Month: August 2018

Mixed State

For the past few days I have been in a mixed state. Not a full-blown mixed state, which is where you are Manic and very depressed at the same time. But rather a softer mixed state. I am hypomanic and depressed at the same time. I am agitated, struggling with patience, creating until my mind gets so tired I can’t function, obsessed with reading and bright colors and research and music, dying to be alone, wanting someone to talk to, exhausted, and unable to stop moving and thinking. Simultaneously.

Mixed states are really hard. On one hand I’m grateful that I’m still creating and using my mind and living a life. On the other hand beneath all that I still don’t feel good. I long to be alone and I can’t be until the babysitter comes back to work tomorrow. She has been away for 2 weeks. I am constantly having to bite my tongue because I feel so short-tempered that I’m even in a bad mood with my family. I don’t want to yell or say anything short-tempered or unkind, so I keep silent. I have been biting my lip a lot!

If I could do anything right now I would take some art materials and books to a hotel room and just work and think quietly by myself for a couple of days. Or I would pay for a father-daughter weekend for Craig and Angelica and I would stay home and wander from room to room by myself. The whole time I would be lost in my mind without repercussion.  I am very lost in my mind now, but that is a negative thing since I am not alone.

I had to take Klonopin and a sleeping pill in order to turn my mind off and get some sleep last night. I hope I do not have to do the same thing tonight. But as long as I get some decent sleep I’ll be happy. It’s probably the only thing that can stand between me and Mania. I just pray I don’t crash into depression.

Dieting With God

I am beginning to not only pray for success with my diet, but to try to actively incorporate God into my process. This morning I ate a delicious snack and then had some lunch that was not healthy but kept me within my calorie limit roughly. And since then I have honestly not been hungry, and I finished that food at 11:30 in the morning. But yet I still been finding myself tempted to eat some of my favorite chips or to get a little bit of Nutella for dessert or to have an ice cream sandwich or to have some wonderful parmesan peppercorn dip.

My diet does not preclude me from eating any of this. I’m going purely on a calorie-counting diet. Within my alloted calories for the day I can eat anything I want. That way I want I’m eating I’m getting food I really enjoy and killing at least some of my cravings. Believe me, I do not have the self-discipline to stick to any other kind of diet. And I believe that food should be enjoyed so when you are eating you should eat something that you like.

But for the past few weeks, basically since I have not been doing well, I have started to crave food even when I am not hungry. I just get cravings for salt and vinegar or for something sweet or for something cheesy. Just now I was in the kitchen and I went to grab some salt and vinegar chips. But then I remembered. I’m not hungry. I’m not hungry at all. I haven’t eaten in hours, but when I did eat I ate a pretty good amount and it was food I really liked and I don’t need anything else. So what is it I am really searching for? I mean some of it probably is the food. I really like food. Everybody says that but I really mean it. But part of it must be something else. What goes on in my mind or in my soul that makes me want something that you are supposed to partake of when you are feeling famished? Maybe I am famished, in some other way.

I want to start relying on God a little bit more for my diet. Partly of course for the selfish reason that there is no greater power in the universe than God so if God will help me who or what can stand against me? It seems silly to me now that I’ve been trying so hard to do this successfully, and I haven’t even asked the Lord for help except in passing. I haven’t sought Him out when I am failing. But tonight as I stood in the kitchen I said to myself, out loud, you do not need chips. You are not hungry. You need something else. You are not hungry. And then I asked the Lord to help me. Maybe the Lord can fill me. Maybe he will fill me with self-discipline, or help direct my mind to other things that I can think about and do that will leave me with no mental space for preoccupation with food. It is time to come to my God who loves me and wants to help me. If he doesn’t help me then I’ll know that my answer is no and either I’m in some sort of test where I need to do this without any help, although I feel like I’ve already been in that situation, or that maybe He’s telling me that this is the weight that I’m going to be and that I need to be less focused on getting slim again and more focused on something else. God never fails to answer a prayer. It’s just that sometimes the answer is no. But hopefully I won’t get a no. I need to lose weight not only because I want to be able to buy smaller clothes, but for my health.

I believe that God will help me when I need help and will bring me to whatever weight I should be at. If I practice self-discipline and count my calories, and if I lean on God to help me resist temptation, then my diet will continue to be successful. I need to pray more and talk to God when I feel tempted. I need to keep diving in the Word to keep close to Him and be filled with the Holy Spirit. Having lost about 40 lb, I have already come so far and I do not want to lose the hard won progress I have made. I feel like if I do I may never get back to this point again. I need to keep pushing ahead. I need to remember that like it says in 2nd Peter, men are slaves to which has mastered them. Food will not master me.

I Need a Kindred Soul

I need a friend. I have friends, a few at least. And I love them. But what I wish I had was one more friend, a friend who likes phone photography or writing poetry or taking still lifes or journaling or painting or collage. A friend I can do creative challenges with, or even start a separate blog with to post collaborative work or stuff that follows the same sort of theme or concept.

I think that working with someone and bouncing ideas off each other would make my creativity stronger. I would certainly love the companionship and having someone to talk to about creativity, either written or visual. It would be fun if we were doing the same thing, but it would be equally great if we were doing two different creative things and just talking about them with each other, and giving each other suggestions and keeping each other posted with our progress.

I feel like I run on and on about poetry and other artsy things to friends that aren’t interested in them. And no one wants to be the person in the room who talks for an hour about something no one else in the room is interested in! But it’s hard when almost no one is interested in something that you really love.

So many creatives throughout history have been shaped by other creatives that they were friends with. I would love to have someone like that in my life and I would love to be that someone for another person.

I am not an amazing artist or photographer, but I really like designing images. I wish there was someone I could talk about it with. Maybe we could inspire and challenge each other. Perhaps we could give each other ideas outside of one another’s usual subject matter or mode of creating in order to sharpen one another’s senses. Why not try mixed media? Or instant film and toy cameras? Or ekphrastic poetry based on one another’s photographs? Book binding? Incorporating ephemera into our art?

Blogging helps me work some of my Creative Energy out. Blogging is extremely important to me. But maybe through my blog I will make a serendipitous discovery of a kindred soul who might want to be an angel in my life and let me be an angel in theirs.

This is probably a long shot, but maybe someday somebody will find this post and a beautiful friendship will spark. I know it’s unlikely, but it’s always worth a try. If nothing comes of it, my life will continue in much the same way and I will not have lost anything. And I have a good life. But if I do find that kindred soul, how happy I will be! If I don’t open my doors no one will know that they are welcomed into my life.

Iron sharpens iron, and friends are priceless. Is anyone out there? Hello….Hello……

Still Life 1

I am thinking of getting into doing simple still lifes with photographs and ephemera. I’ve done a few experiments. I don’t have the most professional looking materials. I don’t even have white foam board right now so I am using white tissue paper from gift wrap. I enjoy arranging decor and photographs and little odds and ends to make a picture. I’m debating investing in a Polaroid camera so that I can use little polaroid pictures for my designs. But for now I’m going to use the stockpile of regular photos that I have printed and haven’t used for scrapbooking.

This picture was taken when my husband and I first got married. I believe we were in Washington DC in this picture out to dinner. If not, we were in Rome. The background so dark and blurred and I can’t quite remember whether this was one of our trip to DC or our trip to Rome that year.

My Daily Log/Diary

I am a pretty prolific diarist. In addition to this blog, I use this colorful book right here to keep a daily log of my mood, what I am reading, my goals for the day, a prayer, and a list of what I am grateful for. I also sometimes write regular diary entries on top of my daily log. I keep a productivity journal that allows me to list my most important tasks of the day and of the week and log how much time they are taking me and what I am truly getting done. On top of that I use an app called Diaro to write brief descriptions of my day and what’s on my mind, and I attach photos. So basically I am always writing something.

I find the doing all this writing about my life and what I’m doing with it reminds me to actually try to do something with it and get stuff done. It’s also going to provide a record of family life for my daughter when she gets older. Maybe these things can be passed down for a while. And what I write on the phone app is backed up on Dropbox.

Journaling sometimes acts as a form of therapy for me. Writing can be very therapeutic. When my mood is fluctuating and I’m having a hard time, this blog and my journals give me a place to vent and sort out my thoughts. When things are going well I have a record of it to look back on when things are going poorly, or even just when I want a trip down memory lane. Writing about my creative endeavors and posting poetry and art allow me an outlet that I don’t have in my daily life for sharing creativity.

I have been an active diarist for most of my life. My uncle gave me a beautiful leather journal when I was in Middle School. It wasn’t my first Journal technically, but it was the first one that I wrote in seriously. After that I filled journals for years until something rather traumatic happened and then I didn’t write one for a long time. But since then I’ve come back full force and blogging is what I have to thank for that. That, and my love of stationery.

Woman

On the bridge of her lips I consider crossing –
my hips a sailboat with no sails.
Behind me, daisies.
Beneath me, silk drenched with dream.
In the sweet musk of human frailty
I rollick like a ship to sea
when she gazes at me,
knife to meat,
erosion to beach.
Destruction never was so complete.
Spread open like an unread book,
I am searched,
My ecstasy excavated,
Preserved in her skin,
Dissolving on her tongue.

Lost Sleep, UMW

The night before last I could not get to sleep til past midnight because my house was spiritually active. It has been for the past couple of days. That night in particular I heard loud running and banging while I was laying in bed. It went on and on. At first I thought Angelica had gotten up and was running in the hall. She does that sometimes when she is hoping we will wake up and tell her she doesn’t have to sleep in her room. So I got up and checked. No Angelica. I went to her room and she was sound asleep. And as soon as I turned my back in my room and closed the door, it started again. It lasted til past midnight.

Then at around 2 or 3 Craig woke me up when he got up. He turned the fan off and the change in ambient noise woke me up immediately. Interestingly enough, he said he turned it off because he had left it running when he went to bed (hours earlier than I did because of his early shift), and when he got up to go to the bathroom or something it was turned off. He turned it back on for himself, but assumed I’d want it turned off again when he got up.

I never turned that fan off.

So yesterday I was too tired to even homeschool. I didn’t have the clarity of mind to teach, so Craig taught Angelica when he got home. I did dishes and ran some clothes in the dryer and that was about it. I broke my social media fast because I didn’t have enough power of thought to do anything else.

Last night I got more sleep, but still got woken up around 3 – this time because of the super loud creaking of the bathroom and bedroom doors as Craig moved around getting ready for another day shift. I can’t win! I finally started to get some sleep around 5:30 or 6, and then Angelica came in to cuddle and talk. So sleep was over!

I am just trying not to let this sleep loss affect my mood. Losing sleep is sometimes very bad for me.

My volunteering with United Methodist Women begins at the end of the month. I am going to be the editor of The Torch. I am attending the meeting and then people will give their articles and meeting minutes to me over the weekend and I will put The Torch together in Publisher. Then I’ll take it to the church copy office to run copies and fold them. I am looking forward to meeting everyone (and praying my anxiety doesn’t act up). Being the editor of the monthly newsletter means I have a spot on the executive board, so I am going to try to make some of those meeting this year. Unfortunately they are all on Friday, and my babysitter has her homeschooling enrichment program on Fridays. So I can only go when Craig has the day off or has certain shifts.

I think I will volunteer for the card making ministry as well. UMW makes cards by buying simple cards and attaching the front of one to the back of a card they have made themselves with their own message inside. I can do that. I am not a card maker, but I can cut and paste. If they need donations of card to use, I may do that too. I collect some really nice cards, Hallmark and Papyrus.