January 9th, 2020: Hello Insomnia

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It’s hard to believe that it is already 2020. I graduated from middle school 19 years ago. I dropped out of high school 17 years ago. Where the hell has the time gone?

When I was in my teenage years or even in my 20’s, I would have never anticipated living to see the year 2020. I was so sure that I would somehow cease to exist. Perhaps that type of thinking was caused by my bipolar depression and rapid mood swings. 🤷‍♀️

It’s almost 4 o’clock in the morning and I am supposed to be getting up at 8 a.m. to go to a doctor’s appointment by 10 a.m. and I am still wide awake while most of the east coast is sound asleep.

It was an extremely long but good day. I should honestly be knocked out from everything that I had to get done. And let me tell you something, you never really realize how much crap you have until you are moving. I am no longer staying with my mom and sister. I moved out on good terms this time.

I was so worried that moving out would cause some sort of strain between the three of us like it did last time but my mom assures me that it did not. My anxiety had gotten the best of me and started to give me some really distorted thoughts that were making me slightly paranoid.

I thought that maybe my mom and sister thought I was being ungrateful because I was moving out when they had done nothing but help me since June. I started to think that they would feel like I was abandoning them or something since my mom is not quite 100 percent healed from her knee replacement yet.

I started to worry that something bad was going to happen to my mom because she would be all alone on the days that my sister worked, I mean, what if she went to take her dogs out and they pulled too hard on the leash and she fell?

I just had all these messed up thoughts and those examples are only a few that came to my mind. And those weren’t even the worst of the thoughts either. My mom reassured me that they were not mad at me and that if an emergency arose she would call me.

I hate that my anxiety gets the best of me like that. It’s almost like all logic goes right out the window and I start to think of things that aren’t very logically likely to happen except in rare cases. And when I try to tell myself that and I try to tell myself that everything will be okay, those “what if’s” start to invade my mind and counter every positive thing that I am trying to tell myself. For every single positive, my mind can always think of at least one negative.

I can’t even be in a car when they have those barriers that they put up when they are doing road work that are close together and it only leaves barely enough room for a car to drive through them without unknowingly holding my breath and then silently having a panic attack in the passenger’s seat so that I don’t distract the driver and make them crash.

I think those barriers are also known as like cattle shoots or something like that. At least that is what those little wall things look like; a cattle shoot.

Then, a few hours ago Jasper (my furbaby) gave me a massive scare when I couldn’t find him anywhere. After how Buddy tragically passed away less than a year ago, I am overly paranoid about something bad happening to Jasper too. I kept calling him and trying to listen for sounds and I eventually heard clawing sounds coming from under the sofa but from the inside of it. Jasper somehow got in there and was trapped!

Panic set in and I started frantically looking for scissors to cut the bottom of the sofa open to let him out. This cat is going to give me a freakin’ heart attack one day! I still have no idea how he got in there. I tried to block all the openings to under the sofa, at least for tonight. I am sure if he really wants to get back under there, he will find a way. I hope he doesn’t though!

Moving Jasper was the hardest part of the day. Multiple people got scratched up, including me, trying to get him in his crate. But we still couldn’t get him in there. I had to put a little leash on him and I wrapped him in a towel like a newborn and carried him into the car and held him the entire ride.

I felt so bad for him though because he was scared and shaking. I don’t like seeing animals scared or hurt. My emotions overtook me and I wanted to start bawling my eyes out right then and there.

Then when we got to the house Jasper hid up until it was time to try to go to bed and then he wanted to start exploring. He’s being extra loving and affectionate right now. Maybe it’s because I saved him from the sofa? 🤷‍♀️🐈

So, I had applied for disability because of my mental health. After waiting for what felt like forever I finally had my hearing in November.

By December, I got a denial for SSI but I applied for SSI and SSD. SSD, according to the Social Security website is still processing their decision so I haven’t technically been denied for SSD yet.

However, I got a letter from my lawyer stating that despite our best efforts I lost and blah, blah, blah. I have been trying to contact my lawyer for three weeks now with no success. I have so many questions for her about the SSI and SSD and if we need to appeal and how to go about that.

I am starting to get so angry because wtf am I supposed to do when my lawyer is always “out of the office” and isn’t returning my calls? She was supposed to be so great, well if she is so great then why tf isn’t she returning my calls!

Plus, on top of that, a lot of what I said in my hearing made me look like a fucking liar because my mental health care team apparently doesn’t know how to document correctly.

When a patient comes to you with a major mental health problem and it’s been discussed so many times, why can’t this information be found anywhere in their fucking chart/notes according to social security?

The blackout (dissociative) issues that I have and mentioned quite a few times during my hearing apparently aren’t anywhere to be found in my medical records, making me look like a liar, when I have been talking about this shit for quite some time now. A few years actually.

When I called my therapist to make an appointment I asked her about why it’s not in my records she said she didn’t know and that she doesn’t know what is all in and not in my medical records. But like, if she’s my therapist isn’t she at least supposed to be documenting about them (the blackouts) when we talk about them as well?

This is just one big mess right now. Social Security sent me like a 13-page denial letter with their “evidence” based decision. But is the denial for just SSI, SSD, or both? I’d love to know and I am sure my lawyer would have answers if she would ever return phone calls!

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It is now after 5 o’clock in the morning and I am still wide awake… By the time I am supposed to get up for the day is probably when I am going to want to crash. This makes me want to cancel my appointment today. I hate going to see doctors on no sleep. The whole process of checking in and waiting just drives me insane when I don’t sleep. Even those office wall clocks sound like they tick louder when insomnia has me up all night.

Perhaps I should just try to lay down and force myself to get some sleep. Although, that never really works.

Well, thanks for reading my insomnia-fueled rant! ❤

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