I Need To Go To Reform School

Yesterday afternoon I gave myself a bonafide anxiety attack! Not a panic-attack think-I-am-having-a-heart-attack call-an-ambulance experience, but one of those where everything that needs to get done implodes on your brain, severe central nervous system overload = FREAK OUT! I had to get to the post office by 5 and at 4:30 I was still sitting here in my sweats from my AM walk/yoga, au natural and not prepared to go anywhere. I started getting the afternoon tremor/shakes that I still seem to be getting from Prednisone and sprung into frantic action. I slapped some foundation and blush on and tried to find something to wear. But nothing that I own fits. I am pulling things down from the closet and struggling into them only to rip them off at the sight of what I actually look like in them. I am not exaggerating, I have 1 ONE 1 (did I make that clear) pair of pants that fit right now. All those months of truffles and Danish butter cookies and Yogurtland while on Prednisone are now manifesting themselves in my slow metabolism and I have really packed on the pounds! I never bothered to get a tan this summer, too preoccupied with post-stroke recovery, and at this point I am pale and white and purple vein-ey and that coupled with FAT is not terribly attractive. I have been wearing closed toed shoes for 3 weeks now because I need to paint my toenails, I have dirt under my fingernails, I am bloated to the point that a pregnant person looks skinnier than I do. Basically I am a disorganized hot-mess! I need to go to the grocery, pay the bills, take the dogs out and all of a sudden, BOOM, I am on overload. A bunch of menial tasks that are not really that important standing alone have formed into one big balloon of "You are a failure at your life" in my brain and I freak out...

I have also been late to two doctor appointments this week. Like 15-20 minutes late. I cannot seem to get myself together! Do I need to put every doctor on speed dial on my cell phone so I don't create near-accidents trying to read the phone number off their business card while driving wildly down the road? Do I need to write the appointments down in my planner for 15 minutes earlier than they actually are so I am on time? How pathetic! I used to be the most uptight queen of punctuality. I was always early everywhere I went. How did I turn into this person? When did I turn into this person? I am sitting here utterly confused...and it hits me. I no longer have the structure of a job outside the home to regiment me. A significant portion of my life was on someone else's time table and I could force myself to conform to that structure just fine. But now all of my life is on my time table and I am not the most disciplined when it comes to routine. But I need to be, for like most Fibromyalgia patients, I do not function well with chaos. It is up to me to create the structure, the routine, that fosters organization and progress out of each day. I have to be a big girl and figure this one out! Send myself to reform school or something! Sheesh!

Last night, with me nice and mellow from anxiety-attack Xanax, my husband and I start unwrapping all the ornaments so we can decorate the tree. My husband is having a hard time. Every birthday or holiday that comes up since I had my strokes cause him to reflect on the possibility of me not being here, had I not survived, and he gets very down. It is hard to watch, breaks my heart, but it is the process he must go through in coming to terms with all of this so I fight the urge to give him a pep-talk and instead allow him to wallow in his negativity. One thing I have found about negativity is that going there is sometimes necessary, but we don't like to spend a lot of time there. It gets late and we have yet to put one ornament on the tree. He does not want me to decorate without him but needs to go to bed, so I promise him I will wait until Thursday night so we can do it together. He gives me the most confused look and says "No, this is wrong, that is not something you will do. It is just strange!" It is in that moment I realize this person I have become may be late or disorganized or knee-deep in chaos, but I sure have relaxed a lot too!

Thanks for joining,

Leah