Sunday night, and the weekend is winding down. I'm being turned loose by myself tomorrow and won't have my trainer with me because she said I was ready. On one hand I know I can do it, but on the other hand I'm still pretty nervous. Was a bit anxious/nervous about it earlier this morning thinking about it. At the same time though when I was lying in bed last night going to sleep I was thinking about the job and was excited for Monday to come so I could get back to it. So obviously I've got mixed emotions going on a bit. (Haha) I printed out a picture of my wife and daughter today to hand up by me in my bus in case I'm ever having a bad day to remind myself why I'm doing it. I think the medicine is starting to help a bit since even when I'm feeling nervous or anxious, I'm finding it a bit easier to block out negative thinking. So that makes me a bit hopeful. I also checked out the first Game of Thrones book to read while I'm waiting at the schools for the kids to get released. I started reading it a while back but ended up returning it because I would never just sit down and read, was on the computer playing games too much. Well I guess it's time to start trying to relax a bit before bed, because 5 AM comes early! Hopefully I'll have good things to say tomorrow.
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It's Saturday, my wife got glasses for the first time ever and she isn't too happy about it. But we are trying to relax and enjoy our weekend. I'm finding after being busy this past week that it's been kind of weird for me to just try to relax. Have been kind of worried that my anxiety would bother me since I wasn't occupied doing something. It hasn't been bad though. Hopefully its a sign that the medicine change is starting to help out a bit, but I guess it could still just be the Klonopin doing its thing. Speaking of which, it's about time to take them. Going to leave this one short and go back to enjoying my weekend. If you are reading this one, I hope you are enjoying yours too.
Well I may have only driven the bus two days this week but oh boy it was the hardest days of the school year probably. I made it through though so I guess that's good. Had anxiety flare ups here and there but they went away pretty fast. Going on little sleep didn't really help that situation though. My trainer that has been riding with me the past two days says she thinks I'm ready to go solo starting Monday, so kinda nervous about that but I know I can do it. I am glad to see Friday though. It'll be nice to breathe and relax for a couple of days. I'm continuing to take the Zoloft and Klonopin and am feeling a bit less 'loud' thought wise but I'm waiting to make any judgement calls on whether it's working or not. It will be nice to (hopefully) get a good nights sleep tonight and not have to get up at 5 AM. I do think I will like the job though, and will get used to getting up early. It's kinda fun interacting with the kids and making sure I get them to school and home safe everyday. Anyways, this is going to be a short one, I'm pretty tired. TGIF!
Well I had my first day of actual work with kids on the bus today. Main thing I'm feeling now at the end of the day is exhaustion. The first days of school are always semi organized chaos, as I was told many times before today. The morning routes weren't too bad other than the downpour that happened as I arrived to my bus and had to pre-trip my bus in the rain but I don't melt. I came home and ended up dosing off for an hour or so during my break and was awoken by my wife calling me on her lunch break. For some reason that sent anxiety feelings shooting into my chest when I woke up. It didn't last though thankfully. I was pretty tired on the drive back to my bus for my afternoon routes but was more awake when I got to my bus and pre-tripped it and got going. The afternoon was pretty crazy with a kid that wasn't supposed to be on my bus for my first elementary school route of the day, so I had to take him back to the school. Then my second elementary route had 90 kids trying to get on the bus which is a good bit over capacity so I had to call another bus to come split my load of kids and get them home. Now the supervisors are going to have to alter that route so it isn't overflowing. The middle school route was pretty uneventful other than a couple boys who didn't want to listen. With the troubles on our other routes though we ran late pretty much all day, just like most other bus drivers.
I didn't get home until a bit after 7 which is probably around a couple hours later than normal. Overall I just focused on doing my job which kept my mind mostly occupied. I had a couple crappy thoughts here and there when I was stopped and not busy but I just tried to shrug them off. I'm definitely going to have to get used to getting up so early, but I was pretty awake this morning during my routes so it wasn't horrible. One of the medicines I'm on is a light tranquilizer to fight anxiety though so I don't know if it's making me more tired than usual or not. I guess I can be satisfied knowing that I'm actually getting paid for my hard work today. I don't think this is something I'm going to want to do long term but for now it'll help pay the bills and give us insurance coverage. I'm still hoping the Zoloft helps with the crappy thoughts and with the anxiety since I will only be taking the Klonopin until I run out of this prescription and I know the Klonopin is what's mainly keeping the anxiety at bay at the moment. But of course the Klonopin doesn't help with obsessive or intrusive thoughts, but the Zoloft is supposed to and also it's supposed to help my Effexor work. My brother has had good results with the combo so I'm hoping I will too. Well I guess I'll play some Overwatch before I go pass out. I'm just glad I survived the day. Went to the doctor today and talked about a couple different medicines but decided on adding Zoloft on top of my Effexor as she said that Zoloft is good at helping to control obsessive and intrusive thoughts. Supposedly it also helps the Effexor work better. This is the same combination that my brother is on and she said since we share genetics that hopefully it'll work good for me like it has for him. Especially since Effexor has worked good for both of us. She also gave me a temporary prescription for Klonopin to help with the anxiety I may have with working my medicine out but doesn't want me on it long term since it causes dependency. I have been on Klonopin before and it just mellows you out basically so it'll be good to have I guess. Tomorrow morning is the first day of school as well as my first day of actual work with kids on the bus so I am pretty nervous about that but am trying to be confident that I will do good. In the mean time I'm still trying to think more positively about things. I mean being obsessed and worried about time passing, whether it be hours, days, months or years is rather pointless. My worrying about it isn't stopping it or slowing it down, but it just causing me to be down and not able to focus on the present as much. Of course knowing that doesn't make controlling it easy. I wish I could rely on faith to where I was 100% sure I was going to some wonderful place after I die where I will see all my friends and family (and pets maybe) that have died before me. My mind just doesn't work like that though. I'm too skeptical and question things too much. I'm not an athiest, I honestly don't really know what I am when it comes to religion. I definitely think if I had the faith of a lot of people then I could accept the temporariness of life a bit easier, but that's just speculation. I mean we don't live forever, that's just a harsh fact, and I don't think most people would want to live forever. Whether or not life is fleeting depends on who you ask I guess. I just want to be able to enjoy my day to day life and live in relative peace in the present without worrying about uncontrollable things and things that most likely aren't going to happen for a very long time. Hopefully this new medicine combination will help me be able to control my thoughts and ease my anxiety a bit. I definitely try to have hope for the future because technology, both medical and otherwise, is changing constantly and there a lot of exciting possibilities for the future. By the time I get around to being old, who knows what the world will look like? Our lifespans could even be extended a good bit with the advancement of various treatments and cures. Of course all this is hopeful speculation but I like to think of it to give me some hope. Here's to hope, eh?
So after a lot of time in traffic and then sitting around in a waiting room, we were informed that my brothers psychiatrist doesn't see family members of current patients, so it was all a waste of time. I'm starting to think there is a conspiracy against me. (Not really, but it does suck.) My brother was able to get me an appointment with the general care doctor he goes to tomorrow at 4, so I guess all isn't lost. I find myself being nervous and skeptical that the GP will be able to get my medicine worked out but I'm going with the flow, or at least trying to. In the mean time I basically just do what I need to do and when I have nothing to do I just sit around tired and somewhat out of it trying to fight intrusive and obsessive thoughts. It's weird because I'll get a thought or feeling that raises my mood and I almost feel back to normal but it's always fleeting and goes away before I can enjoy it. It is nice having my daughter back though, because I missed her greatly. It's weird with her asking me about why I have a doctor's appointment and asking about what medicine I need to get fixed. She's definitely not an oblivious little kid anymore. I worked through my crappy mood and tiredness to make baked ziti tonight and it was quite yummy. I ended up eating two bowls of it even though I didn't feel super hungry before hand. Thursday is bearing down on me as well, being the first day of school and my official first day of work. I'm pretty nervous about it but I know I can do it as well. I've gotten a lot more comfortable with my routes so hopefully I will be fine. In the meantime I hope tomorrow's appointment is actually fruitful and we get something figured out so I don't live in my own head every waking hour, obsessing and worrying about things I can't control. For now though I think I'll play some Overwatch to distract me a bit.
Well my anxiety continues to be low thanks to the meds I'm taking just to make it to the psych appointment tomorrow but I'm definitely still having intrusive and obsessive thoughts that bring my mood down. These past couple of days I have found myself watching hour after hour go by as the day winds down like I'm watching pieces of a calendar fall off and watching the calendar shrink. If I sleep a bit too late or I take a nap because I had to get up super early then I wake up hating myself for it. I feel like I have discovered a new limitedness (not a real word, I know) of my time left and the perceived waste of time in sleeping like that even if I need it drives me nuts. My OCD has been in overdrive, completely obsessing about the passing of time in every way imaginable. It makes me feel almost claustrophobic at times. Luckily I have been able to kind of put it on hold and focus on driving when I'm on the bus but as soon as I'm done it's back to the same crap. I just don't want to be distracted when I start driving with kids on the bus. I feel also like I'm missing a lot of "new job" excitedness with getting my bus assigned and stuff because my head is in the wrong place and all I've felt over the job so far is stress. Stress about getting up early and being on time and every other facet of it.
I should be looking forward to the psych appointment tomorrow but I'm so jaded that I have this thought that even fixing my medicine isn't going to help. Like I've unveiled some grim reality that was previously hidden from me and I'm never going to be able to get over it and live normally again. My daughter is coming home tonight from her grandmother's in Missouri and I've missed her so much and should be totally excited about her coming home and i guess i am but I feel like all of this crap is overshadowing everything positive in my life. We went to her open house tonight and I saw a painting above the wall of her 7th grade hall that said "Class of 2022" and I almost lost my crap. It made the reality of her growing up too fast for my liking very apparent. I told my wife "and man, I'll be thirty two" to which she looked at me like i was stupid and said "I'm five years older than you". I quickly realized I put my foot in my mouth. (Haha) I've just been feeling overwhelmed with all these thoughts constantly in my head this past week. I really hope the appointment tomorrow is fruitful and I can get back mentally to some semblance of normal. |