Crow Puns And Other Bullshit

got me new meds a few hours ago. start the new stuff tomorrow. depression med dosage is going up 20mg, and the new beta blocker my GP prescribed, metoprolol, is a one a day tablet so it should provide more stability. also apparently lowers bp less than the one I'm on right now? so. fingers crossed i guess. we'll see how this treats me.

i am incredibly frustrated, though. as happy as i am to hear that this is all indeed most likely the pots bc it doesn't seem to be adrenal gland in nature specifically (yay hyperpots), because that means less problems to treat and hunt down. ... that does mean my options are still incredibly limited. my doc's gonna keep researching before my next appointment, to see what options she can find. which is comforting. i like having a doctor who cares and is purposefully trying to learn, because the more she learns from me the more people she can help in the future of her career since she's a young doctor right now. I'm also frustrated because it means that there's not a specific cure. there's just symptom reduction, not cure. this is forever.

IT ALSO PISSES ME OFF BECAUSE EVERY FUCKING TIME I TRY TO LOOK MORE INTO IT, OR LEARN MORE ABOUT IT, OR FIND OTHERS WITH IT OUTSIDE OF THE SUPPORT GROUP I JUST KEEP FINDING BULLSHIT "I CURED MY POTS WITH THESE TEN EASY STEPS BUY MY BOOK AND SUPPLEMENTS GUYS" TYPES AND I WANNA BASH MY HEAD AGAINST THE WALL IN FRUSTRATION. Augh!!!

 

did groceries earlier. two stores because i needed a soda restock too. hefted water, hefted the sodas, hefted my groceries. walked both stores. carried all my own stuff inside aside from the water. it fucked me up, i was dead by the end of Aldis, but... it didn't fuck me up AS badly. I don't think. I was sweaty but not as drenched, I wasn't having blackout vision, i wasn't shaking and nonsensical as fast. i still had the crash and recovery phase and chest pain afterwards, but??? that little bit of difference is giving me hope. maybe it'll do more as i adjust. maybe we'll adjust the dose in a few months and it'll do even more good.

but its Something. and i am trying so hard to be cautiously optimistic.

 

so i just read a book for my Monsters class called The Haar by David Sodergren. VERY good book. very quick read, only 200 pages, i fucking tore through it once i got started earlier. Lotta gore and violence as a heads up. Lots. But damn what a good monster book.

that said its also 4:30 in the fucking morning and im wide awake bc i decided to read that book for class Right Then and In One Go once the story drew me in. took about... 3 hours. not bad, considering ive struggled with reading for a LONG while now. guess that and the general sleep issues ive been having shook hands and now i can just... idk nap later or something.

 

got like 4 hours of sleep and could sleep no more. :') Wide Awake. aaaa.

 

in non screaming zone news
had my advising appointment for autumn classes. signup is in a few days.
several of the classes have In Person options. need to try to not chicken out and grab those when available for at LEAST two of them. two are asynch only, and a third i think also has in person options, we'll see how they line up i guess.
nervous.

 

11 straight hours of wildly intense dreams, woke up sweaty and shaky and disoriented.

i was like... in some kind of semi-fantasy setting and suddenly was afflicted with some kind of movement disorder, i couldnt talk, i could only move in short jerks. and everyone around me was treating me like i was mentally handicapped? just bc i couldn't communicate effectively? but for some reason it was beneficial to me to play along with it so i was like. sneaking around gathering all this intel and shit and making my way into unlocking these videogame style quests. eventually i make my way into this like... first grade class room? and the teacher is SO fucking nice and just makes me a place to sit and i vibe with the kiddos and listen to stories for a while to evade capture/notice.
meanwhile someone has finally caught on that im just physically afflicted and is trying to help me track shit down and like. evade capture/death by these roving villains plotting against the kingdom. but there's a BIG communication barrier bc i can't even write or sign or anything and so he has to adjust best he can so we can communicate back and forth.
i manage to collect/unlock a time sensitive thing and we have to get through the castle in a set amount of time if we want to keep the magic items i got, but assassins are loose and we keep having to dodge them and im just stuck between crawling or being hefted around like a sack of unruly potatoes by my dude friend helping me.
first grade teacher comes in clutch. she suspected my situation but was more than happy to act on it. gave me safe space to vibe while time ran out behind us, put some really advanced reading material up for me to see from a distance while she taught the rest of her class the normal stuff, nobody suspected a thing.
made it outside with dude friend and we were like.. trying to figure out some other puzzle but we were suddenly being pursued and things were getting really hectic... and i woke up.

 

last 2 weeks of school. finally FINALLY making tiny progress on my big paper that's due, plan on jumping on the other tasks due too. i'm so fucking close to the finish line i can taste it.
saw the full eclipse when it happened, it was gorgeous, we were in totality. definitely a lifetime experience i am glad i got to experience.
i can see why people attribute religious and spiritual things to it, i felt Something for sure.
skipped therapy this week, wasn't feeling it, feel kind of guilty still.
think i'm getting sick, not positive, but something feels off. lowgrade headache keeps coming and going, and general Bleh is strong. lots of sleeping.
REALLY wanna play some 7 days to die or other videogames. also want to draw, make some new ocs. want to work on bigger art projects.
wanna work on fic too, god, ive had this next chapter in the works since fucking june of last year because i just have not had the time or energy to work on it/bc i was part of a big bang and had to use all time i DID have for writing to get that project done by the due date. i wanna sign up for another one. due date'll be december... if i can get an idea cooking and get most of it done this summer it shouldn't be an issue, hopefully.
famous last words probably, lol.

 

tag teamed curry with my roomie today. she sous chefed, i got it seasoned and started cooking before it reached "stew and wait" phase where i had to lay down again. ate a huge fucking bowl of it and rice and i am SO full, it was so fucking good

 

might just make it out of this semester alive
final week is here
reached the top of page 8 of a 10 page paper due by end of week
have more things to do but. should be able to get them done in time. i hope.

 

i ragequit homework last night and let myself play some stardew to unwind last night. excellent choice btw. but i was up till 3am before i finally went to bed and then proceeded to have the wildest fucking dreams. it was like 3 movies smushed into a single dream.

i was in some kind of a hunter/stalker situation with my ex where he kept turning up after me. we had been a pair for some futuristic game where we had to defend ourselves to the death so i had a Blaster™️ but i didn't want to kill him so i swapped to a tazer instead but it was some kind of bulky annoying thing that was very stiff on the trigger so he kept managing to come close and menace me repeatedly before i could shock him whatsoever and when i did it turned out to be really mild.

then the game had expanded and i was stuck in some kind of a ruined library university complex that doubled as the fighting area. futuristic dressed women with cyberpunk hair sat in booths at the top of the walls and observed us all below. Safe Zones were also housing bc it was like a refugee situation and we were all fighting not only for our lives but for top place/power. i had a family of four or five that were mine that i was fighting for, but they were all people I'd never met in my life who looked nothing like me/were a different race than me. it was my turn again to fight to try moving us from Shit Tier™️ to a higher shit tier for safety bc there were kiddos and an old lady and we wanted them safe and comfortable.

so im prowling the ruined library section with my tazer bc i forgot to switch weapons and run into this large beautiful indian lady who looked like she stepped out of bollywood but she was in some kind of white bodysuit flanked by two mustached men with weapons. shes my opponent. she holds up some kind of a gourd looking weapon and says "Go ahead, attack me". She's impervious bc of it. Zero damage. FRANTIC mad scramble to get distance between us so i can somehow get my Blaster™️ out so i can try fighting this woman to the death.

then it fast forwarded and i guess i won somehow bc our family moved to Shit Tier Below The Stairs site. and then there was a dog funeral? but the dog came back to life and so did all the animals in the graveyard like ghosts...

 

3/5 classes are in

 

4/5 grades are now in and they're all A's. the last one should be a B but if it's not I'll be legit surprised.
therapy went well. therapist was supportive and very pleased with my progress. listened to my concerns. reminded me to set tiny goals for myself, and celebrate those goals when they're met.
i need to do that, honestly. because I'm So fucking bad at it. I'm so so so bad at tiny goals and tiny accomplishments. because if i meet those small goals it doesn't feel good, it feels like "Well. yeah you met that goal, it was babyshit, youd be a failure if you couldn't do that much at least." but i also dont feel good when i meet big goals. like. finished the semester with great grades? feel Meh over it in general. happy but like.... detached.

its like... the happiness/reward center of my brain doesn't work right and never really has. I know some of it is being exacerbated with the psych meds and the brain fog from the pots and cfs and stuff but like. i've always been like this, and coming off the meds is Not An Option because i will literally fucking combust into flames within hours. I actually need to increase the dosage of the mood stabilizer soon, maybe that'll have a positive effect in general. unsure. we'll see, i guess. need to start journaling again probably, too. the stream of consciousness in my scream pit on here is useful for getting the zoomy badthoughts out so i dont spend all the energy writing them longhand and can just wordvomit till i feel calm, but it's not conducive to the longer-form thinking journaling inspires...

 

Final grades: 4 A's and a B+. I'll take it.

 

had a bit of trouble falling asleep last night, and was woken up early by kricket demanding i refill her crunchies to satisfactory levels and then demanding attention after she ate by way of repeatedly licking my face till i acknowledged her. but slept well enough i think. tomorrow's my birthday and I'm just kind of sat here pondering things. I'll be 35. I'm still feeling and acting like I'm early 20's though, because I missed out on my entire 20's and my teenage years. Even as a shut in I'm having a richer experience than I had before and I know most of that is from being on stable meds and therapy, so that's an accomplishment.

Goals... I want to work on fic. Desperately. I've forgotten how to write. Need to hiccup out a oneshot maybe to get my groove back. I want to finally set up a proper study plan and work on Japanese like I keep saying I want to. Since I won't be taking any language courses for my major, I don't get the jumpstart of being in a class environment, so. Gotta step up to the plate and do it myself. I want to do more art, too, but my body is really hindering me on that. My arms give out very quickly when I draw, which is incredibly frustrating for me. Which double sucks because I wanted to try at least slapping a few attempts at my comic plotting to fruition.

Mostly I've just been playing Stardew and zoning out reading Lucky Star.

 

am older now

 

med doctor is adjusting my mood stabilizer 20mg twice and day because otherwise we'd need to have two prescriptions running at the same time for the same thing to make up the uneven dose. apparently it might be more tranquilizing which. kinda sucks but is expected. if i can deal with it I should be fine, though, I want the moodswings and hypomania to chill the fuck out pretty badly.

 

got some laundry done, read some manga, watching some lucky star. gonna do more laundry tomorrow, and rescue today's stuff from the dryer then. aim is to put it all away tomorrow no matter what so i can have the space and the basket open again. might shower too if i can. day has been... kind of bleh but. not in a terrible way. more of a "goddamn i was sleepy" way. it makes me worry a bit about starting the new med dose once i can arrange a delivery tomorrow.

 

got the rest of my laundry washed, and showered last night so i could wash what i'd been wearing and my towel too. gonna drag the laundry back upstairs and put it away tomorrow bc just loading it and then drying it and lugging the other dried stuff up killed me. hopefully spacing it out so much helps me actually manage to put it the fuck away. floor is still a mess but its progress and i'll take it.

 

the new meds seem to be doing okay so far. no major symptoms. i already take a nap a day to function so that's not changed, but im gonna start sleeping with an alarm to avoid the three+ hour conk outs and hopefully eventually skip the naps all together if i can manage it. mood has been... alright i guess? not up not down, just kinda midline Meh which i guess is to be expected. drew a bit, didn't finish anything, got tired. selected a few anime to watch next and what manga to read/keep reading, gonna see about the writing tomorrow too.

 

im realizing.. that if i wanna do my bucket list japan trip someday i need to get stronk. >:C bc a lot of the places i wanna visit. are up fucking stone stairways. and are otherwise inaccessible.... which. is a bitch. bc the spirit is willing but the body is fragile and weak.
i gotta Git Gud, i wanna be able to do it after i eventually get a job after all.