Summer at Stapleton
One thing that’s absolutely essential when you work at home is a schedule. It’s also important if you want to eat well because you’re dieting or diabetic (or both). And it’s important if you’re thinking of going back to work and need to get into the habit of getting up early and going to bed early. I’m finding also that it’s important if you want to lift your depression.
I had a schedule when I was working at home and Hal was alive. I lost it when he died because so much of each day was taken up with grieving. Since I came to Denver, I haven’t been able to keep a schedule . However, all that is changing.
Part of the reason I’m doing better is that my doctor increased my dose of Wellbutrin, so I feel as though I have more energy. Part of it is the classes I’m taking at Colorado Free University and the writers workshops I’m participating in. I have to have pages ready every week. Part of it is the new blog I’m keeping, my new secret project.
I begin to see now how much of my energy problem was due to NOT having a regular schedule. So the Wellbutrin gives me the energy to keep a schedule, which gives me the energy to get a little exercise in–it’s like a feedback loop, and the end result is that I feel less depressed. (That presents the problem of what will I do when it’s time to quit taking anti-depressants, but I’m not going to worry about that right now.)
I will not be going to work for the FBI. I’m not sure how disappointed I am about that. It means that I can keep writing my story. I have the time and energy to write it and no one telling me I’m not allowed to write it. It would have been nice, though; it was a great job with a great salary and benefits package, and I would have gotten all I needed to make my story sound authentic. Ah, well.
I joined another critique group. I wonder if I’m not a little foolish in doing that since the last group I was in depressed me so much. I would drive home in tears after every meeting. The new group has a couple of differences from the last one, however. First, it meets during the day, which means I won’t already be tired when I get there. Second, we will be submitting our pages a few days ahead of the meeting, which I hope will result in better critiques. The group meets in Boulder, a half-hour away, but it will be worth the drive if it works out.
I can feel myself getting it together a little at a time. It’s been a long three years of grieving over Hal, and I haven’t been patient with myself. (As I write this, I can hear my best friend Cyd, whom I lost in 2009, telling me to be patient with myself–what a wise woman she was.) So many times I’ve tried to convince myself that I was done, that I needed to move on, that I only had to be more determined, to try a little harder. I’ve felt the weeks and months slide by while I’ve done nothing but watch my bank balance shrink. I’ve been afraid that I will never recover, that my money will run out and I’ll end up dependent on a sister for food and a place to sleep.
I’ve begun to feel lately that all this might be ending soon. I might finally be ready to work, to play, to live. But not to love–not yet. Intellectually, I know I will be someday, but emotionally, I just can’t imagine it.
