Depression

Depression is such a stupid thing. I have struggled with it for way too long. I am a christian I am supposed to believe that God is taking care of everything and that it will all work out. And I do believe that but.....the depression I deal with has a mind of it's own. I can't just tell it to go away. I feel so heavy, and what am I depressed about? I have no idea - that is part of the problem. If I could figure that out I would be all set. I am having fun working, albeit a bit stressed right now. The money situation while very tight is okay, needs are met. The kids....well, health problems, teenage behavior.....it is all normal. I just feel like there is this cloud hanging over my head and I can't shake it. My limbs are filled with lead and my thoughts betray the hope and excitement that I know is there. I have done so many exciting things at work this week and been creative with both my hands and my mind. So why do I feel gloom and doom. I just feel like I could sleep forever. I know, I know....you can't live by feelings, feelings are fickle. You have to go by what you know to be true, and I do that, but it doesn't get rid of the physical feelings of depression. Somedays I feel like depression is robbing me of my life and I get mad at that. Is it a power in the unseen world that is trying to destroy me? Is there REALLY a struggle in the spiritual realm that would have me be less than what I could achieve because of this opression that is upon me? Or is it a physical thing that I will just have to deal with. It is always at this time of year that the depression seems to come over me in a black wave. The doctor says it is probably because my body is anticipating the lack of sunshine that is quickly coming upon us, and that my body is conditioned for this after many years of repetition.
I want to cry and cry buckets, but I have nothing to cry about! Isn't that the most insane thing you have ever heard of?
I will go to church, drag myself actually, and to my other obligations, I will put a smile on my face and cheer and delight those around me. No one will suspect the heaviness I am experiencing. Is that a good thing or a bad thing? I am not sure. But people don't want to be around a depressed person, so I put on the happy face and it leaves me feeling utterly exhausted when I am done. I think that is why the isolation comes, I just don't want to have to put on that happy face, and pretend all is well.
And I know that those around me would be sympathetic, understanding and accepting if I were to behave how I am feeling, but I don't like being around a person who is a downer so why would they want to be. After all it is more fun to be around the life of the party.
The black hole I am sinking into somedays feels like it will swallow me whole. Everyday seems to be more of a struggle. A determination to survive is what keeps me going. I know that there is a higher power than myself that is in control and He has plans for me. It is my job to keep on the right path and not live by the heaviness that invades my life. I must live by the path that is before me and pull my way along that path and drag that weight behind me. I wish I could cut it loose. Death is the only thing that will free me of that weight.
So I wait it out, wait for the day when I will no longer feel this burden of depression. Will heaven cure that? They say there will be no more sickness or disease and isn't that was depression is? A sickness? Will God really free me of this when I get to heaven? I hope so.

I know the plans I have for you. Plans for GOOD and not for DISASTER, plans to give you future and a HOPE! Jeremiah 29:11

manual for teenagers

Someone should write a manual for dealing with teenagers. Of course any parent of a teenager would probably throw the book in the trash as the kids would probably figure out a way to make that book inaccurate. Oh my gosh! I have heard people say that they would take boys anyday and I would have to agree. One minute I am my daughters best friend and the next she is shouting at me telling me she hates me and will never tell me anything again. I would like to put her in a cave for the next 6 years of her life and feed her through a hole in the wall! Geez!
I get so tired of it!
I don't remember being that tempramental when I was a teen ager. Was I? I will have to ask my mom.

Parenting

Last night was back to school night. Another area that I feel lonely in. First off there is only one of me and two children, and classes to hit and teachers to meet. For the most part I enjoyed seeing the kids schedule's and meeting their favorite teachers. It was hotter than haides in that school though. I bet it was 100 degrees in that school and that was at night! I can't imagine what those kids have to go through during the day when the sun is shining. Oh man! How can they learn in an enviroment like that? And the poor teachers.
The elementary school that feeds the kids middle school was complaining because they didn't have air and it was making it impossible to teach the kids, because they were so hot. Well I agree with that.
When I came out last night to the car there had been some vandalism. Someone had gone through and taken all the gas caps off of cars that they could. Mine was locked so I was okay, but they through them all around the parking area, and one must have skimmed off my hood because I have deep scratches on my hood. They tore bumpers off of vehicles. I hope they catch who did this.
But back to my original thoughts. I don't know any of the other parents, I am not sure I really want to - honestly. But it would have been nice to greet someone and to feel apart of it all. I know, I know - I was there for my kids not to socialize.....but still......sigh.
I didn't fit in at their elementary school because we lived out in the country and not in the additions with all of them. And then we moved and didn't live by the school. But here at the middle school. We live here. It all goes back to knowing your neighbors. I must be the one to change this. Who else is going to do it? No one else is going to initiate a get together to learn who the neighbors are. It must be me.

Friends...

Yesterday after church I was feeling so lonely. My daughter was going to lunch and a movie with friends and I had no one. I couldn't find anyone who was going out for lunch and so I was feel the loneliness all so much more. As I was walking out to the car feeling this tremendous weight, two of the girls from the young adults group flagged me over and said how they had missed me at Sunday school (I went to another class). That helped but then they asked if I wanted to go to lunch, it was a very nice lunch. We didn't go anywhere fancy but it was the company that made it a 5 star restaurant. I really really needed that and enjoyed their company. It made the weight I was carrying yesterday so much lighter.

Loneliness

Loneliness was the topic at church last Sunday, the giant of loneliness and becoming a giant killer. I wish I could remember what he said about defeating the giant of loneliness.

The pastor talked about several different types of lonely people, one was a man who never knew a stranger, could talk to everyone, could call a lot of people friends, but was still lonely. That is me. I can talk to anyone I have many people that I can chat with and ask for prayer requests from but I am still terribly lonely. Another Saturday night spent sitting at home. Another night gone by where no one calls just to say "hey, I was thinking about you and wondering how you are...." The loneliness I carry around is so great and a physical pain. Weekend after weekend I sit around. And like the Pastor said, if you feel lonely and you complain that no one called you how many people did you call? That is a big part of the problem too. I call and call and no one is home they are all out, gone, or not answering their phones. And then that makes me feel worse, because I feel like everyone is out doing something and no one called me. I am feeling so low tonight that it is a physical ache in my chest. Have you ever experienced that much emotional pain that it is a physical ache in your chest or arm? That is what I am experiencing right now.
The depression I struggle with is pulling me down today, the loneliness always accompanies it. It is feeling like no one really cares about me. Yes as my pastor/counselor would say - " you are having a pity party and no one is coming, so snap out of it." If only it were that easy. This is such a physical thing.

Where is everyone? Have the truly forgotten me? Is everyone busy with their life and I am not desirable to have around? What can I change about myself so that I can be a better friend?
A couple of weeks ago, I went over to a get together and found out that a person I thought was a good friend (from the singles group, now married) had a birthday party and everyone was invited - but me - I found out about it later, quite by accident. I was very hurt. What is it about me that no one likes? Am I a know it all? Am I arrogant - self centered - unsensitive? What?
I need to let that pain go but it just builds and builds and then that coupled with the aloneness that I experience...well......sigh......I need to be happy with just me and I need to close people off because if I don't expect people to call me, if I don't expect to be anyone's friend then I can't be hurt. Behind the wall is a safe place to be. You can't get hurt.

Bibles...

Well I did it. I bought yet another bible. Giant Print. I can't read my little ones and the other large print bible I have is falling apart, so I needed another one. It would probably be easier to get new classes so I could read the tiny print. I am being vain, I don't want bifocals those are for old people and I am NOT old. Anyway I bought this bible and I couldn't get it in the New Living Translation like I like I had to get it in the New King James Version, which seems to read pretty easily and it is just one more version to add to my collection.

I also bought a new book - The Lost Books of the Bible - quite fascinating reading so far. I am reading about Mary's parents and her birth and childhood. They say that these books are just as accurate but that politics might have played a part in them not getting in the bible. Or some questionable facts. Like the fact that Jesus when he was a boy got mad at another boy and caused him to fall down dead, and when the townspeople accused him of murder he caused some of them to go blind! But did it really happen? I can't wait to read in the text that part. I am quite curious.

Do you know that Joachim and Anna - Mary's parents couldn't concieve and the angel told Joachim that sometimes God does that so that the child born was not born out of lust but was born as a gift from God? Wow! I think that should be in the bible. Having been through infertility myself I would have been so encouraged to have read that.
I will try to keep you updated as to what I read. It is quite fascinating so far.

Boy I am just full of verbage today, aren't I?

College Animation Class

I am in my second semester of animation at college. We are 4 weeks into school and we have not done any animating yet! How frustrating that is. The class is divided there are some 3D modeling students in the class and some animation students, some are first semester and some are second semester. We have done no 3D work and no animation. The professor is teaching us a Microsoft product to produce tutorials in 3D so he can get grants! The whole class is unhappy and several are talking about going to the dean of the department to discuss what is happening.

I hate the class because I am not learning the animation I wanted to learn. I am learning some fun things but they are not part of animation and that is frustrating. I paid good money to take my animatioin skills (in Flash) to the next level and the prof wants me to create tutorials? You have to know - well - what you are going to create a tutorial on.

And if I went to any of the professional companies and said well I know a little flash but I know Microsoft PowerPoint and Producer - they would laugh in my face! They are not considered the programs of the professionals. Aghhhh. Anyway I think I carried on about this once before.

So the whole class is thinking of protesting. Life is never dull in my household!

time flies....

gosh time flies when you are.....having fun? or are busy? I have so much going on. Classes started and while they aren't hard there seems to be a lot of work. In my W131 class (ha this is what it looks like with the caps on - W!#! weird sense of humor coming through there) any way I found out that any student can use the campus writing center for anything. For example I can take the book I am working on down there and they can help me with the writing of it. Pretty cool! That is very exciting to me. Oh yes for those who don't know I am writing a book called - "Saved by an Email" it is the correspondence between a pastor/counselor and myself during a very dark time in my life. It is my hopes that people who are going through what I went through during that time would be encouraged and changed by the book. I have 100 pages written so far, it is mostly just organizing at this point. I must go through 1000's of emails and decide which ones to use. And then I must change some names, mostly it does not have people's names in it for very little of it is about people. It is about spirituality and emotional well-being.

Anyway I am off on a bunny trail there. I have been busy with my work and my sister's business, and the kids, school and house. My sister wants to work her business so badly and I told her I would work my own business and do the graphics for her and then she could run her business......wow as I start to type this I realize it is too hard to put into words all that is going on.

My youngest son started Middle School this year and he is just blooming! It is fun to watch! Last year the teacher said he barely talked in school and he would come home and just talk and talk and talk. He has always been very shy. Well he joined the drama team! And the drama teacher tells me what a gift he has and how he has such a stage presence! And he tells me everything he does and I told the drama teacher how his teacher couldn't get him to talk last year. It is almost as if we are talking about two different children. But he was so single minded when they announced drama club he jumped on the chance and couldn't wait for it to start. It is so cool! And then he is in shop class - I think they call it industrial arts now - and he is running the power tools and sanding and building things and he is in 7th heaven. He is just blooming! It is so exciting as a parent to see a child take off flying. He is excelling in his classes, even in language which has been a struggle for him. My daughter grumped all through the 6th grade and I was prepared for a repeat but it is not to be so.

My daughter is having health problems. They have decided that the shakiness and two big episodes that she has had is not hypoglycemia as first thought but seizures -- :.....(
They are going to do an MRI on wednesday, and then a sleep deprived EEG and then a 48 hour EEG. The doctor said that it could be because of the onset of puberty or it could be the onset of migraines or it could be something else. She is mad at me and wanting me to leave the whole thing alone, but the doctor heard enough to know that something was going on.
One a positive note - she has had this rash on her arm and the medicine the doctor gave her wasn't making it go away and one day she came to me and said mom look at my rash and I said, "wow it looks a lot better, the medicine must be working" and she said, "no I have been praying about it" so that is encouraging. And I have been asking her if she is experiencing any more shakiness and she said no. Now whether that is because she doesn't want this whole thing with the doctor to happen or because it really hasn't been happening I am not sure. Maybe it is the prayers being sent up.

oh my.....

I am SOOOOOO tired! I decided that it was time to go through all those boxes in the garage from when we moved last October. I was determined that I was going to get more room in the garage. Well I almost accomplished the feat. Almost....but I still congratulating myself on a job well done, even though I didn't get it finished.

I threw away about 15 boxes, condensed other ones so that I now have about a dozen empty rubbermaid tubs and it started to cloud over and I was so exhausted that I just put what was left back in the garage. I have about 5 boxes for the auction house, but still many more to sort through. I am so sore!

And while I was doing this my daughter had two friends over and my son had two friends over and my oldest son is here. So while I worked they tore up the inside of the house and then the toilet overflowed and, and .......well you get the picture! I put them all to work and the house is okay, and then I was so tired that I had all of them come outside and help me with the last little bit.
I deserve a pat on the back. That was a major task! And now we can all get in an out of the car IN the garage. And we can find all the sports stuff and we can find all our tools once again!

Oh groan.....I feel like a 90 year old woman, I am so sore! Even tylenol didn't stop the ache.
But I feel good when I look at my garage.