Tag Archives: Friends

Weekly Plans

Posted on by Gertie

Sunday

  • Walk
  • Mindfulness Meditation practice via the Calm App
  • Work
  • Read a book about Tarot and Tarot Cards
  • Do an art or craft project
  • Cuddle time with my cat Billie (like I do every chance I get)

Monday

  • Walk
  • Mindfulness Medication practice with the Calm Ap
  • Dermatology appointment
  • Mammogram appointment
  • Follow up appointment with regular doctor after self harm act last Wednesday that included an emergency room visit.
  • Dinner with a friend
  • An art or craft project
  • Cuddle time with my cat, Billie (like I do every chance I can get)

Tuesday

  • Walk
  • Mindfulness Meditation practice with the Calm App
  • Work
  • Read a book about Tarot and Tarot Cards
  • An art or craft project
  • Cuddle time with my cat, Billie (like I do every chance I am able to get)

Wednesday

  • Walk
  • Mindfulness Meditation with the Calm App
  • Work
  • Read a book on Tarot and Tarot Cards
  • An art or craft project
  • Cuddle with my cat, Billie (like I do every chance I can get)

Thursday

  • Walk
  • Mindfulness Meditation practice with the Calm App
  • Work
  • Read a book on Tarot and Tarot Cards
  • An art or craft project
  • Cuddle time with my cat, Billie (like I do every chance I can get)

Friday

  • Walk
  • Mindfulness Meditation practice with the Calm App
  • Chores (specifically cleaning my apartment with the help from someone my apartment management referred me to and it is free help)
  • Read a book about Tarot and Tarot Cards
  • Dinner with a friend
  • An art or craft project
  • Cuddle time with my cat, Billie (like I do every chance I can get)

Saturday

  • Walk
  • Mindfulness Meditation practice with the Calm App.
  • Go to the U-District farmers market with a friend and have a wonderful breakfast sandwich from a local vendor.
  • Do an art or craft project
  • Read a book on Tarot and Tarot Cards
  • Dinner with a friend
  • Cuddle with my cat, Billie (like I do every chance I get)

Too Tired to Sleep & It’s Only 1:49pm Seattle Time

Posted on by Gertie

Good Afternoon, World. I haven’t had the best sleep most of last night and all day today. Despite how I attempted to sleep last night for a good night of sleep as well as getting a good nap today, I was unable to do so. It sucks shit that I am so sleepy especially when I am trying to do various things to relax enough to get some sort of sleep.

One of the things that I had done on several occasions is doing mindfulness meditation practices which helps a great deal especially when I am so tired as well as being so anxious. I am so grateful for mindfulness meditation through the Calm App.

Something else I did was going to go to the Farmers Market in my neighborhood. In fact I took a friend with me to hang out with this friend. I wanted to treat her to an awesome food known as a breakfast sandwich. She agrees it’s the best breakfast sandwich she has ever had. Even though I go to this farmers market every Saturday, my friend and I are going to attend together twice a month.

After parting ways with my friend from the farmers market, I came home to spend time with my cat, Billie asI am listening to music. Specifically, I am listening to my Childhood Playlist music on Spotify. In fact it is over 16 hours long and close to 175 songs.

Speaking of music I am planning on listening to music as I do some arts and crafts. I plan on doing some art work via coloring. Coloring helps me keep myself grounded. The crafts I am planning on doing is cross stitching. That is if my cat Billie doesn’t want to play with the string. I am also going to attempt to teach myself how to Latch Hook. I am doing my best to teach myself to teach myself to Latch Hook but I am finding somewhat interesting and relaxing.

Due to the lack of sleep, everything I have been doing today has been helping with the PTSD shit although it still pretty bad due to the lack of sleep.

I do not not have much more to say in the particular blog post. I do want to thank you for reading my blog. It is greatly appreciated from my end of my things that you the reader, read my blog. If it was not for you not reading my blog, I would not be writing my blog. Again, thank you from the bottom of my heart for reading my blog. Peace Out, World!!!

Too Early To Be Awaken on My Weekend

Posted on by Gertie

Good Morning, World!!! As I start this particular post it is exactly 3:45 in the blasted morning on a Friday morning in Seattle. A Friday that is considered my weekend as Friday’s and Saturdays are my weekend. It is too early to be up this early during my weekend and it sucks shit. I woke up due to the fact of an extreme nightmare that consisted of body memories that make it feel like not just the most recent trauma happened but past traumas happened all at the same time. Having nightmares that include body memories are not the easiest thing to deal with especially so early in the morning.

Sadly, my PTSD symptoms are increasing my depression symptoms. Increased depression means that I have to be more intuned with myself regarding self harm urges as well as making sure that I don’t become suicidal. Thankfully, I am currently not suicidal. Sadly, I do have some self harm urges but at least they are at a manageable level. A level where I can create my own safety plan without the help of others such as friends or my mental health treatment team with the exception of my beloved cat, Billie as Billie helps a great deal with my safety planning.

I think I will start my safety plan with some mindfulness meditation to help me get into a better head space to help me with the rest of my safety plan.

As of right now, I think I will work on some artwork. Specifically, the artwork I will be working on is some coloring. Coloring is a great way to help me relax and focus on something creative that will help me do something more challenging to do when I am currently in the head space that I am currently in especially when I listen to music as I color. Music and coloring appear to be helpful together for me to refocus. So, I am hoping that as I color and listen to music with my cat laying by my side I can get into the mindset of reading a novel I am reading.

The novel I am currently reading is The Sorority Murder by Allison Brennan. So, far it is keeping my attention especially when I am in an okay head space. I highly recommend the book. I am really enjoying this book and encourage you to read the book.

In all honesty I hope I can get back to sleep due to the insomnia that is caused by stupid ass PTSD symptoms and I really hope my safety plan will help with me falling back to sleep. At least I know my cat is quite helpful with helping me sleep.

I do not have much more to discuss in this particular blog post. I do want to thank you for reading my blog as if it was not for you my reader, reading my blog, I would not be writing my blog. It is greatly appreciated from my end of things that you read my blog. Again, thank you from the bottom of my heart for reading my blog. I hope everyone has a good Friday ahead of them. Peace Out, World.

Weekly Plans

Posted on by Gertie

Sunday

  • Walk
  • Mindfulness Meditation
  • Work
  • Dinner with neighbors
  • Art (Color)
  • Spend time with my cat, Billie

Monday

  • Walk
  • Mindfulness Meditation
  • Art (color)
  • Work
  • Spend time with my cat Billie

Tuesday

  • Walk
  • Mindfulness Meditation
  • Work
  • Art (color)
  • Spend time with my cat, Billie

Wednesday

  • Walk
  • Mindfulness Meditation
  • Peer Pathways Conference
  • Art (color)
  • Spend time with my cat, Billie

Thursday

  • Walk
  • Mindfulness Meditation
  • Peer Pathways Confernce
  • Dinner with my grandpa to celebrate his birthday
  • Spend time with my cat, Billie
  • Art (color)

Friday

  • Walk
  • Mindfulness Meditation
  • Lunch with a good friend from high school
  • Appointment with my therapist
  • Appointment with my psychiatric nurse practitioner
  • Art (color)

Saturday

  • Walk
  • Mindfulness Meditation
  • Farmers Market
  • Art (color)

Too Long of a Post about Arts & Crafts

Posted on by Gertie

Good Evening, World!!! I was to work today but sadly, I called in sick as I needed to take a mental health day. I have realized that I haven’t done much self care as it is needed to do in any line of work but especially the mental health field and greatly love my work with a passion.

Much to my surprise my family has been encouraging me to do some self care for myself. I am just shocked as hell that it came from my grandpa. I love my grandpa so much. In fact my dad has been encouraging me for weeks to do some self care which I plan on doing.

Just like my family, my friends have been insisting on me doing self care. I am so thrilled that I have friends that care about me. I have the best friends in the world.

As some of you know, I have Anxiety, Depression and Complex PTSD along with treatment resistant Insomnia. Having insomnia sucks and the lack of sleep makes the symptoms of my other mental health challenges that become more symptomatic.

Due to the lack of sleep, I make sure I do a mindfulness meditation practice to start the day when I get up as well as to end the day before bed time. I highly recommend doing some mindfulness meditation.

Anyway, I want to bring something up that might help me with my mental health and my job. First of reading as I love to read. I highly enjoy reading. I am currently reading The Sorority Murder by Allison Brennan. It is a very intriguing book.

As far as arts and crafts I plan on doing is nothing new especially when it comes to art work, specifically when it comes to coloring. I have also dabbled in painting but I am not very good at. I hope to do more painting and coloring especially since I ordered more coloring pages from Stuff2Color. The coloring stuff I got from Stuff2Color and still have a lot of canvas that I bought a while ago and haven’t done anything about. Now it is just time to by paint and paint brushes.

Now on to the crafts part of arts and crafts.I have ordered some Latch Hook stuff already and have ordered more so I can make them for people and their special day whatever that may be as well as donate to local nonprofits so when they have an auction it will hopefully bring in some money. I know not much money but every penny helps for nonprofits. I do need a lot of practice with a latch hook.

Of course,the other crafting I will be doing is crossing stitching. I did cross stitch back in my twenties and really enjoyed doing it. I am not sure why I stopped but I plan to start back up again. I hope to give people a finished product as well as give to local nonprofits who auction off such stuff during a big fundraiser.

Before I forge a friend of mine who is also a neighbor introduced a thing called Diamond Art. It looks intriguing to do as it seems it can take a while to do as there are so many little pieces. I ordered some and am looking forward to doing this Diamond Art.

Of course when I am doing arts or crafts, I will be listening to music or a podcast. Listening to music or podcasts helps me concentrate on being able to focus the text at hand which is Arts and Crafts.

I do not have more to say in this blog post. I do want to thank you for reading my blog. If it was not for you the reader, reading my blog, I would not be writing my blog. Again, thank from the bottom of my heart for reading my blog. Peace Out, World!!!

Taking a Mental Health Day from Work Tomorrow Wednesday 7/26/23

Posted on by Gertie

Right now I am realizing I am needing to take a mental health day off from work tomorrow Wednesday, July 26th, 23. I feel bad for doing this as I don’t want to put more work on my team however my supervisors and team members understand that taking a mental health day is something that is needed from time to time. I am grateful for my team being so supportive.

I realized I need to take a mental health day when I realized I wasn’t doing my regular self care regiment when my PTSD, Depression and Anxiety starts to act up especially when I don’t make it apart my daily self care or just quit doing it because I start to feel better. I know from experience what I need to do for self care.

I have many things to help me through self care regarding my mental health challenges as well as just everyday life. For one I can cuddle with my beloved cat, Billie. I can always read a book that I am quite enjoying. Another thing I can do is make sure I have food on a regular basis. Of course doing art work by painting, coloring and diamond art. Also I can also do crafting by cross stitching and latch hooking. Listening to music is a great help as well as listening to podcasts. Of course there are my friends I can reach out to and go for walks. Mindfulness Meditation has been a great deal of help to me. My family and friends are of great support. Self care is major in helping yourself so you can be able in staying in recovery.

So I am going to end this particular post for now. I want to thank you for reading my blog. It is greatly appreciated that you the reader, read my blog. It wasn’t for you the reader, reading my blog I would not be writing my blog. Thank you from the bottom of my heart for reading my blog. Peace Out, World!!!

Sunday Funday

Posted on by Gertie

Good Afternoon, World!!! I realize it has been a few weeks since I last blogged and that was a brief post since it was a while before that since I blogged last. I hope that made sense to you. I am going to make more of an effort to blog more. I am not sure how I am going to do that besides scheduling blogging into my day as well going back to Weekly Plans every Sunday morning and Weekly Check-Ins every Saturday evening.

So, today is my work from home day. A day where I finish all my notes from the previous week as well as two phone sessions with clients and calling other clients to remind them of appointment with me or other members of the team I work on. Of course documenting (writing notes) on the clients I talked to today.

Of course, as I worked from home today, I had my cat, Billie sit on my lap or lay next to me. Billie is a great way to remain mindful especially doing dreadful notes so, insurance companies pay my employer. Billie is also a great help to keep me relaxed and mindful when talking to any client when they are discussing stuff that can trigger my symptoms of C-PTSD. I am grateful that Billie helps me mindful.

Speaking of being mindful, I have been doing two mindfulness meditations daily and a third mindfulness when I work. In fact the Calm App has a mindfulness meditation geared for work which I am very appreciative of. I find that daily mindfulness meditations help me not just do my better but helps my mental health symptoms stay more stable and is a form of self care for me.

Another form of self care for me is reading. Reading helps me in two ways depending on what type of book I am reading. Reading can help me learn new things or it can help escape my reality. The book I am reading is The Sorority Murder by Allison Brennan. The book I am currently reading happens to help me escape reality in a good way and not in a bad way like dissociation. Dissociation for me is not a good thing especially when I am in a bad space and thankfully, I am not in a bad space which is why I am reading. Reading helps me quite a bit.

Writing the last paragraph I thought of another thing to blog about when I finish a book. That is to blog a book review of a book I finish. I think that could keep you the reader interested in continuing to read my blog or at least I hope it does.

I do not have much more to discuss in this particular blog post. I do want to thank you for reading my blog. It is greatly appreciated from my end of things that you the reader, read my blog. If it was not for you the reader, reading my blog, I would not be writing my blog. Again, thank you from the bottom of my heart for reading my blog. Peace Out, World!!!

A Challenging few Weeks w/New & Refreshed Lessons Learned Along the Way

Posted on by Gertie

Happy Caturday Saturday. It has been quite a couple of weeks of being challenging for me for various reasons and many of them I have had to deal with some eighth deaths in a matter of a two week period. Some of the folks I have never met but really admired in the animal welfare community especially locally here in the Seattle area who touched the life of many humans and cats. Sadly this person took her own life and wish I would have been given to meet her in person. She will be greatly missed especially in the animal welfare community.

On the continuation of discussing death. I can’t really discuss much about it due to HiPAA law but many of the client I work with overdose on drugs and alcohol. Sadly some pass away to drug and/or alcohol overdoses and It is challenging to deal with. Thankfully I have the support of my colleagues with this especially when people have been trying to get off drugs so they don’t have to have a stigma with an addiction.

Dealing with so many deaths is the last couple of weeks I have been reaching out to my support system such as my friends, family and my colleagues as well as my therapist. I am just beyond grateful that I have supportive people in my life to be there for me. Not many people have a good support system and I have a great support system.

Now on to what I do to help with my self care. One way I do self care is due at least two mindful meditations daily; once in the morning and another one before bed time. I am also trying to put in third mindful mediation in the middle of a work day to help me refocus during work. Another way I have been doing self care is spending time with my cat as well as walking two times a day; once in the morning and once the evening. Of course another self care act is going to volunteer at PAWS Cat City a least once a week. Of course working at my job helps as well. I have been reading a lot of books that I find helpful to help with my recovery journey. I also have been doing some art work and hope to show sometime soon.

As this post comes to an end just know there is always hope along the way. I want to thank you for reading my blog. If it was not for you reading and/or following my blog, I most likely would be continuing to writing my blog. Again thank you from the bottom of my heart for reading my blog. Peace Out World!!!!

Weekly Plans

Posted on by Gertie

Sunday

  • Mindfulness meditation with the Calm App
  • Volunteer with PAWS Cat City
  • Visit Grandpa and do laundry at his place
  • Color

Monday

  • Mindfulness meditation with the Calm App
  • Work
  • Color

Tuesday

  • Mindfulness meditation with the Calm App
  • Work
  • Color

Wednesday

  • Mindfulness meditation with the Calm App
  • Work
  • Color

Thursday

  • Mindfulness meditation with the Calm App
  • Work
  • Color

Friday

  • Mindfulness meditation with the Calm App
  • Work
  • Color
  • Spend much needed time with my cat, Billie

Saturday

  • Mindfulness meditation with the Calm App
  • Color
  • Late lunch/early dinner with friends at Red Robin
  • Read
  • Watch movies

The Holidays are Upon Us

Posted on by Gertie

Happy Hanukkah to those who celebrate Hanukkah. To those who may not be aware, this evening (December 18th) starts the first night of Hanukkah. No, I am not Jewish but I do celebrate it with friends who ask me to. This year I am spending four nights celebrating with friends who have asked me to help with their tradition. The evening of today, December 18th starts Hanukkah and ends the evening of Monday, December 26th.

The Yule are celebrated by Pagans with very many types of traditions. I am not Pagan but this is the holiday I personally prefer to celebrate in my own way. This year Yule starts December 21st and ends January 1st.

The next holiday to be celebrated is Christmas Day which is December 25th. Some in the Christian faith also celebrate it the evening of December 24th. Yes, this is the Christian holiday.

The cool thing I am finding is all three religions will be celebrating the same day which is December 25th. Don’t you all think it is pretty awesome. I know I do. This has me curious so the next time this happens will be in 2024. In the year 2024 I plan to celebrate all three holidays with friends, family and myself.

As far as New Year’s I celebrate that as my own holiday. I spend it with my cat Billie, watching movies and sleeping all day.

I do not have much more to say except I hope there is no snow in Seattle I will tell you more in a later post. Peace Out, World and go celebrate your faith.