It seems weird to be writing about TacDys over here on my personal whining post, but... There's a part of me that just can't be divorced from my gamer life, and that's the part I want to address today. The philosophy I've built up after like twenty-seven years as a player of video games and eleven or twelve years as a player of MUDs and MMORPGs is as much a part of me as my anxiety, mood imbalances, and authority issues. I put the tenets of Tactical Dysfunction into play in pretty much every aspect of my life. And... I dunno. Of late I've just felt an overwhelming sense of "you're doing it wrong" when talking to other people.
In gaming, Tactical Dysfunction means forcing the game to work around you, rather than working around the game. It eschews flavor of the month builds and comps, ignores the prevailing metagame, and carves out its own Robert Frost-esque path through the grind. It means accepting all playstyles and preferences as equally valid. It also means striving for excellence, not just on your own level but on a general level, and adapting yourself and your demands to that ultimate goal of greatness. To be Tactically Dysfunctional is to brook no incompetence, to expect the most out of yourself and the people around you, and to mentor and encourage the latter so that they can realize their potential. It's finding out-of-the-box solutions to problems, and making what you HAVE work, rather than forcing everything around you into The Mold and trying to make THAT work. Because generally it doesn't.
In life, or at least in my life, I view people and the world as my fellow players and my game. We all have goals, or at least goals to which we pay lip service. There is competition, and there are those who preach that the only road to success is that which they've traveled themselves. Focus. College. Suit and tie. Corporate sell-out. Anyone who breaks that trend is highlighted as the exception to the rule. An outlier from the standard deviation curve. As a woman walking the path of Tactical Dysfunction, I look for ways to turn my own talents and strengths into a powerhouse, rather than trying to force myself into some society-set mold that doesn't take into account my weaknesses and adaptations to them. Rather than trying to market myself as the ideal pencil pusher or laboratory assistant, I offer myself up as a problem solver, critical thinker, and spiritual heir to Ronald Regan as the Great Communicator. And when I can't find a role that works for those skills, I create my own.
Hence these blogs. And my stream. And all of that. The desire to carve my own path in this world is what keeps me researching branding and marketing, and how to launch and maintain that brand. That's what gets me to push through having low viewership, dipping daily views on the websites, and keeps me fine-tuning my identity as a writer and broadcaster.
I don't believe that by putting myself out there, I have to either take or leave my success as it passively comes to me. Not that I'm going to look down on those who do, but... If they were to come to me for help, I would gladly offer suggestions on how they might improve their lot. And I don't mean to disparage those who play by the normal rules, and chase their society-labeled shoeboxes. Some folks are more comfortable like that, and for a lot of people those predefined roles and rulesets fit as well as what I've tried to customize around myself.
To be Tactically Dysfunctional is to maintain perspective, and consider a person as a whole before making a judgement. It means calling out those who are blindly leaving their strengths to atrophy while fighting to do what is expected of them. It's about nurturing those around you, and building them up so that they can realize their potential, and not just what someone else says is their limit. What it DOESN'T mean is fighting for people who will not fight for themselves. If someone will not invest time into their own development, and actually strive for success after declaring their standards and goals, the Tactically Dysfunctional say "fuck you" and move on. They do not believe in carrying around dead weight. They do not endorse rebellion for rebellion's sake.
And that's the part that people seem to forget when I'm telling them about this mindset, both in gaming and in real life. Because it sounds so much like a liberal lovefest or a carebear family guild, folks seem to ignore the expectation of effort and success. The overall goal of being The Best by doing not what is expected of us, but what we WANT to do. Maybe that's my fault for not properly communicating those conditions, and focusing too much on letting people define themselves. I don't know. But lately I'm starting to get pissed right the fuck off by people calling themselves TD without upholding what I see as the most basic tenet of the ideology: don't be a fucking scrub. Tactical Dysfunction is NOT permission to fail. It's not an excuse for gimping yourself. It affords you the freedom to make choices outside the norm, but NOT choices which will negatively impact your performance or that of your group.
I'm so fucking tired of people saying "But Roxi... you said I could still be successful doing whatever felt right. Why are you being so harsh?" Because FUCKING FUCK people. What you're trying to do is the equivalent of being a professional juggler of flaming rubber duckies as a fucking blind guy with no arms. You're being stupid, and you're ignoring all of THESE strengths. Why? Because you think flaming rubber duckies are cool? Jesus fuck, people. Focus on what makes you YOU and build around that. Don't just go "Oh, this is sparkly" and decide that's what you want to be. -.- That's pretty much the exact OPPOSITE of being Tactically Dysfunctional. And while we're on the subject...
WORK FOR WHAT THE FUCK YOU SAY YOU WANT.
Don't just expect others to form around you to make it work.
Don't just hope for the best, and then whine when it doesn't come to fruition.
You're not following the norm, of COURSE it's going to take a lot more hard work and dedication than if you just followed the cookbook. You should have known that when you jumped on the crazy train.
So yeah. I am Tactically Dysfunctional. It's not for everyone, and I'm cool with that. But don't expect me to sit idly by while you fuck yourself, or let myself be dragged down with you because you don't know what the fuck you're doing.
Homie don't play dat. (Do people fucking say that any more?)
Friday, October 3, 2014
Monday, September 22, 2014
Warning: Highly Inflammable
My friends need to come with warnings like that. Seriously. It would be nice if I could just look at them, or check their facebook, and there would be this popup that says "Crazy Level Orange" when shit's about to go down. We have a terror alert system, so why can't we have a drama alert system? It would make MY life a lot easier, let me tell you. I'd just temporarily unfriend them, block their phones, and whatever else it took to keep my day chill.
The current drama? Of all fucking things, it's World of Warcraft shit. Not exclusively WoW, mind you, but that's the focal point of this whole debacle.
See, we want to have a guild. We thought it would be totally sweet if the three of us went back to leading a raid team like we did in Cata.
Then three became four, because we can't do anything without The Girlfriend. FML. Like, she's the Derpyhooves to our Applejack, Rainbow Dash, and Pinkie Pie. (Yeah, I went there. My Little Ponies, bitches.) If we want to have a LAN party, she has to come. If we want to go get hot dogs and hit the comic shop...we can't do it if she's working, or until she's done work. If we eat out, we have to go where SHE wants to go. If we're gaming together, we have to do what she wants to do.
It's irritating.
And Freya forbid we object, or indicate in any fucking way that we're less than thrilled about going from the Three Amigos to Pain and Panic. (Hades' minions from Disney's Hercules. Keep up.) I shit you not, we all got together to play Diablo, and the entire time it was nothing but bitching about their lack of bed, and that we wouldn't play exactly how she wanted, and that we didn't have food they liked... I'm sorry, but I'm not going to go out and buy a bed just so you can sleep like an angel. We told you to bring sleeping bags. You know your options are that or the couches, which you hate because of the fact that the cats run rampant downstairs all night. I mean, for fuck's sake, we moved our house around so that there would be a room for you people to use when you visited instead of having to be in the living room.
Ah well. At least I got my fucking womancave out of the deal. All the computers are in a central location now, I've got a good set-up for streaming and writing, and we have plenty of room to play cards or host a D&D table. Shit, we could even bring a minifridge up her if we wanted. We have one.
I dunno. I just don't get why everything has to be a big deal when things don't go exactly as my friends want them to. And it's not like they give immediate feedback, like "you're being kind of a dick, all I want to do is play with you guys and get some help." No. We hear about it a month later, when they're using it as ammunition in a wholly unrelated argument.
Anyway, the guild.
Initially, the plan was for the three of us to be co-leaders, or at least for Cookie and me to be officers under him as a leader. He and Cookie would split raid leading duties, and I'd handle my usual roles as guild quartermaster. We started contacting some old guildies and friends, started getting a roster together...
And then SHE happened. It's like by virtue of being his girlfriend she immediately became an amazing player who knew her class perfectly and had five plus years of raid experience. (She's not. I don't think she's ever raided reg, or even really played in a capacity other than Some Guy's girlfriend and pocket healer.) Now all of a sudden she's co-lead, she's telling everyone what to do and what to play, and saying that she gets first priority on class choice and gear. Like that if I have a friend who's a druid, and she decides to switch to a druid, regardless of my friend's skill she's booted from the raid team.
Um, hello. A leader's first consideration is always the team. And I don't think either of them is going to make the call to bench themselves so a more skilled player can get into raid. But whatever.
What REALLY bothers me about this whole fucking thing is that she's completely taking control of everything. Like, the longer they're together, it seems like he's less an less his own person and more and more her puppet. It's as if he's afraid to upset her or make her unhappy, so he just capitulates right away and gives her whatever she wants. Even when he knows that's going to lead to disaster.
And I've been there. I've been that girlfriend. I don't plan to repeat the experience, and I'd do pretty much anything to save my friend from that fate. The only problem is that with circumstances as they are, there's no fucking way in hell that he's going to listen to anyone. Because, you know, his relationship is pure and concrete, and the failures of my past are representative of my failings as a person and my lack of personality.
So yeah. Friends need warning labels so I can tell without having to get dragged into their whirling maelstroms of death and havoc that they're feeling codependent or possessive or whatever on that day. Someone make that app. You could have it parse their FB statuses for the last few days or something for key words and score that to give their crazy index. Or something. I dunno. I don't fucking write apps. You figure it out, make it happen, and I'll download it. But only if it's free, because fuck paying for shit that goes on my phone.
The current drama? Of all fucking things, it's World of Warcraft shit. Not exclusively WoW, mind you, but that's the focal point of this whole debacle.
See, we want to have a guild. We thought it would be totally sweet if the three of us went back to leading a raid team like we did in Cata.
Then three became four, because we can't do anything without The Girlfriend. FML. Like, she's the Derpyhooves to our Applejack, Rainbow Dash, and Pinkie Pie. (Yeah, I went there. My Little Ponies, bitches.) If we want to have a LAN party, she has to come. If we want to go get hot dogs and hit the comic shop...we can't do it if she's working, or until she's done work. If we eat out, we have to go where SHE wants to go. If we're gaming together, we have to do what she wants to do.
It's irritating.
And Freya forbid we object, or indicate in any fucking way that we're less than thrilled about going from the Three Amigos to Pain and Panic. (Hades' minions from Disney's Hercules. Keep up.) I shit you not, we all got together to play Diablo, and the entire time it was nothing but bitching about their lack of bed, and that we wouldn't play exactly how she wanted, and that we didn't have food they liked... I'm sorry, but I'm not going to go out and buy a bed just so you can sleep like an angel. We told you to bring sleeping bags. You know your options are that or the couches, which you hate because of the fact that the cats run rampant downstairs all night. I mean, for fuck's sake, we moved our house around so that there would be a room for you people to use when you visited instead of having to be in the living room.
Ah well. At least I got my fucking womancave out of the deal. All the computers are in a central location now, I've got a good set-up for streaming and writing, and we have plenty of room to play cards or host a D&D table. Shit, we could even bring a minifridge up her if we wanted. We have one.
I dunno. I just don't get why everything has to be a big deal when things don't go exactly as my friends want them to. And it's not like they give immediate feedback, like "you're being kind of a dick, all I want to do is play with you guys and get some help." No. We hear about it a month later, when they're using it as ammunition in a wholly unrelated argument.
Anyway, the guild.
Initially, the plan was for the three of us to be co-leaders, or at least for Cookie and me to be officers under him as a leader. He and Cookie would split raid leading duties, and I'd handle my usual roles as guild quartermaster. We started contacting some old guildies and friends, started getting a roster together...
And then SHE happened. It's like by virtue of being his girlfriend she immediately became an amazing player who knew her class perfectly and had five plus years of raid experience. (She's not. I don't think she's ever raided reg, or even really played in a capacity other than Some Guy's girlfriend and pocket healer.) Now all of a sudden she's co-lead, she's telling everyone what to do and what to play, and saying that she gets first priority on class choice and gear. Like that if I have a friend who's a druid, and she decides to switch to a druid, regardless of my friend's skill she's booted from the raid team.
Um, hello. A leader's first consideration is always the team. And I don't think either of them is going to make the call to bench themselves so a more skilled player can get into raid. But whatever.
What REALLY bothers me about this whole fucking thing is that she's completely taking control of everything. Like, the longer they're together, it seems like he's less an less his own person and more and more her puppet. It's as if he's afraid to upset her or make her unhappy, so he just capitulates right away and gives her whatever she wants. Even when he knows that's going to lead to disaster.
And I've been there. I've been that girlfriend. I don't plan to repeat the experience, and I'd do pretty much anything to save my friend from that fate. The only problem is that with circumstances as they are, there's no fucking way in hell that he's going to listen to anyone. Because, you know, his relationship is pure and concrete, and the failures of my past are representative of my failings as a person and my lack of personality.
So yeah. Friends need warning labels so I can tell without having to get dragged into their whirling maelstroms of death and havoc that they're feeling codependent or possessive or whatever on that day. Someone make that app. You could have it parse their FB statuses for the last few days or something for key words and score that to give their crazy index. Or something. I dunno. I don't fucking write apps. You figure it out, make it happen, and I'll download it. But only if it's free, because fuck paying for shit that goes on my phone.
Thursday, September 18, 2014
Adventures in Crisis Land
So... if you read the last post (and you should, it's...ranty. And context-providing), you know that I was on the verge of running out of some of my medicine and pretty much losing my shit last week. I wish I could say that I handled things gracefully, and without crumbling, but...
Nope. As if. This is me we're talking about, remember?
I dragged myself to the ER, a bundle of raw nerves and fear and jitters, and told them my sob story. Me being me, I got more and more worked up about it the more I talked to the nurses and doctor about it. Go figure. After like...four hours of observation, they finally give me my dose for that night, and tell me that they're sorry, but they don't have any beds in mental health available.
Really? I'm so spazzy when I'm worked up that you want to admit me? Jesus fuck.
Okay.
So anyway, they couldn't keep me, but at least gave me my dose for the following day and sternly advised me to check in with Behavioral on Monday. Which was cool, because I would have done that anyway, even if I hadn't had an appointment with my shrink then anyway. They hand me my papers, and I go off on my merry way.
Gotta ask: what's it mean when they list your "disposition" as group home/assisted living? Like seriously. Does the ER really think I need to be in a facility, or is that just what they put when you need help, but not commitment help?
So Monday came, and big girl things happened. I went to my shrink, who pulled some eleventh hour shit to get me a trick-or-treat bag filled with my meds for a month. I went to the rental office with Cookie, and we cleared up that whole omgwtfeviction thing. Aaaand...I prepped for an interview with the most amazeballs company ever. Like, international law firm billions of dollars we're on the cover of Forbes kind of amazeballs.
It's super exciting, and the position is pretty much tailored for me. The only way I can describe this whole job-finding scenario is going into Goodwill and finding a fucking Armani suit that fits like a GLOVE with the one week tag so you get it for a buck. I finally hit the nail on the head with a cover letter and resume presentation, and... fingers crossed will find out Friday or Monday that I got the job. (And that they waived the contract period and are bringing me on full time so I get bennies starting October 1. But that's kind of...the Disney ending to the whole thing.)
Meanwhile, in the land of live action, I capitulated and said I'd work at Dairy Queen, because it's money and the job is pretty much on offer to anyone willing to take it. I'm kind of amazed that the lady running the store hasn't put out a bunch of uniforms and hiring packets in a cardboard box out front with a sign that says "free to a good home." That's pretty much how getting a job there feels. I start there Friday, which is hilarious because I will hopefully be able to walk in on my first day and be like "...fuck this I'm out."
We shall see! I feel like a kid at Christmas, running around trying to find mom and dad's secret present stash and dropping hints that it would be super swell if there was like... a giant box of Transformers or a fat stack of new comics under the tree come Christmas morning. (Speaking of Christmas, this law firm gives like...two days off for every major holiday and half of the bank holidays. No weekends. Amazeballs.)
Things right now are...not great. I'll admit it. I'm not going to let this potentially life-changing thing eclipse the fact that we're in the financial shitter right now. But they're looking up. There's a glimmer of hope.
Which probably means that the universe lifted the toilet seat and is about to piss on my face. >.<
We shall see.
Nope. As if. This is me we're talking about, remember?
I dragged myself to the ER, a bundle of raw nerves and fear and jitters, and told them my sob story. Me being me, I got more and more worked up about it the more I talked to the nurses and doctor about it. Go figure. After like...four hours of observation, they finally give me my dose for that night, and tell me that they're sorry, but they don't have any beds in mental health available.
Really? I'm so spazzy when I'm worked up that you want to admit me? Jesus fuck.
Okay.
So anyway, they couldn't keep me, but at least gave me my dose for the following day and sternly advised me to check in with Behavioral on Monday. Which was cool, because I would have done that anyway, even if I hadn't had an appointment with my shrink then anyway. They hand me my papers, and I go off on my merry way.
Gotta ask: what's it mean when they list your "disposition" as group home/assisted living? Like seriously. Does the ER really think I need to be in a facility, or is that just what they put when you need help, but not commitment help?
So Monday came, and big girl things happened. I went to my shrink, who pulled some eleventh hour shit to get me a trick-or-treat bag filled with my meds for a month. I went to the rental office with Cookie, and we cleared up that whole omgwtfeviction thing. Aaaand...I prepped for an interview with the most amazeballs company ever. Like, international law firm billions of dollars we're on the cover of Forbes kind of amazeballs.
It's super exciting, and the position is pretty much tailored for me. The only way I can describe this whole job-finding scenario is going into Goodwill and finding a fucking Armani suit that fits like a GLOVE with the one week tag so you get it for a buck. I finally hit the nail on the head with a cover letter and resume presentation, and... fingers crossed will find out Friday or Monday that I got the job. (And that they waived the contract period and are bringing me on full time so I get bennies starting October 1. But that's kind of...the Disney ending to the whole thing.)
Meanwhile, in the land of live action, I capitulated and said I'd work at Dairy Queen, because it's money and the job is pretty much on offer to anyone willing to take it. I'm kind of amazed that the lady running the store hasn't put out a bunch of uniforms and hiring packets in a cardboard box out front with a sign that says "free to a good home." That's pretty much how getting a job there feels. I start there Friday, which is hilarious because I will hopefully be able to walk in on my first day and be like "...fuck this I'm out."
We shall see! I feel like a kid at Christmas, running around trying to find mom and dad's secret present stash and dropping hints that it would be super swell if there was like... a giant box of Transformers or a fat stack of new comics under the tree come Christmas morning. (Speaking of Christmas, this law firm gives like...two days off for every major holiday and half of the bank holidays. No weekends. Amazeballs.)
Things right now are...not great. I'll admit it. I'm not going to let this potentially life-changing thing eclipse the fact that we're in the financial shitter right now. But they're looking up. There's a glimmer of hope.
Which probably means that the universe lifted the toilet seat and is about to piss on my face. >.<
We shall see.
Saturday, September 13, 2014
Because reasons, dammit!
Everything I do, and I do mean just about fucking everything, has a reason. My mind races so fast I put the equivalent of probably twenty minutes of thought into decisions that look to the rest of the world like they're impulses. Things that other people would just say "yes" or "no" to, I agonize over. I may be processing it for like, five minutes, but to me that's like a day's worth of agonizing over the decision.
That's how I go from zero to Hulk so fast. That's how I go from giggle giggle yay to completely shut down, or tears, or whatever in the blink of an eye. After all the therapy and all the meds I've been working with in the last five months I'm pretty much sure that the root of all of my problems is my mind's complete inability to shut up.
So what's this got to do with anything?
Last night I took my last dose of Seroquel XR. I thought I had more pills, but my shrink doubled the dosage, and in so doing cut my supply in half. I thought the coupon I used when I had insurance would keep working even without insurance. And I thought that the behavioral health center would have someone at least on call on the weekends. This is all stuff I had going on well before I told anyone that I was out of medicine. Which was last night.
I understand the instant reaction of "how the hell could you be so irresponsible?" I really do. There's a part of me that wonders the same thing. But the thing is, for the last three days (which is like two weeks, with the way my thoughts go) I've been fretting over this. Worrying at it like a goddamn bunny with one of those wood blocks. Trying to find a solution. The rent? My joblessness? That's felt like the better part of a year instead of three weeks (since I walked out of the hold-us-until job). So no, I'm not going to get mad at you for reacting that way. I'm going to let you have your say, and parse the whole damn thing for information that I can actually use to solve my problem...and then I'm going to let my mind race over how I can fix it.
Me getting mad doesn't fix anything. Me screaming that I've been losing sleep, unable to focus on shit that I enjoy (reading, gaming, my stream...this blog...), and have pretty much completely lost my appetite and desire to keep shlepping around this mortal coil isn't going to help. So yes. I will sit there, and I will stare at you, and nod, and not say a goddamn thing. Because I recognize that you have a fiery soul, and so do I, and the two of us combusting together is only going to cause a whole lot of collateral damage.
I'm scared. Scared as all hell. I've got applications out for aid from the county and state, but those only get processed so fast. I need fifty dollars' worth of medication NOW, not in a week or whenever Job and Family Services manages to get back to me. And that's not counting the Seroquel. That shit is five hundred dollars without insurance, and contrary to what I thought, Astra Zenica will only give a seventy-five dollar credit. It won't magically just be fifteen dollars. I don't know what's going to happen if I can't take those meds any more. I remember how unstable I was before they put me on my happy pill cocktail. I remember vividly not being able to kind-of control the torrent of thoughts, or stop myself from reacting to triggers. I don't want to go back to that.
But I can't talk about this, because it's all my fault. I knew two weeks ago that I didn't have insurance. I knew a week ago that I couldn't afford the pills without it. Yes, I thought I could get them for fifteen bucks, and no, I didn't double check because I was naive. I also just kind of assumed I would get unemployment because I'd been making over ten dollars an hour when I lost my job, and didn't realize that they can tell you no because you didn't make enough money in an eighteen month period. Again. Naive. Thinking that the systems in place will help me when I need them.
I won't go down the hate track with that train of thought. I've been there before. I've railed about everything from race to reproductive responsibility to sexual orientation and gender identity, and I don't want to sully myself with that much rancor. The system is dysfunctional. Blame the system, not the people it actually does help.
So now I'm at a complete fucking loss. Nothing I do today is going to get me my meds by 9pm tonight. Nothing. I can probably go to the emergency room, make up some cock and bull story, throw some tears at them, and at least get meds for the night. But after that? Who the fuck knows. Maybe they'll float me enough to get me to Monday, when I can go over to Behavioral and talk to nursing about maybe some patient prescription assistance. If they'll give me that without a medical card. Or...they'll fucking admit me to inpatient psych. Wouldn't that be a fucking hell of a phone call? "Sorry, honey, I can't come pick you up from work tonight. I was committed." Or better, "Sorry, awesome law firm I'm interviewing with on Tuesday, I can't make our appointment. I'm in a padded room."
But. Ultimately. A girl's gotta do what a girl's gotta do. I thought maybe after my morning meds had some time to get working, I'd calm down, but... I'm not. Which means that it's probably a good idea to just go to the ER. Maybe Freya will smile on me, and make this battle easy on me.
That's how I go from zero to Hulk so fast. That's how I go from giggle giggle yay to completely shut down, or tears, or whatever in the blink of an eye. After all the therapy and all the meds I've been working with in the last five months I'm pretty much sure that the root of all of my problems is my mind's complete inability to shut up.
So what's this got to do with anything?
Last night I took my last dose of Seroquel XR. I thought I had more pills, but my shrink doubled the dosage, and in so doing cut my supply in half. I thought the coupon I used when I had insurance would keep working even without insurance. And I thought that the behavioral health center would have someone at least on call on the weekends. This is all stuff I had going on well before I told anyone that I was out of medicine. Which was last night.
I understand the instant reaction of "how the hell could you be so irresponsible?" I really do. There's a part of me that wonders the same thing. But the thing is, for the last three days (which is like two weeks, with the way my thoughts go) I've been fretting over this. Worrying at it like a goddamn bunny with one of those wood blocks. Trying to find a solution. The rent? My joblessness? That's felt like the better part of a year instead of three weeks (since I walked out of the hold-us-until job). So no, I'm not going to get mad at you for reacting that way. I'm going to let you have your say, and parse the whole damn thing for information that I can actually use to solve my problem...and then I'm going to let my mind race over how I can fix it.
Me getting mad doesn't fix anything. Me screaming that I've been losing sleep, unable to focus on shit that I enjoy (reading, gaming, my stream...this blog...), and have pretty much completely lost my appetite and desire to keep shlepping around this mortal coil isn't going to help. So yes. I will sit there, and I will stare at you, and nod, and not say a goddamn thing. Because I recognize that you have a fiery soul, and so do I, and the two of us combusting together is only going to cause a whole lot of collateral damage.
I'm scared. Scared as all hell. I've got applications out for aid from the county and state, but those only get processed so fast. I need fifty dollars' worth of medication NOW, not in a week or whenever Job and Family Services manages to get back to me. And that's not counting the Seroquel. That shit is five hundred dollars without insurance, and contrary to what I thought, Astra Zenica will only give a seventy-five dollar credit. It won't magically just be fifteen dollars. I don't know what's going to happen if I can't take those meds any more. I remember how unstable I was before they put me on my happy pill cocktail. I remember vividly not being able to kind-of control the torrent of thoughts, or stop myself from reacting to triggers. I don't want to go back to that.
But I can't talk about this, because it's all my fault. I knew two weeks ago that I didn't have insurance. I knew a week ago that I couldn't afford the pills without it. Yes, I thought I could get them for fifteen bucks, and no, I didn't double check because I was naive. I also just kind of assumed I would get unemployment because I'd been making over ten dollars an hour when I lost my job, and didn't realize that they can tell you no because you didn't make enough money in an eighteen month period. Again. Naive. Thinking that the systems in place will help me when I need them.
I won't go down the hate track with that train of thought. I've been there before. I've railed about everything from race to reproductive responsibility to sexual orientation and gender identity, and I don't want to sully myself with that much rancor. The system is dysfunctional. Blame the system, not the people it actually does help.
So now I'm at a complete fucking loss. Nothing I do today is going to get me my meds by 9pm tonight. Nothing. I can probably go to the emergency room, make up some cock and bull story, throw some tears at them, and at least get meds for the night. But after that? Who the fuck knows. Maybe they'll float me enough to get me to Monday, when I can go over to Behavioral and talk to nursing about maybe some patient prescription assistance. If they'll give me that without a medical card. Or...they'll fucking admit me to inpatient psych. Wouldn't that be a fucking hell of a phone call? "Sorry, honey, I can't come pick you up from work tonight. I was committed." Or better, "Sorry, awesome law firm I'm interviewing with on Tuesday, I can't make our appointment. I'm in a padded room."
But. Ultimately. A girl's gotta do what a girl's gotta do. I thought maybe after my morning meds had some time to get working, I'd calm down, but... I'm not. Which means that it's probably a good idea to just go to the ER. Maybe Freya will smile on me, and make this battle easy on me.
Wednesday, September 10, 2014
Explain to me how THIS works
So I lost my job of almost two years in July because I freaked out and melted down. Technically I went on medical leave and never came back, but functionally I lost my job because I went cray-cray and couldn't go back without getting more cray. I had a false start in a local liquor store when they transferred me to the attached supermarket's deli. The overall disorganization of the department and generally shitty scheduling and labor practices combined with a string of asshole customers to create another craytomic bomb, and I walked out. You are now caught up on the last two months of suckage in my life.
There was one glimmer of hope in the darkness: unemployment. I thought for sure that, as someone who'd gone from making sixteen hundred dollars a month to five hundred dollars a month to zero, I'd be able to get short-term assistance until I got back on my feet. And bonus, they'd help me develop my job-hunting skills and find something suitable. Right? Right?!
Fuckin' nope. After a month of jumping through hoops for their information requests, sending in letters from my previous employer, wage histories, and information from my doctors, they tell me I didn't make enough money to collect. I can still appeal it, mind you, but fuckin' what? Apparently I have to have a weekly income average of $233 for like an eighteen month period or something to get unemployment. And for the first like...six months of working at my last job I was getting fuck all for hours, so I got shot down.
They didn't turn me down because I was on bad terms with my previous employer, or because I was some kind of crackhead. They shot me down because I was TOO FUCKING POOR.
How. In the everloving fuck. Does that even WORK?
The last time I applied for food stamps, which my girlfriend and I have decided would be roughly equivalent to a goddamn revolution and us getting a third roommate, I was told I made too much. Bear in mind, this was during the period where I was making so little that it dragged down my average too much for Unemployment to give me the hookup.
What's a bitch gotta do to get some help in this fuckin' country? I can't go back to school because I can't get grants because I defaulted on my student loans because I can't get a fucking job to pay me enough to pay the fucking loans. I can't get foodstamps because I make too much, and I can't get unemployment because I make too little. I was TOO GODDAMN WELL-WRITTEN to get rent assistance (literally, they made me rewrite my statement twice and I was still told it wouldn't go through because they'd read my letter and wonder why I needed help) even though I had a fucking pre-eviction notice in my hands and a bank statement with a negative balance.
So now I'm sitting with like two months' worth of rent do, my electric and water teetering on the brink of getting shut off, my car in such a state that if I get pulled over I'm losing my license for like...ever... and what the fuck are my options? My girlfriend can't support my dead weight any longer. She's at the end of HER fucking savings now, too. We've got eleven bucks between us until Friday until she gets a check that's gotta go to bills, and which will leave us with no food in the house but some pretzel rods from two months ago and maybe five bucks to go grocery shopping on. I've only got half a week's worth left of my meds, which is Kind Of A Big Deal since I need the psycho-active ones to FUNCTION. And the gubment is telling me that I'm in just the wrong income bracket to get help.
I put in a new application for benefits with the welfare and foodstamps people. My shrink says I'm not likely to be successful in applying for disablity, because I'm young and I don't have a very long history of my "condition" disrupting my ability to work (since I didn't bother getting fucking diagnosed until it started causing MAJOR problems at work). I guess at this point I'm going to have to try going back to fast food, in spite of the fact that the whole thing that triggered my meltdown in the first place was, you guessed it, fast food. Maybe the meds will keep me stable. Who knows? Unless, like, they run the fuck out. Which they're going to do in like four days if I don't get some kind of divine wallet intervention before then.
It's frustrating. This is the longest I've ever gone without a job, and it's only been like a month. I've worked my ass off since I was eighteen years old, and all I have to show for it is a buck twelve in my checking account.
And people say this country's socioeconomic structure isn't fucked. Godmotherfuckin'damn.
There was one glimmer of hope in the darkness: unemployment. I thought for sure that, as someone who'd gone from making sixteen hundred dollars a month to five hundred dollars a month to zero, I'd be able to get short-term assistance until I got back on my feet. And bonus, they'd help me develop my job-hunting skills and find something suitable. Right? Right?!
Fuckin' nope. After a month of jumping through hoops for their information requests, sending in letters from my previous employer, wage histories, and information from my doctors, they tell me I didn't make enough money to collect. I can still appeal it, mind you, but fuckin' what? Apparently I have to have a weekly income average of $233 for like an eighteen month period or something to get unemployment. And for the first like...six months of working at my last job I was getting fuck all for hours, so I got shot down.
They didn't turn me down because I was on bad terms with my previous employer, or because I was some kind of crackhead. They shot me down because I was TOO FUCKING POOR.
How. In the everloving fuck. Does that even WORK?
The last time I applied for food stamps, which my girlfriend and I have decided would be roughly equivalent to a goddamn revolution and us getting a third roommate, I was told I made too much. Bear in mind, this was during the period where I was making so little that it dragged down my average too much for Unemployment to give me the hookup.
What's a bitch gotta do to get some help in this fuckin' country? I can't go back to school because I can't get grants because I defaulted on my student loans because I can't get a fucking job to pay me enough to pay the fucking loans. I can't get foodstamps because I make too much, and I can't get unemployment because I make too little. I was TOO GODDAMN WELL-WRITTEN to get rent assistance (literally, they made me rewrite my statement twice and I was still told it wouldn't go through because they'd read my letter and wonder why I needed help) even though I had a fucking pre-eviction notice in my hands and a bank statement with a negative balance.
So now I'm sitting with like two months' worth of rent do, my electric and water teetering on the brink of getting shut off, my car in such a state that if I get pulled over I'm losing my license for like...ever... and what the fuck are my options? My girlfriend can't support my dead weight any longer. She's at the end of HER fucking savings now, too. We've got eleven bucks between us until Friday until she gets a check that's gotta go to bills, and which will leave us with no food in the house but some pretzel rods from two months ago and maybe five bucks to go grocery shopping on. I've only got half a week's worth left of my meds, which is Kind Of A Big Deal since I need the psycho-active ones to FUNCTION. And the gubment is telling me that I'm in just the wrong income bracket to get help.
I put in a new application for benefits with the welfare and foodstamps people. My shrink says I'm not likely to be successful in applying for disablity, because I'm young and I don't have a very long history of my "condition" disrupting my ability to work (since I didn't bother getting fucking diagnosed until it started causing MAJOR problems at work). I guess at this point I'm going to have to try going back to fast food, in spite of the fact that the whole thing that triggered my meltdown in the first place was, you guessed it, fast food. Maybe the meds will keep me stable. Who knows? Unless, like, they run the fuck out. Which they're going to do in like four days if I don't get some kind of divine wallet intervention before then.
It's frustrating. This is the longest I've ever gone without a job, and it's only been like a month. I've worked my ass off since I was eighteen years old, and all I have to show for it is a buck twelve in my checking account.
And people say this country's socioeconomic structure isn't fucked. Godmotherfuckin'damn.
Sunday, September 7, 2014
It's time for some FOOTBALL!
We now interrupt this senseless whining for a very important statement from the deepest recesses of my psyche:
FINS UP, YO!
I am a closet football fan. This time of year, Sundays turn into manic days for me, filled with cheering, angry ranting at the television, and almost self-deluded arguments about why in spite of their record the Miami Dolphins are the best team in the NFL.
WOOO! FINS TOUCHDOWN! Awesome movement after a BIG sack/fumble against the Pats.
*clears her throat*
Like I was saying. I love me some Dolphins, and I have since I was itty bitty. I remember writing letters to Dan Marino when I was like four years old or something, and proudly sporting my team hat all season until my head got too big for it. (NFL Merch costs WAY too much for me to get a new hat and jersey, sadly.) Originally, I picked the Fins because I loved dolphins, and their mascot was a dolphin... It sounds dumb, but remember I was like a three year old little girl when I picked my team. I mean, I grew up in Eagles territory. They start us young, and for some reason I had this deep-seated aversion to the Eagles and the other neighborhood favorite, the Cowboys.
This time of year, I bleed teal and orange. It gets me into trouble now that I live in Steelers territory. I thought being a South Jersey Fins fan was hard. Nope. Out here it's black and gold or red all over. As in you're going to get mauled if you sport another team's colors at the wrong time.
Which of course means my contrary ass was at Buffalo Wild Wings when the Dolphins played the Steelers last year. That was a good game... >.>
Anyway. Happy Gameday, folks. Fins are tied with the Pats right now 20/20, and for once my team's playing AWESOME in the second half.
#StrongerTogether
FINS UP, YO!
I am a closet football fan. This time of year, Sundays turn into manic days for me, filled with cheering, angry ranting at the television, and almost self-deluded arguments about why in spite of their record the Miami Dolphins are the best team in the NFL.
WOOO! FINS TOUCHDOWN! Awesome movement after a BIG sack/fumble against the Pats.
*clears her throat*
Like I was saying. I love me some Dolphins, and I have since I was itty bitty. I remember writing letters to Dan Marino when I was like four years old or something, and proudly sporting my team hat all season until my head got too big for it. (NFL Merch costs WAY too much for me to get a new hat and jersey, sadly.) Originally, I picked the Fins because I loved dolphins, and their mascot was a dolphin... It sounds dumb, but remember I was like a three year old little girl when I picked my team. I mean, I grew up in Eagles territory. They start us young, and for some reason I had this deep-seated aversion to the Eagles and the other neighborhood favorite, the Cowboys.
This time of year, I bleed teal and orange. It gets me into trouble now that I live in Steelers territory. I thought being a South Jersey Fins fan was hard. Nope. Out here it's black and gold or red all over. As in you're going to get mauled if you sport another team's colors at the wrong time.
Which of course means my contrary ass was at Buffalo Wild Wings when the Dolphins played the Steelers last year. That was a good game... >.>
Anyway. Happy Gameday, folks. Fins are tied with the Pats right now 20/20, and for once my team's playing AWESOME in the second half.
#StrongerTogether
Tuesday, September 2, 2014
Why is communication so hard for people?
So so so many things in this world would be easier if people could just communicate clearly. It's like... nobody wants to actually say what they mean, or they just want to string you along because they don't want to be the one to make any kind of decision...
It's infuriating. I like things to be clear-cut and well-defined. When I receive a letter from my employer saying that if I don't get an extension from my doctor, my leave is getting terminated and they'll consider an absence of communication my wish to discontinue my employment, and put a date-effective on it, I expect that "Okay. My shrink won't sign off on it, but my doctor doctor thinks I can go back to work because my stomach's not fucked up any more" translates to "gg, you don't have a job." Following that, I should be able to get the ball rolling on things like unemployment, foodstamps, career development... Basically, that's us agreeing that it's not you, it's me, and it's time for us to all move on.
Now the people from unemployment are telling me that I'm not in the computers or something, the stuff I sent them to verify my employment wasn't enough, and I need to get some kind of payroll history, and now I get a letter from my former employer that I owe them money for my insurance.
Which is news to me, because I thought I'd lost my insurance. But whatever.
Then, to top it all off, my girlfriend picks today to bring up the fact that we're in pretty dire financial straits. As if that's not racing through my mind at every minute of every goddamn day. It's well-intentioned, I know. She's worried about us, and the house, and everything else, and getting a call from unemployment saying they need all this stuff from me still when I was thinking I'd jumped through all the requisite hoops was an unpleasant shock.
I should have taken the appointment my shrink offered me earlier. She had a 2pm cancellation. If I'd gone to that, we could have avoided that whole messy shouting and tears incident.
I want to work. I want to be one of those people who's got a steady job, forty or fifty hours a week, doing something if not meaningful at least useful. I'm smart, I'm well-educated (in spite of not having a college degree), and I'm a driven worker. I'm comfortable taking the lead on projects, thrive in environments where I'm challenged or encouraged to develop and optimize new procedures, and strive to become an expert in whatever I'm doing.
But I don't like not being in control of variables, or at least not being able to mitigate the damage when things go wrong. It's hard for me to cope with double standards, broken lines of communication, and favoritism. And I expect things to be fair, even though I know they almost never are...and get angry when they're not.
I should probably not be putting this online, but hell. What's there to lose? My employers find it out pretty quickly, anyway, either on the application or in interviews. I used to lie, and hide my flaws, and try to be the perfect candidate, but all that's gotten me is a forearm-long medicine list and a resume that shows almost annual job changes. Because that's about how long it takes for an employer to realize just how flawed I really am, and me to decide I need to quit before they fire me.
Maybe it's just arrested development or something. Some lingering "I don't wanna and you can't make me" kind of temper tantrum mentality. Or maybe it's just a mental block, because surely if I've had such bad experiences in the past, I'm bound to have them again. Who knows? I just feel any more like if I could have a quiet cubicle or office somewhere, and someone just fed me a stack of things to analyze, or fix, or edit, or whatever, I'd be perfectly functional. And maybe even able to help people, or the company I work for.
I really should have gone to that appointment today. Hopefully she'll have another cancellation soon. And hopefully I get some good news from either unemployment or a job soon. -.- Just need to keep plugging along with my writing, I guess.
It's infuriating. I like things to be clear-cut and well-defined. When I receive a letter from my employer saying that if I don't get an extension from my doctor, my leave is getting terminated and they'll consider an absence of communication my wish to discontinue my employment, and put a date-effective on it, I expect that "Okay. My shrink won't sign off on it, but my doctor doctor thinks I can go back to work because my stomach's not fucked up any more" translates to "gg, you don't have a job." Following that, I should be able to get the ball rolling on things like unemployment, foodstamps, career development... Basically, that's us agreeing that it's not you, it's me, and it's time for us to all move on.
Now the people from unemployment are telling me that I'm not in the computers or something, the stuff I sent them to verify my employment wasn't enough, and I need to get some kind of payroll history, and now I get a letter from my former employer that I owe them money for my insurance.
Which is news to me, because I thought I'd lost my insurance. But whatever.
Then, to top it all off, my girlfriend picks today to bring up the fact that we're in pretty dire financial straits. As if that's not racing through my mind at every minute of every goddamn day. It's well-intentioned, I know. She's worried about us, and the house, and everything else, and getting a call from unemployment saying they need all this stuff from me still when I was thinking I'd jumped through all the requisite hoops was an unpleasant shock.
I should have taken the appointment my shrink offered me earlier. She had a 2pm cancellation. If I'd gone to that, we could have avoided that whole messy shouting and tears incident.
I want to work. I want to be one of those people who's got a steady job, forty or fifty hours a week, doing something if not meaningful at least useful. I'm smart, I'm well-educated (in spite of not having a college degree), and I'm a driven worker. I'm comfortable taking the lead on projects, thrive in environments where I'm challenged or encouraged to develop and optimize new procedures, and strive to become an expert in whatever I'm doing.
But I don't like not being in control of variables, or at least not being able to mitigate the damage when things go wrong. It's hard for me to cope with double standards, broken lines of communication, and favoritism. And I expect things to be fair, even though I know they almost never are...and get angry when they're not.
I should probably not be putting this online, but hell. What's there to lose? My employers find it out pretty quickly, anyway, either on the application or in interviews. I used to lie, and hide my flaws, and try to be the perfect candidate, but all that's gotten me is a forearm-long medicine list and a resume that shows almost annual job changes. Because that's about how long it takes for an employer to realize just how flawed I really am, and me to decide I need to quit before they fire me.
Maybe it's just arrested development or something. Some lingering "I don't wanna and you can't make me" kind of temper tantrum mentality. Or maybe it's just a mental block, because surely if I've had such bad experiences in the past, I'm bound to have them again. Who knows? I just feel any more like if I could have a quiet cubicle or office somewhere, and someone just fed me a stack of things to analyze, or fix, or edit, or whatever, I'd be perfectly functional. And maybe even able to help people, or the company I work for.
I really should have gone to that appointment today. Hopefully she'll have another cancellation soon. And hopefully I get some good news from either unemployment or a job soon. -.- Just need to keep plugging along with my writing, I guess.
Sunday, August 31, 2014
Good intentions paving stones for sale, CHEAP!
Get it? The road to hell is paved with good intentions? And like... I'm selling paving stones, so I've got enough good intentions that I need to offload some...
Yeah. I tried like four other titles before that one, and they all sucked too. Give me a break. It's Sunday. Which means yesterday was Saturday, and tomorrow is Monday. I'm going to ignore my inevitably manic Monday, and focus on yesterday. Because I am a pro at dwelling on the past.
Yesterday was eventful. I put a few more hours into working on my livestream, entertainment blog, and book. Hell. I started a Kickstarter to fund my pre-publishing efforts! And fiddled around with Windows Movie Maker just long enough to discover that I'm going to need a WAY better program to get my video editing on. (If any of my non-existant readers have some ideas regarding that, I'd love to hear them.) And as if that wasn't enough, I locked myself out when I left to visit my girlfriend at work.
The good news is that her work is just shy of two miles downhill from where we live. The bad news is that it was almost ninety degrees out, I was wearing a long-sleeved tshirt and vest, and my shoes are SO not made for walking distances. They're comfy, a little on the big side, and have zero inside padding. Yeah.. I've got blisters the size of Kennedy half dollars on the balls of both feet and a couple between my toes. Fortunately over night the blisters callused up a bit, because going up to bed last night was pretty much torture. But hey! I walked 3.6 miles yesterday on uneven pavement along a road that goes up and downhill at least twice at steep and gentle grades, and it only took me 28 minutes going down and 32 coming up. Not bad for an "obese" woman who's horribly out of shape.
There's a sick part of my brain that wants to start walking the hill 2-3 times per week, and build up to doing it daily with a weighted backpack, in the name of fitness. Like I'll have time for that kind of crap after my unemployment situation is fixed. If I magically become a full time writer, it'll be different, but until then...
Maybe once the blisters heal up. Maybe. No promises.
...stop looking at me like that.
With work removed from the equation again and my meds getting adjusted up, I'm starting to feel like a normal human being again. And with starting new projects and committing to writing both blogs actively and harvesting material from them for a book, I almost feel like I have my shit together. If I can just somehow fix this money situation by either finding funding on the intarwebs or selling my writings, I'll be golden. I get the feeling that's like saying "if I hit the lottery or find a fat wallet laying on the side of the road next time I lock myself out, everything will be cool" but hey. It's hope.
Hope and photons, man. More or less infinite supply of both, but there's no mass and it takes up no volume. >.<
Yeah. I tried like four other titles before that one, and they all sucked too. Give me a break. It's Sunday. Which means yesterday was Saturday, and tomorrow is Monday. I'm going to ignore my inevitably manic Monday, and focus on yesterday. Because I am a pro at dwelling on the past.
Yesterday was eventful. I put a few more hours into working on my livestream, entertainment blog, and book. Hell. I started a Kickstarter to fund my pre-publishing efforts! And fiddled around with Windows Movie Maker just long enough to discover that I'm going to need a WAY better program to get my video editing on. (If any of my non-existant readers have some ideas regarding that, I'd love to hear them.) And as if that wasn't enough, I locked myself out when I left to visit my girlfriend at work.
The good news is that her work is just shy of two miles downhill from where we live. The bad news is that it was almost ninety degrees out, I was wearing a long-sleeved tshirt and vest, and my shoes are SO not made for walking distances. They're comfy, a little on the big side, and have zero inside padding. Yeah.. I've got blisters the size of Kennedy half dollars on the balls of both feet and a couple between my toes. Fortunately over night the blisters callused up a bit, because going up to bed last night was pretty much torture. But hey! I walked 3.6 miles yesterday on uneven pavement along a road that goes up and downhill at least twice at steep and gentle grades, and it only took me 28 minutes going down and 32 coming up. Not bad for an "obese" woman who's horribly out of shape.
There's a sick part of my brain that wants to start walking the hill 2-3 times per week, and build up to doing it daily with a weighted backpack, in the name of fitness. Like I'll have time for that kind of crap after my unemployment situation is fixed. If I magically become a full time writer, it'll be different, but until then...
Maybe once the blisters heal up. Maybe. No promises.
...stop looking at me like that.
With work removed from the equation again and my meds getting adjusted up, I'm starting to feel like a normal human being again. And with starting new projects and committing to writing both blogs actively and harvesting material from them for a book, I almost feel like I have my shit together. If I can just somehow fix this money situation by either finding funding on the intarwebs or selling my writings, I'll be golden. I get the feeling that's like saying "if I hit the lottery or find a fat wallet laying on the side of the road next time I lock myself out, everything will be cool" but hey. It's hope.
Hope and photons, man. More or less infinite supply of both, but there's no mass and it takes up no volume. >.<
Friday, August 29, 2014
Holy Moly- It's been a month already?!
It's been a month since I last wrote here. The moon has come, gone, and come again. (Giggity.) Women who were PMSing the last time I posted are pissing everyone else off once more- though honestly in the last thirty-plus days I haven't had much time to give a damn about anyone else. The life, she's been crazy.
The month started on a high note. I got a new job, started it, and loved it. For two weeks, I was the chipper, well-medicated girl slinging booze in an uptown supermarket. The drunkies loved me, and I loved them. Except when they smashed bottles of gin all over my floor, or argued with me about bringing carts into my liquor store. (Seriously? Giant basket on wheels vs. alchy, the alchy loses, and that makes us ALL losers.) For all intents and purposes, the job was perfect. I got to feel useful, doing consults for housewives and teenagers on what to mix and how. The business was good, but not too heavy, so there was no crazy stress. Sure, the building was a little hotter than I'd have liked, and the pay was abysmal, but holy shit. I could handle it, and I didn't want to kill myself or have an aneurysm in my sleep so I didn't have to go to work.
I should have known that it was too good to be true. That I wasn't going to be allowed to have nice things for long. And lo and behold...
First they told me I was getting moved to toys. That's cool. I can handle that. Instead of peddling liver failure to the masses, I'll be helping kids spend their parents' money. Only then the schedule came in, and my ass was listed under "deli clerk." Now, last time I checked, the legos and the lunch meat are nowhere near each other. I was confused. Surely there was a mistake.
Oh no. No, no, no. Hell no. Because I am Roxi, and I can't have nice things. Without so much as a "Bite the pillow, I'm going in dry!" I was plucked from a department I loved and dropped in the same seething cesspool of loathing that triggered my meltdowns in the first place. I tried to work through it, but after two weeks- and being told that in spite of my protests, I would be stuck there, and there wasn't anything they could do for my requests to be moved to a less stressful, chaotic department, I flipped out and walked out. Never to return.
(I shredded my preferred shopper card for the store and everything. Fuck those people. I'll go to WalMart.)
In less dramatic, blatantly psycho parts of the week, I started making costumes for my girlfriend and me to go LARPing. (Live Action Roleplaying. Like that movie Role Models. Fake elf ears and all.) I'm a terrible seamstress, but I'm having a blast with that. It's one of the few things I've found that takes my mind and focuses it. I don't have the racing thoughts, or the whirling gyre of fear. It's just me, a bunch of material, and a needle and thread. (And at least two kittens, but they're a constant in all of my life's equations, and can be left out of informal notation.) The plan was for us to go kill a dracolich this weekend, but... She has to work. And I had to work, before I threw a tantrum and stormed out of work. (If "screw you guys, I'm out" counts as a tantrum. And I think it does.)
So now I'm applying for unemployment. Had a massive breakdown in my therapists's office today, to the point where she was frantically scribbling out requests to send to medical about upping dosages and adding meds, and Freya knows what else. I've had crying jags in her office before, but this was the first time I went full on hyperventilate/rock/shake at her. Lessons learned: (1) Take morning meds WELL before going to any appointments and (2) If she didn't believe me about the meltdowns before, now she does. Hopefully, something gives soon, because my rent and bills are sliding and I don't know how much more charm and supplication I can throw at my problems.
The month started on a high note. I got a new job, started it, and loved it. For two weeks, I was the chipper, well-medicated girl slinging booze in an uptown supermarket. The drunkies loved me, and I loved them. Except when they smashed bottles of gin all over my floor, or argued with me about bringing carts into my liquor store. (Seriously? Giant basket on wheels vs. alchy, the alchy loses, and that makes us ALL losers.) For all intents and purposes, the job was perfect. I got to feel useful, doing consults for housewives and teenagers on what to mix and how. The business was good, but not too heavy, so there was no crazy stress. Sure, the building was a little hotter than I'd have liked, and the pay was abysmal, but holy shit. I could handle it, and I didn't want to kill myself or have an aneurysm in my sleep so I didn't have to go to work.
I should have known that it was too good to be true. That I wasn't going to be allowed to have nice things for long. And lo and behold...
First they told me I was getting moved to toys. That's cool. I can handle that. Instead of peddling liver failure to the masses, I'll be helping kids spend their parents' money. Only then the schedule came in, and my ass was listed under "deli clerk." Now, last time I checked, the legos and the lunch meat are nowhere near each other. I was confused. Surely there was a mistake.
Oh no. No, no, no. Hell no. Because I am Roxi, and I can't have nice things. Without so much as a "Bite the pillow, I'm going in dry!" I was plucked from a department I loved and dropped in the same seething cesspool of loathing that triggered my meltdowns in the first place. I tried to work through it, but after two weeks- and being told that in spite of my protests, I would be stuck there, and there wasn't anything they could do for my requests to be moved to a less stressful, chaotic department, I flipped out and walked out. Never to return.
(I shredded my preferred shopper card for the store and everything. Fuck those people. I'll go to WalMart.)
In less dramatic, blatantly psycho parts of the week, I started making costumes for my girlfriend and me to go LARPing. (Live Action Roleplaying. Like that movie Role Models. Fake elf ears and all.) I'm a terrible seamstress, but I'm having a blast with that. It's one of the few things I've found that takes my mind and focuses it. I don't have the racing thoughts, or the whirling gyre of fear. It's just me, a bunch of material, and a needle and thread. (And at least two kittens, but they're a constant in all of my life's equations, and can be left out of informal notation.) The plan was for us to go kill a dracolich this weekend, but... She has to work. And I had to work, before I threw a tantrum and stormed out of work. (If "screw you guys, I'm out" counts as a tantrum. And I think it does.)
So now I'm applying for unemployment. Had a massive breakdown in my therapists's office today, to the point where she was frantically scribbling out requests to send to medical about upping dosages and adding meds, and Freya knows what else. I've had crying jags in her office before, but this was the first time I went full on hyperventilate/rock/shake at her. Lessons learned: (1) Take morning meds WELL before going to any appointments and (2) If she didn't believe me about the meltdowns before, now she does. Hopefully, something gives soon, because my rent and bills are sliding and I don't know how much more charm and supplication I can throw at my problems.
Wednesday, July 23, 2014
You want to stick WHAT? WHERE?
Today was the big, scary appointment with my pokemon gastroenterologist. As usual, I'm not entirely sure why I got so worked up over the thing. I learned nothing at all, pretty much, aside from that I should stop taking NSAIDs and drinking so much soda. Oh, and some of my problems (but not ALL of my problems) can be caused by the hypothyroidism. I think I confused my poor nurse practitioner (I didn't get to see the GI himself, which disappointed me, because I wanted to see if he said his name over and over again like a pokemon, since his name looks like Hitmonlee) with my laundry list of issues.
The highlight of the visit, I think, was once again getting the "did they do ANYTHING in the ER" look/line from the doc. When I went in originally for my incessant dry heaving and inability to keep food down, they pretty much asked me if I was pregnant, drew some blood, and sent me on my way with a proscription for protonix. Cop out, in my mind, but given that the time I went in for violent mood swings, or took the girlfriend in for a foot injury all they did was talk to us for two minutes and write a scrip... Yeah. I'm thinking the ER I go to is pretty much terrible. Unfortunately, all of the doctors there ALSO work at the other local hospital, so the service between them is pretty much equally bad.
Ah well. I had nothing to fear from the GI. This time, anyway. They're sending me for an endoscope and a belly ultrasound. I'm 29, goddammit. I'm too young to be scheduling "minor outpatient procedures." They wanted to do a colonoscopy too, but I gave them a resounding "oh hell no." Exit only. I don't care if nothing actually wants to exit, that is not a sign that things should begin entering. You don't send the negotiator in until all other options to get the hostages released have been exhausted. I know this shit. I've watched Die Hard. And that episode of Good Morning America where they shoved a camera up Kathy Lee's butt. Nooooo thank you. Nopenopenopenopenope. Hellno.
In other, non health-related news, my kitten has developed an obsession with my bra. I'm not entirely sure why, but she seems to think it's the ultimate kitty bed/hammock/play pen. The thing's on its last legs anyway, so I'm pretty much just letting her have it, at this point. Which means I should probably cut the wire out, so if she springs it, she doesn't end up impaled like her brother almost did when he destroyed their pop-up cube...
The joys of havingkids kittens.
Let the count-down begin to the new job, and my first appointment with an actual factual psychiatrist.
The highlight of the visit, I think, was once again getting the "did they do ANYTHING in the ER" look/line from the doc. When I went in originally for my incessant dry heaving and inability to keep food down, they pretty much asked me if I was pregnant, drew some blood, and sent me on my way with a proscription for protonix. Cop out, in my mind, but given that the time I went in for violent mood swings, or took the girlfriend in for a foot injury all they did was talk to us for two minutes and write a scrip... Yeah. I'm thinking the ER I go to is pretty much terrible. Unfortunately, all of the doctors there ALSO work at the other local hospital, so the service between them is pretty much equally bad.
Ah well. I had nothing to fear from the GI. This time, anyway. They're sending me for an endoscope and a belly ultrasound. I'm 29, goddammit. I'm too young to be scheduling "minor outpatient procedures." They wanted to do a colonoscopy too, but I gave them a resounding "oh hell no." Exit only. I don't care if nothing actually wants to exit, that is not a sign that things should begin entering. You don't send the negotiator in until all other options to get the hostages released have been exhausted. I know this shit. I've watched Die Hard. And that episode of Good Morning America where they shoved a camera up Kathy Lee's butt. Nooooo thank you. Nopenopenopenopenope. Hellno.
In other, non health-related news, my kitten has developed an obsession with my bra. I'm not entirely sure why, but she seems to think it's the ultimate kitty bed/hammock/play pen. The thing's on its last legs anyway, so I'm pretty much just letting her have it, at this point. Which means I should probably cut the wire out, so if she springs it, she doesn't end up impaled like her brother almost did when he destroyed their pop-up cube...
The joys of having
Let the count-down begin to the new job, and my first appointment with an actual factual psychiatrist.
Monday, July 21, 2014
FMLA = Fucking up My Life A lot
Honestly, the FMLA (Family Medical Leave Act) is pretty much the only thing keeping me "employed" and insured right now. I'm going into week three without working, thanks to my little meltdown at the store and subsequent issues. Looking down the barrel of a smoking gun called "no paycheck." I got my letter in the mail the other day from corporate that I qualified for FMLA, and that they needed some paperwork from my doctor. Here I was, thinking it was a confirmation that they received said papers, and I could arrange to have all of my shit covered.
Yeah, no. And apparently nobody at my store knows what the hell is going on, because all of my arrangements to use remaining personal and vacation time have to go through the store- not corporate. I'm out of work because I have fucking panic attacks at the THOUGHT of calling those people, or going back to that store, and in order to get my affairs straightened out... I need to go to the store. I thought about possibly texting my manager. Seeing if she'd meet me on neutral ground somewhere, but... what if she says no? What if she thinks I'm weird, or trying to set her up?
I don't know why I obsess over that so much. What if they try to say I'm faking it? Maybe it's because my parents were never very...understanding of mental illness. Or maybe it's because of the social stigma attached to behavioral disorders. I am having problems. I'm not just seeing three different doctors (soon to be four- got my appointment with the psychiatrist at my therapist's practice, finally) because it's fun. I hate doctors. And hospitals. I spent enough time on all that for a thousand lifetimes while my mom was fighting a losing battle with lung cancer. I know my problems are real. My doctors clearly believe my problems are real. My girlfriend, the only thing in this world keeping me clinging to sanity and actually fighting to stay together believes.
Why does it matter to me so much that other people don't judge me and find me wanting?
Something to add to the list of things to talk about with my therapist tomorrow. Worrying at it like a dog with a bone isn't helping me right now.
And hey. At least we're not moving now, right? Silver linings.
Yeah, no. And apparently nobody at my store knows what the hell is going on, because all of my arrangements to use remaining personal and vacation time have to go through the store- not corporate. I'm out of work because I have fucking panic attacks at the THOUGHT of calling those people, or going back to that store, and in order to get my affairs straightened out... I need to go to the store. I thought about possibly texting my manager. Seeing if she'd meet me on neutral ground somewhere, but... what if she says no? What if she thinks I'm weird, or trying to set her up?
I don't know why I obsess over that so much. What if they try to say I'm faking it? Maybe it's because my parents were never very...understanding of mental illness. Or maybe it's because of the social stigma attached to behavioral disorders. I am having problems. I'm not just seeing three different doctors (soon to be four- got my appointment with the psychiatrist at my therapist's practice, finally) because it's fun. I hate doctors. And hospitals. I spent enough time on all that for a thousand lifetimes while my mom was fighting a losing battle with lung cancer. I know my problems are real. My doctors clearly believe my problems are real. My girlfriend, the only thing in this world keeping me clinging to sanity and actually fighting to stay together believes.
Why does it matter to me so much that other people don't judge me and find me wanting?
Something to add to the list of things to talk about with my therapist tomorrow. Worrying at it like a dog with a bone isn't helping me right now.
And hey. At least we're not moving now, right? Silver linings.
Wednesday, July 16, 2014
Rox the Builder! Can she fix it?
Evidently, she can, but it causes a huge mess.
So the day started off well. I had my interview, I did well, I got a job offer... my period stopped. It should have been the best day of the month, right? lolyeahright. With the stress of being more or less unemployed off my shoulders, you'd think I would finally have a good day. And I did, for all of five minutes. Then I started worrying about the fact that I'm taking a two dollar per hour pay cut, going from a guaranteed forty hours with frequent overtime to twenty with strongly-discouraged overtime, and probably losing my insurance. Somehow, my car came into all the worrying, and next thing you know I'm retching out my girlfriend's car window the whole way home. Ole.
Now, my interview was at nine in the morning. I got home, and the girlfriend was still in bed. She's able to get right back to sleep after I tell her the good news, and I lay there for like two hours staring at the ceiling, wondering if the monsters were going to eat me (figuratively speaking). I juuuust get to sleep, and she gets up. And then here come the cats. Once the cats get involved, there's no trying to press on and sleep in. There are six of them. Four of them just want to snuggle and cuddle, and the other two want to kill anyone that comes close. The only thing that kept me from just giving up and storming downstairs was the moose in the cat suit sitting on my chest. (He's like, half Maine Coon. He's a fucking moose.) Getting next to no sleep because of alarms, phone calls, and anxiety might have been okay...
...if I'd been able to come downstairs and give the couch surfers the good news. Only as I'm getting up, I hear the girlfriend telling them ALL about it. Great. Because the brief rush of "look what I did!" excitement wasn't, you know, an emotional high that I desperately needed. It's cool.
Then the sink backed up. Or rather, I went out to take my small pile of meds and noticed that there was water sitting in the sink under the dishes. It was okay for a little, because I promptly forgot about the fetid lake when I popped my birth control out of the blister pack and it bounced across the counter and down between the cabinets and oven.
"Oh fuck!" I yelled, dismayed and already starting to freak out that I could potentially fuck up my entire hormone schedule because now my birth control will be a day off.
"What'd you do? Shit, don't tell me the cats got at your Zoloft," I hear from the living room.
"No. I dropped my fucking birth control."
Silence, followed by raucous laughter. Apparently, a lesbian on birth control is the funniest shit since +1 dead baby flails for raising vile xp.
Which reminds me. I should really call my doctor and find out if (a) I'm going to have my uterus explode out my vajeen now because my birth control is off by a day and (b) if she's figured out how to get me my damn mood stabilizers. Because shit. Any more days like this and I'm going to be back in the ER screaming about wanting a pudding cup and a padded room. In that order. After the thing with the meds, the couch surfers and my girlfriend decide they want to go out for lunch. I spend most of my time worrying about frigging money, and they want to spend it on fast food when we've got perfectly good spaghetti and cereal and stuff here. My diplomacy check whiffed or something, and I ended up popping a couple stomach pills and nerve pills and stuff, and off we went.
And then the fem-surfer's dad calls while we're stuffing our faces with soft serve. He's got a job offer, and we have to make a big decision: are we moving into his house together, or not?
Well, fuck.
I didn't want to move. I really didn't want to move. After the last month of relationship roulette with the couch surfers, and all the shit I've been going through at work and with the doctors, I really didn't want to add the chaos of a move into the mix. The girlfriend and I talked it over a bunch, and we decided that since I wasn't comfortable with it, we'd stay in our place. Which was fine by me.
Three hours later, we've got two plungers and a couple notebooks from WalMart, and we're on our way to see this house I said I don't want to rent, and to talk to the new land lord I don't want. It won't hurt to hear him out, they say. I'm just glad I wasn't driving, because I was pretty much shaking and gnawing on my bottom lip the whole ride there. We get there, and I get to meet the fem-surfer's dog (I am terrified of dogs), and see the house. It's a nice house. Really nice. But it's filled wall-to-wall with twenty-plus years' worth of her dad's stuff, and her stuff, and even his ex-wives' stuff. Every place I've ever moved into has been completely empty. How in the hell am I supposed to envision someplace as MY home, when it's clearly someone else's? Cue the first crying jag.
The girlfriend gets me calmed down, I get my eyes dried and the snot gone, and Daddums comes home. (Late. Of course.) They start talking about stuff like rent and expenses, and the girlfriend and the he-surfer negotiate a little bit, and I'm just sitting there on the couch between them trying desperately to fall into the center of the earth. I don't want to move, remember? Change is bad. Why are we talking about this like it's going to happen? And why do I have to know right now? Don't ask me to decide something like this right now. I'm not in a good place right now to make snap decisions. Yes, when I'm on the upswing I do things like quit my job and move across country on a whim. When I'm three steps removed from suicide? Fuck no. I want to hide under my bed until the world stops being crazy at me.
Then he looks right at me and asks what's wrong. Cue crying jag number two.
Go outside. (There's a yard. It's nice and little.) Calm down again. Reaffirm terror of moving and change to the roommate. And then...
Then logic happened. See, if the four of us live in this house, it comes out to being as much INCLUDING utilities for the two of us as we're paying right now for the rent on our place. Given the pay cut and hours cut, plus my mounting medical expenses, it's a strong choice. And for some reason, when I'm crying my eyes out and terrified, I can't ignore good sense. My whole being is telling me not to go, and I feel like a cat being shoved into a carrier against her will, and there I am nodding and saying it makes sense. Because it does.
But shit, really? Why can't my brain and my gut just agree on things? Yes or no, motherfuckers? PICK ONE. I can't handle this "don't wanna don't wanna don't wanna...okay...don't wanna" bullshit. I don't think the rest of our little group can, either.
But whatever. We are now in some kind of informal agreement that when he starts this new job and moves out, we will take over his property and move our shit in. And our cats. But we don't know if he'll be starting in two weeks or six months. I shit you not, we could be waiting as late as December to make this move. And this is with us having to give our landlords a fucking thirty day notice before we vacate.
Four hours and a free sammich from Domino's later, we get home and the sink is still fucked. And I learn an important lesson:
Those cute little yellow sink plungers at WalMart are pieces of shit, and pretty much will implode the first time you use them. Yeah. And trying to use a toilet plunger on our sink is like shooting Bruce Banner full of gamma radiation. The damn thing kept slipping on me, and I was getting stanky-ass water all over me. Best part? As we plunge it, it just keeps pushing water from one side to the other. Hulk smashes, yells in the trying-to-be-helpful he-surfer's face, and runs outside. Calm down, get the "bitch, slow your roll" talk from the girlfriend, and go BACK to WalMart to get DrainO.
Yeah. Just because that shit says it's for completely clogged drains doesn't mean it's for completely clogged drains. Follow the instructions on the bottle and what happens? Fuck all. Absolutely jack shit. So, being the genius wannabe engineer that I am, I go back to plunging with my now decimated yellow sex toy/sink plunger. Squelch squelch, back and forth, and finally it dawns on me. The U bend.
Two trips to WalMart with matching temper tantrums, DrainO all over my goddamn hands, and all I had to do was unscrew the U bend and clean the damn thing out. -.- This is why I need... Whatever it is I need. Fuck if I know, at this point. Anyway, I figure I'll just unhook it with a bucket underneath the sink to catch the water that was SUPPOSED to make the DrainO work. (Sink clogged? PUT MORE WATER IN IT. Yeah.. But the bottle saaaaid...) The plan was awesome. Until the bucket was too big, and the SINK WAS FULL OF FETID WATER AND MULTIPLE DRAIN CLEANERS.
But hey, I guess at least the kitchen floor got cleaned?
The whole time I'm doing this, mind you, I've got a peanut gallery standing behind me going "This is why you can't tank, Roxi," and "So...is this what our progression raids are going to look like?" And singing the Bob the Builder theme song.
Fuckers.
But you know what? The sink's not clogged any more. Why does it feel like this is somehow an allegory for my life right now?
So the day started off well. I had my interview, I did well, I got a job offer... my period stopped. It should have been the best day of the month, right? lolyeahright. With the stress of being more or less unemployed off my shoulders, you'd think I would finally have a good day. And I did, for all of five minutes. Then I started worrying about the fact that I'm taking a two dollar per hour pay cut, going from a guaranteed forty hours with frequent overtime to twenty with strongly-discouraged overtime, and probably losing my insurance. Somehow, my car came into all the worrying, and next thing you know I'm retching out my girlfriend's car window the whole way home. Ole.
Now, my interview was at nine in the morning. I got home, and the girlfriend was still in bed. She's able to get right back to sleep after I tell her the good news, and I lay there for like two hours staring at the ceiling, wondering if the monsters were going to eat me (figuratively speaking). I juuuust get to sleep, and she gets up. And then here come the cats. Once the cats get involved, there's no trying to press on and sleep in. There are six of them. Four of them just want to snuggle and cuddle, and the other two want to kill anyone that comes close. The only thing that kept me from just giving up and storming downstairs was the moose in the cat suit sitting on my chest. (He's like, half Maine Coon. He's a fucking moose.) Getting next to no sleep because of alarms, phone calls, and anxiety might have been okay...
...if I'd been able to come downstairs and give the couch surfers the good news. Only as I'm getting up, I hear the girlfriend telling them ALL about it. Great. Because the brief rush of "look what I did!" excitement wasn't, you know, an emotional high that I desperately needed. It's cool.
Then the sink backed up. Or rather, I went out to take my small pile of meds and noticed that there was water sitting in the sink under the dishes. It was okay for a little, because I promptly forgot about the fetid lake when I popped my birth control out of the blister pack and it bounced across the counter and down between the cabinets and oven.
"Oh fuck!" I yelled, dismayed and already starting to freak out that I could potentially fuck up my entire hormone schedule because now my birth control will be a day off.
"What'd you do? Shit, don't tell me the cats got at your Zoloft," I hear from the living room.
"No. I dropped my fucking birth control."
Silence, followed by raucous laughter. Apparently, a lesbian on birth control is the funniest shit since +1 dead baby flails for raising vile xp.
Which reminds me. I should really call my doctor and find out if (a) I'm going to have my uterus explode out my vajeen now because my birth control is off by a day and (b) if she's figured out how to get me my damn mood stabilizers. Because shit. Any more days like this and I'm going to be back in the ER screaming about wanting a pudding cup and a padded room. In that order. After the thing with the meds, the couch surfers and my girlfriend decide they want to go out for lunch. I spend most of my time worrying about frigging money, and they want to spend it on fast food when we've got perfectly good spaghetti and cereal and stuff here. My diplomacy check whiffed or something, and I ended up popping a couple stomach pills and nerve pills and stuff, and off we went.
And then the fem-surfer's dad calls while we're stuffing our faces with soft serve. He's got a job offer, and we have to make a big decision: are we moving into his house together, or not?
Well, fuck.
I didn't want to move. I really didn't want to move. After the last month of relationship roulette with the couch surfers, and all the shit I've been going through at work and with the doctors, I really didn't want to add the chaos of a move into the mix. The girlfriend and I talked it over a bunch, and we decided that since I wasn't comfortable with it, we'd stay in our place. Which was fine by me.
Three hours later, we've got two plungers and a couple notebooks from WalMart, and we're on our way to see this house I said I don't want to rent, and to talk to the new land lord I don't want. It won't hurt to hear him out, they say. I'm just glad I wasn't driving, because I was pretty much shaking and gnawing on my bottom lip the whole ride there. We get there, and I get to meet the fem-surfer's dog (I am terrified of dogs), and see the house. It's a nice house. Really nice. But it's filled wall-to-wall with twenty-plus years' worth of her dad's stuff, and her stuff, and even his ex-wives' stuff. Every place I've ever moved into has been completely empty. How in the hell am I supposed to envision someplace as MY home, when it's clearly someone else's? Cue the first crying jag.
The girlfriend gets me calmed down, I get my eyes dried and the snot gone, and Daddums comes home. (Late. Of course.) They start talking about stuff like rent and expenses, and the girlfriend and the he-surfer negotiate a little bit, and I'm just sitting there on the couch between them trying desperately to fall into the center of the earth. I don't want to move, remember? Change is bad. Why are we talking about this like it's going to happen? And why do I have to know right now? Don't ask me to decide something like this right now. I'm not in a good place right now to make snap decisions. Yes, when I'm on the upswing I do things like quit my job and move across country on a whim. When I'm three steps removed from suicide? Fuck no. I want to hide under my bed until the world stops being crazy at me.
Then he looks right at me and asks what's wrong. Cue crying jag number two.
Go outside. (There's a yard. It's nice and little.) Calm down again. Reaffirm terror of moving and change to the roommate. And then...
Then logic happened. See, if the four of us live in this house, it comes out to being as much INCLUDING utilities for the two of us as we're paying right now for the rent on our place. Given the pay cut and hours cut, plus my mounting medical expenses, it's a strong choice. And for some reason, when I'm crying my eyes out and terrified, I can't ignore good sense. My whole being is telling me not to go, and I feel like a cat being shoved into a carrier against her will, and there I am nodding and saying it makes sense. Because it does.
But shit, really? Why can't my brain and my gut just agree on things? Yes or no, motherfuckers? PICK ONE. I can't handle this "don't wanna don't wanna don't wanna...okay...don't wanna" bullshit. I don't think the rest of our little group can, either.
But whatever. We are now in some kind of informal agreement that when he starts this new job and moves out, we will take over his property and move our shit in. And our cats. But we don't know if he'll be starting in two weeks or six months. I shit you not, we could be waiting as late as December to make this move. And this is with us having to give our landlords a fucking thirty day notice before we vacate.
Four hours and a free sammich from Domino's later, we get home and the sink is still fucked. And I learn an important lesson:
Those cute little yellow sink plungers at WalMart are pieces of shit, and pretty much will implode the first time you use them. Yeah. And trying to use a toilet plunger on our sink is like shooting Bruce Banner full of gamma radiation. The damn thing kept slipping on me, and I was getting stanky-ass water all over me. Best part? As we plunge it, it just keeps pushing water from one side to the other. Hulk smashes, yells in the trying-to-be-helpful he-surfer's face, and runs outside. Calm down, get the "bitch, slow your roll" talk from the girlfriend, and go BACK to WalMart to get DrainO.
Yeah. Just because that shit says it's for completely clogged drains doesn't mean it's for completely clogged drains. Follow the instructions on the bottle and what happens? Fuck all. Absolutely jack shit. So, being the genius wannabe engineer that I am, I go back to plunging with my now decimated yellow sex toy/sink plunger. Squelch squelch, back and forth, and finally it dawns on me. The U bend.
Two trips to WalMart with matching temper tantrums, DrainO all over my goddamn hands, and all I had to do was unscrew the U bend and clean the damn thing out. -.- This is why I need... Whatever it is I need. Fuck if I know, at this point. Anyway, I figure I'll just unhook it with a bucket underneath the sink to catch the water that was SUPPOSED to make the DrainO work. (Sink clogged? PUT MORE WATER IN IT. Yeah.. But the bottle saaaaid...) The plan was awesome. Until the bucket was too big, and the SINK WAS FULL OF FETID WATER AND MULTIPLE DRAIN CLEANERS.
But hey, I guess at least the kitchen floor got cleaned?
The whole time I'm doing this, mind you, I've got a peanut gallery standing behind me going "This is why you can't tank, Roxi," and "So...is this what our progression raids are going to look like?" And singing the Bob the Builder theme song.
Fuckers.
But you know what? The sink's not clogged any more. Why does it feel like this is somehow an allegory for my life right now?
Tuesday, July 15, 2014
So I heard you like pills...
...so we upped your dosage across the board and gave you some new stuff, so you could take pills with your pills.
The original was funnier. ("Yo dawg, we heard you like procs, so we put crit in your crit so you can proc while you proc.") But you can't fault a girl for trying.
Holy fucking what the fuck, today was a shitfest. The girlfriend and I got kicked out of our living room at like three because our couch surfers wanted to sleep. We get upstairs and I make the mistake of bringing up our Warlords of Draenor raid comp, which sparks a discussion on whether or not I'll be able to handle progression tanking with my anxiety issues (I've only ever healed progression). Eventually, we fall asleep, only to hear screaming coming from downstairs an hour or two later. Me being me, my first thought isn't "Oh god, I hope everything's okay" or "I should get the sledgehammer and sort this shit out." No, it's "make it stop make it stop make it stop" and I unceremoniously bury my face in my girlfriend's armpit with the blankets over my head. Which I then threw off, because claustrophobic. (I am a hot fucking mess, now that I read this shit. Wow.)
So there we are, laying in bed, whispering about what could be going on downstairs, and all we can make out is "I DON'T PUT THINGS IN MY MOUTH!" from our fem-surfer. My first thought was "what did he do, put a Hotwheels in her mouth? Where'd he get a Hotwheels?" But what came out was more like "so... surprise balls in your mouth didn't go over as well as anticipated?" The shouting continues, and between the noise and my hyperventilating the girlfriend can't get back to sleep- so she does what any decent friend would do. She goes down to investigate.
Seven AM. Both couch surfers crying. Shouting. I'm curled up in a ball on the bed hugging my pillow like it's Alan Grant and it's going to leave me in the path of a ravening tyrannosaur. And then my girlfriend comes back upstairs and goes "you were right." Dead silence.
"What?" I ask, wondering if maybe my ears are clogged with self-loathing.
"You were right. I'm not sure who started what, but he woke up with his cock in her mouth and she woke up with-"
"Stop. I don't wanna hurl all over the bed and I can't take the stomach stuff without food, and that'll just screw up all the meds for the day."
Paraphrasing, of course. No way in hell am I that coherent when I first wake up. I improved the prose for entertainment's sake.
Eight AM. Fall asleep on the love seat. Eight thirty, get dragged back up to bed. Nine AM, phone rings. Shaping up to be a greaaaaat day. I almost screened the call, but then I noticed it was from a company I'd recently applied to. Shit. Now I not only have to be coherent, but polite and charismatic. After alllllll that shit this morning. And I have to go to the doctor in an hour, and... Fuck it.
"Hello?" Short version: apparently in small doses I can pull some awesome phone skills out of my ass, and I scored an interview. For ass-o'clock in the morning tomorrow. Which in five minutes will be today. (From when I'm writing this, dipshit, not from when you're reading it. Jeez.)
TL/DR version: I got pretty much no sleep, and had to go to the doctor's office. They made me wait for an hour, kicking my legs over the side of the exam table with the girlfriend watching some sappy ABC Family show or other on her phone (in her past life she was part of the Inquisition, I swear), which is pretty much a recipe for more ulcers. I kept reading over my medical leave papers, wondering how in hell they were supposed to make these things apply to a behavioral health issue when all it really seems to care about is if I have ten fingers, ten toes, and a fucking pulse. Then I started worrying about losing the job I'm trying desperately not to go back to (explain that one to me, please, someone), and somehow THAT segued into wondering if perhaps my doctor was down the hall delivering a baby or something, or if talking with her annoying office staff was really that much more interesting than unbreaking my everything.
And then the doctor actually came in and I had to find some way to make "my head is fucked up, my stomach is fucked up, I scare myself, and I want off the fucking roller coaster" something that she could diagnose and treat. Which is when the B word got dropped, and then the mood stabilizers came into the equation (which is really just a euphemism for anti-psychotics, I learned. Thank you, wikipedia), and I pretty much started freaking out all over again. On the inside. On the outside I'm pretty sure I just looked like a kicked puppy. Or maybe a kid who just got told she can't get the second My Little Pony if she wants to stop at McD's on the way home from the doctor to get a happy meal.
Jump forward like ten hours, because you really don't give a shit about how I pouted after being pouted at for running Lich King dungeons for money, or how much I just wanted to slap the shit out of the fem-surfer because seriously? If you don't want to do something, don't do it. If you're going to do it anyway, I don't fucking want to hear about it. (Pot, kettle. Sup?) Or the not-so-subtle feelings of butthurt when the girlfriend went out to dinner with her best friend with whom absolutely nothing untoward will happen. I drowned that shit in cherry doctor pepper and Stouffer's mac and cheese.
So it's like half an hour before the pharmacy closes, and I finally decide to get up off my ass and go pick up the scrips. I get there, for the first time in a couple of weeks NOT freaking out in the car the whole time (yay me! Maybe I'm over the feeling of impeding car wreck?), make a beeline for the pharm counter, and give the usual introduction. "Name, birthday, pickup." I'm getting a little too good at this, after three months. -.- The lady stares at the screen for a couple minutes, looks confused, gets one bag off the rack, and looks more confused. Disappears into the back, comes back even MORE confused. (At this point, I'm wondering if she was having to formulate the stuff right then and there, hibachi style.)
Turns out, my delightfully overpriced insurance doesn't cover Seroquel. Seriously? The shit's generic now. I checked. (Again, thank you, Wikipedia.) So now there's some arcane ritual my doctor has to do, which I can only assume involves a whole lot of pot and beer, and I'm back in line for the roller coaster. Fun times. Only totally not at all.
A few days ago (abrupt transitions ftw) I requested a small mountain of books on meditation and mood-control techniques from the library. Today, on the heels of my hurry up and wait doctor's appointment, I added a few books on bipolar (there's one on bipolar II, which kind of made me happy) to the list. I can only imagine what those people are going to be talking about when they process the requests. I mean, when I worked at the library we tracked people's divorces, college searches, cancer struggles... all through their hold lists. They're probably going to be like "Meditation, Bipolar, and...high fantasy? There we go. Probably thinks she's an elf or something."
Which is lies and slander.
I'm a fucking half-orc. Get it right.
Hopefully tomorrow will bring some good news. Then I'll be able to stop freaking out about how to tell them I'm not coming back without using the words "fuck you" or mailing in a case of revenge bears with a note that says "because you cared."
The original was funnier. ("Yo dawg, we heard you like procs, so we put crit in your crit so you can proc while you proc.") But you can't fault a girl for trying.
Holy fucking what the fuck, today was a shitfest. The girlfriend and I got kicked out of our living room at like three because our couch surfers wanted to sleep. We get upstairs and I make the mistake of bringing up our Warlords of Draenor raid comp, which sparks a discussion on whether or not I'll be able to handle progression tanking with my anxiety issues (I've only ever healed progression). Eventually, we fall asleep, only to hear screaming coming from downstairs an hour or two later. Me being me, my first thought isn't "Oh god, I hope everything's okay" or "I should get the sledgehammer and sort this shit out." No, it's "make it stop make it stop make it stop" and I unceremoniously bury my face in my girlfriend's armpit with the blankets over my head. Which I then threw off, because claustrophobic. (I am a hot fucking mess, now that I read this shit. Wow.)
So there we are, laying in bed, whispering about what could be going on downstairs, and all we can make out is "I DON'T PUT THINGS IN MY MOUTH!" from our fem-surfer. My first thought was "what did he do, put a Hotwheels in her mouth? Where'd he get a Hotwheels?" But what came out was more like "so... surprise balls in your mouth didn't go over as well as anticipated?" The shouting continues, and between the noise and my hyperventilating the girlfriend can't get back to sleep- so she does what any decent friend would do. She goes down to investigate.
Seven AM. Both couch surfers crying. Shouting. I'm curled up in a ball on the bed hugging my pillow like it's Alan Grant and it's going to leave me in the path of a ravening tyrannosaur. And then my girlfriend comes back upstairs and goes "you were right." Dead silence.
"What?" I ask, wondering if maybe my ears are clogged with self-loathing.
"You were right. I'm not sure who started what, but he woke up with his cock in her mouth and she woke up with-"
"Stop. I don't wanna hurl all over the bed and I can't take the stomach stuff without food, and that'll just screw up all the meds for the day."
Paraphrasing, of course. No way in hell am I that coherent when I first wake up. I improved the prose for entertainment's sake.
Eight AM. Fall asleep on the love seat. Eight thirty, get dragged back up to bed. Nine AM, phone rings. Shaping up to be a greaaaaat day. I almost screened the call, but then I noticed it was from a company I'd recently applied to. Shit. Now I not only have to be coherent, but polite and charismatic. After alllllll that shit this morning. And I have to go to the doctor in an hour, and... Fuck it.
"Hello?" Short version: apparently in small doses I can pull some awesome phone skills out of my ass, and I scored an interview. For ass-o'clock in the morning tomorrow. Which in five minutes will be today. (From when I'm writing this, dipshit, not from when you're reading it. Jeez.)
TL/DR version: I got pretty much no sleep, and had to go to the doctor's office. They made me wait for an hour, kicking my legs over the side of the exam table with the girlfriend watching some sappy ABC Family show or other on her phone (in her past life she was part of the Inquisition, I swear), which is pretty much a recipe for more ulcers. I kept reading over my medical leave papers, wondering how in hell they were supposed to make these things apply to a behavioral health issue when all it really seems to care about is if I have ten fingers, ten toes, and a fucking pulse. Then I started worrying about losing the job I'm trying desperately not to go back to (explain that one to me, please, someone), and somehow THAT segued into wondering if perhaps my doctor was down the hall delivering a baby or something, or if talking with her annoying office staff was really that much more interesting than unbreaking my everything.
And then the doctor actually came in and I had to find some way to make "my head is fucked up, my stomach is fucked up, I scare myself, and I want off the fucking roller coaster" something that she could diagnose and treat. Which is when the B word got dropped, and then the mood stabilizers came into the equation (which is really just a euphemism for anti-psychotics, I learned. Thank you, wikipedia), and I pretty much started freaking out all over again. On the inside. On the outside I'm pretty sure I just looked like a kicked puppy. Or maybe a kid who just got told she can't get the second My Little Pony if she wants to stop at McD's on the way home from the doctor to get a happy meal.
Jump forward like ten hours, because you really don't give a shit about how I pouted after being pouted at for running Lich King dungeons for money, or how much I just wanted to slap the shit out of the fem-surfer because seriously? If you don't want to do something, don't do it. If you're going to do it anyway, I don't fucking want to hear about it. (Pot, kettle. Sup?) Or the not-so-subtle feelings of butthurt when the girlfriend went out to dinner with her best friend with whom absolutely nothing untoward will happen. I drowned that shit in cherry doctor pepper and Stouffer's mac and cheese.
So it's like half an hour before the pharmacy closes, and I finally decide to get up off my ass and go pick up the scrips. I get there, for the first time in a couple of weeks NOT freaking out in the car the whole time (yay me! Maybe I'm over the feeling of impeding car wreck?), make a beeline for the pharm counter, and give the usual introduction. "Name, birthday, pickup." I'm getting a little too good at this, after three months. -.- The lady stares at the screen for a couple minutes, looks confused, gets one bag off the rack, and looks more confused. Disappears into the back, comes back even MORE confused. (At this point, I'm wondering if she was having to formulate the stuff right then and there, hibachi style.)
Turns out, my delightfully overpriced insurance doesn't cover Seroquel. Seriously? The shit's generic now. I checked. (Again, thank you, Wikipedia.) So now there's some arcane ritual my doctor has to do, which I can only assume involves a whole lot of pot and beer, and I'm back in line for the roller coaster. Fun times. Only totally not at all.
A few days ago (abrupt transitions ftw) I requested a small mountain of books on meditation and mood-control techniques from the library. Today, on the heels of my hurry up and wait doctor's appointment, I added a few books on bipolar (there's one on bipolar II, which kind of made me happy) to the list. I can only imagine what those people are going to be talking about when they process the requests. I mean, when I worked at the library we tracked people's divorces, college searches, cancer struggles... all through their hold lists. They're probably going to be like "Meditation, Bipolar, and...high fantasy? There we go. Probably thinks she's an elf or something."
Which is lies and slander.
I'm a fucking half-orc. Get it right.
Hopefully tomorrow will bring some good news. Then I'll be able to stop freaking out about how to tell them I'm not coming back without using the words "fuck you" or mailing in a case of revenge bears with a note that says "because you cared."
Sunday, July 13, 2014
So there's this pickle jar...
I haven't blogged in years. Not really. For a while I fancied myself an up-and-coming MMORPG blogger, and I pretty religiously posted rants about guild leadership, the "right" and "wrong" ways to do things... Basically, I was an elitist prick waggling my epeen at people. Little surprise that blog never really took off. I think I had one regular reader. In Russia. Which, given everything, kind of makes sense. Those Russians love their World of Warcraft. Anyway.
The last few years have seen me fall very much out of touch with a part of me that used to be pretty damn important- my inner writer. Used to be, I would write constantly. Stories, online role-playing, journals, my blog. Hell, I wrote analytical reports on books I read FOR FUN, back in high school. (I can hear you shouting 'nerd' from waaaay over wherever you are, and trust me. You are not the first person to say that.) Those years also saw me become a much angrier, stressed-out, and emotionally unstable person. Maybe it's just the age of the beast. I mean, I am nearing thirty. All kinds of chemical nastiness is going on in my body right now, I'm sure. Or maybe it's adult-onset mental instability. I wouldn't be the first person in my family to have that problem. I've consulted the oracles of modern medicine, behavioral and internal, and while they've had some helpful suggestions... something's still not quite there.
Hence this blog. Ultimately, this is going to be the Seinfeld of blogs- which most blogs are, in my experience. No stated plot, no major theme or message. I'm not here to share recipes or give tips on rearing a strong two mommy family, or how not to look like a complete jackass in a video game that's been out for ten years. I'm just a woman on a mission to reconnect with the things in her life that really matter, and get rid of all the things that don't.
Which brings me to the pickle jar. The other morning, while I was still sleeping off a panic-attack and crying bout, my unfathomably understanding girlfriend posted this video on Facebook. Short version, a professor dumps a bunch of crap into a pickle jar, and it's a life lesson. The jar is us, the stuff in the jar is all of our baggage. And then there's chocolate, but... I'm going to sidestep that particular issue. (Touch my chocolate and I will cut you.) I realized, after I stopped sobbing like an anorexic blonde chick in a Lifetime movie, that I've spent most of the last few years worrying about all the wrong things. Yes, finances and computer stuff and having the right job and...all that other crap I worry about matter. Well, not all of the crap. Class balance in player-versus-player content doesn't matter. That's sand. (Watch the video. You'll get it.) What matter most are my health, my happiness, and my family. I've let stress from work (and other things) push my relationship to the limit. Multiple times. I let my health go for so long that it took two months and close to five hundred dollars in doctor visits, tests, and prescriptions to START getting me back on track. And my happiness...
I cry at sudden, unexpected noises. And yelling. And strangers making eye contact. I can't sit still any more. My chest seizes up when I go out in public, and when I'm alone at home I oscillate between fine and terrified that something bad is going to happen. I have been very much doing it wrong for a long time, and it's got to change. Pills aren't the answer. They help, yes. But I can't live my life popping pills and hoping that'll make my troubles just...disappear. Somewhere along the line my coping mechanisms took an arrow to the knee. Zoloft won't fix that. Ativan won't fix that. Only I can.
So here we go. The first step in a journey of a thousand keystrokes. With some exponent, because I can blow through a thousand characters pretty damn fast. (Which is why I suck at Twitter and never use it.) Maybe someone will read this, and at least know they're not alone in their hardship. Or realize that their problems aren't as bad as they could be. Or that their problems are WAY worse than mine, and get all full of righteous indignation that inspires them to push on. Or...maybe no one will read it, and I'll just work my feelings out on paper (so to speak)...and move on.
We'll see. That's all we can do, right? ^.^
The last few years have seen me fall very much out of touch with a part of me that used to be pretty damn important- my inner writer. Used to be, I would write constantly. Stories, online role-playing, journals, my blog. Hell, I wrote analytical reports on books I read FOR FUN, back in high school. (I can hear you shouting 'nerd' from waaaay over wherever you are, and trust me. You are not the first person to say that.) Those years also saw me become a much angrier, stressed-out, and emotionally unstable person. Maybe it's just the age of the beast. I mean, I am nearing thirty. All kinds of chemical nastiness is going on in my body right now, I'm sure. Or maybe it's adult-onset mental instability. I wouldn't be the first person in my family to have that problem. I've consulted the oracles of modern medicine, behavioral and internal, and while they've had some helpful suggestions... something's still not quite there.
Hence this blog. Ultimately, this is going to be the Seinfeld of blogs- which most blogs are, in my experience. No stated plot, no major theme or message. I'm not here to share recipes or give tips on rearing a strong two mommy family, or how not to look like a complete jackass in a video game that's been out for ten years. I'm just a woman on a mission to reconnect with the things in her life that really matter, and get rid of all the things that don't.
Which brings me to the pickle jar. The other morning, while I was still sleeping off a panic-attack and crying bout, my unfathomably understanding girlfriend posted this video on Facebook. Short version, a professor dumps a bunch of crap into a pickle jar, and it's a life lesson. The jar is us, the stuff in the jar is all of our baggage. And then there's chocolate, but... I'm going to sidestep that particular issue. (Touch my chocolate and I will cut you.) I realized, after I stopped sobbing like an anorexic blonde chick in a Lifetime movie, that I've spent most of the last few years worrying about all the wrong things. Yes, finances and computer stuff and having the right job and...all that other crap I worry about matter. Well, not all of the crap. Class balance in player-versus-player content doesn't matter. That's sand. (Watch the video. You'll get it.) What matter most are my health, my happiness, and my family. I've let stress from work (and other things) push my relationship to the limit. Multiple times. I let my health go for so long that it took two months and close to five hundred dollars in doctor visits, tests, and prescriptions to START getting me back on track. And my happiness...
I cry at sudden, unexpected noises. And yelling. And strangers making eye contact. I can't sit still any more. My chest seizes up when I go out in public, and when I'm alone at home I oscillate between fine and terrified that something bad is going to happen. I have been very much doing it wrong for a long time, and it's got to change. Pills aren't the answer. They help, yes. But I can't live my life popping pills and hoping that'll make my troubles just...disappear. Somewhere along the line my coping mechanisms took an arrow to the knee. Zoloft won't fix that. Ativan won't fix that. Only I can.
So here we go. The first step in a journey of a thousand keystrokes. With some exponent, because I can blow through a thousand characters pretty damn fast. (Which is why I suck at Twitter and never use it.) Maybe someone will read this, and at least know they're not alone in their hardship. Or realize that their problems aren't as bad as they could be. Or that their problems are WAY worse than mine, and get all full of righteous indignation that inspires them to push on. Or...maybe no one will read it, and I'll just work my feelings out on paper (so to speak)...and move on.
We'll see. That's all we can do, right? ^.^
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)