Hi @BPDSurvivor @Former-Member @BlueBay @HenryX @Shaz51 @Daisydreamer @Former-Member @cloudcore and everyone here. I hope you are going well.
Today is the end of Melbourne being in lockdown but I'm not out with the rest of the city celebrating as I've got uni assessments to do and other things like knitting! Below is the beanie I finished earlier today that I was working on for charity to help me deal with the end of lockdown last night.
Time to go and eat some lunch before tackling the uni assessment that I've been putting off!
Enjoy the rest of your Friday forumites!
Judi9877😎🧶💐
@Judi9877 I'm really impressed with the all knitting you manage to get through, I'd be lucky to finish a square in two nights! Loving the colours in this one too.
How are you feeling about lockdown being over? I know some are really excited whilst others can feel uncertain.
Hope it's a productive afternoon for you with your assignment 
Good evening @BPDSurvivor @BlueBay @HenryX @Former-Member @Shaz51 @Daisydreamer and all forumite friends here. Just popping in to see how things are going and how you are each handling life as we know it.
@BlueBay @BPDSurvivor I read that you're each struggling with life post lockdown in Melbourne and whilst that's not great to hear, I'm admitting right now that I'm over the whole 'let's party since lockdown is over ' thing here in Melbourne. I'm yet to venture out of my house and although that's tomorrow for some food items, I'm actually feeling nervous and slightly anxious about it. I had my psychologist appointment session today and he said that I've got to treat the experience of getting to relike shopping as a science or psychology experiment whereby the hardest thing will actually be driving to the shopping centre and walking in knowing I can shop without restrictions and the rest should be easy. To be honest, I used to love going shopping for clothes and stuff for the fun of it when I was younger and didn't take much notice of how much time or money I spent but now, I'm like let's get the items I need and get out of there so I can spend the time at home or when it's open, at the library, doing things that don't involve money and where I can relax and do my own thing without crowds and people being noisy and so on. To be honest, the best thing about this lockdown episode for me has been having the shops shut or limited so I have to be creative with what I do with my time and work out what's really necessary to live and survive, with click and collect although not ideal, being manageable for me. Yes, certainly I agree that click and collect doesn't work 100% of the time for things like clothes and electronics and books to be honest which I'm finding myself wanting to buy since I can't get all my favourite authors books at the library but it has worked some of the time so that's a good thing. Being anxious and stressed about the virus and people affected by the virus in terms of numbers is also distressing for me and has cost me a trip to get mental health treatment in hospital due to psychosis so that also hasn't been fun at all for me either as I didn't expect it to happen and am still dealing with the ramifications of my own expectations of wanting to get better sooner rather than later which is causing me issues but I'm dealing with it with the help of my psychologist who has told me to ease back into life slowly as I've had a major mental health issue and I need to slow down in order to get back to being where I was before the episode. No, I'm not liking taking it easy and being told what to do but I'll do anything to stay out of hospital and to have a full relapse once again with my current relapses being small yet manageable in the community rather than hospital thank goodness!
@Former-Member @yes, you're correct in saying that we can't avoid the whole reopening thing altogether and that we have to accept that anxiety is part of the reality of the situation. The main thing I can suggest is to take it easy and only do the things you can safely handle like checking in to shops and keeping an eye on hotspots and so on whilst still living your life the best you can in the situation we are currently living under.
Okay! Rant over! Onto other great stuff like the fact that after my psychologist appointment today, which I felt flat and depressed over personally which was my state of mind during the session, I learnt something about myself which was that I can't expect my psychologist to make me feel happy when I'm not happy myself. A simple phone session isn't going to change my mood and that the only person who can do that is me and me alone. Yes, he can help me and give me advice on what to do but in the end, I have to actually do those things to improve me and my situation (my depressed mood) which is what happened this afternoon to me. I did enjoy the session but struggled to come up with the positive things in my life which I saw as being problematic for both me and him that he wanted to hear from me, due to my depressed mood. Anyway, after the session, I decided to try and work on my Mental Health Recovery Blanket and get the next section partly completed as we had been talking about it today and how impressed he was with it (my psychologist) and chose to listen to some music on my iPhone as well to help with my mood. Think music like Sophie Ellis-Bextor, Bon Jovi, The Corrs and Delta Goodrem with Daniel Powters song 'Bad Day' in the mix for great pleasure. Listening to those artists really picked up my mood and helped me come to my happiness realisation theory of mine so that was an added advantage to the rest of the afternoon for me. I later completed the section of ths blanket I wanted to complete (the section that looks like a ladder or steps, depending on your perspective) and sewed it up tonight which made me feel really good about myself and helped my mood go from being depressed to being happy and positive which I liked feeling. It was also good sign that I was able to work through my mood issue without calling for help and noticing that I'm responsible for how I think, feel and act and that I can't expect others to make me feel happy because I want them to. See below for the photo of my Mental Health Recovery Blanket. I hope you like it!
Thanks for reading this long winded post! I also apologise for being so self centered as I certainly didn't plan for the post to be that way initially.
Take care and I look forward to reading more posts soon!
Judi9877😎💐🍀
Hi there @BPDSurvivor @BlueBay @HenryX @Former-Member @Shaz51 @Daisydreamer and all BPD forumites here! Just thought I'd check in to see how things are going for each of you here in forumland☺️!
Tonight, I did a good thing for myself and my mental health which was to start a new blanket focusing on self care especially for me. I'm still going to work on my Mental Health Recovery Blanket but decided to take some time out tonight and use some yarn I'd been saving up for a special project which never seemed to eventuate until tonight when I had a creativity burst and decided to cast on a square in some yarn and title it my Self Care Squares Blanket whereby I'll knit squares in the yarn I've been saving and make another special blanket just for me, knowing that each square will be time spent on self care. See below for the first square I knitted tonight.
I found the knitting of this square to be very relaxing and I was calm knitting it without my emotions causing me any issues. I was able to focus purely on the square and the enjoyment of just knitting knowing that I was making something just for me out of special yarn that I now had a use for which made me feel happy and special at the same time. I plan on knitting more of these squares when I allow myself some self care time on a regular basis.
Take care and stay safe forumites!
Judi9877😎💐
Help us push aside the stigma and discrimination surrounding complex mental health and change the way people talk about, and care for, mental illness.
SANE acknowledges the Traditional Owners of Country throughout Australia and recognises the continuing connection to lands, waters and communities. We pay our respect to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures; and to Elders past and present.
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Help us push aside the stigma and discrimination surrounding complex mental health and change the way people talk about, and care for, mental illness.
SANE acknowledges the Traditional Owners of Country throughout Australia and recognises the continuing connection to lands, waters and communities. We pay our respect to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures; and to Elders past and present.
SANE values diversity. We are committed to providing a safe, culturally appropriate, and inclusive service for all people, regardless of their ethnicity, faith, disability, sexuality, or gender identity.