Lyrics: “Punches” – Frank Turner, 2022
It’s been a while since I wrote a post and I can’t even say why exactly. Probably because I feel like I don’t have anything “newsworthy” to write about. My life is pretty ordinary at the moment. Work. Books. Watching TV series on a streaming service. A bit of politics, but I can’t really be bothered as much as I used to. Therapy…
Therapy | That’s going good, I think. The last few sessions anyway made me think quite a bit and also made me start getting into a bit more routine to not think so much. “Think” as in going down a spiral of worry. Recently my therapist helped me figured out that wanting to do too much or expecting something to work right away might be part of my problem. Or to put in differently: I often forget that some things take time. Trial and error. Training. I sometimes – too often ? – think back on what I have already managed to do in my life, but only see the positive end result and not how long it took me to get there. Right now I often don’t bother starting something, because it seems impossible to me that I’ll manage to get from starting point A to the end point for instance… Z. But that’s because my brain obviously thinks that there are no letters in between. And don’t believe that it’s ok to just get to B or C for a while, because that’s still the right direction. But I often feel bad when I don’t get to at least P or Q right away and then I give up and … Argh! Does that make sense to anyone? Anyway, we’re working on small steps and small expectations at the moment.
Work | I’ve been a bit more relaxed at and about work recently, which feels amazing. I sometimes still worry that I should be more worried, but at the moment I try to ignore that more often than not and just go with the flow. On Thursday some members of my team and I participated at a “goals and other stuff” workshop of our department. We were about 15 people all in all and I think we had a good time and productive workshop. I’m usually anxious about these kind of group projects: lack of self-esteem, too much worry to mess up and what others might think and all that. But I’m proud and happy to report that it all went quite well. I contributed, I made small talk or even proper work-related inter-departmental talk. I kind of involuntarily presented the results of our sub-group at some point, because I was standing nearest to the flipchart. And I did fine! Didn’t feel to nervous in that moment either. Is it a bit pathetic, that I think a day like this is worth remembering here? I don’t care. I got out of that building and thought: “You did good today!” I don’t often have that feeling at the moment, so yeah: writing it down here as a reminder!
Grief | I know this prompt feels heavy, but it’s not all that. I just can’t think of any other for the stuff I want to sum up under this one. Three of us four children decided on which sort of grave plaque we want to get for our mum’s grave. I know we’re late with that. August last year was the time my mum was finally home again after her stroke in May. I don’t know if we really would have managed to care for her at home indefinitely even with care assistance coming in twice a day. But we were determined to give it a try at least. Re: grief, I can at least by now drive around various streets / places, which remind me of the whole ordeal last year with the various hospitals / care home stays all over the area, and not get pissed off or sad about last year. That’s progress. I still miss my mum as someone to just talk to about my day or other random ordinary things. I guess that won’t ever go away.
