[Dear Diary...]

I wrote 3000 words last night. What a relief. I felt like my writers voice returned and I enjoyed it. This was also the first week I didn't need my glasses in months. I've been using my computers and phone way less and I think it's helping headache issues. I've been cooking and cleaning and doing house projects. 

I feel like I want to write every day but I still get anxiety that it's not relaxing and mostly work. 

Creative hobbies are exhilarating for me but exhausting. I still love my couch time. 

[Dear Diary...]

Good week so far. Got some utility updates in my house Tuesday and Wednesday and my heating and cooling is now more efficient. 

I've been sorting legos and drawing a bit again. I was thinking of finishing an animation I was working on last winter. 

I haven't written much but I plan to tomorrow. 

[Ari's Recovery Journey]

7 hours ago, GrainSiloEnthusiast said:

Yes there is a free component and it's really good actually! There's no popup ads or anything either which is really nice. I think it just limits how far you can progress each day which is fine by me I'm busy AF lol! I haven't actually hit any paywalls yet idk what premium even gives you!

Ok that's great to know. I found a few apps for other hobbies or calorie counting and in the middle of using them I'd receive a pop up ad for... video games...lol. not helpful at all. 

[Ari's Recovery Journey]

13 hours ago, GrainSiloEnthusiast said:

I've been trying Rosetta Stone, and so far I like it! It uses the immersion method too, but there's more of a focus on realistic sentences and grammar than with Duolingo. I think I will actually use both together, because I like the Duolingo aleph-bet lessons. I will only pay for one or the other though, if I decide to pay for either of them.

Do you need to pay for Rosetta stone? Or is there a free component?

[Dear Diary...]

I did a lot of exercise this weekend and I did it in a fun way. I bought laser tag on Amazon and had family visit. We ran around my yard playing it and I haven't sweat like that since I did boxing. I've also done yoga 3 times this week. I'm feeling really happy about this and plan on keeping it up. Been good for my mood. 

 

I've been building with legos recently and that's been very therapeutic. It provides the same feeling of being busy and productive without thinking. Similar to TV or gaming, but without the addictive component. 

[Dear Diary...]

This might have been my most productive week at work in years. I felt really good and got lots of compliments from my peers. I also enjoyed what I was doing. It just felt nice. I haven't been able to write or read much, but I'll try and do some today and this weekend. I also got a new weight loss app called FatSecret to help track calories. I was kind of annoyed with MyFitnessPal.

[Ikar's Diary]

3 hours ago, Ikar said:

This forum has many long-timers with a "can do" attitude. For example @BooksandTrees used to write walls of text full of anger and rage and now he doesn't! @GrainSiloEnthusiast decided to make her situation better by improving her financial literacy. There are many other people and stories around the website, but I picked them out as examples to prove that the "can do" attitude works.

Thanks for the recognition. I think therapy and anger management really helped me with this. I was just determined to change as a person and feel lighter, happier, and more determined as a result. I want to be a better person and I think it makes a difference. 

[Ikar's Diary]

Happy birthday!!

[Dear Diary...]

I had a much better week this week. I'd say 4 out of 5 days I was operating over 100% efficiency at work lol. Got a lot done and got a lot of praise from my managers and coworkers who are working for me on a few projects.

I also had some very productive conversations with my wife about a few things we've been discussing and came to some great solutions. 

I also did more cleaning this week and more hobbies in general like fixing furniture and re-finishing them with better stain etc. Less TV and screen time in general. I haven't written this week yet, but I organized a writing group with 3 friends tomorrow and we're gonna write for a while. I'm excited for that.

[Dear Diary...]

On 7/29/2023 at 9:04 PM, Amphibian220 said:

Robert Glover writes a great deal in the later chapters of the book about solving problems in intimacy.

He advised one of his patients to go on a 6 month moratorium. This moratorium coupled with a very healthy environment rebuilt the patient’s health to maximum potential.

Moratorium means totally diverting attention away from intimacy (even not thinking about it) to many other things. In fact being involved with an exciting sport, totally expends all energy in the right kind of way and facilitates the moratorium.

I see that men are supposed to give short attention to intimacy to stay healthy, but tv and internet create harmful habits.

I'll take a look into this. Thank you.

[Dear Diary...]

On 7/25/2023 at 4:18 AM, Ikar said:

@Amphibian220 makes a good point about some healthy level of stress. It can definitely affect your sleep and sex drive. Definitely a good idea to check in with a doctor if it goes on for too long as @Cam Adair mentioned.

To that I'd add that I, too, have a naturally beautiful, empathetic and smart girlfriend to whom I'm very attracted to. All of my friends say we click really well. However I think that sex drive is different at the first stages of the relationship and the later stages. If you are committed for the (healthy) long-term, sex just becomes something you do regularly and it's hard to be regularly super excited about something you do regularly 😄

I'll see what the doctor says, but I think it's mostly stress and I think you raise a great point about how the impulse wanes over the duration of a relationship because you crave love more than lust I think over time.

[Dear Diary...]

On 7/24/2023 at 7:38 PM, Amphibian220 said:

 

I want to say something, if you quit video games, you may have not quit the games completely.

I was a fan of boxing matches throughout my youth and visited boxing tournaments. There is such a thing that the commentators call “forcing your fight on the opponent”. This is when the opponent is put into a   disadvantageous position when he is going to have his ups and downs, but on the whole it is a lost fight for him. If he doesn’t find that thread, or trick how to transition the fight to a different kind, his opponent will dominate.

One athlete also said that your body sort of knows what you are going to put it through, and prepares in advance to eliminate any chance of growth. This is when the athlete hits a plateau and cannot rise above a certain level. To get rid of that athletes put their bodies in shock (ofcourse they have to be sure not to cause themselves permanent health problems)

Now on to your post, the stress mounted over time. Could it have been because you haven’t reacted early by changing things around or that changes have been too small?

This is me thinking out loud to try and steer you more towards analysis, although you may already have figured this out.  how long has it been since your last vacation Matt? 

Thanks. I think it's been two different timelines. I think it's a long timeline where so many big changes have happened in the past 4 years, but there are smaller timelines that I'll say go from month to month or even week to week. I think my long timeline is going a lot better and stabilizing, but the month to month ones are still a little hectic at times. Compare it to velocity and acceleration. Overall, the velocity is a comfortable pace, but at the moment, acceleration is all over.

[Dear Diary...]

6 hours ago, Cam Adair said:

Definitely get your testosterone tested - there are 3 levels you want to look at. When you get your results, look it up online. Your doctor might tell you that you're within the averages but the averages have been being lowered over the years as testosterone levels have been lowering overall. Just something to look into more. You can also get your iron and thyroid checked - one of those can be impacting your fatigue and sex drive. I've been on a similar journey. Godspeed!

Thank you. It's been really odd. I just have to force the feeling of wanting sex sometimes. It's tough because I'm extremely attracted to my wife and love her tremendously. So it can be frustrating when my drive is low. I think low drive could be why i preferred slow games.

[Dear Diary...]

I've been very stressed lately. Work has been pretty exhausting and I'm at a point where I'm afraid to log in sometimes and work on this one specific project that is very hard. I'm stressed because I'm designing 3 things that I've never done before and it's tough making sure you've covered your bases and have all the correct information. So I'm just kind of making sure I have everything I need. The math itself isn't stressful. It's just the process. I also can't seem to make a lot of progress because I have people always asking me questions. I'm going to set up fake meetings I think for an hour or two just to get a good block of time on these.

I'm tired in general and haven't been sleeping great. I switched my pillow because I noticed my neck was hurting when I woke up. I've gotten much better sleep ever since the switch.

I wrote another chapter of my book and I did some exercise outside on Saturday. It felt nice. 

I've found my sex drive to be very low. I'm not interested in it that much and I am extremely tired/bored of porn and my usage of it has dwindled considerably. I sometimes wonder if I have lowered testosterone levels or something recently. I have a doctor appointment next week for a physical so I'll ask about it then.

[Dear Diary...]

All of the events from family get togethers and new work responsibilities have been a bit exhausting mentally. I work on dealing with my anger and frustration in a constructive way but sometimes I don't have enough time to do it.

I finally had to tell people that I need a few minutes alone to decompress and defragment my mind a bit so I'm not holding on to so much data. They handled it well and I'm seeing the results. It's nice. 

Haven't been productive with hobbies but we've done a lot of house projects so that's nice. 

[How to Deal with Cravings]

On 7/9/2023 at 8:27 PM, Shonnasen The Light said:

Oh, I had the same thing. I was so tried from the effort when starting the new habit of deep thinking. Thinking carefully before doing anything I might regret later. things like playing again. 

I still keep trying everyday. I try to take naps when I can, too. And relaxing breaks.

So how is it going for you ? 

Sorry for the delay. I haven't had much time to write recently.

Things are good. Currently going through this process now about cravings just because I'm dealing with new emotions and situations socially and at work. So I'm a little exhausted from all the introspection but I'm feeling better overall and trying to prioritize naps, yoga, and hygiene to calm my mind a bit. 

[Dear Diary...]

I think I'm learning to deal with anger pretty well. Someone in her family really upset me a few times, honestly everytime I go to their vacation home. I've usually stress eaten and gotten upset but this time I'm not. 

I just stand my ground and eat normally. No game cravings or porn. I'm just isolating a bit, talking with my wife, deep breathing, and listening to music. 

[Dear Diary...]

It's been an up and down few days but better overall. We went to my wife's family house for almost a week. It started off bad like the one I mentioned a couple months ago but we had some very fair and impactful conversations that first night and it changed things. 

We both saw how each other was feeling from their perspective and met in the middle. The rest of the trip went well. 

I also wrote another chapter of my book and met with my writing coach. I'm on vacation this week so I'd like to get another chapter written, but I won't put too much pressure on myself because I need to rest and recover as well. 

I've been doing a much better job of eating only when I'm hungry and doing the HALTED acronym for when I stress eat. It's nice because the first letter is hungry and I can rule that out immediately. 

[How to Deal with Cravings]

On 6/30/2023 at 11:16 PM, Shonnasen The Light said:

That sounds like serious effort, but I bet it's worth it.

It's very overwhelming for the first few weeks because you're trying to logically analyze and diagnose why you're being illogical and emotionally off. So it's very difficult and exhausting. I had to take a lot of naps during this phase of my recovery to be honest. 

[How to Deal with Cravings]

On 6/21/2023 at 9:56 AM, Shonnasen The Light said:

What you (BooksandTrees) mean is  - when there is craving, pause, do some analysis, figure out which thing (1 or several from the HALTE) caused it, then, act to change it. Am I understanding this right ? 

Correct. 

[Dear Diary...]

This week was pretty exhausting emotionally. I'm very tired today. I'm not used to being part of a family that is always communicating. My family wasn't close growing up and I stopped talking to most. I grew up in solitude unless I chose to socialize. Right now there's a lot of socializing with my wife's family. They're very nice people and nothing bad is happening. I'm just not used to it so I can be overwhelmed easily. 

We've had good discussions about allowing me some quiet time and space because I'm not used to it. She's been great communicating with me. I think it's just gonna take me some time to adjust. 

I've also lost a few pounds so that is uplifting. Work is good and I'm gonna try writing this weekend. 

I've been drawing a bit too.

[Dear Diary...]

I wrote 2 more chapters of my book and feel very motivated and restored overall. I'm happy about that. Hoping to keep it going. Allergies have made me pretty tired of late and house projects are progressing. 

[Dear Diary...]

14 hours ago, Ikar said:

I have a story to share regarding forcing positive thoughts/toxic positivity:

Almost three years ago, I met a guy who was on his way to becoming a financial advisor. He got me to join his gig with him and I was a part of his team for a while. I eventually quit, because the job required me to do too many things I didn't like or cared about.

I believe a part of me quitting was his toxic positivity. This guy was just always happy to start a new project, excited to do phone calls, attend another team-building etc. During one of the longer travels we had together, I told him he's like the Terminator.

I don't think he asked me to elaborate or maybe he even took it as a compliment. The reason why I said that was because he never had a problem. He never complained. Because of that, I never really believed him. He just seemed too perfect to be real and that's why I never connected with him as a person. I spent quite some time with him, but I never got to know him because of his facade.

I believe he is successful now and quite well off. He's also a very potent meme in my closest circle of friends, because they know him too, as he makes effort to make himself visible in the region.

My decision to stop working with him also saved me thousands or even millions down the road that'd have gone into his pockets or banks offering inefficient financial services. The awareness of cheap and effective investment vehicles is miserable in Czechia, even though they are available. I wish we had an IRA or 401(k) like you do in the US, although thankfully at least some domestic competition to big banks has sprung up recently. That's why I am working on setting up my financial blog, although I'm struggling with allocating time to this project 😞 

100% on having more responsibility as we get older. It's crucial to be able to say "yes" to yourself and "no" to others, and to mean it, if need be.

It's very exhausting being positive when it's not natural. I think people mistake positivity for just being neutral and not being negative. Like you can just do your job, get it done, and still receive positive results without going into it with a fake wave of enthusiasm. It's more draining than being around a negative person because at least that person is being honest lol.

[Ikar's Diary]

17 hours ago, Ikar said:

. I used the inter-dental toothbrush for the first time after a long time yesterday, so that's also something 😄

Hygiene is so important, especially in recovery. 

[Dear Diary...]

Had a really good meeting with my writing coach. My book is coming along well. I'm very burnt out otherwise but I've been trying my best to do at least one or two cleaning chores a day and getting at least half a strong work day in instead of losing the whole day to ruminating. 

It's tough when I'm in a depressed episode like this, but I think staying neutral and not forcing positive thoughts is helping. I'm just doing one little thing here or there until something starts rolling and I notice I'm productive for longer than 10 minutes. 

I've started declining a lot of needless family and friend events. I think people need to understand as we get older, our social circle changes. People with families branch off and going to random friends 1 year old kid birthdays Isn't achievable by most, nor is it worth their time. The older we get, the more commitments and responsibilities we have and is important that we set time aside for mental and physical restoration to counteract the stress from these added commitments. 

If not, we may find ourselves finding quick fixes to cope with added stress... gaming, porn, drugs, alcohol, sleep, social media and YouTube apps, TV, etc. 

Disconnect is healthy and important. You don't have to go camping in the woods, but you do have to take a few minutes here and there to do nothing, accept boredom, and process your day, every day.