I have always struggled when it comes to social interactions. I have always been aware of others awareness of me. I remember having such thoughts ever since I was in day care, my first social habitat outside of my family. Even at such a young age, I knew that people JUDGE. As I grew, it became even more evident that those who say they don’t DO. No one is immune. It’s part of our humanness, our senses take in another persons being and those senses are filtered through our world view. We perceive and make opinions, that being the exact definition of judgement. And that is what has always scared me.

I know I care too much what others think. But it goes beyond that, it is a genuine phobia of mine to be disliked for the image I project, an image that in part, I have little control over. The filter through which people look at me is nothing I can influence. The image I portray is precarious on this precipice. One false move on my part can push me over the edge in another’s good opinion of me.

Now, too most people, I wouldn’t be viewed as ‘weird’ or run the risk of being faux diagnosed with Asperger’s, or anything. At best I would be described as shy, at worst, awkward. To say I am introverted is an understatement.

I should point out that my disorder mostly relates to strangers, and people that I have met and have not formed close friendships with, aka acquaintances. Once I overcome the initial fear and find people I genuinely connect with, I find it fairly easy to open myself up to friendship, and can even become opinionated, loud, and generally lively in small groups of people I am comfortable and familiar with. So to all my friends, I’m sorry but you will never get rid of me, as the task of making new friends is too daunting. No, the major fear for me is the first impression, or even the second, third, fourth, ect, ect) Until that invisible line of friendship has been crossed, I am afraid. Unfortunately since, “no man is an island” I know I will never have the option of avoiding social situations that make me feel fear.

It’s not the ‘during’ of social interactions, that is the worst, it’s the before and after. Before any social interaction (even sometimes a simple phone conversation, or even an email exchange) I obsess relentlessly about the setting, the people, but mostly about my actions and words that are yet to be brought into existence. Will I stutter (a mild childhood throwback)? Will I have food in my teeth? Will I overshare? Will I come across as self-absorbed? 

I will start obsessing over the obsessing. Often that leads to a string of thoughts of:  “I must have a debilitating mental illness if I’m so paranoid about social interactions. If I participate in said interactions will my mental disorder be evident? Will that paint me with a brush whose paint can’t easily be removed?” It’s a cycle, a scary one that in the past has often made me avoid social interactions all together.

I can feel it now, the intense feelings of scrutiny as I walk into a social gathering. I feel like people are watching me, judging me. It makes my pulse race, my skin sweaty, and my heart thump in my chest.  I know this all may sound silly to those who know nothing of what I’m talking about, but that is precisely the point of me writing this. Cerebrally, I KNOW that most people aren’t watching the door, fingers clenched in anticipation, just waiting and looking for people to judge, but to those who suffer from social anxiety disorder, this is how it feels. And that’s just the part of walking into a gathering. If someone I don’t know makes a point of talking to me, the feelings of fear are even more pervasive. What if I say the wrong thing? What if the fear is so great that I can’t converse and all I can do is make noncommittal noises? What if at close range they notice my forehead lined with sweat, wet marks under my armpits? The physical manifestations from this disorder always compound the insecurities. Wall flower? Try a wet wilted, grunting wall flower. Not a pretty picture.

Thus I have tried to avoid socially interacting with others when I can, but mostly because I am in relationships with people who rather enjoy socializing, force myself to socialize alongside them.  In order to actually participate in a social life, In order to cope I have adopted the attitude of the kid at the pool who has just climbed the 10 foot platform. I know I can’t climb down the way I came; I have to walk to the edge, heart pounding, and close my eyes and step of the ledge, all the while hoping not to flail, or belly flop.  This method has been mostly successful. Closing my mind’s eye to the present, while interacting with others helps me get through the process, and sometimes even enjoy it.

But then there is the “after” part of socializing. And again, it involves more obsessing about things said, or unsaid. Wishing I had done different things, or made better impressions. And due to those obsessions, I try to make resolves to not put myself in those situations again. Or when having to re-interact with the people I have (in my mind) made poor impressions on, obsess about better (more normal) ways to socialize with them. Again, it’s a cyclical pattern of fear.

There was a year or two as I stepped into adulthood when I was sick of being who I was, and put on the "popular girl" persona. I surprised myself at my acting abilities. I played the social butterfly but obviously it couldn't and didn't last. Now as I look back I can see that the strain that this act caused on my psyche was one of a few factors that led me to a huge mental break down, which ended with me in a psych ward. (very Girl Interrupted, I know). There were moments, since then that I have felt it was easier to adopt the mask, than have to succumb to my fears. I stepped into my character, and played a part. Every single time I did that I came out exhausted; I realise now that the recovery process to reclaim my true self was arduous, and the results were never worth it. But succumbing to my fears was not an option either.

Before I was diagnosed with social anxiety disorder, and especially after, I felt great despair and hopelessness. I had a dream of becoming a successful artist. And this realization, this name that was attributed to my anxieties, made it seem like this dream was not within the realm of attainability. I was well aware that in order to be a successful artist, one needs to be a shameless self-promoter. And that is the farthest thing from what I was. I was acutely aware that in order to be an artist, I would have to actually show people (strangers) my art (a shocking realisation, I know).

A few years ago, tired of the stagnancy in my life, I decided to be BRAVE (more on that in another post). I made and packed up some art, and participated in a festival. To my surprise, almost every single item I had displayed ended up selling! An even greater shock came when I realised that not once during that entire weekend of interacting with strangers, did I feel any fear. Watching all these unfamiliar people react positively to something I had poured my heart and soul into, gave me strength to be able to approach and relate to them, without fear of their judgement. They had judged my art and were appreciative, so by extension that directly reflected their view of me as a person.

With my art between me and the world I have finally found my armour. I am an artist; I am valuable in the fabric of society. I blanket myself in this realisation, so even when I don’t have a piece of my art to hold up as a shield, I throw out the fear by wearing and being proud of my identity.

ART HAS SAVED ME FROM MY FEAR. If you feel art in your soul, express it, it may just save you too.

Here is a poem I wrote while in the throes of my disorder:

I look out the window to watch the rain slowly fall

I can’t stay inside I get tired of chaining myself to the wall

so I look through my closet for something to wear

I need something to hide in so people won’t stare

I throw on my invisible hat

put on my invisible jacket

slip on my invisible shoes

you can’t see me

but I can see you

I always try to hide my face

no one to invade my space

some say I’m lonely

I say I’m safe.

After a lengthy discussion with a kindred spirit/soul sister/creative encourager I have decided to get into the blogosphere again. I have to say that life has gotten the better end of my priorities lately, and writing has gone by the way side, nevertheless, words, sentences, stories and narratives are constantly swirling in my head. Recently, due to a laptop malfunction (aka it fell of my lap) I have been without keyboard, and even more recently had major emergency abdominal surgery, thus the reason for my recent absence. (I won’t bore by even beginning to go into the remiss of last year)

I never promised myself that I would post regularly, but recently I have had a lot of thoughts on mental health and how it relates to creative expression. My goal is to post some forms of my expression: art, poetry and feelings on the creative struggle.

Of course that is the projected concept; we will see what life throws my way.

To start I will share a poem that I wrote and shared with a friend. We were conversing about the desire to balance our desire to create vs. distractions. I was ecstatically honored for her to share the poem on her blog.

To read the poem and for a more eloquently stated summary of what led up to its inception, please see afterthought composer.

 

Art is not a treasure in the past or an importation from another land, but part of the present life of all living and creating peoples.

-Franklin D. Roosevelt

What I am learning, what has been essential over the last few months is to take pleasure in the small moments. To tangibly FEEL the joy brought about by the instances that could easily be passed over.

In the past couple of years I have really grown to LOVE coffee. Coffee isn’t an addiction for me. I don’t need it to start my day, or use it to be able wake myself up. Trust me, waking up to a crying child who is covered from head to toe in poop, is enough to rinse the sleep off. Plus caffeine messes with my head. It makes me all spastic and jittery, so I try to only drink decaf. 

No, coffee is a pleasurable routine for me. I never had a lot of 'routine' growing up. And if you would have asked me in my teens and early twenties what I would have thought about the words ‘routine’ or ‘schedule’ I would have rolled my eyes, and said something about how I was a ‘go with the flow, never plan in advance, spontaneous kind of gal’. In fact I never wore a watch. It was the perfect combination of forgetting to put one on and eschewing convention. The last point I proclaimed often and loudly. This often frustrated my parents, teachers and my husband.

Go figure.

Well, as any parent can tell you, kids change you.

Kids thrive off routine. If you have ever met a two year old, you will know what I mean when I say they exist in extremes. They have no control over their emotions. One minute giggling in joy, the next screaming in anguishing anger. If the one constant they can have is knowing what comes next in their day, they often feel some measure of control, which in turn helps calm them.

Hmmmmm….
That can't possible relate to MY emotions whilst experiencing PPD…..  Can it???

And here enters the coffee. My beloved routine. I wake up to my littlest one fussing for me. I nurse him in bed while checking my emails (gotta love my iphone- but that is another post for another day), then I get the kids up and we go downstairs. I make them breakfast, and while they giggle, chatter and slop up their porridge, I sip on my coffee, meditating on the small(coffee) and immense(kids) joys that I have been blessed with.

I love hot coffee with generous helpings of creamer. But I really love iced coffee. And in my efforts to partake of it at home and more importantly save money (those Starbucks and Tim Horton’s suckers are exxxxxxpensive!), I have over the past 2 years searched for the perfect iced coffee recipe. I have exhausted pinterest, only to find that every method is painstakingly long, or expensive. They involve cold brewing coffee (long and painstaking) or sweet and condensed evaporated milk (expensive) and many other combinations of painstaking and expensive.

You get the point.

So finally, after long and arduous experimenting, and lots of choking down subpar homemade iced coffees I finally came up with the perfect cheap, fast and easy iced coffee recipe!

Without further ado:

The: “Keep me sane ICED COFFEE”

You will need:
-Milk (skim for a low cal option)
-Freshly brewed coffee(if you use piping hot- then you may need to use more ice cubes)
-Coffee ice cubes
-No dairy liquid creamer (my favorite is International Delight Vanilla Toffee Caramel, or you can use a low cal option)
-Blender


Directions:
-Freeze coffee in an ice cube tray
-Make coffee (drip or pressed, doesn’t matter)
-Put 3-4 frozen cubes of ice followed by 1 cup of milk, followed by 1 cup of coffee into blender. Mix until ice cubes are broken up. DO NOT ADD CREAMER into the blender as it will produce too much foam.
-Pour out 1-2 tablespoons of creamer into large cup, followed by iced coffee.
-Stir.
- Add an extra iced coffee cube into the glass to keep beverage cold.
-Enjoy!


Additional comments
-If you want to make it into a Frappuccino, add more ice cubes to get a slushier consistency.
-Pour the left over coffee into the ice cube tray, freeze. That way you always have frozen cubes of coffee ready for the next day!(or that afternoon, or evening, or...)

~There is nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at a typewriter and bleed. -Ernest Hemingway~

My escapism comes in many forms- Most have to do with CREATING; when I create to escape I can put my whole focus into forming my desired object. Whether it’s a day dream, an art project or a poem, I can leave everything behind. I don’t have to think about reality (that, my psychology students, is what shrinks refer to as 'hyperfocus'). Of course if I`m feeling especially lazy my escapism results in watching The Wire for 8 straight hours, or reading the entire Lord of the Rings trilogy in a week. Small detail worth noting: When I am done a series (TV, movie or book) I actually go through a depression because I am mourning the loss of the characters and the world they existed in. I’m a geek. I know.

Before I matured into adulthood, escapism was a defense mechanism which I didn’t begrudge myself. I did what I had to too survive. But as I grew up, I realized that most of my escapist activities weren’t fair to the ones I loved if it meant distancing myself. So for example, early in our marriage, when I would get too overwhelmed with some sort of hardship, my husband would watch as I vacated reality. As someone who has some pretty intense abandonment issues, this was akin to torture for him. We eventually resolved this issue, but my first instinct to adversity is to mentally turtle, and it`s still something I struggle with and will for the rest of my life. I do realize that CREATING something can be therapeutic, but if it takes me away from my loved ones and my responsibilities then it can be harmful. I need to participate in life. My loved ones need me to participate with them.

One of my favorite forms of escapism is writing. I started writing when I was 5. I don't know how I was writing that early. I remember being 3 or 4, lying on the living room floor with my mom, the newspaper stretched under us, and I watched her read the tiny little news print. I recall looking at the letters and they looked to me like minute little lines and circles. I remember marveling at how one could gain any information from such small boring little squiggles. The next memory I have of words was when I was 5, where I was suddenly writing. I obviously knew my alphabet and I remember writing stories in my little note books (you know the ones with the lines on the bottom and blank page for drawing on the top). I know I didn’t know how to read yet (that came in when I was 6) But I knew what I wanted to say and sounded out the words I wanted to write. When I look back at those stories (thanks mom for keeping those for me) if I read the letters purely phonetically I can sort of follow along with the narrative, but I remember at the time, being completely absorbed in my land of make believe.

I filled journal after journal as a teenager. My fantasies were so real I thought I should write some of them down. You know, make a fortune as a famous writer. So I started many novels and screen plays, I was quite the prodigy. But of course as any true ADHDer can tell you, none of these made it past the third chapter or the first act. I wrote A LOT of bad poetry (I also wrote an occasional good poem, which I probably will post on here every once in a while) I journaled my life and how I was feeling. Sometimes it’s interesting to go back and read some of those teenage angsty ramblings… Most of the time it is just horrifying to see how immature and self-absorbed I was… I mean I am still as self-absorbed as one can be when one is a stay at home mother to two toddlers and a baby.

But when I met my husband, for some reason my writing stopped. It’s like my dialogue had dried up. Rather, I know my dialogue was then directed at him. Poor man. I always say to him (rather accusingly and a bit piteously) "YOU married ME". Even though my oral spewing was then directed at him I know that I was editing what I had to say… Despite what you`ve been told, you can’t tell your soul mate every single thought that enters your brain. The endless nonsensical chatter that spins through my brain would make Andrew go crazy. Despite his passionate love for me, he would have to have me committed for my own good(and his).....(ok, mostly just his).

So writing as an escapist medium, ceased to exist. I watched a Sylvia Plath movie once and there was a quote that went something like this `once a woman gets married or turns 30, she stops writing.` I thought this was an actual quote so I googled researched for hours trying to find this Sylvia Plath quote. I couldn’t find it, so now I actually attribute that quote to Gwenyth Paltrow, or rather the writers of that movie. But I sort of believed it was true. Most of what teenagers (mostly of the female variety) anguishly write about is being crossed in love. So therefore when you find the ever elusive LOVE, you ceased to be anguishly inspired. I know a lot of people write about being happy. But I was too busy BEING happy(due to the love) for the first time in my life to actually write about, you know… being happy.

Recently, in the last few months, as my thoughts seemed to start spiraling, I started searching for an appropriate outlet. I figured banging my head against the wall or tearing my hair out wasn’t really setting a good example for my children. So once the meds kicked in and I began to see things straight I was inspired to start writing.

So here I am.

Mentally (ch)ILL

So. I have a mental illness... Well actually several (the doctors say). But despite that, I think I am a pretty chill person. I know that seems like an oxymoron. But all in all, I am relatively laid back. I know that I have my moments of course, but I do tend to take most things in stride (I wonder where that phrase "in stride" came from? I love etymology... research for another day... Because if there is one thing I am good at, its googling I mean researching. Did I mention I have ADHD?)

As I was saying before I was interrupted... I think my years of mental instability have lead me to cope in a way that I can only describe as "powering down" This makes it appear that I am chill, and for all intents and purposes, I am CHILL….. because I no longer exist in reality. My mind takes a vacation. It is escapism. I suffer from escapism.

I am a MASTER escapist. I have my PHD in Good Bye.

When I was young my parents were often told "She is always off in the clouds somewhere" It’s how I coped with life. My sensitivities were continuously being chaffed raw. Life always seemed to hurt. Something always seemed to make me ponder the "Why?" of life. The pondering always led me down somewhat darkly negative paths. I remember feelings of melancholy ever since I was 5.

5 year olds have SO much to be depressed about. I wish there was a sarcasm font.

I remember being at the pool. And I saw a boy with no arms. It looked like he was born without them. I laid in the water for 3 hours, listless. My family splashed around me, playing, laughing, trying to engage me. I just laid there floating, weightless, and feeling heaviness all at the same time. Drowning with the sorrow that I felt the boy must be suffering from. I mean, he had to have his dad carry him through water, because he couldn’t balance himself while walking, let alone swim. People stared at him. What was life like to be like him? He looked happy, he laughed. But I felt sad. I remember anguishing about it for days. I am sure he was better adjusted to his disability than I was, and I had never even met him... I just observed him for an afternoon trying to figure out "WHY?" and "WHY NOT ME?" Why was he born without arms, and I was born with arms? It wasn't FAIR for him. It ravaged my sensitivities, and the image of him being carried around, to this day, still sets my mood dial on sad.

So that is one of my earliest memories of feelings of depression. Stuff happened in my childhood that probably had a large effect on my emotional state (said STUFF is a drama that can’t really be re-enacted because it involves others besides me, and I will withhold it for the sake of the other players involved). But I truly believe I was born with an extra coating of sensitivity. It is a sticky shellac that ends up attracting more flaws than your standard satin finish. The typical breeze of dusty hurts that normally settle on most people, can be wiped off... Those same dust particles of hurt stick to me and eventually became part of the marred veneer.

So how does one who was born sensitive AND born into a dusty whirlwind, cope? They retreat inside themselves. I have a vivid imagination. When I was young I lived much of my day in alternate realities.  I spent hours day dreaming. One friend, in adulthood, shared her first impressions of me as a youth. She said I had a spaced out, drugged expression. My eyes were always glazed over. I never looked present. Because I wasn’t.

I remember being in confrontations or long drawn out lectures. I could nod along, keep my eyes alert and yet be in another reality. I would have no IDEA what the person was saying to me, but even then I became adept at returning non-committal responses to make it appear that I was following along. It’s almost like I could split my brain in two. One part was operating my outward functions; the other part(the one in charge of my sanity) had kidnapped my consciousness and held it ransom.

As a preteen and teenager I was SO boy crazy. I had numerous crushes, but even though I was so hungry for love, I had such a good fantasy world I never really felt the urge to pursue a real life romance. At the time I felt I was a huge sucker for unrequited love… Why did no boy ever notice me? (It could have been that my awkward phase lasted from 8-17)(it could have also been that I never once talked to a boy I liked) But despite the distress I felt in not having boyfriends, I felt somewhat satisfied in my romantic fantasy life. Now, I actually feel somewhat grateful that because of that pseudo satisfaction, I never actively pursued boys, and therefore never got into any trouble.

Sometimes I remember my fantasies from the past better than I remember the past. Or, I should say, I remember feeling the safety of the fantasies better than the feelings I experienced due to real life. My real life was numb. My fantasies were so alive.