Tag: gratitude

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Season of Gratitude – Where I’m At

The last few years, I have written a series of posts during the month of November about things I am grateful for. It’s usually a collection of things, and sometimes it’s the exact same few things.

Here’s a listing of the last few years’ posts: Thankfulness and Gratitude, Gratitude – Part One, and Gratitude – Part Two.

November has come and gone, and it’s already Thanksgiving. There really isn’t enough time in a month, week, or day. I have had a lot of time to think about the things that I am particularly grateful in this season of life.

I am so grateful for a slow shift toward “normal” life. It has been an adjustment. Overall, Korea is still taking COVID-19 seriously, but it’s shifting slowly toward a “living with COVID” mentality. I didn’t realize how much I have missed. We went to a few festivals last month and have been visiting cafes and going out on dates more often than we ever did when we were still dating.

I am also grateful for continued good health. I have not come down with anything terribly severe this year. No ER visits! No crippling pain. It’s been a mild year. Despite getting COVID in March, I have been very well and strong.

I am so grateful for all of the time I have had to spend with my beloved pets. With the passing of Dobby in April, and then, more recently, Yuuki’s passing in October, I have been feeling so grateful to have had the opportunity to have such amazing animals in my life. It’s been a hard year, and I wish with every ounce of my being that I didn’t have to say good-bye to Dobby or Yuuki. Even so, I am so grateful for the years I have had with the both of them. I cherish every single memory, and I revisit them often. In addition, I have been making so many wonderful memories with the pets that are still with me today. Misha went to the Nakhwa Nori Fireworks Festival in Haman. She loves spending time outdoors and with us. We also made a stop in Changdong, an art neighborhood in our city, that has fake snow every hour in the evening on weekends. She wasn’t that excited about that, but we got some cute pictures.

I’m also so thankful for being able to reach the milestones that I have reached alongside my partner this year. First off, we moved into a small apartment together in August. It was a whirlwind of a move. Like I mentioned in Life Update + Grief Journey, between seeing the apartment and moving in, it was less than 10 days. Then, after the Chuseok holiday, we went and registered our marriage. At this time, we do not intend on having a wedding due to my family being so far and not feeling like we want to celebrate with a huge group of people. Nevertheless, this has been an exciting change and start to a new chapter in both of our lives.

I so very thankful that I will be seeing my mother at the end of the year. She is making a trip out to Asia and stopping in Vietnam first with my aunt. They will circle back to Korea and stay a little over a week with us. I am so excited to see her after 3 years of being stuck in Korea. It’ll be amazing to be with my own family again.

I am thankful for an amazing husband and in-laws. Over the last year, I have really been able to spend a lot of time with my partner and his family. They have been so welcoming and loving despite the language barrier. We went on a few wonderful trips this year to Jeju Island and a fishing trip in Masan. I am looking forward to having a family to spend major holidays with, and to feel more connected to others. Being a foreigner in a different country can be isolating, and I am so grateful that I am a little less lonely this year. And of course, I am so happy that I continue to be loved and cared for by the best husband. Thank you for meeting me where I’m at, and always thinking of me in everything that you do. Thank you for always making me laugh and becoming a crazy fur parent like me.

There’s a lot of gratitude to go around this year. It is a great reminder that I am fully allowed to feel more than one thing at a time. I am allowed to be heartbroken from grief, and appreciate what I have. I am allowed to celebrate accomplishments, milestones, and holidays while I hurt from loss. It’s been a very emotionally complex year. At times it feels like the worst year yet. At other times, it’s been the best. Looking forward to the next year with cautious optimism

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Gratitude – Part Two

Man, I did not intend to have an entire post just about my cat. But I really couldn’t condense how thankful I am for his addition to the fur family.

Like I said in that post, adopting him was the beginning of a lot of really great things.

It wasn’t long after I decided to adopt him that I met my current partner. I had called it quits with my ex 7 months prior, and I was just getting back into the swing of socializing. I have learned so much from my partner about how it feels to not have your relationship as one of your top stressors. Despite a “language barrier” (he is a native Korean), I have never found communicating to be so simple.

I have met a partner that saw me for me and not just a “potential” for who I could be. He accepted me at the state I was in on my mental health journey. He held my hand through the tough bits, and patiently walked with me through it. I am so grateful to have a person that wasn’t pushing me to transform and heal at that moment. He is in this with me and experiencing growth just as I am.

Most importantly, my partner has helped me re-discover fun. Even the most mundane of things is fun when we’re together. Going to Costco, eating burgers at a local burger place, taking the dogs to the cafe, or just hanging out at home doing our own thing while sharing the same space can be fun. I’m looking forward to the time we will have together in the future, however long that may be.

Yes, even that time my cat almost severed tendons in my hand became something we laugh about.

This past year, I fell back in love with my job. That isn’t to say that I do not have periods of burn out, but I had spent so much of 2019-2020 completely disassociated from my work. I no longer remembered why I came back to teach in the first place.

I am so thankful to have a job that doesn’t abuse my willingness to help out. While the hours and the work can be tough, I have never really felt like I was nothing but a body. Over the last year, I have had a few situations (see photo above) regarding my physical health that have required understanding and extra care. I was accommodated and cared for during those times, and I am so grateful to have an upper management team that is actually attentive and caring about my wellbeing.

It’s been good to be able to focus on teaching the best that I can without worrying about abusive colleagues. We get in, we teach, we have some fun, and we clock out at the end of the day. This is how a job should be.

This isn’t to say it’s perfect, but it is just what I needed after years of not having the right environment to thrive in.

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Gratitude – Part One

‘Tis the season to think about what you’re grateful for!

Of course, Thanksgiving isn’t the only time you should be grateful for what you have in life. However, I realized that I haven’t really written about gratitude in 2 years. So much has changed since the last Thankfulness and Gratitude post. Well, mainly the fur family, significant other, and job. Today, my focus is on how grateful I am that those things have changed.

My fur family saw a major change last year when I welcomed Butterscotch to the family. He is my first and only cat. He is my biggest foster fail. He is the perfect addition to our little family. Butterscotch popped into my life during a time of hardship. It was the beginning of the pandemic 2020, and I had just called it quits with my then-boyfriend. I honestly felt like my world had been turned upside and that shit was the lowest it will ever get. What I didn’t know, was that this was about to turn into one of the best years of my life. It all started with Butterscotch.

He was a dirty little thing, and so needy. I was lucky that my boss, at the time, loves cats and she allowed me to have him in his carrier at my feet while I taught online. He had a kitty cold and needed a lot of TLC before he could go to a forever family. I was intent on finding him one. The pandemic made it hard, but I had friends back home that were so interested in adding him to their family. I got on a waitlist for flights heading to Chicago, and got estimates for him to fly.

Despite the promising forever home, I just couldn’t let him go. I was overly protective of him and nothing felt quite right if he wasn’t at home with us. So, after a few foster homes… and friends of mine running away screaming (he’s a bit of a troublemaker), he ended up in my home again in September of 2020. This time, it was for good.

I had to break it to the potential adopters that I wouldn’t be sending him over. I felt horrible, but I would have felt worse if I had taken him away from Misha and Dobby. They were attached. We moved houses quite a few times in this last year, but he has adjusted well each time. I’m so grateful I stumbled on him last year. I can’t imagine what my little family would be like without him.

Like I said at the beginning of this post, adding him to my life was the start of one of the best years I have had in a long time.

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“The Benefits of Heartbreak”

Now that I’ve started out the mood of the post with a song that puts together what the last few days have felt like to me in a nice and concise 3 minute and 30 second musical delight.

This week has felt like an entire month. It started out with a nervous Monday. My mind was all over the place and fearing all of the changes that are happening all over the world. I remember being told by friends and family back home that it’s ok, and I’ll be fine during this COVID-19 mess, but… I still didn’t feel fine. Now that it’s back home my brain went into overdrive. What if my parents get sick? My friends and loved ones? I couldn’t take care of myself. I couldn’t even feed myself. I couldn’t bring myself to get out of bed. I just couldn’t do anything productive. At this time, I managed to reach my partner, and something compelled me to ask “Do you still have room for this relationship?” While he had been busier over the last few weeks, an effort was still made to keep me in his life. I felt so disconnected and so afraid, I asked this question, that I knew the answer to.

Sadly, I could feel my mental health and control over my reactions unraveling. At times like these, my mind can often wander into the, “It would be nice to disappear” area of my brain. Or even scarier, “Who would I have to write letters to? I want them all to know it’s not because of anything they did. I was selfish and incredibly cowardly and useless” territory. I know that when these thoughts begin to invade my thoughts whenever I’m alone, it is often an issue with the medication I’m taking.

By Wednesday, I knew I had to visit my doctor. But, of course, my doctor could not see me. The hospital I visit has become the spot where Daegu city (the Korean city with the most cases) sends patients to get treatment and to keep their hospitals in operation for other conditions. It was shut down for non-COVID19 cases. I could not see my doctor. This is where being a foreigner that has limited ability to speak Korean becomes hard. I panicked, “What do you mean I can’t get support until this thing blows over?” Luckily, I have amazing support that helped me locate a new clinic that specializes in psychiatry. I’m so grateful for my friends this week.

The psychiatrist was compassionate and patient. He listened carefully to my struggles. Took note of what worked and didn’t work before putting me on a new combination of pills. 8 hours after taking my first dose, a sobering and heartbreaking realization hit me. “It’s not that my boyfriend doesn’t have room for me, I am projecting the fact that I can’t keep my head above the water in the situation and I don’t have room to be an understanding and secure person in this relationship. I needed to get back to feeling like myself, and it was no longer sustainable to try to do that while dealing with the pandemic, changed schedules, and our relationship.

I have spent the last few days regretting and then reassuring myself over making this move. Right now, to this moment, I still love him very much. But I know that he is happier and freer without the stress of having to help me maintain a level head and feeling secure in our relationship.

Why is it that it feels harder to say good-bye when it’s not because all of my love for the person has run out, but because I love them and don’t want to burden them any longer? Why is it that this remains difficult for me to process and fully accept?

Why the hell did I rip my own heart out and ghetto stomp it to pieces on purpose?

While the thoughts at the moment circle around a lot of negativity and sadness, I do want to list a few things I’m grateful for.

  1. I’m grateful for the memories that this relationship brought me. I have experienced, learned, and felt so much affection, love, and had so many adventures with a person that I truly enjoyed spending time with.
  2. I’m grateful for the support for my decisions, the compassion and love he showed me despite how difficult this was for me and maybe even for him.
  3. I’m grateful for my network of friends that are rooting for me, and consequently rooting for a small possibility that we may still have love in our future.
  4. I’m grateful for how much change, growth, and love I’ve shown myself over the last year. It hasn’t been easy, but my support system has done their best to hold me accountable.

I felt very reluctant about posting this, but I imagine some readers may have similar experiences they would like to discuss or ponder about.

I will make it a goal to update this blog more often. This is a formative period in my development and I hope to be able to write and record this journey.

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The Next Step

Admittedly, I suck at compartmentalizing my thoughts and going through my issues when I am mentally in a space which I feel more capable. Instead, I’ve been suffering from a constant stream of negative and invasive ideas and emotions at all times. It’s exhausting to keep battling off and rationalizing the more intrusive thoughts while putting on a smile to teach kids. No matter how shitty life has been going, I know I still need to keep moving forward through the barrier. I’ve found a few things that have helped me.

  1. Establishing and sticking to a routine that helps me get out of the house, socialize, and also independently care for my need to explore and roam. I have already begun to schedule/plan for future weekends in order to make full use of my time here, I’d like to travel to somewhere I’ve never been once every month. Planning and searching for places will give me occupation throughout the week.
  2. I do not allow my private living space to also be polluted by work space. This past week, being sick in bed has made it so that it was nearly impossible not to do at least some work while I was here. But it really blurred the boundaries and lines for me, and created a hectic environment in my own home.
  3. Dedicate time to blogging and expressing as much as I can. Because as difficult as it is to feel all the emotions, it is still much better than feeling none.

    I’m going to start #3 here shortly. I think the main thing I want to focus on is gratitude for all of the progress I’ve made since the beginning of my journey. While it certainly has not been linear, it’s been in an upward trend since the beginning, I have my days of difficulties, but overall, I have become a much stronger and more resilient person since the beginning

I am also so grateful to have a strong network and friends and family that are always there tho check up on me. They give me the space I need to grow, but have never stopped telling me how committed they are to being there for me.

Last of all, I’m thankful for all of the interactions I’ve had with people I’ve recently met, as well as everyone else I’ve met in my life time. I am so lucky to have crossed paths with so many different people that have taught me so many different things. Good things, bad things, medium things…. I have learned so much just by being in the presence and becoming connected to so many people in this world.

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One day at a time…

Today has been a little bit of a journey for me. I’ve been feeling very physically ill, and terrified that it was the Wuhan Coronavirus. I know, I know… health anxiety is a real thing and I should stop Googling symptoms. I stopped by the hospital to get checked, and they don’t seem to concerned. Of course, that’s not how anxiety works. I’m still terrified.

Aside from taking care of myself, I have also been sorting through a lot of thoughts this evening. I had planned on doing this, as I mentioned in my last post. It’s my last day of a long holiday weekend and I have been thinking and sorting through a lot of the anxiety, sadness, and fears that I’ve been setting aside because I have been too tired, overwhelmed and anxious to deal with my stuff. Here are some things I’ve sorted through, and some things that I have realized through the last few weeks.

The winter months are packed full of holidays, and I’ve been experiencing some serious sadness and loneliness on an almost monthly basis. Thanksgiving, Christmas, Lunar New Year are all holidays I enjoy spending with my family and friends. I missed out on so many things and I know it’s my own damn fault. I chose to come out here, why? Why did I choose to come out here if I get so sad when I can’t be with people that I love on important days. My anxiety kind of overflows during this time, as my family and loved ones are too busy to communicate and update me. I feel like their lives are flying by while my life is sitting at a standstill waiting for news and updates about their lives. I am justifiably sad/down in the dumps. Even though I have been feeling a little bit sad about things like missing my family, significant other, and friends. I understand that being far apart doesn’t mean that I am not loved and not important. Realizing this and working through the rationalizing has helped me feel a lot less anguished.

Another feeling I’ve been working through is absolute exhaustion from work. It’s really hard to stop myself from criticizing my decisions to come back to a job that does get extremely busy during the winter and summer seasons. There is a fine line between being extremely busy and burnt out. I could feel everyone around me slowly cross that line and enter “burnt out.” And, to be honest, I was getting secondhand burnout and anxiety. “Did I make the right choice to come back?” and “Is this a toxic environment for me?” are thoughts that I actively tried to avoid thinking about during the busy times for self preservation. I know that I enjoy my work immensely. Seeing the kids learn makes me happy. The environment can be what I make it, and I can choose to let the energy of others ruin the experience for me, or I can choose to focus on my own emotions and how I feel.

There have been a lot of days where I did not want to wake up in the morning. I go to bed hoping that I won’t have to wake up the next day. I think about all of the other days to follow and I’m overwhelmed by the weight of the future. I think about all of the things I want to do but haven’t. Before I have even begun the day, I’ve already set myself up for failure. I’ve already set myself up for a day of hopelessness and sadness.

Now that I’ve spent the entire day contemplating what to do with some of these negative and unhelpful emotions and thoughts, I definitely need an action plan to deal with some of the negative and intrusive anxious thoughts. Recently, I’ve been really enjoying a Podcast that brought me a lot of strength today. The Tablo Podcast has helped me see a lot of things about dealing with depression. I really need to take each day, one day at a time. I need to complete thought processes and dealing with my feelings one day at a time. As much as I’d like to just push some of the things off for an “easier” or another day, I really do need to address the day’s feelings on the day so that I don’t carry the day’s weight on me.

Through listening to the podcast I’ve felt a little less alone, as there have been so many moments of “Ahah! I’ve felt exactly the same!” As he describes moments in his life and his own struggle with depression.

A lot of things have been difficult these days, and I know that they can continue being a challenge, but I’m determined to make the best of things and to better my mental health. Every New Year, people make “New Years Resolutions” to be a better version of themselves. I’ve said before that setting a resolution for the year can often mean setting yourself up for failure. So, like Tablo says, I’m gonna make a day resolution for every day of something attainable.

For tomorrow, Tuesday, my resolution is to wake up at a decent hour and do some work around the house before heading to work. And each day, I will need to take all of the emotions and events of the day, and properly address them. No more putting it off for later.

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Late Night Thoughts – Insecurity

I’ve spent a lot of time today ruminating on why I have so much insecurity in my life at the moment. I wondered where it was coming from and how it could be addressed. What I realized is that I feel unstable because self care has been almost impossible. I do the bare minimum to keep myself alive. And the rest of the time I spend time trying to make my dogs happy.

Where do I factor into my daily care? Have I stopped to ask myself how I’m feeling? Have I properly dealt with negative emotions? No. No. And no. Being busy and working 6 day weeks has made it difficult to truly recharge from the weekends. I feel tired, alone, and desperate for rest. Not just physical rest but mental rest from work.

They say you have to start with your basic needs to be able to start addressing your mental needs. I have decided to focus on how to live with the weight of my fears. There really is no one i can count on other than myself. I neee to be my own best friend, caretaker, and source of love.

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Weighted Blankets are the best

I have heard so many good things about weighted blankets for people with GAD or Panic Disorder. I’ve heard that they help calm nighttime anxiety and help with falling asleep. I didn’t really believe all of this until I got Dobby. I like to call her my weighted pillow. She often sleeps on top of my legs or stomach, easily putting on an extra 14 pounds to my body. I sleep really well with her laying on me. And this may just be a coincidence, but she often hops on top of me when I wake up in a panic and kind of knead her paws on my chest, arms, or stomach. While my boyfriend was visiting he remarked on how she’s kind of like a weighted blanket, which must have inspired my Christmas present this year. It has done wonders to my sleep and mood. I’ve said before that my insomnia has a huge influence on my moods. So, of course, with better quality sleep, I’ve had more stability in my moods.

First of all, I have a 15 pound Queen sized blanket from Weighted Idea. This is pretty ideal for me since I often find myself underneath my dogs as well, which easily adds another 15 pounds. I believe he bought it on Amazon. The best thing about it is that it looks great with or without a duvet cover! It can be machine washed, air dried, and it’s just the right size for my bed.

Now, enough raving about the blanket itself. My sleep has gotten significantly better. Within 15 to 20 minutes after getting under the blanket, I begin to feel drowsy. The weight feels kind of like a hug and it just makes me feel safe and tucked in. I sleep more pleasantly, and the weight seems to calm me as the thoughts race.

Panic attack wake ups have dropped significantly in the past few weeks. Previously, I would have several panic attacks a night while sleeping, but, I’ve seen less and less of that with my blanket. I wake up feeling more refreshed, and I wake up less often during the night as well. The last panic attack I had was when I didn’t have the weighted blanket on me, because one of the dogs vomited on it during the day. The difference between having it and not having it was significant.

I know there may be a possibility for a placebo effect but if you’re struggling with falling and staying asleep, investing in a weighted blanket may really help. But I always suggest people to see a doctor about any symptoms of sleeplessness. Many people that I’ve spoken to have expressed their frustrations on how they do not get enough or good quality sleep. It’s a frustration that I share, and admittedly, must be medicated for. Prolonged sleeplessness or poor sleep quality was so detrimental to me, that I wasn’t able to handle the slightest amount of stress or difficult emotions.

Another way that I have improved my sleep quality is applying blue light filter

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Insomnia – The Master of my Emotions

I’ve talked about comorbidity between Anxiety and Depression a bit in earlier posts, but I’ve got a third little friend to discuss today. Insomnia. For as long as I can remember, I have had interrupted sleep. I always wake up in the middle of the night for whatever reason, and it can take some time to get back to sleep. I never really knew how important sleep was to my moods and my emotional well being until recently. That day that I hit Rock Bottom was another one of those days where I had almost zero sleep. A lot of my internal conflicts come from when I spend the entirety of a night worrying/ruminating about some thought or some event that happened that day. It carries on to the next day, and completely weighs me down.

I never thought myself to be one that would become dependent on sleep aids in order to function. Unfortunately, I have started down the road of quite a dependence on my prescribed sleep medication. I have read up on these medications and know that there’s a high rate of dependency and addiction toward them, but I still take them anyways. Sleep is so important to my mental health and the way that I process emotions that I will take the risk of having to have to recover from weaning off of these addictive substances so that I can sleep and learn to manage my emotions with a more level-head.

A lot of people I’ve talked to with mental health issues are also fellow insomniacs. I cannot stress how important getting enough sleep is in order to manage the things that life throws at you. If at all possible, build a bed time routine that will train your brain to get sleepy. I use only warm lighting at night and I try my absolute best to keep my things clean before settling into bed.

These last couple weeks I’ve been going through a bad time in regards to sleep, and it’s gotten beyond the point of Ambien helping me.

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