Another day, another drain pipe

 After Monday's weighty verklemptness, I decided to focus on joy (including sadness), and to find things I can be certain about:

Things to be sure about: 

*Wynton Kelly

*Charlotte Carter

*My tribe

*The Möbius strip that is laundry

*Kittens, puppies and toddlers run on the same energy.

*Edward Gorey.

*The US is basically the BASF of bureaucracy in reverse. 'other countries may have invented it, but we'll figure out a way to f@ck it (and you) up. It's the American way.

*Autumnal depression and a spike in waves of grief is abated by twirling. Reaching the point of having to acknowledge there is a 

I spent the weekend clearing out more residual clutter and hanging art work I have been procrastinating hanging up, whilst I binge watched Jack Irish.  Sunday was the first art class of the season, with just enough time to get to the tip before it shut.  Monday was spent also clearing out. My goal is to have made clear decisions about what to do with the items in the storage locker by next week. It isn't so much that it isn't achievable but it baffles, hurting. 

 It's a tremendously weird feeling that this is the only paid work I'm allowing myself to do all at the moment: being still, nude, silent.  .  I keep sharing out that I should be applying for, wondering why I cannot summon the motivation or interest. It hurts to think about how trauma-bonded I am to my former employer, but I suppose it was inevitable. My first stint working there was after the hedge fund, after my son's death.  And it was so refreshing and fast-paced after the stultifying environment of being a glorified den mother.  When the opportunity to return appeared in 2019, I seized upon it with a fierceness that surprised me. It was a justifiable reason not didn't stay in the US, to not get sucked into the steaming mess that had already been put in motion when my brother and his partner decided to leave Detroit. 

So, yesterday, I listened to myself. The compulsion to 'push, do, push' was balanced by the realisation that I was in position to be operating a motor vehicle or heavy machinery.  I was ditzy and a bit daft, hormonal shapeshiftng in emotion. So, I didn't. I took the train in town, made my way to where I needed to be, loved and allowed myself to be loved by the people I needed to be loved by, and then I took the train home.  I slept, mostly, and the dreams, though vivid, were not as raucous or out and out violent. 

On my way to the Brunswick Centre, I ran into (literally) an artist I used to model regularly for. Her sister has just died. I am very fond of this person even though I have not seen her in 10 years in person. So to be able to give her a hug, well...that was huge. We talked briefly then went on our separate ways.  

This morning, I sat in a coaching session and had my mine blown away by the experience and intersects.  I have begun to realise - as my mother did near my age - that I am most likely ADHD. The process of actually trying to figure that out - and whether there is an Autistic component - feels huge.  Most recently, I had the degrading experience of having to trawl through my personal history with a psychiatrist who basically spent the entire session hitting on me.  If he had been sitting closer, I don't doubt there would have been a hand on my thigh. I felt gross afterwards and the feeling was exacerbated by then having to engage with my former spouse and his partner - mirrors of one another.

To know that I am not alone in the experience of feeling that I have always been a stranger in my life - and I have always been treated as though I am some sort of exotic bird that happened through a window sill or an alien (Stitch?) from another planet, to learn that there are different presentations of Autism and how it manifests has been a huge relief.

But another area we touched on - well, two, really, the first being that word 'echolalia' - was  Premenstrual dysphoric disorder (PMDD) and incredibly severe form of premenstrual syndrome (PMS) that incorporates a body dysmorphic element into the mix...damn,  was about all I could say. I had not ever heard of this term and yet now...well. it explains so much - like where the desire to self destruct is most intense, when I have done the most self-harm, when I have done the most extreme things to my physical appearance (I am no longer allowed to dye or cut my own hair or play with bleach and accelerator). There's more, but I have been writing this in the car, safe in my own bubble and I am just about ready to get out of the car and unload the groceries. It feels safe to open the door. 

Today, not as ditzy but definitely not up for operating a saw, so I am concentrating on my sketchbook and napping and small things I can do to make things flow. Tomorrow the shadchan comes to interview me and take photos and I'm nervous but excited. Lashes are tinted, nails done. Now I just have to decide on the colour lipstick and my outfit. Life moves along, doesn't it just?