Well that's Bi-Polar for you.
Anyway we have some French twinning friends staying with us this weekend. They are from Normandy. So yup, I have been having a massive turn out and tidy up. This is realy difficult when you are a hoarder of all things that might come in handy.
Still I don't have obsessive cleaning disorder, quite the opposite in fact. I wonder if there is a term for bone lazy people like me? Well it's not that I don't want to do the cleaning, it's just I am not good at it. I just do my best. A bit of dust doesn't kill anyone. Both my Husband and I are dead untidy. So it's more about putting things away when we are very short of storage. We are definately not minimalists.
I think that I do have a 'perfectionist' streak, so clean and tidy all the time is a sort of unacheivable nightmare that I dream of. Still the flip side is not doing anything to stave off the massive clear up that is needed when people come to stay. I feel good casting my eye over the place though, it's as good as it's going to get!
Anyway at least I made a post today. I am still not following the news that closely. Other than an impending break up of the Euro. I just can't see how countries can balance budgets all the while a Pan European currency is operating. I think if Greece did default, and withdrew on the Euro on their own terms, we would see a very different Europe emerging. Interesting times.
Quite a bit really. I am not motivated and this is the first time I have felt like adding something here for a couple of weeks. Perhaps its the weather as well as it seems mostly dim and rainy. I definately need some sunny days. Still we have desperately needed rain for the gardens.
I have let myself get too bored. I have a few things to do next week. I will hopefully get referred to the fit for life excercise program soon. I am sure just getting out to go and do something to get those endorphine levels up a bit will be a great help. Also just generally feeling like I have more purpose and energy.
My Husband said I needed to go shopping! I feel very drab. I just don't want to go and buy clothes that will be too big for me in three months time. If I am going to go to the gym and lose some inches it seems pointless to get clothes just yet. I also feel the same about making something for myself.
I haven't been following the news either. It is too depressing. There is a worldwide recession as far as I can make out. Although some countries look as though they are doing ok, if Europe and America as markets buyng from manufacturing nations don't have money to spend, it will affect everyone.
My parents were the epitome of frugal. In this era we are just not used to having so many people realy struggling. I think we have been fed on such a consumer driven dreamscape for so long we know no different. At least during the 1960-70s there was still some family coherence. People helped each other, families did not live so far apart. I wonder how the next few years will change our expectations and values as societies.
We have some friends coming to stay with us in a couple of weeks, so it's a good reason to do a very good house clean. All those drawers and nooks that get skimmed over. Time for a turn out of things that just seem to be clutter and get them to the charity shop. Well I suppose I could car boot sale some stuff, it might be fun to see what pocket money I can get from a few bits and bobs that just collect dust.
I have been away from the internet for a couple of weeks. Yes it is possible. I just waded through my inbox and found someone actually posted a comment on the post I made about ants, and wasting the good bits of fish that get thrown away.
(Thanks for the comment, makes me feel like a propper blogger). There was this ant on my kitchen worktop stealing a huge fishbone, it was epic that the little chap got so far with it. I will never know what happened to the dissapearing fishbone. One of life's delights if you are an ant colony I suppose.
I made a video of him/her trying to steal it away, it's amazing how much they can manouver something many times their size when they want to. It amused and amazed me anyway. I guess anything is possible if we take an ant view of life. Check out the video under 'ants'.
It is that time of year again as the ants have just started waking up again. No I don't actually leave food out for them on purpose, only that time with the fish bone. I must have been a bit manic!
Its time I got myself more motivated to find something worthwhile to be doing. I need a lot more excercise, and the dog needs a lot more walking. I could do with something that presents some kind of challenge I suppose. If I am truthful, I have been borderline depressed for about four months. By this I don't mean unhappy.
Being Bi-polar is always going to be that undulation between depression and mania. It is the definition given to someone who has a dopamine excess/insufficiency problem. The medication used to treat Bi-Polar disorder evens out this problem by inhibiting how much dopamine gets absorbed naturally.
Depression is; lackluster, tired, heavy sleeping, overweight, anxious, lacking confidence, morose.
To a greater or lesser degree all of the above, and if there were a real cause to experience any or all of these symptoms in varying degrees it would be easy to find a solution that flips the switches the other way. No going for long walks with the dog/Husband does not make me 'feel' better, it just makes me realise how little energy and enthusiasm I have during this 'down time'. I tend to be quiet and introverted.
However Mania is all the opposite; Sparkling, energetic, (Slimmer!) alert, early rising, confident, optimistic, and hyper-active. Its like all the ideas and knowledge you have are at your fingertips, in a flamboyant creative flair. Well that's how you feel. This is the 'up-time'. Obviously louder, and seemingly more outgoing.
The whole point of treating Bi Polar effectively is to reduce the extremes of both these swings, because for every 'up' there is a 'down', and it is a roller coaster ride that you never get off. If there is one thing that taking medication and good modern psychiatric direction helps with it's taking out that 'death drop' experience between the extreme highs and lows. The aim is to get into an area where with a good bit of personal discipline, doesn't trigger off an extreme in either direction.
I stress aim, rather than goal as this is an ongoing process rather than somewhere you arrive at. It's an every day process. I don't see it as a 'success' or 'failure' sort of process either. More like habitual awareness, with an occassional lapse because I am human!
For instance because I could, I decided that because I have felt low energy over the last few months, and that getting up is my worst time, I might just let myself sleep in until I woke up. This is not actualy a 'good' strategy.
This Morning, I decided it wasn't a good strategy after all. Now I am going to make sure that by next winter and the inevitable onset of the down time, I will have some kind of excercise strategy in place where I have to get up, go excercise, and hopefully not gain a stone in weight that I wish I hadn't.
I am not blaming myself, nor anyone else. This is just something I will have to do to change next winter's onset. Hopefully with some kind of excercise going on it may minimise the whole effect anyway. This is personal choice. This is not allowing the effects of having Bi-Polar get out of hand. Like they say, change what you do, and you get a different outcome.
I suppose I am thinking about this because of going to a workshop a few weeks ago about what recovery from mental illness looks like. I think it has been in the back of my mind. How does one describe 'wellness', 'recovery', and all the other words used to describe someone who has to a greater or lesser degree found a way of coping with mental illness in all or any of it's forms.
I am described by some friends as charismatic and fun, and others perhaps know me as introverted and difficult to be with. Friends are precious if like me you have mental illness. Friends are people that simply accept there are these polarities in my behaviour and embrace the changes. My Husband being so incredibly laid back He hardly notices! He is always outgoing, and makes friends easily for both of us.
I am sure the concept of 'recovery'/'rehabilitation'/'wellness' from a psychiatric perspective if my cynical side were to comment would be something like.. 'How can we get more people functioning in society and less of a burden on the psychiatric service', which is a bit mean spirited of me but I needed to say it!
I do however feel there is something worthwhile and deeply relevent in this workshop I went to. The main response from those of us invited as clients of the psychiatric service, was the degree of acceptance society is able to come to in acnowleging there are many people having a bad time coping with the world.
For people like me, who have a continuing struggle with the ups and downs, and trying to stay within acceptable limits of depression and mania by using all the help, drugs and self care possible, to those who don't get the help they desperately need, and aren't at a point of being able to take a degree of 'ownership of the symptoms', to those who simply aren't going to be able to do anything for themselves and need a high degree of psychiatric maintainance.
I wonder if perhaps the key is in acnowledgement of who we are. The person we are. The possibilities we can unlock. The potential for self awareness and self help we can utilise according to each person's journey through life. This means describing ourselves by our own criteria, not by someone else's expectation. For instance I know I don't want to work in a job. I ran my own business! I do however want to find something usefull to do now that I am getting over the 'down time'.
People with mental illness have a difficult journey. It is difficult to get a job and hold it down, relationships are difficult to have, it is very easy for all vestige of self respect to go out of the window and never return. These are the things most people regard as tags of success. With most forms of mental illness there is a loss of all these things and more, and the perception is that in order to be 'well' they need to be recovered.
I suppose for me they have been re-evaluated. I think I got to the point where I realised these things work in a shallow sense until a real crisis. Perhaps... (only perhaps) wellness is finding some kind of core stability in knowing what is truly important for oneself, and a defining sense of self that isn't dependent on 'fitting' a kind of stereotypical mold of social sucess.
How would I explain that... I suppose it's the difference between being liked and being accepted! This works for myself and for people who know me I suppose. Do I like myself? I don't like the old me of my youth. I like the person I am now... most of the time.
Do other people like me? The important thing is they don't have to, and I don't have to go out of my way to make them like me.. or dislike me. I respect their choice and enjoy the company of most people, although for differing amounts of time! If someone gets on my nerves I leave them to it sooner rather than later. I respect myself not to get exhausted by other people who are very noisy or quarrelsome for no apparant reason.
I enjoy being with people who enjoy their life and don't find fault with everything. I also don't find it difficult to be with people who have mental illness as I find I feel a sense of empathy and can listen.
I am just turning these ideas over a bit. There is no easy answer. No 'special new word' to use as an umbrella label for defining what this idea of 'wellness' is, except perhaps for an equilibrium within which one can choose elements of direction of one's own life, over the presentation of symptoms of one's own illness.
Does that mean being at peace with who you are? Knowing that within this sometimes broken image the flaws can become attractive. That it is a healing that comes from within that fills those cracked places and repairs and smooths the scars of our inner lives. The lives we might strive to present as perfect on the outside, but crumbled and broken away from within.
Perhaps wellness is the process of taking the crumbled dust of our lifes and learning how to cement ourselves into someone we enjoy keeping company with.
Or rather doing nothing. I have been in a trough this week or so. Not depressed, but just doing very little except some housework and helping in the garden. We always have weeds and once they are tackled there always seem to be more of them to spring up the moment our back is turned.
Anyway everything looks fairly neat-ish. We don't have that sort of a garden. My Husband helped me tidy up round the wilderness. He mowed all that long grass down so it looks a lot better. There is part of me tempted to dig up more ground to grow more things, but I will stick to my original plan of seeing if what I have works well first, and how much actual work it is before committing myself for next year.
I have too much time on my hands. I am going to look for some kind of local charity work after Easter. I may even consider joining the Women's Institute. I need company and something to do with myself that has some kind of purpose.
I suppose I have typical retirement syndrome. I didn't imagine myself stopping working as young, and got caught unprepared. It has been eighteen months since selling my hair salon to my staff, and it seems to have gone by so quickly. Probably in the anxiety of renovating the salon building. It's done now, and the anxiety and worry of it seems to have lifted mostly.
Two things I don't want to do in the future is any kind of renovation, or a regular job! I like being lazy at the moment. There is a glorious summer ahead and I want to enjoy having it. Pottering about in the garden, doing some more painting, and experimenting with new toys like screen printing.
Have a happy Easter Celebration everyone, pray for a peace that sits between all these war torn places and a mediation in Syria.
The west is training and supplying the opposition in Syria, as no doubt it does in just about every uprising against a regime the west wants out. Grow up for heaven's sake, it's all so transparent. I have every sympathy with the Syrian people who want a peaceful reform of their country. It will take time, and a vision of what their country needs to represent people fairly.
Heaven knows, I don't think western politics is fair at all. The British Government aren't being very nice to us in the Channel Islands either. They just think we are a load of tax dodging scum because we are an offshore center. A very well regulated and helpful one I think.
Well we have just lost a court battle with them over something called Low Value Consignment Relief. This meant that we built up a considerable fullfillment industry supplying goods under the £15 threshold for VAT. Mainly from music and other leisure related items. The reason LVCR was there in the first place was that the UK Government couldn't be bothered to deal with items under £18, then they reduced that to £15, now they have decided to tke away the LVCR altogether.
We are in the position of having up to 2000 people here put out of work, and there are only about 97 thousand of us. This is going to cause us unimaginable problems.
The UK Government think they are losing millions of pounds in revenue. I honestly don't think it's going to make a huge impact on high street retail sales in the UK, however the companies that do the fulfillment from here will have to consider where they move to if they find Jersey is no longer the best place to operate from.
We just don't know what will happen in about a weeks time when I assume the 20% UK VAT is added to the purchase price. Perhaps there is a glimmer of hope that customers of Jersey online businesses may stay loyal and continue to use us. I assume they would not be able to buy their purchase cheaper?
The cheek of it also, is that we will have to collect the VAT for the British government, and they will not be paying any of the costs of doing this.
Our Government thinks that the initial impact to our economy if this sector is virtually wiped out ovenight is an extra 10 million pounds in unemployment benefits per year. That is a heck of a lot of money to find for a small island. We simply can't absorb those sort of job losses.
This whole thing could/will hit us very hard. Imagine us as a 100 thousand size Town in the UK, and the local factory closing and putting 2000 people out of work. We are all sitting here biting our nails to see if the orders still come in to keep those people in work.
I think I agree about the stamp duty though. Yes its a lot of money, but if you can afford to buy a very expensive property, you must be able to afford the tax as well. Yes I understand there are ways that a company registered offshore can buy property in the UK and not pay for the stamp duty. We all have to pay stamp duty here on buying a property.
I think if people earn the money that puts them in that super wealthy bracket, paying a higher rate of tax is not always productive. I think there is obviously going to be more effort put into avoiding tax through offshore means if the tax rate is 50%, I think even 45% is high!
We all pay 20%, which is why wealthy people come here. In my opinion, wealthy people create jobs and wealth for other people in the community. That's if they feel better about spending their hard earned cash. I think most people I know that are wealthy worked very hard to be able to retire. Frankly I don't think I would ever want to be 'wealthy', I would worry too much.
Our problem is a shortage of affordable housing, and high cost of living. We have to support a county size hospital, and all social services out of our various tax revenues. We all have a tighter belt on at the moment! The reason we are short of housing, is because we are an island, and the building cos
I watched RT this morning for some news. Also Max Kaiser for his manic view on the world. Just because he can be a bit manic doesn't mean the alternative narrative he puts forward very entertainingly isn't a valuable contribution to understanding our times.
Our world has changed so quickly, and there is so much technology that we are saturated with the quest to keep up with it. Well I am not I suppose because all I have is an old laptop, which while it still works is going nowhere. I suppose I am a techno-simpleton. To be honest I just can't be bothered to learn how to use more than I need.
I admire the young man Max interviewed this morning. A refreshing view of what this world could look like without corporate ownership of our lives, and our inspirations. Some things money can't buy, like the desire of creativity. It's as though we are going to have another revolution rather like the impressionists who were not welcome to exhibit in Paris, so they held their own exhibition and cut out the middle man there.
I would like to think that if anyone does read my stuff here, they might like to donate to my pet charity, which is Shelter Box. I like this charity because it does respond to humanitarian need very quickly. Look them up if you have a moment. As we are dog owners, and get out dogs from the rescue, (Thats dog pound I think in the US), we sponser them locally. We don't put dogs (or any animals) down here, even if they can't be homed.
Max was talking about the techno world verses the petro-world this morning. He described it as survivalists verses techno-communicators. Rather Jules Verne sort of thinking I suppose. I think it would be a good idea to just look after each other better, hear each other better, and see what realy needs to be done to resolve conflicts rather than create them. I have Syria in mind but there are so many places where continuing conflict does suit political ideology and agenda.
I did tidy up the house this morning! So the reduction in that medication has just got to the point of balancing itself. Time for lunch, and I might do some painting this afternoon.
I did scare myself yesterday evening. I managed to put a skewer through my finger, and I mean righ through the fleshy part... careless or what. I did go weak at the knees. There wasn't much blood, but at least I know I am human! I am going to have to buy a supply of plasters to keep it clean. I am surprised it doesn't hurt.
It hasn't been very sunny weather the last couple of days. I was still sleeping too much, I suppose to be honest I still didn't feel brilliant. Today has been a real Jersey Sunny Day, and spent the afternoon digging about in the Garden. We have both been out there. My Husband pruning, and cutting back hedges, and I got that third raised bed finished.
I am going to put the pictures of my scruffy raised beds on the mad gardening blog page. I think they look more like a fly tip at the moment, but if the seeds I put in actually grow perhaps they won't look so bad.
There is a hopefulness about growing things. An expectancy of success tinged with a sort of anxiety that I haven't got a clue what I am doing. Most of my seeds were out of date or going to be within a few months so I just chucked the lot in. I just thought if they do come up I can thin them out.
I am going to grow all the salad stuff in growbags. That was realy easy last year. Also It was easy to do the succession bit by starting a new growbag about every three to four weeks. I just grow all the salads on a cut and come basis. I put the last years growbags on top of the ground I cleared for the raised beds and planted into them. I suppose I should stop chuntering on about my gardening efforts here and put up the picture I just took of the fly tip on the mad gardening blog.
Got a lovely small pork joint in on slow roast, I will crackle up the crackling once it's cooked through. I just can't help thinking about other people who are suffering war and famine in the back of my mind, when we have such a life of solitude and peace.
I don't feel so bad today. I just haven't wanted to do much of anything. We did go for a wonderful walk on Wednesday for about an hour, through the pathways and tracks between the fields that network across our island. Definately off the beaten track. The dog loved it, so did I even though I felt pretty rough.
I had a good meeting with my psychiatrist and CPN yesterday afternoon. I am back to 3 monthly checks for now. Also a reduction in olanzapine to 5mg twice a day. Hopefully I won't sleep so long in the morning and want to nap in the afternoon!
The thing is although the drugs work very well if you embrace them and rely on them to work, some of them put weight on and change your metabolism. Olanzapine is one of them and I have put on a stone over the time I have been taking it. It has also affected how energetic I feel. I realy hate any sort of gym/excercise, although I did say I would try Zumba (under pressure) yesterday.
I suppose Depakote does the same. Good thing I don't worry too much about looking thin! I think getting that stone back off would be a good thing though, so I guess I must cut back on portion size, and do some more physical stuff that metabolises some of my extra padding... yeah right!
I am going to plant some seeds today, and I think dig up that space for my third raised bed. I want some poppys, larkspur, candytuft, and night stock in my border. I might put some of the seeds in that corner bit I put to flowers a week or so back. Gird up thy loins girl and make yourself do it and stop talking about it!
I am going to put some carrot seed, Chard, Thyme, Chives into one of the raised beds. Perhaps its a bit early, but it is quite mild and the packets say plant from March/April onwards. I like small carrots, so I am growing the carrots to be used whole as those expensive baby ones. Spring onions, and some red onions as well. I can never understand why red onions are more expensive in the supermarket they grow just the same. They can be thinned out for salad onions as they grow, just like spring onions.
Well thats me. I watched the news, still no change in the world of warmongering and selling the news on the back of it. I was impressed with the French holding a long demonstration in linked hands over the use of Neuclear energy. Jersey actually buys most of it's energy from France, and this is power from Neuclear energy. We have the Flammanville reactors only twelve miles away across the sea which can be seen on a fine day.
Alderney are pioneering some underwater Turbines, which looks a very promising enterprise. There is no reason why Jersey and Gurnesey couldnt get this kind of energy. It's not like wind power that is erratic, you know when the tide is going in and out. There is such huge tidal flows in the whole area around us that It has to be one of the real options for producing clean energy. So long as it doesn't damage the wildlife I think it would be a vision for the future.
It's a bit of a hotch pot with various old planks and some breeze block we had lying around. Still if it does the job. I have one raised bed kit left, there must have only been two. I will attempt making the next one over the week.
It was too bright and warm to be inside this afternoon, so when I finally woke up at 11.45 am from the sleep of the dead, I got on to the plot about 1pm. I think with three of these things in total at least we can grow herbs, and other things that are expensive to buy in the supermarket.
I do like that superscrimpers program on TV at the moment, I think it is on tonight so will be looking out for it. One of the tips they gave a month or so back was to use the netting from things like lemons and oranges for pan scourers. This is the best tip so far! It realy does work fantastically well for getting burned on deposits off anything. We had a pot roast last night which my Husband did, The pot was awful, and we left it soaking overnight.
I had a go at it with the Astonish pan and oven cleaner in the blue pot, and a lemon bag It finaly came off after about 20 minutes.
Believe me this was good. Both the pot, and the stainless steel tray it was cooked on looked as though it had been under a rocket launch pad. The inside of the pot was really burned on. I wonder what temperature my beloved had the oven on... Incinerate perhaps? The oven now needs cleaning, strangely it just looks like the door. I wonder if the thermostat has gone wrong. We just had it looked at recently when the heating element went. Must keep an eye on it. I suppose this cooker has lasted about ten years so far and we do cook a lot.
The evening is realy mellow for early March, the birds sing so sweetly as the dusk falls and that tinge of pink in a pale turquise sky dusts itself over us. This time last year we were celebrating our 25th wedding anniversary. A bit late as we had saved up to go on a cruise to Norway to see the northern lights. Strangely we met a fellow traveller yesterday quite by chance, (as chance does) A moment to remember such a luxurious and wonderful holiday. It is hard to imagine sometimes how a year passes so quickly in one way, and yet so slowly and agonisingly in others.
I haven't been looking closely at the news, at least I am not being obsessive about it. So much strife in so many countries. Perhaps just being unaware of the misery that other people do suffer spares us of the sense of dread. Are we each powerless to do something to change the way the world does business with itself? Certainly people who do hold immense power do have the real ability to effect change. I wonder why not.
I suppose it's all part of being Bi-Polar and having a screw loose, but I just don't understand other people, or the things they do. The only person I understand is my Husband realy, which is why He is my best friend as well. He is a realy Good Man. He loves me just as I am, and doesn't expect me to be anything but self evident... apart from telling me that dress I made a week or so ago looked like a maternity dress!
Then the next day he said it wasn't so bad, he was getting used to it. Does that mean He would love me wearing a sack, or is the dress realy not that bad in his estimation! I must ask Him... Ok He hedged... He said that He would love me no matter what I was wearing, and that He had also changed his mind about the dress and that He now thought it was lovely! That'll do for me!
I have to get myself out! One of the courses is an informal painting group and the other is a sketching and drawing group. I decided that going back to basics with a drawing class was a good idea, and then the other group for some social interaction, as it says a fun informal group.
It is surprising how expensive these courses are. There is a discount for senior citizens, and for people on benefits. I can't imagine how someone on benefits would be able to pay for a course anyway even at a discount.
I decided this was a good investment for my moral, and for hopefully being a bit more socialised. These courses start in late April for about 10 weeks. I am hoping that they will also inspire me to start painting more. I seem to have ground to a halt on the painting and general creative front. I didn't think not working would be so difficult. It is awful if you realy need a job for the money. I am just in a position where I don't need more money, but I have to make what I have go a long way.
These courses will have to be my 'luxuries' money for the next three months. I had better get as much as I can out of doing them. Make them realy good value, and get myself inspired to do lots of other things with my time.
It is a fantastic early spring day here, blue sky and a real warmth in the sun. I need to get out in the garden and see how much effort I can muster to dig another raised bed. I didn't do it yesterday. In fact I slept most of yesterday.
For some reason my right ankle that has a titanium plate in it hurt like I had twisted it badly. It was a bit swollen as well. This generally goes off after a bit. I broke my ankle really badly over 10 years ago, it had to be scraped up together and sealed with a plate. It took 6 months of physio to walk without a limp, and two years for it to get back all the feeling. I am very fortunate that it is as good as this, so the odd twinge is hardly a problem. The surgeon said the plate would have to stay in my ankle unless the screws came loose, at which point they would probably take it out. This is not a good operation to do unless it is essential.
I always expect to send the airport security off when I am checked, its odd to think of a bit of metal still in my ankle. I hardly think of it until a day like yesterday.
|
RSS Feed
googleaacfa786aeedfc81.html