New Project & Old Whineyness

I looked back through my old posts to see if I'd written about what's on my mind recently enough that I shouldn't write about it again, and I couldn't find anything, so I'm going to go for it.

I've been in a serious funk lately, and I'm not sure why.  Post-Christmas crap, lovely Ohio weather, difficult children, drug side effects -- you name it, I probably am dealing with it.  What's hard for me is not to just throw my hands up and let myself slide down that slippery slope from feeling "funky" to being all-out depressed.

Because, let's face it, everyone has bad days, right? Even bad weeks.  Hell, bad months.  That doesn't mean they're on some sort of collision course with full-on depression.  It just means life isn't all that easy at the moment.  I have to try to remember that even though today may be a crappy day, tomorrow doesn't have to be. 

It's just that -- and this sounds really negative, but it's true -- for people suffering with mood disorders, I think if today is a crappy day, it may be a little more likely that tomorrow will be one, too, or maybe even crappier.  I'm honestly not sure how I'm supposed to tell the difference between a legitimately disintegrating mood and a bad day. It seems like, in the past, I've gotten stuck with my pants down, so to speak; I've thought that maybe I was just in a funk for a while, then all of a sudden I realize that my mood, usually depression, has gotten pretty far out of hand -- and that has meant, at least recently, hello hospital.  I would like to avoid that at all costs, since my one goal for 2012 was to stay out of the hospital.

So, in an attempt to keep my mood under control, I've started working on a few projects that may help.  For one, I've started to run again.  Okay, I've started to jog.  Okay, I've started to shuffle.  I am the world's slowest, ugliest, sweatiest, floppiest runner, but luckily we have a treadmill, so nobody really has to see me. 

I've also decided to try some craftherapy.  I got the bright idea to try to build a dollhouse with my girls.  I've been reading a lot about recycled crafts, so I've been wanting to try some different projects, and a dollhouse seemed like a good idea -- especially since we have a ton of old moving boxes just sitting in the basement crying out to be re-purposed.  And of course I have my knitting projects I started working on this weekend that I talked about yesterday, so those should keep me busy.   

Here's to hoping my different coping mechanisms will help my mood stay above the "danger" line...and if they don't, maybe my last ECT treatment tomorrow will.

A different form of craft therapy

I have decided I am going to create a new word: "craftherapy." There, I did it. M-W.com, suck it.

Anyway, I see knitting as part of therapy, hence the whole name and concept of this blog. But knitting isn't the only form of creative therapy I engage in. In fact, I'm kind of weird, in that when it's hot outside (as it has been this summer), I don't really want to knit. I guess if I moved to Florida I'd never knit. But that won't happen, so whatever.

My point is, there are lots of other ways to be creative and focus on mindfulness and healing at the same time. I found a great book this spring called Art Journals and Creative Healing, which is wonderful for anyone who likes to draw or journal or scrapbook. And, less intense, there is the Zentangle series of books, which the authors call "Yoga for your brain." The Zentangle stuff is kind of like glorified doodling, but, if you're like me, doodling is a great outlet, because you can lose yourself in a drawing, without the added stress of having your drawing look like "something."

I'd love to compile a longer list of books or workbooks that are good for craftherapy (there! I used it in a sentence! It's really a word now!), so look for more suggestions later.

By the way: if you do a Google image search for "crafts," some seriously weird stuff comes up.