The shutters of my mind are closed...

I'm temporarily shut off from my good feelings. I hope it's temporary and not a permanent condition. I'd hate to go through life this way. I really do see things in shades of gray now and black is another prominent color. Lord knows that they are not attractive shades of color to see your life in. I need something brighter than this. 

Let's blame it on the absence of sunlight. It has been dreary all day and cold too. The sky has been overcast and gray and it has been raining. Not exactly the kind of weather to feel optimistic about. 

I know that's not really the reason for my bad mood, but I'm pretending it is. I'd have to dig deep within myself to find the real reason and that may be too much work. Normally I'm all for analyzing myself, but something is witholding me now. Call it my angry little stubborn streak. I feel very ornery at this moment.

Chances are that I'll talk myself right out of it if I sit here long enough. I know I can never stay permanently grumpy. But I don't know if I'm only grumpy or if there's somthing more the matter. I suppose I'll know that tomorrow when I get up and start a new day. Now is not the time to know for sure. 

You shouldn't pay any attention to me. I probably got out on the wrong side of the bed when I got up from my nap earlier this evening. I had been to see my sister and got home late in the afternoon and was very tired. I took a nap when it was not really a good time to take one. I'm a little bit off schedule as a result. 

You see how I can trivialize my bad mood and make it not at all important anymore. It doesn't even deserve the words I'm wasting on it. 

I think I will go and eat some dinner now. I need to feed my body. I can't live on ice cold milk alone. It did taste very good, though. 

Ciao,

Nora

Peacefulness is permitted too...

I'm sitting here in the middle of the night with a cup of coffee and a cigarette and I'm totally at peace with myself. I don't know how long this moment is going to last, because it may only be a momentary thing, but I'm going to make the most of it while I'm under its spell. 

Some feelings slip through your fingers like grains of sand and peacefulness is one of them. You have to take full advantage of it while you hold onto it for as long as you can. It can be gone like dust in the wind in no time. A feeling like peacefulness is so fleeting. 

I don't want to rationalize myself out of it and will just try to stay in this mood. It's the kindest way to be at the moment, but I'm aware of the precariousness of my situation. Once you start discussing your feelings, rationalizing them is not far away.  It's when the need for logic starts to creep in. 

I saw my psychiatrist yesterday and he told me that my rapid cycling was a reaction to the increase in my antidepressants. He said that whenever there was an increase or decrease in a medication, there would be a reaction like a pendulum that started swinging. It will stop swinging as I get adjusted to the change, because it's not the dose itself that causes the problem.

He also asked me to call him by his first name and for us to say 'you' to each other and no longer 'thee.' We've been very formal up to this point, but I suppose that we've reached that time that we can be more relaxed. It will take some time to get used to and we have to make sure that we don't overstep boundaries, but I think it will be okay. I want to make sure I don't slip into some sort of casualness. 

Today is going to be a completely empty day and I have mixed feelings about it. I appreciate the freedom that I'll have, but now that I feel better, I regret the fact that I don't do anything with it. 

It's early times, though, and I still have to wait for the antidepressants to start working properly, which will take a few weeks. I am really in limbo now and can't make any big decisions until I know what I'll end up like and how much I'll dare do. I have to wait a while for the end result. If there is ever going to be one. 

At least I've got the animals to keep me busy and enough exciting events on the news to keep me occupied. I do watch the news during the day and stay informed of the latest developments. 

I'm doing an awful lot of bonding with the dog and he seems most pleased about it. Sometimes, or a lot of times, he sits in front of me and looks at me in complete adoration. I talk to him about anything and everything and he thinks it's all just great. Sometimes he understands me and his ears perk up. Sometimes he talks back.

Well, it's time to take my peacefulness and go to sleep with it. I will lie in bed and listen to the radio until I drift off. 

I hope you're all having a good night. 

Ciao,

Nora

By the wayside of my life...

I'm not in the mood for finishing the book 'Angels & Insects' by A.S. Byatt after having seen the movie, so I just now picked out another novel from the ones on the bookcase that I haven't read yet. It is 'The Abortionist's Daughter' by Elizabeth Hyde and I know very little about it except what I've read on the back cover. I'm taking a chance and hope that I will like it well enough. 

I haven't read anything by this author that I can remember, although some of the titles of her other novels look familiar. I can't say for sure if I've read any of them, though. I will let you know what I think of this one when I'm into it a bit. I've become a critical reader, so novels have to live up to a high standard. I'm afraid I've become spoiled by a few excellent ones I've read this past year. 

The energy I put into reading a book is precious and can't be wasted. I feel that it really has to be worth my while to take the time to sit and read it. It's very often an effort that I have to make and it's not always something that comes easy. It helps if a novel really grabs me with it's good prose and credibility and sense of compassion for the characters. I dislike it if the author's too far fetched fantasy wears me out me and pushes my 'hard-to-believe-button'. 

It's still in the middle of the night, although some people would be optimistic and call this the very early morning. It's not going to be light for some time and I'm facing a totally empty day. That is a day of no appointments and no excessive chores. I will have to find other ways to fill my day. I am sure my imagination will not forsake me and then there's always the Tour de France to watch.

I changed the sheets on the bed last night and found two duvet covers in the closet that I had forgotten about, so now I'm sleeping under little red roses. The covers are as good as new because I've hardly used them and had overlooked them being on the bottom shelf. They were just part of the unseen interior of the closet. They were unnoticeably there. I'm richer than I thought I was.

I saw my SPN yesterday. I don't know how well it went. I was teary eyed at the prospect of not seeing her anymore after September and as it is now, I only see her once every three weeks. I asked for another therapist after she's gone and was relieved to hear that my psychiatrist had already broached that subject with her. I don't think I can quite make it on my own and I think I'm going to fall into a bit of a hole when she's gone. 

I don't do well with changes and this will be a big change as she's played such a crucial role in my life. I have to properly prepare myself for it and not act like it's just nothing at all. I mustn't ignore my feelings by sticking my head in the sand and I can't approach everything rationally only. 

I think I will sit and read my book for a while in my armchair until I go back to bed. It's still not dawn yet. I will take my medicines which will make me sleepy. I can sleep late today. 

Have a good morning. 

Ciao,

Nora

Slow motion...

It's truly in the middle of the night, there's no doubt about it. It's not even close to dawn. In a way that's good because it will allow me enough time to go back to bed and sleep long enough before the Exfactor gets here. I won't be completely befuddled when he gets here, although it doesn't matter so much in his case if I am. He is very patient with me and allows me time to wake up properly without me having to be all artificially cheerful. It's a much kinder process of waking up. 

I will try to be up on time before he gets here anyway and have the coffee ready. We are both always ready for a cup because a lot of times the Exfactor only drinks tea in the morning at his place and I'm convinced that it doesn't give him a proper start to the day. He really seems to come alive after he's had a cup of coffee here. That's because he drinks things like mint tea with sugar which leave him dopey. 

I'm drinking coffee now in an attempt not to be too sleepy headed and to be able to finish this post before I go back to bed. I've made just a little pot of it so I won't drink too much. There is always cold milk. I do need something to keep the slumber at bay for now. I would fall instantly asleep behind the keyboard if I didn't. It wouldn't do to have a row of letters imprinted on my forehead. 

It's not bad being in this half awake state. It's actually kind of pleasant. I feel as though I'm slightly drugged and better able to express my feelings, although they are all tenuous and hardly of any consequence at all. They are strictly nighttime feelings of made of ethereal stuff. Like fluffs of stardust and just as lightweight. There's not a heavyweight thought among them. 

I would always like to exist in this state of mind, somewhere in limbo I suppose. Neither here nor there. Somewhat approachable yet not quite present in my own elusive way; in a dreamy state of mind. It's a much more relaxed way of being.

I can't keep existing here. Reality pulls me back and has me return to the present situation which is that I'll have to go back to bed and finish sleeping. Besides, the dog wants impossible things from me that I don't know how to fulfill. He's been out back and he's had a snack. I don't know what else to do. There's little escapism when you get right down to it. It's all of momentary nature. 

Right, I'm off to bed to sleep some more and perchance to dream. I actually have no doubt about that. I always do the second time around and the most interesting things too. 

Have a good morning.

Ciao,

Nora

Kindheartedness...

I suppose that's best to describe the benign feelings I have right now about the world  in general, though not about all things in specific, but I'll not let myself be bothered about them right now. I want to have nothing but benign feelings, pushing away the effects of the less happy news items I watched on television last night. If they are all true, they make me feel very jaded indeed and I want none of that right now. 

I do want to enjoy my few hours of peace and quiet in the darkness and silence of the night and believe in the general goodness of mankind, though it is hard to pull the wool over my own eyes. It requires a state of oblivion that even I don't know I'm capable of. I'm going to give it my best try, though. 

The face of one man is etched in my mind right now and that is the face of Dominic Strauss-Kahn and I wonder how he is doing in his single prison cell on Wicker Island. I want the allegations to not be true, but I'm afraid they are and I'm ever so sorry about that. It bothers me to no end that a man in his position would steep so low.  I suppose I feel an enormous amount of disappointment. This isn't about having extra-marital affairs anymore. This is about rape and it's very serious. 

Enough said about that. I have to find something equally true and honest in its place. Something to offset it. Something of beauty and elegance. That's hard to come by in this world. I suppose I'm looking for a hero and I can't find one at this moment. I need a Nelson Mandela.

I suppose that I don't feel as benign as I thought I did, though I wish to. I worry about men in power abusing their privilege. It's been shown that the brain activity of people in power changes and that they take bigger chances and do things ordinary people would not. They are risk takers. This goes for women in power as well as men. Women are more subtle, though. They don't have a penis in their pants with which they have to assert themselves. 

I'll gently return to the night and it's peacefulness. If I sit here so silently, it's hard to imagine that there's a big complicated world out there. I can make my own world as small as I like. I can make it as small as the light of my desk lamp reaches. I can forget about yesterday and the day that is to come. All I have to do in a while is go back to bed and sleep. I don't even have to dream about unpleasant things, at least, I hope not. 

On another subject, the book I'm reading, 'Loot and other stories,' is not fascinating me at all, but then again, not many books are lately and I never seem to be able to finish one. I will have to go in search of another book that will hopefully grab my attention well enough. I do still have enough to choose from on the bookcase. It's a shame to leave all these books unread, but maybe some day in the future I will go back and finish them.

Today actually brings nothing complicated with it. It is a day of no consequence at all. I can make it as simple as I want and I am grateful for that. I will do some simple chores and generally take care of my mental health, which has for the most part been good. I'm not going from one extreme mood to the other, but am mostly positioned somewhere in the middle range. You have no idea what a relief that is. I'm not in the bouncy castle.

I hope you're all having a good night and that you'll have a good morning when you get up. We're actually going to have good weather. 

Ciao,

Nora

With time and patience...

After the unfortunate reaction on my part after meeting my first ex-husband, I had a real good discussion about it with my personal helper on Monday morning and that seemed to have helped me a great deal. She pointed out the fact that I was a human being with very human feelings and that it was not so strange that I reacted to him the way I did. I have subsequently had a good blogging friend point out the same thing to me, and even illustrate it with a story of her own, so I feel much better now. 

I haven't had to take anymore extra medication and to me that is a good sign. It means I am more steady on my feet and more solidly held together. I'm not falling apart anymore, although I look back in horror at the time when I did and at anything that reminds me of it. Even the clothes that I wore. They all need to be washed before I will wear them again. I don't even want to wear the boots I was wearing. They will need to be banned for a while. 

I feel like doing something radical such as rearranging the bookcase, but I've managed to keep myself from doing that huge chore yet. I don't want to bite off more than I can chew and really need to set apart a time for that. For now I just want to be content that I feel more normal again and that I seem to be back in control of myself. The fact that this is so, fills me with joy and I feel as if I've escaped some sort of sentence. 

Of course, anything I say during the night mustn't be held against me and I don't want to be held accountable for it. During the night I am an eternal optimist and always see the glass more than half full. It's how I feel during the day that will really count, although it is strange that those feelings should be more legitimate. I'm alive during the night too, after all, and I sleep half the day.

I'm sitting here drinking cold milk now and getting a bit chilled from it, but it is ever so good for my thirst. I will go back to bed shortly because I'm tired enough to sleep some more. I'm sure I have no interesting things left to do here. 

I hope you're all having a good night. 

Ciao,

Nora

Unbelievably so...

Optimistically speaking, it is early in the morning and if it were summertime, the sun would be coming up now. That's how I excuse my early presence here. I'm sitting here with a cup of coffee and a cigarette and I've just answered my emails and let Tyke out back. It was a little bit cold out there and I stood by the back door in my tank top and pajama bottoms. It was very refreshing, but now I've put on my bathrobe. I'm not that hardy. I did have goosebumps.

Since it's Sunday today, it is officially a day of rest, although you may say that I've had one of those yesterday too. I know I did, but it wasn't official, I was sort of cheating then. Yesterday was a wasted day and I bow my head in shame when I think back on it. It was a day that I have nothing to show for and that is not something I'm proud of. The day slipped through my fingers like loose sand at the beach. I somehow, despite all the rest I'm supposed to get, hope to make up for it today and make it a worthwhile day. How I propose to do this is a mystery to me yet, but hopefully I'll think of something. 

Actually, what I forgot to do yesterday was plain enjoy myself. I was rather uptight all day long and didn't really relax. I didn't even take the time to just sit in my armchair to enjoy the solitude. The times that I could have, I turned on the television and watched programs that I wasn't really interested in. I think I felt uptight because I had cut down on my anti-depressives, and despite my resolve not to let that bother me, I think it did subconsciously influence me, as if I was expecting something to go wrong. I was just a bit on edge. 

Nothing really went wrong and at the end of the day I felt fine. When I went to bed I was perfectly normal and in a good enough state of mind. I really think that I had worried for nothing, even though it was only on a subconscious level and with hindsight. I misjudge the power of the pills, although at the same time I don't underestimate them. I do know they play an important part in the workings of my psyche, but I know that it's not so bad that I can't reduce them safely up to a point. I suppose I should say that I underestimate the strength of my own psyche and the fact that I am capable of dealing with my feelings. 

You do learn something new every day and you're never too old to learn, or maybe they are the same lessons you learn over and over again, just in a slightly different form so you don't forget them. There does seem to be a lot of repeat, but that maybe due to my foolhardiness. It's very well possible that all people are foolhardy and that we're all learning the same lessons over and over again. Maybe they don't really stick until we get older and they are engraved well enough into our brains. 

It's been a pleasure to sit here and write this, but I do think that I have to go back to bed and sleep some more. It's not nearly time to start the day. I am starting to yawn and that is a sure sign that I'm not done sleeping yet. It will be nice to get back into bed for a few more hours. 

Have a good day, all of you. Or a good night if you're about to. 

Ciao,

Nora