Friday Reflection

With Christmas bearing down on us like a freight train, I'm finding myself increasingly baffled by just how much I do not want holidays. Like, how long has it been since I looked forward to a holiday celebration? When did I move from tolerating them to dreading them? The ones I do enjoy -- like Halloween -- are the ones with basically no social obligations.

Since changing jobs, I've been trying to take advantage of being less stressed out: get my sleep schedule under control, eat better, start getting real exercise again... 

What I'm finding is that in order to even attempt that, I'm having to try to roll back what turns out to be a whole bunch of unhealthy coping mechanisms that I've apparently accumulated over fucking years of being low-key miserable. It's hard. It's good, but it's hard. It's like I'd forgotten how to not be miserable -- or, now that I'm not so much so, I don't remember how to stop acting as if I am and need this stuff to get by. 

It starts with putting in the work, I guess. (And it's complicated by the fact that I am not looking forward to moving into 2025, but that's -- say it with me -- another post.)

Anyway, Firstborn's back home, Secondborn is finishing up his last school day of 2024, and I -- once again -- am mere days out from the holiday with no idea what we have planned and what I'm going to need to be ready to do. Which is, to be clear, mostly on me. 

But I think I'd like, at some point, to get back to anticipating holidays. I'd like to be able to look forward to getting together with family and friends. I'd like to be interested enough to be planning for the holidays, instead of basically hiding from them. I'd like to go into them feeling rested and prepared.

I'm starting to remember that that might be possible.

Weird Dreams

There's a meme going around somewhere that asks, "Are you Self-Sufficient as in Self-Sufficient? Or are you Self Sufficient as in I Am Carrying The Weight Of Years Of Other People Expecting Me To Get Things Done Without Adequate Explanation, Resources, Or Support?" and boy howdy, that one hit me pretty hard. 

I have trouble knowing when I need to ask for help, partly because I think Previous Job spent nearly two decades training me to expect that no matter how reasonable the ask, management was never going to direct additional resources my way. Not if they cost money. Maybe I could get my co-workers to help out -- they were actually very good about that, but a lot of them were in the same position I was, resource-wise.

(It's also apparently a pretty common thing with ADHD/Spectrum folks, but leave that aside for the moment. I know that not knowing when to asked for help is an issue for me, and I've watched Firstborn struggle with the same issue. Which is why I believe it's vitally important for both of us to avoid being in situations like that, where our response is just to take more and more of it onto ourselves until we burn out completely.) 

Anyway based on a weird spot of insomnia Saturday night and the even-weirder dreams that hit when I finally crashed on Sunday afternoon, I'm pretty sure that my brain's having trouble processing that, particularly in relation to the New Job. To be clear: the New Job has been very reasonable in its expectations (especially as I'm still getting the lay of the land), substantially more relaxed, and it looks like for the first time in my life they're actually willing to throw money at things that would make my job easier and more efficient. 

And apparently I have no goddamned idea how to process that. 

But yeah, I think part of the reason I couldn't sleep Saturday night is because my brain was just saving up for this huge processing trauma-dump session which it promptly dreamed me through on Sunday. (I'm actually writing this Sunday evening, so hopefully my actual night's sleep will be less fraught.) About fourteen straight hours of playing Baldur's Gate 3 probably helped too. 

So yeah, that was my weekend. How was yours?

(Monday morning update: Ohhhhhh, yeah, more weird dreams last night and this morning, very definitely work/stress related. Woke up feeling a lot more relaxed afterward, though. It'd be nice to change jobs without my subconscious having to stop and process a shitload of deep-seated emotional trauma, but I forget that, well, that's just not how people work. At least, it sure as hell isn't the way I work. And shaking off all that accumulated stress and burnout feels like trying to hatch, like trying to force my way out through an existential egg-shell from the inside... or smash my way out of a cage.)

(And the way the calendar looks, I'll get this more or less settled just in time to have to turn around and process the whole thing with Firstborn going off to college. I can't even imagine...)

(August's going to be interesting.)