An Unnecessarily Long Entry Mostly Because I Had Nothing Better To Do Than Talk About Myself

I've been feeling better. I have lots of energy that I'm putting to good use. I did schoolwork most of the day yesterday. I'm caught up on school work that I've missed now. I feel a little overwhelmed by all the assignments I have coming up. My planner is a stocked closet of assignments and due dates. But, if this productive energy stays, I'll be able to do it. Even if it doesn't, I have to do it. I'm so close to graduating. 3 more semesters.

This energy. It feels. Strange.

I have been in a really good mood for several days now. Is this what normal feels like? I'm not on cloud nine. I just have a lot of mental and physical energy that I can put towards being productive and feeling good. I have the energy right now to feel good.

Once my meds were adjusted two weeks ago, I slept through the night for about a week, but I'm back to restless nights again. It doesn't seem to affect my day time activities, though. I have enough energy to spare.

For example, I woke up about 5am this morning and didn't sleep again until 6am. Usually, even losing an hour of sleep would totally mess me up. I'd be exhausted and have A LOT of trouble getting up and out of bed. This morning, my alarm went off right at 7:30am and I got up fine. I took all 3 of my 5 minute snoozes from my alarm, but that was more because I knew I had time to spare and wanted to check my email and all that. I got up this morning and stayed awake. Under normal circumstances, when I get up early, usually I crash around 10am or 11. But not today. I stayed perfectly attentive through my entire nearly 4 hour class. We took a 10 minute break while we were there, but I didn't need it. I could have kept going for hours.

Is this Normal Amy? Have I been so far gone from normal for so long that normal feels.....wrong?

Don't get me wrong; I like having all this energy. I'm doing a lot with it.

But I feel like something's wrong. Maybe I'm just making a big deal out of nothing. I can't trust my own instincts and perceptions, after all. I have a warped perception of myself and the world I live in, so maybe that's all this is.

I'm still hallucinating every day. Today, the little lights I see flickering in my vision have been a lot worse than they usually are. I usually see little lights daily (this has been happening for several months now) and they come in and out randomly, but today I've been seeing them almost constantly. It's been really distracting.

I was in class taking notes, so when I looked up I noticed that there was a person in the corner of the classroom that I hadn't seen or heard walk in the room. I started freaking out because, "Is she real? Can I trust her? What if she tries to talk to me and she's not real? What if she is real?" I took a breath and turned to the girl next to me, quietly asking if there was a person in the corner. She said that there was, so I calmed down a little, but was still suspicious. What if she just meant the professor, who was also over there? I calmed down a little more once my professor gave us a 10 minute break and started talking to the girl in the corner, then I fully calmed down once the girl came over to my table after the break and started talking to us about the assignment.

"Okay. She is real. False alarm." 

I'm scared I will see someone like that one day that looks completely real. But isn't. I haven't had any really bad hallucinations as of yet (mostly just the lights thing; sometimes there's a cat in my house; sometimes I see people for a few seconds then they disappear), but I can usually tell that those aren't real. I'm scared this will keep getting worse. It's gotten progressively worse the older I get. Will it ever get to a stopping point?

Please stop.

Something of a Spiritual Update?

I want to talk about God. But there's not much new to say.

I haven't been spending a lot of time thinking about him because I've been struggling, but I'm getting better now, so time to focus on finding him again, right?

It's hard to see him in places where I keep seeing shadows and demons and ghosts and generally negative things. It's hard to feel at peace when I know that my life is not peaceful. There are parts of my life that are very scary. Where has God been for me in all of this? Has he been there at all?

I feel uncomfortable praying, because every time I try I start hearing him or Mary or angels speaking to me and I know they're not real. My prayers and intentions may very well be real, but the responses cannot be. They are often not kind responses. I try to search for him within the madness, but I find only ashes.

I started a journal, a sort of lectio divina. I read the readings for today on the Laudate app and write about how it makes me feel or what I think about it.

I've only written once, but it was nice. I felt like I was on the right track. One of these days I will type up what I wrote about and post it, but not tonight. I'm too tired. It's probably not that revolutionary, anyway.

My aunt and I are going to start reading a book about prayer together and discuss it. I need to order it tonight. My goal is to make a little bit of time every day, or every other day, if need be, to read and think. Perhaps I should start a reading journal. I'm so forgetful nowadays.

Perhaps one day I will find God in the ashes of my life and maybe one day we will fall in love with each other again.

Something of an Update?

Things have been getting better. They're not falling apart as much. It gets a little better every day. 

I've had several doctors and therapists tell me over the last few years that I may never be symptom free. I could be on the best meds possible and still hallucinate. As long as it's manageable and doesn't affect my day to day life, I'm fine. 

I'm fine. 

I can deal with the demons that patrol my room at night, The Woman, who waits in my room to scream in my face when I open the door. The shadows. The monsters that peek around doorways and stare. The distant screaming. 

I'm fine. 

I can handle this. 

It's not that bad. It's really not that bad at all. I have dealt with much worse. 

I'm feeling a lot better than I was, trust me. It almost had me again. But, again, I prevailed. 

And I will keep prevailing.