exhausted in Each Day

It’s hard to keep everything front of mind, and not let this brain of mine run with the bullshit it makes up. I have been hyper emotional lately, and there’s a few good reasons for it, but instead my brain keeps feeding me, mostly sadness and overwhelming joy, which turns into tears basically immediately.

When I was trying out the guanfacine, I said to M how I felt flat. I wrote about this back in new meds. M took this as a bad thing, like I was feeling low. But after some thought I told him that it wasn’t low, or that my ability to feel was impaired. But given the rollercoaster that my feelings usually are, flatness could also be called peace. But in the end I never did get back to that feeling of good-brain I had in those two weeks before writing new meds, and between that and the cost, emotional regulation (if that’s what it is?) isn’t enough effect to justify the drug.
But this week, wow. I have had an incredibly hard time regulating my emotions. I have trouble articulating myself. Mush mouthing words, being unable to think my way through a sentence. Being way too revealing in conversations with people who don’t deserve that level of personal information. But I feel like between coming off the guanfacine, and getting literal heat exhaustion for several days in a row, dysregulation isn’t exactly surprising.
Last Thursday I went to the gym to do the force prep class. I felt good, I busted my ass, and about halfway through I started to feel the telltale signs of overheating, along with my usual headache when I push myself. And then I sat in a 37°C room for three hours, as I’ve been doing for the past several weeks because the military doesn’t know how to maintain its assets, i.e. our building’s HVAC has been on the fritz since before I got here in 2018, and we still have to suffer debilitating temperatures because no one will fix it.
Friday I skipped the class because I woke up with a headache.
Saturday I woke up with a headache.
I also started getting random nausea. I felt relatively ok on Sunday, but Monday after 3 hours in the sauna office, I spent the rest of Monday miserable.
Tuesday I woke up with a headache. I was misery all day.
Wednesday I went to the clinic, and after taking 2.5h to assess me (in an un-aircondidtioned room in like, 90% humidity during a heat wave) they gave me A DAY off. Ignoring the fact that I literally had 2h left of my shift… I fucking hate that nurse practitioner, she’s the same one who, when I went in to talk about burnout she said, “it sounds like you just need a holiday”. No, you motherfucker, I need work to stop breaking me.
Some things never change.
Annyyyyywayyyyyyy.
I went into work today and actually wondered if I might be sick during the morning brief. When I saw my boss he was like, “what are you doing here?” He thought that today was going to be my day off, not yesterday. I wish I fucking knew that.
We’re not in the hot office anymore (it only took them MONTHS to start thinking about moving us), so hopefully things will improve. It didn’t help that I had to come home and move all my plants from the back deck, as the roofers came today to drop off the shingles. I’m so happy to have this weight off our backs.

I made a joke to M about how highly emotional I am, and when he responded in jest, I said in seriousness, “Considering how much I manage to stifle my expression of emotion, it’s safe to assume that there is approximately 1000 times more going on inside.... okay, 1000 times is an exaggeration. But I’d say 100 times is not.”

I read on an ADHD forum that someone wrote a list of things they liked about themselves, and I considered doing the same. But then I also thought of dividing that list into things that I like because I’m told other people like them, or what I like about myself because I like it. But I haven’t done it because I’m honestly a little worried that the second list would be depressingly short.

Did I mention I was discharged by my psychiatrist? Since we’re not trying to find meds anymore, she said that Dr. LastName would be able to treat me on her own.

Writing more often feels easier these days. I need to keep it up.