Making progress in self-care (working on it!)

[goth_mike]

OK, after a week or two away to practice actually caring for myself, I was well aware that while not obviously unhealthy in any way, I would rapidly become so unless my ways changed significantly.  I have been sleeping better, and find that the best sleeping pattern is actually sleep for five hours, wake up (naturally) for about an hour and then sleep for another five hours!  Interestingly I found an article about how this is actually the natural sleeping pattern for human physiology, and was forcefully changed during the period of industrial revolution.

Anyway, I begin to digress.  I first had to work on my social anxiety and outer critic before firstly finding that I actually have some very good and supportive friends, and then thinking through the memories and feelings which traditionally resulted in social anxiety where I would assume everyone was secretly judging and thinking the worst in situations which were outside my traditional "comfort zones".  This is because that actually did happen quite a lot, but thankfully I have demonstrated to my inner child that this is no longer the case.

So, time to get (physically) healthy then!  I went to a gym, for the first time EVER!  For me this is a huge achievement, as much of my previous trauma had been related to physical and group activities.  I wouldn't have gone on my own (still couldn't face that) but luckily outer critic work resulting in being able to work out who my friends are (and there were more than I thought) meant I had support.  This is from a very good friend who himself is recovering (physical injury resulting in lots of surgery) so it was good that we could support each other; I could provide the physical ability where required while he was extremely supportive mentally and seemed to intuitively know when I was becoming anxious before even I did and change the situation to suit.

It was actually far more enjoyable an experience that I was expecting and certainly beats sitting around on my own getting hammered on chemicals!

Speaking of which, I still get the compulsion to drink (and not stop until it stops me) but luckily as I think and feel my way through things, and new memories arise, that compulsion is becoming less extreme and easier to control.

Still taking it one step at a time (and a couple backwards sometimes) but will be hitting the gym again tomorrow!  Hope it goes as well as the first time, but at least my inner child (I think) is becoming more convinced that I am able to protect him.

[Three Roses]

I'm happy to hear the progress you're making! Well done, you! 

[Jazzy]

That's awesome! Great job. You're making a lot of progress quickly! 

[goth_mike]

Thanks!  There's still days at a time when I feel like excreta, but a recent attitude shift means I can be "OK" with it while it lasts and have faith that overall things will continue to improve (fingers crossed)!!