Yeah, it helped

Yes, today was one of the "good days" in all this - teaching went well, I was still carrying around the good warm fuzzy feelings from what the students did for me yesterday, and the week is over.

I also had the grief counseling. I think it helped, even though, as I said, today was one of the good days - yesterday, until early afternoon, was one of the bad days.

I will admit I was apprehensive, never having done anything like this before, and I'm always worried that I'm going to be "judged as weird" by someone.

I guess I'm not so weird. I found out that all the bad things I'm experiencing - shorter temper, bad short-term memory, mood swings, clumsiness - are absolutely typical of grief. (We probably don't talk about grief enough in regular culture. I didn't know about the short-term memory thing but now everyone I talk to is telling me how utterly standard it is, how when they lost a husband/mom/dad/brother/sister/good friend they had it happen)

She gave me an hour and fifteen minutes. I don't know if that's typical, I kept expecting to be told "time's up," but eventually we kind of wound down and she suggested that I had the three free-to-me sessions within 90 days, so I could make an appointment or call her if I needed one. (I made one, for about a month out, though I suspect I will be doing even better then, and maybe I don't need it. Or maybe it's just the good-day talking)

I did find out a couple things about me.

- I need to be more patient with myself. Well, yeah, I kind of knew that already, but hearing someone whose specialty is this sort of thing say it reminds me that I do. (And I mean that in general, not just while grieving. I wouldn't yell at my niece for messing up while trying to play piano, so why should I do it to myself?)

- Self-soothing (taking a hot bath, going to bed early, reading well-loved familiar books or watching well-loved familiar movies) is not "distraction," it is allowing myself a break from the whole thing in between the processing. It's if I stuff the grief down and don't allow myself to feel ever (not the case) that I'll have problems in the future, that we all just need a break from grief.

- We all have "buckets" that hold our emotions (metaphorically) and when she heard me talk about "normal" times for me, she commented that normally my bucket was maybe 1/4 of the way full - so I was able to manage my emotions comfortably and if there was something that went wrong any waves in the bucket were minor. But right now, my "bucket" is really full and that's why dumb little things (like the projector thing yesterday) makes it roll over, and that makes good sense to me - normally the projector thing would not have upset me so much. (And maybe my students understood that too)

(At least I didn't get ANGRY angry about the projector; I was more borderline teary. I dislike anger more than I dislike tears.)

(And I guess my strategy for dealing with anger - getting up and walking away for 10 minutes if I at all can - is a pretty darn solid one. Because if I can WALK, I can get the anger down to the point where it's just useful energy instead of something unreasonable)

- If I have to come home and sit on the sofa and stare at a wall or cry, or even go out to my car and cry before I drive home, that's OK. If my house is a mess for a while because I don't have the energy to clean, that's OK.

- If I start to struggle during the day, if I can promise myself that I can cry or rage or whatever I need after I get home, and that helps me suck it up in the moment, I should do that but I also MUST allow myself to cry or rage or whatever later - she likened it to "you don't promise a child something 'later' and then take it away." Actually it's kind of shades of 2004 when I told myself "you can't worry about whatever he may be diagnosed with, but you can go home and pray about it at night" and I did that and it helped.

(Maybe I need to figure out something new to work on? Maybe knit the Christmas socks for my mom while I cry or think or whatever. I need my hands to be busy).


Other than that: yeah, it just takes time. I need to give it time. I am not good at being patient with things like this, I tend to feel like I should handle things/get over things faster than I do.

***

And it's the weekend. I have half a thought of running my newest big quilt out for quilting.

And I have $64 of loyalty-money at Ulta (those of you who shop there will now realize the embarrassing extent of my Ulta addiction). I MIGHT go tomorrow after bell choir practice and use those points, I don't know. (I need more of the concealer use some time soon). And "nice baths with nice bath stuff" was one of those self-soothing things.

And I ordered a copy of "The Goonies" on dvd after seeing someone refer to it on Twitter, remembering how much I love the movie, and found that it's less than $15 on dvd. It came today, so maybe I watch it again this weekend. (I acknowledge it is not a GREAT movie, in any way - but it is a FUN movie, and sometimes you just want a fun movie where you laugh and cheer for the good guys and that's sort of a silly fantasy and where the good guys win in the end. And there are enough dumb jokes in it to amuse my inner 12-year-old. And I have enough happy memories of it from when I saw it in the theater with a friend (and my little brother, and my mom, even - and my mom enjoyed it too).

And I signed up, on an impulse, for a needle-felting class in a couple weeks at Quixotic Fibers. It will force me to get out of the house, and to go have fun. Yes, it cost some money, but it will be fun and nice (if enough people sign up....it still might be cancelled). If it does go, I will wind up with a "fluffy owl" at the end of it. And it will be fun to hang out with other people, maybe make some new friends. (Maybe THAT'S what I need to do - get out more in the area and go DO stuff, like stuff that puts me in a group, not like just shopping, and that will maybe help me make some new friends, which is something I need)