to try, try, and try again...

Neurotic Nelly

You Ever Get That Feeling....

You ever get that feeling that the people you thought would most understand you on a very basic level, completely misunderstand everything about you and everything that you do? 

Yea, it's been one of "those" kind of weeks. I am still trying to recover from it all and I feel really down in the dumps and frustrated. I was hoping to have excellent news to share today. I was hoping to have an upbeat post that was inspiring and left you with the feeling of content. Unfortunately, that's not going to happen. So if that was the kind of post you were hoping to read today, you might want to stop reading this right now.

Or now....

Definitely by now...

Okay, you have been warned.....

It started when I talked to a dear friend the other day. I was explaining some issues with my kids and I don't know what I was actually expecting....support maybe? A friend's compassion? I don't know. What I got felt more like judgment and maybe a tad bit of stigma....not the greatest of conversations, I assure you. I am not sure that was her intention, she is a very busy person and has a lot going on. I caught her at a busy moment so that may have had something to do with it. I can't really spread conjecture on her state of mind or on how she thought the conversation went, but for me it felt like a heart break. I felt misunderstood and possibly blamed. I have no idea how I am supposed to get over the lump in my throat every time I think about it. I am sure we will get over this issue but at the same time, now I am afraid to share things about myself and family I would have never thought would be an off topic.  I am afraid I will be wounded again.


Then it was the doctor's office today. I don't even know where to start. I thought my doctor would be happy that I have lost twenty pounds in two months. That I have been keeping my blood sugar down to excellent levels. I am pretty sure I am actually borderline and not full blown diabetic and she had originally put me on two metaformin a day. Something that made me violently ill. She then put me on one a day, and since I have lost the weight it has been really hard for me to make sure my sugar doesn't go too low. No missing meals for me. At it's lowest it was 79. Not super low but anything 70 and under can be extremely dangerous.

She was mad at me. Because I ate. I had to, as I explained, because when I miss a meal my blood sugar dips way down. She didn't care. She said next time just make the appointment in the morning.....Now, I am no rocket scientist, but I eat at 6.a.m. when the doctor's office is still closed and that means to have an appointment where I haven't eaten would have to be noon. Which would be fine, except you sit in her office for a while and by the time she got in to see me, it would be really low. How is that safe?

I was hoping I had lost enough weight to get off the metaformin. I suppose not....not that she said anything about it. I felt completely invisible. How does one feel invisible while participating in a doctor's appointment about oneself? I dunno, but apparently it is possible.

Then the actual reason besides the check up, that I went to see her was totally ignored. She snapped at me again when I asked her what my blood sugar level was and then recanted when my numbers where excellent...Yea, no kidding. 

To top it off she then said she couldn't give me a flu shot because they were out, but she couldn't look me in the eye when she said this and I was pretty sure she was lying and just didn't want to have to write it up and give it to me. She told me to go to my pharmacy. Well, that would work except none of the places giving out the flu shot take my insurance. So I would have to pay out of pocket, when in my doctor's office it is totally covered by my insurance. I mean, what the hell lady? Yea, to say I was angry would be putting it mildly. And then after all of her being rude and snarky about me eating, and how my tests would be faulty now that I ate, she made me get the blood tests anyway. Now I ask you, how does any of this make any sense?

Short answer...it doesn't. I knew we had crossed a line of no return when she made me take the meds but never said I was actually diabetic. Nor did she tell me to get a machine and check it. I mean who does that? You are diabetic but don't bother checking your blood sugar...I found out my levels were one point over normal when she "diagnosed" me.  Now it has been nothing but one big hassle and she doesn't even take the time to explain anything to me.

I need a new doctor. I have decided I can't trust her in any fashion. And it bothers me that now I have spend all day tomorrow trying to find a new one. The anxiety is overwhelming. I am frustrated. I feel like vomiting when I even think about doing it.

And that is how anxiety works. I don't know what others expect from me, but when I feel like I am being judged or blamed, I get anxiety. I suffer from an anxiety disorder...go figure.

I feel like those that should understand me don't and trying to explain it to them in a way that totally makes sense to them sometimes feels like I am banging my head up against the wall. I am not alright. I am not always as capable as I appear and yes, spending the whole day trying to find a doctor that will actually listen to my concerns and answer my questions seems like a daunting task. It seems to me like climbing Mt. Everest. So there. I never claimed to be perfect or even healthy. I am not. I have a mental illness and sometimes it rears it's ugly head and I am left to deal with all of the fallout alone. I am sorry if it inconveniences anyone or takes up their lunch hour. I am just trying to get through my issues and live my life....sue me.

And that is where the frustration comes in....I have known both of these people for years, many years and I am dumbfounded as to how in the hell neither of them understand me at all. Dumbfounded. I wish it was only them, but alas  there are tons of people that just don't get what is wrong with me. Even those that understand somewhat, have moments of obscured believability and it just makes me sad. And tired. Mostly tired....I am just tired.

Sick and tired of trying to explain, make excuses, prove that I have what I say I have and how it affects me, and that it isn't because I am lazy or distracted, or looking for attention. My God, if it were only so simple as that. 

I guess I am just wounded. I feel judged and ignored, placated and disillusioned. I guess my heart is broken. My nerve endings are burnt. My feelings are raw. I just over all want to go sit somewhere quiet and cry. Sigh, see I told you this post wasn't hopeful or fun...

I know it will all work out for the best. I know that getting a new doctor is a must for any sense of freaking sanity. I know that this too shall pass, but until then everything kinda sucks right now.

Oh well, I will post again on Thursday and maybe things will be a lot better. Thanks for always being there for me. I really am glad there are people like me that understand what this hell is like. I am so glad to not truly be alone.

Neurotic Nelly 

Frustrating....

The weather has been crappy and cold. It feels more like the Antarctic rather than the USA. I have been feeling a little overwhelmed and tired. I would like to get out and take a walk. I would like to sit on the front porch and bask in the sun. I would like to pretend that this depressing and oppressive winter is gone and spring has arrived....but it's been negative 18 all day so that plan is out.

I am a positive thinking person. I haven't always been this way but as my mental disorder slowly and methodically ripped everything away from me, I decided to hold onto at least one thing that it couldn't take away....my attitude. I struggled to remain hopeful, I battled to look for the silver lining in everything, I fought to be positive in the face of that soul shattering desolace that was left behind after my OCD had taken a firm hold over my life. For me, being positive wasn't a natural disposition as much as it was a choice. A choice to refuse to let OCD make me miserable in spirit as well as in life.

I am always hopeful, always looking on the bright side, always reaching out to help. I am just wired that way through my personality but also through choice. I don't want to dwell in the land of negativity that I once lived in. It is a harsh unforgiving place. Cold and dark and depressingly lonely.

I want to walk in the warm fields, feeling the grass beneath my bare feet. To feel the sun warming the air around me and smell the crisp scent of the earth renewing, regrowing. Starting a new. I long to feel the cool gentle breeze through my hair and on my skin, giving me goosebumps from the sheer joy of it. I want to sit on my front porch with my husband and a warm cup of coffee and listen to the world wake up one bird song at a time. Hear the trees rustle. See the dawn break in it's magnificent pinks, purples, reds, and oranges. And I can't do that because it is the middle of one the coldest winters we have had in years. And it frustrates me.

I long to write prose and stories and my blog posts and not fear that my words will be turned around against me or be turned into something I did not say. Something I did not mean. Something I am unaware of. I long to write and not have to second guess what my posts might mean to others and if they will be taken at face value, as they should be. Because I always say exactly what I mean and if I don't write it, then I don't feel it. I long to write freely, unabashedly, unbiased, and most of all like I used to. All of this second guessing has made me deal with writer's block and I, as all writers do, detest writer's block. And it frustrates me.

I miss the calmness. This year I am going to be doing things that I need to do but inadvertently make me extremely uncomfortable. I am going to be going farther in things that I have ever gone before and it scares me. Terrifies me, really. But they are necessary for me to learn to be more independent from others and more independent from my mental illness. Small things that everyday people take for granted but haunt me like a reoccurring nightmare. This year my resolutions are small, seem petty, and to normal people would seem quite silly and juvenile. I am going to take small bus trips around my old town so I can learn to take the bus....by myself. Something I have never done before. Go somewhere alone and unprotected. I am going to start small like the library I used to go to years ago. That way, if I miss the bus I still know where I am. It is all my idea and all of my own accord to want to do this. I want to learn to be more self sufficient before I turn thirty five. I want to be able to go do things and stop missing out on life because I can not drive. I want to be able to go to my own doctor's appointments or take my children for ice cream and not have to wait til my husband gets home or call the plethora of family members to see if they can make time to take me somewhere. I want to be more free from my anxiety and fear. It's daunting and scary and it feels like I am years behind in this journey. Like I am a child. Like I am inadequate, somehow. Like I am just learning how to walk again. And it frustrates me.

I am going to be working on visiting friends. Actually going out and visiting them. Something I never do. That would mean taking the a fore mentioned bus, going out of my comfort zone, making sure I am on time, and letting go of the control I have weaved over my life like a thick woolen blanket. A blanket I originally wove because I thought it would make me more calm, when in reality all it has done is make my socialization become stagnate and allowed it to smother me. A few days ago, an old childhood friend that I recently reconnected with said that we should meet up sometime and shoot the breeze. I answered enthusiastically and got really excited at the possibility, but the voice in my mind laughed at me. "Yeah, sure Nelly. You, go out and actually leave the house....alone....to meet up with friends? Bahahaha that will be the day." I realized the voice was right. I have never gone out with friends alone without them or someone else driving me. Never felt comfortable with giving myself permission to do so and worse yet, never given myself the responsibility to try. My best friend lives less than thirty minutes away from me and although we talk on the phone often, I haven't seen her in over a year. I could make excuses, she works a lot (and she does), she is busy planning her wedding, she has so many things to do....but the truth hits me like a ton of bricks as I write this. I haven't seen her not because she doesn't have time for me, but because I have allowed myself to become unable to visit her. It's not her....it's me. I have allowed myself to become home bound on a strategic level, not because I have an auto immune disease that makes going out risky or because I have lost both legs from stepping on a land mine but simply because I am too scared to do so. And it frustrates me.

The things, illusions really, that I have clung to in my life that make me feel protected have in many ways, bound me to my illness. Some would call them excuses but I would venture further. I would call them crutches.  Crutches that I used to think made me feel safe and secure. Crutches that held the anxiety at bay. I used to feel comfortable being shut up in my home. I used to be fine with just being how I am. I told myself that many times, but deep down I was just scared and maybe a tad bit ashamed. Ashamed that I am so very afraid to try new things. Ashamed that I let the OCD take away my ability to be more independent and free. Ashamed that because I feel anxiety, I have never learned to take the bus before I hit thirty five years old. That I have never went to the grocery store by myself and bought what I needed alone. That I have never just went across town for no reason at all by myself. That I have not allowed myself to explore the world, the library, the book store, the local restaurant, my friend's homes without being with someone else to share it with. That I have left out that part of getting to know myself that way. I mean, yes I know myself, but I don't know how to go anywhere alone by myself and I think that might be the biggest tragedy of all. That I have allowed my pretty house with all of it's comforts to become my sanctuary, my security blanket, and my prison all at the same time.  I have allowed the OCD to do this to me, and worse yet I willingly participated in this event. I forgot how to fight it, or not fighting back became a habit, or I was too exhausted to try, or even that I simply allowed the fear to take over and I stopped trying all together. As I write this and look honestly at my life and the pain OCD has caused me, I am aghast at how far I stopped being who I truly am. A fighter, a positive thinker, a warrior of my ow mind. And it frustrates me.

I could dwell and sink myself into the self abuse pattern that many of us know so well. A part of me wants to. A part of me wants to blame myself and paint my misgivings and failures in big red letters across my chest like the proverbial Scarlet Letter but instead of an A for adulteress it would be a huge S for Scaredy Cat. A part of me wants to punish myself for all of the things I should have done by now but have allowed the fear to prevent me from doing so. But what would be the point in that? I have already suffered by not doing those things in the first place. Why punish myself twice for the same crime? I mean, I have a mental illness but it doesn't make a masochist. I don't enjoy suffering.

So, I am going to go with the positive approach. Not because it easier, it's not. It is always easier to stay in the familiar pattern of self abuse and self blame. We are comfortable there because we are used to it. I am going to not only not punish myself for not doing the things I think I should be doing but I am also not going to keep holding onto the old excuses and faulty crutches that keep me from doing them. It will be uncomfortable. It will be scary. It will be utterly terrifying in some cases, but I am no longer going to allow my freedom to be stolen away bit by bit by my OCD. I am going to get through this and slowly take back my life piece by piece. Yes, I am starting at an older age and I am relearning how to do things most people do on a regular basis, but they are not me and I can see the silver lining. It is better late than never and I am going to learn how to be more free, more independent, and just who I am without the comfort of my stifling security blanket that I have weaved around myself. I am going to write and not second guess my words. If someone wants to believe that I wrote something else than what's on the paper, then it's their problem. I have nothing to do with that. I can't change other people's minds. I am going to learn how to give myself responsibility for how I get to places and give myself permission to do so. I am walking out of the prison I have built for myself with pretty wall paper and comfortable furniture. I am going to seek adventure and not let fear keep me back. I am going to take that damn bus and learn to like it, or at the very least not be afraid of it. I am going to go to that library, and the store, and yes, my best friend's house. It is going to be hard but I am going to slowly learn to trust myself finally, one step at a time. One day at a time. One bus ride at a time. I can do this. I have to do this. I am going to do this...

Neurotic Nelly