Stuff

I talked to Nicholas after I posted the last entry. He was upset that I said I wasn't sure if he loved or hated me. He said he doesn't hate me and is just trying to help me.

Part of the problem is that I have to make a lot of changes at once and it's hard for me to work on me and keep up my relationships as well. I'm trying to re-learn to love myself while loving other people too, and it's just tough going.

Nicholas fussed at me recently about my lack of self-love, and I told him I'd been taught in elementary school that loving oneself was selfish, that you should put yourself last, after God and others. Now, I no longer believe in the Christian God (I went to a Bible-thumping Baptist private elementary school and was reared United Methodist), but certain things from my upbringing stay with me. The combination of that schooling and my father's behavior toward me really makes it hard to realize that it's okay to love me.

So I have to learn to love me, and to take care of me.

I'm trying to change the way I behave toward myself, the neglectful way I treat my body. I can't exercise right now because I'm still getting over the damn strep throat, but as soon as I'm over that I'm going to start exercising (walking or something) for half an hour a day, and now that I have my guitar, I'm going to spend at least an hour a day learning to play it.

As previously mentioned, I need to rediscover my sense of fun and silliness. When my daughter was little, I did any number of silly, fun things with her. Now that she's older, some of the things we used to do are no longer amusing to her, but I still need to learn to let myself be silly sometimes.

I guess I also have to learn to balance taking care of me with taking care of everybody else.

It's just a lot, and sometimes I feel really overwhelmed by it all.

I also need to get back into counseling. A couple of days ago I sent off an email to a program here in Florida that helps people disabled by mental illness afford treatments and things to improve their quality of life. Hopefully they'll send me an application so I can get into the program and it will help me pay for my counseling.

Another thing I need to work on is my fear of other people's anger or unhappiness. Any time someone is unhappy or upset or (heaven help) angry with me, I panic. I feel this need to appease their anger. I guess I'm afraid that angry people will hurt me in some way. I suppose I have to let myself understand that people can be angry and NOT want to hurt me even though they're angry at me.

Again, it's just a lot of mental and emotional work, and it's overwhelming and sometimes confusing and frustrating.