Car Crusaders

05 Mar 2013 20 Comments

by Sandy Sue in art, bipolar disorder, mixed-media art, relationships Tags: , , , ,

handmade greeting card, collage artMethodical deliberation is not one of my strong points.  The bipolar temperament tends towards the impulsive and, later, lots of head-slapping.  But, I’m determined to do this car-buying thing differently, if at all possible.

Yesterday, I took my dad’s truck in for an oil change and general look-see by my trusted mechanics.  The folks at Alley Auto have been very good to me—they’re like family.  (Wait.  My cousin’s husband owns the shop, so they really are family.)  They always figure out the cheapest way to fix a car-related problem, make sympathetic noises when I have my car-stress-induced crying jags, and even bought my old Ford Escape when it got too expensive to fix anymore.  They rank high on my list of Real Heroes.

I knew I could count on them to give me the real skinny on compact cars, and I wasn’t disappointed.  We nattered in the office for a half hour—Rose, the tough office manager with a Lauren Bacall voice; Todd, the tender-hearted wise guy; and Bob, the all-round nice, decent, human being my cousin married.  Boy, howdy, did I get an ear-full.

The Smart Car, it seems, is not the car of choice.  Foreign-made, with no dealer in Iowa, any repairs would be expensive and done long distance.  And even though it is teeny-tiny, its gas mileage is only average.  There are other compacts and sub-compacts of similar price that offer more car and better mileage.

The Dodge Dart was a favorite.

And they threw out the Ford Focus.

Also the Honda Fit.

Honda Fit

And maybe the Ford Fiesta.

We have dealers in town for all these cars, so my car posse suggested I go drive them all (when the snow stops and the roads are shoveled).  Bob said once I find a couple I really like, then the team will do some research on reliability and repair stats to see how they hold up over time.  They’ll also give me pointers on what questions to ask the dealer and other car-Ninja techniques.  In the meantime, they’ll keep my old truck running on the cheap.

I was weak with gratitude as I hopped on Google to research these other cars.  What a giant relief to have a whole team on my side, ready to help me make a calculated, well-informed decision.  Even when I eventually leave this oasis of stability, I can hold onto these Car Crusaders for support.  Maybe I can really do this thing.  And, maybe this time, I won’t have to deal with so much post-manic, decision-making face palm.

captain picard, face palm

Getting Better

13 Feb 2013 14 Comments

by Sandy Sue in bipolar disorder, mental health, mixed-media art, quality of life Tags: , , , , , ,

handmade greeting card, collage art

I stood at my kitchen window yesterday, watching the morning come.  Prickly, my brain hot and sore, vague urges and angers surfaced in bubbles to pop, causing an instant of relief and splatter like a crime scene.  I felt the craziness in me like a wild animal, pluck-pluck-plucking at my soft tissue with one, long claw.

I watched a car go by on the street.  My mind mused:

I thought I’d be better by now.

And a Pandora’s Box opened.  Beliefs buried underground rose.  I expected my symptoms to lessen once I got off medications.  I expected my compulsions to ease as I worked on mindfulness.  I believed in a life where I’d be better.  I planned for it.  But, my symptoms are the same.  My compulsions are the same.  Mindfulness and being medication-free only help me See.  I’m never getting better.

I’m never getting better.

After a moment of self-pity, I looked back out the window.  Gray now.  The tree, the sidewalk, the patches of snow.  Another car went by.

Ah, the next thought settled on me.  That’s what all this has been about.

Revelations come in waves, for me.  They wash up over me, I get wet, then they recede.  I dry off and forget about them.  Except they leave sand in my shoes.  The next wave comes.  This one is stronger, knocks me off my feet.  But, it too, recedes, and I dry off again.  Each wave pushes me a little further up the surf line until, finally, I’ve altered my path enough to stay out of the water’s way.

The waves are coming fast now.

More and more, I’m being called to live Here and Now, to inhabit the person I am Now.  Not planning a life for someone who doesn’t exist.  It means respecting the fact that people exhaust and trigger me, accepting that food comforts and fantasy delights me.  It means embracing the changeable spectrum of my capacity, knowing that one day I can create a ritual full of symbolism and spirit for a group of 25 and the next day can only take a shower before going back to bed.  It means contemplating solitude and finding peace there.  It means respecting myself Now—the limits, the talents, the inconsistencies.  It means being willing to listen to who I am Now—what I need, what I want, what fills me up.

I don’t really know who I am Now.  I know who I was.  I know who I should be.  I know who other people expect me to be.  But, I’m willing to stand at my kitchen window until I find out.  Or until another wave nudges me in the right direction.

Going Deeper into Bad-Assery

01 Feb 2013 13 Comments

by Sandy Sue in Bipolar Bad-Ass Training, bipolar disorder, mental health, mixed-media art, spiritual practice Tags: , , , , ,

handmade greeting cards, collage artBy definition, a spiritual practice is never finished.  There’s no timeline, no stopping point, no date on the calendar that can be X’ed out.  The practice itself is the point—to keep returning to whatever activity was chosen to exercise mindfulness.  To keep using what is set before us in order to go deeper.

So, as a spiritual practice, bipolar disorder rocks.

For a couple of years now, I’ve seriously engaged my mental illness as practice.  I’ve tried to map the funky mental landscape.  I’ve gathered information from research and from my own experience to make changes in my routine and perceptions.  I’ve envisioned myself a warrior, doing battle with the vagaries of the illness.  A Bipolar Bad-Ass.

And now there’s a call to go deeper.

There’s no more data to gather, no more analysis to be done.  All that information is part of me now.  What’s called from me now is a deeper acceptance of the illness and my life as it is.  Always in the back of my mind, I held the belief that if I worked hard enough, stayed awake, fought my compulsions, slashed the delusions when they attacked, I would find peace.  Someday, I would get well.

In holding out for Someday, I skipped Today—which was deliberate, because Today is horrifying.  But, I’m called to embrace it.  All of it.  The poverty, the obesity, the solitude and the madness as well as my creativity and skills, the small pleasures and joys.  There’s a shift in the Bad-Ass from screaming in battle to something quieter.  I don’t know who she is yet, but I can feel her emerging.

Part of her Call is to be present to the Discomfort (once I pull away the drama and suffering, this is the word that fits best).  Discomfort drives the compulsions, attaches to the distorted thinking, flails and panics.  Discomfort underlies poor choices.  It warps reality.

But, it’s just Discomfort.  Greater or lesser degrees of it will travel with me the rest of my life.  My Constant Companion.  So, the next phase of Bad-Assery seems to include becoming comfortable with the Discomfort.  This feels like a koan, a riddle with no solution.  But, that’s also part of practice—holding a question for the sake of holding it.

Maybe this is part of my Bad-Ass’ journey—to set down the sword.  I can’t imagine it yet.

So, I’ll try to just sit with that discomfort.

I’m on an Adventure.

Shallow Lessons

23 Jan 2013 6 Comments

by Sandy Sue in bipolar disorder, mental health, mixed-media art Tags: , , , , ,

handmade greeting cards, collage art

Taking a break from myself for the past week turned out to be an experiment in possibility.  Each morning I got up and posed the question “What do I need today?”  Most days involved some sort of exercise, often twice in the same day.  There was usually a call for delicious, healthy food that I cooked myself.  I read a lot, which startled me since reading has been difficult post-ECT.  Soy chai from Starbucks seemed to be the treat I craved most.  I took several trips to the City without being driven by mania or depression to see what that might be like (delightful, by the way).

What I didn’t do was journal or make art—things I’ve done almost every day since I moved back home six years ago.  I only interacted with strangers for the most part.  And I put a moratorium on thinking.

Years ago, when I lived in Minneapolis, my friend, Lily, and I would go on “shallow” dates.  Both of us tended to over-think and ponder deeply the meaning of Life, so we would pick a fluffy movie and go empty our brains together.  Trouble was, we always found The Lesson or A Point to even the most retarded movie.  We laughed that we could find the Gift in lint.

I tried something a little different this week.  I focused on sensation and intuition.  Both of these ways of knowing have become untrustworthy, co-opted by bipolar delusion and compulsion.  I learned not to trust myself, what I feel and what I desire, because the illness warps perception.  But this set up a constant, internal battlefield.  More than just holding tension, or observing my internal workings, I rejected them.  Or I labeled all feeling and desire as part of the illness.  Either/Or thinking is much easier than trying to tease out the healthy from the unhealthy.  It also requires a lot of thought and analysis.

So, this week I practiced not-thinking.  I tried to listen to my body for what it wanted.  I tried to turn in the direction of beauty and ease like a flower toward the sun (no thinking involved there).  And if I felt compulsion push at me, I listened and felt it instead of analyzing and reporting it in my journal.

It was like mud settling in a pond gone still.  Defensive and vulnerable when I started the week, I felt my body soften and my heart take a deep breath.  My aversion to people thinned and relaxed.  Issues shifted from vague discomfort to solid little pebbles with much less mass than I expected.  Pathways cleared.

My vacation contained good and bad days (or in my new vernacular, sunny and stormy mental weather), so I was able to practice not-thinking on my rapid cycling as well.  I found much comfort in the mantra “Don’t think, just feel.”

So, as I come back to the people and responsibilities in my life today, I feel refreshed and ready.  I have some changes to make and more work to do.  But I’ll try to keep it shallow.

Taking the Bad-Ass into Battle

08 Dec 2012 8 Comments

by Sandy Sue in Bipolar Bad-Ass Training, bipolar disorder Tags: , , , ,

XenaSo, okay.  I’m deep in depression and have been for months now, navigating the best I can, but that’s not working anymore.  When bipolar disorder rips all the skills away and leaves raw flesh, something is still there.  Some sort of intelligence, some sort of animal instinct.  It may not be logical or sane, but something is moving under the madness.

It manifests as compulsive behavior—a thrashing around to find solace, relief and oblivion.  It’s old, and ingrained, and mindless.  I’ve always thought of it as wild, savage, completely uncontrollable.  I’ve managed it by moving the breakables out of its way and cleaning up after it rampages through my life.  But, like I said, that strategy isn’t working anymore.

The only thing I can think to do now is bring the Bad-Ass.

I’m not sure what that is, but I know what it’s not.  It’s not telling myself to suck it up, snap out of it, or get over it.  I already know that doesn’t work.  Ditto on setting unrealistic goals or lists of things to do.  Bringing the Bad-Ass is not an assault on myself, it’s not hacking at my illness with judgment.

Natasha Romanov, Black Widow, AvengersIt seems to be more of a shift in how I hold my body.  I square my shoulders a little more and pay attention to how I walk—a firm, strong gait instead of waddling with pain or shuffling off-balance.  Yes, I feel suicidal and hopeless, but the Bad-Ass is there, too, and allowing her to be there gives me more physical strength.

There’s also a sense of the Bad-Ass in the gaps.  This season of insanity hasn’t been one thick slab of cement.  It thins sometimes, pulls apart in gaps before closing up again.  And if I allow it, the Bad-Ass can fight through those gaps.  I could do that yesterday, and spent an hour strategizing.  Where am I feeling the most out of control?  Is there anything to be done?  What messes have I made?  How can I clean them up?  Are there any tools that still work?  Can I capitalize on those more?

This is not the time to make changes or try something new.  My illness won’t tolerate that.  But the Bad-Ass helps me return to tools that work, ones that I lost along this long road.  I can go back to keeping a Food Journal and weighing myself every day.  It doesn’t matter right now if the news is grim, the act of doing those things will bring back a sense of routine.  They help channel the wildness.

Because I had to cancel all my obligations the past few days, I see I need to put some contingency plans in place.  I don’t know why I didn’t think of this before—probably my wishful thinking that this time I could be reliable.  Oh, the delusions, the delusions… The Bad-Ass takes care of business in the here and now.  Through her, I can ask for back-up, make sure there’s someone who can take over when I can’t lead the meditation groups.  That will relieve a lot of pressure.

I dream of the day when the Bad-Ass can be with me all the time.  I guess it’s my fantasy of recovery, of beating back this illness forever.  But maybe there’s a way to bring her to the battle more often, to use her strengths and hutzpah while I’m cycling, to feel her calm, steely resolve even when I’m caught in my compulsive behavior.  All I can do is be open to it and watch what happens.

I’m on an Adventure.

The Dreadful, Horrible Day

13 Nov 2012 8 Comments

by Sandy Sue in Bipolar Bad-Ass Training, bipolar disorder, mental health, TV and Movies Tags: , , , ,

After yesterday, when I was puttering along and actually living, today’s sudden plunge into abject terror and compulsive frenzy came as a shock—and I’m fairly used to the roller coaster ride.  I found myself pacing all over my little apartment, trying to figure out how I could get food when I had no money, seizing on that no money echo and scaring myself about surviving the rest of the month.  Schemes dashed in and out too fast to pin down, all rejected, all dug out of the trash to revisit.

Nicholas Cage, Bridget FondaFor distraction, I started to watch a sweet movie from the ’90′s, It Could Happen to You—Nicholas Cage and Bridget Fonda as a cop and waitress who share Lotto winnings.  Every few minutes I had to turn it off to pace from kitchen sink, to bathroom, to living room chair—I had to have FOOD.  What was the plan?  Grocery store? Convenience station?  Then, the compulsion would let go enough to watch the movie a little more until the next attack.  I tried to concentrate on the love story, the kindness and generosity of the characters, but they only seemed to rev me up even more.  A two hour movie took five hours to watch.

When the movie ended I went to bed—hoping sleep might trigger a shift in mood.  Hoping to blunt the fear with oblivion.  Frantic sleep—little burps of drifting off only to jerk awake with nightmares.  And those jerks sent the cats flying off the bed to mutter in the corners.

I gave up on that strategy and tried to work on my manuscript.  Instead of writing, I organized sections.  That helped.  Organizing.  Arranging.  Tidying.  All very calming distractions.

I’d decided earlier to hold out until 4:00, then I’d go to the movies.  I had just enough credit left on a gift card my sis gave me for one last movie.  And Tuesdays are “free popcorn matinees” at the local theater.  Food and distraction.  Perfect.

James Bond, Daniel Craig, SkyfallSo, I went to Skyfall, the new James Bond movie, got lost in the action and story, enjoyed the technical bits, and kept breathing.  Afterward, I was able to pick up a reasonable supper of vegetable fried rice instead of ransacking the candy aisle at the grocery store.  I could feel this mixed episode shifting.  There’s always a steely resolve that comes over me when I get to the other side of a particularly bad one.  It’s like once I survive that, I can survive anything.  As I pulled into my parking space at the apartment, I said to myself, “We made it.  Disaster averted.  Well done.”

Truth is, as hysterical and flat-out bug-shit as I was today, I could have done a world of damage.  The fact that I didn’t has more to do with Grace than any kind of management technique or skill.  And yet there was some of that, too.  None of this is clear.  None of it tidy.  It’s hard to analyze while holding on by your fingernails.  In the heat of crisis, that’s all we bipolar’s have—our bloody fingernails and the cliff’s edge.  Analysis is for later, when the smoke clears and the fires burn down, when we can be a little more objective about the extent of the real damage done.

I’m hoping I get to do that tomorrow.  I’m hoping this shift into a less crazy gear sticks for a bit.  But, it may not, and I need to be ready for that, too.  And since I got a little taste of the Bad-Ass—that determined, Double-O-like creature—I’ll be okay either way.  Dignity under fire, that’s the Bond way.

Debt and Agitation

23 Oct 2012 10 Comments

by Sandy Sue in bipolar disorder, mental health Tags: , , , , , , ,

handmade cards, collage artI lost my mind for a little while this morning.

I’ve been struggling to hold my compulsive behaviors at bay, which is like telling the ocean to be still.  When the bipolar tide comes in, there’s no arguing with it.  Silly wall of water!  You just go back out to sea where you belong!  Sure, I could scold all day long.  Trouble is, I’d still drown.

When I’m severely agitated, I bolt.  I can’t make myself stay in my apartment or even in town.  I have to get in my truck and drive.  Usually to a friendly coffee shop in Ames or Des Moines where I can sip and write in my journal.  This soothes me.  This allows the anxiety and hysteria to ooze out until I can once again function like a human being.

I used to be able to moderate my rabbitty behavior by going to a coffee shop here in town.  But, Haven closed, and all the other cafés or bakeries or restaurants have too many strikes against them—too expensive, too loud, too dark, bad food, bad coffee, bad service, and the worst—uncomfortable chairs.  I have no middle ground anymore, no place where I can get away from my apartment without driving at least 45 minutes.

This is not an ideal situation for someone with no money.  I have to charge gasoline to my credit card, but can’t pay the balance.  So it grows.  And if I try to pay more on the balance each month, I have no cash and dip into the tiny cushion of my checking account.  So that’s shrinking, too.  As I sink deeper in debt, the stress of trying to physically rein in my symptoms and the squeeze of lack triggers more agitation, depression and manic flights of escape.  This morning I could not see a way out of this loop.  And the undertow of hopelessness pulled me under.

I talked to my mental health clinic about payee services in my area.  Could I find someone to help me manage my money?  But the thought of turning over my credit card or trying to “budget” my flights out of town made me sob out loud.  I thought about what else I could eliminate from my expenses.  I thought about asking my mom for money.  Everything seemed penny-pinching and ineffective.  The only real solution is to be mentally stable.  Silly old mental illness!  Just go back to whatever genetic pool you came from and let me get on with my life!

I’m too poor to be bipolar, that’s all there is to it.

Hysteria is never helpful.  I recognized this as I sobbed into my napkin and the other patrons at Panera tried not to stare.  Yes, my compulsive behaviors are active and overwhelming at present.  Yes, I am in debt.  But, I have people who love me and won’t let me end up sleeping in my truck.  This season will pass.

I don’t have a solution.  My view is too narrow and constricted right now.  But, that actually seems okay.  There are just some things that can’t be fixed.  Like bipolar disorder itself, maybe this is another partner I have to write onto my dance card.  I don’t know.  Not knowing is terrifying, but I can relieve myself of the burden to fix this situation for now.  That helps.

It’s like floating.  When the ocean seizes a person, they can fight and exhaust themselves, or they can float and save their strength.  For now, I’ll float and dream of life rafts.

In and Out

20 Oct 2012 8 Comments

by Sandy Sue in bipolar disorder, developing consciousness, exercise, mental health, mixed-media art Tags: , , , , , , , ,

hand made cards, collage art

♦ ♦ ♦

Awake at 4:00.  Panic and sinking despair.  Read email and blogs to calm, calm, calm. But the discomfort like gravel under the skin, ants in the brain.  Go! Go! Go!  Dash water on our face and find clean underwear.  Enough grooming.  Go!  Will jump in the truck and Drive.  To the Forbidden City.  Starbucks.  A movie later.

Another voice.  So quiet.  *wait.

Check billfold.  $45 to last two more weeks.  Not enough.  Check movies and times.  Ah, one we haven’t seen.  Print out the free soda coupon.  Check bank account.  Balance on the Visa is HighHighHigh.  Nothing left in checking.

*don’t do this today.

We lay on the floor to listen better to the quiet voice.  Want to bolt.  Need to bolt.  But can’t squeeze past the facts.  Have to.  Have to.  Can’t stay in town.  No proper coffee in town anymore.  No proper writing place.  Can’t come back to the apartment-prison.  Can’tCan’tCan’t.  Go now.

*wait.  can you hold the tension?

No.  Too much.  Drowning.

*think of it like an experiment.  try, and see what happens.  try one thing.

On the floor with Henry watching from the chair.  We can go to the Y.  Ride the recumbent bike.  Walk.

*yes, then what?

Then, we’ll see.

*good.

We walk to the Y.  Ride the bike.  Moving through syrup.  Pain.  Exhausted before starting.  Stumbling tired after.

*what now?

Experimenting and holding the tension of flight or fight.

*can you stay?  *can you keep from spending money today?

We will stay in town.  We have a gift card for the movies here.  Maybe go later.  Forget going to the inadequate cafe.  Make our own chai.  Need almond milk.  Forget going to the grocery store.  Too tired.  Too much pain.  Make a meal from what we have.  Healthy, but too much.  Staying, but eating.  Can only hold so much tension.  Drop into eating and watching a movie.  Then, drop into full sleep.  For hours.

Wake up like a drunk.  Out on the sidewalk with the iPod and an apple.  Walk.  Eat a proper snack.  Feel the breeze—sun-warm on the top, October-cool on the bottom.  Shuffle through drifts of leaves.  Plodding, plodding.  Still, the gravel under the skin.  Still, the ants in the brain.  Feet are platters, swollen and sore.  Body feels huge, bloated.  FeelFeelFeel.  But, the urgent voice is quiet.  Only the Other voice is here.

*breathe.  turn your face to the sun.  yes…

We miss our street concentrating on putting one platter in front of the other.  Funny.  At home, we pound a nail and hang a picture.  We need a companion for this picture.  TensionTensionTension.  Online we find one.  Not too expensive.  And we need double-sided tape.  And…and…and…  Tension stretches and snaps.  Running free.  Almost.  Remove items from the shopping cart.  DeleteDeleteDelete. $35 spent.  Not too bad.

*come back to holding the tension. be curious.  can you keep coming back?

Daylight fades.  Henry sits at the window watching the street go dark.  Time to shroud the TV.  Time to write.  Time to breathe.  In and out.  Like the tension.  Like the experiment.  In and out.

In and out.

Hallmark Doesn’t Make a Card for This

16 Oct 2012 17 Comments

by Sandy Sue in bipolar disorder, mental health, mixed-media art Tags: , , , , , , , ,

hand made card, collage artBirthdays kinda suck.

It’s not the part about getting older.  That’s actually a triumph for me—making it through another year.  No, it’s all those demands to be happy, and to celebrate, and to have a great day.  I can’t take the pressure, man.  The revolving mixed state I’ve been in the last couple of days brought lots of presents.  Happy wasn’t one of them.  Nor was the capacity to celebrate more than climbing into bed.  And telling me to smile only makes me want to punch something.

Perhaps I’m a bit sensitive about that last point.  Ever since I was a wee bipolar lass, people have told me to “snap out of it,” or “put on a happy face,” or my favorite “what have you got to be sad about?”  So now that I’m a heavyweight in the Bipolar Bad-Ass division, I don’t tolerate folks telling me how to feel.  I may not actually whack them, but I do get deathly quiet.  Ooo!  Snap!

Back to this birthday business.  It’s not that I don’t appreciate the lovely cards and presents.  I am relieved that people remember who I am and that I was born.  It’s just that, birthday or not, I still have to figure out how to get through the day without

  • Eating the other pie I bought at Perkins last night
  • Driving hard and fast until the gas runs out in my dad’s truck
  • Putting my nightie back on and spending the day watching the ceiling fan turn

I have a couple of ideas.  I could try to get my hair cut.  I cancelled my last appointment when I was sick, and twice this week someone asked me if I qualified for their Senior Discount.  Hmm.  I know I’m 55 now, and could technically be someone’s grandma, but if that’s the case, then I’d like to look like a hip grandma.

I could try to get an appointment with Michele.  Nothing says celebrate like a session with your therapist!

What I’ll probably do is drive to Starbucks thirty miles away, get a Soy Chai, and spew all the obscenities and self-pity spared you here into my journal.  My Scottish friend, Evelyn, taught me a new epithet I’m dying to use—FEK OFF!

In fact, here’s what I want for my birthday—Everyone send me your best swear, your rudest, over-the-top expletive.  If I have to be riding this roller coaster today, I can at least have good stuff to shout at passersby.  And all those people who keep telling me to smile.

Now that’s a gift that keeps on giving.

Scooping the Loop in Bipolar Town

08 Oct 2012 10 Comments

by Sandy Sue in bipolar disorder, exercise, friends, mental health, mixed-media art, vegetarianism Tags: , , , , , , , ,

hand-made cards, collage art

Life is a series of natural and spontaneous changes. Don’t resist them; that only creates sorrow. Let reality be reality. Let things flow naturally forward in whatever way they like. —Lao Tzu

= = =

Change is hard for me.  I guess it’s hard for most people.  We get comfortable in our routines, settle in and snooze.  Life rolls along in a predictable way that’s soothing and reliable.

Change requires attention, energy, planning, and action.  It shakes us up and makes us re-evaluate everything we’ve taken for granted.  It knocks us out of that fuzzy comfort zone.  Sometimes it’s painful—letting go of ideas, people, places, things we hold dear.  Sometimes it rocks us to the core.

Part of my bipolarness is the need for routine—a generally consistent schedule to my day or week.  My routine comforts me.  It soothes the anxiety and agitation that are constant companions.  It gives me a way to move through the day when that seems impossible.

Also, my routine helps me maintain my priorities and meet my goals.  When the mood swings start looping one after another, it’s hard to move forward.  Routine is like a light over a familiar off-ramp that I can’t see in the dark.  Instead of driving around and around on the Rapid Cycling clover leaf—not able to focus, not able to make a choice about what to do—I can maneuver my car to that off ramp with my routine’s help.  I can keep moving forward, however slowly.

Big changes to my routine can trigger a blow-up of my symptoms.  And, since nothing stays the same except change, I’m discovering I need a strategy to manage those times.

Last week I had to quit my beloved deep water aerobics class.  The routine had changed over the summer from mostly cardio and core work to more arm exercises.  Too much of that makes my bum shoulder worse, so I tried to adjust my workout, ask for help, do my own thing.  But I wasn’t getting the workout my brain needs, so today I went back to the shallow water classes.

I’ve made good friends in the deep water class.  We created a tight community that supported each other.  But I know how important a hard workout is to my brain chemistry and to my over all health.  The decision was excruciating.  Not just because of what I had to give up in the class, but because it mucked up my routine.

Add to that my homelessness in terms of a coffee shop/writing aerie, my conversion to a vegan diet, and developing several new friendships and my routine is pretty much shot to hell.  I know in time I’ll pull together a new structure, but right now I’m free-falling.  And the anxiety that produces keeps me from rational thought.

All I can think of to do today is seek comfort—not the bipolar versions of comfort which are all obsessive-compulsive (though those are really calling to me), but something more useful, healthy and safe.  And if I can’t do that, then maybe I can aim for the least amount of harm in my compulsive behavior.  I’m not sure I can even do that.

I have to hold Lao Tzu’s words as a mantra today.  Let reality be reality.  Let this illness be what it is.  Flow with the changes without resistance.  Breathe.  Eventually, I’ll start to slow down.  Eventually, a new off-ramp will show up with a light bright enough to steer by.  Hold that wheel lightly.  Observe.  Embrace the new road coming—a new life is on the other side.

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