Just had a wonderful meal

of lentil loaf, Gruyère velouté soup, homemade bread, and a Belgian endive/mushroom/asparagus salad. Really, the groceries cost very little, but the meal would be ridiculously expensive were we to dine in a restaurant. I love YKWIA's cooking. All I did was chop up two onions this time (he's very sensitive to onions as far as eyes watering, and I usually fare better, particularly if I have my contacts in) and the cleanup. I have two pots soaking at the moment. Otherwise, it's all in the dishwasher, which is running, or I've hand washed it.

Today there wasn't a game, but I worked four hours. We'd signed up for some voluntary overtime, and the folks who worked on Saturday got all the grid shuffling done (we have new scheduling grids, so it's a means to put the displaced appointments back in where they go--it takes much less time than rescheduling every appointment).  No one was certain how long it would take, so they had us working on it through the weekend and Monday [the medical centre is closed tomorrow for Presidents' Day].  It looked like I wouldn't be working after all, but my boss said I could come in today and get some things done.  There's enough in a couple of queues for me to work all day so I will be coming in tomorrow.  Today I reviewed some of the reschedules and mostly stuffed envelopes of letters going out for appointments that shifted more than 10 minutes in the process.  I hand-addressed and licked every envelope.  Apparently, our postal meter machine will seal the envelopes, but I wasn't sure about that, and by the time I found out otherwise, I was almost finished. :)  It wasn't too bad, though.

The other night I sat down and did some financial stuff and really fell into a funk that spilt over into grief over my mother (the anniversary of her death is coming up) and general issues of sadness.  I stayed in bed all evening and really felt emotionally hung over the next day.  I cried a lot and there were bags under my eyes that covered half of my face the next day.  I don't know, the financial stuff triggered it, but I don't know where all this anxiety and gloominess came from.  I listened to a lot of Simon and Garfunkel, which made me feel better (their music always does, despite the tendency to sing about death, suicide, depression, and the like).

Yesterday, like I said, I felt hungover and achy, mostly a combination of emotional overwroughtness and then arthritis acting up, as it was an extremely rainy day.  Today I felt much better, thankfully.

Anyway, that's why I hadn't been writing. I'd gotten onto Facebook in my funk for a bit but mostly stayed off the computer completely.  But I am doing better.  I did chores today, and I need to do my laundry tomorrow after work (I did the dog blankets and bath mat today,  as I meant to do those last week, and there has been a prodigious amount of mud brought into the house over the last few days, with all the rain).  Today was a little warmer and the sun actually came out, and it did a lot for my mood.  Tomorrow it's supposed to be in the 70s.  We've got rain coming back in the forecast, though.

Okay, I'm going to check off my Habitica checkboxes, scrub those pans, and probably go on to bed a little early.  Good night.

I hesitate to write this

But last night the stress of trying to keep everything current with no money coming in (well, theoretically there's money coming, but it hasn't gotten here and I'm not sure when it will) got to me, I got very upset to the point of what I used to call an emotional storm. I used to have those fairly often, but haven't had one in years. It's almost like an emotional seizure. You get so emotional, you get so caught up with anxiety and depressive thoughts all at once, that you can become dissociative, or in my case last night, you want to hurt yourself, and you have suicidal ideation. Usually they last about 20 minutes, leaving you exhausted. Last night's was about two hours. It included intense crying, and I really had to do a lot of self-talk, as my best friend couldn't deal with me, and it never occurred to me to call a hotline, which is what I should have done.

Today I've felt drained and hung over. I haven't gotten much if anything accomplished, although I did try. And I found out there was a check issued today by the unemployment office, although it won't be here in time to keep a debit from causing an overdraught. I was trying so hard not to let that happen. But I'd been told some of the money should come in mid-April, and the unemployment was supposed to be automatically deposited a week after I was finally able to get benefits. Neither of those were the case, which proves that in case of finances, don't believe anyone unless they put it in writing, and even then, be suspicious.

Still, things should eventually get better. I'm still looking for work every day, applying for jobs, and I should have money coming in, as Sunday I request my next benefit payment, which will be for a full two weeks and hopefully they'll have the automatic payment set up by then. I'm even getting my tiny refund from the state on Monday, according to the credit union. It's just none of it was in time. But there's worse things than overdrawing an account. I know my reaction was over the top--it's a known issue I'll discuss with my therapist and psychiatrist. But it was still scary.

My, I'm weepy today

due to my hormone cycle. I cried during Monster High earlier, and Horns. I was on Facebook just now and there's a group I follow that is called Lost and Found Pets of Lexington, Kentucky. Someone had found a dog who had been hit on New Circle Road and circled back to get it, but it had died. She took it to an animal hospital because it had a tag for a rescue group that usually microchips, and the hospital was going to try to find the owner(s) and break the bad news. There was a picture of a black dog that accompanied the post. The purpose of the group is to find pets, including providing closure when they die as a result of getting lost, but it absolutely tore me up and I started crying. I really am being a bit labile, and animals being hurt or killed is a trigger for me to just go into tears. The second time I watched Dances with Wolves in the theatre years ago, I had to leave during the scene where the horse and wolf die. I hid in the bathroom (as did another woman). I cried when we watched Sounder in school. I refuse to consider watching Old Yeller. As it is, I was almost barred from watching 'Lassie' as a child, and also 'Run, Joe, Run!' I just have a soft spot for animals, and I hate to see them suffer in any way. I hope this family gets some closure. I feel so badly for them. As far as I'm concerned, pets are family. I love the ones in my life, even though I don't have pets of my own (except fish). They are wonderful to have in your life, yet it's so painful when they die. I think that's one reason I still don't have any of my own--when Cerys died, several years ago, I just couldn't bring myself to try to 'replace' what was, for me, the perfect dog. And I don't have the right environment for a dog, anyway--I'm not home enough, although I'm home more than I used to be. Sometimes I think of getting a cat, though. Sometimes.