Tag: #evilpixie

Doom Scrolling

We all do it. Someone sends you a cute video of (insert favorite subject here) and then you swipe up to see what’s next and then it’s three in the morning . By then you’re all tangled up in knots because the terrifying truths from your favorite influencers have enraged you and then your gears get stripped by a cockatoo tap dancing along with a Fred Astaire movie. (@jackson_huhniverses) And you keep going, hoping for another spoonful of sugar to make the horrors perpetrated in the world go down a little easier.

This solid waste of time is a symptom of the anxiety, and an excuse to submerge myself in the depression, I know this. Last week I spent 40 hours swiping instead of doing something productive, positive or useful for my mental and/or physical health. I wish they would put guardrails on these sites so you can’t go careening out of control. Can’t the algorithm that learns what you want and like learn to cut you off like a conscientious bartender? At least when I’m crocheting because I can’t deal with the sudden rush of anxiety over (insert crisis here) I’m making something…..doom scrolling doesn’t accomplish anything.

What I’m realizing is my depression, or the Void, is looming over my life again. I’m talking medication-upping, therapy-seeking depression. I’m hoping my desire to get out of bed before 7:00am, well, up and doing something like write or job search in bed, is a sign the light is coming back. I started walking with the ducks again and I’m putting forth a courageous effort to stop the scrolling before my alarm clock goes off. I’m ten toes down withstanding the void, but I am terrified. Rereading my post Distraction was a giant flashing red light and I blithely went about my life like “It is what it is,”

The answer is the beginning of my last paragraph: “…I’m realizing…” I can do something about it, and I’m trying. God help me, I am trying, Then I scroll up in my brain to make plans and a perfectly balanced cinematic short of the evil pixie pops into my mind to remind me this is my life. I will always be depressed, I will always be paralyzed by anxiety and I will die that way. (I won’t lie, death has been on my mind lately). I need to recapture the hope I had in Beyond Surviving, I’m not starting at zero, I still think I’m further along than when I started this blog what feels like a hundred years ago, I guess that’s something the evil pixie can’t take away. Celebrate the small wins, is what they say.

The Birthday Blues ~ Early

Although no one can go back and make a brand new start, anyone can start now and make a brand new ending.

Carl Bard

My birthday is close to the middle of July and traditionally a few days before and a few days after I’m moody. I’m a Cancer, I’m moody. Honestly, moody is my default setting in July. But it’s June. It’s the end of June but it doesn’t make it any less June. The evil Pixie has been telling me I’m almost 60, I’m unemployed, I have four years before I retire and then what am I going to do? My writing career is a blog no one reads and a few unfinished manuscripts with plenty of good intentions to wrap it up in a bow but it’s not a solid retirement plan. I’m going to have to work upto a week or two before I die, or so is the current plan.

To distract myself from the tears I got a notification a friend of mine had posted something on her facebook page and I was curious. I read the post, and it was a happy little thing about meeting up with people who put you on a path which positively changes your life for eternity, and I smiled. I scrolled down and the quote above by Carl Bard was tucked away few posts down and it was an ah-ha kind of moment. I can make a new ending. I don’t know how fabulously it will live up to my expectations, but I have to try…..I mean honestly, it’s not like I have much of a choice. It’s that or become destitute, live off my family and endure their barbed supportive comments or I can keep moving forward.

Speaking of moving forward…..

I did go on an interview today. I’m not sure I want the job, and I’m thinking I don’t have to take the job if it’s offered. I know that kind of contradicts the statement about living off my family, etc, but it’s sitting in front of monitors for 12 hrs a day. The only thing I liked about it was the 3 12hr. shifts per week so I would have four days off. It’s not sticking people with needles, but it’s just for a short time. I have another interview on the 5th. I’m not so worn down by the evil Pixie that I can’t put on a happy face and convince people I am more normal than I am (Being more normal than I was) and isn’t as draining as it was in the past. I was affable, confident and charming in the interview and I’ll hear Friday if I was convincing enough to get the job.

If the Blue Mood keeps up though I’m going to add more Ashwagandha to my medication protocol until the birthday is over. I’m not planning anything with the family, and they rarely plan anything for me so I think I’m going to go to the beach somewhere and work in my journal. It’s been so long since I sat with my journal it should be a nice treat. I generally go through my goals for the year and adjust what needs to be change, prune what is overreaching and give myself a gold star (or a really nice dinner) for what I’ve accomplished so far in the year. That is the one thing that is absolutely spectacular about having a birthday in the middle of the year; it gives me a chance for a year-in-review and still have time to get it all done before the end….of the year…..not the final end….that hopefully is still evolving to something less blue.