Monday, No Monday No Cry

My nephew came to stay last night.  I thought it would make me freak out to have him here but he's been a rather pleasant presence and I wasn't anymore anxious to have him here than I used to be when house guest came over before things got bad.  He's staying again tonight.  He and my oldest are working on a dirt moving project at the yard my son has been taking care of all summer.

I didn't sleep last night.  I wrote my last blog post in the wee hours of the morning.  Lack of sleep hit me today at around 1 PM.

I was able to get out of the house before that.  Mostly just to take the teenager to cross country.  I still jump when the phone rings.  My primary care physician called with a referral for me so I can get in.  Tina's going to make the appointment and go with me the first time so I don't back out.

Some of what's been so hard is holding it all in and my last blog post took a lot out of me but it has helped me to be more stable.

I've let the boys play lots of Rockband 3 on the Xbox these past few days.  More than I would usually do but it makes me smile to hear them knowing all the words to "Jukebox Hero" and "Crazy Train" oh and they are quickly learning "Rosanna".  Boy number 2 is able to play many of the songs on medium difficulty in pro-mode and keep up even with the pedals and the symbols.  Tina is really quite good too.

I decided to make a list of things that make me afraid or anxious and some of them started back when I was a kid.

As a child:

1. When on a sleepover, when we would go outside to play I couldn't go back in the house even if I had to use the bathroom unless someone who lived there was with me.  If my friends wouldn't go I would go around to the front of the house and ring the bell.  I had to have permission before I could go in.  My friends who noticed thought I was weird.  As I got older I was able to stop doing this but it never stopped making me anxious.
2. I didn't like people to hear me using the toilet.  I would and still often do turn on the water.  If I'm at a public restroom I will go in if I can't possibly make it, I"m less anxious in dirty gas station bathrooms because I can lock everyone else out.
3. I used to babysit for neighbors.   The parents would always say I could eat whatever was in the fridge or the cupboards.  I never did.  I would imagine them running out or thinking I was a pig or something.  I either brought my own meal or ate nothing even if I was expected to prepare a meal for and feed the child I was watching.

As a teen:

1. I hated the school bathrooms so badly that I would avoid them if at all possible.  If I had to void my bladder I would go into a stall if available.  If my friends were there I would try to time my trip so I would either go before or after they were there if I had to use a urinal.  If I had to have a BM I wouldn't go at all.  I was afraid of a lot of things.  being heard, smelled, running out of TP.  I began to have one BM a day, right after the evening meal, with all of the after school things I was involved in it was the only time of day that I could pretty much guarantee that I would be home before scouts and young men's activities started etc.  I hated to be teased about it but I couldn't explain why it was such a problem for me.
2. Dating was hard.  I had a hard time talking to girls that I liked unless I was acting like a clown. more and more this became my defense mechanism.  The problem was I was still not very quick witted.  So I was just as embarrassed that most of my jokes didn't land.  
3. When I did finally ask a girl out I tried to arrange the asking so that I was either in a group, singing a doo-wop song etc, or I would plan it so that I didn't even have to be there.  A puzzle or something would ask for me.  Since this was normal for High school it was real easy to do.  Once asked though I became even less serious around the girl.  Joking more and more and sometimes inappropriately, or out of context.  I grasped for any words that popped into my head it would often become a funny non sequitur but it was not intentional at all.  I also didn't like to go out on a date with a as large of a group as possible.  This was very apparent to a lot of friends.  I made a couple of friends miserable when I forced them to ask girls to cotillion so I didn't have to go alone but they had a lot of hard finals coming up and didn't want to go.
4. I had a few girlfriends in high school and early college.  After a few months of dating  I became uncomfortable.  I had a hard time reciprocating affection.  Even though their affection was often demonstrated, I worried that I was misreading them and I had it all wrong and the a hand hold or a kiss would be unwelcome.  when I began to start worrying enough about it I would start thinking "Well it's time to break up"  If I couldn't ask a girl out in person, or hold her hand, how was I gonna have a serious talk about breaking up.  I couldn't ever be serious around this person anyway.  I would start worrying about it a lot and once I did, I couldn't talk to to the girlfriend at all.  After a few weeks of that my silence had done the breaking up and not only did I not have a girlfriend I would have lost a friend as well.  I caused a few hurt feelings this way.  Not because I'm such an amazing catch but the manner in which I handled things had to be a blow to someones ego.

Okay.  That's a big enough list for now.  I need to do something else because my stomach is hurting writing this.  Even now  I can see the idea of having to go and talk to a therapist is causing me such angst that I'm trying to write these things down that I know I'm going to be asked about when I go.  If I script it out I think I can talk about it.  I'm sure I will become comfortable with whoever I see after a few visits and it won't be so bad.  I'm not trying to bag on myself with these posts, just trying to find things that bother me. so I can figure out where to start to fix it.

Last night's blog post released a lot of tension but this one is making it worse.  So this is all for now.  I think I'll post this one.  If I can handle it being on Facebook then maybe I can get used to talking to a stranger about it.  Granted my Facebook isn't so upsetting to me the past few days.  I"m sure some of my friends are upset because I un-friend-ed them but I had to get my friend list down by half for some reason to feel ok.

It's so weird.  Hope that isn't permanent.  No it's not going to be.  I'm deciding right now.  I'm not going to let this get to me.  It may take awhile but I'm going to feel normal again.