After a morning walk with Lydia and an afternoon visit to see a friend, I settle down to a relaxing evening.
Nothing much to do; nothing to prove.
I don’t know what the future holds, and have a lot of fear associated with this, but I can’t do any more, for now.
All I can do is what I’ve been doing, take each day at a time and be as positive as I can be within it; also accept that some days are better than others and sometimes it’s good just to do very little.
This morning, I said some prayers for meditation that are provided in the book, Universal Compassion, by Geshe Kelsang Gyatso Rinpoche. I’m familiar with these prayers as I’ve recited them several times at different ceremonies I’ve taken part in at Buddhist Centres over a number of years. It felt good, to refamiliarize myself with the words, that are so soothing and somehow reassuring. I don’t even feel I need to fully understand them, just say them, meditate and take it on faith that they will help me through; they are helping me through.
She soaks up the sun when she wants to, and searches out shady spots when she needs to cool down.
We have a good walk together, mid- to late morning.
I still find the ‘waking up and getting out of bed’ bit of the day very difficult. But I do it, with the help of a routine which involves meditating and sitting quietly with a cup of tea before I do anything else. And this morning I did get myself out of bed a bit earlier than I have been doing, so something must be working.
Over the last couple of weeks, as well as preparing paperback versions of my two latest books, I’ve also taken part in an open mic poetry session at a local library. This was so inspirational not least because the library is in my home town, and I don’t have many positive associations with my home town, due to what I now realise is the trauma I experienced as a child. I disassociated, went into survival mode, and the rest isn’t history because I can hardly remember any of it. But it doesn’t matter. I’ve realised it doesn’t matter because it’s in the past, and I’m living my best life today.
What constitutes a ‘best life’ for me though, doesn’t mean that I need to go on exotic holidays or do ‘special’ stuff all the time. It’s the ‘small’ everyday stuff that does it for me, most of the time. Yes, I like to go out for meals, have treats and takeaways, holidays occasionally, but I don’t want to miss out on what I have around me, in the here and now, every day.
And that includes attending to my own personal paperwork – and filing.
Historically I haven’t been the best at this, although steadily, during the process of my recovery, I have been pulling chaos into order, establishing priorities and making sure that I don’t leave a pile of debris in my wake (literally, in my wake, i.e. when I do ‘pop my clogs’ my affairs are going to be so simple for the Executor to administer).
I first started developing a set of ‘rules for self-management’ some time ago, as an antidote for having been badly managed by others. Ideas for these rules popped into my head from time to time and I wrote them down, not knowing what I was going to do with them, or when I would be able to do anything with them. The self-management rules became ‘poetry rules’ for a while, as I related some of my poems to the inherent principles within.
Now I’m back to thinking again in terms of self-management, and I’m going to steadily work through my rules, applying them to my life as I continue to walk and work with Lydia, write this blog, live with my partner, meet up with friends and neighbours, write more poems, make more pots. I’m going to do my own filing as well along with a lot of other things I want and need to do.
Ambitions
Gleeful
Wild
Outrageous
Contagious
Cheerful
Fearful
Full
Respectful
Disrespectful
Mad
Sad
Glad
Cook
Read a Book
Make Tea
Dance
Romance
Work
Shirk
Naughty
Nosy
Silly
Me.
Available on Amazon for Kindle and Kindle Unlimited:
Ironically, I’ve recently been feeling too tired to write about what I have wanted to write about: sleep. Until today.
Breaking the cycle of inactivity is massively difficult during a period of depression. It feels impossible to know what to do or where to start that will make any difference in any meaningful and lasting way. And then sleeplessness takes hold and so it goes on.
I still have variable experiences of being able to get to sleep, and sleep long and deep enough to feel rested. However, any current difficulties I have are nothing compared to what it was like for me, years ago, when I became addicted to sleeping pills (Triazepam).
In the end, to detox, I took myself to Turkey in the hot season, walked and sweated for miles and eventually screamed myself off them.
The process of detox itself, especially in unsupported circumstances, is very dangerous, and, to anyone contemplating taking tranquilizers of any kind, I would say, “Don’t!”.
It might be easy for me to say that now, as I did take them then and felt that I needed to – desperately – at the time. Maybe I did. But that was before I had explored all the other options and possibilities, mainly because I didn’t know about them.
There is much more awareness and access to mental health coping strategies than there used to be over twenty years ago when I was going through some extreme experiences. Meditation courses and apps, Cognitive Behaviour Therapy, affirmations (I use these a lot), talking therapies, the benefits of exercise and so on. Even so, despite drawing on these approaches and applying them in my day-to-day life as best as I can, I don’t always sleep well.
Now, though, I’m much more able to sit or lie with the lack of sleep and rest into it, be patient with it, rather than going for a quick fix with all the associated draw backs. If I’m really struggling to settle, I might get up, watch a bit of telly (reading is usually out of the question at these times, such is the impact of depression on my capacity to concentrate), make a cup of tea or – even better – hot chocolate. I also occasionally indulge in a glass or two of wine or a gin and tonic. (I’m conscious of the drawbacks and addictive aspects of alcohol reliance but it does sometimes do the trick; a couple of paracetamols – again as a very occasional alternative and never at the same time as alcohol – also eventually send me off.)
I’m gradually working towards having a kinder and more balanced relationship with myself, doing what I can to be good to my body and my brain. I work on being thankful, get my brain into ‘glad’ mode and accept that I am getting “there”, which is “here”, with every day a blessing.
It is much easier for the me that I am now, than the me that I was twenty years ago, to not fall back on the quick fixes, partly because I have worked hard to find out about and put self-management strategies into practice and partly because I am in a much better place on a personal level. It is much easier to get to sleep on an evening, knowing that in the morning I will wake up in my partner’s loving arms.
Maybe there was a time when I did shoot the Albatross, and paid the price. But sleep is a very gentle thing, and doing my best to let sleep slide into my soul is part of an essential process of healing.
As this 28-day cycle of journaling/blogging comes to a close, I reflect on how far I’ve come in being able to make the most of every day as I do, after the journey of mental health breakdown and recovery that I’ve had, for most of my so far 69 years.
I’m now going to have a short break from writing while I put together a two-volume book of the story of Lydia and me so far. While I’m doing this, I will re-post a blog from the past every day.
A full collection of my earlier blogs, from March 2020 to September 2024, is now available on Amazon for Kindle:
‘Rules’ came originally from a set of ‘self-management rules’ that I devised, largely to reflect on some of the very negative experiences I’d had of being managed by others. I later developed these Rules into ‘Poetry Rules’, relating them to poems that I wrote or had previously written.
‘Rhymes’ are my poems, even though not all my poems rhyme. I just like writing them, expressing myself through words in whatever way I choose.
‘Recovery’ pieces reflect on different approaches and factors that influence mental health and wellbeing, including barriers to recovery.
‘Recipe’ is largely focused on one dish, but it’s an important one: Leftovers Soup.
‘Random’ – well, anything that didn’t quite fit in to the other categories but wanted to include anyway.
Step by step, day by day, the story of Lydia and me continues, and I’ll continue to record it at https://gladabout.life/.
It may not be the only Peace Café in the World, but it is the only one that I know, in this part of the World. And it’s a good one.
The lunch followed a morning of Buddhist meditations and teachings, on how to overcome anger and frustration.
I’ve done a lot of work on my ‘anger issues’ over the last 3 decades but found recently that I needed to do more.
The principle presented in today’s teachings is to practise patient acceptance, with a loving heart.
There are some aspects of my life where I find this easy and joyful, such as the work I’m doing with Lydia. It does require patience, to keep repeating the same training routines and reassurances, and to keep looking for further ways to provide reassurance and help her overcome her fears.
On the other hand, having let go of most of my own anxieties now about being able to keep going on a sustained basis, I no longer feel under any self-induced pressure to achieve ‘outcomes’. We just do what we do, day by day. I love my time with Lydia, and I think Lydia enjoys her time with me too.
I got another ‘wake up’ call from her at 1.30’ish this morning.
This time she did want to go outside, which I presumed was for a toilet need.
Usually, she’ll come back in quite quickly and we settle ourselves down for some more “sleepy time” but this morning I waited a while and then went out to see where she was.
It was a warm and beautiful starry night.
I’m not great on constellations but I did recognise a clear ‘plough’ and a star that shone very brightly, which I thought may have been the North Star.
Thanks to Lydia, I had those few special moments looking up at the stars.
Sitting outside now, as I write, in the sunshine, after a mellow morning followed by a leisurely lunch, I do feel a sense of personal peace that I thought for a long time I would never be able to feel. Yesterday was grief and anger; today is peace.
I’ll still have to keep working at it: meditating; learning; relaxing; growing; writing; loving.
I’m lucky to have a lot of good things in my life and to be able to have days like I’m having today. I do wish that for others too.
I don’t claim to be a dog trainer or a mind trainer – I’m just a woman with a dog who writes a blog, and has written a book, about life, and about being glad.
Lydia woke me at about 1.30am, with a gentle nudge from her nose.
I thought she must need to go outside for a pee but as I started off downstairs, I realised she wasn’t following me. When I went back into the bedroom she was rolled over, ready for me to tickle her tummy; give her a “rub-a-dub-dub” massage that she’s growing to love. So I did.
Now, I realise I probably shouldn’t be encouraging disturbances to my sleep in this way, but then again she asked so nicely, and I do think we are approaching a breakthrough position with addressing her anxiety. So, I give her plenty of “rub-a-dub-dubs” before reintroducing her to the idea of “sleepy time”.
This afternoon, I had a good play session with my steam cleaner. It’s almost as good fun as a pressure washer and the bathroom is now clean.
After a shower – in my now clean bathroom – and an early change into pj’s, I sat outside for a while, reading.
I finished the autobiography that I’ve been reading for a couple of weeks. It ended with an account of an inquest into the death of a family member. The writer’s loss is immeasurable, as is the courage and humanity shown by him and his family. Re-engaging with life, through grief, isn’t easy, but they are doing it. Every day, they are doing it.
I don’t claim to be a dog trainer or a mind trainer – I’m just a woman with a dog who writes a blog, and has written a book, about life, and about being glad.
The Buddhist teaching last night was about ‘patient acceptance’, this being the opposite of anger.
I have been working on patient acceptance for some time, and also been struggling with anger.
In his book, ‘How to Transform Your Life’, the Venerable Geshe Kelsang Gyatso Rinpoche says that “We need to think about our own faults because if we are not aware of them we will not be motivated to overcome them.”
I have been motivated to overcome my fault of anger and continue to be motivated to do so; never more so in my life than I am now. Meditating helps.
The benefits of meditating in a group, for me, are significant. That doesn’t mean that I can’t and don’t benefit from meditating on my own, but there is something about a group meditation that I find has a calming effect, at a very deep level.
Today, I don’t feel angry.
It’s now early evening.
I had a lovely walk with Lydia this morning, then met up with a friend and sat outside in the sunshine, then met up with another friend and had a walk with her and her dog. I think that all adds up to a very good day. I am very lucky, to have had such a good day, today.
Lydia is lying quietly outside. It’s very peaceful here.
Glad About 
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