Category Archives: Road To Recovery

Day 45. Getting Better Or Just Numb?

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Today is a full day for me. Sort of. First I went to do a photo walk with some local amateur photographers that I have never met. Normally I would be trembling with anxiety but it seems that the events of the last two months have made me somewhat numb to extremes of my internal emotional roller coaster. There is just no gasoline left misery tank, perhaps? Or it is possible that I am actually getting better? Probably not. There hasn’t been enough time for that to happen. In fact, the likelihood is my brain is trying to trick me into thinking that everything is going well just so that I do not go any further in my therapy. After the initial excitement of getting professional help has dampened and I talked out my grievances of the unfairness of the universe, the real hard work needs to be done and I am not looking forward to that. I feel apprehensive and embarrassed; I wish to get some sort of validation and I am terrified to find out the worst about myself. As much as I understand that it was my fault my relationship has ended, I am horrified to have it confirmed by an impartial third party. I have waisted years of my life by not getting help earlier and have settled into this self-pity, angry at the universe kind of lifestyle. So what if I wake up every morning thinking that I hate my life and myself. At least I know where I stand. This therapy and self-discovery thing is too new and I do not have any clue as to where it leads.

One thing I do know is that even though I wish I did not, I still love Her.

Day 43. Universe Is Fucking With Me.

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The tendinitis in my right wrist is still going strong. Typing is torture. Plus I’m starting to get busy again. I am still at the very beginning of my journey and there is still a long way to go; so I am really not where I need to be but at least I’m not where I was yesterday.

It would also seem that some people out there actually like me. There are my improv mates; we had a great practice tonight for our long-form narrative show in two weeks. It will be an improvised play done in a specific genre. The practice, as I said said, went well. I managed to remember what I told myself before: go in with an emotional choice and not a cognitive one. I think it is helping and letting me relax and play the game.

And I am also in demand for my photography skills apparently. I will be covering the local improv festival and I will be starting to cover a bunch of shows here in town for an entertainment blog. Things are starting to get back to the way they were but I am no longer the way I was. Or at least trying not to be the person I have been. There is good reason to be optimistic about the future but my mind is stuck firmly in the past. On Her. So as I am trying to forge a better life for myself and become a better man because even though she will never see the results but she is the one that makes me want to be a better man. So as I strive to get ahead, it is imperative that I forget Her and learn to live without thinking of Her.

But I still love Her.

Day 36. Feeling Weird.

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So this was a weird day. Not that anything weird happened. In fact, quite the contrary: my telco has finally relented and I got a new phone to replace the one that has been falling apart for some time AND I got a much better plan.
Then, I spent the rest of the evening in great company playing the Werewolf game.
So why don’t I feel great? Why do I feel like something horrible is about to happen?

Day 33. Falling Off The Wagon?

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The feeling that something is going wrong has been really quite persistent as of late. I feel that I am settling back in my old way of being and thinking.

This needs to be further explored. However, all I can think about is Her and how I still love Her.

It is as if the two problems (preexisting depression and heartbreak) are keeping me stuck in one place and each is not letting me get past the other. Not sure what to do at this stage…

Day 31. Postmortem Of The Less Than Triumphant Return To Improv.

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Last night was, what may have been, my return to improv. I hosted an earlier show and that went extremely well. My own show, however, was not as successful.

Hindsight, as they say, is 20/20 and so looking back on things I realise what I mostly did wrong. I have previously posted on the rules of improv. Well, I forgot one of them: play and have fun. I have been so wrapped up in my own misery that I simply did not remember to relax and enjoy being silly.

It is also clear that I have not been applying this rule to life as well. I have got to learn to play the game in life and not take things so goddamn serous.

I am doing another show in a few weeks and will, hopefully, remember to abandon the seriousness and just be in the moment.

Day 30. A Month Of Pain.

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Oh, boy. 30 days in. If I had been trying to stay sober, I would be getting a chip. Instead I get to think about how depressed I still am. There is no achievement, no medal, no badge of honour. I just get to carry on being a miserable fuck.

There is a certain calm in knowing exactly the way things stand and I have done a somewhat decent job of admitting there is a problem and being open about my feelings. Except that tonight I am going to have to act the hell out of pretending that I am happy and riding high. First, I get to host a show and then I am supposed to improvise in one. To say that feelings of anxiousness, misery and fears of inadequacy are rather overwhelming at the moment would be an understatement of the century. The good thing is that I get to warm up and get in the mood by hosting an earlier show and also because this is theatre. I do not have to be funny but I do have to do a good job of building the story. I suppose it is the same in life.

Let us hope that I do not fuck up either.

Keep On Keeping On.

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They call it stormy Monday but Tuesday’s just as bad
Wednesday’s worse and Thursday’s also sad

– T-Bone Walker, “Call It Stormy Monday” (1947)

Monday mornings. They are never easy. After two and a half weeks of not having to wake up early to go to the office, it is especially difficult to get going.

This morning I was rather horrified also to discover that there seem to be far more grey hairs on my head than there were a month ago. Have I not noticed them before or has the stress of recent events caused that? It is, unfortunately, a possibility. My inner state these days can easily be described as highly agitated and stressed.

How long can I keep going like this? I have only had two therapy sessions but I am already wondering whether I need to ask if SSRI’s are right for me. As much as I yearn for an emotional relief, I am apprehensive about mixing Methylphenidate with an SSRI. Is pot a legitimate alternative?

For the first time in years I’m getting heart palpitations and irregular heartbeats. I haven’t had to endure that since before I was diagnosed with ADHD-PI and started on Methylphenidate (Ritalin). It used to help control depression and anxiety as by-products of ADHD-PI but somehow this is no longer enough.

For the sake of myself and those around me I have got to figure out a way to want to live and to figure out how to forget the woman I love.

Day 19. Struggle.

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Lately, it has been a struggle to keep writing. The novelty of having to write at least one post a day has worn off and the boiling geyser of feelings has subsided. Now it seems that all there is left is dull ache of sorrow.

Sunday night I had been able to get myself to the theatre and do a pretty good improv show. In the fit of irony, the universe has arranged that in the very first scene I did in the workshop before the show, my scene partner’s character broke up with my character. All I could think of is “Shit! Just don’t start crying.” I managed not to do that. There was a small crowd but it was better that way for me, though I imagine, not for the theatre. As smoothly as the show went, I still struggled with trying to keep positive. It is not easy for me at the best of times and I am not going through the best of times at present.

Getting back to writing though, the challenge of doing one post a day or more has been beneficial in establishing a discipline of writing. I need that structure now to help me get through this shit.

It should also be of help in my therapy. I am actually supposed to write two letters: one to my dead grandfather and one from him. The first one is relatively easy. He is on my mind a lot and I think of the time we could have been having together often. The second letter will be hard. I can’t even imagine what to write. It has been almost 19 years since he passed away. I remember his face but not his voice. I rarely think in my native language these days and that puts me even further away from trying to access him deep in my psyche. What would he say? How would he say it? At best, that letter “from him” would just be me saying what I think I know I should do. I wish I could hear his voice. I wish I could listen to his advice. (I will definitely need to do a post inspired by him, about him very soon.) In the meantime, I will have to find a way to keep at it.

In improv we say (I believe Meisner pioneered this) “if you are stuck in the scene, state something that is true. This writing challenge has been doing exactly that for me: a way to say something true about myself in order to keep going. A constant lighthouse of stability and common sense to keep me away from the rocky shores of dark, evil thoughts that would eviscerate me.

I am taking this life one day at a time.

I just have to keep on writing one post at a time.