Some Cheese with that Whine

Well, yesterday's post really did sound like a bunch of whining, because it really kind of was. I'll never be under the same kind of pressure as my mom is, because she's under a ton of pressure and here I am doing a comfortable amount of work each day and not pushing myself to do a ton more.

Yup, this was me yesterday.

This isn't to say that I should seek out the highest-pressure 70-hour work week job I can find. You don't bench press 200 pounds on the first day, you work your way up. That said, if you're comfortable lifting 50 pounds, maybe it's time to try adding some more weight. (I should disclose that I lift five-pound hand weights when I lift any weight at all and will likely never attempt to bench press any weight, ever.)

So for starters, I am going to spend a bit more time trying to post on this blog more than every four or five days. No, writing stuff isn't easy, and no, putting it out on the internet for other people to see isn't, either. I realize there's this thing called social media where people announce their latest bowel movements and describe their relationship drama in over-the-top detail, but I only use Facebook for playing their flash games until I get bored of a game and move onto a new one.

Today is self-deprecating humor day.

I don't want to get so comfortable I sleep through life, as it were. I don't want to push myself so hard I end up in the hospital, either, though. But luckily, there are such things as happy mediums, and it's mostly a matter of finding one. There is a lot more I could do, sure, but there's also a lot that I'm doing already. Lack of substance abuse, volunteerism, getting involved in my community, working, writing, and trying to help my family more are hardly doing nothing.

Much of what I have to say today is owed to the excellent work of my therapist, whom I saw this afternoon. The weight-lifting metaphor is my own, but he's the one who pointed out that I don't want to let myself get stuck again, even if it's in a somewhat better place than before. The best part was that he pointed out how far I've come and that it's not something to brush off or minimize.

Hooray, I'm sticking with my pic theme!

Making an effort to change your life for the better, no matter who you are, is worth it. It doesn't have to be zero to sixty, and in fact, I wouldn't recommend attempting that because it's setting yourself up for failure. Doing a little bit more day after day and week after week, however, can add up over time, until you are miles away from where you started. Just like that old saying about a journey of a thousand miles.

And to ensure that today there is some cheese to go with yesterday's whine, here is one last ultra-cheesy joke.

Under Pressure

It doesn't exactly take a genius to realize that we live in an incredibly high-pressure world. Whether you're in a post-industrial nation where everything moves at a million miles an hour or a third-world country where you fear for your life and safety every moment of the day, there's pressure all around. This isn't such a new development. It's hardly news.

This song is almost old enough to run for President.

In case you've never heard it before, this is by 

Queen and David Bowie.

We've all felt pressure, from society, from our families, and from ourselves. I will freely admit that, likely due to the fact that I have bipolar disorder, I do not deal well with pressure. It makes me want to curl up in a ball and hide, or break down, or do something really stupid like self-medicate. When three different people are all talking to me at once, vying for my attention and demanding my help, it tends to send my anxiety spiking into the stratosphere.

Since right now I am living with my parents as I try to get back on my feet, or get on them for the first time, this multiple-people-talking-at-me thing happens more often than you'd think. I do have a bad tendency to isolate myself by hiding in my room, but too many times when I walk downstairs, I get bombarded. I could just be trying to slip out for a cigarette, or I could be leaving for five minutes to check on the neighbors' dogs. The moment I open the door is usually the best possible moment for my dad to ask about tax forms, my mom to ask about how to use the computer (she's still hoping they're a passing fad), my oldest brother to ask when dinner is, and my youngest brother to ask about homework.

It was between this guy and a zombie

horde tearing someone apart.

Yeah, I know, first world problems. It still stresses me out. Not much I can do but try to take a deep breath, answer them all as efficiently as possible, and get out there for that cigarette as fast as I can. Trying to explain that it bothers me tends to provoke an angry backlash of offended people, so I have given up trying, which might not be the best solution.

Lately some of the pressure has increased, specifically from my mother. Now I realize that she's under much more pressure than I am: she is a teacher in an inner city school with a new curriculum and a bunch of obnoxious kids that hate her for being a teacher, she has five kids, her husband has a brain injury, her daughter has bipolar, the list goes on. I realize that I will never be under the same amount of pressure she is, largely because I will 1) never be a teacher, not even if they actually start treating them well and 2) never marry and/or reproduce.

An actual photograph of me.

Anyway, at the risk of sounding whiny, because my mother did make a much better effort to try and understand my illness, I do sometimes wish that she would stop asking me to put more pressure on myself. I am not trying to dive headfirst into doing everything at once. I have plenty on my plate right now, and I am trying to keep up and incrementally increase things once I've got a handle on them. But it often seems that I am not doing enough.

The other day she told me I "can't settle" for working at a part-time work-from-home job that will only afford me a low-cost apartment and some basic living expenses. She also told me that I needed to put more effort into my appearance by wearing makeup every day. She made sure that I knew that "better is not well" and just because I'm doing better doesn't mean that I'm well enough to be a facilitator at DBSA. And she decided to tell me all of this before I had my coffee.

Now, I've accepted that with a mental illness of this magnitude, there will have to be some settling in my life. I have to settle on a lower-stress job, which means I have to settle for something part-time, most likely. I have to settle for taking a handful of pills every day and not ever having a beer or a joint or going out to a wild party. I have to settle on knowing that many people will treat me differently because of my illness.

Just because I have to settle for these things that my mother and many others would find terribly depressing and pathetic doesn't mean that my life is over, or that I can never enjoy myself again. I will probably never make much money, but since I will also never have a family, that's really not an issue. I will never be able to drink again, but that doesn't mean I can't enjoy other pastimes, like tabletop gaming. I will never be able to have shallow friends again, but... that's actually a blessing.