Just another life update. It turns out that missing ten days of school due to an emotional meltdown puts you way behind on life obligations, so I’ve been going crazy trying to catch up. I finally turned in my last past-due assignment yesterday and now I’m trying to finish this week’s projects by the end of the weekend so I don’t fall behind again. I’m stressed over grades because I chose to take the late penalties over the indignity of telling my professor that I was in the hospital. However, so far I’ve gotten 100% on everything I’ve turned in with the exception of the points deducted for the work being late, so I’m pretty sure I can still get an A. I’ve noticed that I still do my best work late at night which does *not* align well with life in a group home where we are expected to take night meds by 8:30 at the latest. So I just stay up anyway and let them think that I’m sleeping. I no longer have to take medication that’s purpose is to induce sleep and a can of Monster energy can more than counteract a dose of zyprexa.
I’m a bit worried about my turtle. He was fine on Friday but yesterday he barely touched his sweet potato and today he’s been less responsive than usual. Unfortunately it’s the weekend and I don’t know if this is worth calling his veterinarian’s emergency line. It’s hard being a single parent. The fact that my son is a reptile really makes it harder sometimes because reptiles do not have any occasion to ask for help in the wild so they are remarkably good at hiding illness until it’s life-threatening. That being said, I’m pretty sure that the only reason Dr. X never picked up that I have hypochondria by proxy was because he didn’t know me with my turtle present.
I’m stressed about money. Everything was fine but I wanted to buy Christmas presents for my siblings and niblings because that’s basically the only contact I get with them all year. If I were still driving I could just sell plasma but the nearest place to do that is far enough away that the cost of rideshares to and from would take almost all my earnings, and it’s basically impossible to get there via public transportation especially with the short-staffing and reduced bus schedules.
I’m working on developing positive relationships with group home staff. It’s going okay. This one poor guy has been working doubles every single day which has actually been working out well for me and I’m starting to be able to be myself around him. White guilt is a real thing. I think about what I need from staff and then I think about all the unfair world history that resulted in me being able to get help and them having to be the ones to give it to me, and that makes it a lot harder for me to be open about my needs. The irony of a group home with 100% white residents being staffed by 100% African immigrant workers is not lost on me. It’s like I’m so afraid to be racist that I end up being racist, which I recognize and which then adds to white guilt, and then it’s a vicious cycle. They’re not perfect and neither am I and it’s hard for me to figure out what’s what.
On an entirely different note, I’m trying to be more social. The MeetUp app apparently still exists despite taking a beating from COVID, and I went to my first meeting for people who are asexual. It felt good to be able to relate to other people. Even in adolescence and college and a few years after, before being exposed to any medications at all, I never understood why other people were interested in sex. I assumed that everyone else was also just pretending to be interested in it. Obviously there was also the dynamic of being in a cult and having to dress super modestly and never be alone around men, etc, but in my case there wasn’t much to repress. I can honestly say that I have never in my life looked at a human and thought that they would look better with no clothes on. Clothes are great and I want everyone to wear clothes all the time. However, I’m heteroromantic and still yearn for a relationship, which is hard to get when you’re overweight, not at all interested in sex, and living in a group home due to out-of-control PTSD. I keep asking my PCP to sign me up for gastric bypass surgery and they keep telling me that it’s major surgery with a lot of side-effects. However, I was always stick thin before I started taking psych meds and that was part of my identity and it feels like my body was just one more thing that trauma (and my mother) managed to rob from me.
In positive news, I’ve been embracing my love of animal videos. I hate almost all movies and TV shows but I like watching YouTube. Sometimes I watch videos by other ex-Christians, but more frequently I watch videos of cleaning or literally just an hour-long video of a person mowing an overgrown lawn. I also like animal videos, especially ones put out by The Dodo. I found a playlist by them called “Cat Crazy” and it made me so happy to watch that I was still smiling for a while after watching it. I can’t remember if I posted this TikTok video previously but I watched it over and over for like a day when I first found it. It reminded me of Dr. X and my social worker and lots of other hospital staff who went above and beyond to help me when I was down and out. They never danced and their faces were obscured by masks but I think deep down they rejoiced over my accomplishments.
With that, I have a turtle to attend to, and I’m horribly behind on all ADLs and self-care tasks, and I have to read and summarize three chapters and write two discussion board posts plus several replies by the end of the day. To anyone still reading this blog, I don’t know who you are but I appreciate that you exist and you care about me ☺️
