Happy Birthday

Today I am 32 and my blog is 2. I've been totally unimpressed with my own birthday; it barely registered in a very busy and stressful day. We'll celebrate this weekend and I will care more; for today it has meant little except that I kept dating things 1/15/1976 rather than 1/15/08. Oopsie.

I resigned my job today. I'll work out 3 weeks notice and then have 3 days to get back on track before starting the new job. It turned out that this was the least stressful part of my day. The worst was later when a patient who can get a little uncooperative put herself in a position where she couldn't hold her balance and wouldn't correct it. I couldn't hold her up for very long because she is big and much taller than me, so I eased her to the floor. That means lots of documentation and I feel guilty, even though I know very well that I did everything I could.

Anyway, the blog is what I really feel something about. I'm glad I started this thing on my birthday. Birthdays have always been hard for me and this has given me something happier the last few years.

When I started this thing my ideas about my illness were so wrong. I just had no clue how sick I could really get. I started this when I was feeling good. However the same night I started it I overdosed on caffeinated iced tea that I thought was safe. I was manic for a couple weeks. When I came off the high I immediately hit rock bottom because my therapist announced she was leaving the country in a month. I spent that month crying and picking a therapist and deciding against the first one she recommended because I thought I wouldn't like her approach, and then meeting with the man I see now. After she left I took a few weeks off to adjust to the new therapist (and to use up a surplus of PTO days). Then my assistant was fired and I got very manic trying to handle things. Then there was lithium toxicity and the summer I learned to cry, sort of. Then I changed jobs, went through a lot with my new job, was very depressed, was stable, was manic, was stable, went back to the job, and today I resigned.

Two years ago I thought I had answers. I think I took a lot more credit for how well I do overall back then. Now I know that doing well is just part of going with the flow. I'm trying to learn to not fight so hard when it's time to handle a cycle. I'm not good at it, but I am trying.

When this thing started I hoped that I would meet others who were mentally ill and working in mental health. I haven't really, and my own career has moved away from psychiatric patients too. In my new job I'll do a lot of dementia work, but that's still different. It's funny though, that I find I'm actually more sensitive to co-workers talking about psych stuff now than I was back in my psych OT days. Maybe that's because I'm pretty sure that these people now KNOW and they still say obnoxious things. Yet I know they do because I am very willing to laugh. I just want everything, I guess.

Anyway, my age is showing and I must be getting to bed. Tomorrow is another big day and unless I'm incorrect I'm looking at yet another day without stopping. Saturday can't come too fast....