Reading around the other day when I was ranting so much about the "spiritual fucks and their stupid platitudes" I have to admit that I'm a bit curious now about the different stages of withdrawal. I usually get goofy instead of bitchy, but walking into day six without a cigarette just feels a little weird. I don't really feel like I've made it over any kind of "hump" to speak of; I don't honestly think I'll feel like I've accomplished any real goals until I've passed one month (realistically with me ...six weeks). Most websites I went to said that the first four days are the hardest, but I guess that I have one thing going for me that "most people" don't: a chronic condition that when aggravated, feels a hell of a lot worse than nicotine withdrawal ever will. Honestly ...the first two days almost feels like a cheap drug high to me; days three and four are much harder than one or two.
...and that's where I'm at this morning; my "chronic condition" is in high gear so it's hard to concentrate on much of anything. I had a minor craving last night, but felt so shitty from what was really just "another day in the life" that I was able to pass off the craving without so much as a second thought; this morning I'm too dizzy to really even care. Maybe I'm a little more determined this time since I feel sort of painted into a corner to do what I've needed to do (for arguably much better reasons) all along anyway. Maybe I'm just doing the equivalent of hitting my right hand with a hammer so I don't think about how much my left foot hurts. At one point yesterday, my left eye went dark in the peripherals kind of like somebody shone a bright light in my eye ...except that my vision was fine straight ahead, just super-dark around the edges. It's happened like that before more than once, so I didn't get too overly bent out of shape about it and everything was back to normal inside of a half hour or so. It's been a few years, but I've never shown stroke activity in an MRI to date, so I just don't worry about it. The bizarre ways my vision gets affected by the dizziness is something that every single doctor to date has just filed off as "weird" but I honestly don't think any of them has taken it very seriously.
I've got five weeks before the big move, and I'm sure making a hell of a start. I got up in the attic at Moms yesterday and moved a ton of stuff around as well as nailing down a bit of plywood to move around on. I honestly don't know what the fuck Dad was thinking when he put particle board down up there (and I'm about 90% sure it was him and not the previous owner); it caves in as soon as you put any weight on it between the rafters (that you can't see because of the freaking particle board). The good news is that there's plenty of room up there after all. The first time I went up there, I nearly had a heart attack because it was so full of stuff. Turns out that there were two things going on I wasn't seeing in the initial "OMFG!" I went through. First was that everything was piled around the ladder/stairs going up; second was that most of the boxes were empty (leave it to my folks to save air from 1994). I make fun, but I actually sympathize a little bit ...I hate parting with a really good box; I do draw the line at filling an attic with them though. There's a hell of a lot more room than my initial guess though.
I brought my sister and BIL's steam cleaner back with me on the last ranch trip, and I made the huge start in carpet cleaning yesterday as well. First carpet cleaning in at least 16 years. I did two rooms, and I'll go back today to do two more. I'm pretty impressed with how good it looks in the two rooms that I've already done ...I'm hoping the next two will go as well, but I can only hope that the rest of the place looks as good as the dining room. The front room is worse than the dining room (I'll be doing the front room today), but the living room is by far the worst of all of them. I'm not sure if I'll try to tackle the living room before I'm actually moved in or not. I may, but I think some of it will depend on how the front room and computer room goes, and how thorough Mom will be on going through her stuff.
I always worked on the car in two day stretches, so I keep telling myself that "I can do this" even when I know good and well that my body is almost done and I'll be running on borrowed steam. Good ...I can burn off all those fucking calories I got from eating everything in sight for the last five (first four?) days. I won't say that the suffering is good for my soul, but it sure helps keep my mind off of things I don't really want to be thinking about.
It's time now. I think I'll start getting the stuff out of my closet that I want to bring up this time, and start getting busy on trying to get myself freed up enough to work a little bit.
c'est la vie
Wednesday, June 6, 2012
Monday, June 4, 2012
...and on the fourth day
Oh, the shame of it all! ...I keep putting myself back in the same place.
Today is beginning my fourth day without a cigarette, but I'm only slightly bonkers on the "compared to" scale. I've been quitting and restarting so much in the last year that it's a wonder I have any brain cells left. I figure the near constant state of withdrawals that I've been subjecting myself to can't be good for me (as if the smoking itself was). I don't see any studies on the effects of trying to quit so many times in succession.
I'm a big believer in "cold turkey" as a quitting method; I've quit that way dozens of times (seriously true, although my tongue is firmly in my cheek as I say it). I don't honestly know if I've gone a complete year without a cigarette since that first time that I "seriously" quit, but I'm pretty sure that I've at least come close. I may well have gone that long until Dad died. The times I've stayed quit the longest were all cold-turkey though; I think the (very) first time with Wellbutrin lasted for quite a while as well though.
Interesting trying to read up a little online about all the different ways to quit. One website when talking about success rates discouraged the cold turkey method since it had the least success and it said only 3-4 out of 100 stayed quit after a full year. ...but for some reason, all the other "methods" listed the rates by six months (if that) rather than a full year. The site that advocated cold-turkey simply said to conduct your own survey and ask the people who had been quit for a year and over how they did it and he wagered that well over half would say they went cold turkey. To be honest ...that's at least the percentage I've seen in real life. To give a derogatory mark for the cold-turkey dude, he said the best method is to simply not smoke another cigarette. Yeah it's true, but still a major "Captain Obvious" answer akin to saying the best way to avoid being poisoned by arsenic is to not suffer arsenic poisoning.
I can't bring myself to put much stock in anyone's method unless they've got more than a year of abstinence behind them. I shouldn't piss on anyone's methodology, but I find some of them to be annoying as shit ...especially the types harping about how God cured them of the desire to smoke ...and they'd been quit a whole three days (praise be!)! Google search some support boards and I guarantee you'll find at least one on your first hit.
Fuck them. Good for them if it actually works in the long run, but still FUCK THEM! One thing that pretty well all sites said was that you need a support system, and on that front I'm kind of fucked since nobody I really know well even knows I started again in the first place. I've not told family or my best friend(s), so I guess I'm kind of stuck with what I have. In one sense, that is a good spur to stay quit since I can't smoke after I move anyway without letting that particular cat out of the bag.
Perhaps it's just the withdrawals, but my patience is done. I stop and look at forums and the people just make me nauseous. I think I shall find something to immerse myself in.
Today is beginning my fourth day without a cigarette, but I'm only slightly bonkers on the "compared to" scale. I've been quitting and restarting so much in the last year that it's a wonder I have any brain cells left. I figure the near constant state of withdrawals that I've been subjecting myself to can't be good for me (as if the smoking itself was). I don't see any studies on the effects of trying to quit so many times in succession.
I'm a big believer in "cold turkey" as a quitting method; I've quit that way dozens of times (seriously true, although my tongue is firmly in my cheek as I say it). I don't honestly know if I've gone a complete year without a cigarette since that first time that I "seriously" quit, but I'm pretty sure that I've at least come close. I may well have gone that long until Dad died. The times I've stayed quit the longest were all cold-turkey though; I think the (very) first time with Wellbutrin lasted for quite a while as well though.
Interesting trying to read up a little online about all the different ways to quit. One website when talking about success rates discouraged the cold turkey method since it had the least success and it said only 3-4 out of 100 stayed quit after a full year. ...but for some reason, all the other "methods" listed the rates by six months (if that) rather than a full year. The site that advocated cold-turkey simply said to conduct your own survey and ask the people who had been quit for a year and over how they did it and he wagered that well over half would say they went cold turkey. To be honest ...that's at least the percentage I've seen in real life. To give a derogatory mark for the cold-turkey dude, he said the best method is to simply not smoke another cigarette. Yeah it's true, but still a major "Captain Obvious" answer akin to saying the best way to avoid being poisoned by arsenic is to not suffer arsenic poisoning.
I can't bring myself to put much stock in anyone's method unless they've got more than a year of abstinence behind them. I shouldn't piss on anyone's methodology, but I find some of them to be annoying as shit ...especially the types harping about how God cured them of the desire to smoke ...and they'd been quit a whole three days (praise be!)! Google search some support boards and I guarantee you'll find at least one on your first hit.
Fuck them. Good for them if it actually works in the long run, but still FUCK THEM! One thing that pretty well all sites said was that you need a support system, and on that front I'm kind of fucked since nobody I really know well even knows I started again in the first place. I've not told family or my best friend(s), so I guess I'm kind of stuck with what I have. In one sense, that is a good spur to stay quit since I can't smoke after I move anyway without letting that particular cat out of the bag.
Perhaps it's just the withdrawals, but my patience is done. I stop and look at forums and the people just make me nauseous. I think I shall find something to immerse myself in.
Sunday, June 3, 2012
You need to work on your mood!
Too crazy!
I'm surprised that it's been a little over two years since that last entry. Not TOO surprised mind you, but geez ...long fucking space of time to go without writing though, especially considering what I kinda started the blog for in the first place: documenting the restoration of my old Z-car.
I brought my car back to Dallas a week ago (7 days tomorrow, actually). I'm really not quite sure when all the changes sank in, but I do know that I lost all my heart for writing after my Dad passed away (two months before that last entry), and definitely after Mom was diagnosed with cancer and went through a really brutal (not to mention unsuccessful) chemo regimen. I just went to see my neurologist last week, and a new doctor who was sitting in kept remarking about my mood. I admitted that my mood was a little poor although I didn't really admit that it's been on a downhill run for a little longer than I really want to admit to. There has just been so much going on on so many fronts ...I really don't know quite how to sort out what from what these days.
I don't have a great restoration car although it doesn't exactly look shitty either ...although I can't say the initiative dried up on the car in concurrency with the writing , things sure didn't work out like I had hoped for on that front either. It'll be a fun little car to start driving again, but it's certainly no show car. After repeated fuck-ups with paint and body work, I just put a very thin skin of black spray-can primer over the metal body areas on the last trip, and I've decided to just call that "good enough for now" until I can afford to let somebody who has a clue what they're doing paint it for me. Given that this side is the one that was wrecked, I guess I could have done a lot worse.
I took it in for the inspection and alignment on Friday, so there really isn't much keeping me from driving it again as full time as I'd kind of like to. It needs a fair bit of rubber (weather seals and new tires), but that won't really need to stop me from driving it.
I only glanced briefly over the last few blogs I wrote, but apart from Dad's death being conspicuously missing (actually, my not mentioning that is perfectly consistent with me), I also neglected to mention that I trashed the engine in my other car and had borrowed a car from my oldest brother.
Weird fucking conundrum for me. I lost my Dad, I lost the engine in my car the day before I lost my Dad. I'm pretty sure I was at least moderately enthusiastic about fixing my other car at my sister and BIL's ranch even though their political and religious views make me a little sick to my stomach to be around for any amount of time. Nearly three years of subjecting myself (and to be fair ...vice versa, although I'm a fuck of a lot better about keeping my beliefs to myself than they are) to stuff I either find silly or just outright hateful. I added to my emotional distress by borrowing a car from the brother who asked me to stay with him, then asked me to leave.
Ah well ...I made myself miserable in a lot of ways; working myself to a frazzle and then coming down sick for months on end happened three times. I didn't even go the full year before deciding to fix up the Daewoo with the trashed engine rather than continue driving my brother's car. In retrospect, I wish I had simply given up on the body work with the Nissan and started driving it again without all the work that I wasn't really qualified to do in the first place. Had it looked kind of crappy, it probably would have been perfectly safe in the fucking unsafe apartments I lived in at the time. It might have also averted a lot of the general angst and resentful feelings that have been stirred up with the sister and BIL over the long amount of time the car has darkened their shop.
Oh yeah ...and in that silent year to follow, on two occasions I had my door kicked in while I was out of town and my apartment robbed (once at the ranch working, once house and dog-sitting). The second time they mostly just stole all the brand new stuff that I had bought to replace what was stolen the first time. The first time I had no renters insurance ...the second time had I filed a claim, the renewal rates over the course of the next two years wouldn't have covered what was stolen (and they likely would have dropped me rather than renew at the 300% increase that is standard after a theft claim). I moved to an awesome new place less than a month after the last burglary, but I've recently had my rent at the new place raised to an unsustainable level given my income, so now I'm saddled with moving again. The last place, the neighbors robbed me blind ...this place I should have been worried about the management, but at least my neighbors are mostly great (my next-door neighbor is bat-shit nuts, although harmless for the most part).
I love the new place, but I tore up the rotator cuff in my right shoulder in the initial move here and spent months (and thousands of dollars that simply piled onto my already straining credit cards) in physical therapy only to finally be told I need surgery that I have neither the money nor the patience for. I'm in pain a great deal of the time, but not unlike my disability ...I've mostly just been learning how to ignore it. Swell thing to have when I'll be moving again in the next month though.
This time I'll be moving in with my mother, where I can only hope that my history with room-mates doesn't repeat itself. The only sure thing about my moving in with my mother is that I'll most certainly have the ringside seat to watching the cancer slowly finish her off. Don't take me wrong ...I'm glad to be there for her, and I really hope my being there will make her remaining days somewhat easier. She most certainly needs the help around the house as much as I need to pay down this outrageous credit card debt that's racked up in the last year. I'm still not enthusiastic about having to watch it up close and personal just like I did with Dad though. I can only hope her passing will be a little more peaceful ...I still have nightmares about Dad's from time to time.
So yeah ...my mood has had a little to be desired. No need for anti-depressants, and no need for a therapist; I think damned near anyone in my shoes would have a few issues with their mood. I have little doubt that I'll be able to push on through it, although I really would like to start rediscovering my sense of humor again.
I think that's been the heaviest casualty since all this started and I'm hoping that I'll start rediscovering it after the coming move is over with.
I'm surprised that it's been a little over two years since that last entry. Not TOO surprised mind you, but geez ...long fucking space of time to go without writing though, especially considering what I kinda started the blog for in the first place: documenting the restoration of my old Z-car.
I brought my car back to Dallas a week ago (7 days tomorrow, actually). I'm really not quite sure when all the changes sank in, but I do know that I lost all my heart for writing after my Dad passed away (two months before that last entry), and definitely after Mom was diagnosed with cancer and went through a really brutal (not to mention unsuccessful) chemo regimen. I just went to see my neurologist last week, and a new doctor who was sitting in kept remarking about my mood. I admitted that my mood was a little poor although I didn't really admit that it's been on a downhill run for a little longer than I really want to admit to. There has just been so much going on on so many fronts ...I really don't know quite how to sort out what from what these days.
I don't have a great restoration car although it doesn't exactly look shitty either ...although I can't say the initiative dried up on the car in concurrency with the writing , things sure didn't work out like I had hoped for on that front either. It'll be a fun little car to start driving again, but it's certainly no show car. After repeated fuck-ups with paint and body work, I just put a very thin skin of black spray-can primer over the metal body areas on the last trip, and I've decided to just call that "good enough for now" until I can afford to let somebody who has a clue what they're doing paint it for me. Given that this side is the one that was wrecked, I guess I could have done a lot worse.
I only glanced briefly over the last few blogs I wrote, but apart from Dad's death being conspicuously missing (actually, my not mentioning that is perfectly consistent with me), I also neglected to mention that I trashed the engine in my other car and had borrowed a car from my oldest brother.
Weird fucking conundrum for me. I lost my Dad, I lost the engine in my car the day before I lost my Dad. I'm pretty sure I was at least moderately enthusiastic about fixing my other car at my sister and BIL's ranch even though their political and religious views make me a little sick to my stomach to be around for any amount of time. Nearly three years of subjecting myself (and to be fair ...vice versa, although I'm a fuck of a lot better about keeping my beliefs to myself than they are) to stuff I either find silly or just outright hateful. I added to my emotional distress by borrowing a car from the brother who asked me to stay with him, then asked me to leave.
Ah well ...I made myself miserable in a lot of ways; working myself to a frazzle and then coming down sick for months on end happened three times. I didn't even go the full year before deciding to fix up the Daewoo with the trashed engine rather than continue driving my brother's car. In retrospect, I wish I had simply given up on the body work with the Nissan and started driving it again without all the work that I wasn't really qualified to do in the first place. Had it looked kind of crappy, it probably would have been perfectly safe in the fucking unsafe apartments I lived in at the time. It might have also averted a lot of the general angst and resentful feelings that have been stirred up with the sister and BIL over the long amount of time the car has darkened their shop.
Oh yeah ...and in that silent year to follow, on two occasions I had my door kicked in while I was out of town and my apartment robbed (once at the ranch working, once house and dog-sitting). The second time they mostly just stole all the brand new stuff that I had bought to replace what was stolen the first time. The first time I had no renters insurance ...the second time had I filed a claim, the renewal rates over the course of the next two years wouldn't have covered what was stolen (and they likely would have dropped me rather than renew at the 300% increase that is standard after a theft claim). I moved to an awesome new place less than a month after the last burglary, but I've recently had my rent at the new place raised to an unsustainable level given my income, so now I'm saddled with moving again. The last place, the neighbors robbed me blind ...this place I should have been worried about the management, but at least my neighbors are mostly great (my next-door neighbor is bat-shit nuts, although harmless for the most part).
I love the new place, but I tore up the rotator cuff in my right shoulder in the initial move here and spent months (and thousands of dollars that simply piled onto my already straining credit cards) in physical therapy only to finally be told I need surgery that I have neither the money nor the patience for. I'm in pain a great deal of the time, but not unlike my disability ...I've mostly just been learning how to ignore it. Swell thing to have when I'll be moving again in the next month though.
This time I'll be moving in with my mother, where I can only hope that my history with room-mates doesn't repeat itself. The only sure thing about my moving in with my mother is that I'll most certainly have the ringside seat to watching the cancer slowly finish her off. Don't take me wrong ...I'm glad to be there for her, and I really hope my being there will make her remaining days somewhat easier. She most certainly needs the help around the house as much as I need to pay down this outrageous credit card debt that's racked up in the last year. I'm still not enthusiastic about having to watch it up close and personal just like I did with Dad though. I can only hope her passing will be a little more peaceful ...I still have nightmares about Dad's from time to time.
So yeah ...my mood has had a little to be desired. No need for anti-depressants, and no need for a therapist; I think damned near anyone in my shoes would have a few issues with their mood. I have little doubt that I'll be able to push on through it, although I really would like to start rediscovering my sense of humor again.
I think that's been the heaviest casualty since all this started and I'm hoping that I'll start rediscovering it after the coming move is over with.
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