Daily Archives: December 29, 2012

Or more appropriately, when e-mail CAUSES a panic attack.

The level of my dysfunction knows no bounds…

I get a daily e-mail from a job site that send me postings in the area I am qualified for.

I clicked to check one out…And of course, I am not qualified, but I suppose they have to send me something. I got to clicking on other links, giving tips on interviews, wardrobe, doing call backs, resumes, gaps in work history, blah blah blah.

AND OFF TO THE RACES WE GO.

My heart is still pounding 50mpm (fifty miles per minute). I am shaky and my head is spinning.I can barely steady my hands to type and have to keep hitting the back button. (And it doesn’t help that my kid is in my face chattering and the cats are making like flying squirrels through the living room and two of the girls are in heat because I am too broke to fix them so the noise is MAKING ME WANT TO FIND A NOOSE AND CLIMB INTO IT.)

Grrrrr.

Oh, I am also breaking out in  hives.

Yeah, I am totally ready to go to work, I have all my ducks in a row, I am calm, cool, collected. NOT.

I get it, I am an undesirable candidate due to my past.

But everyone from the shrink to the counselor thinks I am ready and it would be beneficial for me to go back to work now. Been trying for a year,, got two chances and two rejections.

And just READING about all the expectations has me freaking out because most days, if I make it out the door and my kid and I are wearing pants, I am doing well.

I cannot help that I have disorders. I cannot help that a bad med reaction fried my brain ten years ago and now I am like some absent minded adhd bunny. I am trying to “rise above it all.”

But I wonder if I am really truly ready.

I still cannot process stress properly because the panic disorder is still running rampant. (Thank you, el shrinko, for prescribing a medication for the panic disorder that helped with my depression but totally nullified and my Xanax and set the panic attacks off, yayy for pharmaceutical science.)

I try very hard.

I can’t help but wonder if I simply haven’t been allowed to stabilize long term enough-ya know, a year or two on a working med regime, rather than 14 months of med changes and side effects and failures.) I have so much pressure on me, inwardly and outwardly, and it seems no one really cares about my mental state, just what they think I should be and what they think would be best for me.

One day, I’d like to get a say in what is in my own best interest.

Even if I just need more time to try to get my shit together. It may not seem important to most people. I mean, I am upright and ambulatory, so I must be all better, right?

But if a simple e-mail can send me into the rabbit hole…

I’m not “there” yes. I am not cured, I am not even stabilized enough, and I am not ready.

I just have this loud voice in my head telling my disability money could go away at any time and I need to cover my ass, I can’t be put into a position where I can’t take care of my kid.

Then I have everyone else telling to suck it up and get off my ass.

And the mental health professionals who just don’t get it.

Is it really any wonder I feel like I am smothering most of the time?

Life is tough, but sometimes, it’s just impossible when you’re in a perpetual state of confusion and catch 22s.

Used to be, only my postal mail made me panic.

Now even my electronic mail is triggering me.

If this is everyone’s idea of recovery, I think they’re the ones who need psych help.

i got a wild hair up my ass the day after christmas to sign up for eharmony.  i find this very mystifying because i am on a sabbatical from dating.  i suppose i figured that by the time i found someone worthwhile, i might be ready to start seeing people.

but mostly, i wanted to see if a computer algorithm could pick out compatible mates better than i can!

and i suppose part of me wanted to know if there really is anyone i’m compatible with out there.

it’s come to my attention that eharmony may not be the best forum for me though.  for instance, i get the sense that the people on it are pretty conventional.  there’s not really a space for broaching the topic of polyamory or open relationships…the next best thing was to rate the importance of monogamy really, really low.

i feel pretty constricted answering the questions.  one guy sent me a short-answer question that was something along the lines of “if i had a bad day, what would you do to make me feel better?”.  i typed some bs about giving him the space to vent while making comfort food but what i really thought of was “a fucking awesome blow job!”

or the other one that was like, what’s an ideal day like with someone you’re dating?  i mean…of *course* the answer is to spend all day naked, alternating between lots of fucking, movies, naps, and ordering in chinese.  you just can’t say that though.

i don’t do well in contrived situations, and eharmony is completely contrived.  there’s only been one guy that i thought *might* be able to keep up and that’s because one of his multiple choice questions was “with which sentence do you agree most?” and the two options were: 1) a sensible person never does anything dangerous (or something like that) or 2) I sometimes like to do things that are a little frightening.  i’ll give you one guess as to the one i picked.  plus, he gets bonus points for proper grammar.

another guy wanted to meet in person already.  had to put the brakes on that one.  another called me out, suggesting that i was on eharmony as an experiment (ding-ding-ding!).

eharmony guarantees that you will end up in a serious relationship by the end of a year, or you get another year for free.  poor eharmony.  never saw me coming. 

Not long after my first post today I received a text from R that said : OMG!!!!!

That pretty much set off every panic receptor I have. Did I fuck something up? Did he? Was one of the TV’s we thought were toast working? Was the house next door on fire? My mind was abuzz. My heart was pounding, my legs went weak, and terror soaked into my bone marrow.  I texted back for a response…

and all I got was “you will soon see.”

That sent me into full fledged panic, wondering what the fuck was going on. I was curious, but more than  anything, I was scared, thinking perhaps I had done something wrong and he was mad at me.

That kind of got me off the fence about going to the shop, since he wasn’t talking, I needed to know what OMG!!!! meant.

Terror coursed through my veins the entire time I drove, dropped my kid off at my mom’s, and went to the shop.

It turned out Kenny had wrecked his van.

Bad for Kenny.

But Kenny was fine.

And I had been put through a dozen panic attacks for no real reason.

GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!!!

Why can’t people just get it through their fucking heads that shit like that fucks my head up?

It might work for a million other people, but getting me riled up that way is a VERY BAD THING.

My stomach has churned all day. The tension is to the bone. It  should have dissipated, but it hasn’t. Xanax can’t touch this level of anxiety and frustration.

FYI- due to panic disorder, it is beneficial if you just tell me what is going on rather than play texting games or whatever.

As well as R knows me, you’d think he’d understand this by now. I don’t think he wants to face it, because then he might have to think lesser of me for having such a “weakness.” He never did respect the panic disorder when we were together, there’d be no reason he’d have changed by now and developed any empathy.

Considering how anxious he gets at the shop-talking about his heart pounding in his throat-when he is about to plug in a TV and see if the repair took, running the risk of electrocution, fire, and the tv blowing up…That’s panic, baby. That terror you feel in that few minute span…is pretty much every second of my life.

Can he draw the parallel?

Hell no.

And do I speak up?

Nope.

It’s like talking to a wall, kinda like the donor. I didn’t choose this, I don’t like, and I fight it with everything I’ve got, but sometimes, it mops the floor with me. Would it kill you to just not do things that set it off?

The building is on fire, fine, panic and go spaztic and freak me out.

But, my god, someone smashed their car up and they walked away fine…That is soooo not worth the panic. A plain  message stating the facts would have sufficed.

But nooooooooooooooooooo. Panic disorder is a myth so there’s no need to pay it any mind.

I stayed the whole day.

But he didn’t have shit for me to do and I internet window shopped most of the time.

I was not amused.

I told him I was going to leave early.

And he said, “No, don’t. I like your company.”

And being the pathetic trainwreck that I am, I stayed. I mean, my own husband ended our marriage with a phone call, he found me so horrid,so for someone to say they enjoy my company is pretty healthy for the self esteem.

Especially an ex boyfriend. Surely if I were as terrible as the donor says, then my exes would want nothing to do with me, right? Yet I speak to all my exes.

Except the donor.

So maybe I stayed for R, maybe I stayed for my own ego.

I am just glad this day, this week, is coming to an end.

May 2013 have a little more positive bent than 2012 did.

I won’t hold my breath.

At worst, I am right.

At best, I am wrong and get pleasantly surprised.

That I can live with.

Well meaning people who incite my panic disorder without just cause…

I find that hard to live with.