Sick and Tired

For the last few weeks, I have been feeling really meh, and for the last couple of days, I have also felt physically sick. It's amazing how much power the mind has over the body... I mean, I legit had some issues today (yesterday) with acid reflux, even though I take something for it daily, but I know part of it is all the stuff that is weighing on my mind.

First, this whole mess of living in a village for businesses is really stressful. I have too many people breathing down my neck about us being a retail store with regular hours, etc. I've been placing a lot of value on their comments, but no more. We're closed for the foreseeable future, and the money that was going to be spent down there, taking down walls and re-routing electricity and such, is going to be spent in our apartment instead. I can't continue to live with three floors of utter chaos, and it's been 5 years since we moved in... we spent a bit of time in the beginning sprucing the place up, but then spent the vast majority of time and money on the main floor. No more. I want our home to be comfortable, pretty, and exactly what we want it to be. I don't want to settle anymore.

We're picking tile, and other flooring, doing all new moldings, and painting doors and such to transform this 70s apartment into a proper modern farmhouse. Yay! We will finally be upgrading our used oven, whose numbers you can't even read anymore and whose heat is totally random, and we will upgrade our hand-me-down microwave that takes double the time to heat anything. I'm going to actually USE all the vintage linens I have been collecting (GASP!) to make curtains and other things to use throughout the house, and I want to create a gallery wall in our dining space, and repaint some furniture that has been in need for quite some time.

Meanwhile, we have found a great contractor who is reasonably priced and highly-skilled. He's going to do some work in our bathroom, arguably the worst room of the house at the moment, before we set him loose on the main floor demo. He has a great plan of attack for that space, so I'm excited to see what he does.

All of this has brought me such peace of mind. My anxiety about how everything was going to work out in terms of rebuilding the store space and reopening to appease our neighbors was making me sick. I just want to forget about all of that for now, focus on our home, and use my studio for what it is meant to be -- a studio. No set hours, no nothing. I can use some of the space for taking photos of my work to post etsy on and on my eventual website, I can use some of the space for a filming area to film my online classes, and I can spread out as much as I want without having to worry that a customer is going to see my mess. When it's time to tear up that space, we will know. For now, I am happy to be more INTENTIONAL with what I am choosing to do. ;)

Aaaaaand we're back.

My therapist, as well as several friends and J have all suggested I go back to journaling in some form. So here we are. I don't like pencil/paper journaling anymore because my carpal tunnel makes it difficult to write for any length of time, and this is easy and seems natural...

Going into 2020 I had a bunch of goals. So many that when January 1 finally hit, I felt incredibly overwhelmed and froze in place. But they are important goals, so I'm going to brain dump them here.

Spend time, every day, working on my physical health
1. exercise/move for 20-30 minutes daily
2. take all meds every day
3. track food consumed in an app to track calories and be more accountable re: what I eat
4. drink more water and less Coke Zero
5. meal plan and eat at home more often
6. take my blood sugar and record it at least once per day
7. reduce overall carb intake - fewer than 90 for a while, then fewer than 60 per day
8. stop eating after 8PM
9. to bed by midnight
10. awake by 9AM
11. work with diabetic coach as prescribed by Dr. D

Spend time, every day, working on my mental health:
1. journal daily, even if it's just a brain dump
2. meditate daily for at least 5 minutes using Calm app
3. read and/or work in my mental health books
4. chat with M or J weekly about what I am reading/learning
5. reduce the time I spend on Facebook
6. stick to routine visits with Dr. A and Abi

Word of the year: INTENTION
1. plan my week on Sunday evenings using my calendar(s) and Daily Agenda paper
2. make big decisions after sleeping on them - discuss them with J to get feedback
3. have plans/vision for everything I purchase, including art supplies
4. take the classes that I have been saving up
5. schedule time with friends every other week

Word of the year: AUTHENTICITY
1. do what is best for me (and for us) and not what others want/expect of me
2. work on realizing that what *I* think about myself is all that matters
3. work on art that makes me happy, and not what I think will sell
4. spend time with people who are authentically themselves, and who genuinely like me
5. give of myself in ways that are authentic to me (classes, random gifts, telling them how I feel about them, spend time with them)

I already feel better having written them out instead of having them bounce around in my head.

I have started exercising and am currently on day 2 of a 30-day challenge. I'm enjoying that Body Groove is freeform and allows me room to deal with my own limitations, but also allows me to grow and get better daily. Just doing the elliptical isn't entertainment enough, it doesn't change up enough, to keep my attention. Plus I can wake up, put on clothes and just do it without having to go anywhere. I'm working on stretching out my left shoulder, too, as I go through the program. I'm realizing how stiff my body is and how much mobility I have lost because I don't move/exercise. My legs are certainly better than my upper body, but I'm not liking how that feels. It will get better as I progress.

My evening eating habits are unhealthy. For whatever reason, after dinner, I just binge, even if I am completely full. Part of it is that I am sitting and watching TV, so I clearly need to change that up somehow. If I am not eating while watching TV I am playing games on my iPad. I'd like to be using that time better -- working on something smaller so that I can be upstairs with J, but nothing messy or too easy for the cats to interfere with. Even my coloring books would be a good option. I will put together a bag of supplies that I can easily stash with things I can do with my hands while watching TV. I will also add some SF gum to the bag so that if I need to chew something, at least it's not all sorts of bad food. And we have a good stock of SF Jello I can eat that is sweet, as well as mini pickles when I want something savory. I need to find something else salty, something chip-like, to snack on too. Maybe some of those keto cheese crisps?

I'm going to print out my list above and post it in a few different places so I see them daily. Part of ADHD is easily losing track of time and what I was meaning to do. I have a habit of getting lost on FB or YouTube for hours at a time, and then feeling terrible about it. Hopefully having my list of goals in front of me all the time will help me focus better. Having a daily checklist of all the things may help me stay accountable, too.

The Love Boat

So anxiety and depression keep me from doing a lot of things. In fact, as I recently figured out, though being a homebody/recluse/hermit shelters me from bad stuff, it also keeps me from the good stuff. I've been cocooning myself to feel better protected. Through therapy I have learned that because I didn't feel protected as a child, I learned to build an armor and protect myself. After the horrific experience I had with my last boss and "teammates," my armor was broken, and I no longer had the tools to rebuild it, so I retreated to safety, and refused to come out. We even moved cross-country because I needed to be that far away from the pain.

Then someone on a FB Live this morning said...
"A ship in harbor is safe — but that is not what ships are built for.”

In fact, ships are supposed to go out to sea, battle storms, and see new places. They are purposefully built with strong materials so that they can withstand the pressure of the waves that pound against them. Their decks are built and sealed so that water just slides off of them and does no damage. They don't hide in a shelter, in fact, they ARE a shelter that protects the people and cargo they transport.

WE are ships. I.AM.A.SHIP.

We need to believe that we are meant to get out into the world, to see new places, to try new things, and to withstand the crap people throw at us. My harbor has been safe these last 6 years, and though I am not quite ready to set out for open waters just yet, I'm starting to tool around in the marina. I am built of strong stuff, and though I had a hole and was taking on water, I am working on pumping all of that out and preparing to become sea-worthy once again. This time my sides will be that much stronger, my deck that much more protected, and my cargo safer than ever before. I will also be equipped to allow others to use my harbor, as I won't be needing it as much, which translates into being a better wife, friend, and daughter.

Glee-peats

Have you ever been so sad about something, so connected to someone who leaves your life, that you can feel your heart actually hurt when you think about it? Just for a moment, you can actually feel it rise in your chest to take a heavy sigh before it settles back into place and the tears start?

The first time I felt that level of pain was the first time I had to take to Jason to the airport after he visited me in college. I remember driving away from the airport, and a plane flew over my car. I was sure it was his, and I felt it -- my heart was sobbing, and I felt terribly alone and sad. There was a longing with it that I knew wasn't going to be satisfied for months until I saw him again.

I felt the same way a handful of times since, usually as a result of a tremendous loss, but in the last few months I have felt it again.

I've been watching Glee while I work, specifically the last couple seasons, when one of the original members of the Glee club loses his sense of self. He doesn't know what he wants to do with his life, and his original plan didn't work the way he thought it would, so he questions everything. Long story short, he decides to go to college to become a teacher, and there are several scenes of other teachers reminiscing about what it means to teach and how it feels to connect with a class of kids.

Then I received a lovely card in the mail from one of my former students. She's in her third year in college, pursuing her dreams of being an actress. In the note she told me that she has also added a major in early education education, and that I impacted her life, as a teacher. Most of the time we don't really get to hear these things from former students, especially as an elementary level teacher, so when we do get that level of feedback, it makes a huge impact.

Anyway, all of this has contributed to some major decisions being made. It's been 5 years since I've been in a classroom. When people ask me why I left, I always explain that the politics of being a teacher are exhausting and you just can't teach anymore because you always have to worry about test scores and not always what's best for kids. However, there is another truth...

The last four years of my career were spent in the same school, the first three of which were working for someone who managed to make me doubt myself on a daily basis. She mistreated my closest friend (who, incidentally, is an amazingly gifted teacher), she created a hostile work environment by pitting teachers and other staff against each other, and she made it clear that the secretary and registrar of the school were the most important people there, even above the kids we worked with. To make matters worse, the final three years of my career were spent working with a teammate who was the single most manipulative, passive aggressive, mean girl I have ever met. A million times worse than Regina George. These two women contributed to my overall feelings of inadequacy, instability, and self-loathing. Those feelings have stayed with me all these years, no matter what happened, no matter who tried to tell me differently.

But then I felt it. About a month ago, watching Glee and hearing these fake teachers talk about impacting the lives of kids, I felt it. My heart rose into a heavy, deep sigh, and and the longing began. I wanted my own group of kids so badly that it hurt. My passion for education and doing what's best for kids has never wavered, not once, despite feeling like a failure.

And for the first time in 5 years, I actually considered going back.

The more I've considered it, the more I want it. I'm still terrified because after 5 years I feel like a new teacher all over again. But, I also have regained some confidence that I thought was gone forever. Yes, I made some mistakes in my career, and there are things I regret and kids I know I could have worked harder to help, but I also know there are kids like Ashley, who I did impact in a positive way, and there are more to come.

So this is all to say that although I will continue to make pretty things and have a shop, I am also going back to school for spring semester so that I can renew my Wisconsin teaching license and try to get back into a classroom next fall.

I hope that in a year I will be able to reclaim part of my identity that I have been missing and can no longer deny will always be part of me.

Teacher.

Growth

So....

Today I saw a post on Facebook by someone who visited my booth at a fair.  She posted on a local "for sale" board that she is now making bracelets just like mine -- she's clearly gluing pre-made metal on to belts.

Once upon a time this would have really pissed me off.  I would have ranted about it, maybe even contacted her about with a snarky remark, which would only have served to make me feel horrible later.  Instead it served as a great reminder that I think every artist needs to hear sometimes...

First of all, it reminded me of how far I have come in my learning and my work.  In the past I may have felt jealous or competitive about someone doing what I do, instead I feel like this is a sign to ramp up my game and take the next step in my jewelry.  Instead of making the same stuff, I am designing new pieces, learning new processes, and really working on my style to create a signature look.

Second, I'm flattered that someone liked my work enough to try to duplicate it.  She's clearly at the very beginning of doing what she does, but still, she liked what I made enough to decide to go purchase all the supplies to make them herself.

Last, and this is what I really want to impart on other artists... this other person deciding to duplicate what I do does not, in any way, detract from my work.  She's not the competition, she's a member of the artist community now, and we actually have something in common that we could talk about were we to meet by chance.  I'm not going to contact her, offer her advice, or anything like that, but I do applaud her and wish her well as she begins her own journey as an artist.

I know some folks who feel as if someone else ripped off their ideas for their own benefit.  Here's the thing... I didn't invent bracelets.  I didn't invent leather, soldering, recycling belts, etc. I simply took what was already out there and put my own spin on it, and now someone else is doing the same!  The circle of art! :)

Guess Jeans and Benetton Sweaters

So a few days ago one of my Facebook friends wrote a post that was a blatant judgement on someone else, a stranger they witnessed in public, doing something that was quite mundane, but something that they would never do (apparently).  They ended their post with "who does that?"  The mundane thing in question was totally something I would do, given a similar situation.  The funny part about it was that the person making the judgement gets judged on a daily basis based on the lifestyle they lead.  She is confronted often, probably daily in social media, by people who think she is not only wrong, but damned to hell.  That's pretty intense, and it was very much a pot/kettle moment to me.

Humans are very judgmental by nature.  We feel entitled to our opinions, our preferences, and our statements, even going so far in America to protect them at the governmental level.  I get it -- I mean, on a very basic level, when we judge someone else's preference as sub-par to our own, we feel more right, superior even.  And when friends and family, whose approval we seek, actually validate our opinions, they become even more solidified.  So we must be right, right?

Here's the thing... although choices help make life interesting, and differing opinions/preferences do the same, we often allow them to serve to both group us and separate us from one-another.  Think of high school -- the ridiculous stuff that we allow to impact who we like and don't like... clothing labels, the kind of cars we drove (or didn't), music we listened to... and it continues today as adults, just on a different level.

What if we didn't judge one another's opinions, choices, preferences, etc?  What if, even when someone made a monumentally bad choice (in our humble opinion), we gave them the benefit of the doubt that they are doing the best they could at any given moment?  What if we truly did embrace and appreciate how different we all are, but how similar we all are, as well?  What if we're just all here to love each other and be the best version of ourselves possible?  Don't you think the world would be a very, very different place?  I don't think this is pie in the sky, either.  I really believe that this is a simple choice, and I've been trying to remind myself that if I am doing the best I can, others must be doing the same.  It doesn't always work, but with simple things like other people's choices in terms of clothing, music, art, and the plethora of ways they choose to express themselves, why expend that energy?

Why try to find ways to tear each other down?  There's plenty of room at the top for everyone.

Grab a beverage and sit a spell...

This is going to be long, so bear with me.  I have a lot to say.

I want to begin by saying that this is not meant to be a tirade of excuses.  The following are realizations that I have made about myself and why I am the way I am.  I'm not asking for pity, just understanding.  There's happy ending, I promise.

Being a good person is important to me.  I have a strong need to be needed, to be remembered, to leave a legacy.  In the last few years I have thought a lot about what I want people to say about me when I die.  "She was a saint," isn't one of them, make no mistake.  But I do what to be remembered as someone who gave back a lot... as someone who was a good teacher and wonderful friend.  I want people to use words like "funny," and "caring," and "compassionate."  This is the life that I want to build for myself, because I know that I am the one who needs to work to deserve those accolades.  But it has been difficult to believe that I could ever be deserving of them.

I am an only child, ADHD, and an introvert.  Until recently I didn't truly realize how all of that has impacted my life.

As an only child, I didn't have siblings to beat on me or that I had to learn to exist and share with.  I grew up thinking everything was all about me because, well, it was!  I was a well-behaved kid, but awkward in terms of making friends or playing with other kids because that was not the norm for me.  I realize now that so much of what I did and said as a kid made me sound like a selfish, spoiled brat.  I wasn't trying to be.  None of what I did or said was maliciously thought out, it was all simply my honest reactions to the given stimuli or task.  At family holidays that were spent with my grandfather's side, the next youngest person in attendance after me was my own mother!  I was both mature for my age, and terribly immature because I didn't know how to act around other kids.  I have felt awkward my entire life.

As I moved in to middle and high school, where girls become horrifyingly judgmental, mean, and competitive, it only got worse.  Puberty brought with it big boobs earlier than pretty much anyone else, brand new insecurities, and crippling anxiety and depression.  I know I was a selfish friend, but I didn't know any better.  I was used to always getting what I wanted -- like listening to the music I liked, or watching the shows I liked without any siblings to give me grief about it.  I always had my way, and came to believe that was what life was supposed to be like.  I don't think I was selfish, honestly, because I was clueless about it.  It just didn't occur to me to think about what others may have wanted, so I was bossy about play (to maximize the time I did have with other kids, I wanted to do what I couldn't do alone), vocally jealous and resentful in regards to what I didn't get to have, and always worried about what others thought of me because I wanted to be involved in everything.  I know now that I lost some very good friends thanks to this behavior, all the way through college.

Being an only child also messed with my definition of the word "fair."  To this day I have a tendency to be almost childlike with my black and white views.  Everyone should get the exact same thing, the exact same amount, in the same amount of time.  I was a child communist!  I'm able to make out some shades of gray now, as an adult, but there are many areas where I am still all or nothing.  I constantly have an internal struggle between being a true leader or just doing it myself, whatever "it" may be.  My way may not be the right way, but at least it's something!  But sometimes my way IS the right way. ;)

Being a fatherless child made me crave attention, connection, and approval.  I found myself telling stories to create a better presentation of myself... someone that I saw as deserving of what I craved, because certainly I was not deserving as I was or am.  That's what you do when seeking approval.  I also employed what I call the Fat Girl Diversion Technique (aka "Make 'em laugh!").  If I make self-depricating jokes about myself, others will feel compelled to tell me that I am the opposite of those things in order to make me feel better.  But, of course, I was smart enough to know that they would feel compelled to say these things, so they must have been said out of obligation and not because they were true.... which led me back to feeling badly about myself.  Vicious circle.

The approval-seeker in me, ironically, never believes the good stuff.  I have no problem, however, feeling like a terrible let-down of a human being when I don't get on with 1 person out of 25.  It's my fault that someone doesn't like me, and obviously they are right!  I hope they don't tell anyone else because then no one will want to be my friend anymore!  Oh hi there, Anxiety.  Thanks for bringing your bestie, Depression, with you!

So how do I respond to this?  Well, I push people away so that they can't hurt me, of course!  Anxiety becomes paranoia, which leads to accusations or saying things I don't really mean, thus becoming the person that that first guy (who I honestly probably didn't like in the first place) said I was or thought I was.  Then I have to put my tail between my legs and apologize, hoping my real friends, who I mistreated, will understand and forgive me.

Sigh.  It's all so exhausting.

But here is the good news... to know better is to do better, and admitting that you have a problem is the first step to recovery.  I have already begun to work on these issues... I know my triggers and am trying to deal with them as best I can.  The most important part is to step outside of the problem and look at it and analyze it.  Ask "how does this really impact me?" and "what would be the best response to this?"  I am learning to slow down and not react immediately, which is really hard for me to do, so if you have ever been a target of this, or are in the future, please know how very sorry I am and that I am working to change.

2015 is going to be the year of letting go.  I know that all of this anxiety stems from one situation in my life that I have clung to for the last 35 years.  It's a crutch that needs to be kicked out from underneath me and burned.  It's based on a lie that I created in my head at a very young age and took responsibility to fix, even though it was never my problem in the first place.  I know that once I can fight it and kill it, it will no longer hold me back from everything that I am meant to accomplish and the happiness that I deserve (because we ALL deserve happiness).

And that begins my path to being the person I truly want to be, not the one I assigned to myself out of fear, self-hate, and blame for something that is not mine to take.

I know I'm not the only one.  May my very public way of beginning the battle be empowering to you and help you start to reckon with your own beasts.