Spotlight on Stigma... Welcomed but Not Accepted

It's 2:26am. I have fallen asleep twice tonight but woke up within 30 minutes each time. I don't know what I can do to get to sleep. I... am... exhausted... ...but I just can't sleep.  I know at least some of the factors that are keeping me from sleeping.  I have a pretty severe case of RLS (Restless Legs Syndrome). This is why I'm not in bed at least trying to sleep. The creepy-crawly feeling in my legs and the almost constant kicking drive me crazy. If I'm up doing something, it's not quite as bad. So I decided it would be a good time to do some cleaning and work at my desk. I have several auto-immune disorders and a storm front is coming in. The change of barometric pressure seems to always cause a flare-up. For me, a flare-up causes increased pain (more than my normal), increased dryness in my eyes and mouth/throat, and I've just started suspecting it's why the RLS is worse at some times and not at others. I'm also hypomanic right now. I have sev

It's been close to two weeks since I first met with my new therapist. The last blog I wrote was about her insight that I had become too enmeshed with my various disorders/conditions/issues.  I've been pondering this idea a lot this week. One of the big changes I've made was to revise what I record each day in my journal.  Over the past year or so I've been producing my own guided journal. At first, I made up a word document and printed it out for the month, writing in it both morning and evening. Some examples of points I recorded each day were: Thoughts about a Daily Meditation... Focus for Today... Today I Feel... One Thing I Really Want to Get Done Today... Excited about Anything?  The Hardest Part of Today... Plans for Tomorrow... Each month I would decide what worked and what didn't. I would add things I decided I wanted to focus on (like one topic became: One Time I Laughed Out Loud about Anything because I was trying to focus on noticing good things that happ

"You are more than your addictions, health challenges, and mental health issues." This is something that my new therapist emphasized with me at the end of our first session together. At first, I was defensive when thinking about it. Not to excuse what I've been doing but in order of explanation, when, within the span of fewer than five years... ...you figure out that you are an addict ... and then recognize that you have addictions in two areas, not just the one already recognized; ... you are diagnosed with several new physical health conditions, not just those you've been dealing with your entire life; ... you realize that you have bipolar type 2. .. and then learn that you have a few more mental health conditions, not just those you've been dealing with your whole life, ... it's difficult not to focus on these things . Any one of those three aforementioned areas would be hard for anyone to deal with in that time span.  Having to learn and navigate what all

When you have multiple physical and mental health issues, new symptoms pop up all the time (or old symptoms come back into play). When you have an anxiety disorder and those symptoms show up, it's less than exciting, as the big dogs - cancer, heart attack, and major organ failures - are the first thoughts. The latest was a pain in my ribs, mostly in my right side. I've had this pain for a long time, off and on. During the time I've had this pain, I had my gallbladder taken out (as it's in that area) and I was diagnosed with diverticulitis after an ER visit when the pain became extreme.  However, my gallbladder has been gone for several years now and I'm not showing the other symptoms of diverticulitis. I have researched it over and over throughout the years I've experienced this pain.  Last night it was acting up and I decided to research it again in order to calm my fears that it might be something serious. After reading all the same information I had read the