Feeding the Introvert

Sometimes blogging takes chocolate and tissues.

So I had therapy today like I do every Wednesday.  It's hard to do it in the middle of the day and go back to work, but that's what I do.

We're working these days on giving myself credit for things I do (like go to therapy every week) and permission to take care of myself.

Although I've learned a lot of extrovert skills, deep down I'm an introvert.  Large parties take a lot of energy.  We made a plan for me to try and attend a "party" on Sunday (yes Wonderland) and what I should do self care wise to make that more likely to happen.

We also talked about staying in to feed the introvert vs staying in 'cause the depression and/or anxiety is overwhelming and learning to figure out the difference in those two states and how to treat them.

So I do a lot of hard work for 45 minutes, drive back to work, pick up a piece of pizza, and sit back down at my desk.

We have a company wide meet at 4 which went well...

And then happy hour...

My cute little start up of 10 people is not 110 people.

They rented out half a resturant for our happy hour... which still left a standing room only space crowded with people...

Oh... and booze... lots of booze.

The new anti anxiety medicine means I can't drink.

Except for my birthday where I skipped me meds, I haven't been drinking since december....

And there weren't any non alcoholic drinks.

Pitchers of margaritas (two kinds), sangria, and ice buckets full of beer.

"Oh go to the other side of the place and just say you're with the group and order a soda," I was told.  I gathered one of the 3 other people I know at the company that don't drink and headed to the bar... where we waited for 10 minutes without being acknowledged.

So I give up and am making my rounds to head out.

"stay and have fun" says one co worker gesturing with their glass.

"Why are you leaving so early" says another trying to get me to stay.

Now I'm trying not to break down before i get to the door.

'cause I don't belong.

I don't have the reserves to deal with this many people and this much alcohol that I can't have without easy options.

I make it outside and go back to the (empty) office to make it look like i haven't been crying.

I make it to the car and drive home to call my mommy (which fixes everything).

Self improvement is damn hard.  How do people have time for it and a job and other commitments?

I just wish I didn't feel so broken.. that it didn't take so much effort just to function.

My therapist helps a huge deal.  She pointed out that as an introvert, sitting in an open office layout 50 hours a week is really draining... no wonder I don't want to do anything on the weekends and spend Friday night just trying to finally clear my head.

I wish I was sometimes still numb.. that I could playing along and hide in plain site and not feel a huge weight on my chest while I did it.

It's just getting so hard to feign interests any more... it takes so much effort...

And with everything else.. my reserves are shot.

A practicing submissive

So.......

I keep staring at a blank blog post.

This has been trying to come out of my brain for a while....

And yet I sit here staring at the blankness hoping something will start to trickle out.

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I don't feel submissive anymore.

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That was harder to get out than I thought it would be.

It started when the SF Service Salon group started last year.  Several people pointed it out to me as something that would be up my alley.

It totally, on paper, looked like something that would interest me... but I had this deep visceral dislike of the whole thing.

At the time I saw it as a fundamental difference in opinions in service and submission.  I don't get filled at all from service by itself.  What's filling (what was filling?) to me was the service and the symbiotic relationship with the individual.

It's like boot blacking.  Blacking at a stand is about providing a service... and you get tipped for that service.  I'm a jovial happy person, but not particularly submissive.

Doing Sir's (a hypothetical Sir of course since I don't have one) booth in the privacy of home is completely different.  It's a back and forth of energy between two people and the boots is just the medium for that exchange.

So fast forward months... add in two or three different medicine regimes and two differing diagnoses...

And I'm not feeling submissive at all.

It doesn't have any draw anymore.

Raunchy kinky sex sounds fun.

Beatings sound ok (not even that's drawing me in).

Basically rough sex with some hair pulling is all that seems interesting (again in theory 'cause, well, I suck at scheduling).

Well and then not rough, vanilla-ish sex sounds good too.

Everything else just seems.... fake?

No that's not the feeling....

shallow?

empty?

unfulfilling?

None of those are right but the right words doesn't want to come out (and forcing it just makes it burry down deeper in my sub conscious).

I also have some friends who gave up on kink.... and seem to be really happy.  They decided it wasn't worth it and gave the husband/kids track a try and seem to have more fulfilling lives (yea I know grass is greener but hey, this is my pity party so I'm allowed to admire that grass).

It's also just not been a great time to be kinky.  I've purposely stayed the fuck out of all of the drama on fetlife.  It just seems like... like power struggles and feelings of community... where no community exists.  I never ever went to an event and thought I wasn't 100% responsible for my person, that I wasn't the only person who would stick up for me, but that's just me.

It just makes me want to run away screaming from everything kinky and make do with my occasional (very occasional) fucks with kink-light boys.

But I'm not very submissive.... it feels like a role I played for a dozen or so years on a show that's been canceled...

Med Changes

So I'm not a week off of the mood stabilizer.

I don't feel flat anymore... I get the normal ups and downs of life.

I'm not nearly as tired as I was (though I'm still sleeping a lot).

My sex drive is back with a vengeance.

-BUT-

I can't sleep through the night to save my life.  I'm at only one wake up around 3 am.

I'm still tired which may be the anti anxiety or the not sleeping through the night.

I still have no tolerance for drama, foolishness, some silliness, or conflict.  The good is it doesn't affect me.  The bad is I just pack up and walk away from all of it.

Another week on this and then we see the doc about what he thinks we should try next...

Blank Canvas

I'm not sure what's going to come out here.

Sometimes you just start writing 'cause you can tell something wants out but you're not 100% sure what it may be.

It's before 8pm on a Friday night and I'm ready for bed.  I'd say it was lame except it makes me feel happy.

Tryst is tonight at the Citadel.  I kind of wish I had the energy for it...

But I also  know that I'm not really in a place to be trying to meet new people.

I haven't broached poly yet with my new psychologist.  We're just starting to work on some identity stuff and relationship stuff so we're eventually going to get close to it.

We did start looking at what is important to me.  I feel bad saying no if a relationship looks good on paper but I don't get any kind of "spark."  She thinks that spark/chemistry is important to me and that it's more than ok to take a couple of dates to see if it's there.

But we both agree that I've got bigger fish to fry more immediately.  I see the new psychiatrist on Monday.  I think I want completely off the mood stabilizer and them maybe a different anti anxiety drug...

I've also in all aspects need to work on taking care of me... eating, sleeping, meditation, exercise (once I'm not exhausted all the time), and not letting my care-taking nature drain me.

I forget it all the time... but I'm an introvert...  I sit at work in an open office layout with people around all the time...  That's really draining.  I'm taking Monday off (for the doctor and some other fun stuff) but am working Sunday in exchange.  I'm kind of excited for the quiet and how much work I might get done.

The introvert needs to be charged more often and it's been dragging me home alone away from people until it gets what it needs.

And the dating won't happen till the meds are changed and the introvert is re-charged.

And then we'll address poly.

Well maybe...

I'm not looking to find more secondary guys.  I really enjoy the ones I've got.. the play partners, the out of town people, the locals, the fuck buddies...  Whatever you call them, they're great.

What I'm looking for looks enough like a "regular" (not the right word) boyfriend that I can frame it that way with the psychologist and then adjust it to what I need if I don't feel the need to discuss poly with her.  Right now I don't, mostly 'cause that's not what's causing me any sort of mental load.

We'll see....

This took 45 minutes to come out... I think I'll stop now.... but we'll see if more decides to drip out of my brain over the course of the weekend....

Self Growth

I seem to be looking at a lot of that these days.

I wish I could schedule it for not when I've spent $350 flying to DC for an event...

Last weekend I went to DOWF in DC.  The event it self is great.  I totally recommend it.

I, strangely enough, was miserable.

There's nothing anyone else could do about it and I didn't want to make it a big deal... but yea, it's not for me.

So what things did I learn??  It's still coming out but we'll see what the list looks like right now as I lay here in bed with a bit of the sniffles with my ears still plugged from the flight...

- I can't work reg
The first day wasn't bad, but people are stupid and I just can't deal with them anymore.  Much like I know I can't work security if I ever want to have fun as a bottom at a kink event, I'm putting registration on the same list.

- I need to make evening plans
During the day I can go to classes but at night, I need to have plans.  Without plans, I'm not gonna hang out in the dungeon and watch things... I'm going to watch TV in my hotel room and go to bed early.  Surrender was different 'cause I'd have at least one boot blacking shift during a party so I had stuff to do and was able to socialize there.

- I shouldn't go by myself.
My friends are all awesome, but they're so awesome they're busy.  Busy enough that I can hide a near melt down... that's not true.. I didn't melt down... I don't think... I dunno

- These meds are done
I want off.  I'd rather take anxiety and the 2-4 nights a month of no sleep due to anxiety than the crap I deal with now.  No alcohol and not caffeine makes me a pretty lame person.  I have no social lubricant and I can't deal with not a lot of sleep.  That's not the way I imagined 30.  I also have random generalized crowd and driving anxiety which is completely new with the medication.

I started another bullet point... and I have no idea what I was going to write.  It's 9pm and I'm about to go to bed.  I've got therapy at lunch time tomorrow.  That's gonna be a huge ball of fun......

Literary strength

I'm a firm believer that books have totally helped form my personality. My two favorite books are Pride and Prejudice and Jane Eyre.

I was watching one of the new Jane eyre movies on the plane and I realized I have 2 favorite books of the story. The first is when Mr. Rochester confesses his love ("it is as if I had a string somewhere under my left ribs, tightly and inextricably knotted to a similar string situated in the corresponding quarter of your little frame. And if that boisterous channel, and two hundred miles or so of land some broad between us, I am afraid that cord of communion will be snapt; and then I've a nervous notion I should take to bleeding inwardly.")  I realized my second is when she leaves him.

For dear readers not familiar with the story, on their wedding day it comes to light that Rochester is married and his wife, who is mad, has been locked in the attic the whole time Jane has been living at Thornfield Hall. Jane sees everything she wants torn from her.

 But Rochester offers it back. He wants to take her to Europe where no one will know she's not his wife. Who would know, he asks.

I would, she replies.

Removing the time period issues (why doesn't he just divorce the crazy wife), what strikes me is Jane's sense of self. She's not willing to be with the man she loves (who's also crazy rich) if it means living a lie and compromising her own self worth in her head.

Elizabeth Bennett in Pride and Prejudice does the same thing. Mr. Darcy offers to marry her mid way through the book and she declins. He's full of pride and has really been a douche. But marrying him would leave her set for life. She sticks to her no (till he changes his ways and she can see him for who he really is underneath the outer shell).

And it all leaves me thinking... Could I do the same thing?  Could I say no to everything I wanted if it came with a poison pill? Could I say no to my own Mr Rochester if being with him required a personal or emotional sacrifice?

I kind of feel like I did it once. I changed courses. I could have kept in the status quo even though it wasn't right for me....  But that was more tony stark than Edward Rochester.

But I was younger and more idealistic.

Now???

Who knows what I'd do...

Saying no

Or why it's not, for me, a consent issue.

By consent issue I mean a fear of consent being violated.  That goes along with the "I'd say no, but I don't think he'd respect it."

I think that can be a lot of why people say no.

My inability to say no is much more rooted in self loathing.

"If I say no now, I might not get to say yes to anyone ever again."

It's quite a fatalistic thought...  Logic brain knows it's not true, but emotional brain keeps running the following script.....

"You're plain if not downright not attractive... and fat... don't for get fat....  If someone is interested grab the fuck on and ride that till they lose interest 'cause there might not be another one."

I know, I'm not very nice to me.

It's a problem I fall into fast with internet dating.. 'cause there's a sunk cost.  I messaged or they messaged, we chatted for however long it took to get coffee logistics worked out.  Given some of my social super powers, they feel comfortable and have poured out bits and pieces of their soul to me....

And I don't feel the spark...

You say thanks, but no thanks at that point, right?

Well I should.. but my emotions get involved.  It would be mean to say no.  Maybe I can force it and it will work.  I'm not trying hard enough to make it work.

I don't have problems saying no to people who I meet in person.  "Do you want to play" "No thanks I'm good."  But someone I've talked to online for a week?  Somehow I feel like I've got to try to see if the investment I already made will pan out...

Well... you see a problem.. what are you going to do about it.

A dear friend held my hand all day long and wouldn't let me hide from my own patterns.  It's a good thing our brains won't sync in their crazy cycles so one of us can be the rock for the other.

I'm gonna stop the online dating.. for not.. for forever?  Who knows.  I didn't take the profiles down... 'cause that's too hard quite yet.  But I put a message on them saying to message if interested and we could set up a munch meeting.  I wanna meet them in person (safely) faster so that I don't feel the investment.

I start seeing my new therapist on Thursday.  I'm really nervous, but I'm hoping to go over more of the bad mental thought processes about self dislike.  The last time I was in therapy, I was so bad off (thank you grad school) we were focused on survival.  Now, I kind of want to be happy, whatever that looks like,

So until the next break down, dear readers, Good night... and Good morning.