i hear the voices when I'm dreaming

Why is my brain. Seriously.

7pm: hey it’s bedtime ... you know you want to sleep ... here, I’ll help ... zzzz

9pm: oh hey we’re in bed, time to DO ALL THE THINGS

11pm: I AM NEVER SLEEPING AGAIN

the following morning: ughhh what was I thinking, must go to sleep sooner tonight

afternoon: so very groggy mehhhh can't wait for bed

7pm: hey it's bedtime ...

...

Every. Single. Fucking. Day.

The stupidest thing is I can’t tell if I’m groggy in the daytime because I’m oversleeping (and therefore would be better off trying to stay yo later to get less sleep) or undersleeping (and therefore would be better off trying to confiscate my own iPad at night). or if it's entirely just fucking meds.

Well, no, that’s the second stupidest. The actual stupidest is being tired until I get in bed and then being wide awake. Wtf is that anyway. I mean, it’s not just a matter of “bed is more comfortable so I choose to spend the last few hours of my day on bed”; I actually end up half falling asleep on my aide while they’re putting me to bed. And then am awake. Because that makes so much sense.

It used to be that 10 was early for me to go to bed -- and now I wilt by like 7 or 8. Until I'm in bed. But I think I'm still really half wilted, because I think my body needs to be in bed even when my brain isn't ready, but I dont have any stamina any more.

And I think it would be a bit different if I could get in and out of bed by myself, or if I didn't have someone coming at a fixed time to get me up on the morning, but the whole thing is just ,,, frustrating and I don't understand it way.

I am having stupid fucking nostalgia about who I used to be and what I used to be able to do

...someone today introduced me to Vitamin String Quartet, who are fucking awesome, but one of their covers was something from Phantom of the Opera, and even though I've listened to it bunches of times, usually in German, something about their arrangement tugged me back to hearing it in person; POTO was something that my college bff and I bonded over, as well as the second thing I really got involved in the fandom for (and that was kickoff to getting involved with Buffy fandom and it was all "downhill" from there), but also there was a non-touring production in SF that we went to at least 15 times in our four years because SF was close enough for an evening trip and because the theater wasn't entirely wheelchair accessible (no elevator) so they had to give us wheelchair seats (back of the orchestra) for the cheapest price because we couldn't get to the nosebleed seats, and if you give two POTO-obsessed teen/twentysomethings the opportunity to see POTO regularly and cheaply they're damn well going to take it

so emotional dump back into when I could move decently much and still still do things and when I ... I mean I had depression for 3/4 of the time and it was new and baffling and difficult, but not the trudging through life feeling of unending depression; back when I could still write and still do cross stitch and still thought I had the opportunuty for a job and a life and stuff

and I wasn't prepared for this at all, and now I can't stop crying at how pathetic I am now and his small my life has gotten

Network page linkhopping led me to http://musingsofanaspie.com/2013/01/31/emotional-dysfunction-alexithymia-and-asd/ and, uh.

Because, I recently realized, I don’t discriminate between anger that is aimed at me and anger in general. When someone is angry, I invariably feel like I’m the cause or the target, even when I rationally know that I’m not.

If The Scientist calls me after a bad day, I hear how upset he is and immediately feel distressed. Not distressed as in “I should console my husband because he’s had a bad day.” I feel distressed in a “this is incredibly stressful and I want it to stop” kind of way. My brain immediately goes into “fix it” mode, searching for a way to make the other person feel better so I can also relieve my own distress.

...

...and I am sitting here going "wait, what, you mean everyone's not like that"

and, like, except for the 'impoverished imagination and fantasy life' bit I would totally be labeling myself alexithymic

because *there is a word for that*

A summary of my life over the last few months: ( Stuff sucked, more than usual )

I've spoken about the above things, although I can't remember how much was posted here, how much to Facebook, how much in other places online, etc. The next bit, though, is new.

( State of the ysa now )

So I apparently went through a phase in high school where I kept insisting I was half Vulcan. I don't remember to what extent I thought I was joking; my mom says I was adamant about it. It was more than just being obsessed with Spock (which also happened, because Spock is awesome), it was actually saying/pretending/believing/whatever that I was half Vulcan. (The sort that looked human, because no pointy ears here.)

Fast forward to today, when my TNG rewatch continues, and I get to the episode Hero Worship, wherein a human kid that survives a traumatic incident that kills everyone else on his spaceship basically imprints on Data and starts maintaining that he is an android, and talking/acting as though he is. The show is not really very subtle about the whole "androids can't experience emotions, he wants to escape his fear / terror / bad memories / trauma, being an android allows him to do that for a while" thing.

And something clicked in me. Because Vulcans are (at least in theory) good at *suppressing* emotion, and replacing with logic, and while they tend to be imperfect at it, there is the whole theme of struggling to overcome emotion. And I was at the time dealing with a whole bunch of shit -- high school is stressful, puberty and associated change is stressful (even though I didn't have any sexual complications going on), surgery and chemo and similar things are stressful, scary untreatable progressive medical conditions are stressful -- and ... yeah.

Huh.

I have at least learned enough to (most of the time) realize that running out of cope is not my fault.

Training a new aide, and she keeps being convinced that she can do transfer maneuvers when she (thinks she) understands them, but understanding and doing are two different matters. Yesterday morning we got me on to the toilet ok, but couldn't get me back to the chair, and we ended up having to call someone to come help. She came last night for additional instruction; she was supposed to come this morning with a person that could be backup, but she decided after last night's session that she "understood" it and showed up alone. While she did have a better understanding of what to do, it ... wasn't enough. And we had to call one of my other aides, and wait for her to get across town, and by that point my foot was asleep, and so I couldn't really do much to help out with the transfers.

Yesterday I was perfectly able to cope. I knew, even if she didn't, that it always took aides a few days to get a good handle on the transfer. (My body is so very different than anyone else's. See also: the easiest way to pivot me upright when I am leaning back is to push on the back of my head. Neck and spine are thoroughly, solidly fused, and so that gives good leverage and doesn't hurt me. It's counter-intuitive, though.) I was able to stay cheerful, more for her sake than anything, and patient, and very "we will get this" levels of upbeat.

Today, less so. And now one of my other aides is here, and cleaning up, and I know that stuff needs cleaning up, and I want to have an organized space, but there is still a part of my brain having a "DON'T TOUCH MY STUFF" meltdown, and with yesterday's and today's stuff on top of the consistent feeling of augh, I am very very low on cope.

And in the past, being out of cope has led to being out of self-cope; to irritation that I can't just grin and bear it, or to the nonlogic that since I dealt ok with things the last time X happened I should be able to deal with them now and it is a horrible flaw and personal weakness that I wasn't.

Today, somehow, I am managing not to feel that way. Just to sit with my inner toddler and kind of cuddle her, and I don't have to make impossible promises, like "everything will be better tomorrow" or anything, just kind of *be*.

I think this is progress.