Tuesday, April 26, 2011

Motivation

As in, I have none.

School holidays are always hard. As much as I love The Terror, he does sometimes live up to his name, and even when he doesn't I feel guilty about not doing more fun, exciting and educational things with him. All our spare time seems to be spent with me on laptop wasting time, him watching telly or playing games on Wii and when I finally manage to drag myself and him away from our addictions there is usually much whinging. Or he wants me to play with him and I can only handle small amounts of that, not having the energy or the imagination to keep up with a seven year old. While the weather has been great, and we have mostly been managing to get out for a bit every day, when it's too hot we really don't want to stay out long. And I get tired so easily I need to go home and do nothing for a bit.

So mostly the last two weeks have been not going outside enough and not doing enough exercise and eating far too much. Few days around my birthday (yes, I am officially Old now) were good, but exhausting.I have Stuff now, including more books to read than I'll get through in a reasonable time. And chocolate and whisky, which won't help with diet, but makes life a little more pleasurable. But now the time has come to try and get back to a routine and pick up my Wii Fit regime and look more seriously for work and I'm dreading it. Of course, there's only a couple of days and then another long weekend, one in which my SO will be away, so there's little chance I'll really be ready to do anything and I'm not sure what I should do anyway.

Which brings me back to the motivation thing. I occasionally think of things I could do (or "should do", but I'm trying to avoid that) but they just seem to big and scary that I can't even make a start. Trying to concentrate on smaller things that actually might be useful in and of themselves, instead of just the first step on a long journey, but even those seem to fall by the wayside or be too hard. Every day is a battle to actually get myself to do anything without just collapsing into tears from stress. Or sometimes just a battle to not collapse into tears full stop. And yet sometimes, when the pressure is off, I find myself just getting things done and being ok. But only sometimes. And while I occasionally think "I should mention this to the doctor" whenever I get there I either just forget or can't think of the words or am feeling more positive and think I'll be ok or feeling more negative and think that's just the way it's always going to be. I guess it isn't really my GP's job to help me get my act together but then I'm obviously depressed so maybe it is. But the community mental health team made it clear to me last time I was referred there that they considered me "well enough" to get by with self-help. Despite the self-help failing being the reason I was referred there. But that's the NHS for you - desperately underfunded and unable to cope with long-term "mild" mental health problems.

Now I've rambled for a bit and forgotten my point, if I had any. But I suppose I've managed to blog, which is one of the things I keep trying to do and failing. So that's a start.

2 comments:

Serenity said...

If I may offer a few ideas... Why not start by putting a piece of paper pinned to the wall, keeping a pen nearby. Whenever you feel like you can't do something, make a short simple note. If you can date it all the better. This is something to take to the GP- all doctors can only assess you based on how you present yourself in that short time frame, and in fact I am also in the habit of saying nothing for similar reasons... You can get therapys on the NHS for anxiety and depression (even now) though you may be limited to 6 sessions at first.

Saying the full truth to the doctor is very hard (particularly as by the time you get in it feels like you shouldn't make a fuss), but it is something you need to do.

Excuse me if you know all this, I don't know you particularly well.. but I don't like watching people suffer :(

Adele said...

Thanks for the advice, I might well try and follow it. I have tried keeping diaries and things in the past, but it never seems to get me very far because interpreting it is difficult. Especially in a five-minute GP slot.

I think my biggest problem is I don't trust my own judgement of what I can or cannot do. And because I feel worse having tried and failed at something (having complete meltdowns in public is pretty damned embarrassing to say the least) I often end up erring on the side of caution and just doing....nothing.