luck of the Irish

When I was a freshman in college I was quite surprised when St. Patricks' day came and nobody really cared.  I am from an Irish background in a town where the Irish were so prevelant that Irish themes prevail and St. Patrick's day was a big day.  My college was anti-drinking to the point you could be expelled for it so green beer wasn't a thing and nobody did anything.  It was totally foreign.

It has also been a day I have remembered because it was the day my father brought a big envelope to the school in one of the kinder gestures he ever made.  It was the college acceptance letter I had been waiting for, the one for my school of choice.  6 weeks later he was telling me I wasn't going to college because I wouldn't join the military and he wouldn't pay, but it was a nice thing to do that day.  I was called to the office for a mysterious reason and that was it.  I didn't stop grinning for 2 days.

Today though I am beginning to think that the Luck o' the Irish is bypassing me this year.  Or it is the luck from the potato famine that brought my great-great-grandparents here.  Over the weekend I went outside without my ankle brace on to meet my sister and nieces.  I was carrying the baby in when I stepped on a stone and my ankle turned completely under.  It was weird because I felt the scar tissue tearing and it felt gross but was not that painful.  I put an immobilizer on it and saw the ankle dr. today.  The x-ray was inconclusive but I did tear things in there and may have broken the end of my fibula.  It wasn't possible to be sure without additional xrays that require sedation because the new fracture would be just below an old one.  Clinically he seemed to think it was fractured but the treatment is the same anyway; I just have to wear another kind of brace for a few weeks and it is on all the time but showers and exercise.  No walking without it.  Annoying but could be a lot worse. 

So this year I've had a solid month of being sick from little niece germs, lithium toxicity, a fairly nasty episode that is still fighting with me and now a potentially broken ankle.  And it's only mid-March.  At this rate I'll be in traction for all 4 extremities like in old cartoons by December.

One thing went really well today.  Dr. Mind made me angry the other day.  He said I have no hope.  He prods at things like this I think partly to make me angry because I'm trying to learn to say "I"m angry and this is why" and although right now I'm really only doing it with him I've gotten a lot better than I was 6 months ago when this started being something we were doing.  Plus right now I'm seeing him extra so that I can talk and cry as I can't cry here and so he'll push further to get tears; my not crying has been the sign I was suicidal too many times.   Anyway because I was so angry I wrote an enormous list of things that I had hoped for and that have left me not hopeless but simply floundering to find footing because most of the things I hoped for in my life haven't happened and some of those things in the last few years I haven't found a way to replace because I am so limited in what I can do when I'm mid-episode.  I'm embarrassed to volunteer anywhere knowing that I will only be able to do so in bursts and then will need months off.  Last semester babysitting gave me a sense of doing something routinely that was good but this time I haven't been able to do it and really can't handle the girls alone right now.  I can barely handle them with other people there when they get challenging, as much as I hate that.  It's so hard with Anne because she sees that I can do things sometimes and not others but she doesn't understand why.  I know it hurts her feelings and causes her to act out, which hurts my feelings and makes the whole thing harder.

So anyway, counseling was actually good because he was glad that I finally fought back and did so beyond just saying "that made me angry".  He told me once that he worries sometimes because I don't fight like I used to.  I guess some of my used to popped out in the manic, angry moments I wrote my 3 page list of what I hoped for before he ever knew me, after he knew me and what does he think I am searching for now?

He also suggested maybe I should blog.  I'll get right on that. :) (8 years into i....)