Recovery & Mental Nuts

Wires_Guy_wires said:
Anyone aware of how @HorseloverFat is doing? Maybe he has me on ignore or something, which is why I can't tag him. But I haven't heard from him in a while.
If anyone speaks to him outside the forum, let him know we miss him!
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It's been a while since I talked to him, so I should do that.
Last time I did he was doing pretty well. Playing gigs with his band, new girl of great expectations, kids all doing great, high hopes all around.

I'll see if I can't get in touch, and either I or he will report back.
 
ShadyStump said:
@ForeverRaynning, go start a damned air layer! They're not that hard. Most of the people who screw it up are afraid of going too far. The rest inexplicably somehow went to far, which takes no mean effort. Other factors in failure include things mostly outside your control, so just do some reading or watching, and go for it.
People say, "be brave enough to fail at something new."
I say I've never failed at the same thing IN THE SAME WAY twice. I make a point of finding new and improved ways to fuck it up.
Embrace your mediocrity: your chances of success stay exactly the same while your chances at disappointment go WAAAY down, and now you're much less intimidated by the idea of trying it again and again.
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I hear ya, rooting hormone arrived today, need to soak the sphagnum moss as its in dry and condensed blocks atm, then need to pick some branches, maybe even the ‘good’ ones! Will get it done this weekend. Been watching videos, know the common failing points, it doesn’t seem that hard, agree a lot of it is out of our control. And I guess once its done I then have plenty of time to work out what to do with them once they root 😅 I’ll need another bench haha.
 
ForeverRaynning said:
I hear ya, rooting hormone arrived today, need to soak the sphagnum moss as its in dry and condensed blocks atm, then need to pick some branches, maybe even the ‘good’ ones! Will get it done this weekend. Been watching videos, know the common failing points, it doesn’t seem that hard, agree a lot of it is out of our control. And I guess once its done I then have plenty of time to work out what to do with them once they root 😅 I’ll need another bench haha.
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Sound like you have some summer projects in mind. Tag me if you start a thread on them. I'd love to see.

Also, next time your parents come bitching, just say, "hold this tree for me," and then go to work on something else. Do it enough times and one or another of those problems will get solved. Worst case scenario they keep the tree you left them holding.
 
Cajunrider said:
Too many deaths in my extended family lately. This weekend I am attending the last of 3 in the past 4 weeks.
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The one funeral that hurts the most is my niece's who was possibly murdered. Police is still investigating. Autopsy is being done on her decomposed body found in her apartment.
At least for the old their life is somewhat realized. For the young it is tough to handle the "what might have been".
 
Personal update.

There's ALLOT of stuff on here I posted when I was not doing so great. Some of it I never would have shared except that I was trying to make sure the thread stayed alive, and, well, lead by example. I fear there were moments it looked like I had just made a thread for me to piss and moan in, but I really wasn't trying to, and I know there's no way to keep it going sometimes without demonstrating that it's ok to let loose here when you have to.
If you've done that, and got no responses, I know in my case it's because I just didn't know what to say, and I'm sure I'm not the only one.

Anyways, I'm here to prove that it's not all pointless, even if to no one but myself.
I'm feeling great! Better than in a VERY long time. Life is still crap, at least on paper, but I am genuinely confident in my future. As evidence, I have actually kept up on the mowing this year!

Work is crap. Turns out I hate substitute teaching. I don't get hardly any of the things out of it that I loved about working in education because I'm only ever there 1 day at a time, and, well, it's gig work. I never know when I'll get work, and it's rarely ever a good time for it.
BUT I'm finally on with the VA, even if at half the level I expected, and I'm regularly getting asked about taking full-time positions in education, so I'm confident that I'll have options there in the future should I decide to take them.

My dad's ALS is progressing. If I were to place money on it, I'd say this fall some time. It's going to be a complete mess when it happens, too. My siblings have never been known for their ability to come together; at all, ever, under any circumstances, in fact quite the opposite. Hell, we still don't know what to do with my brother after 5 years. His ashes are still sitting in a box on a dusty shelf because no one could ever agree on what to do with him, so we all forgot.
BUT, silver linings. There's no reason to believe it won't be something similar with dad, which means the only long term drama that could come up is fighting over the estate. Worse case scenario there, one way or another I wind up with a house in the end, either by inheritance or by purchase with my inheritance, then never have to deal with them again if I don't want to. And I'll only have to go through it once.

Here's the exciting one! My oldest daughter is autistic, and cannot get along with her mother at all. About a month ago their relationship hit rock bottom when she ran away from her mom's house, and it was decided she would stay with me full-time now. I made her go back to Mom's for Mother's Day, and they started digging. It turned into a very unfortunate run-in with her stepfather, and now child protective services is involved.
BUT we're walking away from this with me having primary custody of all 4 kids!

Between getting the kids, the VA benefits, inheritance from my dad dying, and job options; by fall 2026 I suspect we will be set for life.
I am not happy about any of it, but I can't find a way any of it turns out worse than the moment it takes to get through it. You've all seen my anxiety; I can find a way almost anything can go poorly, but this time I can't see it.
Like I said, it's awful at face value, but it all leads to me and my kids doing better than we ever have before. One thing at a time, and we win in the end.
 
Cajunrider said:
The one funeral that hurts the most is my niece's who was possibly murdered. Police is still investigating. Autopsy is being done on her decomposed body found in her apartment.
At least for the old their life is somewhat realized. For the young it is tough to handle the "what might have been".
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I'm sad to here that. Please let us know if there's anything at all we can do.

I've struggled with this myself. My older brother died in 2020, and I still struggle with missing him sometimes; still wonder what rock bottom would have looked like for him if it hadn't been getting shot, and looking forward to him recovering from the meth, becoming the person I always wanted to look up to, but he never got the chance. Just remembered his birthday is this week.

Remember, life is for the living, and there's plenty of them left. Chin up, arms wide. Let the young ones show you the way.
 
ShadyStump said:
It's been a while since I talked to him, so I should do that.
Last time I did he was doing pretty well. Playing gigs with his band, new girl of great expectations, kids all doing great, high hopes all around.

I'll see if I can't get in touch, and either I or he will report back.
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That's great, thanks a lot!
 
I've been trying to work my way to quitting smoking for a little while now, and am (theoretically) in my last week or so of damn nicotine patches. Not feeling particularly confident about it though.

I decided it's time because I got sick of having to make myself interrupt perfectly smooth running activities just because I was getting cranky from nicotine fits. It always leads to things shutting down because I had to walk away for 5 minutes.
But I also never get that 5 minutes to myself to just breathe and collect myself any more. Kicked the kids outside to play today so I could try to relax and watch some TV, but between commercials and my kids it takes an average of 30 to 45 minutes to get through a 15 minute YouTube video.😖

I'm struggling with the fact that my world is largely chaos, and without the nicotine to help keep my brain chugging in a straight line I'm constantly getting derailed. Just like when I quit drinking, without the ability to artificially slow my brain down I still struggle to keep it rolling in the right direction. There's no smooth turns when any given situation shifts any more. It's a screeching hault, I fall over on my face, then have to pick myself back up and get going all over again in a new direction. I'm constantly tripping over myself, even with simple things. It's not the first time I've quit, but it's the first time I've had to worry about holding everything in the family together singlehandedly with nothing to prop me up.
 
@ShadyStump , I feel for you, man. Quitting booze was really hard; quitting nicotine was much harder. I've been in recovery long enough to hear many people say that nicotine was a mmore difficult addiction to quit than heroin or oxy because it's so available and doesn't stop you from functioning; you can get it and indulge almost anywhere. My father stopped smoking in 1962, but in 2010 (with COPD!) he told me he still dreamed about smoking.

But quitting nicotine is an investment in yourself and in your children. You will be healthier and they will have a healthier living environment and a healthier dad.

To keep myself on track in the face of my husband's many medical issues (none of them life threatening) I like to meditate and do yoga. Unless I wake up much earlier than him, and walk the dog first, I'm not going to have any time for my meditation---and I'm still likely to hear him calling for assistance at any moment.
In order for me to have any time for gardening and bonsai, I ask him to handle all financial obligations: bills, balancing checking and savings accounts, etc. But...with his necessary pain meds (now mostly cannabis, but historically morphine, oxy, and fentanyl---all medically prescibed) his brain fog was something I had to monitor.
To do yoga, I have to go to the gym. I've been doing yoga for 24 years, but if I try at home there's no way the dog won't lick my face while I'm in a head stand! Or husband will forget what I'm doing and call me, or he will fall, or his ostomy bag will fail, etc.
My life is about creating order from chaos, and that requires constantly adjusting my attention. Walking the dog is usually the closest thing to meditation and peace that I can get on a given day.
Peace, brother.
 
ShadyStump said:
I've been trying to work my way to quitting smoking for a little while now, and am (theoretically) in my last week or so of damn nicotine patches. Not feeling particularly confident about it though.
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It's really hard. I've been trying to quit for awhile. I have the gum but it doesn't really help much. I've cut down by half but still struggle to just stop. Idle time is the biggest deterrent for me, so I try and stay busy.
 
NashsMan said:
My life is about creating order from chaos, and that requires constantly adjusting my attention.
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THIS👆is exactly my problem. My mind isn't good at attention switching, and nicotine facilitates that. I'm trying to do the right thing, but it means giving up all the external tools I've leaned on for most of my life in order to keep up in the world.

I'm realizing that the general theme for my life the past few years has been rebuilding myself from the ground up. Unfortunately, one of the things I've learned is that, no, I really can't keep up with the rest of the world on their terms, not even slightly. I'm ok with that, but no one else is, so it doesn't matter. My 9yo doesn't care that I can't manage the interruptions; she just knows she wants to talk to me about something.

Carol 83 said:
It's really hard. I've been trying to quit for awhile. I have the gum but it doesn't really help much. I've cut down by half but still struggle to just stop. Idle time is the biggest deterrent for me, so I try and stay busy.
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It took months of me building up to it. Started with everything in the book to interrupt the habits: switched from cigarettes to a pipe for a long time; then started using the patches for the work days, and out with the kids; false start with just the patches and chain smoked cigarettes like crazy for a couple days; then woke up with no cigarettes left one day, and toughest it out for the full day until I finally went and got low dose vape pen in the middle of the night. The next morning I slapped on a patch, finished out the vape as occasional support when I was about to kill my kids for no reason, but it ran out last night. Now it's just the low dose patches. They keep me up at night sometimes, so I only wear it during the day. Plan is to try pushing it off as long as I can every morning, until I get through the day.

That one that still kicks my butt, though, is that smoke right before bed; that moment where I collect myself at the end of the day and get ready to sleep. To side step the triggers and cravings, that whole routine is all messed up now, and I haven't slept for crap in weeks.😫
 
I woke up very productive today already. Shouted at my 9yo for asking for help with her bike before I had gotten to coffee; then yelled both the younger ones and their friend who stayed over last night for the cheese all over the floor; then yelled at them for playing with the hose too much while filling the kiddie pool; then got distracted by fertilizing the garden while yelling at kids and forgot about the sink full of dishes, and walked back in to find a river running down into the kitchen heater vent.

Got a couple loads of laundry in there, though, including the woollens that have been needing it for a while. That's been successful so far.
 
Today I got a BBQ dinner with half a smoked chicken, a link of deer sausage, and some baked beans. I went to the nature reserve and sat at the boat house watching the rain while eating my lunch. I mulled over the things I’ve done at the place.

I have culled the crawfish pond and collected a bunch of BCs.
I have pruned a big grove of Mayhaws and collected two dozens of them.
I’ve grown about 1000 BCs from collected seeds and planted them back to the land. The beavers ate half of them. The ones I planted on the lake banks were sll destroyed saved only one.

I’ve left the place better than before I came. That felt good.

With a belly full, I grabbed my root slayer and waded into the swamp. Beneath the canopy of a big BC, I found a rare twin trunk. I dug that up and took it home. That felt gooder! 😄

Now my truck smells like wet mud but I think I have “learned me some”.
 
Hi everyone, nice idea this mental support thread. I've had bad depression for a long time, 2 suicide attempts, and my life has felt like a hopeless dead end for the last 3 years, but I've been managing reasonably well for the last year. My trees are the one thing that still make me hopeful for the future, thinking what they might look like in a few years time, and whenever something needs work I can feel like something in my life is progressing.
Also every 1-2 weeks when I have therapy in another city, I go to the botanical garden there afterwards and it's heaven. Botanical gardens have been like refuges for me for years, through different countries and cities. Always calms me down
 
ShadyStump said:
There's ALLOT of stuff on here I posted when I was not doing so great.
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Same here. I've been having a pretty rough time for the last year and half or so. Too many funerals, too much tragedy, way too much stress and sadness. Taking it out on those around me and spiraling. Let's just say that now is not the time I'm going to quit smoking.

FWIW, it gives others additional strength when we read that we are not alone in the headspace we occupy. I think this thread has helped others. It helped me.
 
dbonsaiw said:
Same here. I've been having a pretty rough time for the last year and half or so. Too many funerals, too much tragedy, way too much stress and sadness. Taking it out on those around me and spiraling. Let's just say that now is not the time I'm going to quit smoking.

FWIW, it gives others additional strength when we read that we are not alone in the headspace we occupy. I think this thread has helped others. It helped me.
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Thanks. I'm hoping to be ready to quit for real soon. For now, though, I'm in a place where I'm keenly aware that I don't want to smoke any more, just not in a headspace to make it work without those around me paying the price.
Kinda gives me something to look forward to.

RozendaalArts said:
Hi everyone, nice idea this mental support thread. I've had bad depression for a long time, 2 suicide attempts, and my life has felt like a hopeless dead end for the last 3 years, but I've been managing reasonably well for the last year. My trees are the one thing that still make me hopeful for the future, thinking what they might look like in a few years time, and whenever something needs work I can feel like something in my life is progressing.
Also every 1-2 weeks when I have therapy in another city, I go to the botanical garden there afterwards and it's heaven. Botanical gardens have been like refuges for me for years, through different countries and cities. Always calms me down
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I mentioned once before about people not getting any responses. I don't like it, and I'm sorry.
You're not alone. I don't always know what to say, or how to help, but we're here. If you can handle something trite and platitudinous, I'll make a point of doing better about it.
 
ShadyStump said:
I mentioned once before about people not getting any responses. I don't like it, and I'm sorry.
You're not alone. I don't always know what to say, or how to help, but we're here. If you can handle something trite and platitudinous, I'll make a point of doing better about it.
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Better late than never. Don't worry about it, it's nice enough just to find this thread. With each their own problems we can't ask for more than that silent understanding anyway.
 
I'm writing again!
For real and stuff!

But the backup battery in my AlphaSmart died and I lost all my work when I went to change the regular batteries.
😖😫
Fixed now, but I have to start all over.
I don't usually do space aliens, but this one has space aliens.
 
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