I went to bed early, took my nighttime antidepressant before 10.30pm, and still couldn’t wake up early as planned. Last week, I pulled a neck muscle, and the pain wouldn’t bother me except that it’s not going away despite stretching, exercising and correcting body posture. It’s because I’m not able to sleep on my lovely futon mattress in a house with double beds aplenty, but none of the ones that are actually good for one’s back and overuse injuries.
It reminds me why I kept moving so much, last year. I never really mind when my mood disorder is chronic, because at least it isn’t like the physical pain that accompanies overuse injuries. In one shit sharehouse, my room pretty much only had space for my bed. My bad shoulder rarely complained.
At present, every morning, is pain. My bad dreams are slowly returning, and my head is struggling more now to block out noise, of others living, and self-hatred generally. That’s what life is like with a chronic mood disorder. It’s late afternoon now, and my (non-injured) left shoulder is still complaining, but I’ve read one zine while chugging down a beetroot latte.
‘a list of (some) things that trigger my PTSD’ doesn’t have a specific creator named, but on the back, it says ‘Nope Club ’16. The last page also says words that although are hard to reconcile, are comforting to those of us who have ever suffered any kind of trauma:
‘Sometimes your monsters look exraordinarily ordinary.’ (I’m not correcting the spelling error).
It’s hard to talk about or even admit PTSD-type triggers because they do often seem so silly, but terrifying to a particular person. I went a few years of not being able to watch Breaking Bad and still can’t watch Game of Thrones because my mind will bomb me with nightmares and guilt for months. When I first started watching Gilmore Girls, I had to stop because it upset me so much that I didn’t have anyone in my life, the way Rory has her mum Lorelai.
It took, and takes, more than a few years to develop opposite habits of consumption that end up acting as antidotes to PTSD triggers. As someone who has struggled with sleep for as long as I can remember, I find even now that thinking of my old cat Wolfie, or my current gorgeous rescue Fance as ‘guards’ on my bed helps me feel safer, warmer, happier, then eventually, safe enough to fall asleep.
Mel Stringer’s zine ‘Every Morning’ has a person looking happily asleep, while a cat sleeps nearby on the quilt, on its cover. A joyous image, squee! A lot of the folks profiled in the zine about their morning routines did indeed involve loving cats, and loving humans/partners, negotiating bathroom time and makeup/outfits. The zine is from 2015, and I totally just realised that in limiting computer use last week, I have also not reviewed any zines just before Festival of the Photocopier, sigh. Anyway, I’m trying not to beat myself up about these things!
My beetroot latte is finished and now it’s officially early evening, so off I jetset into another hot drink, and more reading material.
(PTSD – post-traumatic stress disorder – normies, please stop using it as joke to say you’re wounded by shit, btw)