Re your friend needing something to do, people, etc.:
There are all sorts of online volunteering opportunities available. Maybe one of those could help? And/or some kind of online class? (Event Brite is a good place to start.)
GK, Thanks for those suggestions. I have been wondering about that sort of thing. As for classes, he would want to be delivering them, not taking them, and he has tech problems with computers. He can manage "Turn it off, then back on again," without me, but is currently worrying about a projected Zoom session with a colleague from SETI and a meteorologist.
I'm hoping the rector may come up with something he could do locally while also advising him about proceedings with the lying bunch from last year. From whom he has never been told what he is supposed to have done. (She has an interesting back story which may enable a forensic eye to be cast over things - very helpful last year, and she advised him to stick to his truth.)
Very oddly, other supporting friends have been stripped away - down the Q-anon rabbit hole, or similar, into the fallout from a stupid tweet, and reasonable family issues. He believes in active evil entities ranging over the world, which have not been part of my religious life (why would God allow them?), but it could almost convince me of them, and that he is under attack. Prayers to keep them away from me welcomed.
I'm not sure how to access volunteering organisations, but will have a look.
I'm more an anxiety kinda guy. Though of course I experience lows.
I'm highly strung. Reactive. It's affected my career.....
What career? It's in tatters....
But my mental illness is no excuse for bad behaviour I know
Maybe not, but medication (whether for mental health issues, or for other conditions) can easily affect one's mood, and behaviour.
One can hardly be blamed for that, though people often don't realise why one is apparently *behaving badly*.
Hey...that's weird....we are almost connecting here....thanks to you God Bless
So far, nothing. Our area is a blank (there's a NextDoor site, but people offering help, not asking for it), and most volunteering links seem to go nowhere, including the RVS, once they get my postcode. I still hope the rector knows people who would welcome phone contact or such. I'd rather we were connected through someone trusted than a random person online.
I'm more an anxiety kinda guy. Though of course I experience lows.
I'm highly strung. Reactive. It's affected my career.....
What career? It's in tatters....
But my mental illness is no excuse for bad behaviour I know
Maybe not, but medication (whether for mental health issues, or for other conditions) can easily affect one's mood, and behaviour.
One can hardly be blamed for that, though people often don't realise why one is apparently *behaving badly*.
Hey...that's weird....we are almost connecting here....thanks to you God Bless
Hardly weird. A common experience, I would have thought.
So far, nothing. Our area is a blank (there's a NextDoor site, but people offering help, not asking for it), and most volunteering links seem to go nowhere, including the RVS, once they get my postcode. I still hope the rector knows people who would welcome phone contact or such. I'd rather we were connected through someone trusted than a random person online.
It's up to you, of course, but I think asking your Rector is a good starting point.
Oh, @PDR do take care of yourself as best you can! Come here and have a good rant as often as you can. 🕯🕯🕯
Moddey Dhoo has been evicted off the hearth rug and back into his passageway, With the weather we have been having the bugger probably found it too damn draughty! Mrs. PDR is doing somewhat better, but is a goodly distance from being well. Less pain means that the distorting effects of pain and discomfort on her personality are currently minimal. We seem to have returned to limbo after a trip to purgatory or possibly hell.
To be honest, I don't like Limbo very much, it reduces the stress but it does not actually solve my problems. When the stress level drops I realize how much I miss things like day trips, slipping over to the next town for lunch, gardening together, and sex - or in other words, the agenda being set by us not the damn disease. I think about a third of my energy goes into coping with coping, which is a hell of a waste. However, the temperature is better than the other two, and the Mrs. is a lot more comfortable.
Love to all who post here, and those who might like to.
Good to hear of a transfer to limbo, PDR, even though I absolutely get what you say about the dislike of limbo. Coping with coping is indeed knackering.
On the whole, I would have to say this weak as been a bit of a b*st*rd so far. The missus has had a relapse, but nowhere near as awful as some of the previous trips around this particular mulberry bush, but nonetheless a relapse. Unfortunately, bad news has a tendency to 'pile-on' and I have discovered that a good friend of mine has cancer. Needless to say, there was a certain amount of private eye leakage this afternoon, and I am in one of those moods where I am inclined to regard any light at the other end of the tunnel as being in all likelihood a train coming the opposite direction, but at least there is no dog on the hearth rug so far. The cold bright weather, and the fact it is Lent, is helping with that.
My friend has the thing howling around him today, a ******* Baskerville of a black dog, and it's reactive and the causes just cannot be shifted. He's sleeping it off, I hope, at the moment after a bad dawn.
The cold weather’s not helping me. The warmer sunnier weather last week gave me some hope of feeling brighter but this week the cloud has descended again.
Praying for all who post and those that don’t 🕯
The cold weather’s not helping me. The warmer sunnier weather last week gave me some hope of feeling brighter but this week the cloud has descended again.
Praying for all who post and those that don’t 🕯
This. Totally. I was astonished at how much difference it made.
Coming from as far north as I do (I grew up at about 59°N), I never thought I was bothered by lack of sunlight, but the fact that it's suddenly become light in the morning before I leave for work, and sometimes still light when I get home has given me a real boost in the general well-being department.
I am happy to report what seems to me to be a normal low mood. I was feeling low yesterday and a bit teary, because I had to miss yet another shift because of covid-like symptoms (hay fever/allergies and some muscle soreness) and I had these symptoms for more than a week. I even thought of writing to an old friend and telling him I loved him, which would have been the wrong move.
Anyway, as I was feeling this way, I could tell it was a normal response to circumstances, and today I feel much better. My Doc is giving me all the tests, and when the x-ray people saw that I had flu-like symptoms and 2 covid tests, I was done and dusted in 10 minutes flat, skipping a full waiting room.
Very oddly, other supporting friends have been stripped away - down the Q-anon rabbit hole, or similar, into the fallout from a stupid tweet, and reasonable family issues. He believes in active evil entities ranging over the world, which have not been part of my religious life (why would God allow them?), but it could almost convince me of them, and that he is under attack. Prayers to keep them away from me welcomed.
I'm not really close to this way of thinking, though I sometimes hang out with charismatic RCs who do think this way. But to my mind, these things, whatever they are, aren't catching, and there is no need to be afraid. Yours, if such things are real, are already with you, as mine are with me. God knows what they are, and with time, and prayer, and the help of friends, and sometimes with professional help, I find out what mine are and (I hope and pray) you find what those things are, which afflict you.
FWIW, I think an anthoropomorphic (maybe that's not right) approach to evil is often unhelpful and can lead to fear of the bogey man (and/or rejection of my personal responsibility), but sometimes I find it useful in trying to weed out what is warring away inside of me. And the bible is not scared of such talk of 'roaring lions' and so on, so perhaps it is OK for us to catiously go there, even today.
M_i_M, always happy to demonstrate the old truism of the lifelong lurch from liberal to conservative :-)
Cheers MiM. For those who saw my antics in the Royal Family thread last night, I am pleased to say that I just got a bit overexcited. No mood cycling here.
Feeling a bit like I'm going down for the third time. I'm in no physical danger, but I want to scream loudly. Fortunately all the people I want to scream at are dead or live too far away.
Thanks everyone.. Today started with a frost but is sunny now. Sorted out stuff with my youngest brother who is actually lovely when he's not obsessed with falling down the covid rabbit hole of conspiracy theories.
Also a friend came around to measure the wall where I fell over and put my head through it the other day. I was relieved that he will be able to fix it easily. Having it break was a nuisance, but I think I would have injured my neck if it had been more solid.
Just a note to share my joy. My Dr has stopped my Lithium all together, a process that has been going on for two or three years, when kidney damage began to surface. While it does show that my kidneys are damaged, I am so happy because it confirms that my mental health is good enough to take this step without introducing additional medication.
I have had a few challenges over the past few months, and my reactions have all been within the part of the spectrum I call proportionate. The Ship and you who participate on this thread (including, perhaps especially the dear Golden Key ) are a very important part of this achievement.
What good news, Simon Toad. May the road ahead be smooth and you successfully navigate the pot holes along the way.
(I have high functioning bipolar disorder and am medication-free)
Comments
Re your friend needing something to do, people, etc.:
There are all sorts of online volunteering opportunities available. Maybe one of those could help? And/or some kind of online class? (Event Brite is a good place to start.)
Good luck! And you're being a good friend.
I'm hoping the rector may come up with something he could do locally while also advising him about proceedings with the lying bunch from last year. From whom he has never been told what he is supposed to have done. (She has an interesting back story which may enable a forensic eye to be cast over things - very helpful last year, and she advised him to stick to his truth.)
Very oddly, other supporting friends have been stripped away - down the Q-anon rabbit hole, or similar, into the fallout from a stupid tweet, and reasonable family issues. He believes in active evil entities ranging over the world, which have not been part of my religious life (why would God allow them?), but it could almost convince me of them, and that he is under attack. Prayers to keep them away from me welcomed.
I'm not sure how to access volunteering organisations, but will have a look.
Just search on "online volunteering". Lots of stuff.
Hey...that's weird....we are almost connecting here....thanks to you God Bless
Hardly weird. A common experience, I would have thought.
It's up to you, of course, but I think asking your Rector is a good starting point.
Moddey Dhoo has been evicted off the hearth rug and back into his passageway, With the weather we have been having the bugger probably found it too damn draughty! Mrs. PDR is doing somewhat better, but is a goodly distance from being well. Less pain means that the distorting effects of pain and discomfort on her personality are currently minimal. We seem to have returned to limbo after a trip to purgatory or possibly hell.
To be honest, I don't like Limbo very much, it reduces the stress but it does not actually solve my problems. When the stress level drops I realize how much I miss things like day trips, slipping over to the next town for lunch, gardening together, and sex - or in other words, the agenda being set by us not the damn disease. I think about a third of my energy goes into coping with coping, which is a hell of a waste. However, the temperature is better than the other two, and the Mrs. is a lot more comfortable.
{{{PDR and Mrs PDR}}}
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moddey_Dhoo
Good to hear of a transfer to limbo, PDR, even though I absolutely get what you say about the dislike of limbo. Coping with coping is indeed knackering.
I'm having a bumpy time, too.
Praying for all who post and those that don’t 🕯
This. Totally. I was astonished at how much difference it made.
Anyway, as I was feeling this way, I could tell it was a normal response to circumstances, and today I feel much better. My Doc is giving me all the tests, and when the x-ray people saw that I had flu-like symptoms and 2 covid tests, I was done and dusted in 10 minutes flat, skipping a full waiting room.
I'm not really close to this way of thinking, though I sometimes hang out with charismatic RCs who do think this way. But to my mind, these things, whatever they are, aren't catching, and there is no need to be afraid. Yours, if such things are real, are already with you, as mine are with me. God knows what they are, and with time, and prayer, and the help of friends, and sometimes with professional help, I find out what mine are and (I hope and pray) you find what those things are, which afflict you.
FWIW, I think an anthoropomorphic (maybe that's not right) approach to evil is often unhelpful and can lead to fear of the bogey man (and/or rejection of my personal responsibility), but sometimes I find it useful in trying to weed out what is warring away inside of me. And the bible is not scared of such talk of 'roaring lions' and so on, so perhaps it is OK for us to catiously go there, even today.
M_i_M, always happy to demonstrate the old truism of the lifelong lurch from liberal to conservative :-)
Also a friend came around to measure the wall where I fell over and put my head through it the other day. I was relieved that he will be able to fix it easily. Having it break was a nuisance, but I think I would have injured my neck if it had been more solid.
Life's definitely looking up,
I have had a few challenges over the past few months, and my reactions have all been within the part of the spectrum I call proportionate. The Ship and you who participate on this thread (including, perhaps especially the dear Golden Key
(I have high functioning bipolar disorder and am medication-free)