Personal Blogs

So this will likely be my last post before the big day.  By tomorrow I will have fully entered into stress-overload.  My friend will spend the night settling my nerves at intermittent points during our conversation, when I stray from the more interesting topics, and revert to asking repetitive questions about the following day.  Saturday we'll get ready, slowly, in stages, and then Sunday I'll have done it.  I also just remembered that I have to go to a 60th on Sunday afternoon, and much as I want to (and will) go, I wish these things would stop falling so close to one another.  

I went to see my doctor today to see about getting PRN anxiety medication for events like tomorrow.  I was thinking maybe 4 tablets a year, just to cover Weddings, Balls (that shouldn't happen again really though)... rarities basically.  As soon as I walked into the room I felt panic rising.  I had my hands under my coat and they were shaking like crazy.  I was conscious that I was sweating on my forehead which is normal for me during panic, but I didn't want to wipe my brow for fear of him seeing my shaking hand.  Not that I mind that in itself, but my knowing that he had seen it would have served to make me more nervous, feeling more of a need to behave normally, and thus entering into a spiral that would have soon become out of control.  I hadn't even got out my question and already I wanted to run out as fast as I could.  Truth is, without repetitive doctor visits, I won't be allowed, even for such a small number.  They are too addictive, and my personality would become immediately dependent on them.  He did at least allow me more sleeping tablets.  He's pleased with the way I have managed them to date.  Maybe if I keep that up he'll reconsider the others.  Surely PRN meds would be better than alcohol, as one offs here and there.  Maybe not.  He's a good doctor, and the only one that I will see.  He's known me since I was two, and though I've lived all over the country, I have always always travelled back here to see him.  I have to wait weeks to get an appointment.  So given those facts, I have to respect his decision.  In truth I do; I just don't like it. 

I watched Catfish last night and it had a profound effect on me.  I had night terrors on and off all night, about one of my hugest fears: that people are not who they say they are.  I used to have an ongoing fear that my service users did not really have learning difficulties.  I once asked one of the ladies I worked with if she really had autism, and she just burst out laughing.  In theory, she did not have the mental capacity to even understand the question, but the reality was that she laughed.  Anyway, it was a startlingly good film and I only wish I had watched it sooner.  It is extremely rare to have me so gripped, though of course this did have in its favour a very small cast.  That usually bodes well for me grasping a proper understanding of what's going on.  Let it be said that I was genuinely riveted.

It's been a day of panic actually.  I wonder if it was fuelled by the reaction to the film last night.  Earlier was unfortunate, as I went to the train station to get my tickets sorted.  I had forgotten that school had started up again, and I walked up just as all the kids and parents appeared out of the various school gates.  My heart sank.  Every cell in my brain told me to turn around, go home, and do it later.  But these are the moments when I am supposed to fight the instinct, discuss the problem in my head, decide how frightening the reality actually is, and ultimately realise that it's all in my head.  Of course, what they will never quite accept, is that in my head as it may be, it is still my head.  As in I am the one to experience it!  It's done now anyway, and I'm not going out again.  I've overcome two of my phobias in one day; that's quite enough!!!

Aside from all that nonsense, which is a part of my day-to-day life, I have had a happy day.  And a productive one.  The nagging and rising fears about Saturday night can only be pushed to the back of my mind by being active, and to that end I have properly sorted out the massive tent from last weekend, which was quite a job I might add.  I've done a lot of other boring but necessary jobs too, but there is no reason to list them!  Isn't etiquette a funny thing?  If I could go to this ball in jeans and a t-shirt, just hang with my mates, few drinks, few laughs, I'd be getting excited, not anxious.  Anyway, I have to go and try to sew on a button.  Something I have been avoiding all day as it possibly one of the most frustrating aspects of clothing repair I have ever had the misfortune to experience.