Today began like any other “night shift” day….After staying up until 1am, I woke up at 5am, fed all the animals and had my breakfast while I waited for my hubby to get home from work. I was so happy when he got home that I giggled like a school girl, while I showed him a picture of the acid burned arse of a male friend of ours. He laughed for quite a few minutes, our friend is so accident prone and then I gave him a short list of things I needed him to do before he went to bed. I got to spend about an hour and half with him before it was time for bed. I slept from 7.30am to 11.30am and then it was time to start my chores!
I began by cleaning the kitchen and then I ventured out to do the grocery shopping and go to the chemist. I of course had my social anxiety/agoraphobia screaming at me inside my head, but I pushed through all that and had quite a successful trip; even managing to do a reverse park which my husband always encourages me to do. When I got home I was quite anxious and so I decided to take an hour to myself to calm my nerves. By the end of that hour I felt very fatigued but didn’t want to go back to bed in case I disturbed my husband, so I pushed on.
Then I remembered my new chores app (Home Routines), so I opened it up and had a look at what my planned chores were for today. It was great, because I had planned it all out in advance, I knew exactly what I needed to get done and I got to it. Strangely while doing the chores I found myself starting to feel more at home in our house; I finally feel like I’m settling in.
Dan got up at 4pm and headed straight to work. I relaxed in front of the TV and then I decided to challenge something else that causes me great anxiety, having a bath while I’m home alone. I always worry that someone is going to break in while I’m naked and so I usually wait until my husband is home. But I had forgotten about this during the day and because I am coming to realise how irrational my fear is, I decided to do it. I ran myself a bubble bath and decided I would stay in it for at least 15mins. I managed 15mins and then jumped out and was dried and dressed within seconds. I didn’t overcome the anxiety entirely but I challenged it, which is a good start.
Having mostly achieved my objective with the bath, I was feeling enthused so I decided I would attempt to read a chapter of a book. My ability to read is very limited at the moment due to my inability to concentrate and memory problems. Luckily for me the chapter was 7 pages long, so I did it! I read a chapter of a book, can’t say that I remember what I read very well though. But again, it’s a start. After achieving that I decided I had done enough for today and I have just been relaxing and watching TV, chatting with friends via Facebook and now, writing this blog, in the time since.
Although I feel very tired and sad for some unknown reason, I also feel satisfied that today was a day of achievements. I feel good that I tackled things head on and gave it my best shot and I feel lucky that nothing went too wrong for me. The rain clouds even parted when I ventured to the shops, so all in all a good day with the universe on my side. An extraordinarily ordinary day.