During the weekend, I’m used to only having a few hours of time to myself while Zoë is out with her dad. Usually the five hour visit each day actually translates to three or four once her inability to get ready to go expediently and the nearly constant ability he has to bring her back here early to pee, is factored in.
During the week, I get 2.25 hours, twice, while she’s at preschool, but that doesn’t take into account the half hour each of walking to and from it.
This weekend is her second sleep over with her Grandma, and by extension, her father – something his mom’s proposed take place once a month. She left at 10:30 yesterday morning, glowing with excitement after I gave her an extra-squishy hug and two extra kisses.
Today, I slept in until 2:30 in the afternoon, essentially negating the sleeplessness that going to bed at or after 4am usually leaves me running dead on my feet with. Today, I’m mild-mooded, even mellow.
Yesterday after they left, after my nerves had returned to full strength from the mild disagreement her dad and I had, and before another disagree ensued over text messaging – because once again, we’re back to that place wherein me not sleeping with him equates to be being the enemy – I got things done.
I, like everyone I know, especially single moms, have a backburner list a million fucking miles long. I started dealing with some of the things on that list. I got some paperwork done that’s been begging for my attention for months; I washed dishes without needing to occupy a child to do so, or concurrently while making dinner; I went Christmas window shopping, sending myself text photos of what, where and the prices of things we would want to buy in the coming month.
I felt like a million dollars, more so than keeping up with the daily to-do list, less like I was merely treading or suffocating under a tide. I felt manic.
I joked over dessert with friends at 11 pm that the medication I’ve been taking to help manage the mania might be failing in that regard, but that it was okay with me, since it was managing the lows. And all win with little fail is about as perfect an existence as I can imagine living.
When I woke up this afternoon, I looked at the clock and cringed, thinking of the hours lost, the lack of productivity. Until I realized that sleep was productive. Until I rolled off of the futon and immediately started cleaning, and then got dressed to go outside.
Once I saw that I had an intrinsic drive to keep going, to shop with laze and enjoy the taste of my eggnog chai latté, not to hurry or become harried with should dos, a new thought occurred to me:
Being relaxed means I get more done, better; being stressed leaves a bad taste on my tongue, regardless of how many check marks are on my list.
I should be sleeping more.
I got into a fight with my psychiatrist on Monday.
Well, two.
Within the first 15 minutes of my appointment.
I felt like he wasn’t listening to me. I felt that he was trying to force his impressions upon me, that I needed to meet some pre-conceived notion of status-quo or normal. That I needed to make more money in order to be considered successful and that freelance writing was a pipe-dream since according to him, it takes at least 10 years to have any success in it. That I was naive for planning to home school.
When he asked me how the medication’s been, I was honest, stating that it’s kicking ass, but the focus issues are really complicating my life. He dropped the subject, looked for more samples of my little helper and upon finding none, wrote me a new ’scrip.
I brought it back up – the attention stuff – because not-so-ironically, I was focused on it.
He said he figured that it was because I was manic and so, we’d try the meds for a little while longer and then decide whether I should try something different, or add in something for ADD.
I was absofuckinglutely convinced I wasn’t manic.
I mean, I’ve been sleeping. I’m not being self-destructive, even though the ability and notion may have occurred to me. I’m not dieting, or any of the other typical stuff. I feel great. I have energy. Everything is going to work out, finally, it feels like – I’ll be able to work more, and earn more and get my degrees whilst privately schooling Zoë, and hey, I might even get my head screwed on enough to have meaningful relationships with people. It’s more than going to be okay, it’s going to be the best life, ever. And don’t screw with this notion, because I will cut a bitch.
Oh, wait.
Yeah, that’s kind of the definition of manic. Shit.
Score one for psychoghandi.
The other fight started because he asked me how long I planned to be on social assistance for and my back went up immediately, necessitating my over-explanation that I’m not on welfare, I recieve rental assistance, which is something a governmentish office hands out to all low income families, due to the number of social-housing units and subsidized housing options in BC.
It was very important that I make it clear that I wasn’t on welfare.
He kept bringing up that I needed to find a plan to become more successful and to me, it was like he was hammering the point home that I needed to make X in order to be successful in life. All I heard was dollars and cents and that he was judging the ideals that I planned (have always planned) to raise Zoë with – seeking enough and being happy is far more important than having an abundance of stuff and hating what you do to get it.
His statement was that I had to plan for when Zoë went to school and I could work more hours, to which I replied that she wouldn’t be, because I would be home schooling. That started a new shit-storm, with me listing off my reasoning while not-too-gently ticking them off on fingers. (In truth, I kind of hurt my hand.)
He said I was extraordinary. That I was different.
He didn’t mean it as a compliment.
Today, I was complaining (again) about the session to a friend as we expunged on the cost of dental care leading to both of us delaying it, and now needing extremely expensive amounts of dental work done – despite having private insurance. And I agreed that yeah, maybe I needed to make more so that I could, like, afford dental. Mentally, I added, and probably new boobs within a couple of years.
And I brought up the rental assistance argument. And the term welfare. My friend, tactful and unwilling to conflict with most, stated that from the other end of the fence, as someone paying into those kinds government programs with tax dollars and not getting anything back even though she has two kids because her husband is well-employed and makes too much for them to qualify for all but one of the kick-backs I do, she understood his point.
And suddenly, the asshole cloud lifted and it hit me, like, whoa, what he was really trying to say. I’d been so focused on him not listening to me, and trying to tell me that I needed to change. But I wasn’t hearing him.
Yes, I need to work more. Not because it fits a social norm of a healthy, well-adjusted person living within the confines of a stereotypical box – because that funding that I receive, is for people who need it and I should be trying to not need it anymore.
Score two for psychoghandi; and friend with the assist.
