Depression has a hold on me!

I try and deny it. I try to will it away. I fight to NOT be depressed yet here I am.....depressed and I have been for months.

I don't like the word/label. I don't like admitting it. I don't like how it feels. I hate when it happens (and it happens at least 1-2 times a year). 

I work hard to stay up even when inside I want to curl up and hide (or sometimes die). I fight like mad to do the things that are to help a low mood/depression (I know they are not the same but I want to just tell myself I am having a bad day and not that I am truly depressed).

I know why I am depressed. I know what triggered this episode of depression. I am hoping & praying that as things change over the next 4-6 weeks that this depression will lift.


For me depression usually follows an event or several stressful events. I can sometimes see it coming and work to do what I can to NOT fall into depression but that usually doesn't work and I end up dealing with the darkness that has been a part of my life for as long as I can remember.

This is what depression looks like for (and in) me:
Hopelessness
Tired...sleeping a lot/yet not sleeping well
Eating is off...usually not enough & not healthy
Moody.....need I say more
Unable to make decisions on my own (well I can but I second guess myself a lot)
Isolation
Crying or sometimes unable to cry
Feeling sad most of the time
Wanting to give up
Self hatred
Low self esteem
More fights with my husband
Discontent/unhappy with my life
Lonely
Anxiety (although this time doesn't seem to be as bad as before this episode started)
I do lie about how I am doing both to myself and to others

Well that is all I can think of right now.

Thankfully, I can say that I have not gone into a major depressive episode (for me since everyone is different). This has gone between a low grade to moderate depression. I think that being spring has helped and all the skills I have learned in therapy have helped. Getting involved and staying involved even when I didn't feel like it has helped. I have retreated and isolated a LOT but I still work to get out and do some things that are fun.

I am also thankful that during this episode I have been able to maintain sobriety and not revert back to old destructive behaviors just to get through. I have watched a LOT of TV but I will give myself a break on that one since most of what I watch is comedy or programs I enjoy. 

Whenever I would be really low and knew I had an appointment with my psychiatrist I would work on exercising, eating and doing anything I could to bring my mood up just so he wouldn't suggest antidepressants. I am not against them and I know they help a lot of people and have helped me in the past BUT I have BAD side effects from them and there is only one that really works for me but it still has side effects that for now I am not willing to add to my already grumpy mood. 

So for today...I'll be OKAY! 
I am taking one day at a time, one moment at a time and I will keep fighting. 
This too shall pass (I just want it to pass quickly).

What a difference a year can make!!

It is April 1st, 2015 and I started thinking back to a year ago when things were NOT going well for me. It has been a crazy year but a GREAT one also. The work I have put in and the changes in me are HUGE! I still have a lot of work to do and I am good with that. I don't have things figured out and I am good with that....I don't need to have them figured out. I do like the person I am now and that is something I wasn't sure I would ever get to. 

A year ago I was spiraling in my addiction. I was seeking the 'high' and getting it. I was seeking to fill an empty void (the God void) in me in the wrong way. I knew what I was doing and I knew it was insane and I wanted to stop but was having trouble with that (that's addiction). I look back at my journal and it is all there, my thoughts, my concerns, my need & want to stop, my wanting help but not wanting help.

What is interesting is that the 3 months leading up to last years slip (Jan-March 2014) was very stressful AND this year the last 3 months (Jan-March 2015) have been very stressful. So why did I slip last year and this year I am sober and happy and moving forward? I would say healing, growth, lots of hard work and my faith in God to grow me into the woman He wants me to be.

I am now living my life and when stress hits I work to do what I need to to make sure I am taking care of me during those times. I stick with things I know I enjoy, cut out things that are not needed at the time. Work on my self-care and that is a lot of hard work.

Looking back here are some things I noticed:

SA Meetings: Jan-March 2014 I attended 23 meetings
                         Jan-March 2015 I attended 5 meetings

Jan-March 2014 I was in DBT group every week PLUS my therapy sessions (which I still do weekly). I was also attending a ladies sex addict support group but I think I only made one or two of those. I was sponsoring 3 gals (not the entire 3 months). I was working the steps and calling my sponsor everyday (pretty much). My husband and I tried a 30 day abstinence with building intimacy (had sex once in those 30 days). I was meeting other ladies in SA for dinner almost weekly.

Jan-March 2015 I have been done with DBT since last Sept so not doing that in a group setting. I do have weekly therapy sessions. I have done an amazing Bible study at my church. I am growing in my walk with Christ. I am only sponsoring one gal. I am not working the steps. I do see them as a moral compass to live by and will work what I need to when I need to but for me they feel like common sense and like I said a moral compass to live by anyway. I am working on my trauma. I don't talk to my sponsor as much (not even weekly sometimes). My husband & I seem closer than ever and it is amazing. I have pulled away from SA a bit and I know that I can always go back/go more frequent if needed. I have worked on building relationships outside SA. I have been getting involved in other activities to enhance and enjoy my life. I have gone to a few Celebrate Recovery meetings and really like them.

So in this past year I had to reset sobriety 2 times (well technically 3). I had to reset this time last year from my slip up from being online chatting with guys. Then in July I masturbated and reset then again a week later and reset....now that is my sobriety date Aug 1st, 2014. That means I am 8 months sober today!!

I have learned a lot about myself over the last year and I think that is why I am doing well. I have learned to love myself, to be okay with who I am and what I deal with. I don't define myself by what I do or what has happened to me. I am growing and healing and this is a journey....MY JOURNEY and it is a lifetime journey that I am glad to be on. I have so much HOPE even in the midst of stress and turmoil (sometimes it feels hopeless AND I know it is not). I think that is all I can hope and pray for today!! 
                                   I AM OKAY!!

Dealing with Triggers

Before I started this intensive part of my healing journey I didn't really know what my triggers were. I think I knew some of them but didn't label them as triggers. When I was at the workshop at Bethesda I had to write out some of my triggers. I had a few I could think of but have since learned that so many things trigger me and I am learning how to deal with those triggers.

What is a trigger? From my understanding is this is anything that STARTS the desire to medicate with the "drug" of choice. Many use the acronym H.A.L.T. (don't let yourself get too Hungry, Angry, Lonely or Tired) as being common among triggers. There are so many more that I could not list them all and people may have different things that trigger them.

For me stress & anxiety are high on the list. Being bored, lonely, tired, sick.....like I said LONG list. Then there are the visual reminders. As a sex addict I cannot "test" myself by watching or reading certain things. I can be triggered by being somewhere I have acted out or driving by somewhere I have acted out.


This is what happened to me the other day. I was driving home and was feeling hungry, tired & anxious when I drove past a hotel I met a guy at. Unfortunately this is a hotel I pass often and my husband knows about me being at this hotel so it can be a stress for both of us. Anyway, as I drove past I looked at the hotel and the memories came flooding in fast. I felt shame start to rise as I remembered what I had done. I quickly prayed and I can say I was praying out load in my car and I was praying hard because I didn't want these thoughts in my head.

I was able to let go of the shame then the thoughts turned a little to what was 'good' (if I could really say anything good came out of that encounter because there was NOTHING good about that). My mind (addict, satan....I tend to put the 2 together at times) wanted me to want something that was NOT good by trying to tell me there was something good about it. Again I prayed and then started listing all the GOOD things that being sober and NOT acting out has done for me.

I finally was able to get home and the thought/trigger was gone....or so I thought. Once I went to bed that night the thoughts assaulted me again. I was frustrated but prayed and was able to mindfully listen to music and fall asleep. The next morning I knew I had to get this stuff out of my head and fast. SO I told my husband. Since I didn't feel like I was going to or even wanted to act on the thoughts I felt safe to tell him. I also know that if I don't get them out of my head, the longer they are there the more power they have and then the possibility of me acting on them becomes more likely and I don't want that.

My husband was grateful I told him and we had a really good, very healing and intimate talk which brought us closer together. I was concerned of re-traumatizing him but he gave me grace and love. I am truly grateful for that.

I have been working on my recovery/healing and growing a lot there. I have been growing in my faith and relationship with God. I have been growing in my relationship with my husband and building a healthier, more intimate relationship with him. Satan doesn't like all this and I know that he will attack, especially in that area for me, I've had it happen before. 

Okay that was a recent trigger but I do get triggered a lot and pretty much all the time. So here are some things I do to help:


I stay connected with my husband & other people
I stay in God's Word & prayer
I work on self-care
I recognize the triggers and let them go
I AVOID triggers I know that I can avoid

I am sure I do other things but can't think of them right now. I know that after the trigger comes the ritual and that is another blog. If I am triggered I avoid going into any ritual because that is just the next step to acting out.

Triggers can't be completely avoided but they can be dealt with to create a healthy healing journey! 

Fairy Tales, Romance & Real Life

A great deal of my life I have lived in a fantasy world....in my head that is. From a very early age I dreamed of the "perfect" man, life, kids, house, etc.... I think that is every little girls dream. I also fantasized about SO many other things but that is not what I am going to talk about today.

I have read many romance novels and I love romantic movies. This may not seem like a bad thing but for me I know that if I am not careful these things DO create a problem. No one can live up to the fairy tale happiness in these books and movies. Love and sex do not play out that way in real life.

Recently I have had some major changes to adjust to and some traumatic events to deal with. Stress to put it mildly. When I get stressed my anxiety goes up and then I want to retreat into something that is unreal, escape into fantasy. Not always a sexual fantasy but just anything that takes me out of real life. Lately, my husband has been very busy and we have not had as much time together as I would like. So I started reading a romance novel (not an erotic novel...can't do those anymore). Within a few pages I start to feel it....that feeling that something is not right. Not so long ago I would have gotten angry and not know what the problem was BUT now I know. 

DISCONTENTMENT!!

I become discontent with my marriage! WHY? Because I want the romance, the fun, the crazy love that is in the book. What I have is a very busy husband working to provide for his family. A man that loves me for me and has accepted me for who I am. Someone that likes to take care of me, do special things for me, sacrifice sleep to listen to yet another one of my boring rambling stories (well sometimes he will fall asleep to them but I don't blame him for that). Someone that loves me unconditionally. He is not perfect....AND neither am I. We have been married a long time and have been through a lot together and we are still together, working to grow our marriage even after many events that would tear a marriage apart. 

Once we started dating I thought it was crazy that he wanted to spend time with me and not to just have sex (although that was a part of our dating). We had a rocky start but once we decided to get married I thought I had found my knight in shining armor. The young man that was coming to rescue this young girl who already had one kid and now with 2. That fantasy was shattered really quickly and then I went back into my head.

I used fantasy to escape during most of my marriage. I would fantasize about the "perfect" man coming to rescue me from my now not so perfect husband. Once I actually went outside my marriage I realized that real life still did not measure up to my fantasies. Then reality really hit (the disclosure of those events).

I don't believe in fairy tales. I believe in real love. I believe that I have to work on me to be a better wife and not try to change my husband. I do believe in romance but not what is in the books, TV or movies but what my husband really does for me...the little things and sometimes really big ones. Real life is not always fun but once I stepped out of the fairy tales and fantasy of what I thought life and marriage should be and stepped into what is real and true I have found that inner peace and love of self that I cannot even express how amazing that is. I now look at my husband and love him no matter what. He is my prince. He is the one I want to grow old with. He has been an amazing father to our kids. He is loving and kind. He is compassionate. He works hard to provide so I can stay home. 

Our love story may not read like a fairy tale or romance novel but I would rather be living in real life with the man I do have than pursuing a fantasy that can never be.

REAL LIFE.....A MUCH BETTER PLACE TO LIVE!!

<-------That would be my husband!! 
I am very thankful that God brought us together & I have a man like that!!

WHY???

Merry Christmas Eve!!

I thought I would talk a little about the last 6 days and the struggles I have been having. Thankfully not so much on the sex addiction part although the thought had come to mind but I was able to let it go pretty easily. That is progress and I am thankful for that.


I over-think, over-analyze and just make things much worse than they are....in my mind. I want to know WHY things happen and WHY I have the thoughts and feelings I do. My therapist tells me that asking WHY is like a 3 year old and it will drive me nuts just like when kids do the "why, why, why???". Yep, that can drive any parent a little nuts when we hear that over and over.



For me it was easier to be patient with my kids (I was not in any way perfect at this just easier than being patient with myself). I am having to re-parent myself and this can be very difficult at times, like when I want to know WHY and I want to know NOW!! I have been working on NOT asking WHY but just letting things BE.

I know that the holidays stress me and I feel like I have been doing very well on that front. No major depression, not acting out in my addiction or any other self-destructive behaviors. Being around extended family can create trauma triggers, reaction and I am working on recognizing and working through those. My husband has been very stressed and I am working to not take on his stress. The weather is just gloomy, cloudy and dark more than light. I don't have SAD (seasonal affective disorder) but I think that these short gloomy days can affect anyone.

I have felt a little more detached and not the happy me that I was a week ago and I don't like that. I want that feeling back. It takes a little more work but I am getting back there. I know that I can't be happy all the time and I am okay with that I just think I need to know WHY and I don't. It's all part of this journey and I just need do what I can for self-care.
  

Yesterday I needed to cry and it took me arguing with my husband over stupid things to get to the point that I broke down and cried. I was then tired and able to feel connected, to myself and others. I got my bear and took a nap. I woke and felt reset. Not that things will be perfect but to feel better and re-connected to myself & my husband especially is a much better feeling.

I again am thankful for what I have learned about myself over the last several days and things I will do differently in the future to help me be a better me and healthier me. This is a journey and it won't be over until the Good Lord takes me home. 

I am looking forward to Christmas and the New Year. 

I hope everyone has a very Merry Christmas!!

Working MY Program

It has been a week since I posted on gratitude and I am very thankful that I am still doing very well and very grateful for the progress I have made and am continuing to make. 

Over the past week I have been thinking about my recovery and what I feel is best for me. I had an epiphany last weekend and that is where I am now...trying to figure out what is "right" for me. What does MY program for recovery look like now? How do I need to change things to continue moving forward?

I did talk to a few people about this and I realized I need to be careful as most 12 steppers feel that if you "cut back" on meetings you might as well prepare for a relapse. I understand that many cannot and probably should not do that but I need to figure out what is best for me...not anyone else.

I am listening to my gut, instincts, heart....or most likely God on this one and I am not making any huge changes at this time. I did miss my meetings the past week and to be honest it was actually good for me. I got to spend time with one of my kids which was a much needed thing for both of us. I had a panic attack the night before I was to get up for a meeting and it took a lot out of me...rest was more important at that time. Self-care came first as for me lack of self-care can be worse than missing meetings when it comes to my addiction(s).

My program will continue to change as I change and my life changes and as I heal and grow. I think that should be the case for everyone because if nothing changes then nothing changes and change is what helps us grow.

I did make a chart for myself because there is a HUGE difference in last spring when I cut back on meetings and now. I am NOT quitting or giving up on recovery. I have NO desire to go back into any of my addictive/destructive behaviors (even though I know that the urges will come around and I need to be prepared). I don't plan to stop going to meetings just maybe go to some different ones see if something is a better fit or maybe just go to one a week. I am NOT backing off on my recovery/healing work. 

I DO plan to continue working recovery and healing. Use the tools I have learned and cont to learn on a regular basis. I DO plan to keep moving forward, keep growing in my relationship with God, have fun and enjoy life. I want to get back out in life and serve where God wants me to serve.

I want to create a life worth living not just survive. I want to keep changing to improve myself and my life. I am choosing to work MY program and do what is best for ME!!

Gratitude

The Thanksgiving weekend (4 days) is about over and so is the month of November. Crazy how time flies. It seems to me that people focus on being thankful around Thanksgiving or even the month of Nov. I believe being thankful/grateful/full of gratitude should be an every day occurrence.  That's my opinion.

I have been a bit reflective on the past 6 days or so since I posted about my struggling and looking back helping me to move forward posts. What has changed? Why now in better place? How long will this last? Thoughts and questions I ask myself.

I do know that one thing is my PERSPECTIVE on life and how I handle things. Looking back really helped me to be thankful for where I am at and grateful for what I have now. I am thankful for so many things that I would not be able to list them all here.

I've worked on tools to help me through some potentially difficult times and just being prepared helped and didn't even have to use many of the tools I prepared, but I was ready for anything.  I have worked on communicating with my husband on what I need and how to better handle my struggles. I have been confused over trying to listen to others (sponsor, recovery family, therapist) about things I maybe need to do for healing and what I feel it right. This is something I took to God in prayer and just told Him how confused I was and that brought me to my therapist and DBT skills...what would she say "what does your wise mind tell you?". So I sat down and worked that up using DBT skills and came up with what I felt was best for me using my wise mind (this is a Mindfulness skill) and then sat down with my husband and talked it over with him. He was in agreement over the "new" plan.

Things haven't been perfect but they never will be but I am very grateful that today (& the last 6 days) I have NOT been struggling in my addiction. I have had a mostly positive outlook (again not perfect) on life. I am working on staying in the present and not worrying about what's going to happen next or when will the bottom drop out (my mood plummet, my addictive thoughts come rushing back, etc....). This is not easy for me but so much better than a year ago, six months ago or even a week ago when things were not so good.

So for now I am trying to not over-analyze things (this is very difficult for me), work on self-care and what I need to do next and not a week from now. Working on what is 'right' for me in this journey of recovery and healing. Changing things as I go for what is needed at the time. Knowing that none of this is a "one size fits all" program and everyone is different in how they respond to different things. So for today I choose to be GRATEFUL/THANKFUL!!