This is a blog post
A new one. I am having a fit of nostalgia for my blogging days. If I could think of… some purpose for blogging, I might pick it up again. But I cannot! Let me try random rambling… mostly I realise it’s interesting to look back, and maybe 60 year old me wants to know what 43 year old me was thinking!
On mental health
I’m currently journaling once a week on BetterHelp, where I am seeing a new therapist, but that stuff is definitely way too personal to post here. Let me write about therapy in general though. I went back to seeing my long-time therapist after some… interpersonal and increased anxiety issues. And she helped, and I love her a lot cuz I’ve known her for so long now (over ten years). But when she went on a break, I thought okay, I’ll try to find someone who does CBT cuz I need to get a handle of these needless anxiety spirals. And I found my current one, but as soon as she tried a CBT approach, my heckles went up. (See, I’d hoped I’d be less opposed to CBT since I’ve changed a lot since I last tried it, but alas!) So now we’re kinda doing interpersonal again, but she is very different from my previous therapist and I feel like I am making such progress with her! She’s confronting me with things I’d never thought about. It’s interesting and intriguing (and scary).
I also had some interesting experiences post-Covid. Did I mention I had Covid in March? Well, I did. And then I had… some post-Covid symptoms. Or effects. Something. I even went to the doctor several time and to a cardiologist and to get a lung scan and all sorts! And I had two funny episodes that were definitely something so I definitely had to be ill for real….. and then last week when I thought my cat was dying I had two more of those funny episodes and turns out they were panic attacks! I really should’ve known better after years of reading about other people having them and thinking they were dying. Well, now I know what they are and yay, anxiety still has new things to teach me? I’m also on meds for anxiety again tho and some things have improved, and even my reaction to some triggers has… I am learning to deal. Some. To be continued…
On love and grieving
The second trigger for my panic attacks was my little cat becoming very ill and my fear that she’d be put down. She is mostly fine again now, but it was really dicey for a while and my God, the grief. The unfairness and helplessness and the wailing and flailing. And I get to experience that all over again when she does die. And again for my boy. I wasn’t wrong to not get attached to anyone for so long. But also, the love we feel for animals is so much simpler and unspoilt than that for humans and their complicated motives and their… separatedness. My little cat is pure love. Humans… difficult. I’m still not a great candidate for love, tho working on it and, well, therapist picking me apart in wondrous ways.
On cycling and plans
I read through my plans for 2021 again and most of them involved travel and aren’t gonna happen. Even Paris is unlikely, as Covid numbers don’t look great now and it’s only gonna get worse as we go into winter. So the only possible one might be a multi day bikepacking trip…? I did get the bike for it (oh yes, I got the backup gravel I wanted, and good thing, too!). Even one night is multi day! I must try to make it happen.
Anyway, I won’t beat my 2020 cycling distance thanks to the Covid break and other… impediments. That’s okay though, I’ve still had some great adventures with Tristan and without (mostly with) and am being unreasonably optimistic that we might get a nice autumn after a pretty middling summer. Cycling is so great. I love my Stauséi and my Sauer (I know those are kind of the same thing) and many other places in this weird and wonderful country (shame about the people) and I am so grateful for all of it.
There. That was a blog entry!
PS Oh wow, today is Michael Jackson’s birthday. I came across some mentions of him in my old posts and my feelings about him sure have changed. 😶