One last job. Then she’ll retire. But this job just might kill her. Isn’t that always the way?
We value your privacy and would never spam you. We will send you relevant offers and add you to our mailing list, though.
Yesterday was a bad mental health day.
You are allowed bad mental health days.
You shouldn’t feel guilty for good mental health days, either.
This is a time of incredible change, and neither your body or your mind are used to things moving so fast.
Today was a bad mental health day, but hopefully, tomorrow will be better.
It’s the old AA thing. Dear lord, give me the courage to change the thing I can, and to accept the things I can’t change and the wisdom to know the difference. ( not totally correct but close) You can’t change what is happening out there, but you can use the time you have to move ahead. I had to learn to dismiss what I couldn’t change and move on or go under. Went there one time and refuse to go back to that dark place.
I get that bad mental health day. To avoid meltdowns, I look to finding what I can do to make the time go faster. I can’t change the lockdowns mandated by the government, or the empty shelves in the stores, but I can work on my projects and be ready fro when things return to more normal and I’m back to work. Today is an editing, writing and reading day with working on a class in between. I also don’t listen to the news or feed into the craziness and panic of the masses.
i love your attitude.
Several years ago, my husband and I drove through the south during a late tornado season. We stopped at a small station in rural Louisiana. The greenish clouds hung low and oppressive in the sky. The air had a strange heaviness I’d never felt before. The moment I stepped out of the car I understood how a dog feels when it cowers under the porch, hiding from the approaching thunderstorm. I couldn’t keep myself from hunching my shoulders as I scurried into the station. Inside, a group of locals stood around chatting and laughing as if the very air wasn’t screaming danger. I asked the cashier if the low clouds and strange color meant a tornado was coming.
She shrugged. Yeah, she’d heard warnings. She rang up our fuel as if this happened every day, the picture of unconcern. I told myself if the locals, who experienced this every year, were unconcerned, there was no real danger. Stay calm. Stay calm. Rationality couldn’t override instinct, which screamed RUN! HIDE! GET AWAY! We got in the car and broke speed limits for hours driving north – away from hurricanes and towards snow.
I feel the same now, but there is no safe place to drive to. No place to run. No place to hide
Every day I see the number of dead rising, the stock market falling, and the march of the disease get steadily closer. My world, the way I know it, is ending. I know nothing about how the world will be when this is over, only that it will be different.
Every day I shower, get dressed, go to work – as if the air around me isn’t heavy and laced with warning; as if it were a normal day and my hands weren’t shaking. Every day I fight to focus and lose. I accomplish nothing.
Every day I come home drained from a day of constantly tightened muscles and air too thick to allow for deep breaths. I slump on the couch searching for simple distractions. I overeat. I watch hours of television. I play endless rounds of simple games on my phone.
The internet tells me over and over that now, more than ever, the world needs my creativity. I owe it to the world to create. Now is the time to finish my novel and send it out. Now is the time to sing and paint and sew and create beauty where none was before. I am so sorry, world. I hate to let you down this way, but there is a storm coming and I don’t know how to create when I can’t breathe.
I think it’s tragic that people are saying that people NEED your creativity. Honestly, if you can’t do anything, that’s okay. This is a BANANAS time. The way I cope is by working and doing things, but that’s not everybody’s thing, and honestly, it’s only years of practice that allows me to do that. It takes time to assess and develop something that you think is worth saying. I very much liked this comment though, and the story you told, so that’s something. Sometimes, all I get is a Facebook post done in a day.