petard.us

As I said, I intend to use this blog to be accountable for the things I need to do to be healthy and deal with depression. Now it looks like the problems of the past month came from a drug that was mis-prescribed and made my diabetes act out. Even so, I need to be accountable to you guys, so here goes:

Brush my teeth every day. I sometimes take days off on weekends. I usually do brush my teeth though.

Brush my teeth at bedtime. I often just fall asleep. I also tend to eat bedtime snacks, so I need to work hard to remember to brush before I fall asleep.

Shower and shave every day, except weekends. In the winter I tend to skip a day. As I spend four hours a day traveling to and from work, it gives me a bit more time for myself, reading etc. But it is warming up, so every day now!!. Corollary: try to shower in the morning.

This means getting my lazy butt out of bed when the alarm goes off. I have two alarms set, five minutes apart. This is new as of February. I have done better with this since I stopped taking the Actos. I need to keep up the good work

Reading. I need to read serious books, whether computer or history and biography. Reading only light stuff like mysteries is a bad sign. And more sci-fi would help too. Read my art history book a bit at a time

Learn new stuff. Devote some time to php and javascript. Read some Greek or Hebrew scriptures. Book of Ruth raises my interest.

Get exercise. See if the Xpress bus schedule would work. That would give me an extra twenty minutes each work day. And use the fitness center at the apartment headquarters.

Diet. Keep up the work of a cooked meal in the evening. No more just quick stuff. cook, damn it. I have lost twenty plus pounds. Keep it up.

Go to my therapy group

See the psych doctor and my regular doctor.

Get tests I need:
Prostate biopsy. (The dildo that bites)
Colonoscopy. It’s overdue
Stress test for cardiac function? Maybe I need this.

Find a way to church. Call Jim again about St Bede’s. Then find someone there who lives near me.

Oh, and keep blogging.

I will add to this as needed. In the meantime, pray for me, or do your spiritual equivalent.

February was a terrible month for me. I felt terrible all month. At the beginning of February, my doctor changed one of my diabetes meds. Then my glucometer failed. When I got it back up it was giving very high readings, and I thought it had gone wonky. But it was consistent. Then it occurred to me about the new med. Last night I took my old med that was left over from the before the change. Today the blood sugar was where it should be. And I feel much much better. I felt much more with it this morning, energetic and looking forward to the day to come. And I have been that way all day until now. I intend to keep it that way if
I can.

Result: Monday am first thing I am seeing the doctor to get the meds changed back.

I intend to use the blog as a way of being accountable for taking the steps I need to take. You can feel free to comment there or by email. I do hope you all will.

I came to Atlanta knowing no one except one or two online. I came without a car but moved within easy bicycling distance of my workplace. I was, however, in suburbia and isolated. Then thew office moved and I got an advance and got a car.

After a few months the car died completely, so I had to get rides until bus lines finally showed up here. So now I spend three and a half to four hours in transit every day. I shop by bus on the weekend. The buses do not run late in the evening, so I cannot go out and participate in any activities. The buses do not run on Sundays, so I cannot go to church.

The lack of social contact is killing. I am not introverted enough. I need contact with other humans. The office is very small and there are no real social opportunities. This soul-killing life has been the slope which I slowly went deeper into depression.

I am hungry, starving, for human contact. I need friendships. I need affection, I need to give affection to another human being. Adonai said in Genesis, “It is not good for the human person to be alone.”

Cue up Psalm 130.

About a month ago I requested prayers for my health, then later reported it was only the flu.

Now I want to ask for similar prayers for depression and anxiety, and for perseverance in dealing with them.

The week after the flu I was sick again, with fatigues and dizziness, and was off work again for a number of days. In looking at this, I realized I was probably having an anxiety attack. I went to the doctor and was prescribed some Xanax. I found that this really knocked me out; I slept for 13+ hours a few times. Since then I have taken half the dose, and not in the evening. My sleep cycle is pretty much back to normal.

I realized then that I had been on a very slow downward slope for a long time, and that the illness and loss of income had been the trigger for anxiety and a deeper depression. I also realized I had missed some anxiety attacks in the past because they took the form of physical ailments.

What I noticed was that I had slowly dropped a lot of stuff that was helping keep me saner. I had lately been reading only easy-reading mysteries. I was no longer reading history or biography or computer books, so my innate curiosity had been repressed. I also realized that on the computer I was only drifting around amusing myself, when before I had been learning new things and studying the functions of my operating system and so forth and learning programs in greater depth or learning new ones.

I also noticed that while I was more or less keeping up with my diabetic diet needs, I wasn’t really doing a lot of cooking or providing much variety in my diet.

Clearly I had to deal with these and I am doing so. I ask your prayers for my perseverance in this.

I have also gotten myself into treatment at the local public mental health clinic. I will be getting into a group and seeing a doctor. This last is probably very important; I have been taking Paxil without psychiatric supervision for a few years now.

While the Xanax is dealing with the anxiety, I have a lot to be anxious about. Because of missing work, I have been unable to pay my gas bill, and though the gas is still on, it could go at any time. I also will not be able to pay my rent which is due Sunday. I have tried local agencies that help with these things. They cannot give me enough to make it, and their giving the amount they will give requires proof that I have the rest of the money to pay the full bills. I don’t.

There is has also been some anxiety about my job. I am sick a lot and off work. But also some tasks that I had were taken by another person and nothing added. I was feeling worthless to the company. Now some tasks have been added back, and more are on the horizon. That will probably help some; it seems to be doing that anyway.

I am full of fear of poverty for the rest of my life. If I am unable to work, I can get Social Security, but not enough to live on, and no medical coverage. I will get more if I wait to retire. But I fear ill-health and being unable to work. And I will never have a good income from Social Security. I have never worked a well-paid job; I have mostly done human services in the broadest sense. Many of what should have been high-earning years were spent in a monastery where the minimum Social Security was paid. This makes me feel really hopeless.

An update on Oliver: He is just the same, just skin and bones, seems tired and weak. He was prescribed a steroid; I have no way to tell it has help except that he is on a health plateau, it looks like. He has been taking it for a year now, and the vet will not approve a refill until they see him in the office. Needless to say, I can afford that.

Pray for me and my situation.