do not be self-defeatist

Sunday night came and went with far too little trouble.  No panic attack, no depressive bout.  I'm sure the beer helped.

I spent the weekend buying new Office software, backing up my home desktop computer in order to reformat to Windows 7 in order to be able to use said software, and furiously putting together 3 presentations.  I practiced one of them so many times on Sunday that my tongue gave out on me.  And then I decided to take a break.  With beer.

This morning, I am paying for the beer (2 bottles, btw) -- and probably the relaxation as well -- with unrelenting morning nausea and dizziness.  How I made the bike ride to work is a mystery.  How I will make it home later is an even greater mystery.

But in this physical unpleasantness, being thankful that all the undergrads are taking midterms this week and are not all up in my grill, I am making an honest effort to not be self-defeatist.  A subtle metaphor to my weekend, it is somewhat like reformatting my default mode and replacing it with a new operating system.

My week is not doomed from the start, my anxiety is unfounded, and the academic world will not decide Wednesday afternoon that I am not fit for a PhD. The worst thing that can possibly happen is that I'll run 2 min over.  Do not be self-defeatist, do not be self-defeatist, do not be self-defeatist.

barely hanging on

Mondays are supposed to be my easy days.  They are the only days where I do not have to teach, take a class, attend a seminar or schlep back and forth between the main and medical campuses multiple times.    Mondays are supposed to by my get-your-shit-together days.  I haven't had a good Monday since December.

The impetus of everything I am doing for this degree is that I love --generally speaking -- science itself. And I love that I have the freedom and opportunity to dance with it.  This term particularly, I am severely lacking in that love.  All I want to do is sleep.  Because I don't sleep.  I don't do yoga anymore.  I barely eat and when I do it is desperately and not healthily.  I don't relax... ever.  I am so deeply freaked out by the awesomeness of my commitments this term that I am, in fact, barely functioning.  When I finally do fall asleep, it is not for long, and when I am forced to get out of bed in the morning -- get ready for this one -- my ambitions for the day are drowned out by the abounding excuses to stay in bed.  Y'all.  This is a phenomenon generally unfathomable to the Ragamuffin.  It's like my body is trying to speak to me... I can almost make it out... "you have an autoimmune disease... yooooou jackaaaaass...!"

Today, I hate everything and everyone and am even pissed off at my boss for no particular reason.  I am pissed off at my brain and its lack of cooperation with my demands.  I am pissed off at my demands for being so unreasonable.  I am pissed off at 2 of my 3 undergrads for aspiring to nothing despite my most fervent efforts to make them love and commit to what they are doing under my supervision (so much so that I may have to "let them go"... seriously.  I have never encountered this situation in my 5 years of mentoring 14 undergrads...).  I am pissed off at my lack of creativity, and at my not being a good enough teacher or student.

My body hurts, my brain hurts, my heart hurts.

I want to go to sleep.