Aftermath

Wednesday the steam pipe explodes and sends us running. I question how I feel and what’s going on. After a lot of trouble I get home. The only reason I stayed late at work was because of class.

Thursday I call and hear class wasn’t canceled even though it is quite near the site. I couldn’t get to that side of the city anyway. I’m on edge- I feel it. My back feels tight, my arms. When I stretch everything fights against it. I’m jumpy. On the subway, I’m looking around, moving if a kid sits next to me because their movements are too unpredictable.

I have a lot of papers to critique before Saturday and was hoping to get a lot down on Thursday but I found I couldn’t focus. I’m agitated and my leg is going up and down, super antsy. I finish two but they aren’t my best effort. I’m dizzy, a headache is waning, and my only desire is to eat junk food (nachos for dinner), which is bad as I’d been good on my diet and gone down a wee bit. But I don’t feel satisfied. Then, even though I hear my neighbor open her door and know she’s coming to visit me because we had talked about it earlier, when the doorbell rings (or buzzes incredibly loud) I jump. In getting to the door I hit my leg against one dresser type thing and then stub my toe on my shopping cart folded against my closet door and kind of fall into my door cussing. I hear her asking if I’m all right through the door.

That night I just can’t get to sleep at all. It’s late and I still have to go to work. The whole time my head is swimming and I can just feel everything is tight.

“Damn,” I think, “it has gotten to me. My foundation was shaken again.”

And it has. I end up needing that glorious Ambien to get some sleep at all. And the dreams, ah, gotta love the dreams.

In my dream I have given birth to a child. That child’s father has another child from another woman. We are living in the house together. That woman has quadruplets from another man. Shades of Jerry Springer for sure. Add to that a bulldog and a standard poodle. Remember, standard poodles are huge animals.

Something happens and everyone goes away leaving me with six kids and two dogs. I’m trying so hard to balance everything, then the poodle goes to the bathroom on the floor – I hadn’t had a chance to walk it. Next one of the kids is upstairs, I’m trying to tend to mine, and can’t find the quad. Then I start wondering where everyone went and realize I have to go to class and finish my homework. My heart starts racing as I try to find someone to take care of the kids.

Now that part is easy enough to analyze – it can simply be that I’m stressed out and feel overloaded. I have my students (my kids) to take care of as well as work and school. I’m not one to miss a class, and finding out that one still went on bugged me a lot. That’s fair enough and wasn’t too bad.

But then it shifted and I was sent into this stock room to go get a new handbag. When I was in there it was really crowded, floor to ceiling with boxes of bags in plastic rap. But then the door opens and a loading truck starts pushing in more boxes. I’m there screaming for them to stop, trying to find a way out, to claim over the boxes, but can’t. It just keeps coming and coming and pushing in these huge pallets of boxes until I slip and fall under them.

Now again, it’s not too hard to figure out what that is about. The boxes are this rude woman who insisted on shoving herself into the subway despite it already being past capacity. Many of us couldn’t breathe it was so tight and we were screaming at her to at least let us out but she was calling us all idiots and refused to move out of the doorway saying she had a right to get in and get home. It was awful and at the next stop when the doors open she still wouldn’t move and a good number of us finally pushed her to the side so we could get out and breathe again.

Anxiety dreams.

My anxiety levels are high. When I woke up Friday I had scratches up and down my arm. This is also something I used to do in my sleep. There are just a few, I’ve only counted four so far, but they are there and will be for a bit. Granted, I’m not at my highest levels, but I do feel the change. Which is a start, I’m listening to my self and my self is agitated and unsure. It’s a bit confused and processing a lot of information. The “I’m safe” thing hasn’t kicked in because it looks like a war zone outside – there are officials walking around with gas masks and barricades and the streets are all torn up.

What I need to do is focus. Take some time this weekend and go for a long walk to calm down and just breathe deep. I need to at least take control of the eating and start back on a healthy diet as I was before. I notice the difference. When I start getting agitated and sleepless the first thing I reach for is the caffeine to wake me up in the morning and it only increases and intensifies the jumpiness, yet I do it. Unfortunately, I have so much to do (teach as well as my own homework) that I don’t know if it’s possible to relax for a few more weeks.

Saturday and I’m still on edge. It doesn’t help that there is construction outside and I can’t concentrate. I forgot some students names in class, even after I just did roll call. Ugh.