You were in my dreams....you were driving circles around me.

[raybear]

I was so tired yesterday evening which always makes me overly sensitive and emotionally raw, so of course usually what happens is that some sort of incidents and misunderstandings occur that get blown up. Though this time I did a pretty good job of telling myself "you're just overreacting because you're tired -- don't underestimate exhaustion."

One of the stranger changes in my body since being on hormones is my sleep patterns. I went from being a super heavy sleeper who could crash anywhere for a minimum of eight or nine hours, to a fairly light sleeper who only needs about seven. I can still sleep most anywhere though, which is why I'll still doze off on trains or during movies. But I don't like to go to bed and then be woken up because I risk being up the rest of the night.

So, right after recording my audblog, I took two melatonins then left for Lowenstein's. I called wearemany in part to help me stay awake for the trip which worked well, though I was definitely starting to get loopy -- showing up at the apartment and finding huge three story plastic tarps covering the side of the building didn't add to my surreal mindset. I had been sneezing for almost an hour (you can hear me sniffling on the audblog) from allergies, so I got ready for bed, took a benadryl and crawled between the sheets to wait for her arrival.



Then I started to trip. Oh my goodness, did it feel good. All my physical tiredness and anxiety from the week was gone from my body and replaced with relaxation (though it didn't get rid of mental anxiety). Then I realized not only had the melatonin kicked in, but I had just taken an antihistamine which tends to make me drowsy. I started to panic -- just like when I get too high and I'm afraid to fall asleep because I might not wake up. I was concerned I had overdosed on products that make you sleepy and tonight would be my last night on earth. The big sleep was coming to take me away. I checked my pulse and my breathing which were both normal. I talked myself down a bit and went back to enjoying my relaxed drowsy feeling, realizing I was overreacting.

Lowenstein showed up and I managed to get awake enough to talk with her a bit. In the course of chatting, she told me her out-of-town lover would be staying with her the next night, and I was immediately hit with this wave of unexpected jealousy and anxiety that threated to ruin my near-comatose state. But in the five minutes, when she was out of the room preparing for bed, I went through this procesing in my head (which now I couldn't tell you what I was thinking at all) and by the time she came back I was pretty much fine.

I find it easier these days to deal with difficult and complicated emotions if I realize I don't want to be feeling that way. Sometimes I get so overwhelmed and immersed that I lose all perspective, and being the Cancer I am, I get attached to ideas and feelings pretty easily, and it's not until well after the fact that I think "wait, I don't even want to be that kind of ______ [jealous, possessive, needy, angry] person." But in other cases, if I'm feeling something negative and I tell myself, hey I don't want to be this kind of person which means inherently I'm NOT this kind of person, so I can get through this. Whatever I'm feeling can pass, just don't fight it too hard either way.

My horoscope today nailed it:
CANCER (Jun 21–Jul 22): Why hasn’t anyone invented a self-maintaining and self-balancing relationship—one that has a built-in emotional gyroscope? It sure would make life easier, especially now for you Crabs. There are irritating facets of your closest relationships that are annoying you, but you don’t seem to be to eliminate the source of irritation without also eliminating the source of pleasure.

I mean, this is always the balancing act of open relationships -- what comes with freedom and independence is working through my programmed ideas of possession, as well as needs for reassurance and what should come from me and what from my partner. Though frankly, getting rid of the source of "irritiation" not only would eliminate a souce of pleasure, but it wouldn't even really get rid of the source of irritation. It would just ignore or hide it for awhile.

Which means even though I had a moment of insecurity and worry and anger, in the end, I just got to enjoy being in bed with her and falling asleep happy and loved.

Comments

[lakenaiad.livejournal.com]

I find it easier these days to deal with difficult and complicated emotions if I realize I don't want to be feeling that way.

Wow. That's such a good way of looking at it. I mean, you still feel what you feel and need to go through the feelings to get out of them sometimes. But realizing that you don't want to be feeling jealous seems like realizing that you *do* want things to be the way they are even if you are not feeling good about them at the moment.

Definitely going to adopt that as a piece of advice to remember on my own polyamorous journey.

[raybear.livejournal.com]

It's definitely a fine line between trying to control your emotions by suppressing them and not giving them too much power. I'm constantly trying to work on the balance of acknowledging and feeling them without being dictated or overwhlemed by them. Also, realizing just how damn changing everything is, so it's not helpful to get overly attached to a certain feeling if it's going to be disappearing within an hour or a day or a week. This is a scary one for me still, because I still cling to ideas of permenance for my source of stability, rather than relying on my ability to adapt and float through change as the only real stability.

Unrelated: I TOTALLY thought of you this morning on the way to train, wondering if you got a part-time job at the poster shop on Belmont near the train station because the window display was ALL Johnny Depp pictures and posters: Edward Scissorhands, Sleepy Hollow, stills from other movies and press shots. You should walk by and drool!

[lakenaiad.livejournal.com]

I did, yesterday. sigh...