(random, depression, journey with the gas can, y056.barium )

[elainegrey]

In my growing confidence that i am not the person who is causing the failure to communicate:

I sent a reminder for next week's retreat planning meeting  on Thursday morning (Dec 7, living in infamy), which began, "The next meeting dedicated to [retreat] planning will be Thursday, 14 Dec, 7pm Eastern, 4 pm Pacific on Zoom...." Thursday evening i was meeting with someone in the same zoom room for a different purpose when a third person showed up: "Don't we have a meeting this evening?" they asked.

I wonder if this is the beginning of everyone being in a long COVID haze?  I suppose, given the person,  there could also be an aging component to it.

--== ∞ ==--

I am trying to find a word or metaphor  that isn't depression to describe where i have been the past six months: enervated and frustrated because i was enervated, is accurate to some extent. I believe the management change and my coach change coming fast  after the  first surgery recovery milestone (back to work) were a seed. I believe my expectations for recovery were too high, and my disappointment at not meeting them was part of the malaise. And now this cough since the beginning of October.

Perhaps it's the walk to find a gas station, when the car ran out of gas, but one doesn't really know why the car ran out of gas.  So there, that's my metaphor, i'm on a journey with the gas can

I would like to feel in March, when my 56th year is complete, that (minimally) i am refueling. I think i am currently at the part of the journey where i recognize some of the reasons i ran out of gas, and some of the reasons  why i wasn't (magically) refueled. I feel like i might be trying to figure out how to get the gas in the tank, at this point -- maybe i'm still looking around for a source of fuel. I've made it past willing the tank full, feeling guilty the tank wasn't full,  fixing some of the causes of the tank failure. Some of that sounds very similar to stages of grief, which - yes - there was probably grief and anger about how people "left" me  and the surgery.

Looking ahead:

Resolving the immediate cough will probably take a combination of time and medical intervention. I'm seeing a doctor in person on Tuesday.*

Invigorating will take some amount of discipline/commitment as well as patience as well as compassion for the enervated state. Balancing those three is hard, because my experience is much advice focuses on the first.

• One of the more frustrating cases of "abandonment" is my primary care doctor's inaccessibility. This latest issue has been, apparently, he's been without an assistant for a month and a half, and thus my messages have been unanswered -- i've been waiting to

   

It's hard to tell how much of an impact there has been since starting the "resilienceli program". It's probably been good to have the reminder to do the thought-checking during this period of stress. I also wonder whether "depressed" is the right term for how i have been doing. "Stuck", "frustrated", and "unmotivated" might have described things better? It does make me wonder how much of "being depressed" was caused by ADHD (and the asthma/allergies): i think untreated health issues and being not well and being told i was well could have lead to part of the cognitive dissonance that i understand can underlie depression. Early on i thought about the dissonance of what i was generally told about my capabilities.... well, health is a capacity/capability too.

Efficient posting improvement: my email client's templating system saves the "To;" line as well as the body.

Comments

[yourlibrarian]

The lack of medical staff (or even support staff) in a lot of places is really affecting care at a time when people need even more of it. Glad to hear you'll finally be seeing your doctor.

Your comment about the COVID haze made me wonder what we're going to start to identify as long-term effects of mass infections in a population.

[elainegrey]

There are some interesting stats out already. (I'll note for myself the US has a population of 330+ million people)

https://libertystreeteconomics.newyorkfed.org/2022/10/long-covid-appears-to-have-led-to-a-surge-of-the-disabled-in-the-workplace/

https://www.americanprogress.org/article/covid-19-likely-resulted-in-1-2-million-more-disabled-people-by-the-end-of-2021-workplaces-and-policy-will-need-to-adapt/


https://blog.dol.gov/2023/01/03/covid-19-and-employment-trends-for-people-with-disabilities

[yourlibrarian]

Thanks for these!

[tamena]

this might sound weird but I appreciate your introspective posts like this a lot
they help me with the things I've been struggling with these past few years especially reminding me I'm not the only one. Sometimes it gets really lonely even being married
I wish there was a different way or maybe a better way to define depressed the way you're feeling it too.
It's not classic depression, it's a funk that's hard to define and we need a better word for it!

[elainegrey]

I think both of us expect much from ourselves. When we aren't meeting our expectations, it's very destabilizing.

[tamena]

That would be the understatement of the week *hugs*

[elainegrey]

LOL, yup. *hug* back at you. Stay dry!

[amaebi]

I’m sorry you’ve been having that kind of pervasive struggle— I didn’t realize. :(

[elainegrey]

It's just been a low grade *thing* since recovering from the surgery. I think i expected to bounce back faster, got frustrated around that, then had some significant work stress, and then had the work stress and the asthma. I hope that coming out of the asthma i will be more compassionate with myself about expectations.

[amaebi]

I definitely think you can fruitfully and happily be easier on yourself, maybe put the evidence of your experience before your planning?

You know, after I got X-rays taken and learned that I had advanced arthritis of both knees, and then got a bit over the shock of that, I gradually realized that I was thinking of my bad knees as either a moral flaw or the result of moral flaws.

[elainegrey]

Oh gosh yes, the moral flaw. If i just had more will to exercise, if i just had more focus, if i managed my time better, etc. The times i've had knee pain, i've been very conscious of my "moral duty" to loose weight. (Well, i'm conscious of that more than just then.)

Consciously understanding the cultural toxin doesn't necessarily mean i've managed to completely flush it, but i'm hoping to start from a place of play and curiosity this year.